Star Wars Outlaws Preview – This is the open world game you’re looking for
thesixthaxis.comStar Wars Outlaws certainly has the weight of expectation behind it. The first truly open-world single player Star Wars game, it’s been shorn of the Skywalkers and Palpatines, and instead aims to give us a story that focuses on the criminal underworld of the galaxy far far away. I didn’t even see one lightsaber during my four hours with Outlaws, and it’s much more interesting to discover what this game is, rather than what it isn’t.
Star Wars Outlaws is set after Empire Strikes Back, which, as anyone knows, is peak Star Wars. The Empire still has a Force stranglehold on the galaxy, but inbetween the cracks, criminal syndicates are rising to power. Our hero Kay Vess, and her adorable companion Nix, dream of a life of freedom, and they’re convinced into taking part in a heist. It does not go well.
We hopped in early to Kay’s story, where she’s just crashed a very important and rare spaceship that she has… acquired. You’re now stuck on the planet of Toshara, an all-new creation designed collaboratively by Massive and Lucasfilm, adding to the Star Wars canon. Mirogana City is the capital of this attractive, Mediterranean-esque landscape, and it’s where you’ll run into plenty of new characters to run jobs for and stab in the back.
At the start of our demo we meet Waka, a worryingly helpful Rodeon who offers to fix up your newly trashed ship, sending us out to get parts from in and around Mirogana City, which just so happens to be the hub for the three major crime syndicates who’ve set up shop here. There’s the Empire knocking around too, and given that this is when they’re at the height of their power, it’s probably best to avoid them.
Mirogana City is a classic Star Wars dive of a place, a city built beneath, and within a mountain, leaving only the mountain’s peak and a core to hold it up. Beneath it is a grimy, deeply insalubrious place, filled with unsavoury characters, and just as George Lucas intended, it feels realistic and lived in. You’ll believe that you could turn
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