According to Procera Networks, the recently released beta for Star Wars Battlefront caused a major spike in broadband traffic for a fixed broadband network in Europe. In fact, on October 8, when the beta was released, traffic went up 30%.
That stat is more impressive than Chewbacca’s skills at holographic space chess, and not just because it shows the international fervor for Star Wars-related content. Major spikes in traffic are usually caused by major events like the Super Bowl, but this was caused exclusively by gamers downloading large files –the beta was 11GB–off of EA’s network.
It seems likely that networks around the world experienced spikes around the release of the beta. It’s a reminder that increased device usage isn’t the only concern for expanding broadband networks; they need to accommodate spikes in traffic for gaming too.
Star Wars Battlefront comes out on Nov. 17, 2015.