Star Wars: Galactic Racer Reviews: 88 on Metacritic, Best Star Wars Game Since KOTOR

LAS VEGAS — FRIDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2026 — Somewhere out there, a podracer fan from 1999 is having the week of their life. Star Wars: Galactic Racer — the first Star Wars racing game in 24 years — launched Tuesday on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S, and the reviews are the kind of thing that makes you check the date twice. Eighty-eight on Metacritic. Ninety-seven percent of critics recommending it on OpenCritic. Two perfect tens. Not a single score below an eight. This is the best-reviewed Star Wars game since Knights of the Old Republic in 2003.

01 The Scorecard

The embargo lifted Friday, October 2 — four days before launch, which is the move a confident publisher makes — and the numbers have only solidified since. On Metacritic the PS5 version sits at 88, Xbox at 86, and PC at roughly 82–84 depending on the count; OpenCritic has it at 88 with 97–98% of critics recommending, per the aggregation pages. Multiple outlets note it's the highest-scoring Star Wars game on Metacritic since 2003's Knights of the Old Republic, ahead of both of Respawn's Jedi games.

The individual scores read like a highlight reel. Giant Bomb went 10/10. VGC went 5/5. Eurogamer reportedly went all the way to 100. Then the wall of 9s: GameSpot, Metro, TechRadar, Push Square, Shacknews, TheSixthAxis, Press Start, Noisy Pixel, XGN, DayOne, ComingSoon, The Drive — ten-plus outlets landing in the same neighborhood. Game Informer gave it 8.5, IGN an 8, GamesRadar 4 out of 5, PSX Extreme a 9.6. One review roundup put it simply: two 10s on top, a column of 9s down the middle, a row of 8s underneath, and nothing lower.

02 What Critics Love: Burnout DNA in a Galaxy Far, Far Away

This is a debut game from Fuse Games, a UK studio founded in 2023 by former Criterion leads — the Burnout and Need for Speed people — working with publisher Secret Mode and Lucasfilm Games. And reviewers say that lineage is everywhere. IGN called it a mix of George Lucas's universe and the destructive spirit of Burnout and MotorStorm. GamesRadar's review headline captured the feel: true to its Burnout legacy, blisteringly fast space racing that keeps you coming back to the grid.

The game is a roguelite arcade racer built around run-based progression. You play Shade, a lone racer chasing revenge and glory in the Galactic League — an unsanctioned underground circuit in the lawless Outer Rim. Four vehicle classes, each with its own handling model: landspeeders for beginners, speeder bikes for the brave, skim speeders (new to the franchise), and honest-to-goodness podracers. There's an upgrade tree per class, a mechanic companion named Hibi tuning your rig between runs, around a dozen Scenario mini-seasons, Arcade races with friend leaderboards, and PvP multiplayer. Performance targets 4K at 60fps on current-gen, and reviewers confirm the framerate holds even in the chaos.

Metro's GameCentral review — 9/10, titled "podracing paradise" — said it was the best Star Wars racing game ever made and "a generational peak for sci-fi racers at large," praising the propulsive racing, the upgrade versatility, a surprisingly great campaign, and giving Sebulba his long-overdue spotlight. Giant Bomb called it everything a podracing fan could hope for. PSX Extreme (9.6) praised the locked framerate, excellent tracks, and roguelike campaign depth. WayTooManyGames gave it a 9 for a physics model that, per the outlet, "rewards precision," and a campaign packed with weeks of content.

03 What Critics Don't: the Launch Wobbles

Nothing below an 8 doesn't mean no complaints. The big one: the launch on PC and Xbox was rough, with performance issues and bugs dragging down the experience on those platforms. Player-sentiment aggregator Skip The Critics has it at 76/100 from over 3,300 reactions — 66% positive — with performance, value, and multiplayer as the low-scoring aspects. If you're buying on PC or Xbox, make sure the patches have landed first.

Then the design gaps, which are consistent across reviews: no local multiplayer (PSX Extreme notes the tradeoff was made to keep the framerate locked — and honestly, fair), no standard time trial or practice mode to just run a track on your own, a track and planet count that could be bigger, and a £49.99 price that some reviewers felt needed more meat to justify. These are real knocks, and they're the reason the scores are 9s and 8s instead of a parade of 10s.

04 Why This One Matters: 24 Years Since the Last One

Context makes this bigger. Galactic Racer is only the fifth Star Wars racing game ever — after Episode I: Racer (1999), Racer Arcade (2000), Super Bombad Racing (2001), and Racer Revenge (2002). It was unveiled at The Game Awards in December 2025, and for a licensed debut from a brand-new studio, the confidence was telling: review code went out early, the embargo dropped four days ahead of launch, and the team clearly knew what they had.

And what they had was the spiritual successor to Episode I: Racer that nobody managed to make for a quarter century. Multiple reviewers — Game Informer especially — frame it as the game for everyone who grew up on The Phantom Menace's famous "now this is podracing" moment in 1999. The last Star Wars game to review anywhere near this well, Star Wars Zero Company, was itself a surprise hit; Galactic Racer just lapped the field. For a franchise that's had a rocky couple of decades in games, two of its best-received releases ever landing back to back is a genuine trend worth noticing.

05 Should You Buy It?

The honest read from the reviews: if you like Star Wars, buy it; if you like racing games, buy it faster; and if you loved Burnout, cancel your plans. The roguelite campaign structure — randomized events across planets, crashes that can end a run, perks that carry forward — is the smart way to keep a racing game fresh long after you'd normally shelve it, and the Arcade and PvP modes give it legs beyond the campaign.

Just be smart about the platform. PS5 is the consensus best version right now at 88; PC and Xbox versions reviewed lower and launched with the performance issues the aggregators flagged. At £49.99 it's not a budget ask, but a game with two 10s, a wall of 9s, and 97% of critics recommending it is not a gamble. It's the safest money in racing right now — and, apparently, the best Star Wars game in 23 years.