EA has announced that Apex Legends Mobile will close, development on Battlefield Mobile will cease and developer Industrial Toys is to be shut down.
As reported first by GamesBeat, it’s a triple blow for EA’s mobile division. We reported yesterday that Apex Legends Mobile looked like it was in trouble, with revenue having dropped dramatically in the last few weeks. Respawn said today:
“At Respawn, we aim to provide players with games that are consistently outstanding. Following a strong start, the content pipeline for Apex Legends Mobile has begun to fall short of that bar for quality, quantity, and cadence. It is for this reason, after months of working with our development partner, that we have made the mutual decision to sunset our mobile game. Although disappointing, we are proud of the game we launched, are grateful for the support of the Apex Legends community, and are confident that this is the right decision for players.”
“Respawn and the Apex Legends team remain excited about mobile as a platform and look forward to new opportunities to serve players there in the future.”
GamesBeat’s report also states that development will stop on Battlefield Mobile, and the studio behind it, Industrial Toys, will close. It was working with Battlefield studio DICE on the game, which was in soft launch in five markets on Google Play.
On the Battlefield closure, EA added: “As the industry has evolved and our strategy to create a deeply connected Battlefield ecosystem has taken shape, we decided to pivot from the current direction to best deliver on our vision for the franchise and to meet the expectations of our players.”
“We remain highly committed to unlocking Battlefield’s enormous potential. We’re hard at work at evolving Battlefield 2042, and are in pre-production on our future Battlefield experiences at our studios across the globe.”
[EDIT 1/2/23: EA boss Andrew Wilson later explained the decision a little to investors – report here.]
