The director behind both 2023’s Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order and this year’s sequel, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, is leaving EA and Respawn Entertainment to “pursue other adventures.” Stig Asmussen has been with the Apex Legends developer for about a decade, having worked as a lead environment artist and art director on the original God of War titles at Santa Monica Studio prior to joining Respawn in 2014.
Asmussen helped revitalize the series with the release of Fallen Order, which debuted to critical and commercial success. It was followed by Survivor earlier this year, a game that also outsold its predecessor and became the second highest-selling video game of 2023. Though it had a few initial performance issues on PC, Survivor has seen a number of updates that have improved the game, including DLSS support and the ability to play it at a stable 60 FPS.
Both games benefited from the team’s focus on crafting a story that placed its protagonist, Cal Kestis, at the center of a well-developed universe. The studio faced challenges, including overcoming Lucasfilm’s initial reluctance to greenlight a Star Wars game that didn’t feature multiplayer, and the aforementioned performance issues in the first few months of Survivor’s launch. But despite the challenges, Asmussen and his team were able to deliver an excellent two-part narrative that left fans wanting more.
That’s why it was so surprising to hear that Asmussen would be departing Respawn and the company, which he joined in 2014, to pursue other opportunities. EA did not provide a specific reason for his departure, but the company’s statement to Bloomberg reads that it was a mutual decision based on “the needs of the business.”
The statement also confirms that Asmussen will not be involved in a potential third game in the Jedi series. That is disappointing to hear, especially considering Asmussen’s comments in the run-up to Survivor’s release that he always envisioned a trilogy for Kestis’ adventure. It will be interesting to see if EA and Respawn can continue the story without Asmussen at the helm.
Staff Writer — James has been a huge fan of video games for as long as he can remember. He was once told that he could not make a career of it, and he set out to prove that person wrong. Now he writes about the industry’s biggest stories for IGN Unfiltered each day, and he enjoys talking with the world’s best game makers when he can.
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