Set in the Star Wars universe between the events of The Empire Strikes Back (1980) and Return of the Jedi (1983), the story follows Kay Vess, a young scoundrel who assembles a team for a massive heist in order to escape a crime syndicate.

The development team, supported by Lucasfilm Games and ten other Ubisoft studios, sought to combine canonical elements of the Star Wars universe with their own ideas, focusing on creating cinematic and seamless gameplay.

On the other hand, the game received backlash for its unpolished and buggy gameplay as well as the poor AI, and failed to meet the sales expectations of Ubisoft.

[3] The player controls the scoundrel Kay Vess (voiced by Humberly Gonzalez), traversing open world environments on planets and in space while engaging in various activities.

[6] Kay has the Adrenaline ability, which charges during combat and triggers a time-slowing effect, allowing for a rapid series of shots at marked targets.

[4] The player can also explore the orbits of planets and moons,[13] as well as engage in space combat using the ship's weapons, including a laser cannon and missiles.

[1] In Outlaws, the player encounters four factions: the Ashiga Clan, Crimson Dawn, Hutt Cartel, and Pyke Syndicate.

[18] The game features a six-level wanted system that determines the intensity of Imperial forces' pursuit of Kay for committing crimes.

Kay successfully opens the vault, only to be surprised when Dennion's crew reveal themselves to be part of the Rebel Alliance, and their real objective was to free their team leader Asara Deyn, who was being held prisoner by Sliro.

Eventually, she manages to salvage a replacement nav computer from a shipwreck only to be double crossed by Waka, but he is killed by the bounty hunter Vail Tormin, who is after Kay's death mark.

Jaylen asks for Kay's participation in breaking into Sliro's vault again to steal his fortune, and instructs her to gather necessary crew members to pull off the heist.

On Akiva, she searches for the droidsmith Gedeek Obaz and helps him hijack the Empire's Viper Droid project for the Rebel Alliance to secure his loyalty.

Kay and her team manage to escape the planet, but she finds out what they stole wasn't Sliro's money, but instead a codex containing all of his information about the Empire.

[22] Meanwhile, Massive, eager to move beyond the games as a service model used in their previous titles, sought to expand their creative opportunities.

[34]: 0:32:23  Furthermore, the developers drew inspiration from the sources that influenced George Lucas, such as spaghetti Westerns, the works of Akira Kurosawa, and classic war films,[13][35] in addition to McQuarrie's concept art, Joe Johnston's storyboards, and Phil Tippett's creature designs.

[37] This period was deemed a "perfect starting point" as it allowed the story to shift away from the Rebel Alliance and instead focus on the criminal underworld, a subject not deeply explored in the franchise before.

They relied on Dorling Kindersley's Star Wars visual guides to recreate the city of Mos Eisley and the planet's distinctive dunes and canyons.

[39] The studio aimed to present the protagonist, Kay Vess, as a "resourceful underdog," contrasting with the trained soldier archetype seen in their The Division series.

[14]: 80 [40] Gerighty stated that Kay's story arc was a coming-of-age journey, transforming her from a "street thief to a fully-fledged scoundrel who is well known and kind of respected and feared by the syndicates.

[26] Her appearance, including her clothing and physical attributes like her broken nose and scars, was designed to visually convey her life experiences.

The developers focused on creating the game's open world that expanded gradually and felt "conscious," rather than simply being large in scale.

[45] Outlaws was developed using the Snowdrop engine, which had been enhanced to support Massive's three core design pillars: densely populated, dynamic cities; expansive landscapes with various activities; and outer space exploration.

Pre-orders for the editions, priced at $110 and $130 respectively, launched simultaneously, offering vehicle cosmetics and granting early access to the game several days before its official release.

[59] The PC version, along with the Wild Card DLC expansion, debuted on Steam on November 21, 2024, but immediately faced challenges in attracting players, with a peak of just 834 concurrent users.

He compared the game to the Millennium Falcon as "a bucket of bolts held together with repurposed parts and prone to breaking down, but at its best it's more than capable of jolting your pleasure centres into Star Wars fan hyperspace.

"[70] As a result of low aggregate user review score on Metacritic and having an estimated 15% less sales than Assassin's Creed Mirage despite a 30% higher budget, on September 3, 2024, J.P. Morgan slashed its sales forecast by two million units, predicting 5.5 million units sold by March 2025, causing Ubisoft's share price to reach its ten-year low.

[83] According to Tom Henderson of Insider Gaming, Star Wars Outlaws reportedly had sold 1 million units within its first month of release.