STAR WARS: Galactic Racer Review

What I love about the Star Wars franchise is how much it spills over into video games. It’s rare to see a bad Star Wars title; I’ll just say we could use another new Battlefront game while I’m here. After the recent success of Star Wars Zero Company and its turn-based action, Fuse Games offers a totally different spin with its latest experience. We haven’t seen a notable Star Wars racing game since the early 2000’s. STAR WARS: Galactic Racer, published by Secret Mode, has now flown onto Xbox Series X/S.

Rise Through The Ranks of the Galaxy’s Fastest Racers

The main draw for big Star Wars fans will be the campaign mode, which serves solely as a single-player experience. Here you’ll play as Shade, a racer who is reluctant to become competitive but decides to invest his time in the Galactic League. Reigning champion Kestar Bool is intent on keeping their name at the top of the ladder. What’s interesting here is that rather than having a flurry of races, there is a roguelite structure instead. Throughout the campaign, you’ll have different branching paths, upgrade selections and alternative race conditions. This approach really makes ploughing through the campaign interesting rather than repetitive. Taking a strategic approach to how you manage your vehicle upgrades and which path to take makes the game much more spontaneous.

Scenario & Arcade Mode Provide More Challenge

Scenario mode is a good one to dip into once you have some experience with how the game handles, though you can dive in whenever you feel like it. Here, there are several scenarios and races where modifiers and rules are juggled around to test your driving and bring replayability once you have clocked the campaign mode.

Arcade mode appears to be more casual, and I spent my time here trying to beat some of my friends’ lap times. It’s nice to see what lap times your friends have done whilst scrolling through the events, and this can really drive the competition up between those close to you. It’s also a handy mode to jump in and access pretty much everything without unlocks and get into a race immediately.

Hyperspeed Handling That Just Feels Exceptional

STAR WARS: Galactic Racer doesn’t solely focus on podracing but instead introduces a variety of vehicle classes. Landspeeders, speeder bikes and skimspeeders are all options to race around in. What I loved about having these different options is that they all handle very differently from each other. There are pros and cons to each of them. Landspeeders provide stability and accurate cornering, whereas the speeder bikes focus on raw speed and the ability to nip through tighter gaps. Skim speeders were the most difficult to handle for me, as they are agile but have a bit of a steeper learning curve. All of them handle exceptionally well with a controller, though, and you do feel like you’re powering at speed. There is nothing more satisfying than nailing a tight curve or squeezing through a tight gap in the terrain whilst overtaking opponents.

12 Player Online Multiplayer Extends Longevity

I’ve had a blast playing online against random opponents in 12-player cross-platform multiplayer. There’s a variety of modes here, including a quick race that keeps rolling into the next race. There is also the option of a tour mode that operates as a single-player experience that judges over multiple events rather than a few laps. There is a ranking system here that I presume hits max rank at level 100. Personally, I’m not sure if the appeal would still be there once you’ve levelled up to max rank, but perhaps Fuse Games may introduce more to keep players playing in the long term.

Fast, Flashy & Full Of Star Wars Flair

Visually, STAR WARS: Galactic Racer caught me off guard with how stunning it looks. I have a 77-inch LG C5 OLED screen mounted within a media wall, and I was just taken aback at how incredible the backdrops and tracks looked. Even traversing at insane speeds, it doesn’t ever lose its crisp, detailed fidelity. Vehicles are incredibly detailed, and witnessing them become smashed to smithereens is a spectacle to observe. With these excellent lighting effects and consistent smooth performance on Xbox Series X, they really do deserve a round of applause for the art direction.

Audio design is equally as strong as the game’s appearance. A well-composed soundtrack that you’d expect from the Star Wars Universe is present. I tried playing this on a really top-range headset, and also my surround sound system in my living room and I was blown away. Hearing 12 racers thunder past each other and the sound of the throttle as you boost to go even faster, I could feel the bass rumble through my house. So yeah, you could say the presentation across the entirety of the game is simply magnificent.

Final Thoughts

Being completely honest with you, I normally zone out when playing circuit racers because they don’t do much to hold my attention. Doing laps of the same track over and over isn’t usually my jam. So games like Forza Motorsport, whilst impressive at what it does, don’t scratch my itch. Open-world racers tend to do a bit more for me. However, STAR WARS: Galactic Racer really sunk its claws into me from the get-go. Whilst some of the environments did feel a little repetitive, the racing itself is versatile and spontaneous enough to make every single race feel thrilling.

You can see the love the developers have poured into all areas of this game, whether it’s ploughing through the campaign with its roguelite mechanics, beating your mates’ lap times or diving into the scenarios or online multiplayer. Progression feels meaningful, and it converts to dozens of hours of gameplay. Whether you’re a hardcore Star Wars fan or just someone who simply loves racing games, this is one of the surprise hits of 2026 for me.