Electronic Arts has agreed a partnership with Nexon to produce free-to-play Titanfall Online - but before you get excited, the project is currently slated to be released for Asian markets only.
It’s not the first time that EA and Nexon have worked together - EA hired Nexon to create the free to play FIFA Online 3, currently the number one online sports game in Korea.
Titanfall was originally developed by Respawn Entertainment, whose co-founders Vince Zampella and Jason West were responsible for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, before an epic bust-up led to ongoing legal action between the pair and former bosses at Activision. After jumping ship to rival publisher EA, West and Zampella delivered their vision of life after Call of Duty. Released last year, Titanfall was an online-only first-person shooter that saw teams of players battling it out among war-torn urban battlefields, free-running across the environment and calling in hulking mechs to aid them.
“With its pilot vs. titan gameplay, among other innovations, Titanfall is a uniquely intense game experience,” said Nexon President and CEO, Owen Mahoney. “We look forward to working with the talented teams at Respawn and EA and leveraging Nexon’s free-to-play expertise to deliver a new and engaging online game based on Titanfall to the Asian market”.
Titanfall Online will be a remake of the original game on Xbox One, brought to PCs in Asia with a free-to-play business model slapped on top. No release date has been given.
Meanwhile, Respawn is currently hard at work ona sequel to the original. Instead of being exclusive to Xbox on console like before, Titanfall 2 - or whatever it ends up being called - is planned to be a multiplatform title.
Continue Play’s Editor-in-Chief, Dale Morgan, was impressed by Titanfall, awarding Respawn’s debut effort a solid 8/10 when he reviewed it last year.
“Titanfall is amazingly good fun. It certainly isn’t perfect, but as the first release from a new studio – albeit one made up of seasoned genre veterans – it’s a bloody good effort,” Dale wrote in his Titanfall review. “It’s addictive, incredibly attractive, and displays a good awareness of tight mechanics and gameplay balance. It’s a shame that it doesn’t contain a dedicated single-player mode, as such a campaign would have been a better way to show off the narrative that Respawn clearly were at pains to convey; but from a gameplay point of view, it’s a compelling experience that will keep you coming back for more.”
