ROGUE LEADER

As Ubisoft makes its big Star Wars debut, Massive makes the bold decision to go small

- ALEX SPENCER

As the unmistakable roar of TIE fighters tears through LA's Novo Theater, the crowd responds with equal volume. Our feelings about overenthusiastic attendees at these things have been made clear - doubly so when the entire presentation, as with the Xbox showcase we're here to watch, has been prerecorded. And yet all that cynicism melts away for a moment as we're transported back to all the other dark, tightly packed rooms we've shared with people whooping at space battles up on the big screen.

Besides, in a June that's otherwise low on the unexpected, this manages to feel like a surprise attack. No small feat, given we've known this game was coming since 2021, when Lucasfilm announced it was bringing EA's exclusive Star Wars licence to an end and working with Ubisoft's Massive Entertainment. At that time, though, we might have imagined something akin to the Swedish studio's Division games: a lootheavy co-op shooter with the military hardware swapped out for blasters, the Washington Monument for a moisture vaporator.

Instead, we begin out in space, as a Rebel blockade runner crashes into the prow of an inbound star destroyer - a neat inversion of A New Hope's opening moments, and a way of establishing the relative fortunes of the Empire and Rebellion at the point Outlaws is set, between The Empire Strikes Back and Return Of The Jedi. Not that this wider picture much concerns our protagonist, who is introduced in a scummy Outer Rim cantina, cheating at the intergalactic equivalent of poker. Kay Vess, you have to suspect, is not much of a joiner.