In a peculiar, but welcome turn of events, the highly-anticipated Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order will be powered by Unreal Engine 4. Although EA has its own proprietary game engine called Frostbite, representatives from EA have confirmed that the upcoming Star Wars title will be built on the Unreal Engine developed by Epic Games.
Neither publisher EA nor developer Respawn have issued any official statements regarding the decision, but many in the gaming community can more or less understand why. Frostbite is known to cause several issues and is notorious for its instability. One of the most recent examples of its sub-par performance as a game engine is with the release of Anthem.
Although Anthem was one of the most anticipated titles of the year, its launch and post-launch performance left much to be desired. Bugs, connectivity troubles, stability issues, and performance problems all kept Anthem from potentially being one of the best video games of the year. While the folks at EA and BioWare are desperately trying to breathe life back into the game with some post-launch CPR, fans and developers alike are pointing their fingers at the Frostbite engine. Indeed, the Frostbite engine has proven to be a troublesome game engine, most recently with Anthem but also with past EA games like Mass Effect: Andromeda which arguably flopped in 2017.
Possibly hoping to avoid another fiasco, especially with a franchise as grand and well-loved as Star Wars, the decision was made somewhere along the line to use Unreal Engine 4. Developed by Epic Games, the Unreal Engine 4 is arguably the most popular and developer-friendly game engine. It powers everything from indie games to AAA titles and is used on PC, consoles, and even VR.
In any case, many in the gaming community are relieved, and some even quite happy, that Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order will be powered by Unreal Engine 4. It seems both the players and the developers themselves see this decision in a positive light.
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order will be officially unveiled at the Star Wars Celebration in San Francisco later today. Fortunately, even if you’re not present at the festivities, you can catch the event live on Twitch in the stream embedded above.
