Free Radical is a British game studio by former Rare developers best known for the "Time Splitters" series and almost as famous for the PlayStation 3 exclusive "Haze" debacle. Free Radical went bankrupt shortly after the release of "Haze," and the cancellation of "Star Wars: Battlefront 3" may have been the fatal blow. Star Wars: Battlefront 3 was an ambitious game that mixed strategy on the ground with dogfights in space: on the ground you could control your character in huge battles, but you could also board a ship and zoom off into space. The video above is an internal showreel leaked in 2008.

A few years into development, Free Radical decided that the project needed to be delayed and consulted LucasArts. It was a cruel decision, one of the former developers said this week, especially considering that "Battlefront 3" was canceled when it was "two yards from the finish line. It was an absolute crime."

Ever since news and images of the project, including fascinating ones like the "dark" Obi-Wan Kenobi concept art, leaked out, fans and those involved in it have wondered what might have been. Michael Barclay, then a junior designer at Free Radical, is now the lead designer at Naughty Dog for games such as The Last of Us: Part II and Uncharted Credited: The Lost Legacy," among others. Asked about the "one you missed" in your career on the game developer's Twitter feed, Barclay replied (opens in new tab): "[Star Wars Battlefront III] was going to be really great, but it's two yards from the finish line. It's absolutely criminal that it was cancelled by the way. Gamers have no idea what they were robbed of."

Impressive internal footage is one thing, and does not make a finished game, but Barclay's sentiments are probably shared by anyone who loved "Time Splitters" and wondered what this last great Star Wars triumph might have been. Battlefront 3 was conceived during Jim Ward's time as president of LucasArts, and was an attempt to reboot some of LucasArts' classic properties: this strategy has been used with "The Force Unleashed" and the abortive "Indiana Jones" action game with varying degrees of success, including. [Free Radical co-founder David Doak (open in new tab) said, "They had good ideas about technology, but they were very ambitious. And they seemed like nice people." The fact that the hired help was 'Star Wars' made a difference, even though we had been pretty disappointed at 'Haze' and didn't want to work for hire as a rule. It was also a wonderful tonic for the free-radical troops. It was a great tonic for the development department because you didn't have to go very far into the development department to find someone with Star Wars shit on their desk. It was a marriage made in heaven."

Free Radical worked on Battlefront 3 from 2006 until it was cancelled in 2008. 'It was very ambitious because you had to get a population of that size in that environment,' he said. In fact, it was doing so well that we ended up making two of them, and we were allowed to do some really interesting things with the mythology."

[10 [However, LucasArts lost faith in Ward's "reboot" and he left the company in early 2008. New management immediately set about cutting LucasArts' spending in half and canceling the project. Free Radical had reached a milestone, but LucasArts simply stopped paying.

"I saw some people saying, 'How can you cancel something that was finished?'" said Doak, "To be fair, [Battlefront 3] wasn't finished, but it was far from a car crash and had some interesting ideas. They got a call from upper management about restructuring and had to save a certain amount per year. Game over. "

Free Radical's "Star Wars: Battlefront 3" will always be "might-have-been". However, what is left about it is not that it was cancelled because it looked bad, but because some bean counter decided it was too costly a project. For more on the events leading up to Battlefront 3's cancellation and Free Radical's bankruptcy, click here (opens in new tab).

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