I was a programmer and level designer for the project Galaxy In Turmoil from the moment the project transitioned from Unity to Unreal Engine 4 till the cease and desist from Lucas Arts.

Why do projects like this post updates and information?

Surely by now everyone knows they'll be hit by a cease and desist. I suppose it makes good portfolio work?

Well not really. Back then the plan was to keep the project secret and release it when it was playable. The updates of the project was my idea to try and attract skilled people who would be interested to lend a help. As we learned later when the management met with Lucas Arts turns out they were actually interested about the project and would've helped, but their agreement with EA didn't allow them so they had to close it.

So EA are the villains of the piece. Big surprise.

Ehh not quite. Since they are based in the US if they don't defend their IP( I mean it's Disney, but exclusivity and yada yada) it makes sense for them. Also since both games would be somewhat spiritual successor one would draw the attention from the other it made a lot of sense.

Well now that EA no longer has the license can’t you just pick up where you left off? I am sure someone at Lucas Arts can see an opportunity here.

Well to be honest this has crossed my mind multiple times, but still would need a team to do it. There was one salty kid who wanted to work on the project before, but didn't that actually (with the help of someone with more experience) actually attempted a remake (can't find the video) and there is also a Legacy mod that ports the assets from BF 3 to the original Star Wars Battlefront 2 that is a very well done mod. To get back to the topic if I got the chance I would probably give it a try, but for now I would rather focus on other projects.

What is the mod that ports the battlefront 3 assets?

If you decide to start back up, it may be worth reaching out to LucasArts and asking if the cease and desist still stands now that EA no longer holds exclusivity, and if they’d be willing to help as they were before

The mod is called Star Wars Battlefront III Legacy. About the cease and desist we shall see.

What about now since EA aren't involved with Star Wars anymorr?

Well I don't think many from the original team would be enthusiastic about another try given how the last one ended.

I mean you could ask prior permission from LucasArts and then go from there if they gave a thumbs up. It would be amazing to see.

Maybe, but having now Battlefront 2 from EA we would have to make something more than just a remake. Not to mention one part of the team probably still supporting Galaxy In Turmoil and the other moving to their own projects.

Why didn't you just make original models instead? Of course it would get cease and desist if you use copyrighted stuff, so why did you?

Well the whole point was to bring Free Radical Design Battlefront 3 as it was supposed to be. We didn't want something that played like that. Also we didn't had the staff to create models, animations and textures. Creating a new IP was already being discussed before the steam publish deal so there is that.

So make a whole game with original models/IP, and build it so you can easily swap out all models/textures for "Player made" ones, then release a torrent of the star wars assets silently and anonymously let people know where to get it.

Make the original IP stuff shitty, who cares

Mod support was planned as far as I know for this reason after the case and desist, but I left after that and I don't know if they added it.

Couldn't create models, animations or textures? That's most of the game... How did any expect this to work out?

We resorted to using models, animations and textures out from the leaked build of the game. In time if we found out people who cared enough to make models and textures we would replace them. Also not to mention the unreal marketplace is full with animation assets.

from the leaked build of the game.

Normally I'm quite opposed with corporations needlessly shutting down fan games (it's surprising how many people in here conflate trademark law and IP law), but I would never touch leaked assets of an existing company...

Well funny thing while many projects usually get in trouble with the assets this time it is was the opposite.

How was it the opposite? You did get in trouble with the assets.. That's literally why you got a cease and desist.

Nope. We got cease and desist because EA had exclusivity deal. From the management meeting with Lucas Arts

"During our meeting, there was a fair share of both lighthearted and serious moments. LucasFilm informed me that although they would of been open to the idea of negotiating a license for Frontwire to work on the Star Wars IP, that they are not able to due to their contract with Electronic Arts (EA).

"I was told that Lucasfilm had already spoken with EA about Galaxy in Turmoil and that EA expressed no desire in letting our project continue. Their main concern was due to the possibility of Galaxy in Turmoil taking away attention from their Battlefront franchise."

And people would've eaten you guys alive for making an asset flip. Go low poly if need be, watch some YouTube like imphenzia, ask young talented kids if they'd like to help an indie project, anything that would be on a path to success. Not just plan to rip-off one of the biggest giants in entertainment and expect nothing to happen. It's a good thing it didn't get released, a cease and desist is the best thing that could've come out of this.

Clearly you knew nothing of the topic before commenting so let me shed some light. The original game we were re-making was called Star Wars Battlefront 3 made by free radical design. The game was closed before it could see a proper release because of disagreements between the developer and publisher. Our aim was to make the game 1:1 as much as we could with assets from the version that was leaked. Believe me people would chew us out more for using low poly models rather than using the original. At the end both the developers who made the models and the License holder to the assets didn't have problems with us using them. We had talent that started building models from scratch because the original models were Xbox 360 models, but the cease and desist came because the License holder had an exclusive contract with EA and EA didn't want this project out there. If not for that contract the license holders said they would be glad to for both sides to find a way for the project to happen.

I don't think people would necessarily chew you out, it depends what you promise your game to be. You marketed it as a 1/1 replica, essentially shooting youtself in the foot in terms of alternatives. You could have marketed it as "massively inspired by gameplay of X" and it would have probably been fine.

Yes, people will miss the graphics. But if you're clear about what your game is meant to be I doubt they'd be angry about it at all.

Well yeah, but as fans ourselves who waited for a long period for that game to come out and then hearing the news, and watching more and more information getting leaked at how amazing this game would've been we decided the game would be perfect the way it was. At some point we had discussions as to adding new features depending on how the others saw the game, but until then the 1:1 was our main goal. And I mean as much as possible since both projects were built on different game engines

I was going off you saying you had no way to make models, textures or animations. That's all. Now you say you had talent working on models. So I'm out.

Clearly you can't read. I said we had talent near the end of the Star wars Themed project near the time we got cease and desist, but ofc we still used the original models as placeholder, but please see yourself out. Just watch out for the door.

Models, animations and textures aren't "most of the game". Almost every game made by a studio starts out with placeholder assets (sometimes from the marketplace) and artists are hired to make custom ones later on.

Yes, games start out with placeholder assets. Not stolen assets.

Well like I stated for probably the 4th time today(not counting how many before that) the assets were placeholders and would be replaced when we got the talent needed. By the time we had people with 3D modeling skills the cease and desist hit us( and no it wasn't because of the assets). We didn't get complaints from neither the original developers neither from Lucasfilms regarding the assets. Also considering few Devs actually shared assets with us can't say we stole them.

How long would you say was still needed until getting to a release build? 1 year? 2 years?

I think if we kept our course and didn't waste time with management, back up plans and most importantly Steam Publishing deal I think the game would've been somewhat playable by 2019.

Thank you.

A follow-up, im not too aware of the steam publishing deal. Do you have a say in the "cut" they take off the top?

Well to put it straight the management really wanted the game to be published on Steam. There are different theories to why they wanted that, but I won't go into further details for now, but let's just say that the moment the project acquired a deal with steam to publish the game there that's when the rest of us realized the Star Wars part of the game was dead in the water. Conveniently some part of the team were secretly working on the new IP and a new build of the game using a different source project(same engine)

Does that new game fall under the cease-and-desist as well?

Also… I hate to be that guy, but how was it not obvious to the entire team that this project couldn’t be for-profit if it used unlicensed IP? Did the publishing deal plans kinda get snuck under the radar until it was too late?

Well the game was in no way build for profit. The steam publishing deal was only to be able to publish the game on Steam for free. We would be better committing a real crime rather than trying to sell a Star Wars game on Steam.

It sounds like they purposely gathered eager creators for a game idea they knew was too good to be true, then as soon as they presented their idea and got the steam deal they backtracked and had plans already to implement a new game in its place. I won't assume any of this to be true, but in simple terms they landed a large deal with smoke and mirrors and wanted the developers to take the heat when the game is released and everyone is wondering what happened with the original plan.

All the while your ambiguous managers recieved a hefty cut of the deal and you get to deal with the developer issues.

And if there's anything I've learned, its that reddit communities will always blame the developers first before the parent company. So your head would be on the chopping block first before your managers.

Well the original plan was to build the Star Wars game. Now after management came that's where one of the main programmers left and they started using a marketplace project. Can't say for sure myself, but I am sure the time invested after the management team was formed was the smoke and mirrors and the steam deal was to kill the project faster, but hey that's just my take on it.

I am struggling to see why a managing team would purposely push for a Steam deal to kill the game. Is it just to make sure the game has a full obligation to cease and desist? This sounds like Star Wars (Disney) worked an inside job to sabotage a fan made game that may have blowed them out of the water. I really feel like I'm misreading something here. But hey, i appreciate what you're doing thanks for shedding some light. I didn't know this was going on.

It would made more sense for them to kill a free game and turn it into a project they could earn money from. I don't even remember how did we agree to assign them as managers. One moment we have a community manager and the next moment we had like a CEO(that escalated fast) . The original project was not gonna be monetized in any way and they probably saw that as a waste of time and effort.

Oh and quick edit. If it was a Disney plan they could just send us the cease and desist letter way earlier.

I see. Yea the quick switch probably influenced certain programmers and such to jump ship. Plus with star wars being the main vein of the game its easy to see the legal troubles. It's definitely leaning to purposeful malcompliance. But what is weird is that they chose to go about it this way instead of just an early legal C&D order.

Honestly we have many youtubers and streamers that make content that is temporary and still flood their bio with merch and patreon.

If a fan based game needed help in getting investments and such, or if there was simply not a whole lot of money making in-game, i wouldn't have minded seeing merch or even patreon to help support updates, DLC, and payroll. That feels a lot more productive and valuable than to launch a triple A title, slam a 20 dollar skin in it, and call it a money maker. There's much more healthy ways to pull money that is actually necessary for game development. But many days we can't trust it, and then you and your team has a great game but no wants for the money, cause you know the players you make the game for have already been burned.

I'm rambling, apologies, it just sucks to see a developer really trying to create something for the players but because of the economy and such they can't move anywhere for a better financial environment.

Well for most of us it was mostly the learning experience and actually building something as a team. Sure financial help would be nice, but getting a game out there was our main goal. Like someone else mentioned here it would be a good portfolio piece too. And yeah most games that were born from passion turn out great(not all) and a lot of AAA games are just yada yada last game slightly better textures slaps 2x the price of the previous title. We see many companies that we remember for great games turn to greed and new ones that are still trying to keep the gaming industry focused on entertaining the customers and not just take their wallets. In the end of the day I understand that they have to earn money, but there are ways they could do that and the players would be happy. And to be honest now it's a great time for developers to put their projects out there thanks to Kickstarter, patreon and etc(as long as they are original xD). The team behind RenegadeX that remade a favourite game of mine for free and they still keep updating it with maps and soon a new expansion is what motivated me in the first place to do something out of passion and love for a certain franchise and they are proof that financial backing isn't always that important into making a quality product.

I don't understand the whole "steam publishing deal" thing. Steam doesn't "publish" any games (Valve does for Valve games). Any dev can self publish or go through a publisher on the other hand to publish themselves on Steam. Sorry if it's just semantics here though.

Below you mention that the deal was to have it put on Steam for free, but compared to like the recoupable 100$ fee, that seems like a weird hassle to go through or wait for.

I guess I don't really expect an answer. I'm just confused and maybe I missed something.

Well it's kinda my bad for misspelling it. It was more like a distribution deal that allowed the project to be put on Steam.

“After ongoing discussion between Valve Representatives and myself, Valve/Steam has agreed to ship Galaxy in Turmoil to it’s millions of users for free. While this is undoubtedly a big step and accomplishment for Frontwire Studios itself, it’s an even bigger step for you, the community.

“By Steam agreeing to ship Galaxy in Turmoil we are not only adding more validation and awareness to the project by opening up the game to a whole new audience, we’re also cementing Frontwire Studios’ reputation as an up and coming developer with the opportunity to now publish our games on Steam in the future. This will help us ultimately achieve our goal of making the games that you, the community want.” (quoted from an article)

Why did you switch from Unity to UE4? How was the transition?

Well here I really don't have an answer. When I first discovered the project it was on Reddit and it was made by a user named TheDarkSithLord. After volunteering to help in any way I can that's when he told me he had plans to use Unreal 4 and would leave the rest to me. If I had to guess it was because Unreal Engine 4 was more easy to work with. Now about the transition I had 0 experience with unity and I just started my transition from UDK to Unreal Engine 4 so it was quite challenging. I didn't use the stuff he already made for unity instead I used assets extracted from the leaked Xbox build of the game we were remaking.

For certain types of games, UE is easier to create something working, IMO. I've created a race game in both UE and Unity (not anything worth releasing, lol) and it took half the time in Unreal. I'm not knocking Unity, I think it is far stronger for RPGs, I just happened to be making a race game. I wouldn't release either version, they are like Mario Kart if the AI was A*, which it is (recalculated every 30s, so if it messes up, can be really off, but gives players a real chance to win - at 0s they will probably never win).

Yeah I agree with you on this one. Unity isn't a bad engine, but Unreal Engine 4 is just more accessible.

Haha. That’s perfect. Unofficial Lucas game. Assets lifted from an EA game. What could go wrong?

Well if EA didn't had an exclusive deal.

From the interview: During our meeting, there was a fair share of both lighthearted and serious moments. LucasFilm informed me that although they would of been open to the idea of negotiating a license for Frontwire to work on the Star Wars IP, that they are not able to due to their contract with Electronic Arts (EA).

I really wish Lucasfilm would give multiple publishers a shot at making Star Wars games. Giving it to just EA has severely stagnated the amount of Star Wars games we get and I hate it sooo much. I greatly miss the old days when we used to get lots of Star Wars games.

Well that's what they are doing now. We got KOTOR remake, Eclipse and who knows how many new Star Wars games on th horizon thanks to EA losing their exclusivity.

Oh, they finally lost it?!? When did that happen?

Not sure.

https://www.pcgamer.com/ea-isnt-slowing-down-on-star-wars-games-despite-losing-exclusivity-ceo-says/

Also assets lifted from EA game ?. The assets where from Free Radical Design Battlefront 3 that was in development way back in 2008, but it's always fun to read comments like these.

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Well when we spoke with few of the original developers they didn't mind. Some of them gave us folders with assets, and other information about the game. If we had the talent to make our own we would.

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Well like I stated for idk how many times. At the end even Lucasfilms were open to negotiate with us working on the project. We didn't just say **** you we making star wars game now. We talked with both the original developers and the license owners. The reason we talked with Lucasfilms later was we needed something to show and not just go and say can we make SW game trust us we can.

EVEN IF Lucas gave you the greenlight, you were still using copywrited assets that you may or may not have had real permission to use.

I mean if LucasArts/LucasFilms owns the assets and if they gave the greenlight that would pretty much be all we need to complete the project. Of course if our team managed to attract 3d modellers and etc we would replace all the assets. Someone from the team actually build the Coruscant map simply from using the original collision mesh as a reference.

Why do people think they can use proprietary IPs when they have no contract with the property owner? How did you think this game would be released given the strong grip Disney had over the IP?

Well here was the difference. We had contact with the devs who were working on the game and after we built a prototype to show we got in contact with Lucasfilms to try and find a way. Problem was the EA exclusivity deal. Believe me we didn't just hope EA wouldn't see the project and let us do what we wanted to.

Hope you learned that devs are not copyright owners, outside of small indie studios, that is.

We knew that already. Like I mentioned earlier we wanted a prototype to show to Lucasfilms to try and persuade them. Well we did kinda , but cough exclusivity deal

Are you allowed to change assets and continue the project? Like make it Space Fights: Combatzone 3 or w.e lol. Change all the art so it doesn't look like it, change sounds, etc.?

I am pretty sure that's what the rest of the team did. But yeah as long as the assets were ours and we didn't use any copyrighted material without permission we were allowed to continue on the project. The project is currently on Steam with the same name Galaxy In Turmoil. Can't guarantee you will enjoy it tho.

What is your favorite game ever made and why is it Starcraft II?

I would pick command and conquer (almost any of them) everyday instead of StarCraft 2. Now StarCraft brood war is another story.

[In thick Russian accent] Acknowledged

[in the same Russian accent] Agreed.

I remember going hard on Red Alert when I was younger, but that 1v1 Ladder has my heart. Broodwar is a bettwr story and game, but terribly unbalanced in multiplayer.

Weirdly enough the only game from both franchises that I actually enjoyed the multiplayer was the forbidden CnC4 Tiberium Twilight. I was too much of a casual single player enjoyer to survive every multiplayer tactic they used on me. Tho I did enjoy StarCraft 2 and Tiberium Wars multiplayer when it was 2 v 2.

Yeah, especially CC4.

Story was meh, but I really enjoyed the multiplayer.

Would the ships all be original designs after LucasArts’ CnD?

I didn't participate much after the cease and desist, but I think the game that became Galaxy In Turmoil after that is using original assets. The game is free on Steam so you can check it out.(I didn't)

Wait the game you worked on is out? And its free? And you havent played it? The fuck is happening, am I still high?

Well after the case and desist (actually a little before that) me and the management didn't really get along. First problem for me was why did we really need management in the first place considering we were a small dev team. Second the game is basically a re-skined project from the marketplace. The only thing that they have different is vehicles. The rest plays almost the same as that mentioned marketplace project. Maybe they changed that.

Interesting. Yeah the way you talk about it, the whole managment situation does sound weird.

Well one could say the management would be better off killing the project faster so they could release their own IP after all the hype and free publicity they got from the game being Star Wars, but that is just my opinion

what are some common traits level designer/programmers share?

Hmm that's a good question. I would say getting annoyed at the 3D modeling team when we could really use the assets for testing.

Why would you ever move away from Unity? Unless you needed serious high performance.

Well like I stated earlier the decision to move from Unity to Unreal was made before I joined the project by person who started the project. I still think the switch was made because Unreal Engine 4 blueprints are easier to understand.

This actually came up tonight while hanging out with a couple friends:

Do you know what it costs for a developer to license unreal and how does that work? Also since you were a fan project how were you able to use it? Is it open source to some extent?

Well to quote from the Unreal Engine 4 faq

This license is free to use and 100% royalty-free; you can use it to create internal or free projects, or to develop linear content or custom projects for clients, but not for publishing off-the-shelf offerings.

For commercial products

Unreal Engine End User License Agreement for Publishing: This license is free to use and incurs 5% royalties when you monetize your game or other interactive off-the-shelf product and your lifetime gross revenues from that product exceed $1,000,000 USD. ...

Interesting. Thanks for the reply!

No problem. Just in case I advice you to check their FAQ

https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/faq#:~:text=Unreal%20Engine%20End%20User%20License,that%20product%20exceed%20%241%2C000%2C000%20USD.&text=There%20are%20also%20options%20for%20custom%20licenses.

Do you have any project related or otherwise you are currently working on?

I have few projects I am working one. One of them is trying to port a project from UDK to Unreal 4. The other is a kinda like Space MMO, but that is on hold.

You said the reason for its fall was because of the EA exclusivity deal. And now that the deal ends in 2023, is there any chance that this game will continue to be developed with proper support and licensing?

Edit: I didn’t realize the game had rereleased in its own form away from Star Wars to avoid the CnD. Along with the original team leaving a lot of the project behind.

Well to approach Lucasfilm I would have to find volunteers again(or hire people) and would need to prototype a demo that we would have to present Infront of them. Their deal already ended with Lucasfilm allowing other studios to make star wars games, but I don't see myself or someone else returning to this project.

[deleted]

I thought it was cool the moment my alias appeared on GameSpot, but yeah being noticed by Lucasfilm is something else.

I was following this from the beginning, but kind of slowed my excitement when it changed so drastically.

Why did the game change its core function so immensely, surely the mechanics were not also part of the CAD?

Well for starters they stopped using the source projects on of the developers built when it was a Star Wars project and they bought a project named generic shooter from the marketplace cause It had multiplayer and other stuff ready. Apart from that didn't try the game after the cease and desist so I have no idea how it plays(probably like that template)

Thank you! It’s not great 😅 I played it for 20 minutes then abandon

I didn't expect anything else to honest. That means the game is still using this as its core.

Tragic for what was close to being a great sequel

I think there was a chance that even if we were allowed to work with the Star Wars IP that it would end like the game you played, but just looking star wars.

Possibly, but a fan can dream.

Thank you for all your work you put into the game pre-CAD

Thank you for being a fan and supporting our original dream. Maybe someone will pick this idea and build what we couldn't.