Visceral's Canceled Star Wars Game Was Much Closer To Completion Than Previously Thought

TheGamer

By Scott Baird

Published Feb 21, 2019

A person close to the canceled Visceral Star Wars project has revealed that it was a lot closer to completion than anyone had realized.

The Star Wars fans who are still saddened over the cancellation of the video game known unofficially as, "Ragtag," should prepare to feel sad all over again, as a person close to the project has revealed that it was a lot closer to completion than anyone had realized.

Ragtag was the name given to a project that many people considered to be an Uncharted-style game that was set in the Star Wars universe, and whose cast would have be similar to outlaws and pirates, instead of Jedi Knights or soldiers of the Empire/Rebellion.

Amy Hennig joined Visceral Games in 2014 to work on a Star Wars game, which was later revealed to be Ragtag. When EA shut Visceral Games down, Hennig left the company to form her own studio. She was recently interviewed by USGamer, where she spoke candidly about her time at Visceral Games, the problems with working with the Frostbite Engine, and the fate of Ragtag.

Hennig revealed that Ragtag was beset by problems early on thanks to a requirement by EA for the game to use the Frostbite engine, even though it was primarily designed to run first-person shooters, which meant that they had to code in a lot of third-person action elements (such as climbing) into the engine themselves. Hennig also revealed that Ragtag was farther along in development than anyone had realized, and that it was only canceled due to it not fitting in with EA's business plan.

EA took a lot of flak for their business decisions with Star Wars: Battlefront II that caused the industry (and several international governments) to take a closer look at how loot boxes are implemented in games that are meant for a general audience. The fact that they canceled a game that looked as awesome as Ragtag is just another reason to question their business decisions regarding the Star Wars license.

It seems that Disney is the real company that needs its head examined, as they have said that they are fine with EA's treatment of the Star Wars license (even with all of the bad press brought on by Battlefront II) and that they intend to allow EA to keep the license for the foreseeable future.

The next Star Wars game released by EA will be Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, which is due to come out in the 2019 holiday season. Fallen Order will be the true test to see if EA has learned its lesson, or whether they will bungle another Star Wars game.