Star Wars: Battlefront

About

Star Wars: Battlefront is a third and first-person shooter video game series published by LucasArts, Electronic Arts and Disney Interactive Studios, which features fast-placed action gameplay taking place within the Star Wars universe.

History

On September 21st, 2004, the original Star Wars: Battlefront game was released, which was met with favorable reviews from critics and fans of the Star Wars franchise. On October 31st, 2005, the sequel Star Wars: Battlefront 2^[4] was released, receiving similar praise to its predecessor.

On October 9th, 2007, Star Wars Battlefront: Renegade Squadron was released, featuring new heroes, character creation and vehicles like the Millennium Falcon. In 2009, the game Star Wars Battlefront: Mobile Squadrons was released for mobile phones and Star Wars Battlefront: Elite Squadron was released for the Nintendo DS and PlayStation Portable consoles.

Online Presence

The Battlefront series has a significant presence on community sites like Tumblr and Reddit, where there are several subreddits dedicated to the series.^[6][7][8]

Mods

On December 31st, 2007, YouTuber Old Stuff uploaded footage of a mod map for Star Wars: Battlefront 2, which gathered more than 2.2 million views and 2,400 comments in the next eights years (shown below, left). On November 11th, 2011, YouTuber UltimateGamerSidious uploaded footage of a mod map titled "Landing at Point Rain" (shown below, right). Over the following four years, the video received upwards of 1.8 million views and 770 comments.

Battlefront 3

Star Wars: Battlefront 3 is the title of a canceled game in the series which has been compared to other popular vaporware^[11] products like Half-Life 3. The game spawned a fansite^[12] and a dedicated subreddit.^[13]

Battlefront (DICE)

Following the extended delay of Battlefront 3, as well as the closing of LucasArts, the future of the Battlefront series was uncertain. At an E3 press conference in June 2013, the video game company EA DICE unveiled a teaser trailer for a new Star War Battlefront game (shown below, left). On April 17th, 2015, the official reveal trailer was shown at Star Wars Celebration 2015 (shown below, right).

Following the release of the trailer, several controversial details about the game were revealed, including several missing key features from previous installments in the series, including space battles, Clone Wars maps and the removal of splitscreen from PC versions. In reaction to this, several YouTubers expressed their outrage over the lack of these features (shown below). On April 18th, Forbes^[14] published an article titled "You'd Have to be Crazy to Pre-Order Star Wars: Battlefront."

Open Beta

In early October 2015, an open beta version of the game was released for PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, which showcased three missions, “Walker Assault,” “Drop Zone” and “Survival.” On October 6th, YouTuber Jackfrags uploaded a walkthrough video criticizing several bugs discovered in the beta version, garnering upwards of 1.19 million views and 7,600 comments in the first week (shown below).

On October 9th, YouTuber Zephs uploaded a video titled “Star Wars Battlefront – RIP Luke Skywalker,” in which a Luke Skywalker character is crushed under the foot of a giant AT-AT assault vehicle (shown below, left). That same day, YouTuber TheSyndicateProject uploaded a video of gameplay footage from the beta version in which an Imperial Stormtrooper struggles to inflict wound on the player due to its poor aiming mechanisms (shown below, right). In five days, the two videos gained over 4.6 million views and nearly a half million views, respectively.

On October 11th, Redditor Kmlkmljkl uploaded a GIF of players teabagging a fallen enemy during a Star Wars: Battlefront beta match to /r/gifs,^[15] receiving more than 5,000 votes (89% upvoted) and 600 comments in the first 72 hours (shown below). On October 13th, the beta officially ended, having been tested by nine million players. On October 13th, Redditor mario85827 submitted a post asking why people were criticizing the game to the /r/OutOfTheLoop^[16] subreddit.

Star Wars Battlefront 2

On October 30th, 2017, EA Star Wars released the launch trailer for Star Wars Battlefront 2 (shown below). Within two weeks, the video gained over 2.6 million views and 9,600 comments. The game is scheduled for release on November 17th.

Unlockable Characters Controversy

In mid-November 2017, it was revealed that playable characters like Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker would be locked for fourty hours of dedicated playtime unless players paid to unlock them. On November 12th, 2017, Redditor MBMMaverick submitted a post to /r/StarWarsBattlefront titled "Seriously? I paid 80$ to have Vader locked?". Within 24 hours, the post gained over 69,100 points (88% upvoted) and 2,900 comments. In the comments section, the official EACommunityTeam Reddit account responded to the complaint (shown below). Over the next day, the comment received a score of negative 394,000, becoming the most down-voted comment in Reddit history.^[17]

On November 13th, Redditor Unwanted_Commentary submitted a screenshot of the comment along with a faked followup post in which EACommunityTeam says "edit: We also now choose to live as gay men," parodying Kevin Spacey's response to a sexual assault allegation (shown below, left). Over the next 11 hours, the post garnered more than 31,100 points (92% upvoted) and 550 comments on /r/dankmemes.^[18] The same day, Redditor HitlerDabsOnJews posted a "Who Would Win?" image macro pitting Reddit against the EA logo labeled as "one greedy boi" (shown below, right).^[19] Also on November 13th, Redditor TheMadPuma submitted a post titled "Can we please boycott Star Wars Battlefront 2" to /r/gaming,^[20] where it gained upwards of 14,800 points (89% upvoted) and 1,400 comments in three hours.

Search Interest

External References