Battlefield 5 is in the making and slated for release sometime in 2016, according to Dan Vaderlind, development director at DICE.
Right after the success of Star Wars: Battlefront, Vaderlind is "moving on to another project," which he hinted as the next "Battlefield."
Now that we've shipped Battlefront and a part of the team continues to work on it, I am moving on to another project, the next Battlefield..
— Dan Vaderlind (@mrVaderdan) December 11, 2015
With that said, the game developer isn't entirely shifting its focus on to Battlefield 5. The company and publisher seem to have a lot in store for the Star Wars shooter, continuing to pack in more and more DLC to follow up the recent Battle of Jakku, including free maps and Star Cards.
Moving forward, Blake Jorgensen, CFO of EA, announced the company's plans for the next Battlefield, confirming the upcoming launch of Battlefield 5. On that note, he said that the game will return to the traditional military setting that it's known for, instead of the cop theme used on Battlefield Hardline.
"What we've said is that our intention over the next couple of years is to have a first-person shooter as one of the core titles. This year, obviously, it's Star Wars Battlefront. Next year, it's another Battlefield title," Jorgensen said.
What's interesting about these events is that they contradict the statement that Patrick Söderlund, executive vice president of EA Studios, gave last year, when he said that the publisher had no plans to annualize the Battlefield franchise.
There is unfortunately no official release date yet, but EA said that it's aiming for a holiday 2016 launch.
It's also worth mentioning that the pattern of releasing each Battlefield series every two years will be broken with the upcoming installment, as Battlefield 3 rolled out in 2011, Battlefield 4 in 2013 and Battlefield Hardline earlier this 2015, with Battlefield 5 in 2016 instead of the expected 2017.
