Star Wars is an action-packed franchise, but not every moment is spent fending off TIE fighters and making monologues about the state of democracy. Though we may not see it in the movies often, the world of Star Wars is full of downtime, and there are countless ways to spend it: bellying up to the bar at a cantina, seeing the Mon Calamari Ballet’s performance of Squid Lake, or watching over the son of your former padawan.
But one of the most iconic leisure activities in Star Wars has long been a peripheral part of the experience: the card game Sabacc. Thankfully, that’s all about to change.
According to the ESRB ratings summary for the upcoming game Star Wars Outlaws, players will be able to “wager in-game currency on Sabacc, a blackjack-like card game with detailed rules.” This is a surprisingly major development for a fictional game that has been at the center of some key plot points in Star Wars movies and expanded media.
Sabacc will be a playable minigame in Star Wars Outlaws.
Sabacc was first introduced in the 1983 novel Lando Calrissian and the Mindharp of Sharu, and it quickly became a favorite element to introduce as an in-universe substitute for traditional card games, and as a way to subtly emphasize the seedy underbelly of the universe. It wasn’t seen in live-action until Solo, where it famously was used to explain how Han Solo acquired the Millennium Falcon.
For fans, Sabacc was a physical card game only. Decks of special hexagonal cards were available for purchase, and if you managed to get a ticket on the Galactic Starcruiser, you could even play with a character.
Before now, Sabacc was a physical game only.
This is partially due to a bit of a legal issue with the Sabacc name. Lucasfilm never trademarked the word, so software developer Ren Ventures filed a trademark and created its own mobile game called Sabacc. This led to multiple lawsuits between the two companies, but ultimately Lucasfilm won out and managed to file its own trademark for Sabacc in 2018.
So for the first time, players can now try their hand at the “most civilized game in the galaxy” in video game form, with no materials necessary. As the preferred game of bounty hunters and smugglers, it’s the perfect choice for it to premiere in Star Wars Outlaws, but it’s still been a long time coming.
