Electronic Arts has confirmed that they will be releasing a new Battlefield game in 2018. Battlefield will be replacing Anthem in 2018 and Anthem will be pushed to a 2019 release. The news broke during EA’s Q3 earnings call today. Battlefield will be released this October, while Anthem, Bioware’s newest IP, will be released in the first quarter of 2019. `Electronic Arts denied that the delay was due to development problems with Anthem, but rather their decision to release a new Battlefield game this fall. Considering how successful Battlefield 1 was, who can blame them? Because Anthem is a brand new IP, EA wanted to give the game the best chance to succeed, so it was pushed back to Q1 of 2019, which is a smart move.
Kotaku reported that the delay was because of development issues, but EA refuted that claim. EA CFO Blake Jorgenson had some choice words, probably directed at Kotaku’s story while speaking to the Wall Street Journal.
“It’s not a delay. People are trying to create a story.”
Anthem was first debuted at E3 2017 and has been met with much excitement from the gaming community. This is Bioware’s first major IP since the Mass Effect series and although Andromeda didn’t live up to expectations, Anthem looks amazing.
There is no information on what timeframe this new Battlefront game will take place in, but considering the success of Call of Duty: WWII it would be smart to have it take place during the World War II era and explore avenues that haven’t been shown in a video game before.