I Finally Remembered Why I Fell in Love with Star Wars Outlaws (After Two Years of Denial)

It’s 2026, and I’m still flying the Trailblazer through the frozen debris fields off Kijimi, looting derelict freighters and cackling as Imperial fighters come to collect a prize I already pocketed. I’m supposed to be heading to Tatooine for a job, but space keeps pulling me in. That’s the thing about Star Wars Outlaws—it burrows under your skin, even when its surface-level puzzles make you want to scream into a ventilation shaft. Two years after launch, I’ve finally made peace with this scoundrel simulator. But boy, did it take some soul-searching.

Back in 2024, I played a nearly four-hour preview at a hands-on event, diving into two core missions: one on the savannah world of Toshara, another on the frostbitten streets of Kijimi—yes, the same Kijimi from The Rise of Skywalker. Even then, Massive Entertainment’s love for the source material was undeniable. The game wears the original trilogy like a well-worn smuggler’s vest. The moment you boot it up, the font screams Lucasfilm, the sound design hums with authentic Star Wars electricity, and that gorgeous ultrawide presentation slaps black bars on your screen like a love letter to the 1970s. Creative Director Julian Gerighty once told me they baked a full vintage lens simulation into the Snowdrop engine—barrel distortion, chromatic aberration, film grain, the works. You can toggle the bars off, but if you do, Gerighty might just shed a single, knowing tear.

That adoration isn’t superficial, either. It’s in the way you interact with crime syndicates, the way your reputation opens doors (or slams them shut), and the way the galaxy feels alive even when you’re just loitering in a cantina. But here’s the rub: strip away the Star Wars paint job, and what’s left underneath is a decent, sometimes rigid, open-world game that might not hold your attention without a trusty blaster and a sidekick named Nix.

Let’s talk about that rigidity, shall we? Star Wars Outlaws does a lot of things right, but it also has moments where it feels like you’re piloting a Corellian freighter with the parking brake on. You always have to be facing exactly the right direction to interact with a character. Stealth isn’t as intuitive as you’d expect from the publisher that birthed Splinter Cell and Assassin’s Creed. And every time I crawled through a duct—which was more often than I’d like to admit—I felt a strange kinship with Still Wakes the Deep. Kay can pick up any blaster rifle she finds, sure, but she’ll drop it the second you try to holster it. Always. She’s an amateur smuggler, not an arsenal-toting mercenary, and the game will remind you of that with an almost passive-aggressive insistence.

“Trust the process,” I kept muttering to myself. And honestly? Once I leaned into that scrappy identity, the friction started to feel… intentional. Kay’s aim sways. Her escape plans collapse. That low-level chaos became a feature, not a bug.

Then there’s the open world, which is refreshingly free of the Metroidvania-style gating that plagued the Jedi games. You don’t need to unlock Force push to reach a distant ledge; you just hop on your speeder bike and go. Want to visit Kijimi before Tatooine? Knock yourself out. That freedom—the ability to chart your own path through the galaxy—still feels like a minor miracle in 2026. And the space travel? It’s not just a loading screen with glitter. You actually fly your ship between planets, engage the hyperdrive yourself by flicking those thumbsticks forward, and get pulled into spontaneous dogfights when scavengers show up. There’s no power management or shield balancing like Squadrons, but the dance of lasers and debris is enough to make any Rebel fan’s heart skip a beat.

Of course, the game’s puzzle obsession—and I mean obsession—tested my patience more than a Hutt’s digestive system. Need to get into a bar? There’s a vent nearby. Can’t reach a lever? Send Nix. Yellow grapple point above you? You know the drill. Outlaws follows the modern adventure game playbook a little too faithfully, offering the simplest solution to every problem. That said, in a galaxy this sprawling, sometimes you just want straightforward progress so you can get back to the immersion. The hacking minigame, where you match audio cues, was genuinely clever and scratched an itch I didn’t know I had.

The skill system, though, is where Outlaws shines brightest—and it’s part of why I’m still playing. You don’t unlock abilities by spending arbitrary points. Instead, you complete actions in the world, reach a milestone, meet a mentor character, and then pull off a dedicated mission to earn your upgrade. Want to improve stealth? You’ll be stalking targets and learning from experts, not just filling a bar. It’s one of the most story-integrated progression systems I’ve seen in a mass-market game, and it makes every new ability feel earned.

And then there’s the Wanted system. In 2026, after a few updates, it’s even more diabolical. Cause too much trouble on land, and Dark Troopers will hunt you down. Do the same in space, and a Star Destroyer warps in to ruin your evening. To clear your name, you can’t just respray your speeder and lay low like some Grand Theft Tatooine; you have to infiltrate an Imperial facility, hack a terminal, and erase your record. It’s a chore that feels thrilling every time.

So, do I recommend Star Wars Outlaws in 2026? I’ve wrestled with that question since 2024, and the honest truth is this: if you’re a Star Wars devotee, the game is a must-play, warts and all. The love poured into it is infectious, and it earns its place in the canon by making you feel like a scoundrel on the Outer Rim. If you’re a gameplay purist who needs every mechanic to be razor-sharp, you’ll find plenty to grumble about. But me? I’m still here, blasting through space, adopting every stray Nix-like creature I meet, and occasionally grumbling at a vent. It’s not a perfect game. But in a world full of safe, homogenous Star Wars products, Outlaws has the guts to be scrappy and sincere.

Maybe that’s enough. Maybe I’m just making excuses because I hear the hyperdrive hum and I’m twelve years old again. But you know what? I’ll take it.