Star Wars Battlefront II is not dead. It is just apparently waiting for the community to yell loud enough. After Battlefront Resurgence Day 2026, the old DICE shooter has once again reminded everyone that there is still a real audience for large-scale Star Wars multiplayer. Not a theoretical audience. Not a “wouldn’t it be nice if EA noticed” audience. An actual, log-in-and-play audience. According to SteamCharts, Star Wars Battlefront II has seen a major jump over the last 30 days, with average players up more than 100% compared to April and a recent Steam peak of 9,377 players. That is only Steam, not the full picture across console and PC platforms. But it is still a very loud signal from a game that officially stopped getting new live-service support years ago. Resurgence Day Was More Than Nostalgia The community-led Battlefront Resurgence Day 2026 was set for May 23, inviting players…
Dave Filoni Says He’s Becoming Lucasfilm’s Little Obi-Wan
Dave Filoni has found a very Dave Filoni way to describe running Star Wars. Not “brand architect.”Not “content overseer.”Not “the guy trying to stop the galaxy from collapsing under the weight of canon spreadsheets.” No, Filoni sees himself a little differently. Speaking to USA Today, via AOL, the Lucasfilm creative chief described his role as helping bring out the best in the people around him and being “a little Obi-Wan” when creators need guidance through the galaxy. Honestly, that may be the most Star Wars management quote ever given. The Mentor Role Fits Filoni Almost Too Well Filoni has always been a slightly unusual figure in modern Star Wars. He began as George Lucas’ animation apprentice on The Clone Wars, became one of the key voices behind Rebels, helped shape the Disney+ era through The Mandalorian and Ahsoka, and is now one of the central creative leaders steering Lucasfilm into…
Mando and Grogu Just Made Starfighter’s Job Harder
The Mandalorian and Grogu has done its job. Star Wars is back in theaters, the opening weekend was strong, and Grogu has once again proven that he may be less a character and more a tiny green economic stabilizer with ears. But that success also makes the next Star Wars movie more interesting. Because if The Mandalorian and Grogu was the safe theatrical restart, Star Wars: Starfighter is shaping up to be the real test. The Safe Bet Worked The numbers are good. The Mandalorian and Grogu opened with roughly $165 million worldwide, according to Reuters, giving Lucasfilm exactly what it needed after years away from cinemas: proof that Star Wars can still pull people into theaters. But it did so with a lot of help. Din Djarin and Grogu are familiar. They have years of Disney+ momentum behind them. They are family-friendly, toy-friendly, meme-friendly, and emotionally simple in the…
Star Wars’ Streaming Detour May Not Have Hurt the Franchise After All
For years, the big worry around Star Wars was simple: had Disney trained audiences to see the galaxy as a streaming franchise? After The Mandalorian, The Book of Boba Fett, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Andor, Ahsoka, and several animated series, Star Wars had spent a long time living on Disney+. Good for subscription value. Good for weekly discourse. Good for Grogu GIFs. But maybe risky for theaters. Now The Mandalorian and Grogu has opened with around $165 million worldwide, and the early answer may be less dramatic than expected. Star Wars did not return to cinemas like The Force Awakens. But it also did not come crawling back with a broken hyperdrive and a note from accounting. As box office analyst David A. Gross told Variety: “For Star Wars not to be hurt in any obvious way by its long detour onto streaming is good news for the franchise.” That is the…
May 25 Is the Real Star Wars Day, and the Movies Prove It
May the 4th has the pun. May 25 has the receipts. Long before Star Wars Day became a hashtag, a merch wave, and the annual moment where every brand with a social media intern suddenly discovered lightsabers, May 25 was already the date that changed the galaxy. The original Star Wars arrived in theaters on May 25, 1977. Six years later, Return of the Jedi opened on May 25, 1983. That is not just trivia. That is the franchise’s cinematic birth certificate and the original trilogy’s victory lap landing on the same calendar square. So yes, May the 4th is fun. But May 25 is the day Star Wars actually became Star Wars. The Day the Galaxy Opened When the film now known as A New Hope first opened in 1977, it was not yet a sacred text, a streaming category, a theme park ecosystem, or a multi-generation licensing empire….
Mando and Grogu Opens Big, But Star Wars Still Has Something to Prove
Star Wars is back in theaters, and the opening weekend number is doing exactly what Star Wars numbers usually do: starting an argument. The Mandalorian and Grogu opened to an estimated $165 million worldwide over Memorial Day weekend, with about $102 million coming from the U.S. and Canada, according to Reuters and AP. That is a big number. A very big number, in fact. It is also the lowest domestic opening for a Disney-era Star Wars movie. So yes, welcome back to theatrical Star Wars, where even success has to arrive carrying a small glowing discourse grenade. A Strong Opening, But Not a Supernova For almost any other franchise, a $165 million global launch would be a clear victory lap. For Star Wars, it comes with an asterisk shaped like the Millennium Falcon. The good news is obvious: The Mandalorian and Grogu brought Star Wars back to cinemas after a…
How the Star Wars Universe Became One of the Most Iconic Mod Inspirations in CS 1.6
Imagine this: you join a server, round starts, and instead of the usual AK-47 fire you hear the unmistakable hum of a lightsaber. Your enemy isn’t a CT or T – he’s Darth Vader. The map isn’t Dust2 – it’s the scorching desert of Tatooine. If you’ve ever experienced this in CS 1.6, you already know what we’re talking about. If you haven’t – buckle up, because this rabbit hole goes deep. Why the Star Wars Universe Is a Perfect Fit for CS 1.6 Modding There’s something almost poetic about the combination of Counter-Strike and Star Wars. Both are legendary franchises with massive, passionate communities that refuse to die out no matter how many years pass. The Star Wars universe is a goldmine for modders. It offers an enormous variety of characters, weapons, environments, and lore that translate beautifully into a first-person shooter format. Instantly recognizable aesthetics – the sleek…
SWTOR Bounty Contract Week Returns Next Week
The galaxy is about to reopen its most respectable excuse for legally questionable bounty hunting. Bounty Contract Week returns to Star Wars: The Old Republic from May 26 to June 2, giving players another chance to sign up with the Bounty Brokers Association and chase targets across the galaxy for credits, reputation, weapons, armor, mounts, and the warm inner glow of making someone else’s problem disappear. Professionally, of course. According to the official SWTOR May 2026 in-game events calendar, the event begins and ends at 12:00 PM GMT and is open to players at level 15 and above. Time to Dust Off the Contract List Bounty Contract Week is one of SWTOR’s most straightforward recurring events, and that is part of why it still works. You pick up contracts from the Bounty Brokers Association, track down your target, gather intel, confront the problem, and decide whether you want the job…
Can Mando and Grogu Make Star Wars Feel Big Again?
Star Wars is back in theaters, but the real question is slightly more uncomfortable: Does it still feel huge? The Mandalorian and Grogu has finally brought the galaxy far, far away back to cinemas after a long theatrical break. It is the first new Star Wars movie since The Rise of Skywalker in 2019, and Disney is clearly hoping Din Djarin and Grogu can do more than sell popcorn. They need to remind people that Star Wars still belongs on the biggest screen possible. That is a heavier job than it sounds. The Galaxy Returns With Smaller Expectations According to Reuters, The Mandalorian and Grogu has been projected to open somewhere between $75 million and $100 million in the U.S. and Canada. For almost any other franchise, that would be a strong launch. For Star Wars, it is more complicated. Disney-era Star Wars used to open like a cultural emergency….
Fortnite’s Mando Crossover Is Only the First Step
Fortnite is not just borrowing Star Wars costumes anymore. It is starting to look like one of the places where Star Wars tests what the franchise can become next. With The Mandalorian and Grogu now tied directly into Fortnite through a dedicated Watch Party Island, quests, rewards, and a full Nevarro-inspired experience, Lucasfilm and Epic Games are doing more than tossing Din Djarin into the Item Shop and calling it a day. According to StarWars.com, the Watch Party Island gave players a special message from Jon Favreau and a 10-minute sneak peek of The Mandalorian and Grogu ahead of the film’s theatrical release. That alone is unusual enough. But Favreau’s comments to GamesRadar make the whole thing more interesting. He called the collaboration “a very first step” toward what he sees becoming a much larger project. That sounds less like a one-off promo and more like Lucasfilm quietly opening a…
Disney Just Turned Smugglers Run Into a Mando and Grogu Ride
The Millennium Falcon just got a new job, and naturally, Grogu is involved. A new Mandalorian and Grogu mission has officially arrived for Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run at Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, launching at both Disneyland Resort and Walt Disney World Resort alongside The Mandalorian and Grogu hitting theaters. That timing is not exactly subtle. But honestly, neither is putting Din Djarin, Grogu, Hondo Ohnaka, multiple planets, branching destinations, and the Millennium Falcon into the same attraction update. This is Star Wars synergy with the hyperdrive fully repaired. The Falcon Has a New Mission The updated Smugglers Run mission sends crews after ex-Imperial officers, with Hondo Ohnaka once again turning your vacation into unpaid space labor. The adventure begins on Tatooine, because apparently every Star Wars mission is legally required to touch sand at some point. From there, the ride can branch toward several major locations, including Bespin, Coruscant, and…
Mando and Grogu’s 88% Audience Score Splits the Room
Star Wars is back in theaters, and yes, the galaxy is arguing again. The Mandalorian and Grogu currently has an 88% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, based on more than 1,000 verified ratings. That is a strong early sign that regular moviegoers are responding much more warmly to Din Djarin and Grogu’s big-screen adventure than many critics did. Because naturally, Star Wars could not simply return to cinemas quietly. It had to bring a scoreboard. Audiences Are Much Kinder Than Critics At the time of writing, Rotten Tomatoes lists the film at 64% on the Tomatometer and 88% on the Popcornmeter. That gap is the story. Critics have been more cautious, with several reviews describing the film as fun but familiar, charming but light, or closer to a supersized Disney+ adventure than a major cinematic reinvention. Audiences, apparently, are less bothered by that. For many viewers, “Mando and Grogu go…
Pedro Pascal Still Wants More Mando and Grogu
Pedro Pascal is not talking like someone ready to put the helmet away for good. With The Mandalorian and Grogu bringing Din Djarin and his tiny green chaos apprentice to the big screen, Pascal has made it clear that he still sees more road ahead for Star Wars’ most famous clan of two. Speaking in a new CBR interview clip, Pascal said he sees “a next chapter” for the pair, whether that happens on the big screen or the small screen. That is not an official announcement, obviously. Lucasfilm has not suddenly dropped a secret trilogy, a Disney+ season, and a Grogu holiday special into our laps. But it is still the kind of quote that tells you something important: the actor at the center of this whole beskar-covered machine does not sound finished. The Clan of Two Still Has Mileage The appeal of Mando and Grogu has always been…
The Mandalorian and Grogu Just Landed in Fortnite Again
Fortnite has opened the Star Wars toy box again, and this time it is very much walking the Way. New The Mandalorian and Grogu items are now live in the Fortnite Item Shop, bringing another round of Din Djarin energy into Epic’s never-ending pop culture blender. The big headline is the The Mandalorian (Pen & Ink) outfit, but the sneaky little scene-stealer may be the new BDX Droid sidekick. Yes, Fortnite has found another small droid to make Star Wars players point at the screen. A New Mando Look Hits the Shop The current shop rotation includes The Mandalorian (Pen & Ink), a stylized version of Din Djarin that fits Fortnite’s growing love of comic-book-inspired variants. It is not just the outfit either. The shop also lists several related cosmetics, including the Beskar Spear, Beskar Mythosaur, TIE Fighter Tow, and Modified Beskar Hallikset. And of course, Grogu is there too,…
Battlefront II’s Battle Point Event Is Live, So Prepare for Chaos
Star Wars Battlefront II has pushed the big red chaos button again. The Battle Point Event is live, which means reinforcements cost less, more of them can flood the battlefield at once, and your average match now has a much higher chance of looking like a Clone Wars episode where the director lost control of the extras. Lower costs. More special units. Busier objectives. Louder everything. For a game that officially ended live-service support years ago, Battlefront II still has a funny habit of reminding everyone that it can absolutely still start a small war on your Friday. Cheaper Reinforcements, Messier Matches The current SWBF2 event calendar lists the Friday Battle Point Event as lowering Battle Point costs for reinforcements and increasing how many can be active at the same time. That sounds like a small rules tweak until you actually load into a match. Suddenly there are more clone…
Battlefront II’s Siege of Kamino Update Still Feels Like a Turning Point
Seven years ago, Star Wars Battlefront II got one of those updates that quietly says a lot about where the game was heading. The Siege of Kamino Update did not add a giant new era, a headline-grabbing hero, or a cinematic trailer that made everyone lose their minds for three days. Instead, it did something more important for the actual people still playing: it made the game feel more complete, more social, and more tuned to what the community had been asking for. Released in May 2019, the update brought Kamino – Cloning Facility to Capital Supremacy, added the in-game Voice Lines Wheel for heroes, raised the level cap for all units to 1000, and adjusted Heroes vs. Villains after removing the old target system. That may sound like patch-note soup. It was not. It was one of the updates that helped turn Battlefront II from a game people argued…
The Star Wars Eclipse Waiting Game Just Got More Complicated
There are red flags around Star Wars Eclipse now. Not the fun Sith kind. The labour-union, restructuring, “what exactly is happening inside this studio?” kind. Just one day after Quantic Dream reassured fans that Star Wars Eclipse is still moving forward, the situation around the studio has become much messier. The French video game workers’ union STJV has strongly criticized Quantic Dream following the cancellation of Spellcasters Chronicles, claiming that the studio’s restructuring could put 95 jobs at risk and accusing management of mishandling both the cancelled project and the wider production situation. That does not mean Star Wars Eclipse is cancelled. It does mean the calm official message now has a lot more noise behind it. The Official Line Is Still: Eclipse Continues Let’s start with the important part: Quantic Dream says Star Wars Eclipse is not affected. After announcing that Spellcasters Chronicles would be shut down, the studio…
Vader Immortal Episode I Made Darth Vader Feel Too Close for Comfort
Seven years ago today, Star Wars put Darth Vader in your personal space. Released on May 21, 2019, Vader Immortal: Episode I launched alongside the Oculus Quest and gave Star Wars gaming one of its strangest experiments: a canon VR story built less around “beating” Darth Vader and more around surviving the deeply unpleasant experience of standing near him. That sounds like a small thing. It was not. Because in VR, Vader is not just a character on a screen. He is tall. He is close. He is breathing. And suddenly, all those jokes about Imperial workplace culture feel much less funny when the office manager is eight feet of black armor and unresolved trauma. A Star Wars Story Built for Presence Developed by ILMxLAB, Vader Immortal was structured as a three-part VR adventure set on Mustafar. Episode I introduced players as a smuggler pulled into Vader’s orbit, with ancient…
The Empire Strikes Back Turns 46, and Hoth Still Owns Star Wars Gaming
The Empire Strikes Back turns 46 today, and somehow Hoth is still doing unpaid overtime in Star Wars games. Released in the United States on May 21, 1980, The Empire Strikes Back did more than make Star Wars darker, colder, and emotionally meaner. It gave the franchise one of its most endlessly reusable gaming scenarios: Rebel snowspeeders versus Imperial AT-AT walkers on a frozen battlefield. That sequence is so clean, so readable, and so instantly interactive that it basically arrived pre-packaged as a video game level. Big walkers.Small ships.A generator to defend.Tow cables.Lasers.Snow.Panic. What more does a game designer need? Hoth Was Star Wars Gaming Before Star Wars Gaming Knew Itself The first licensed Star Wars video game was Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, released by Parker Brothers for the Atari 2600 in 1982. And what was it about? Hoth, naturally. Players controlled Luke Skywalker in a snowspeeder, fighting…
Grand Admiral Thrawn Just Rode Into Red Dead Redemption 2
Grand Admiral Thrawn has survived Rebels, Ahsoka, Legends, canon, hyperspace whales, Imperial politics, and decades of tactical overthinking. Now he has apparently arrived in Red Dead Redemption 2. Because modding is a beautiful lawless frontier. A new Nexus Mods release titled Grand Admiral Thrawn (Star Wars) brings the blue-skinned Imperial strategist into Rockstar’s western sandbox as an add-on PED. The mod is created by NameyNameName15, uploaded on May 15, 2026, and lets players spawn Thrawn by typing “thrawn”. That is the whole pitch, really. Thrawn.In Red Dead Redemption 2.Possibly surrounded by horses, dust, outlaws, and people who have absolutely no idea what the Chiss Ascendancy is. A Very Wrong Galaxy, In the Best Way This is not a giant Star Wars total conversion. It does not turn Valentine into Coruscant or replace Dutch’s gang with the Imperial Security Bureau, although now that idea is loose in the air and should…
Star Wars: Droids (1988): The Odd Little Cartoon Tie-In That Took Star Wars Somewhere Else
Not every Star Wars game begins with a trench run, a lightsaber, or an exploding space station. Some begin with R2-D2 and C-3PO wandering into another problem, which is more or less the permanent condition of their lives anyway. That is what makes Star Wars: Droids such an interesting little side road in the archive. Released in 1988 for the ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, and Commodore 64, the game was published by Mastertronic Added Dimension and developed by Binary Design as a tie-in to the animated Droids series, also known as Star Wars: Droids – The Adventures of R2-D2 and C-3PO. As part of our Complete List of All Star Wars Games Ever Made (1979–Present), this is exactly the kind of title that deserves more attention than it usually gets. It also sits comfortably in the Star Wars Games (1979–1989) era, because it shows how strange and flexible Star Wars…
Star Wars Eclipse Survives Quantic Dream’s Latest Cancellation
Star Wars Eclipse has not vanished into the Unknown Regions. Not yet, anyway. Quantic Dream has cancelled development on its multiplayer project Spellcasters Chronicles, but the studio says its long-silent High Republic Star Wars game is not affected. According to reports from GameSpot and Insider Gaming, Quantic Dream told players that Star Wars Eclipse “continues as planned,” even as the studio shuts down its other project. That is good news. It is also the kind of good news that Star Wars gaming fans should probably receive with one hand on the emergency brake. Eclipse Is Still Officially Alive The important part is simple: Quantic Dream is saying Star Wars Eclipse is still moving forward. That matters because the game has become one of the strangest open tabs in modern Star Wars gaming. Announced back in 2021 with a gorgeous cinematic trailer, Eclipse promised a branching narrative action-adventure set during the…
Galaxy of Heroes Just Made Returning to the Holotable Less Painfu
Coming back to Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes after a long break can feel like opening a closet and being attacked by five years of laundry. Characters. Relics. Events. Currencies. Datacrons. Territory Battles. Quest tabs. Shops. Shards. Mods. More mods. The other mods you forgot existed. That one squad you were definitely building before life happened. Capital Games seems to know this, because the latest Galaxy of Heroes update is aimed directly at returning players. EA has announced an Improved Returning User Experience, built around a new questline designed to help lapsed players re-acclimate to the Holotable with clearer short, mid, and long-term goals. In plain Basic: if you have a friend who quit SWGOH and now panics when they see the home screen, the game is trying to make that return less terrifying. Returning Players Get a New Path Back In The headline feature is a revamped returning user…
Star Wars: Hunters Is Dead, But Its Weird Little Lore Archive Lives
Star Wars: Hunters may be gone, but apparently the Arena left behind more paperwork than a Hutt legal department. Trevor Davey, the timeline-obsessed Star Wars archivist behind The Life of a Star Wars Timeline, has collected 79 in-universe documents that were originally published on the now-defunct official Star Wars: Hunters website. You can read the full archive in his Substack bonus update, where he gathers Arena News posts, Boz Vega interviews, Hunter monologues, and other strange little scraps of official character flavor. That may sound niche. It is niche. It is also exactly the kind of thing Star Wars gaming history needs someone to save before it vanishes into the same digital pit as old launchers, dead forums, and mobile games that once had lore tabs. The Arena Had More Story Than Many Realized Star Wars: Hunters launched globally on June 4, 2024, as a free-to-play competitive arena game for…