There’s a certain dissonance I always feel whenever I play an RPG as a “good” character. Good people don’t go through strangers’ homes, ridding them of their earthly possessions (and perhaps whatever food they have lying around) to be sold later for gold/credits/dollar, dollar bills, y’all. That’s objectively not a good thing to do, yet it’s necessary in RPGs if you have any hope of buying equipment, weapons, or consumables, especially in the early game. It inherently conflicts with wanting to be a good, heroic protagonist, which is why I love how Kay Vess couldn’t care less about being heroic in Star Wars Outlaws.
Kay is out for a big score – nothing else matters. She needs credits, lots of them, to finally escape from her life of crime. She goes planet to planet doubling crossing the four criminal syndicates for a quick payday and, of course, stealing from them.
I steal anything I can get Kay’s hands or Nix’s paws on. Who cares if I just did a job for the Pykes if I’m going to betray them to the Crimson Dawn on my next contract for a clean 500 credits? All the more reason to steal antique necklaces and durasteel from their base. They won’t miss ‘em.
Don’t mind if I do.
Playing as Kay Vess is perhaps the first time in an RPG where I feel comfortable stealing from NPCs. I don’t play series like Grand Theft Auto, where crime is in the name of the game, instead preferring RPGs where I can play a heroic protagonist out to find his adopted daughter or save the galaxy. Yet even looting corpses felt slightly wrong as Geralt in The Witcher 3. I spent eight books reading this man’s adventures – he’s got nothing if not scruples.
In an early Mass Effect 2 mission on Omega, your Shepard has a dialogue option to threaten to kill looters… after she looted every safe she came across (and will continue to do so). It’s a hypocritical moment in a game where you’ll acquire a fair chunk of your scratch by stealing from others.
But you won’t find any of that tone deafness in Star Wars Outlaws. Sneaky, sneaky sneak around to stealy, stealy steal from everyone in a galaxy that’s as unforgiving as the game was before its stealth got patched. Though Kay isn’t evil, she’s not trying to be a hero. She’s not above vices like gambling everything in Sabacc or throwing money at the space ponies. She’s still very much a criminal, so don’t think twice about pulling one over on another criminal. This is a galaxy full of scoundrels, so you shouldn’t feel bad about being one.
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