Titanfall won't support eSports play at launch

Titanfall, the upcoming game from a team of former Call of Duty developers, is not planning to support official competitive gaming tournaments, at least not with the first iteration of the game.

"That really hasn’t been our focus," Respawn Entertainment community manager Abbie Heppe told the Major Nelson blog. "Our focus has been to get a really solid foundation out. A game that is really fun, that will attract players, and keep them playing for a really long time."

Though next month's Titanfall may not include all the eSports functionality some players might want, Heppe teased that a future iteration of the game might, depending on feedback.

"That said, we have a TON of interest from the eSports community, and I know we're not going to be shipping with all the features that they're going to be wanting in the game, but we're in our first iteration," Heppe said. "A lot of the games that have developed good eSports features and the competitive community are ones that multiple iterations to get that done and to build in those things."

"So while that couldn't be a priority for us here, we're definitely listening to all of the feedback," she added. "We're interested in what competitive players think when the game ships, and it's definitely something we’ll look into, but not something that's been our primary focus."

This isn't the first time a member of the Respawn Entertainment development team has teased a future installment in the Titanfall series. Cofounder Vince Zampella said last fall that additional games in the series could come to non-Microsoft platforms. Meanwhile, publisher Electronic Arts sees a bright future for the franchise, with CFO Blake Jorgensen saying last week that the series will be around for a "long, long time."

Titanfall launches March 11 for Xbox One and PC, while the Xbox 360 iteration will come later on March 25. For more on one of 2014's biggest games, be sure to check out GameSpot's ongoing coverage of Titanfall as part of our newly launched The Next Big Game feature.