Battlefield 5launched in November of 2018 and whilethe finished product was pretty good in its own right, the game itself quickly failed to sell like EA had hoped it would at market. Mere weeks afterBattlefield 5released, it was already seeing many heavy discounts at retailers in the pursuit of selling more units. All in all, it was a rough release for both EA and DICE.
Today, EA has explained a bit more about why it thought thatBattlefield 5struggled out of the gate in its quarterly financial call. Electronic Arts CEO Andrew Wilson touched onBF5almost immediately in the call and addressed why he thought the game didn’t perform like they thought it would. Wilson cited that thedelay of the game from its original October release date to Novemberas one of the biggest causes for whyBattlefieldsuffered. He also stated that failing to release without the game’s promised battle royale mode was a mistake.
“Unfortunately, the later release date meant the game launched deeper into a competitive holiday window where heavy price discounting was a big factor. In addition, we also made the decision to prioritize other features, including a single-player experience, at launch over a battle royale mode,” Wilson said of theBattlefield 5launch. “As a result of these decisions, we struggled to gain momentum and we did not meet our sales expectations for the quarter.”
Later on in the call, EA also acknowledged that it stumbled out of the gate with the reveal ofBattlefield 5and as a result, they were never able to catch up to the competition such asCall of DutyandRed Dead Redemption.
Despite the mistakes made though, EA continued to state that it believes in the future ofBattlefield 5and envisions it doing well in the long-term. Next month’s addition of the battle royale mode Firestorm was specifically pointed to as a reason why they believe the game will bounce back. “We’re responding to our players inBattlefield 5by delivering the content they want most into the live service, on a cadence that will fuel the community with fresh new experiences for many months to come,” Wilson said.
Lastly, EA cited the ever-massiveBattlefieldfanbase and community as yet another reason why they thinkBF5will have a long tail. Currently,Battlefield 1continues to boast a user base of around 4 million players whileBattlefield 4still actively has around 2 million players. EA believes thatBattlefieldplayers stick around for a long time, and they expect that to be no different withBattlefield 5.
Honestly, I’m very interested in seeing howBattlefield 5does as we move forward in 2019. I’m looking forward to seeing how Firestorm plays and what other new features DICE continues to add over time. Whether or not any of these new additions to the game though will help it bounce back from a poor launch though remains to be seen.
Battlefield 5is out now on PC, PS4, and Xbox One.
