Here’s Every Game Shown Off During EA Play’s Digital Conference

Electronic Arts had its annual EA Play conference Thursday, with of course a change to digital format due to social distancing guidelines.

The company had a good amount of announcements and gameplay segments, with the highlights being an in-depth look at the upcoming game, Star Wars: Squadron, and the announcement of a new Skate game in early development. However, many of the teases felt far too early to be announced, and hotly anticipated titles, such as Mass Effect developer BioWare’s next project, were barely hinted at.

Here’s everything announced from the event:

A new Skate is in development

Developers: Parry and Chung, unknown studio
Release date: TBA
Platforms: TBA

Skate creative director Cuz Parry and and game director Deran Chung took the digital stage to announce that a new entry in the beloved skateboarding videogame series was early in development. They didn’t confirm nor deny the game was the long-requested Skate 4, following Skate 3’s release almost exactly a decade ago in May 2010. So it could be that, but it also be a remake, remaster or mobile game. We simply don’t know.

Next-gen teasers

OK, so EA technically did show new games in development by Criterion Games, BioWare, DICE and Motive Studios, all of which contain some of the best game development talent in the world. However, that comes with a big asterisk: All the footage shown is extremely early in development, as in, the backgrounds often aren’t colored in at all.

Star Wars: Squadrons

Developer: Motive Studios
Release date: Oct. 2
Platforms: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC

By far the most in-depth look at a game of the presentation, Star Wars: Squadrons had a deep dive into everything from its presentation and story to its mechanics and strategy. The game will be playable in VR, and all versions will support cross-play with each other, so you can play together regardless of platform.

Apex Legends coming to Switch, adding cross-play

Developer: Respawn Entertainment
“Lost Treasures” collection event date: Tuesday, June 23
Platforms: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC; Switch port coming Fall 2020

Respawn game director Chad Grenier showed off a ton of new content battle-royale Apex Legends players can look forward to playing within just a few days, and fortunately, new platforms will be able to play the game for the first time come Fall 2020. Apex Legends comes to Steam and Switch in that time, as does cross-play between the five platforms.

A TON of EA games are coming to Steam

Following a trailer talking about the importance of diversity in The Sims, EA went on to announce that a staggering amount of its games are coming to PC game launcher Steam, seemingly giving up on its dream to have its own proprietary launcher, Origin, used exclusively for its PC titles. The list goes on: The Sims 4, Titanfall 2, A Way Out, Dead Space 3 and more are all available on the platform right now. The EA Access program, a subscription service where players gain access to new and old EA titles with the price of admission, is also coming to Steam in the Fall.

EA Sports in next-gen

Introduced via FaceTime by football quarterback Lamar Jackson, EA showed off its biggest cash cows, its annual EA Sports games, supposedly running on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X. Unlike many high-fantasy games, sports titles are relatively realistic and small in scope, letting the developers go to an insane amount of detail impossible in larger-scale titles. Especially when we might be looking at a world without in-person sports for a while, these next-gen offerings could act as attractive alternatives.

It Takes Two

Developer: Hazelight Studios
Release window: 2021
Platforms: TBA

Eccentric film and game director Josef Fares’ previous two games, Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons and A Way Out were widely praised for inventive storytelling, so there’s reason to keep an eye on his and Hazelight’s new co-op adventure, It Takes Two.

Lost in Random

Developer: Zoink Games
Release window: 2021
Platforms: TBA

The studio behind smaller EA titles such as Ghost Giant, Flipping Death and Fe, Zoink Games is developing a Tim Burton-esque game, Lost in Random, which seems to take typical tropes of randomization in videogames and integrate them into the narrative.

Rocket Arena

Developer: Final Strike Games
Release date: July 14
Platforms: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC

The first game by Final Strike Games, Rocket Arena is a colorful character shooter in which two teams of three duke it out with guns, jetpacks and lots and lots of rockets.

For more on EA’s games, check out our impressions on The Sims 4’s latest eco-friendly expansion and Dante Douglas’ opinion on EA bringing out BioWare’s worst.