It’s no secret that Star Wars Outlaws, the science-fantasy franchise's first foray into the open-world genre, wasn't the hit that publisher Ubisoft expected it to be. The game’s sales didn’t reach the heights one would expect. And despite developer Massive Entertainment releasing multiple updates to address issues players had, the initial lukewarm critical reception still hangs over the game nearly a year after launch.
This week, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot spoke about Star Wars Outlaws’ middling reception, placing part of the blame on the broader “choppy waters” of the franchise around the time of its release. While Guillemot does have a point, as Star Wars has been going through a bit of an identity crisis at the moment, Outlaws’ issues stem from trying to sell gamers on a fantasy most of them aren’t interested in.
“Outlaws was released at a time when the brand that it belonged to was in a bit of choppy waters,” Guillemot told investors during a shareholder Q&A this month, according to Gamesradar.
Outlaws released right on the heels of the poorly received (and underrated in my opinion) Disney Plus series The Acolyte. The Mandalorian has seen a noticeable dip in quality in later seasons, and its spinoffs, Ahsoka and The Book of Boba Fett, failed to satiate audiences. Except for Andor, it seems like Star Wars is in a bit of a rut on the small screen. And while it’s set to return to theaters in the near future, the excitement about these projects is nowhere near the fever pitch it was at when the mainline films were coming out during the 2010s.
But Outlaws also suffered because of the very thing that set it apart from most other modern Star Wars games: the lack of the series’ most iconic faction of characters.
Outlaws is the rare example of a Star Wars video game that left the mysticism out of the equation completely. There is no unlockable lightsaber. There isn’t a former Jedi or Sith in your crew. Its protagonist isn’t concerned with The Force in the slightest. The game is focused solely on letting players live out the swashbuckling life of the Han Solo archetype. You’re smuggling goods, working for gangsters, and pitting the galaxy’s most dangerous criminal organizations against one another.
While it's commendable that Ubisoft took such an inspired and original approach for its Star Wars game, one that fits the open world genre perfectly, sidestepping the most iconic and beloved part of the lore among wider audiences was always going to be a tough sell.
When you look at the best-selling Star Wars video games, nearly all of them feature Jedi in some capacity. According to Circana, the top ten best-selling Star Wars games all feature playable Jedi. Missing from this list are critical hits like the long-dead MMO Star Wars Galaxies, beloved real-time strategy game Empire At War, and DICE’s underrated X-Wing spiritual successor Star Wars: Squadrons. Each of these games either de-emphasized Jedi or left them out altogether. Even platform-exclusive hits like the N64’s Shadows Of The Empire and Gamecube’s Star Wars: Rogue Squadron II - Rogue Leader, each of which was a big part of Star Wars canon at the time, fail to make the sales dent that Jedi-focused games did.
To Guillemot’s credit, he admits that Ubisoft’s own shortsightedness played a part. He said Outlaws “had a few items that still needed to be polished,” and its bugginess at launch “did affect sales volumes.” Outlaws’ bugginess changed the way the publisher handles its releases, including the near-immediate delay of Assassin’s Creed Shadows into 2025.
But history shows there’s a winning formula when it comes to successful Star Wars video games, and that formula relies pretty heavily on players’ ability to wield a lightsaber. Outlaws straying from that trend, I’d argue, was and still is one of the game’s biggest hurdles.
This trend reflects one of the franchise’s big challenges in gaming. While there are many stories to tell when it comes to the Jedi’s nearly 25,000-year history, translating that into a video game narrows the scope of what a successful Star Wars game looks like. All Star Wars games starring Jedi are third-person action games with a focus on melee combat. Trying something new in that formula is the best way to set yourself apart from the high bar set by studios like Respawn and Raven Software. But doing so also risks losing the interest of more casual Star Wars fans.
Ubisoft and Massive are just the latest game companies stung by this “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” conundrum that so many have struggled to solve.
The publisher hasn’t lost hope, though. In the wake of Outlaws’ most recent expansion, it was announced that the game will be released on Nintendo Switch 2. Guillemot told investors that releasing the game on the new platform, with the improvements made over the past year included, is a second chance for the open world adventure to find its audience.
