All Articles: Star Wars: Battlefront II

Electronic Arts has announced that Star Wars: Battlefront II‘s revamped Progression System will “begin rolling out” on March 21. In a complete reversal from the pre-release Beta, the new Progression System ensures that any item impacting gameplay can only be earned through gameplay, and “will not be available for purchase.”

The developers provided more details about the update on the game’s official website:

With this update, progression is now linear. Star Cards, or any other item impacting gameplay, will only be earned through gameplay and will not be available for purchase. Instead, you’ll earn experience points for the classes, hero characters, and ships that you choose to play in multiplayer. If you earn enough experience points to gain a level for that unit, you’ll receive one Skill Point that can be used to unlock or upgrade the eligible Star Card you’d like to equip.

You’ll keep everything you’ve already earned and unlocked. You will keep all of the Star Cards, heroes, weapons, or anything else you have already earned. What you have earned will still be available to use with this update regardless of how much or little progress you have already made.

Crates no longer include Star Cards and cannot be purchased. Crates are earned by logging in daily, completing Milestones, and through timed challenges. Inside of these crates, you’ll find Credits or cosmetic items, such as emotes or victory poses, but nothing that impacts gameplay.

A secondary update to the Progression System will appear in April, allowing Star Wars: Battlefront II players to purchase cosmetic items with real money. But an earnable in-game currency, Credits, can also be used to unlock these customization items.

Star Wars: Battlefront II is now available for the PC, PS4, and Xbox One.

The run-up to Star Wars: Battlefront II‘s launch has been filled with more fireworks than Luke’s trench run through the Dark Star in the first film. Many fans were disappointed in the beta, and many reviewers took issue with the game’s progression system, which seemed overly-dependent on purchasing in-game currency with real money.

Rather than ignore the outcry, Electronic Arts and DICE responded to these complaints with a statement about the future of the game from DICE’s General Manager, Oskar Gabrielson. According to Gabrielson, the developer and publisher have decided to turn off the online storefront for Battlefront II’s in-game currency. For now, players will only be able to unlock the game’s more advanced features (including the ability to play as Darth Vader) through gameplay.

However, EA and DICE also announced plans to restore Battlefront II’s microtransactions after they rework the game’s progression system:

[A]s we approach the worldwide launch, it’s clear that many of you feel there are still challenges in the design. We’ve heard the concerns about potentially giving players unfair advantages. And we’ve heard that this is overshadowing an otherwise great game. This was never our intention. Sorry we didn’t get this right.

We hear you loud and clear, so we’re turning off all in-game purchases. We will now spend more time listening, adjusting, balancing and tuning. This means that the option to purchase crystals in the game is now offline, and all progression will be earned through gameplay. The ability to purchase crystals in-game will become available at a later date, only after we’ve made changes to the game. We’ll share more details as we work through this.

Star Wars: Battlefront II is now available for the PC, PS4, and Xbox One. Gabrielson’s full statement can be found on Electronic Arts’s official website.