Star Wars Battlefront ditched single player to hit The Force Awakens' release date

The lack of a single player campaign in Star Wars Battlefront kind of bugged everyone a bit. Actual Star Wars man John Boyega even asked EA about it, look: 

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In an investor call EA has now admitted the lack of a story was purely to hit the latest film’s release date. Speaking in the call, Patrick Söderlund, executive vice president of EA Studios, said: “It was a conscious decision we made due to time and being able to launch the game, side by side with the movie that came out, to get the strongest possible impact”. That's despite not actually having any direct content from Ep 7, only a cross over 'Battle of Jakku' DLC map. 

However, it doesn’t sound like EA will repeat the mistake, as Söderlund admits the game was criticised as a result. He also talked review scores, saying “I think the team created a really good game based on the premise that we had. Are we happy with the 75 rating? No. [On Metacritic, and actually 73 right now.] Is that something we’re going to cure moving forward? Yes?”

That moving forward likely refers to the another previous EA call where it confirmed that a new Star Wars Battlefront was on the way with content  “from the new movies”.

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Leon Hurley
Managing editor for guides

I'm GamesRadar's Managing Editor for guides, which means I run GamesRadar's guides and tips content. I also write reviews, previews and features, largely about horror, action adventure, FPS and open world games. I previously worked on Kotaku, and the Official PlayStation Magazine and website.