Star Wars: Outlaws may focus on a new character - smuggler, thief, and all-around scoundrel Kay Vess - but it’s also a story set smack dab in the middle of the original Star Wars trilogy. The game takes place in between the events of The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. That leaves plenty of room for familiar heroes and villains to appear during the course of the game, and they definitely do.
How exactly does Outlaws fit into the bigger picture of the Original Trilogy? How does the game forge connections between Kay and iconic Star Wars heroes and villains? Here’s what you need to know.
Warning: this article contains full spoilers for Star Wars: Outlaws!
In Outlaws, Kay slowly makes a name for herself and works her way up the chain of command in the game’s various criminal syndicates. It’s inevitable, then, that she’ll eventually encounter some familiar faces. The Star Wars franchise certainly has its share of memorable crime lords.
Kay eventually encounters Crimson Dawn’s leader, Lady Qi’ra, during her missions on the icy planet of Kijimi. Qi’ra was played by Emilia Clarke in 2018’s Solo: A Star Wars Story (though she’s voiced by Tamaryn Payne here), where we learned that she was Han’s old flame before being recruited into Dryden Vos’ organization. The movie ends with Vos being killed off and Qi’ra traveling to meet the real boss of Crimson Dawn, Darth Maul.
If you only follow the Star Wars movies, you might not know how Qi’ra’s story has unfolded since then. She eventually takes control of Crimson Dawn herself after Maul is killed shortly before the events of A New Hope (as seen in the animated series Star Wars Rebels). Qi’ra has gone on to play a pivotal role in Marvel’s Star Wars comics; she’s at the center of 2021’s War of the Bounty Hunters crossover, where she steals the carbonite-frozen Han from Boba Fett and auctions him off to the highest bidder. In Outlaws, ND-5 even references that ill-fated auction in a conversation with Kay.
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