DICE on Battlefield: Annual releases “will eventually kill the franchise”

Developers DICE feel that if they release a Battlefield game every year, they will have less ideas to implement in their games each year, and that would ultimately kill the franchise. That’s not their “business plan”, they say.

“The business goals for us are not to release a game every year,” Battlefield series producer Patrick Bach said in an interview with Gamerzines.

“If we were to release another big Battlefield title next year, that would mean that we’d have less than a year to build it, and that would mean that we’d have to have another studio building it for us, which would mean it wouldn’t have that DICE seal of approval, which would mean they’d just have to release a copy of the game we just released.

“EA would never force us to release a game every year. I think that would dilute the vision of the franchise, and you will eventually kill the franchise by doing that.”

When asked if, like the CoD series, developers could be switched every alternate year, Bach said it could be done ‘in theory’ but ‘that would be the day.’ He said, however, that releasing regular expansions like Bad Company 2: Vietnam was something the devs were looking to do.

“What we noticed with Battlefield: Bad Company 2 was that if you spend enough time on making an expansion pack like Vietnam there’s enough content to make it feel new and fresh. It’s not only a map pack, it’s weapons and vehicles, and it makes the game feel fresh again,” he said.

“I think that’s a more healthy way of expanding on the game experience. It’s not a new game but a twist on your old game, and I think that’s a healthier way of looking at a franchise rather than just trying to cram every single last penny out of it.”

Battlefield 3 releases in October on the Xbox 360, PS3 and PC.