Sabacc cards on the table first, right: Star Wars Outlaws won’t win many Game of the Year awards. There are a lot of reasons for this, not least because there have been other major releases this year which have been bolder, better marketed, or which have advanced the medium in some exciting way. Other major releases where the enemy AI isn’t comically thick. Add to that the general drag factor of the Ubisoft Open World Malaise we all have to varying degrees, and its gong prospects seem about as convincing as Anakin and Padme’s chemistry. But you absolutely shouldn’t care about that, because it slaps.
Mechanically, there’s honestly nothing in Outlaws which you haven’t seen before. It’s a big greatest hits package of Open World Things (with “climbing towers to unfog the map” mercifully left off the track listing, like Shiny Happy People but for sadists). It’ll evoke everything from Assassin’s Creed to Red Dead Redemption with its heady mix of urban wheeler-dealing, open world joyriding, tense stealth, and close-quarters combat. It’s got Tomb Raider style dangly climbing and a bewildering array of upgrades to unlock for your vehicles and equipment, all of which require some kind of task to be completed before they become available – most often they’re skill challenges, but many of them are proper sidequests, forays into enemy bases to steal unique parts or investigations as to the whereabouts of Skill Tree Expert No. 8. That sort of thing.
There’s a lot to get on with. As one would expect. And those of us who prefer sneaking around to a straight fight are well catered for, as it’s possible to complete almost any objective without raising any alarms. Most of the time you can go in blasting as well, if you like. The game will rarely penalise you for being loud, and most Situations are possible to get out of with a bit of quick thinking. Most actions will, though, have some kind of effect on the reputation system, particularly when you’re doing contract work, which is a constant procedurally-generated job system that you’ll earn most of your cash from, and is also the means via which you will ingratiate yourself to the worst people on whichever planet you’re on.