Highlights
- Battlefield 2042 will end post-launch support, hinting at future changes to the franchise's development teams and direction.
- EA Motive joins other studios in working on the next Battlefield game, setting aside Dead Space projects for now.
- Motive's expertise with the Frostbite engine could help improve launch content and possibly bring back high quality single-player campaigns for Battlefield.
It is clear that EA is starting to look towards the future of the Battlefield franchise, with it being announced that Battlefield 2042 will not be receiving any more post-launch support following the end of its seventh in-game season. Many fans are curious as to what the next iteration of the franchise will look like, with EA also confirming a shake-up of the usual development teams that handle projects that fall under the IP.
It was recently reported that EA Motive will be joining a group of development studios in charge of the next Battlefield release, with DICE, Criterion, and Ripple Effect making up the rest of this force. EA Motive recently impressed fans with its work on the 2023 Dead Space remake, and its switch over to the Battlefield franchise could spell good news for the next Battlefield release at the cost of any future Dead Space remake projects.
Why The Future Isn’t Very Bright For Battlefield 2042’s Best Feature
Battlefield 2042 featured one game mode that stood out from the rest, yet it sadly did not receive enough attention to make its future hopeful.
Dead Space's Hopeful Future May Have Been Passed On to Battlefield
EA Motive has already had quite a successful history under the EA name, having developed the campaign for 2017's Star Wars Battlefront 2 and being the main developer of 2020's Star Wars: Squadrons. This early success was compounded by Motive's 2023 remake of Dead Space, which was praised by many for its graphical improvements while maintaining the tension and atmosphere of the original release.
The quality of Dead Space in particular clearly impressed EA, with the company recently announcing that EA Motive will be putting a lot of its resources into future Battlefield projects going forward. This future focus of EA Motive will be shared between Battlefield and its upcoming Iron Man game, and this leaves little room for the studio to push resources towards another Dead Space project.
Many fans of the 2023 remake were hoping that Dead Space 2 and 3 would eventually receive the same treatment, and this now seems more unlikely than ever. While this recent announcement might be bad news for the future of Dead Space, there are still a lot of positives that can be gleaned from Motive's future work with Battlefield.
EA Motive Can Help Battlefield Move Past its Recent Content Issues
Motive already has extensive experience with EA's Frostbite game engine, meaning that it should quickly adapt to development on the next Battlefield game. As well as this, having more studios actively working on this project will hopefully ensure a wide range of launch content, something that Battlefield 2042 famously struggled with. For example, Battlefield 2042 boldly chose not to feature a single-player campaign, and Motive's past work with content such as the campaign of Battlefront 2 could mean that the next Battlefield is going back to its single-player roots.
Having separate teams for things like multiplayer and single-player elements is something that Call of Duty has employed over the years to meet its annual release schedule, and it seems that Battlefield could end up emulating this development approach from its largest competitor. While it is a shame that the recent news regarding EA Motive spells bad news for any future Dead Space remakes, the fantastic track record of EA Motive will hopefully continue into the new upcoming era of Battlefield.
