Star Wars Outlaws didn't put its best foot forward when I played it at Summer Game Fest. That demo covered most of what you do in Ubisoft's next open-world game: sneak, hack, shoot, and fly. It was fine, but it was overfamiliar, and I couldn't shake the feeling that I was experiencing Outlaws in the exact opposite way it was intended. I wanted so badly to hop on Kay's speeder and explore the open world a bit, but we were rushed through three linear missions on strict 20-minute timers.
Ubisoft flipped that SGF demo on its head at a dedicated Star Wars Outlaws preview event held earlier this month in Orange County. No on-screen timers, no segmented missions—I played nearly five hours of Outlaws, and a good chunk of that time was spent chatting up NPCs, taking on side jobs from factions that all hate each other, and full-sending Kay's speeder off the biggest rock ramps I could find on Toshara, a planet of deep canyons and desert brush where the opening hours take place.
