DICE rolling out new FPS, PSP Battlefield 2

Although the PSP's launch lineup featured a variety of games, one genre that was conspicuously absent was the first-person shooter. In fact, gamers won't be able to lock and load the first PSP FPS, Coded Arms, until the end of June.

Today, though, Digital Illusions CE announced it is bringing one of the most successful shooter franchises of all time to Sony's portable platform. Battlefield 2: Modern Combat, the first console version of its wildly popular Battlefield series, will be released on the PSP in the first quarter of 2006. It will ship alongside the Xbox 360 version of the game, which will first arrive on the Xbox and PlayStation 2 in fall of 2005. The PC version of the game, simply called Battlefield 2, will ship in June.

But while DICE is developing the console and PC versions of Modern Combat itself, it's farming out development of the PSP edition "to Electronic Arts' English studio." It didn't specify which of EA's several UK-based studios, which include operations in Chertsey and Warrington, as well as Criterion Studios in Guilford.

"To Digital Illusions, licensing is an attractive solution, since the company doesn't have enough resources, personnel-wise, to produce the PSP version at the moment. We also get a larger product portfolio without spending money on extra development costs," said Digital Illusions' CEO Patrick Söderlund.

Besides the PSP Battlefield 2 licensing deal, Digital Illusions also revealed it is working on a new first-person shooter. The still-unnamed game is an all-new intellectual property "based on Digital Illusions' brand," and it will be developed at DICE's Canadian studio in London, Ontario. The FPS will be released for the PC in fall of 2005. It's unclear if it's the same Untitled game that will be released for the PlayStation 2, Xbox, Sony, and "MS Next-gen" in 2006 and 2007. DICE is also readying another unnamed game for release in 2007, solely on next-generation platforms. The complete release schedule is below.

Battlefield 2 - PC - June 2005
BF2 Modern Combat - PS2, Xbox - Fall 2005
Untitled FPS - PC - Fall 2005
BF2 Modern Combat - Xbox 360, PSP - Q1 2006
Untitled - PS2, Xbox, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3 - 2006