The effects of the pandemic never cease. According to a report out of Polygon this morning, Electronic Arts has tapped Criterion to assist with ensuring Battlefield 6 gets delivered this fall.
Laura Miele, EA’s Chief Studio Officer, provided the following statement:
“[Battlefield] is shaping up great, the team has been working incredibly hard, they pushed hard last year, and yes, we have been working from home,” Miele told Polygon. “And it’s hard; it’s hard to make games from home, and the [EA DICE] team is fatigued a bit.
“We have a great game and some incredible potential with this game,” Miele added. “We’re playing to win; we’re playing to put a great Battlefield game out in the market.”
Miele also touched on the the more downstream effects of the teams working from home including morale and burn-out due to not being engaged with fellow creators:
“Making games is one of the more sophisticated, and complicated, forms of media that exists, and it requires creative energy and connection to team members,” she said. “I think that there’s been, you know, fatigue and some burnout, working from home. A lot of that even has to do with just the needs that people have with their families; some people are taking care of their kids at home [while they work]. So our productivity is not as high, and then the creative connection and creative energy isn’t as high when they’re working from home.”
Our Take
This is very understandable and while NFS fans may be upset, sadly the on-going situation with game development from home continues to take its toll. There’s no doubt that Battlefield 6 will be EA’s biggest release of the fall so this doesn’t surprise us at all. We simply hope BF6 delivers on the experience fans of the franchise have long been waiting for.
