Disney recently breathed new life into the Lucasfilm Games brand. At the same time it was announced that Bethesda was working on an Indina Jones game at Machine Games, and now the next surprise follows. As the news portal Wired reported, Ubisoft has apparently succeeded in securing the licenses for the production of an open-world game in the Star Wars universe. The development should therefore take over the Ubisoft studio Massive Entertainment, while the title should be based on the Snowdrop engine, which also comes from the studio. Julian Gerighty will take on the job of Creative Director. Gerighty was also involved in the development of The Division 2 and The Crew, which are also based on the Snowdrop engine.

The announcement is surprising, so far it was generally assumed that the exclusive rights to desktop and console titles with Star Wars reference were held by Electronic Arts. According to Wired, it is officially said that EA is valued as a strategically valuable partner in the past and in the future. However, they saw “room for more” and wanted to work with “the best studios in the industry”. EA still 2013 emphasized that they had the exclusive rights for 10 years, but according to internal reports Disney is no longer satisfied with the cooperation, which is why they decided to Contract 2023 expire.

It makes sense that Disney should focus more on its extra income, such as gaming. After all, the core concept suffers considerably in times of closed cinemas and amusement parks. The recent replacement of the CEO position with US American Bob Chapek may have triggered a rethink at the company. It remains to be seen when new information will be available for the planned Star Wars Open World title.