The size of AAA games these days means bugs are almost inevitable, especially in open-world games like Star Wars Outlaws. Whether it's a graphical glitch, a stuttering line, or something more serious, everyone has stories of running into bugs, and sometimes fixing those can be problematic for developers.
In a message sent out to Star Wars Outlaws PS5 players, Ubisoft has apologized to those who "had access to an older version of the game", as they might be encountering issues after the most recent update on PlayStation 5. In the letter, they tell players to make sure they've updated to the latest version (1.000.002 as of the time it was sent), and to start a new save as if they continue on a prior save they will "unfortunately face issues and progression blockers."
While journalists and influencers are used to issues from testing games heading up to release, including needing to restart, what makes Star Wars Outlaws different here is that it follows the increasingly popular trend of AAA games to allow early access to players who pay more for a special edition that lets them play the game up to three days later. Thus, players who paid a premium to get their hands on Star Wars Outlaws just a bit earlier are losing their progression, and time spent in the game because Ubisoft failed to ensure that the version released was ready for its effective actual launch date.
Star Wars Outlaws has received largely positive reviews, including our Star Wars Outlaws review by Erren Van Duine, but this highlights a problem with this model of release, where major publishers are releasing these games as completed with essentially two separate release dates. Here, we see these premium-paying players losing saves they made during that time so far. Electronic Arts has used the same period to help shield Madden from reviews, by not letting reviewers publish their reviews until after the early access period was up and it reached the second, 'official', release date.
This is far from the first time that Ubisoft has faced issues with bugs in their games. Most famously would be with Assassin's Creed Unity, which became notorious for its wide variety of glitches, so much so that a decade later it's still a byword for it. However, even that game didn't reach the heights of Ubisoft's worst bug, which came in 2001 with Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor, a Dungeons and Dragons RPG that when you went to uninstall it, the game would uninstall system files on your computer.
As for now, Star Wars Outlaws appears poised to join the Star Wars: Jedi games like Fallen Order, and Jedi Survivor as substantial modern single-player additions to the rich Star Wars video game history. Even if it is making life harder on those who tossed in some extra credits to play early.
