J.J. Abrams is the Star Wars film franchise’s only hope, but as a major gaming property, it could rot away in the belly of a sarlacc for the next 1,000 years.
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In First Assault, teams of up to eight Stormtroopers or Rebel fighters would face off against each other on familiar Star Wars planets. We contacted LucasArts and will update this story with its response.
LucasArts planned to reveal the game with a closed beta in September, but Disney put the developer’s projects on hold after acquiring it along with Lucasfilm and Star Wars in October for $4.05 billion.
The Kotaku report goes on to suggest LucasArts was hoping to justify the release of Star Wars: Battlefront III based on the success of First Assault. The Battlefront franchise is a multiplayer shooter take on Star Wars. Developer Pandemic produced the last one for Xbox, PlayStation 2, and PC in 2005.
Apparently, LucasArts is already testing vehicles for Battlefront III.
Disney has previously spoken of its desire to create more social and casual games based on Star Wars, and it’s possible that First Assault will never see a release date.