RE-1 was first introduced in Star Wars: The Old Republic as a mini-pet companion given to players between November 14th, 2019 to December 10th, 2019, in celebration of the release of Respawn Entertainment's Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. The droid was based off early unused concept artwork of the canon droid character BD-1. The game's developers worked with Respawn to make sure RE-1 was properly influenced by BD-1 whilst fitting with the Old Republic era.