We are only a couple of weeks away from the release of the highly anticipated open-world space adventure “Star Wars: Outlaws” and although I’ll save my full review for its release I have been hands-on with the title at a special event where I also got to sit down and talk to some of the team who worked on the game. So I have some thoughts.
Timelines are important in this universe which is why having Star Wars Outlaws being set between the films “Empire Strikes Back” and “Return of the Jedi” is such a no-brainer. The Empire is a dominant force, while the underbelly of crime syndicates are also at a peak in a war-torn universe.
You play as Kay Vess with her offsider Nix who are an inseparable pair of rising scoundrels ready to make their mark and a few credits along the way.
I had the chance to play a few missions at a recent closed-door event at the Microsoft Experience Centre in Sydney and I was happy with how smooth the game felt and how the team had managed to capture the aesthetic of this particular era of the franchise. Although I was locked to certain missions on an unreleased version of the game, it still felt ready to play and full of life.
I’ll admit, that while I was excited to see the game, I wasn’t too fussed about the “Nix” character element which from afar looked too similar to the dynamic in Star Wars: Fallen Order. However, I soon forgot those apprehensions as the dynamic felt very intuitive and the bond of friendship was well developed to the point that the characters feel like an extension of one another.
The thing I love about playing in the Star Wars universe is that you see lots of new and exciting creatures and landscapes that are nicely wrapped in the familiarity of a world that has been in my dreams since I was a child. After years of watching the movies and TV shows and playing the various games that have been released, you aren’t completely learning a new language, it’s more like another regional dialect.
From the moment you take the controls you know it’s a Star Wars title and that was important to the team who spent tireless hours building it. They are all too aware that in the current “Fandom” getting it wrong can lead to a toxic outcome. Thankfully, so far, I think Star Wars Outlaws does enough right to make it an enjoyable Star Wars experience that allows you to overlook any shortcomings.
During the event, I managed to get some time to sit down and talk to Chloe Hammoud – Associate World Director at Massive Entertainment and Samuel De Vos – Lead Concept Artist at Star Wars Outlaws. Both have a wonderful history in the gaming arena working on titles like The Division 2, The Far Cry franchise and Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora.
I asked Sam how they managed to capture the essence of Star Wars in this new game,
“The way that Star Wars was rendered in the original trilogy, there is, as you can see, there is definitely a lot of grain, a lot of character and a lot of visual. And there is the visual image as well. And the team has put a lot of effort with the Lens Project to recreate that film, grainy experience. And I think in a day and age where everybody’s really focused on creating the perfect image, I think that’s kind of a refreshing, romantic, charming visualization.”
Over the conversation I discovered that a lot of the inspiration came from the original concept art for the films, Chloe explained “Because what Ralph McQuarrie has established and created to support Lucas’ script is so important, so iconic. We needed to go back to that. And the simplicity of shapes, the balance between familiar elements and more alien elements, I think that was really interesting to us. Basically, it is a large part of the visual inspiration that Ralph McQuarrie delivered to the original trilogy. So I think it is really at the very base, at the very beginning, right after you look for those initial inspirations, the 60s, 70s designs, samurai movies, Western movies, the next step is sort of his conceptual designs”
The team were able to work on a new syndicate for the game that took inspiration from Asian cultures leaning into George Lucas’s love of Samurai stories.
Sam explains that “The Sheiga Clan is their name. They’ve been living for generations upon generations on Kijimi. It’s an existing alien species from Star Wars. It has not been shown that much. It’s the Melitto. They are actually blind and have quite, like you were saying, an insectual look to them, which is very interesting to build around. And their outfits, as you say, are very inspired by samurai movies and Southeast Asian culture.”
“And that is also because Kijimi as a city, that’s where it gets its inspiration from. So when you’re walking the streets of Kijimi, you will see a lot of those details in the architectural design as well. So it makes sense for the Sheiga Clan to adapt that into their outfits. And you will also see their culture, and their values represented in their own stronghold, for example. You will see tactile elements on the floors and the walls that help them navigate their space. But also in the way that they interact with each other is quite hierarchical because they are a hive mind, they have a queen. So it’s definitely a lot of interesting elements to the Sheiga Clan. And I think massive and everybody working on it did an awesome job, of course, working together with Lucasfilm Games to make sure that it’s an authentic edition in that lineup of criminal syndicates.”
If I learnt anything from my time talking with these two talented individuals and my short time with the actual game, it’s that the entire team working on this title were immersed in the culture of Star Wars. It was a franchise and responsibility that they don’t take lightly and they are excited to see what everyone’s reactions will be when the game launches on August 30 (or 3 days earlier if you pre-order the Ultimate edition).
