From Jango Fett to the 501st, mods are coming to Battlefront in full force
In the past several days, a storm has been rising in the Battlefront community: Mods are finally becoming a reality for the PC edition of EA’s 2015 game.
This recent awakening is thanks to advancements on the Frosty Tools Suite, a collection of tools that enable the editing of EA’s Frostbite engine (which was used to build Battlefront). The Frosty Tools currently enable users to swap out character skins and unlock hidden menu items in Battlefront. The tools also enable deeper editing of the game’s files, which could lead to some interesting mods down the road.
I’ve already highlighted some of the cool things that are now moddable, such as the novatrooper and Hero Blast. However, even more customization options have arrived since I first wrote about mods on Friday.
The clips below and images come from Cinematic Captures, who has been sharing some awesome creations over the past couple days. The reskins below are all made by Clonetrooper163. To start, here’s a reskinned Boba Fett in the flavor of Jango:
An image of the infamous bounty hunter:
Next up is this tweak to stormtrooper armor that makes the 501st a possibility:
Continuing on with the 501st theme is this stormtrooper commander skin inspired by the Force Unleashed games:
Then there’s also Luke Skywalker and Han Solo in stormtrooper armor, something that was originally planned for the game, but was eventually cut:
There’s also a few others on Cinematic Captures’ YouTube channel, so I definitely recommend checking those out!
Beyond reskins, the officially unreleased Hero Blast mode has been unlocked. While this mod isn’t public just yet, it will arrive at some point soon, along with a Star Wars Battlefront modding subreddit. Here’s Elliot from BattlefrontUpdates’ first time playing the mode:
Skirmish has also been seeing some tweaks. A user on Redditor reported that they were able to alter the game’s AI in order to make the offline mode more intense. This could potentially open the door to more unique Skirmish mods, but we’ll have to wait and see, of course.
If you are wanting to download Battlefront mods, the Nexus hub for Battlefront is growing daily. The site swbattlefrontmods.eu.nu is also hosting mods. Note that you’ll need to install the Frost Mod Manager in order to actually make use of the mods. This is a helpful tutorial for getting started. Again, these mods are exclusive to the PC version of the game; PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions aren’t moddable.
For those that want to make mods or help the community out, there is a Discord server available.
While this all sounds cool note that Battlefront producer Paul Keslin stated on Twitter that mods aren’t officially supported by EA or DICE:
Technically any "mod" is a breach of our rules and can be subject to penalties.
— Paul Keslin (@TheVestalViking) July 2, 2017
Florian Le Bihan, who focuses on competitive gaming at DICE, added:
Where you're more likely to be at risk is usage of these 3rd party programs in multiplayer games (not private / custom games)
— Florian Le Bihan (@DRUNKKZ3) July 2, 2017
So it’s worth keeping this in mind if you do choose to download and install any mods for the 2015 edition of Battlefront. Hopefully, EA won’t crack down on the various mods that don’t give a player a competitive advantage in the game (such as the local customization mods, unlocking Hero Blast or altering Skirmish).
It’s also worth adding that EA/DICE have been very receptive to some modding aspects in the past, such as with the Cinematic Tools. That mod enables content creators to have greater freedom when capturing in-game moments and creators that use it have frequently been featured on official social media channels connected with Battlefront.
Mods are an important piece within the gaming world and I really hope they are given the chance to flourish with Battlefront. We still see new mods come to the original Battlefronts, so this could be a chance for the 2015 game to live on into the future. I’m also really impressed with what I’ve seen from the modding community so far, so I’m keen to see where it goes!
What type of mod would you most want to see in Battlefront? Share in the comments below, or ping SWGO on Facebook or Twitter.
(All images in this post are from Cinematic Captures’ Flickr page.)
