Why The Single Player Campaign Was Important For Titanfall 2

(Image credit: Respawn Entertainment)

Respawn Entertainment's big focus on this year's outing of Titanfall 2 is all about the single-player. There's an all-new campaign included in the new game and the developers explain why it was important to be included.

Gamespot reports that Titanfall 2 producer Drew McCoy explained to them during a closed preview session...

For us, single-player was a chance for us to expand on the universe we established in the first game. It was something that we as developers wanted to do. But we also wanted to bring more people to the party--those people who don't always want to go online and deal with the stress of the competitive game.

That's actually a really good point. One of the main issues with the first Titanfall is that it did have a campaign, but it was told through a series of missions attached to the multiplayer game. Some of the die-hard fans of the first game will defend that it had a pretty good story and that it did have a proper campaign mode. However, most people who enjoy campaign modes enjoy being able to play them via single-player means... offline.

Respawn went back to the drawing board because they weren't sure how to deal with the single-player content of Titanfall 2 at first. They thought about how they would have to remove many core elements to make it all play out in a way that would fit the structure of the narrative, but as noted in the Gamespot piece they managed to keep the parkour, titan combat, and loadout customization without sacrificing on the story.

The story, by the way, focuses on rifleman James Cooper from the Frontier Militia. He drops onto the battlefield and ends up taking control of the damaged titan BT-7274. It was revealed in the debut story trailer that BT-7274's original pilot was killed in action and Cooper had to take over because there was no one left.

Based on the interrogation scene of BT-7274, we get the impression that perhaps Cooper didn't make it out alive either, but gamers will have to play the game to find out exactly what happens on the planet surface and just what sort of harsh encounters the duo must survive as they attempt to get to safety.

In Titanfall 2, there's a much stronger focus on character narrative. Gamespot points out that there is entertaining banter between Cooper and BT-7274, as well as dialogue to help with world-building.

The most important part of the single-player, however, is the combat. And the Titanfall 2 demo showcased sandbox-style environments for players to run around in as they attempt to complete objectives. One of the commenters below the article draws a comparison to Mechwarrior 4, where it was possible to travel around the open, sandbox arena maps and complete objectives how you saw fit. If Titanfall 2's single-player campaign plays out centered around players being able to choose how to engage targets and objects within that sandbox, then it could end up being a much better game than some people are expecting.

While the hype for the original Titanfall was off the chain, things have scaled back a bit as Respawn shares the spotlight with another 2016 fall release, Battlefield 1. It wouldn't surprise me if one of the games end up getting delayed to ease up on the market cannibalization, but one thing is for sure: gamers are definitely excited about Titanfall 2 and this time the excitement is organic and not manufactured out of an inescapable boatload of hype.

The game is due for release on October 28th for the Xbox One and PS4.