Star Wars Hunters is a game that’s been out for a while that I meant to play, but I kept putting it off. Over the last few months, I invested my time into it, and it’s actually pretty good. Zynga has been known for some awful (yet successful) Facebook games, but this time they’ve made a Switch, Android, and iOS title that’s hard to believe is free sometimes.
At first, I thought the game was going to be Fortnite with Star Wars branding, but it’s more like a third-person Overwatch or Paladins than Fortnite. For one, there are only matches with eight players instead of a hundred. Typically, it’s 4 vs. 4 matches.
The modes are the standard shooter staples. You have the regular deathmatches, hold the zones, and capture the flag, but with their own Star Wars branding and naming. Personally, I never get tired of deathmatches, while the other modes don’t hold my interest for very long. That’s pretty much most shooters though.
What’s really cool about the game is that you have a large roster of heroes and villains to choose from, and none of these characters appear in the TV shows or movies. That’s good because otherwise, everyone would just be Luke Skywalker or Darth Vader the entire time. Instead, almost any kind of race or warrior type in Star Wars has a generic representative. Funny enough, the Jedi hero is a robot… who shouldn’t even be Force-sensitive since he isn’t even alive. Even General Grievous was biological despite his advanced tech exoskeleton.
And not all the characters are equally balanced. You’ll recognize the really popular ones when you see them on the battlefield all the time, and the complete trash ones when you forget they exist. But the developers did try to mix things up, and a well-rounded team with different class types can dominate a squad made up entirely of characters with the best firepower. Still, without a good way to voice chat on Switch, teamwork is just hoping your teammates aren’t stupid.
Star Wars Hunters is not the best free game, nor the best Switch game, or even the best Star Wars game, but it’s a solid little gem. I kind of regret ignoring it for so long, but it’s been a decently fun ride. I doubt it will still have a community three years from now, but if Zynga builds upon what they have and improves it with a sequel, they could end up being almost as successful as Fortnite and Overwatch commercially.