It was recently revealed in an interview with an ex-developer from Respawn Entertainment that Titanfall 3 was in development for almost a year. It was ultimately scrapped, with the studio pivoting and instead using the developed assets to manufacture Apex Legends, which is now one of the most popular battle royal games in the world. In the interview, the developer – Mohammad Alavi – explained that Titanfall 3 was well and truly underway when orders came down the wire to scrap it all.
This news came following a ten-month development window that had seen the team piece together a story, a playable product, and new technology to support the project. Reportedly, some of the ‘higher-ups’ in Respawn Entertainment fell in love with PUBG – arguably the founding father of battle royale games – and they decided to pivot. To that end, they created a large, open battle royale map and stuffed it full of Titanfall 3 content.
Would You Have Rather Had Titanfall 3?
Image Credit: Respawn Entertainment
In the interview that was published on YouTube by The Burnnetwork, Alavi spoke candidly about how the Titanfall 3 project devolved.
‘… we worked on Titanfall 3 for ten month, right? I mean, we had like, new tech for it, we had multiple missions going ,we had a first playable, which was like, on par to be just as good if not better than whatever we had before, right?’
He expanded by highlighting what sparked the change over to Apex Legends.
‘… the multiplayer team was having a hell of a time trying to fix the multiplayer … That was a great multiplayer, but that’s not something I (could) continually play for two years, right? So, we were trying to fix that from Titanfall 1 to 2, trying to fix it from Titanfall 2 to 3, and the multiplayer team was like, just dying. And then PUBG came out.’
From then on, development pivoted to an all-new battle royale product, with a concept surfacing in the form of a large map backed up by Titanfall 3’s multiplayer classes and assets. It was released in 2019 to an overwhelmingly positive reception and history was made, but would some players have preferred Titanfall 3?
Changes in Secret
In Alavi’s breakdown, he revealed that the change was so sudden that Electronic Arts executives weren’t even aware of the pivot for six months after the ultimate decision was made. It was likely for the better, though. Following years of progress, it was revealed that studio chiefs have plans to keep Apex Legends running for twenty years, milking it for all its worth.
It has also grown to become widely regarded as one of the top esports games out there, with tournaments taking place every year that boast considerable cash prices – like the Apex Legends Global Series.
Is it a good thing that the studio’s developers found themselves hooked on PUBG and cancelled Titanfall 3? If they hadn’t, Apex Legends never would have seen the light of day.
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