After the announcement of the disappearance of the San Francisco studio and the development of former Naughty Dog Amy Hennig and comedian Todd Stashwick , Jason Schreier decided to conduct the investigation. The Kotaku reporter has published an articlein which we learn more about the project, codenamed Ragtag .
The latter started in the hands of a small team and presented itself as a game of pirates in the open world, called Jamaica internally. When Disney redeemed Lucasfilm in 2013 , an agreement was signed with EA for games taking place in the galaxy far away, Jamaica became Yuma then Ragtag , and the pirates a group of bandits of the Space at the head of which there was a character very influenced by Han Solo, dubbed Dodger.
The latter, presenting himself as Stashwick with a pretty mustache, was accompanied by other scoundrels: the gallant Robie, Oona, daughter of an intergalactic caid, and Buck, leader of the troop. The story, set between A New Hope and The Empire’s Counterattack , was set against the backdrop of Aalderan’s destruction by the first Death Star , and revolved around petty thefts and robberies. . And the idea, to distinguish the project from an Uncharted , was to let the player embody several protagonists with different abilities.
Suicide mission?
Several involved or close developers told Schreier that the road was rough and that they knew the project as the studio threatened for a long time. The resources and the budget were not enough for his ambitions. The Frostbite engine, like Mass Effect Andromeda , proved difficult to tame, and the relationship with EA, which monopolized forces for Battlefield Hardline and its DLC, and whose executives did not understand the absence of Jedi and lightsabers , were not looking good.
And Amy Hennig, who wanted to supervise and approve everything by applying methods that nobody was familiar with, made the task very complicated. Finally, the success of Battlefront had the impact of seeing Motive , led by Jade Raymond, retire in early 2016 to be employed on Star Wars Battlefront II .