New Star Wars Squadrons CG Short Reframes The Good Guys

EA has released a brand-new CG short for Star Wars: Squadrons. Titled "Hunted," the video was collaboratively produced by developer Motive Studios, along with Lucasfilm and its visual effects studio Industrial Light & Magic.

The short is set before the events of Squadrons, and it focuses on one of the pilots you'll play alongside in the single-player campaign. While we're accustomed to seeing heroic Rebel pilots battle against faceless Imperial forces, this short inverts that story. Instead, it's the Imperial TIE pilot who selflessly rescues one of his comrades, and a dogged X-Wing who serves as the looming threat.

"In this standalone story, Imperial forces are in retreat after a surprise attack by the New Republic at the Imperial dockyard at Var-Shaa," reads a line from the video's description. "However, for Titan Squadron Leader Varko Grey, the battle is far from over. He finds himself as the last TIE pilot on the battlefield, hunted by a renegade New Republic X-wing."

Star Wars: Squadrons launches on October 2 for PS4, Xbox One, and PC. The game is coming out just before the launch of the Xbox Series X/Series S and the PlayStation 5, but Motive is not working on a new version of the game for those platforms. That said, the game will be playable on next-gen consoles through backwards compatibility.

Squadrons is a budget-priced game, launching at $40 USD. The game has an original Star Wars single-player story, along with multiplayer in the form of 5v5 matches featuring cross-play across console and PC.

In other news, EA has confirmed that Squadrons has now reached "gold" status, while the developer also announced that the PS4 and Xbox One editions will feature throttle controls on console. For more details, check out our Star Wars Squadrons preorder guide.