A new interview with the lead developer of Star Wars: Republic Commando reveals two promising pitches for a potential sequel that were once being dicussed at LucasArts.
Over the years, there have been many video games set in the Star Wars universe that went beyond normal expectations for licensed content. These titles often received at least one or two sequels — something that can’t be said for squad-based FPS and cult favourite Republic Commando.
However, it seems that this wasn’t always the plan. A new interview with lead developer of Republic Commando, Brett Douville, suggests that LucasArts was home to two separate pitches for a potential sequel, before the studio underwent a company-wide ‘reboot’ that scuppered these plans.
The first would have seen players tasked with executing Order 66, acting as a parallel to what we saw occur in Revenge of the Sith. For the uninitiated, Order 66 refers to Senator Palpatine’s command for the clone army of the Republic to systematically wipe out any living Jedi Knights, as a precursor to Imperial rule.
The other pitch would have centred around the character of Sev from the first game. The campaign of Republic Commando ended in a cliffhanger, with the character left behind on Wookie homeworld Kashyyyk and likely killed in the ongoing combat taking place there.
However, the proposed sequel would see Sev escape from this situation and continue his military career with the nascent Rebel Alliance. One tagline being thrown around read “every Rebellion begins with a single soldier,” which would suggest that Sev would play a big role in the canon established by the game.
Of course, these discussions were being held before the Star Wars franchise was taken over by Disney. The company is clearly intent on keeping a tighter grip on the effect that extended universe content has on the larger world being fleshed out by new cinematic releases, which are set to release annually for the foreseeable future.
That being said, we’ve already seen an established Star Wars video game franchise resurrected in the form of last year’s Battlefront. Rumours persist that a new Republic Commando might be in the works, but at this point EA is remaining silent about future plans for the license.
A potential Republic Commando sequel likely wouldn’t follow either of the plotlines conceived by LucasArts several years ago. Despite this, it seems increasingly clear that the franchise might not be quite as dormant as it’s been presumed to be since the original game released in 2005.
[Source:- gamerant]
