‘Star Wars: Past Victory’ Evaluate – Podracing Involves Quest, However Loses Velocity in Combined Actuality

Star Wars: Past Victory – A Combined Actuality Playset seems like a fairly clear directive to make a top quality MR sport that showcases Quest 3’s passthrough capabilities. In that respect, it’s a partial success, because the MR/VR hybrid serves up some neat diorama-style racing motion blended with a surprisingly heartfelt narrative, all of the whereas packing in a wholesome dose of the identical excessive manufacturing worth and visible surprise that made Vader Immortal so successful. Nonetheless, it was tough to shirk the sensation midway via that I’d a lot quite be enjoying this in VR.

Star Wars: Past Victory Particulars:

Developer: Industrial Mild & Magic
Writer: Disney Digital Content material
Out there On: Quest 3 & 3S
Reviewed On: Quest 3
Launch Date: October seventh, 2025
Worth: $20

Gameplay

Star Wars: Past Victory affords up three single-player gameplay modes: a story-driven marketing campaign, an arcade racing mode with 4 accessible tracks, and an additional little MR mode that allows you to select, resize and articulate sport fashions and place them round your room.

Whereas it does serve up a two-hour marketing campaign, I can see why the “playset” naming was added right here. Past Victory is extra of an MR mini-game grafted to a way more partaking VR narrative, quick as it might be.

It does this by periodically dropping you out and in of MR and VR modes when the sport decides it’s time, like getting into a constructing to repair your podracer (VR), truly podracing (MR), fetching a component on your buddy (MR), or having a kind of necessary narrative beats that actually provides ILM an opportunity to flex its animation expertise—that are completely second to none. These narrative chunks occur each in MR and VR, with MR narratives enjoying out like multi-shot 3D cutscenes.

Placing you within the boots of the up-and-coming podracer Volo Bolus, you end up combined up with the artful and harsh podracing legend Sebulba, who has plans that will help you get again in your toes after a nasty crash. Below Sebulba’s tutelage, you start racing once more—however at a worth. No spoilers right here, however let’s simply say it includes crime.

Lengthy after the credit rolled, I used to be nonetheless occupied with Volo’s struggles to steadiness his love for racing whereas attempting to be true to his buddies. It’s not concerning the grander rebel in opposition to the Empire, or a Luke Skywalker analogue who’s ‘The Chosen One’ with all the requisite plot armor. You’re only a podracer who doesn’t wish to get into bother. However bother finds you.

Throughout the marketing campaign’s eight chapters, which characteristic a few of the medium’s finest animation, you’re handled to a handful of Mario Kart-fashion races. And the combined actuality 3D sport board positively faucets into the LEGO portion of my mind, letting you resize it to suit your room. You will get it as small as a chess board, or as large as I acquired it right here.

Within the sport’s 4 races (or race-adjacent getaway scenes), you’ll decide up well being, boosters, and secondary capacity recharges, which for Volo is a boosted bounce that will help you get forward of nasty obstacles like jutting rocks and sticky orb-things. Every racer has their very own loadout, which you’ll discover within the Arcade part of the sport. There, you’ll discover different racers and all 4 tracks. In marketing campaign mode although, you’re locked into Volo’s racer, which isn’t upgradable.

Racing is a enjoyable little expertise, however it’s admittedly one and not using a ton of depth—extra of a neat sideshow to the narrative. I don’t wish to name it dinky, as a result of it’s a fairly fast-paced expertise, however I believe the ‘wow issue’ of it being on my lounge flooring is actually doing the heavy lifting. I might be ‘wowing’ much more in VR, I can let you know that.

Okay, so this isn’t the VR podracing sport of my goals. And whereas racing micromachines will be mildly cool, the remainder of the sport’s MR implementation is a particular sore spot. Extra on that within the Immersion part under.

Moments in VR are sometimes stuffed with expressive narrative beats and moments to go hands-on with contraptions and objects that actually promote the entire Star Wars universe vibe. However then there’s an MR overworld to navigate (seen above), which was one thing so painfully boring compared. Piloting my little two-inch Volo forwards and backwards across the map is a questionable design selection—perhaps one born from the need of justifying extra combined actuality the place it is likely to be higher changed with first-person VR.

Fortunately, there’s a good slice of absolutely immersive zones, which mainly sign a return to truly enjoyable interactions and extra immersive narrative beats. Briefly, MR racing: alright. The rest MR: no thanks.

In VR, you’ll be handled to attention-grabbing one-off duties to restore your ship, which embody a bevy of instruments and contraptions, like welders, computerized screw drivers, and ship components galore—all of that are cleverly given to you by your second set of arms. Want a wrench? Your hand simply presents it to you on the top of a holster.

Ultimately, I believe ILM did an okay job of integrating MR into Past Victory given the present {hardware}, which isn’t actually saying a lot.

It’s nonetheless early days, and Quest 3 can’t actually perceive your room, which suggests builders don’t have the flexibility to create techniques that may dynamically use it to good impact—one such exception being Starship Dwelling (2024)—making the type of 3D gameboards you see in Past Victory a type of low-hanging fruit. It’s admittedly only a playset, in any case, and I believe setting participant expectations was an unlucky necessity.

Immersion

For all its MR boring spots, Star Wars: Past Victory tries its degree finest to make up for it with a collection of expertly realized VR set items and character design, the latter of which shines with regards to movement seize, animation, voice appearing—the lot.

In VR, it’s simply as spectacular as Vader Immortal, which is one in all my favorites to indicate off within the Venn diagram of my Star Wars nerd-friends who don’t personal a VR headset.

That mentioned, by counting on MR, the studio primarily unlocked the flexibility to incorporate a ton of cutscenes, which do a few of the heavy narrative lifting—making it really feel like I used to be watching a 3D TV in my lounge—okay, perhaps extra of a volumetric TV.

From a sport mechanics perspective, I’m not in opposition to having any of that when it truly is sensible throughout the context of the world. As it’s, Past Victory shifts you between MR and VR not as a result of you should pilot a podracer like a drone, or transfer a two-inch droid across the map as a result of your actual physique is partially imprisoned in carbonite, or for every other motive that may droop disbelief for the complete two hours.

You’re simply in your lounge one second, and unceremoniously in a podracer storage with Sebulba the following. Easy narrative explanations, and perhaps a little bit of magic to decorate my room up in MR to make it really feel extra like a galaxy far far-off (and fewer like the place I’m scripting this evaluation), might have bridged that inexplicable hole from being so jarring.

Okay, I do have one gripe concerning the sport’s VR bit. Oftentimes there are invisible partitions in bigger areas, which pressure you to remain inside a set zone, normally for narrative causes. Since Past Victory isn’t essentially a big format VR sport although, I discovered it principally forgivable, though nonetheless much less immersive than it may need been.

Consolation

For all my gripes, the MR mode may be very comfy, permitting you to reposition and resize the board to suit your enjoying fashion, whether or not that be on the ground or in your lap. Podracing is frenetic, so your bodily room anchoring you in place needs to be comfy for many everybody.

As for the VR, there aren’t any wild rides or moments of pressured locomotion outdoors of the non-compulsory head shake, which you’ll flip off within the settings. Locomotion choices embody your customary set of consolation modes, together with teleport and clean motion, clean and variable snap-turning, and in addition standing and seated modes.