Leaked Details of New Star Wars Game Suggest Strong XCOM Vibes

Early in-development screenshots of a previously announced Star Wars game from Electronic Arts, Respawn, and Bit Reactor have leaked online. And while the screens are from an older build of the game, it seems like this upcoming Star Wars game is heavily inspired by XCOM.

Back in 2022, EA and Lucasfilm announced three new Star Wars games were in development: A sequel to Jedi: Fallen Order, a Star Wars FPS from Respawn, and a Star Wars strategy game from a then-newly-created studio known as Bit Reactor. Flash forward to today and that Fallen Order sequel, Jedi: Survivor, launched in 2023. Meanwhile, the Star Wars FPS was canceled. However, we’ve not heard much about the strategy game. Now, thanks to some leaked screenshots, we have a better idea of what to expect. I hope you like XCOM.

As first reported by MP1st, a Bit Reactor artist shared some screenshots of the upcoming Star Wars game via their online portfolio. The screenshots indicate that Bit Reactor’s game is known internally as Star Wars Bruno.

The screenshots are dated to 2023, so it’s very likely that Project Bruno looks different in 2025. Still, based on the screenshots it appears that Bruno is heavily inspired by XCOM. In the screenshots we can see characters like Bo Katan taking cover while aiming at an enemy. Above that enemy’s head is a hit chance percentage. Another screenshot shows two characters entering “overwatch,” aka that mode in XCOM where your soldiers take out any alien that enters their line of sight.

Of course, it’s possible that two years later Bruno has changed a lot. But I’d bet a few of my Lego Star Wars ships that the upcoming game is still very XCOM-influenced. I mean, Bit Reactor is a studio that was founded by a former XCOM dev alongside over a dozen other people who worked on the series at Firaxis. It ain’t shocking that their first big Star Wars game is similar to XCOM. And I’m excited about that. I’ve grown tired of every new Star Wars game being a shooter or a third-person action thing. We deserve a Star Wars turn-based tactics game.

We won’t have to wait long to see more about this upcoming Bit Reactor Star Wars game, as Lucasfilm has confirmed that it will reveal the project on April 19 during Star Wars Celebration 2025.