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Source: https://www.pcgamer.com/bethesda-reveals-a-new-indiana-jones-game-being-made-by-wolfenstein-studio-machinegames/

Yesterday, Disney announced the return of Lucasfilm Games as "the official identity for all gaming titles from Lucasfilm," including Star Wars games "and beyond." Today we got our first look at what the new label is getting up to, and it's a surprise, to say the least: An Indiana Jones game being developed by Wolfenstein studio MachineGames.

Oh dear, an Indiana Jones game? On one hand, we have Fate of Atlantis (I should really play that again). On the other hand, we have...stuff that was not good enough for me to remember.

Shell company shuffle breakdown (for those interested):

Bethesda (the publisher, not Bethesda Softworks)
--> Zenimax Media
-------->Machinegames
--------> Id Software (not involved, but they're owned by Zenimax as well, if you were wondering why someone else is attached to the Wolfenstein brand)

Disney
---->Lucasfilm Games... who... aren't the developer or the publisher, so... I guess they've got a person or two to make sure nothing inappropriate or lore breaking is done with Indy? But otherwise this is another Todd Howard project with Beth and MG.


And of course, nothing is addressing the real question:
has Disney finally split off SW from the EA license agreement or are they just putting the 'Lucasfilm Games' sticker on things, and EA will continue to destroy good looking projects and put out crap?
In theory that was a 10 year agreement that doesn't end until 2023.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
Oh dear, an Indiana Jones game? On one hand, we have Fate of Atlantis (I should really play that again). On the other hand, we have...stuff that was not good enough for me to remember.

Last Crusade was a crap adventure game, then there were two(?) third person games, of which the first, Indy versus Russians, was pretty decent. The other one, Emperor's Tomb or something, less so?

Oh and Desktop Adventures, which was a fun randomly generated time killer.

But nothing can quite top Fate of Atlantis.

Voss, something to add to the top level of your company breakdown: assuming no regulatory problems, Microsoft acquires Zenimax Media this year.
I wonder if this could be Disney testing the possibility of giving Microsoft the licenses that EA currently has?

Whatever happens I think once the contract is up ea have lost the licence. That or they will have to share and compete with titles

...puts on cynic hat...

They will probably just take the Tomb Raider games and overlay IJ over LC - instantly ready to market!

Not sure how this falls in with the EA license stuff, but they did show off Star Wars themed Fortnite skins the other day.

 MDSW wrote:
...puts on cynic hat...

They will probably just take the Tomb Raider games and overlay IJ over LC - instantly ready to market!

Nah. The cynic hat is just Wolfenstein with a Indy skin.

If it were Eidos (for TR) or Naughty Dog (Uncharted), it would go that direction. I don't know that Machinegames has an engine (or programmers) that could handle all the wall running, puzzles and etc, so they may just stick with pure gunplay.

Well...

Wall-running wouldn't really be appropriate for Indy. But the only way that Wolfenstein play would be appropriate is if they modeled it on the original Muse Software games (with lots of changes, of course).

Looks like they did announce that EA lost the exclusive star wars license.

https://www.escapistmagazine.com/v2/ubisoft-massive-to-make-open-world-story-driven-star-wars-game/

Well, didn't renew the exclusivity, anyway. They talk a fair bit about more stuff with EA. And with a target of 2023, that's the original end point for EA's exclusive deal anyway.

Not sure about what to expect from Massive. Clancy's 'The Division' and Farcry 3 suggest more shooty games.

There was word last year (or 2019), that Disney was looking into making its own computer game studio, but that doesn't seem to have happened, at least not yet. Odds are good that if they decide to, they'll just buy an existing one, but Microsoft seems awfully busy in snapping people up.

I wonder if they'd go back to Obsidian for another shot at an RPG.

balmong7 wrote:
Looks like they did announce that EA lost the exclusive star wars license.

https://www.escapistmagazine.com/v2/ubisoft-massive-to-make-open-world-story-driven-star-wars-game/

As far as I'm aware, we've never seen the specifics of EA's license. EA did make an announcement that they are still working on Star Wars games though.

 Kanluwen wrote:

balmong7 wrote:
Looks like they did announce that EA lost the exclusive star wars license.

https://www.escapistmagazine.com/v2/ubisoft-massive-to-make-open-world-story-driven-star-wars-game/

As far as I'm aware, we've never seen the specifics of EA's license. EA did make an announcement that they are still working on Star Wars games though.

It was publicly known to be a 10 year deal and kicked off in 2013. It looks like they're respecting the existing deal, not burning any bridges, but aiming to bring stuff out right after it ends.

 Overread wrote:
Whatever happens I think once the contract is up ea have lost the licensce. That or they will have to share and compete with titles

I'm amazed it took this long. They've had this exclusivity license for so long and have produced what in that time? 4 games? 2 became PR disasters. The decision to give EA an exclusive license never made sense.

Massive (Division series) has apparently gotten a deal already for a new open world game.

I'd be down to try some George Lucas' Star Wars The Division

Yeah, EA totally wasted the license trying to make their usual microtransaction machines. Fallen Order was the only one worth remembering and it's still not much compared to what came before it. I will never forgive the fact that they scrapped stuff like 1313 when things got transferred over.

 Grimskul wrote:
Yeah, EA totally wasted the license trying to make their usual microtransaction machines. Fallen Order was the only one worth remembering and it's still not much compared to what came before it. I will never forgive the fact that they scrapped stuff like 1313 when things got transferred over.

Even worse than that, Squadrons was apparently surprisingly good, but EA had no intentions to support the game after launch when it released. So not only did they fail at trying to make gakky microtransaction machines, but the one game they put out that people probably would have tolerated that crap in because the base game was good enough was launched with no intention to support it. EA did end up supporting it in the end, but it's amazing how the best games EA makes are the ones it interferes in the least (Dead Space, Squadrons, Bad Company, and Mass Effect 1 all being examples). Then EA gets involved in them and burns them to the ground.

You'd think 20 years of experience in the industry would have produced a more functional company.

 LordofHats wrote:

 Grimskul wrote:
Yeah, EA totally wasted the license trying to make their usual microtransaction machines. Fallen Order was the only one worth remembering and it's still not much compared to what came before it. I will never forgive the fact that they scrapped stuff like 1313 when things got transferred over.

Even worse than that, Squadrons was apparently surprisingly good, but EA had no intentions to support the game after launch when it released. So not only did they fail at trying to make gakky microtransaction machines, but the one game they put out that people probably would have tolerated that crap in because the base game was good enough was launched with no intention to support it. EA did end up supporting it in the end, but it's amazing how the best games EA makes are the ones it interferes in the least (Dead Space, Squadrons, Bad Company, and Mass Effect 1 all being examples). Then EA gets involved in them and burns them to the ground.

You'd think 20 years of experience in the industry would have produced a more functional company.

Yeah. That's part of the reason why I'm worried if they ever do announce Titanfall 3 at some point because TF2 and Apex Legends did well precisely because of a general lack of direct oversight from the executives, but at this point they're going to have their grubby fingers in any major sequels in the same universe.

I feel like the only thing that EA has learned is that they want to be more of a casino than an actual game company. Gambling! Er I mean Surprise Mechanics all day, every day!

 LordofHats wrote:

You'd think 20 years of experience in the industry would have produced a more functional company.

EA is a perfectly functional company. Their profits increase every year as does their stock. They are making their shareholders and happy and rich. What more can a company do? Please its customers? don't be silly.

 LordofHats wrote:

 Grimskul wrote:
Yeah, EA totally wasted the license trying to make their usual microtransaction machines. Fallen Order was the only one worth remembering and it's still not much compared to what came before it. I will never forgive the fact that they scrapped stuff like 1313 when things got transferred over.

Even worse than that, Squadrons was apparently surprisingly good, but EA had no intentions to support the game after launch when it released. So not only did they fail at trying to make gakky microtransaction machines, but the one game they put out that people probably would have tolerated that crap in because the base game was good enough was launched with no intention to support it. EA did end up supporting it in the end, but it's amazing how the best games EA makes are the ones it interferes in the least (Dead Space, Squadrons, Bad Company, and Mass Effect 1 all being examples). Then EA gets involved in them and burns them to the ground.

You'd think 20 years of experience in the industry would have produced a more functional company.

I suspect EA's failures stem directly from their successes. They're a billion dollar company that's been around for 38 years, basically the entire span of the video game industry.
And they've got a lock on the Sports games, which they've producing since 1991, and people buy them religiously, almost regardless of quality or changes.
Their focus on online stuff (and the associated microtransactions and lootboxes) made them a lot of money despite the problems.

They make a lot of 'broad appeal' (but IMO shallow) games and they know they can coast on their successes. So they do.

IMO I despised all of EA star wars games aside from Star Wars Squadrons. And that game had an issue with getting stale/replayability. It's not a game meant to be played for hours on end. I could do maybe 2 matches and then I tire of it.

I always wanted a sequel to republic commando. Hopefully now that EA apparently doesn't have an exclusive license we'll get more creative SW games again.

Fallen Order was a great game. First Jedi oriented game that actually felt like a cinematic style Jedi.

I agree. fallen order was good, but rumor has it around the time fallen order game out disney was not pleased with EA, in fact given that after the SWBF2 lockbox fiasco there where no SW games with lockboxes of any type, I kinda wonder if disney ordered EA to cut that crap out.

but yeah EA blew it was Star Wars and I see this announcement as Disney reckongizing it. that they're announcing this, this early suggests to me that disney didn't even consider re-upping the deal. The inital deal with EA occured right when SW:TOR was doing quite well for itself. shortly after SWTOR basicly went off a cliff (I know I stopped playing after KOTFE and given the sheer number of people who seem to have it seems it was a bit of an exodus) and of the games EA's put out well.. let's go over them shall we?

SW: BF1 - A nice looking shooter, but with no single player mode it felt like a 30 dollar game with a 70 dollar price. to say I was dissappointed would be accurate.
SW:BF2 - ok this game is actually pretty good now, not sure I'd advise buying it brand new, but next time you spot it on sale you might wanna snag it. Still when it launched it was a PR fiasco thanks to lock boxes etc
SW: JFO: A great game, easily EA's top game for SW. It's in many ways something of a "classic adventure game" but the jedi powers really make it unique to itself
SW: Squadrons - this basicly started off as a "hobby" for one of the devs until EA noticed it and picked it up. their disintreast in supporting it really speaks for itself, they've shown a willingness to change that but really this shows EA's issues here. In a world where people are willing to put in MILLIONS into the vapor ware that is star citizen, you'd think a good starship game'd be a no brainer.

Battlefront2 was only "a PR fiasco" because people would not listen to those of us actually playing the game and instead chose to listen to YouTubers who basically continued to discuss things that were in Alpha or the Beta and were going to be addressed in the retail build.

Lootboxes were removed from basically all non-EA Sports games previous to that nonsensical 'PR fiasco'. The first Battlefront game did not feature them and Battlefield ditched them after BF1.

Squadrons' lack of support, btw, has been suggested by Frazier(whose passion project this was, and continually pitched it to them) to be less "disinterest" and more "wait and see". There have not really been many flight simulator games out in recent years. There's basically been the Ace Combat series which is highly arcadey.

 Kanluwen wrote:
Battlefront2 was only "a PR fiasco" because people would not listen to those of us actually playing the game and instead chose to listen to YouTubers who basically continued to discuss things that were in Alpha or the Beta and were going to be addressed in the retail build.

So... You're saying it was a PR fiasco? And I don't know what you're talking about, that game had loot crates for almost half a year. There were articles discussing their removal when it happened and more when they were readded to the game

I don't get why you continually miss the point of purpose every time EA's handling of their exclusivity deal comes up. How dare people criticize the game they're playing for the way it plays, it's just in beta guys! This was the excuse when people shill any number of gakky games. I can give it to EA cause I've heard they really got BF2 working after the games first year and I've seen praise here and there for their improvements to the game. That doesn't change that it took a year after the release for this praise to really manifest as more than empty excuses and by that point in time the game could already be written off as having lived it's effective life.

Meanwhile, with an exclusive license to do whatever they want and hordes of studios with different kinds of experience, the only other two games they produced were one sleeper hit they didn't believe in and one big hit that they let someone else make. I seems pretty consistent that when EA makes games, they become fiascos. I can't help but wonder if Disney noticed the pattern and rethought the entire enterprise given years of EA effectively wasting golden opportunity.

No, I'm saying that people should have known better than to listen to youtubers but instead it's always "EA bad!"

 Kanluwen wrote:

Squadrons' lack of support, btw, has been suggested by Frazier(whose passion project this was, and continually pitched it to them) to be less "disinterest" and more "wait and see". There have not really been many flight simulator games out in recent years. There's basically been the Ace Combat series which is highly arcadey.

X and Elite both have strong elements of space combat sim, among many other things. There's also the interest in Star Citizen.

The former two seem to be doing decently enough. No comment on the latter.

 Kanluwen wrote:
No, I'm saying that people should have known better than to listen to youtubers but instead it's always "EA bad!"

I don't watch Youtubers (not video game Youtubers anyway), and EA is bad. My memory also isn't so short that I can't remember the mountains of flak BF2 took immediately after it's official launch and the 'it's all the Youtuber's fault!" just sounds like sour grapes.

 Kanluwen wrote:
No, I'm saying that people should have known better than to listen to youtubers but instead it's always "EA bad!"

I'm not sure if you've bought EA stocks or something, but I mean EA was voted as one of the worst companies in America in the past for a reason. You don't need youtubers to tell you what to think when EA blatantly promotes anti-consumer and crunch practices with their games. Even looking past BF2's lootbox debacle, look at how Anthem was managed and released. You can't tell me that doesn't smack of incompetence and mismanagement.

I don't watch youtubers, and largely consider them useless bags of hot air pushing nerd rage for clicks. BF2 however got negative PR, eneugh to be reported on by news articles etc. (I didn't partiuclarly follow it's release, I just know it got bad PR)

so yeah, EA mishandled this lisence and are paying the price. no arguement there.