Summary

• Star Wars Outlaws introduces players to the criminal underworld, exploring new planets like Toshara and established ones like Tatooine.
• The game captures the essence of the original trilogy with attention to detail, blending new locations with familiar Star Wars aesthetics.
• Screen Rant interviewed associate world director Cloé Hammoud and associate art Director Marthe Jonkers at Summer Game Fest 2024 to learn more.

Star Wars Outlaws will take players to the galaxy’s seedy underbelly in the IP’s first open world game, and Screen Rant interviewed associate world director Cloé Hammoud and associate art Director Marthe Jonkers at Summer Game Fest 2024. Instead of dealing with Jedis or Rebels, players assume the role of Kay Ness, a thief embarking on the heist of a lifetime. The title will let players explore the Outer Rim freely, revisiting the era between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi for the first time in many years.

The game blends existing locations like Tatooine with brand-new ones created from the ground up, like the planet Toshara. Toshara is inspired by the African savanna with a sci-fi twist, and has its own cultures, locales, and secrets to discover. Outlaws will feature new enemies, creatures, and delve into the galaxy’s criminal syndicates like never before.

Screen Rant Interviews Star Wars Outlaws' Associate World Director Cloé Hammoud & Associate Art Director Marthe Jonkers

Artistic Inspirations, Vast World & Immersing Players

Screen Rant: One of the most exciting things about this game is it's marketed as the very first open-world - truly open-world - Star Wars game. What locations are you most excited to see players explore and bring to life when you were making this?

Cloé Hammoud: That's a really tough question. It's like picking your favorite pets, basically. I would say it was a true opportunity, honestly, as a world director, to create such a diverse world, to have so many different planets with different environments. We created Tatooine that fans love and know so well, but we've also have brand-new creations such as Toshara, which is a new savannah moon. We also have Akiva, more humid jungle environment, and of course Kijimi, which is a more frozen planet.

I would say among all of this, it was really cool to be able to add new locations to Tatooine, and we really got into the source material of what influenced George Lucas when he created that planet to stay true and to stay authentic to the mood and feel of the planet. We created a new settlement called Wayfar, and that has this true frontier type of vibe with a sheriff. I don't want to reveal too much, but there is a lot more to unveil to this, and I hope players will be excited as well to discover this location.

Marthe Jonkers: Maybe I can jump in on that as well, because I also really want to highlight Toshara, which is a moon that we created in close collaboration with LucasFilm Games. It's a completely new location that we were able to make from scratch and completely create ourselves. It has a lot of groundedness to it because Star Wars design is actually quite grounded.

It's in a galaxy far, far away, long, long time ago, but actually a lot of the planets, locations, characters, they have something recognizable about them, and that's the same with Toshara, right? We based it on the savannah biome, and we did add a layer of alienness to it, which is the emberlene, the orange stone formations that you can see when you play on Toshara. I just think it's super exciting that we were able to add this to Star Wars' galaxy, and I'm really looking forward to players also being able to explore this planet and all the facets that it has.

Something else that really sets this game apart is we're getting to explore sort of the criminal underworld side of the galaxy, versus all of the galactic civil war locales that we're normally seeing. Was it freeing to be able to go off the beaten path and explore these areas that aren't often explored?

Marthe Jonkers: I think it was super interesting for us to dive into this underworld, because we were really wondering - Star Wars Outlaws takes place between the Empire Strikes Back and Return Of The Jedi, and in that era, the Empire is very strong. There's a lot of civil unrest and the crime syndicates, they are fighting for power. It's a very dangerous time, and being able to explore that and having Kay Vess and Nix going into that underworld and learning how to survive and how to engage with these crime syndicates and crime lords, taking on risky contracts and infiltrating faction territories, all of that was just very interesting for us to explore. I think it gave us a lot of opportunities as well, right?

You spoke a little bit about how you've not reimagined Tatooine, but you've expanded upon it and created these new areas. What is it like to be building upon a planet where there are established places that fans know, but you need to make something new that's cohesive with that?

Cloé Hammoud: Like I mentioned before, our intention was to really understand what was the creative process of George Lucas and his methodology. So, you spoke about adding a familiarity element, but also an alien element to it. There is also something that had a huge impact on him when he was young, was the Wild West and the western movies that he saw, and we really dove into that, the spaghetti western movies, all of these fantasies of being in the Wild West and all this iconography and visual language that comes out of this production.

We were super interested to recreate this. The world team that worked on Tatooine, they were huge fans of Star Wars, and especially the original trilogy. So they were eager to respect, of course, what has been established, but they were also super keen on their take on this. I had very interesting propositions coming from the team. Like you said, you spoke about being consistent. We wanted to create new locations that could definitely fit into that planet without necessarily breaking too many rules, but having Lucasfilm Games guiding us on this was also a real good journey, I would say, because they responded very well to all our propositions and they were super responsive and ive.

This game also marks the introduction of the Ashiga Clan, which is completely new, and they have a really distinct aesthetic with their head pieces - they look awesome. When you were deg those completely new organization , what were you looking at in of how they fit into the universe, culturally speaking, and what inspirations were you using when you were deg them?

Marthe Jonkers: Deg the Ashiga Clan was super fun. It was very exciting, because they're based on Kijimi. So we had that base, and Kijimi was featured in Star Wars movies, so we know what it looks like. Of course, we expanded on it in Star Wars Outlaws, but we tried to create this syndicate that would feel like they have been there for a long time and they've kind of assimilated with the culture of Kijimi.

A lot of influences on Kijimi's architecture, for example, are very much Asia or Japanese inspired, so this is also something that we pulled through into the design of the Ashiga Clan. A lot of their clothing was - we looked at kimonos for example, and we looked at ukiyo-e or woodblock prints for the color palettes, just to really ground that idea that they have been there for a long time, they're part of this place now, they've ruled it.

Cloé Hammoud: The weather also had an influence.

Marthe Jonkers: Definitely.

Cloé Hammoud: The padding -

Marthe Jonkers: That goes for all the characters on Kijimi, because it's very cold there, so they need to wear a lot of thick jackets, and you will see that they have lots of gloves, because it's super cold. They have also their own color palettes. Every location, every planet that we designed will have their own population with their own style of clothing, their own color palettes. So -

Cloé Hammoud: Working in Sweden, we knew how to do padded design.

Cloé Hammoud: We had experience with the frozen cold weather, so for us it was something easy.

Marthe Jonkers: Yeah, exactly.

In general, talking about artistic inspirations, I'm curious where you guys found yourselves looking to the most. Were you looking at old Star Wars concept art or old comics and that sort of thing when you were deg the world?

Cloé Hammoud: Yeah, of course. We went back again to the source. And of course all of the concept from Ralph McQuarrie were super inspiring. It has its simplicity in the shape. There is an element of scale in his design. There is also a huge influence coming from the sixties and the seventies. All of these retro-futuristic elements that we try to also integrate in the design of one of our main city on Toshara is called Mirogana. All of the architecture has this rounded metal shape to it that we were super interested in adding.

Marthe Jonkers: Well, also for the characters, I think because we took our inspiration from the same sources as George Lucas had for the original trilogy, because we want to stay very authentic to that era. We also, for the characters, had a lot of these pillars. For example, the simplicity that you mentioned from Ralph McQuarrie is very important to us in the design, the silhouettes that need to be quite recognizable. We had this three-second rule where you had to be able to tell roughly the story of the character by just looking at them for three seconds. I think approaching it in that way helped us to grasp the authentic original trilogy, Star Wars vibe.

Cloé Hammoud: The camera lens, also, the cinematic. When you played the game this morning, you had a set-up, and this is how we want players to play the game, is this ultra-wide set-up is super important for us to recreate this cinematic realism. It goes through, of course, camera effects, special lens that we use, all of these different details that allow us to be as authentic as possible to the original trilogy movies.

Something that stood out to me about the world too is it's also so interesting to traverse, there are so many varied ways that you get around the world. What is it like deg a world that's interesting not only aesthetically, but in how you move around it as well?

Cloé Hammoud: I think that's a super good question, because it's the challenge of making an open world game. It's making sure it's not only fun to explore and discover, but it's also feels good. It's readable enough and it has an easy way to traverse, and all of these distinct planets offer different experiences. They are really handcrafted. This is what we wanted. Not only in of color palette, in of weather, in of biomes, but they also offer different feelings. Because Akiva is humid jungle, but as you - I don't know if you've traveled to a jungle environment, but it has this thick vegetation, sometimes you can't go through the bushes and all of the different foliage. Toshara is wide open plains that is very true to the savannah feeling.

All in all, I think we wanted the players to feel this diversity, and you have a speeder, so that allows you to explore more, and this thrill of speed and all of the stunts you can do all of this was super important for us to integrate. Kay has many different tools. She's got a grapple so she can climb, she can discover more locations as well. There is a lot to see in Star Wars Outlaws for sure.

You've mentioned how you've created these completely new locations as well, which must feel like a big undertaking in a universe that's already so established. What are the biggest challenges that come with making places like Toshara where it's something that's never been seen before, but you want fans to feel like it fits in?

Cloé Hammoud: The fact that we wanted to create a scoundrel fantasy was the through-line for us. Kay and Nix as a duo, memorable duo, to be able to navigate the underworld and meet all of these different characters, go into these cities, this bustling environment, and then cantinas, where you can overhear conversations, you can mingle with imperials, you discover all of these backstages that we are not necessarily seen in other Star Wars medias before. All of this, the underworld theme and the fact that you have so many different layers to that, for example, there is a big corruption aspect on Toshara. All of this made us able to create this diversity of location that are all tight and all belong to the same ecosystem in a way.

You talked a little bit too about trying to tap into that spaghetti Western feel with a lot of the areas, and I think that's perfect for a story about an outlaw. What were you hoping to make players feel the most in that sort of cowboy aesthetic fantasy where they're being this outlaw in the world?

Cloé Hammoud: So I can speak on the world building aspects, and if you want, you can speak on the more art and the visual conception of it, but I think we've tried to tell all of these stories through many different characters as well. I mean, there is something that I do like on Tatooine. It's a very micro story, but it's super interesting. There is a character you meet, he has has lost his moisture farm. He's desperate, and then you have to help him to get his moisture farm back, and then eventually if you manage to do so, you will become a co-owner of a moisture farm - so that's a pretty fun story. But we were interested in also showing all of these different aspects of Tatooine, and showing that it is a true frontier world, and it's difficult to live on this planet for sure.

Marthe Jonkers: I think we really want to tell the story of Kay and Nix, and at the beginning, she's a thief, but this will be a journey about her really becoming a scoundrel and really learning how to navigate the underworld. I think that will be the interesting part for a player as well to go on that journey with her. You're getting introduced to all these crime syndicates, these new locations together with her and seeing how she reacts to it, and you'll be able to navigate it in a way that you want to do it. If you're more into sneaking, Kay can definitely sneak. She even has these sneaker-style boots that we haven't seen before in Star Wars, but it's perfect for Kay because she can sneak around and be very silent.

But if you are more someone who wants to play that gunslinger fantasy, like the spaghetti western fantasy, she has a blaster as well with different modules, you have different strategies that you can have to navigate all these dangerous places that Kay and Nix will have to maneuver into, and of course she has Nix, which is one of my favorite characters. Nix is based on our pets.

They have a really close relationship and he helps her out a lot. When you are navigating these areas, he can help you distract enemies and you can sneak into smaller spaces. It's really up to you, and you will grow together with Kay and you will see how she will engage into these new relationships, make new friends, new enemies. We'll be super excited to see how players will experience that.

Source: Screen Rant Plus