In recent light of Ubisoft, the company’s CEO, Yves Guillemot, has suggested that the reason for Star Wars Outlaws’ flop was due to the dwindling interest in the brand (press X to doubt). This comment has drawn huge criticism from gamers globally, many of whom were quick to point out the performance issues and massive holes within Outlaws, and holes they were, as the title struggled due to the mass wave of issues.
Courtesy of a recent episode which came in from Insider Gaming’s weekly podcast, an exclusive was dropped that a sequel to the Star Wars Outlaws game was planned and ultimately dropped as the ship had sailed for Ubisoft to recover from the backlash from fans over the glaring issues with the title. Whilst the sequel was never completely chiseled into Ubisoft’s development schedule, it was planned and, in the works, but never entered full production. Rightly so, by the way, because a sequel on top of that would have been the wrong move.
As we know, Star Wars Outlaws was a massive miss from Ubisoft, and in comparison, to the expectations which were put into place for Ubisoft to do well financially and expectations from the studio themselves. In September 2024, Star Wars Outlaws sold as little as one million copies in the first month, which shows a lackluster performance by the team developing the title. If you compare the copies sold to other games which were released to a positive reception, one million copies don’t cut the mustard unfortunately, not for a title of this caliber anyway.
With the sequel being cancelled, are you, as a fan of Ubisoft and/or Star Wars, surprised? Because I am certainly not, as the issues were not at all a disinterest in the brand. The failure stemmed from the issues that disappointed all excited fans when they booted up the game and got into the actual gameplay. Whilst I am not one to kick something while it’s down, Star Wars Outlaws did a very good job at losing fans out the gates with an overall poor performance, bad stealth options and, while I know stormtroopers are poor at hitting their marks, man, they couldn’t hit a barn door on a bright summer’s day.
Fans were hyped to be getting a new Star Wars title to the already booming franchise, especially with how Star Wars Battlefront took off again months after it had launched, and this came from a lack of interest in the brand… Fans would love an open-world, modern Star Wars game, but it looks like we may have to wait to get our hands on something similar to this anytime soon. The only game that springs to mind that offers some kind of similarities to what Outlaws should’ve been is Intergalactic, a game from the studio behind The Last of Us, yes, the humble Naughty Dog. The similarities I say are familiar due to the glowing weapons and robotic enemies to slay, though with each new announcement about the game, it seems to be meeting a great deal of criticism as well.
What do you guys think about this? Did Ubisoft’s main man have a point? Or was he totally wrong? Let us know in the comments below.
