So many Star Wars projects have a feeling of “should have been better” lately that it’s hard to get too excited for something new. Now that I have collectively played about five hours of Star Wars Outlaws, I am beyond excited to see more mostly because I can’t stop comparing it to Andor.
Outlaws Makes the Right Choices for its Scoundrel Game Design
When it comes to a Star Wars game about a Jedi, we can all make some accurate guesses on what fun gameplay will look like. You’re going to have a lightsaber, or two, and some cool force powers.
Of course, not all games featuring a Jedi are the same, but they’re all in the same ballpark. Let me slice up some dudes while throwing them around with the force, and I’ll be pretty happy.
But how do you make a compelling Star Wars game when you don’t heavily feature its most iconic archetype in the Jedi? Further, how do you do it when you also don’t feature other nearly-as-iconic characters in clone troopers or stormtroopers heavily either?
Enter the scoundrel archetype. Throughout Star Wars media we get some glimpses on what a scoundrel is. They’re often portrayed as smugglers, thieves, and other ne’er-do-wells.
However, we don’t really get to see much of them aside from the one to start it all: Han Solo. He’s fine working in grey areas outside the law, relies heavily on his ability to talk his way into or out of a situation, and has built up enough skills and confidence to get himself out of a scrap if he needs to.
That description more or less fits Kay Vess to a tee, the protagonist of Star Wars Outlaws. She is a smooth talker, good with a blaster, great pilot, and lacking scruples when it comes to getting what she needs and wants from her colleagues working in the morally grey.
But how do you make scoundrel gameplay compelling? This is far and away the biggest question I had going into the game. Is it enough to just make it another fun shooter, giving us an arsenal of a bunch of sci-fi weaponry?
That is not the direction developer Massive Entertainment went.
Outlaws Takes the Same Approach as Andor
I’ll get into the combat more later, but the most compelling part of Outlaws is how it crafts a world around Kay interacting with both criminal syndicates and just the general people that inhabit the worlds we get to visit.
For me, one of the best parts of Andor was just how much it was a look into the innerworkings of the Star Wars universe, particularly giving us a glimpse at the sinister bureaucracy of the Empire.
In the same way, Outlaws lets us dive into the criminal underworld of the Outer Rim and learn more about its inhabitants. As far as visual media goes for Star Wars, I think Outlaws is going to be the best look we have had yet on what its like to be your average person in the Star Wars universe.
That’s what has me incredibly excited.
Where so many Star Wars stories are about the relatively impersonal glories of war, of politics, or focused on the Empire in some way, Outlaws is more grounded in its scale. So many Star Wars stories are high-level and grandiose, hardly focusing on what actually happens in the universe.
Imagine if someone’s sole understanding of where you live comes from hearing about your politicians or actions of your government. That’s kind of what we’ve had so far with Star Wars.
I think that’s partly why Andor resonated with so many people, aside from just how well-crafted and well-written it is. We got to see how average folks, like us, would live in the world, including those that have decided to stomach (or embrace) the Empire.
From what I’ve seen so far, I can’t say Outlaws is going to reach the same heights of Andor, but it’s certainly trying to tell a similar type of story.
Outlaws ties this exploration into the people of the Star Wars universe with the scoundrel gameplay wonderfully.
In Outlaws, Information is the Name of the Game
So much of being a scoundrel is having information and using it correctly. There are some moments in Outlaws you have the option to use, or not use, some information you just learned. Maybe you’re wanting to court, or screw over, one of the syndicates so you want to use save it for the right person.
While this is nothing new, you’ll obviously learn some information and get things like side quests just by talking to people in whatever area you’re in. What’s cooler, though, is the sometimes more hidden information.
There are obviously places that will be harder to get to, with things like puzzles of how to open doors blocking your way, but sometimes you just run across a datapad with something someone would want to know or you may overhear something in a conversation.
Part of the gameplay is just paying attention to what people are saying around you. Some of those are casual conversations you can just pick up on as you go by, but there are obviously some Outlaws sets aside for you to listen to.
In some sort of cantina, two guys were having a loud conversation about some job they just did. Well, I had the option to just sit around the corner and eavesdrop, learning where they just stashed their latest score. I of course ran off to nab that for myself.
The emphasis on immersing yourself among the people is what has me most excited for Outlaws. Getting answers to all these anthropological questions is interesting. Things like how do people entertain themselves, what are their basic needs and how do they meet them, how do they organize their cities and societies, and a whole bunch more.
Kay gets some help with learning a bit more of how the criminal underworld works with a character I can’t wait to see more of, Danka, a Mon Calamari information broker. She sees Kay is a little green, at least to this part of the galaxy, and gets her some help with some information and a job or two.
Danka is written really well with some smart dialogue. Honestly, what has me the most excited to see more of her is that she reminded me of Margo from The Americans. The lines are great and so is her delivery. Plus, I can’t wait for her inevitable betrayal of Kay (or at least taking advantage of her in some way).
Obviously, Outlaws focuses on one part of the galaxy, the Outer Rim. The Outer Rim is where criminals thrive, so the daily lives of people that live there is going to be different. We won’t see what society or life is like for your average joe on a “typical” planet of beings just living their lives.
Just as there is a whole order and hierarchy among the Jedi, we’ll get to see how the criminal world has itself set up. Outlaws focuses on four syndicates: The Hutt Cartel, the Pykes, the Ashiga, and the Crimson Dawn.
Your Syndicate Reputation Will See A lot of Ups and Downs
The core part of Outlaws revolves around Kay’s interactions with the various criminal syndicates. All sorts of interactions, quests, choices, and more will either gain or lose you reputation with one syndicate or another.
Outlaws tells you that your reputation is fluid. Maybe at one point in the game it makes sense to have the Pykes on your side to make things easier. Later they may not be as useful, so it’s not a big deal to go against them if you need to. Then again, maybe even later their usefulness may crop up again.
The ever-changing nature of Kay’s reputation with the syndicates is a great example great design for Outlaws‘ scoundrel gameplay.
With a character who is all about getting what’s theirs, it doesn’t make sense to have them see a singular loyalty with any one faction. Certain situations have different necessities, so one syndicate or another may be more useful to be friendly with at a given time.
Even more, I think it gives some insight and character into how the criminal world in Star Wars works. This selfish individualism is an understood reality and an assumed part of everyone’s identity you encounter. Everyone’s loyalty has a price.
So, it makes sense that any one person or group’s feelings towards Kay will change over5 time. Everyone knows they are using each other for their own gains, so sometimes you win and sometimes you get burned.
Plus, and this goes back to information being so important, you can almost always pull yourself back into someone’s good graces if you give them a key piece of information or heisted some object they greatly desire.
Bygones will be bygones in a world run on “what have you done for me lately?”
Outlaws is Truly Open World
Outlaws gives you a lot of freedom to do what you want, racking up reputation (or losing some) with the syndicates as you go. Featuring five worlds – Toshara, Akiva, Cantonica, Tatooine, and Kijimi – Outlaws has huge sprawling maps to both fly and run around in.
I only got to experience Toshara and Kijimi in my time with the game so far, but both were incredibly impressive. Toshara in particular, where I spent most of my time, was awesome to explore.
Toshara has a huge city to explore in Mirogana. It has plenty of shops to visit, gambling, streets to explore, a cantina, and a whole bunch more. It felt like a breathing city with all sorts of interesting aliens going about their business.
It’s not on the scale of something you may see in a Rockstar game or Night City in Cyberpunk 2077, but it’s a great hub to interact with and learn more about the world.
Outside of the city, Toshara was full of little settlements, buildings of all types, caves, and a lot more I didn’t have time to check out in my time with the game.
In one area, I stumbled upon a camp full of loot and a hidden cache to only be met with the occupants when I stepped out of the cave all of their stuff was hidden in. They weren’t happy and a gunfight ensued.\
Another saw me going about an elaborate series of parkour jumps, a la Uncharted, that led me to a little animal sanctuary and a rare resource.
I also had a ton of points of interest and quest markers that I had accumulated during my time in Mirogana. Quests I had accepted and conversations I overheard were marked on the map, so there was quite a bit I just didn’t have the time to get to.
Most of my time was spent on hanging around the cities and doing parts of the main quest, so I didn’t get to check out a lot of the open world to see just how much is going on. A lot of open worlds have a lot of filler or are just too bloated, but I couldn’t tell you where Outlaws is on that spectrum based on my time with the game yet.
Beyond just the cities and the worlds, there’s the orbits around the planets to explore as well. Going to and from a planet is relatively seamless, with hidden loading screens, but it’s not like No Man’s Sky where you can fly onto and out from a planet as you wish. You’ll use a menu to go to and from with a cutscene in-between.
Even so, moving to space in your ship is natural and works quite well. Out in orbit there are quite a few things to check out as well, like debris to salvage, other ships maybe fighting off pirates, and quite a bit more I didn’t get to see.
From there its easy to engage the hyperdrive and head off to another planet.
The open world design looks great and it all gels together pretty well, but it’s definitely my biggest worry for Outlaws. Too often great games can get bogged down by all the fluff and just being too big.
I’m not sure if that’s going to be the route with Outlaws, but its the most common place to trip up with these types of games. Thankfully, so much of what I saw was integrated with other aspects of the gameplay, like syndicate reputation or finding interesting things to check out by eavesdropping, that I think most of it will be satisfying and feel worth your time.
Outlaws Combat and Stealth is Fine
The combat in Outlaws is probably best describe as just fine. It’s not the flashy part of the game, as I imagine a lot of your time will be spent running around and interacting with a lot of the different characters in the game.
Outlaws gunplay and moment-to-moment combat is closest to something like Uncharted. You’ll be dodging to cover, picking up guns dropped by enemies, and stealthing about to move around the battlefield.
My one caveat is that I didn’t engage with the too much in my time with Outlaws. What I did play was fun, though I didn’t get to experience a ton of variety. Read more about the combat in my previous hands-on preview.
I do know that there is an upgrade system for your blaster and Kay will get access to certain abilities, so there’s a good chance I didn’t see a whole lot. For example, she has access to a classic deadeye ability, slowing down time and marking people to shoot, like in Red Dead Redemption.
Instead of shooting in combat, most of my time was spent stealthing. It makes sense in the context of being a scoundrel, as a shoot first ask questions later reputation isn’t going to get you far most likely. At least, good luck getting people to work with you.
Stealthing is where you’ll likely use Kay’s trusty partner Nix the most, aside from some puzzle elements out in the world. Nix can distract people, interact with objects in the world, and even set off grenades on someone’s belt.
Like the gunplay, stealthing is pretty standard fare. If you’ve played one of these big budget character action games in the last decade or so, it will be familiar. It’s more or less the same as Uncharted, Horizon, etc.
In other words, based on what I’ve seen so far, the combat and the stealth is not going to be the reason you’ll remember Outlaws.
Star Wars Outlaws Hands-on Preview | Final Thoughts
My time with Star Wars Outlaws left me wanting more, genuinely excited for what I am going to see in the final game. Excitement for something new with Star Wars has been few and far between, so that alone is a huge win for me.
The worldbuilding is great and the characters you interact with are smartly written. That is more than likely what we’ll remember moreso than any one particular gameplay element in Outlaws.
There’s all the makings of a great game here that will be more than satisfying for Star Wars fans. Hopefully the constant Andor reminders are a good sign.
Star Wars Outlaws releases August 30th on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S.
