Star Wars Battlefront 2 is free on Epic right now

EA's exclusive reign over Star Wars game draws to a close with the news that Ubisoft are making an open-world Star Wars game, making this a curious week for the Epic Games Store to give away Star Wars Battlefront 2. For the next seven days, you can grab a free copy of Dice's for all sorts of authentically Star Wars-y zapping and swording in singleplayer and multiplayer modes. It has come a fair way since it launched crammed full of loot box crud. Once again, waiting for a freebie pays off.

Oh, but to be clear: this is 2017's Star Wars Battlefront 2, not 2005's Star Wars: Battlefront 2. Only a fool would confuse those two.

Our former Matt (RPS in peace) quite liked the singleplayer campaign, saying it "absolutely succeeds at immersing you inside the Star Wars universe". The multiplayer was another matter, not least of all because it was riddled with a mess of loot boxes and currencies. EA ripped that out after the backlash and then released content updates for years, adding new maps, modes, characters, and vehicles from across the timeline of the films - including murderous ewoks. I'm honestly not sure how it ended up. Opinions, anyone?

While it's not clear exactly what's gone down between EA and Disney, whether their 10-year exclusivity deal is ending early or what or why, the two aren't parting ways yet. Lucasfilm Games said yesterday that they have "a number of projects underway with the talented teams at EA". But it's hard not to imagine that Disney weren't super-pleased with Battlefront 2 being the flashpoint for a loot box backlash that resulted in several countries deciding many loot boxes are illegal gambling.

Hie thee to the Epic Games Store before 4pm next Thursday to grab a free copy of Battlefront 2 for keepsies. This here is the Celebration Edition, which unlocks almost all the cosmetics.

The next free game after this, from January 21st, will be Galactic Civilizations III. That's the 2015 sci-fi 4X strategy game by Stardock, which Adam said was a good'un.