It’s no secret that Large Leisure’s Star Wars Outlaws has seen some blended opinions heading into launch. Whether or not it was how the everyday open-world system that its writer is notorious for would shake out or the graphics within the gameplay showcased so far, there have been considerations over a number of features. One explosion in a gameplay video from IGN garnered large backlash for the way awkward it seemed.
Critiques are actually in for the open-world sci-fi action-adventure, and whereas it presently has a 77 Metascore based mostly on 61 critics’ opinions, there are some less-than-enthusiastic reactions to go together with the positives. In our personal evaluate, we largely loved the story and open-world design however discovered the general motion, enemy AI, stealth, and design choices to be iffy. Insta-fail sections in 2024? You actually shouldn’t have.
Nonetheless, from the outset, Star Wars Outlaws has all the time seemed lovely. That preliminary exhibiting final yr generated some skepticism concerning the general efficiency (which we’ll delve into extra shortly). But, the Snowdrop Engine proves once more that it’s merely phenomenal for creating giant worlds laden with constancy and particulars.
It was additionally utilized in final yr’s Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, to not point out The Division 1 and 2, with all three video games positively obtained for his or her beautiful visuals. The engine additionally delivers completely beautiful character fashions, atmospheric results, and lighting, particularly when transitioning indoors to outside and vice versa.
The worlds all look colourful and vibrant general, with the 21:9 mode including to that cinematic aptitude. Whether or not you’re out within the wilds and gazing upon mountains within the distance of Toshara or slinking by crowded streets and alleyways at evening, there’s a sure appeal and a focus to element all through. The wind is real looking, inflicting timber to bend and dirt particles to journey of their course. It even ruffles Kay’s hair. All of this appears to be like nice whereas accentuating the realism even additional.
The artwork design can be very robust, recreating extraneous particulars from the basic movies with out skipping a beat (and capturing the seedier facet of the universe’s areas fairly nicely). Even the pre-rendered cutscenes look sharp by way of general constancy and animation work. Sadly, even when taking part in on PC, there are some locations the place you’ll be able to spot lower-resolution textures, reminiscent of on sure rocks within the surroundings.
When testing the PC model, we used an AMD Ryzen 9 5950x, an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti, 32 GB of RAM, and a solid-state drive. The decision was set to 3840×2160 with DLSS enabled (upscale set to Biased and High quality). We caught with the standard preset on Excessive, that means nearly each single graphics choice – from Setting Refraction High quality to the standard of Microdetails, Particles, and Scatter Density – was set to Excessive. Most Ray Tracing settings are on Medium, although BVH High quality (which affected the geometry high quality), Raytraced Diffuse Reflections (and their decision), and Raytraced Specular Reflections, had been set to Excessive.
For probably the most half, the efficiency was fairly good, remaining regular even with a number of gentle sources and characters within the environments. It’s whenever you enterprise out into the open environments of Outlaws’ multifarious planets that fluctuations will be noticed. Traversing on the Speeder in Toshara noticed the body price fluctuating between 50 and 60 frames per second, even with minimal motion. Nonetheless, it’s very playable and doesn’t considerably hamper the expertise. Ray tracing additionally appears to be like fairly beautiful, particularly when traversing over water our bodies and seeing the surroundings mirrored in the identical.
It’s the console model the place issues begin to get dicey. We examined out the PS5 model, which incorporates the particular 21:9 cinematic mode alongside different choices like Movement Blur Depth (each digital camera and per-object), Movie Grain, and Chromatic Aberration. In any other case, you’ll be able to select from two graphical modes – High quality and Efficiency – that are pretty easy.
The previous will be fairly secure all through, however some stutters are obvious throughout the extra hectic fight sequences, each on and off the Speeder. Efficiency Mode appeared way more secure and suffered fewer hiccups whereas providing the next body price. Although there’s an apparent trade-off in decision, if you’d like probably the most fluid expertise, it actually looks as if that is the best way to go.
Nonetheless, the PS5 model suffers most when accounting for the general technical polish. Animations would glitch out usually, including to the woes of traversal and exploration with Kay. There have been additionally a shocking quantity of points with lip-syncing and hit detection. Additionally, as crisp as draw distances may usually really feel on the PC model, they’d look considerably muddier on the PS5. That distinction intimately is noticeable within the early hours when Kay is tasked with breaking right into a mansion, as she scales a cliffside whereas the latter is seen within the background with fireworks going off.
If that weren’t sufficient, audio bugs and the occasional pop-in would happen on PS5, disrupting immersion all of the extra. Contemplating how well-versed Large is with the engine (heck, they created it), this might simply be a case of Star Wars Outlaws needing extra time within the oven to actually hammer out its technical points on console.
For what it’s value, we didn’t encounter any game-breaking glitches or crashes, and nothing that hampered progress (at the least none within the opening hours). Fortunately, when analyzing loading occasions, each platforms carry out extremely nicely, transitioning to and from cutscenes with subsequent to no delay.
Total, Star Wars Outlaws is a surprising open-world title, one which captures the franchise’s feel and appear to an unbelievable diploma. The particular cinematic mode is a welcome addition, including to the authenticity of being set throughout the authentic trilogy. For all of the criticism towards it, there’s one thing particular about strolling by these areas or hopping on a Speeder and watching the plains unfurl earlier than your eyes, particularly at totally different occasions of the day.
Nonetheless, the easiest way to expertise all of it is on PC, arms down, whether or not it’s because of the multitude of choices obtainable or just due to its extra constant efficiency (which may use a little bit of tightening up). The PS5 model isn’t outright horrible on a visible stage. High quality Mode may use shoring as much as deal with the body drops throughout fight; nevertheless, the general expertise might be considerably improved if the pop-in and draw distance points are addressed. It’s nearly every thing else that desperately wants extra polish to actually ship on that house scoundrel fantasy.
No matter the way it performs by way of gross sales, Star Wars Outlaws will likely obtain extra updates to enhance the expertise and handle any lingering points. Because it stands, very like final yr’s Avatar, it’s an unbelievable benchmark in current-gen visuals that can cater to franchise lovers with its particulars. Right here’s hoping it aspires to extra.
