An XCOM-styled game that takes place in the Star Wars universe—Star Wars Zero Company—sounds like a no-brainer in hindsight. However, according to Gregory Foertsch, Bit Reactor founder and former art director on Firaxis’ XCOM series (as well as Marvel’s Midnight Suns), the project has more interesting origins. In an interview with PC Gamer, he revealed that, after 22 years at Firaxis, where he spent a lot of time making strategy games, he wanted to stay in the same genre for his future projects as well. This became possible thanks to a phone call from the late Vince Zampella.
“I’d left Firaxis after about 22 years of working there and making strategy games my whole career,” said Foertsch. “I knew I wanted to stay in the strategy, the tactics space. I’m sitting in my office with the lights out and my computer on, my wife’s asleep, my kids are asleep, and the phone rings,” he continued. “It’s this number that I don’t recognize. For some reason, I answered it, and the voice on the other end said, ‘Hey, Greg, this is Vince Zampella. I heard you have a game you want to make. Can you tell me about it?'”
The phone call would lead to Foertsch describing a brand new tactical strategy game. Zampella asked him if it could be based in the Star Wars universe. “And I said, ‘Sure, different game, but yeah, absolutely.’ Meanwhile, I’m thinking, ‘This is insane, right? Like, this is crazy. It’s Star Wars.’ And so I said, ‘Yeah, I can do that.’ And Vince was just like, ‘Pitch me.'”
Star Wars Zero Company was officially unveiled in April 2025, shortly after a series of leaks revealed images and its official title. The turn-based tactics game is coming to PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S in 2026, and is set between the events of Episode 2: Attack of the Clones and Episode 3: Revenge of the Sith, and will likely involve small-scale skirmishes happening amidst the war between the Republic Army and the Trade Federation.
Shortly after the unveiling, Foertsch had spoken about how Star Wars Zero Company will feature a grittier atmosphere, bringing up Rogue One and Clone Wars as the key points of comparison.
“The Clone Wars offers us a lot of the tools we need mechanically for the game, which is great,” explained Foertsch. “But it’s also interesting, we haven’t seen that kind of zoom level in the Clone Wars, and so it’s a pretty unique spot to land that also offered a lot of great options for us from a game design perspective, to tell a really great story with some great mechanics added to it. That really opened the door for us to do a lot of things.”
He was joined by creative executive Kelsey Sharpe, discussing the nature of the Clone Wars story, which allowed for optimistic themes while still maintaining the grounded atmosphere of the war.
