Star Wars Outlaws Review - Should You Buy It? (Spoiler Free)

okay so I've been playing Star Wars Outlaws for over a week now and I wanted to discuss all of my thoughts about the game in a spoiler-free video for all of you guys now obviously there are mixed opinions on Star Wars outlaws some people are 100% getting it some people are still unsure and so I'm hopefully here to give you an honest opinion and a fair review of the brand new open World Star Wars game I do want to say a big thank you before we get started to Ubisoft just for allowing me early access to play the game and as I mentioned previously this will be a spoiler-free review so you guys can watch without worrying about anything being exposed about the story that I can possibly make it so this is going to be one click away and with that said subscribe if you guys love Star Wars and let's get into it starting off with the platform and price so Star Wars Outlaws obviously releases on August 30th but with players who are purchasing the gold or ultimate edition of the game will be granted Early Access a few days earlier on the 7 which is the time of this video it should be going live the game will release for $70 if you're grabbing the standard edition 110 if you're getting the Gold Edition which adds 3-day Early Access a few of the cosmetics and the season pass that offers exclusive expansions coming in the future and finally the Ultimate Edition coming in at $130 this gives you everything that the Gold Edition that would have given you as well as a few extra cosmetic bundles and the digital art book of the game and it's available on PS5 Xbox and PC through Ubisoft connect now starting off with the graphics this is one of the things that I immediately noticed when getting my hands on the game in Sydney last week it's how incredible that this game actually looks the combination of the graphics and the world design that a massive have created here this game genuinely looks phenomenal during my play test session we played on PC and while I been reviewing at home I've been playing on PS5 and both look great but of course as always PC just looks that little bit better now I will spend more time later in the video discussing the actual locations themselves so we can delve into that a little bit deeper but after testing the game on PC as well as PS5 in both quality and performance mode the PC the game just could be one of the cleanest graphical games I have ever seen so for the graphics section of this video I'm going to give it a 9.5 out of 10 next up we're going to move into the performance of the game so as any new AAA game releases that we need to talk about the performance because something that is said to be an incredible game or hyped up to be the next big thing could just be a complete flop due to the fact the performance doesn't hold up for example look at Jedi Survivor last year massive hype for another huge Star Wars game and unfortunately plagued with performance issues on day one leading to a lot of players being frustrated and not returning to the game it was of course corrected pretty quickly but again it's hard to say how much damage was caused from that happening so hopefully this game does not suffer the same when it goes to Global launch luckily for Star Wars Outlaws well at least for me so far that doesn't seem to be the case playing the full version of the game most things behave as they should and I haven't run into many issues during my 30 hours playing over the last week in saying this though the bulk of my time has been on PS5 and in performance mode but I'll definitely do some more extensive testing and break it down in a full video when I compare the PC version and console versions of the game in the near future I will say there are a few minor issues when taking off into space where portions of the screen appear for black for a few seconds but the dev team is apparently already aware of this the other thing I noticed as I did get into the later stages of the story is that the game did crash a few times on the PS5 version in the middle of missions forcing me to have to re Lo the PS5 and start again now while this was frustrating I understand that this game as a whole is incredibly taxing no matter what system that you're going to be playing on but I would say that a few crashes here and there are expected with a game of the scale overall with a handful of crashes during my 30 hours playing I would give the performance an 8 out of 10 next up I want to quickly touch on the storytelling without making It spoilers because as I mentioned at the start of this video it is going to be a spoiler-free review so now I'm going to let you guys experience it for yourselves and just discuss a little bit without too much detail the segment is going to be pretty short but I will dive into it fully once we approach the end of the spoiler period in about 2 weeks I think the best way to describe the story is that it is good not great the early portion of the game was interesting as we kind of figure out who KES is however a large portion of the mid game felt slow and kind of dull in terms of the story personally I believe the last 3 to 4 hours of the story itself is actually the best of Star Wars Outlaws so if you're someone that needs an engaging story all the way through you may have a little bit of a hard time here until you get into the end game I'm going to score this story 7 out of 10 because out of the 20 approximate hours of the story only five to six of them felt super engaging and then the middle section of the game was just okay next up is the side content now being an open world game there is obviously a plethora of side content in Star Wars Outlaws everything from working with the different syndicates to running missions for experts and then some things as simple as Gathering Intel for someone at the local Cantina what I'm trying to say I guess is that this game has levels to the side content some of it is super basic like the Intel missions I just mentioned but for someone which to be honest it isn't super engaging and it can be frustrating if you have to fly back and forth between planets watching The Landing cinematic and the takeoff cinematic multiple times over this can get a little bit frustrating if you're doing those more basic missions that aren't really worth the reward The Syndicate missions however are a step up from that taking you on missions to displace some of the other syndicates with choices along the way that will help or hurt your reputation some of the missions felt really well written and others didn't but seeing the way the syndicates interact with each other was pretty fun one of the missions in this category for example featured flying into the atmosphere taking out some enemies in the Trailblazer finding a cargo and deciding who you want to return it to between Crimson Dawn and the Pikes I feel like this sort of decision making added an extra level to the missions gave it a little bit more depth which I liked but again it's still something that's very basic in terms of a mission now probably the Highlight for the side content was those missions that do lead you to the experts as well as those that lead to certain gear upgrades they really felt like a step up again those missions were their own little scripted story inside of the story and felt really intentional with the way that they were laid out in the game the expert system for leveling up your skills is really thought out and it helps you try all of the different gameplay features that the game has to offer so I did really actually like these side missions because they felt like they tied into the game really well overall I give the side content an 8 out of 10 with hopes for some more really engaging content coming in the future DLCs now the Gunplay and the weapons the the combat in this game is a really interesting talking point with Star Wars Outlaws early gameplay footage looked really clunky in a lot of the trailers and Gunplay just looked off when compared to other third person shooters this concern was definitely apparent in the early part of the game but quickly changed once I started upgrading the Blaster a little bit between alternating plasma ion and explosive shots as well as having access to a stun shot it really allowed you to feel like the Blaster could do a lot more things than expected one of my favorite upgrades was a part of to make K's Blaster automatic and this was a world of difference from just the standard single shot once I unlocked automatic firing I don't think I took it off for the rest of my playthrough there was no way I was going back to semi-auto after trying the automatic option and it just made everything feel a lot smoother when taking out enemies you also get access like I mentioned to the explosive shots and these honestly are just straight cheese which can be really fun just watching enemies fly over the map when you actually shoot them with this explosive shot I could pretty much just sit there all day and use this on enemies and just have a really good laugh so I did like that feature as well another feature of Star Wars Outlaws is that you can use other weapons from defeated enemies in combat however one of my biggest issues with this is not being able to take them with you like yes I do understand the extra blasters having limited shots to not make you overpowered but the fact that you drop the weapon every time you interact with something or move to a new area or climb a ladder I feel like this should be a little bit different overall I like the way that K's Blaster progresses throughout the story and the different firing modes become really fun when you get used to switching in between them to take out different types of enemies but I would like the chance to take these secondary blasters with us a little bit longer there were definitely scenarios where I wish I had the Blaster from the last section whether it be a sniper rifle or like an E11 or something along those lines it definitely would have helped in certain segments that I felt like I couldn't carry it into so for the game play if honestly I had to put a number on it I would say it's an 8 out of 10 there's a few little bits of room for improvement but overall it was pretty solid once you start to get into the game next up is NYX NYX is probably not only one of the cutest companions we've ever had in a video game but he's also incredibly helpful he is not just there to look cute he's actually there to give you a hand NYX has a ton of things that he can help you with like giving Aid in fights traversing the map finding hidden treasures and distracting enemies and a ton more NYX was honestly used in every part of my entire story playthrough and I probably couldn't have gotten through a lot of sections without him his pulse scan helps you to find hidden doors his ability to get into a locked room and unlock the door for you both add a little extra depth to the game play not only that but his ability to distract enemies while you're trying to stealthily sneak through an area is also super useful it really felt like everything NYX can do was deliberate and really well thought out and not just there to make him do something other than look cute NY can also protect K if you need him to attack enemies and my favorite part fetch weapons from defeated enemies to help give you an advantage so as I mentioned as a whole I think ncks made a really cool addition to the game and he wasn't just there as like a fan service as a cute little side character I would honestly rate ncks a 9 out of 10 for what he can do next up is the space combat now when it comes to the space combat I said in an earlier video that this game looks just like starf fighter assault from Battlefront 2 which I was a little bit skeptical about but to be honest now that I've played it I was actually quite impressed with it the space combat features a new Pursuit mode where it can help you to hold track of the star fighter that you're chasing and on top of this there are various Maneuvers to help you avoid incoming enemy fire not only this but there is quite a bit of weapon customization and upgrading so you can make the Trailblazers offensive capabilities exactly to your liking which I thought was a cool feature too if I had to be honest while there were elements that did feel like Battlefront 2 it definitely had some more advanced features more similar to that of Star Wars squadrons but also with the Game Zone twist it was a very simplified version of flying and anyone can just pick it up and do well at it but it was also gave you the ability to make it a little bit more complex and actually feel like you were a skilled pilot I was pleasantly surprised with this so to be honest I'm going to give it a score of an 8 out of 10 following on from the trailblaze up we're going to talk a little bit about the Speeder bike now the Speeder bike is just a short segment here and as fun as it was to zoom around on this thing the GTA style animation when you crash just wasn't it some of the good things here though were progressing to be able to fly it on water the sharp shooting enemies off their Speeders while they're chasing you and just quickly getting around the map so I really do believe that the Turning circle on the Speeder bike is really fun you can like drift it and make it pull a quick 180 if you need to it just handles really well over all I think it's a pretty good experience flying around on the Speeder bike that felt mostly true to that Star Wars feeling other than of course yeah when you stack it and you come off and it looks really janky like in GTA but other than that I can't really complain next up I want to talk about the crime syndicates the crime syndicates we obviously have the Hut cartel the asiga clan Crimson Dawn the Pikes and the zerich fash now personally I was excited for this feature in the game but I can't help but feel a little bit disappointed and I'm going to explain why you do have a few missions for the different syndicates throughout the story as you visit each of the planets but other than that the contracts that you can perform as side missions just kind of felt a little bit average and didn't really contribute all that much to the game I do although like the rewards that came with helping each of the syndicates and I'm currently working on maxing my reputation with Crimson Dawn to get the sweet Cosmetics that come with reaching the max level of reputation with them overall what seemed like a pretty key part of the game honestly felt hit and miss it was great during the main story and when you visited the planets for the first time you could really feel their presence but there were other times after the story where you'd want to go back and have a similar experience and the actual syndicates themselves just felt kind of irrelevant again it just felt like another one of those features of the game that was good not great so I'm going to give The Syndicate portion or the reputation system a 7 and 1/2 out of 10 transitioning away from the syndicates I wanted to talk about The Wanted system now this is to do with the Empire The Wanted system is cool if you just want to cause a little bit of Chaos in the world taking out Stormtroopers or imperial officers will give you a wanted level similar to GTA and while this seems easy at first it does get much more difficult once you hit level six on The Wanted scale there's a few ways to clear your wanted level but the coolest one that's possibly in Star Wars Outlaws is meeting up with some death Troopers taking them out to steal a key card from the Imperial officer that is with them taking out the rest of the enemies remaining in the area and then going to the terminal inside the camp and clearing your name from a computer now while there isn't too much depth here it is cool if you just want to wreak some havoc on some Troopers so again it's one of those features that is there and it's kind of cool but it feels like you wouldn't really miss it too much if it wasn't there I just feel like it was trying to flesh out that open world feeling a little bit more now I know I've been pretty critical of the game up to this point so let's talk about something that I actually really did enjoy the expert missions and the progression system honestly the expert missions are really fun each one gives you a little side adventure to go on outside of the main story leading to new upgrades along the way even after completing the missions if you want more unlocks from that particular expert there are some really fun challenges to do to unlock more skills which makes you use all of the features that the game has to offer so it gets you to try a little bit of everything so you really get to experience the game in full personally I am in the middle of trophy hunting for the unlock all expert abilities and I can pretty easily lose track of time trying to perform these objectives while exploring the map and taking out enemies honestly for the progression system I do give it a 9 out of 10 just for a fresh take on skill upgrades that was actually enjoyable to pursue along the way and it's something that even though I would play a couple of hours at a time doing these upgrades it didn't feel like that it actually flowed really smoothly and went really quickly and I would look down at the clock and go wow I've actually been doing this for quite some time and I'm not bored I'm not distracted I'm not wanting to go and do something else these are actually just really enjoyable way to progress your skill set next up we're going to talk about the characters just quickly though characters in Star Wars Outlaws are obviously kind of hard to talk about with going into spoilers so I'm going to keep this section really short K's character started a little bit boring if I'm 100% honest but towards the end of the game it was a lot better it wasn't on the same level of development as calus for example but it was still decent as for some of our other main characters NX of course was adorable and super useful throughout the whole game nd5 is a badass although I would have liked a deeper dive into his backstory at some point and Jaylen is your typical Suave outlaw self SLO as the main villain though felt like his presence needed to be a little more apparent throughout the story it felt like he just popped in every now and then and it was just kind of weird when he showed up because it didn't feel like he was supposed to be there but I guess towards the end of the story this did pick up when you do go for one of the final missions so that's all I'm really going to say about him but once you play through the game you'll probably understand what I'm saying he's still a really interesting character inside the game I just would have liked to see a little bit more from him one note as well is that the character models themselves went in conversation the mouth movements did not look good at all so personally for me this brought the score down a little bit giving the characters a 6.5 out of 10 I think they need a bit more development and honestly they needed to clean up that mouth animation it just threw me off so much when I was actually watching these people interact and talk to each other so I'd love to see that fixed up either in a future patch or if there is a followup to this game if that can be a little bit cleaner that would be great next up let's talk about the locations the locations in Star Wars Outlaws are a highlight for me every single segment of this game was absolutely beautiful with cantonica tne kajimi AKA and Tashara all just having so much detail and you can tell there has been so much love and care taken with developing the worlds I honestly couldn't give the team high enough praise for this part of the game I love the fact too that each of the planet's space sections were all different with a special shout out to whoever designed kajimi space section that looks absolutely incredible it was probably one of my favorite sections in terms of being in the Trailblazer to see all of the design that's g into that part of the game so Props to whoever that is and believe it or not 10 out of 10 for the locations and Designs inside Star Wars Outlaws I loved exploring every minute I loved seeing the different locations and how much detail and effort has you know directly been put into it even something like exploring through Mirana city with the wanted posters on the wall or just little bits of ores placed around the place really made it feel like Star Wars and I think if you're making a game like this that has to be nailed on the head and the team over at massive have absolutely done that here next up is the traversal now traversal is an interesting one and while this is a short Point nothing groundbreaking was really done here it felt really solid overall it gave a similar feel to Jedi Survivor with a little bit of variation with the inclusion of the grapple all of the climbing was kind of what you expected from a game like this I feel like most story driven games that requireed traversal the climbing is basically exactly the same so this did nothing different in that aspect not to say that's a bad thing though but there was just nothing really groundbreaking and honestly it was just a solid job here so nothing great nothing bad just kind of what you'd expect from this sort of game one of the features that you probably didn't know about Star Wars Outlaws is the photo mode I spent a small amount of time in photo mode but there is a ton of options for customization and taking the perfect shot which I know a lot of you guys are going to love for me personally the only time I will use Photo mode is for thumbnails but it is great to have it there nonetheless it has all the same features that most photo modes in a video game would have and combining these with just just the absolutely gorgeous landscape in Star Wars Outlaws it makes for some incredible screenshots so I can't wait to see what you guys can come up with with your own screenshots once you get your hands on the game now going from visual into audio the audio is kind of an interesting topic when it comes to this game because to be honest it was one of the things that I saw the least amount of polish with there were multiple issues that broke my immersion which for a game set in a Star Wars universe is pretty crucial a feel issues I noticed during my time playing were that characters speaking seemed to be out of sync again at something to do with that mouth animation which I feel like could have been cleaned up and it would have been a lot better the com link messages were coming through at the same time as my conversation with somebody else and some of the audio did cut out when traveling in the Trailblazer in space and are flying around the planet's orbit hopefully these things can be fixed because I feel like it would drastically improve that audio portion of the game but as of right now I'm scoring this a 5 out of 10 the next thing worth mentioning here is the customization the customization is pretty extensive but I still feel like it could have been better for those who don't know what customization options there are there are outfits for K and Nyx the Trailblazer and K Speeder bike now there is good and bad here I like the Trailblazer customization because you can change the color coming from the engines as well as the paint job and the charm inside the cockpit the Speeder Bike gave you paint jobs to choose from as well as a trinket to hang from the handlebars but my favorite thing is the trophy that you can have on the side of the Speeder Bike hanging things like Death Trooper helmets or a mouse droid a pike helmet and more and these rewards are kind of earned throughout the story or throughout certain missions and once you complete them that you get an actual trophy relevant to the mission that you've just completed for next you can customize one cosmetic item which can be for his tail like a scarf around his neck or a wrap around his tail or goggles on his head which yeah are super cute but it feels like there should be more that you can do than just equip one thing here and the only other thing that you can actually equip for NYX is types of food which will give some boosted stats I did like the idea of the boosted stats but I still think there should be more visual customization available for our little companion for K you can customize her jacket pants and belt however it feels like a missed opportunity not giving us custom hairstyles or helmets hats as well as maybe separating the boots from the pants K's Cosmetics do give some handy stat boosts as well though which I did like so overall I can't complain too much I just feel like there should have been a few more options there I give the customization a 7.5 out of 10 but again that's probably just me being picky I feel like we were spoiled for choice in Jedi Survivor with the amount of customization that was available there now saak and Faria races inside Star Wars Outlaws there are a few optional mini games this includes castle saak and betting on the farer races which is practically just horse racing a lot of the time these games add mini games as an afterthought and it's pretty noticeable when it's done so sometimes this can feel a little bit irrelevant but when these mini games land and become a hit with anyone playing the games they really can make an impact for me the first example that comes to mind is gwent in The Witcher the fact that people can lose hours in a mini game like this seems odd but when you're actually playing it yourself it's so addictive this is exactly the same with Saar and Star Wars Outlaws I found myself playing game after game and not noticing how much time I was spending sitting at the same table playing I even caught myself at 1 Point low on credits and unable to buy into a round of Sauk so I walked over placed a bet on the far the erasers won the BET and went straight back to the saac table to buy in now yes I realize that makes me sound like a Serial gambler but at least it's just a video game and not my actual Galactic credits right the faier races on the other hand are pretty simple you interact with a hollow table look through the Faria stats like their weight previous races their personality and a few more other stats and you can pick based on which one you think will win there are also room rumors that you can hear around the worlds in some of the canas and throughout other areas that discuss fixed far races so you can keep an eye out for those because it's pretty easy credits if you know which one is going to win the next race you can just go to the nearest father year race table and basically bet on whatever you heard in the rumor and it will come out as a win mini games 9 out of 10 really solid a lot of fun and I can lose so much time in subak and I'm sure you guys will too next up is my final thoughts and my overall score for Star Wars Outlaws overall the world design and Graphics are gorgeous and super immersive which is going to leave any Star Wars fan giddy with the joy gameplay itself is good but not great with the Gunplay becoming increasingly enjoyable as you progress and level up the open world has pros and cons with the missions I feel like some of the Intel missions are a bit boring but the expert missions and challenges are a lot of fun as for the story The High really is the end of the game so you're going to have to go through about 15 hours of decent story before you get to the really good stuff the space combat as well felt smooth and while slightly familiar they added some features that kind of made it its own which I really did like and the Cosmetic upgrades are pretty cool as well although I would have liked to see a few more options for K and nxs as I mentioned earlier honestly if you're on the fence about this game I would give it a 7.5 out of 10 with if you are a Star Wars fan that could probably push up to the 8.5 Mark there's a few things here that is going to give it a little bit of a lesser score for me being completely fair but again I'm a Star Wars fan so my rating is going to be a little bit out of perspective for someone that's coming to the game as not a Star Wars fan if you're not I'd say you'd be around the 7.5 if you are you're probably looking more 8.5 but again some things need to be cleaned up there's really cool parts to the game and the overall gameplay EXP experience but I think they just need to tidy a few things just to make it a bit more polished and a bit more immersive now I was always going to pick up this game even without being offered Early Access by Ubisoft so thank you again to them I was going to buy this game regardless and I'm really glad I actually got to experience it in terms of the future DLC we do obviously have the Jabba mission on day one as well as the gold and Deluxe additional season pass extras in the coming months person I hope these are an adventure of their own and not just a couple of missions K goes on that are ultimately forgettable I really would like the two DLCs to be at least 5 hours long taking us on brand new Heist Adventures building on Kay's character because I felt like that didn't quite land in the base game once again if you're on the fence about purchasing the gold or Ultimate Edition Ubisoft plus is also available for anyone wanting to play the game without the large price tag and it does actually include all of the extra DLC content as well so there's an option for those of you that are looking for something more budget friendly I really do hope you guys enjoyed this in-depth spoiler-free review of Star Wars Outlaws I am curious to know from you guys after watching this if it helped you decide to get the game or not so please feel free to let me know down in the comments as always thank you so much for your support on the Channel with so many new subscribers coming in lately I really do appreciate you all but with that said I am going to get out of of here there are a few more videos on the screen now if you'd like some more Outlaws content and with that said I will see you in the next video and May the force be with you always