E3: Star Wars Battlefront teaser trailer from EA

At last, EA has blessed the Star Wars community with its first proper glimpse of Star Wars Battlefront, sort of.

To open the show for Electronic Arts, the audience was given a behind the scenes look at the early stages of Battlefront’s development over at EA owned DICE in Stockholm. Here are some thoughts on what proved to be a mixed presentation:

What more do we know? Not much.

As exciting as it was to see DICE showcase their development of one of most loved Star Wars games of all time, they didn’t actually tell us much more than we already knew. So many questions have been left unanswered. Is it third or first person? Can you play as a Jedi? Which movies are included, episodes one through six or just the original trilogy?

To be left even more disappointed, there wasn’t even a release date. A small slogan at the end with “see more spring 2015” was painfully unhelpful as EA chief financial officer Blake Jorgensen announced months ago that the game was expected for release in the summer of 2015.

This E3 was widely expected to showcase exactly what Battlefront was going to offer; instead it will leave fans scratching their heads for another 10 months, searching for more clues in the short two minute clip.

Battlefront taking advantage of next gen

Despite the considerable lack of detail of the actual game itself, what we did get to see looked truly stunning. From the snow speeders on Hoth to the speeder bikes on Endor, Battlefront had the detail and accuracy that every fan will no doubt be drooling over for months to come.

Bearing in mind the length of time it’s been since Star Wars Battlefront 2 was released (nearly a decade ago), the look of the game was expected to be considerably upgraded by its new developers, but DICE have clearly gone above and beyond on visual effects, mastering the same sights and sounds that fans can instantly relate to the films.

DICE and EA want the fans back on side

As the clip goes on, what soon becomes apparent is that this presentation wasn’t really about showcasing Star Wars Battlefront.

DICE refer to themselves as an experienced team of ‘fans’ that not only want to stay as true to the films as possible but that they’ve also made the effort to go on location and work with Lucasarts to make a better game. Emotion, love, and passion all get a mention when describing this projects development and this is no accident.

For DICE and EA, this presentation was about reassuring the Star Wars community that their franchise is in good hands. There are so many dedicated Battlefront fans, DICE are trying to prove that they are just as emotionally invested so will do everything not to get it wrong, which some still expect them to do. And who can blame them? The release of Battlefield 4 went horribly wrong with endless bugs plaguing the games launch so there has been plenty of doubt surrounding DICE’s ability to take on such an important project.

The reaction

Positive but mixed. Although there was jubilation on Twitter that Battlefront fans finally had something other than a teaser trailer to watch over and over again, there was also clear frustration with the lack of real information.

EA also made matters worse for themselves when they tweeted this question:

This prompted a mixed response from users, with one asking "What is there to think about? You announce that we'll finally see something in 2015. I'm excited, but it's too early to dwell on."

Conclusions

Despite being left in the dark and forced to do nothing but speculate once again on Star Wars Battlefront, this particular franchise is developing quite a reputation for suspense and surprise, not just in its games division but also for the new set of films. This shouldn’t be discarded as a negative as this tactic seems to keep the interest level high and the conversation going. The hope is that the wait is worthwhile, which so far seems to be looking good.