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As we reported this week, EA just got the LucasArts just last month, will retain the rights to design Star Wars games for mobile, social and online gamers.
So now that the discusses the topic and SWTOR at length:
And yet EA has a spotty track record when it comes to franchise tie-ins. Whereas handing a major property off to a smaller, more creatively flexible studio can yield the occasional (and completely unexpected) Batman: Arkham Asylum, LEGO Star Wars, The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay or Star Trek: Bridge Commander, the challenge when you ritualize conceptuality, then attempt to wring creativity from individuals on exacting timelines complicated by multi-platform demands and implacable shareholders is…well, it’s all but insurmountable. The result, more often than not, is mediocrity, and that’s typically your best-case scenario.
With that in mind, here’s why I think the EA-Star Wars deal can’t possibly work…or, you know, maybe could, given the stars and planets aligning.
EA’s initial trip down Star Wars lane was confused and tedious
Star Wars: The NCsoft’s Guild Wars 2, the apotheosis of sprawling world-building MMOs, The Old Republic feels quaint and sadly upstaged.
The company’s tie-in track record is disgraceful
Observe the Harry Potter games, based on J.K. Rowling‘s ridiculously successful books: The think of a truly memorable EA video game/movie tie-in. Can you?
They go on to give some more reasons why this EA deal is the pits. And I have to it they are pretty spot on with all the reasons. However… they balance it out with some good reasons why EA just might be able to pull it off, after all. One being of course, that they have the budget and the resources to make this work.
Some other reasons Time gives: the game engine already exists, EA has motivation to prove the haters wrong and of course, those resources available to them are huge.
So what do you think? Will EA be able to bring justice to the future of Star Wars games or are we all doomed?
