EA discusses console market predictions and lofty Star Wars Battlefront ambitions

EA held its quarterly earnings call last night and as usual, some interesting information came out about the publishers plans and view of the market. We already know that Bioware's new IP has been pushed back of FY 2019, but it seems EA has also been surprised by growth in the digital games market and console market. The company has also set some lofty ambitions for Star Wars Battlefront II this year, which will have ‘three times the content' of the original game at launch.

Let's start with EA's expectations for Star Wars this year. According to CEO Andrew Wilson, EA is currently expecting to sell a massive 14 million copies of Battlefront II between its release and the end of March 2018. The company hopes the sequel's increased amount of content and “very robust” update plan will help drive that, though more details are due to come at E3.

As far as the console market goes, it seems the current generation is doing quite well in its fourth year. According to EA's predictions, we will end 2017 with 105 million PS4s and Xbox One systems out in the wild. The company didn't make specific number predictions for the Nintendo Switch, but EA does plan on supporting the console with games beyond FIFA.

To top it all off, the company seemed surprised by the growth in digital purchases amongst console gamers and now expects 40 percent of its sales next year to be digital.

KitGuru Says: EA got off to a bad start with the original Battlefront but if this one can truly impress, then perhaps it will meet its lofty sales goals. It will certainly have a good user base to target, with 105 million consoles set to be out in the wild by the end of the year.

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