New Open-World Star Wars Game Coming From Ubisoft's The Division 2 Dev

Ubisoft has announced it is partnering with Lucasfilm Games on a new Star Wars title. The development effort will be led by Massive Entertainment, the studio behind The Division series. Although little is known about the game, it has been described as "a new story-driven open-world Star Wars adventure."

The unnamed Star Wars title will be developed on the Snowdrop engine, which was most recently used by Massive Entertainment for The Division 2. Julian Gerighty, who was the creative director of The Division 2, will serve the same role for the Star Wars title.

"This is a lore that we love, and we want to do it justice with a game and story that bring both lifelong and new fans on an immersive and outstanding journey that will stay with them for years," he said.

Both of Massive Entertainment's The Division titles have been games as a service, inviting players to return frequently to engage with daily tasks or new content, earn loot and develop characters, and play with or against others in multiplayer. It's unclear whether the Star Wars title will follow this same format, but Ubisoft CEO Guillemot has described the project as being part of a long-term collaboration with Disney and Lucasfilm Games.

"The vast Star Wars lore is an incredible source of inspiration for our teams," commented Guillemot. "This is the beginning of a long-term collaboration with Disney and Lucasfilm Games, and we are pleased to be working hand-in-hand to build upon the incredible legacy of Lucasfilm to create a game that we know Star Wars fans will love."

Douglas Reilly, VP of Lucasfilm Games, added: "Ubisoft [has] a unique talent for crafting immersive worlds so we're thrilled to work with them on this project. We are inspired by the passion and talent of the team at Massive, and together we share a vision for the type of original stories we want to tell with our players in this expansive galaxy. They have the creativity, experience, and community understanding to bring awe-inspiring authenticity, depth and innovation to this new Star Wars game."

Lucasfilm recently announced its gaming efforts would exist under the new Lucasfilm Games umbrella. Along with Ubisoft's Star Wars title, Machine Games, the Bethesda studio behind Wolfenstein: The New Order and Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus, as well as their expansions, is working on a new Indiana Jones game.

The announcement of this game might be a surprise to some, as it was believed that EA had the exclusive rights to developing core Star Wars games, based on its 10-year deal with Disney from 2013. It appears the terms of that deal may have changed, but Disney will continue to work with EA in the future on Star Wars.

"EA has been and will continue to be a very strategic and important partner for us now and going forward," Disney games boss Sean Shoptaw told Wired. "But we did feel like there's room for others."

According to the report, Lucasfilm Games might be looking to partner with even more studios, outside of EA and Ubisoft. "We get no shortage of folks knocking on our door, wanting to play with our toys," Lucasfilm Games boss Douglas Reilly said.

For the Star Wars game from Ubisoft, Shoptaw said he's hoping it can help the Star Wars brand connect with players on a longer timeline than TV or film.

"That really leans into why we are doing what we're doing, because these are massive entertainment experiences that last many hours, much longer than film," Shoptaw said. "When people are paying $70, or they're paying good amounts of money to spend time with your content and play your game, you've got to reward that investment."

Massive is also working on a new Avatar video game for release in 2022. Whether or not the announcement of the Star Wars game impacts the Avatar title remains to be seen.