The inevitable has come to pass following Disney’s closing of LucasArts. After firing over 150 people and ceasing development of both Star Wars: First Assault and Star Wars 1313, Disney said they would switch to a licensing model for their games instead of developing in house. Now Disney has announced they’ve penned an exclusive deal with Electronics Arts to develop and publish most Star Wars licensed games. Disney will retain some rights for mobile, social, tablet, and online games.
It’s not a surprise. EA created Star Wars: The Old Republic and are — like Disney — an enormous entity that will force choke anyone who gets in their way. (That sounds familiar.) In the press release, EA Labels President Frank Gibeau says, “DICE and Visceral will produce new games, joining the BioWare team which continues to develop for the Star Wars franchise. The new experiences we create may borrow from films, but the games will be entirely original with all new stories and gameplay.”
All new stories and gameplay? Kotaku is way ahead of you, EA. Their commenters put together a bunch of photoshopped EA-Star Wars crossover games we can look forward to. We picked our favorites below. The full-sized version of these and the rest of the photoshops are available at Kotaku.
I would play the hell out of this, especially if the Wookiee rips arms off Sims who beat him at chess. GRRR, LOGIC POINTS!