A massive Squad mod transforms the game into an unofficial third Star Wars Battlefront title with massive maps, online chat features, and plenty of characters and vehicles from the vast Galaxy Far, Far Away. Squad is a Steam-published multiplayer tactical shooter from Canadian developer Offworld Industries that was released in 2015. It serves as a spiritual sequel to Project Reality, a mod for 2005's Battlefield 2 that added several new game modes, factions, and maps from across different historical conflicts like World War II, the Vietnam War, and the Falklands War.
Coincidentally, the game Squad owes most of its influence to was developed by DICE, the studio behind 2015’s Star Wars Battlefront reboot and its 2017 follow-up titled Star Wars Battlefront II. While Battlefront II was met with a cold reception from fans due to a perceived over-reliance on microtransactions, later content updates added new worlds, characters, and game modes to the experience. Indeed, Star Wars Battlefront II would eventually be regarded as one of the better titles to come from EA’s ownership of the Star Wars gaming license by the time DICE announced the final Star Wars Battlefront II Battle of Scarif DLC in 2020. Star Wars Battlefront II’s popularity would be bolstered further by a successful free giveaway on the Epic Games Store early last year, but EA and DICE have maintained that there will be no further content for Battlefront II nor any follow-up games.
In the meantime, a massive mod titled “Galactic Contention” transforms Squad into a spiritual successor to the Star Wars Battlefront series, as noted by YouTuber OperatorDrewski in a recent playthrough video. According to them, Galactic Contention drastically alters the look of Squad to more closely resemble the Star Wars universe, replacing all the in-game models and maps with characters, vehicles, and locations from the mainline Star Wars movies - including specialized Jet Troopers and Commander Droids. It has been available to download on Steam for years, with frequent updates adding new assets and features like the ability to communicate with teammates through voice chat to an even greater extent than Battlefield 2042 or Star Wars Battlefront II.
Galactic Contention might be the closest thing Star Wars fans get to a new Star Wars Battlefront game for quite some time, as EA reportedly canceled a previously-planned Battlefront 3 to allow DICE to work on correcting the many technical issues surrounding last year’s Battlefield 2042. Even after EA announced its newest slate of Star Wars-based games in January (including the upcoming Star Wars Jedi: Survivor), Battlefront 3 was not among them. This apparent cancellation of the DICE-developed Star Wars Battlefront series seems to have been planned as far back as Battlefront II’s final support period, as game director Dennis Brannvall confirmed that there was further Star Wars Battlefront II DLC centered around the volcanic world of Mustafar and fan-favorite The Clone Wars characters Ahsoka Tano and Assajj Ventress, but it was ultimately scrapped.
While EA and DICE might not be releasing an official Star Wars Battlefront sequel any time soon, Squad’s Galactic Contention mod serves as a reasonable and perhaps superior substitute thanks to its vast wealth of content and extra features. Only time will tell when Star Wars fans will next be treated to an FPS experience set in a Galaxy Far, Far Away, but at least there are plenty of unofficial games and mods out there to provide some tactical space action in the meantime.
Source: OperatorDrewski/YouTube, Steam