Star Wars Outlaws Interview: Julian Gerighty On Player Choices, What Inspired Nix, & Rogue One's Influence

will take players to never-before-seen places as Kay Vess, a thief living in the Outer Rim. Instead of the typical hero story starring Jedis and Rebels, the title has opted for a much more personal, morally ambiguous story of a quest to pull off an epic heist. It marks the first truly open-world entry in franchise history, promising a slew of different places for players to explore, and spoke with creative director Julian Gerighty to find out more.

The many planets in are a mix of existing locales like Tatooine and new creations, like the savanna-inspired Toshara. Though the criminal life is a tough one, Kay won’t be alone — the adorable merqaal Nix, axolotl-like creature, will be by her side along the way. The title takes place in a rarely-explored part of the IP’s timeline, taking place between the events of and .

Players will be able to form alliances with some of the Outer Rim's major syndicates in Star Wars Outlaws, with each group offering unique rewards.

Screen Rant: First, I would love to talk about how you guys landed on this point in the timeline for the game, because it's one that hasn't been explored for quite a while.

Julian Gerighty: It was actually a suggestion from Lucasfilm Games. It was something that we came to them with this idea of an open world scoundrel game, and they took a beat and said, «There is this one year period between Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi that is perfect.» The galaxy is in chaos. The Empire has just won this battle at Hoth. The rebels are retreating. It's the perfect moment to have a scoundrel story, because the criminal syndicates are flourishing and that's where it comes from. So it was actually their suggestion — don't get me wrong, it's my favorite period in Star Wars, so it was just really, really a lot of joy hearing that that was what they saw this game featuring.

What kind of challenges come alongside — you have these existing pieces of lore that you're taking chunks of like the Crimson Dawn and that