Is Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic a direct sequel to KOTOR? Everything we know after Game Awards 2025 teaser
Hype for an unexpected new Star Wars game has reached fever pitch after a teaser trailer dropped last night.
During the Game Awards 2025, a number of new titles were shown to be in development, including Tomb Raider: Catalyst, an expansion for Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, and Control: Resonant, a sequel to the beloved 2019 game Control.
It came as Expedition 33 swept up the awards, winning 10 of the 13 categories it was shortlisted for - including the coveted gong for game of the year.
But one announcement took gamers by total surprise, with Arcanaut Studios and Lucasfilm Games teasing a brand new Star Wars game.
Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic - which has already been affectionately dubbed FOTOR by fans - is a new action role-playing game (RPG) where you play as a force-wielding character in the final days of the Old Republic. The trailer shows a female character getting out of a spaceship and heading towards a structure, igniting her lightsaber as the screen cuts to black.
It is unknown whether you play as this character, or if there will be a character creation like games such as Mass Effect, Skyrim and Star Wars: The Old Republic.
In Star Wars canon, the Old Republic was around 1,000 years before the Phantom Menace film, giving the developers almost complete creative control for the story.
Arcanaut was created by Casey Hudson, the director of the original Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (KOTOR) game and the Mass Effect trilogy.
Hudson said: “When we developed the original KOTOR, we wanted to create a definitive Star Wars experience - crafting an adventure that consisted of all the things we dreamed of doing as Star Wars fans.
“Now, 25 years after we started work on that game, our aspirations are equally ambitious. Fate of the Old Republic represents an opportunity to explore a contemporary vision of a definitive Star Wars experience, using state-of-the-art technology and game design, and an all-new story crafted specifically to deliver on the combination of player agency and immersion in Star Wars that was at the heart of KOTOR.
“Star Wars has been an ever-present force in my life, from the time I saw the first movie in 1977 and throughout my career, where it’s been a constant source of inspiration.
“It’s hard to describe how exciting it was to be able to work in the Star Wars galaxy, contributing to its incredible legacy. We had so much fun working on Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, and it was one of the defining experiences of my career.”
KOTOR was released in 2003 on PC and Xbox, with a sequel dropping the following year. A third game was planned but ultimately never released, before the MMO Star Wars: The Old Republic was launched on PC in 2011.
Douglas Reilly of Lucasfilm Games has confirmed that Fate of the Old Republic, is not a direct sequel to KOTOR, but still serves as its spiritual successor.
He said: “Throughout my two decades of working on Star Wars games, including Star Wars: The Old Republic, I have been fortunate to see first-hand just how much these stories mean to our fans.
“For us, this new project is about honoring that legacy by creating something in the same tradition of a deep, cinematic, choice-driven role-playing game. Reuniting with Casey has been a tremendous honor, and we are pouring all of our shared passion and experience into building the next great chapter.”
At the time of publication, there is no set release date for Fate of the Old Republic; it’s assumed that it will release on all major platforms, including PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S.