Among the issues that led to the less-than-amazing response to Star Wars Outlaws earlier this year, one of the biggest was its numerous forced stealth missions. Ubisoft has already softened those requirements a bit and promised more changes to come in the upcoming title update 1.4. Now, the devs have revealed the extent of the changes coming in this week’s patch.
“Our first step in expanding player choice is removing forced stealth from almost all quest objectives,” creative director Drew Rechner explains in a new blog post. “This doesn’t mean that sneaking is no longer a viable or even preferable option in some cases. Rather, if you’re caught while sneaking, the objective won’t fail and reset you to the last checkpoint. Instead, you’ll seamlessly transition into combat. We know many of you enjoy the stealth approach, so it was important to us to preserve that playstyle while also giving you the freedom to decide how to tackle each mission. Ultimately, you’ll have the choice to sneak, go in combat-first, or—my personal favorite—sneak until you’re caught and then blast your way out.”
Title update 1.4 drops on November 21 alongside the game’s first DLC pack, Wild Card, and its debut on Steam. This update will also let you fight inside syndicate districts, “which previously only allowed for stealth.” These all sound like some pretty fundamental changes to the way the game plays, and with the fixes coming so soon after launch I can’t help but wonder how Outlaws debuted with some of the design decisions it did.
Combined with the previously announced combat changes, it’s starting to sound like Star Wars Outlaws is going to be a whole new game after title update 1.4 drops – or, at the very least, the game it should’ve been at launch. If I wasn’t already starting to feel bad about playing and liking this open-world game at launch, I certainly am now.
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