Despite Star Wars being one of the most adored franchises in all of pop culture, many Star Wars fans feel let down by EA and its contract with Disney. Although the 10-year contract was signed nearly six years ago, EA has only released three Star Wars games so far, one of which is a mobile game. On top of that, EA's use of microtransactions in Star Wars: Battlefront 2 at launch tainted EA's credibility. However, EA claims it is still fully committed to making Star Wars games.
Following the shocking discovery that EA cancelled its open world Star Wars game, EA wasted no time in providing more information regarding the cancellation. Apparently the game, codenamed "Orca," had too long of a development period, and EA feels it needs to ship games at a faster rate. However, no loss of jobs have been reported, as the developer has simply been given a new project to work on that EA hopes will be ready to ship in 2020.
This cancellation of an open world, large-scale game comes nearly one year after EA shut down Visceral Games, which was developing a single-player Star Wars title at the time. EA cancelled Visceral's title because it was "too linear," and now EA's open world replacement title has been cancelled in favor of a smaller title, which will most likely be single-player linear experience. EA's CFO Blake Jorgenson was quoted as saying, "People don't like [linear titles] as much as they did five years ago or ten years ago."
Although it is only speculation, EA's choice to cancel the "Orca" game in favor of a smaller, quicker project is likely tied to the rumors that Disney may take away EA's rights to Star Wars. While the two companies do have a formal contract in place, Disney has the ability to withdraw from the contract if it feels EA has not delivered on what was promised.
Regardless of how Star Wars fans have reacted to EA's Star Wars: Battlefront, Star Wars: Battlefront 2, and Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes, the general public seems open to EA's newest title releasing this year, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. However, neither Respawn nor EA have revealed much about the game, except that it is releasing in 2019. Nevertheless, EA should tread carefully with Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, as it may very well be its last chance to prove to Disney that it deserves the rights to make Star Wars games.
Source: Variety