How Does Star Wars: Battlefront Tie into The Force Awakens?

Star Wars: The Force Awakens will be the biggest film of the year. If you doubt this, you need to go check your Star Wars history, because nothing else this year will come close to the mass hysteria (or lines) The Force Awakens will cause when it hits theaters on December 18, 2015. One month earlier, Star Wars: Battlefront will land on the PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC. While Battlefront clearly features the original trilogy versions of Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker and more, there’s a distinct link between Battlefront and The Force Awakens.

Unlike some other games and films, Star Wars goes in chronological order. Episode One happens first, and Episode Six occurs last. Therefore, Episode Seven takes place after the events of Episode Six, approximately 30 years after Return of the Jedi if you want to be more exact. We know Han Solo, Chewbacca, R2-D2, C-3PO, Luke and Leia all makes appearances in the new film (along with a slew of new characters), but that’s not the only link between the original trilogy and The Force Awakens.

Battlefront will offer DLC on December 1, 2015 for those who pre-ordered the game, or December 8 to everyone else. The Battle of Jakku takes place during the aftermath of the Rebel victory on Endor at the end of Return of the Jedi. During this time, the New Republic confronts an Imperial hideout on Jakku that doesn’t quite end well for those involved.

While Electronic Arts hasn’t shown much of The Battle of Jakku, you can get a glimpse of it in the second trailer released for The Force Awakens. At the beginning of the trailer you can see a Star Destroyer that crashed in the desert. It appears as though the ship has been out of commission for some time, and the fact that Jakku is a remote desert planet located in the Outer Rim would explain why the ship remained untouched for nearly 30 years.

If the Rebels won on Endor, you may ask yourself why the Battle of Jakku even matters. Like most wars, winning a single battle (no matter how important) generally isn’t enough to win the war. There are still small skirmishes that take place after such pivotal battles. In the case of the Battle of Jakku, this was a massive landscape of destruction that ended up shaping the future of the galaxy.

What you play through in the Star Wars: Battlefront DLC will allow you to find out which events lead up to the battle, and of course play through the battle itself. You’ll have to wait a few weeks to watch Star Wars: The Force Awakens to find out how such a battle ended up shaping the future of the galaxy, but without this key component to link Return of the Jedi to The Force Awakens, you will miss a decent amount of the story. Of course you can watch The Force Awakens without having played The Battle of Jakku DLC, and it’s likely the new film will make some sort of mention concerning the battle, but it’s always nice to have all of the details.

In addition to linking the events of the Battle of Jakku to The Force Awakens, there’s a little bit more significance to the battle. One of the new characters in The Force Awakens is Rey, the female lead you’ve seen in both trailers. Her home planet is Jakku, and it closely resembles Luke Skywalker’s home planet of Tatooine. It has recently been revealed that one of the new characters is a Skywalker, and the new trilogy of films will continue the Skywalker legacy beyond Luke and Leia. We’re not saying Rey is a Skywalker, and having any kind of information about her past and the past of her home planet is important, but it certainly seems interesting that Luke and Rey have similar backgrounds, and this desert planet is so important to the Star Wars mythos that it’s featured as DLC in Battlefront.

For a more complete look at Star Wars: Battlefront, check out the multiplayer modes that will be available, as well as the weapons and special abilities the Empire and Rebel Alliance will choose from.