Star Wars Battlefront 3 has been on the minds of many fans, but creating this follow-up is not as simple as many believe. EA can’t just decide to make another game, there is a lot more to consider and many reasons it might not seem worth it to the publisher. All this is to say that you’ll probably be disappointed if you were holding out hope for a Battlefront 3.

Star Wars Battlefront 2 Had Many Issues

The release of Star Wars Battlefront 2 in 2017 was heavily affected by problems, mostly related to its unpopular microtransaction and progression systems. The game’s progression system was complicated, using multiple types of currency and loot crates that held items like Star Cards and Crafting Parts, which directly changed gameplay by giving stat improvements and new abilities.

One of the biggest complaints was that players had to spend a large amount of time or real money to unlock famous characters, such as Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker. At first, it was calculated that unlocking just one hero could take about 40 hours of playtime, or players could use Crystals (bought with real money) to purchase loot crates, which had a random chance of containing the needed items or currency. This system basically pressured players to spend money on top of the game’s original price.

The player community reacted very negatively, with many expressing anger over paying full price for a game that seemed like a free-to-play title with pushy money-making strategies. This anger came to a head on Reddit. The now-notorious response from EA’s representative about the microtransactions said, “The intent is to provide players with a sense of pride and accomplishment for unlocking different heroes.”

Star Wars Battlefront 2

Released

November 17, 2017

ESRB

T for Teen: Violence

Developer(s)

DICE

Publisher(s)

Electronic Arts

This statement was met with huge backlash, quickly becoming the most downvoted comment in Reddit history, reaching over 660,000 downvotes. The controversy grew even worse when people accused the loot box system of being a form of gambling, leading to investigations by government agencies in places like Belgium and Hawaii.

Due to widespread criticism and outside pressure, including reports of a phone call from Disney, EA made changes. Just before the game’s official release, EA announced that all microtransactions would be temporarily removed, saying they would redesign the progression system based on player feedback.

Months later, microtransactions were brought back, but they were restricted to cosmetic items only, with gameplay-changing items and hero unlocks tied only to in-game progress.

It’s Not So Easy Making a New Battlefront

Making a new Star Wars Battlefront game after the poorly received launch comes with major obstacles, affecting both developer morale and the ability to keep key team members. DICE, the studio that developed the most recent Battlefront games under EA, has lost a large number of employees as time has gone on including those that worked on the Battlefront series.

Unfortunately, key developers who worked on the Battlefront series at DICE have since left the studio, especially after plans for a third game were canceled. Losing important team members can make creating a potential Battlefront 3 much harder. Rebuilding everything from the ground up rather than rolling the old team into the next release can certainly take the wind out of a project’s sails. The Battlefront name itself may also carry a negative reputation and be seen as risky for publishers and developers because of the problems surrounding the last release.

The performance of other recent Star Wars games, especially those made by studios outside of EA after their exclusive license ended, shows how hard it is to succeed with the Star Wars brand in today’s gaming market. Star Wars Outlaws is a key example. The Metacritic score reached 75 from reviewers, while player ratings are down to 5.4, showing the game has been panned by fans and critics alike. Outlaws didn’t sell well for a Star Wars title, and Ubisoft’s stock price dropped sharply, hitting its lowest point since 2015.

Making a new Battlefront game comes with additional challenges given it depends on the Star Wars IP. That means tackling the technical and creative challenges of a big-budget shooter and making a game that pleases fans and the rights holders (Disney).

Games Like This Require a Lot of Background Deals

Creating a big triple-A video game, especially one based on a brand that’s a household name, means dealing with a complicated financial and legal situation. Making games at this level is always very expensive, with costs often reaching tens of millions of dollars and the most ambitious games sometimes going over a hundred million dollars.

These huge development budgets pay for long research and design periods, salaries for hundreds or even thousands of employees over multiple years, building and keeping up necessary technology, making the game work well on different platforms, paying fees to release the game on those platforms, and running massive advertising campaigns that can sometimes cost even more than making the game itself.

However, when the game uses a well-known intellectual property (IP) owned by another company, like the Star Wars universe owned by Disney, there is an extra and often very large financial cost added in the form of licensing fees.

Electronic Arts used to have an exclusive license to make Star Wars games for consoles and PCs, and as part of that deal, EA paid Disney a licensing fee. These licensing agreements don’t come cheap, especially for big IPs like Star Wars, and often include the IP owner getting a share of the money made from the licensed products. Disney is set up to make a lot of money from these deals, possibly even more than the company that licenses the IP.

EA may have turned down a proposal from DICE for a third Star Wars Battlefront game partly because of these high licensing costs. After all, EA had already parted ways with FIFA and instead rebranded as EA Sports FC. According to Tom Henderson, a well-known insider, a developer said that because of the licensing terms, a potential Battlefront 3 would have to sell 20% more copies than the previous game, Battlefront 2, just for EA to make the same amount of money.

Expect a Reboot, Not a Sequel

Even though the series deserves a direct sequel to Battlefront 2, the next game in the franchise looks likely be another reboot. This change is largely due to Disney no longer having an exclusive licensing deal with Electronic Arts for Star Wars games. Since the exclusivity period has ended, Disney and Lucasfilm are now allowing different companies to work on Star Wars games. EA is still working on some Star Wars games under this new, non-exclusive model, but these are mostly described as story-driven or single-player experiences.

In the past, Disney preferred licensing its intellectual properties to other companies rather than making games themselves. EA’s reboot is a good example of this, and the company will likely look for a different studio to take the helm despite the recent player resurgence.

A reboot gives developers more freedom to change old ideas, add or remove characters, and create new locations and stories. The main goal of a reboot is to bring a series back to life, attract new fans, and make more money, especially if the series feels outdated or doesn’t meet current gaming standards. EA’s own franchise was a reboot of the games that came before, which bizarrely also didn’t get a third installment despite being almost finished.

Given Disney’s licensing approach and EA’s reluctance to take the series, it might be easier and less risky for Disney to approve a Battlefront reboot with a new developer instead of a direct sequel. A reboot would let a new studio start from scratch, using the core Star Wars Battlefront concept but with the freedom to change gameplay, story, and progression systems. This could help avoid the high expectations and criticisms tied to the previous EA Battlefront games, especially the controversial launch of Battlefront 2.

Activision, the company behind Call of Duty, could be perfectly poised to pick up the reins on a new Star Wars-themed first person shooter. The studio has recently outdone EA in first-person shooters and could be where Disney is looking to outdo the former games in the Battlefront series.

Right now, there’s just too much baggage to pin your hopes on a direct sequel. Even taking into account Battlefront 2‘s success in 2025 as a game that’s finally been “fixed” it seems unlikely we’ll see anything yet (and EA were likely as surprised by the title’s resurgence as you were).