Development legend and Halo creator Marcus Lehto was supposed to work on the next generation of Battlefield and is now resigning
Marcus Lehto is no longer working at EA: This bad news is spreading like wildfire through the Battlefield community.
The veteran developer and co-creator of Halo was brought on board shortly after the disastrous release of Battlefield 2042 and ran his own studio at EA, Ridgeline Games.
EA suddenly deleted from profile
The drastic step had become known via social media. For example, as the Battlefield expert DANNYonPC discovered, Lehto had suddenly deleted all references and mentions of EA and the Battlefield brand from his Twitter profile:
Seems like @game_fabricator has left EA, removing all references of battlefield from his bio, problems are starting already? pic.twitter.com/kqzsWCnTl6
– DANNYonPC (@DANNYonPC) February 24, 2024
Shortly afterwards, the suspicion was confirmed: his LinkedIn profile now clearly shows that Lehto has left EA. However, there has been no statement or formal announcement of his departure
Why was Lehto so important for Battlefield?
Many fans interpret Lehto’s sudden departure as a setback for Battlefield: As game director, he was supposed to set a new course for the brand and had already obtained fundamental fan feedback in 2022
At the time, he indicated that he wanted to bring back the dark mood of earlier parts of the series, as well as the dynamic destruction and focus on vehicles such as jets. His studio Ridgeline was to expand the overarching identity of Battlefield and create a kind of coherent Battlefield universe.
What does this mean for the future of Battlefield?
There are now concerns in the community as to whether and in what form Lehto’s studio will continue to exist and work on Battlefield at all.
Ridgeline Games currently has no open positions according to the careers page and the studio’s art director had already left in January 2024. DANNYonPC comments: “Are the problems already starting now? “
A new Battlefield game is currently in the works at developer studio Ripple Effect (formerly DICE Los Angeles), which EA says will build on the foundations of the series.
The head of the project is Respawn boss Vince Zampella (Star Wars Jedi, Apex Legends, Titanfall). Former Battlefield main developer DICE in Sweden will only be providing support in the future. It is not known when the new project will be presented. Meanwhile, BF2042 will start Season 7 in March 2024.
