Star Wars Battlefront will NOT feature Single Player Campaign Mode

D23 is well underway today, and as expected, EA is flexing its muscle with Star Wars Battlefront. EA Chief Operating Officer, Peter Moore, recently sat down with Gamespot, and talked about the game, which is rapidly turning out to be the most highly anticipated Star Wars video game, in quite some time. The interview is really quite extensive, and has some very interesting details, but the one that stands out the most, is the fact that Star Wars Battlefront will not feature single player game mode…because no one plays that way, apparently.

"“Very few people actually play the single-player on these kinds of games. That’s what the data points to.”"

He’s not wrong. In my very extensive experience of playing online games — from MMORPG’s (Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games) like Everquest, World of Warcraft, and Star Wars: The Old Republic — to online console games like Call of Duty (Which is what Star Wars Battlefront will most closely resemble), the days of the single player game mode has gone the way of the Dodo bird.

Moore even talked about the ever evolving nature of MMO’s:

"“Between when a dev team starts work on a game, and when it finishes, the world becomes a different place. I remember when we started work on Star Wars: The Old Republic; at the time, the model to go for was subscription. By the time we had the game ready, the model to go for wasn’t subscriptions.”"

SWTOR (Star Wars: The Old Republic) is now a free to play game, with the option to subscribe, which opens loads of exclusive perks and features for those willing to pay $15 a month. And, this seems to be a model that most game manufacturers are adhering to. Many players, myself included, are actually willing to pay the extra money to have access to these special features, and furthermore, are willing to spend actual real world money on In-Game Shops.

With Star Wars Battlefront being a game that will mainly be played on consoles, you can rest assured that there will be DLC packs available for purchase rather quickly after the game’s release in November…and this is the norm in the video game industry. Moore talked about what he calls the erroneous belief that major game companies ship these highly anticipated games incomplete, with the express intention to charge their consumers more money, in some sort of convoluted cash grab…but he says that’s just not true in EA/Bioware’s case.

I believe him on this account, as in my experience, EA and Bioware have sterling reputations, despite that popular desire to bash them for previous Battlefront games. Star Wars Battlefront can be pre-ordered now, and will be available on November 17, later this year.

Next: Star Wars at D23: The Art Awakens