While the Star Wars IP is starting to branch out once again in the video game space, there's one particular genre of game that fans haven't gotten in recent years: a space faring epic RPG in the style of Fallout: New Vegas. Players have gotten some Star Wars RPGs before, but never in the Fallout style of first-person, where players create a character and get to be whoever they want to be in a single-player world.
It's honestly kind of shocking that this kind of game hasn't been really made since the older era of Star Wars games, considering the anticipation fans would have were one announced. The slew of upcoming Star Wars show and books could mean more video games in the future, putting this type of a game very much be on the table.
Building A Star Wars Character
One of the most tantalizing reasons to have a New Vegas-style Star Wars RPG is all of the different character build options that would be available. The Star Wars franchise has so, so many different character archetypes, and the ability to build a character with traits from two or three of these archetypes would be something special. Players could imagine a Force-sensitive bounty hunter or a smuggler with an affinity for using lightsabers; after all, those hokey religions and ancient weapons can be a Force to be reckoned with. The possibilities here are insane, and a lot of Star Wars fans would finally have the chance to build the character that they've wanted to see for years.
Not only could the character build options be great when it came to how the character functioned, but Star Wars has always had characters everywhere on the moral spectrum, as well; morally dark, light, and gray. In an RPG where the player is faced with choices that have real consequences on the regular, players would really get to be in charge of what kind of character they want to be.
The Impact Of Player Choice
One thing that could hold a game of this nature back, and might be the reason that one doesn't exist yet, is the nature of the Star Wars universe itself. It's a universe with a lot of history and a ton of characters. Different parts of the Star Wars universe and its timeline are constantly being explored, so a game of this nature might have a hard time actually doing anything with its story.
Establishing a story and characters over which the player has direct interaction with could be a very difficult thing to do because different players are going to make different things happen by the choices they make. In a universe where things are meticulously crafted so much that there could be history books written about it, the game would have to take place in a section of that universe where things could be somewhat fluid.
Where In The Star Wars Timeline Could This Game Be Set?
There are a couple of different possibilities here. In order for the game to take place in a recognizable section of the Star Wars universe like The Force Unleashed, the impact of the decisions that the player makes would need to be limited to characters that only appear inside the game. These decisions can't have ramifications on characters that appear in movies, comics, shows, books, or any other form of media, because those characters could be impacted in different ways depending on how the player plays. A really interesting story could still be told here; it would just need to be separate in scope to the traditional Star Wars story, with characters created entirely for the purpose of the game.
The other option here is to have the game take place in an era of the Star Wars universe outside of anything that fans have seen before or in the newly-established High Republic era, as this would allow the story to have the same scope of ramifications that Star Wars usually has. The problem with this is that, if the setting is too different, it might not feel enough like Star Wars to have the appeal that a Star Wars game should have.
All in all, the first option seems like the better one. A Star Wars story with exclusively personal stakes, as opposed to galactic consequences, would be a good way to give the game its own flavor, while still keeping the game in the Star Wars universe players know and love. While nothing like this has been announced, it really only seems like a matter of time until something along these lines exists. EA is doubling down on being the Star Wars game developer, as it dips its toe into exploring more concepts for Star Wars games, with things like Jedi: Fallen Order and Squadrons. As it creates more and more Star Wars games, with luck, it'll get to this style of game eventually.