It may seem hard to believe, but the world almost missed out on the iconic LEGO Star Wars series, according to TT Games co-founder Tom Stone. In a recent episode of the podcast Bits N' Bricks, the developer revealed the game's storied past and the troubles the company had pitching it to large publishers, before an offer from Eidos managed to salvage the project.
In the ninth episode of the podcast, hosted by Brian Crecente and Ethan Vincent, Stone was invited to talk about the origins of the studio's love affair with LEGO, which has culminated in a veritable cornucopia of irreverent video games covering beloved franchises like Harry Potter, the Marvel and DC Universes and, of course, Star Wars. With LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga on the horizon, it seemed an opportune moment to look back wistfully on the creation of the first LEGO Star Wars game back in 2005.
Development began back when Stone and compatriot Jonathan Smith were senior management in LEGO's official videogames department, LEGO Interactive, working with the developers at Traveller's Tales to create a LEGO Star Wars video game after deciding that a classic Knight's Kingdom game wasn't going to cut it. When LEGO Interactive was shuttered in 2004, Stone and Smith formed Giant Interactive Entertainment, which remained the exclusive rights holder for LEGO video games, and continued working with Traveller's Tales to keep the project alive.
The game's development continued but there was still one big issue to surmount: finding a publisher willing to take a punt on an unproven concept. Giant Interactive had only just been formed from the ashes of LEGO Interactive, and much of Traveller's Tales' backlog consisted of middling-to-okay licensed games, so perhaps it's not surprising that several of the companies Stone approached, including Activision, THQ and EA, politely turned him down. Things started looking up, though, when both Ubisoft and Eidos expressed interest in the game, leading to the ultimate decision to sign on with Eidos in 2005 - apparently because, as Stone puts it, "they didn't have any other games [at the time]" and so would be able to dedicate their full attention to LEGO Star Wars.
And the rest, as they say, is history: LEGO Star Wars released in 2005 and was positively received, becoming Eidos' best-selling game of the year, and Traveller's Tales merged with Giant Interactive soon after, creating TT Games. LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy released the following year to much acclaim, and since then Traveller's Tales have released a LEGO game almost every single year, culminating in this year's LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, which looks to cover all nine films in one bumper package.
LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga is currently in development for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S and Nintendo Switch, and is set to release in 2021.
Source: Bits N' Bricks