Now that Star Wars Battlefront has shipped, and with development on Mirror’s Edge Catalyst well underway, DICE are moving their focus to the next Battlefield game, according to a tweet from DICE’s development director.
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Now that we've shipped Battlefront and a part of the team continues to work on it, I am moving on to another project, the next Battlefield..
— Dan Vaderlind (@mrVaderdan) December 11, 2015
Rather than the cops ‘n alligators spin-off that was developed by Visceral, it seem likely this one will be a proper Battlefield sequel – either Battlefield 5 or Bad Company 3. Personally, I’m holding out for the latter. I always preferred the tone of that series to the perpetual somberness of the main entries.
This information coincides with the announcement that EA are opening up an e-sports division, headed up by Peter Moore.
“Today I am excited to announce that Peter Moore is moving into a new role as Executive Vice President and Chief Competition Officer for Electronic Arts, leading our new EA Competitive Gaming Division (CGD),” writes chief exec Andrew Wilson.
“As the latest step in our journey to put our players first, this group will enable global e-ports competitions in our biggest franchises including FIFA, Madden NFL, Battlefield and more.”
It seems like EA have big plans to grow Battlefield as an e-sport.
What this means for the franchise isn’t clear just yet, but I hope it doesn’t detract from the game’s scale – that’s what’s appealing about it, after all. I can’t see Battlefield’s glorious messiness bothering Counter Strike any time soon, but it will be interesting to see what comes from this new division.