WWE Reportedly Considering Deal to Have EA Develop its Future Games

With WWE 2K22 set to drop this week, the series' first mainline release since taking more than two years off to perhaps reinvent itself, a new report suggests there will especially be more eyes on its launch in the coming days.

According to a report by Fightful on Monday, WWE is considering a deal to bring its video game series line under the supervision of Electronic Arts.

"Multiple sources have stated that WWE has had preliminary discussions with EA about bringing the WWE games line over to one of the top gaming publishers in the world," the Fightful report reads.

According to Fightful, the overwhelmingly negative response to WWE 2K20 (2019), which released to scathing reviews and record-low sales, as well as alleged budget cuts leading up to each launch in recent years have been viewed as damaging to the WWE brand.

The WWE video game series has been developed and published by two different publishers over the years.

Its inaugural game, WWF SmackDown! (2000), was developed by Japanese wrestling game developer Yuke's and published by THQ — an arrangement that would run until 2012 with WWE '13.

With 2K taking over as the series' publisher with WWE 2K14 (2013), WWE 2K19 (2018) ultimately would be the last game in the series to be developed by Yuke's.

Yuke's has since pivoted towards working on a console game for WWE rival All Elite Wrestling.

WWE 2K20 was the first game in the series to be developed solely by 2K's California-based studio Visual Concepts, which is seemingly looking to run things back with WWE 2K22 with a redesigned gameplay engine and new controls.

WWE 2K22 is set to officially release on March 11, 2022, for PlayStation 4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S and Windows PC (via Steam). The "nWo 4-Life" and "Deluxe" editions were released earlier on March 8.