It's been such a long, winding road for Star Wars.

No, not Episode VII. We're talking Star Wars: Battlefront III, the fabled, canceled-and-false-started third entry in the beloved tactical shooter series. It's had a tumultuous journey, but with the shuttering of LucasArts, the baton was handed to EA Games' DICE — the creators of Battlefield. The Swedish developer is hard at work on the game right now, bringing it up to speed with modern-gen gamer expectations.

A teeny bit of concept art was shown off at E3 2014, but aside from that, EA has been cagey regarding details and when we might finally get our hands on the new, numberless (hey, it worked for Tomb Raider) Star Wars: Battlefront. Until now.

During an EA investors call on October 28, 2014, company CEO Andrew Wilson announced that DICE's new Battlefront is going to be released in time for Christmas next year (2015). Wilson also noted that this means that there won't be a Battlefield game in 2015; EA is holding off on that until holiday 2016.

Hmm... Where have we seen that "Holiday 2015" date before? Oh right, it's that other thing that's happening with "Star Wars" in the title.

Of course it's no coincidence that the new Battlefront's timeframe matches up with the release date for Star Wars: Episode VII. The smart money says not to go getting your hopes up for game levels that take place in the settings of the new movie. But then again, you never know. Lucasfilm certainly has its act together these days, with its Star Wars story group overseeing every product that's released to ensure a continuity across platforms that's 100% canon. So it's possible.

With the new Star Wars: Battlefront aiming for a launch that's just a little over a year away, it's reasonable to suspect we might get our first look at in-game footage in the near future. At the very least, it should have a major presence at 2015's E3.

Photo: DICE/EA