Those wonderfully witty folks over at Star Wars: The Old Republic Strategies have posted this fascinating nugget of information that points to a possible (unconfirmed) codename for Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic which would appear to honour the maker himself and his hometown in Northern California. The game itself is a single-player, narrative-driven action RPG from Arcanaut Studios and Lucasfilm Games, set “at the end of the Old Republic,” and while ‘Modesto’ likely has no story or plot relevance, naming the birthplace of the man who created the sandbox that we’re still playing in half a century later may well hint at efforts to evoke the Lucasian feel that has thrilled multiple generations.

The latest Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic speculation is not about a Sith Lord, a planet, or a returning character. It is about a possible internal codename: “Modesto.” The name surfaced through Star Wars community posts and leak chatter, but it has not been officially confirmed by Lucasfilm or Arcanaut Studios. That matters, because if the codename is real, it immediately points to something bigger than a random placeholder: Modesto is George Lucas’ hometown.

Why “Modesto” Stands Out
“Modesto” is not just any California reference. Lucasfilm has explicitly described Modesto as the place that shaped George Lucas’ adolescence and inspired American Graffiti, while StarWars.com recently called it the small California town where Lucas grew up before making Star Wars. That makes the alleged codename feel unusually specific. If true, it would be hard to read it as anything other than a deliberate nod to Lucas himself.