Electronic Arts Still Pushing For ‘Star Wars Battlefront II’ Microtransactions

Electronic Arts still wants to include microtransactions in “Star Wars Battlefront II.” This is in spite of the fact that the company is getting harsh criticism from fans of the franchise and despite the fact that its new game is being labeled as a “Star Wars”-themed online casino game designed to trick young players into spending cash.

On Tuesday, EA chief financial officer Blake Jorgensen maintained a firm resolve when he talked about “Battlefront II’s” controversial microtransactions system at a Credit Suisse conference. According to him, they are “not giving up on the notion of MTX (microtransactions),” as first reported by Eurogamer.

However, Jorgensen admitted that they still haven’t decided on when would be the best time to re-introduce the feature to the game. For now, they are observing fans and examining aspects of the game that may need the microtransactions. Jorgensen said these are necessary for them to know the best time to roll out the feature to players.

“We’re really watching how people are playing the game. We’re trying to understand are there certain modes where MTX may be more interesting than not? What are the consumers saying about it? How are the consumers playing the game? What do the metrics look like? We’re learning and listening to the community to decide how best to roll that out in the future,” Jorgensen said.

Jorgensen also justified their perception about microtransactions and why they thought of introducing it to the game in the first place. “We pulled-off on the MTX because the real issue the consumer had was they felt it was a pay-to-win mechanic. The reality is: there’s different types of players in games. Some people have more money than time, and some people have more time than money, and you want to always balance those two.”

Nonetheless, Jorgensen said that the microtransactions controversy is a “great learning experience” for them. He then added: “We are trying to run the company with an ear to the consumer at all times, not only in the testing phase but when the game is up and running ... If we're not making mistakes along the way and learning from them, that's when you should worry about us. But our view is these are great opportunities for us to continue to tune the game, to adjust things.”

Meanwhile, Polygon pointed out that EA made the situation worse by blaming the issue on the consumer. As per the outlet, Jorgensen was wrong when he said that the problem surfaced because fans felt that the microtransactions system was a pay-to-win mechanic. “This attempt to blame the customers for not liking how EA tried to sell power is part of the reason why EA continues to make the situation worse. The reality is that the company created a game that benefitted players who paid, because who has time to play for the numbers of hours it would have taken to unlock the characters everyone cared about?”

Polygon went as far saying, “You weren’t reacting to a problem, you created the problem and then tried to sell us the solution. These responses to the disaster of your game prove you’re still trying to blame other people for your greed, and maybe the person most responsible can be found in the mirror. Don’t blame the players for not wanting to buy their way out of a situation you designed into the game hoping to increase microtransactions.”

“Star Wars Battlefront II” was released on Nov. 17. From the looks of things, the controversy is hurting the sales of the game. As a matter of fact, the game has not made it to the top 100 list of Amazon’s best-selling video games as of this week. The U.K. market has even seen a 61 percent decline in physical sales after the first week compared with “Star Wars Battlefront” from two years ago, as pointed out by CNBC.