If there's one thing that's annoying about Star Wars stories it's that some of them can try and make you believe they'll save the galaxy only to have little to no real implications for the wider story. Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is a great example of a story that showed us an incredibly cool character only for them to be killed off because they didn't exist in canon.
However, Star Wars Outlaws is looking to avoid this problem by removing the game's narrative from any ties to the fate of the wider galaxy. Speaking to GameInformer, narrative director Navid Khavari said "Kay's dream is to land a score that will allow her to live life free and find her place in the galaxy. This is especially true after a heist goes wrong, and she unexpectedly becomes one of the galaxy's most wanted. By necessity, she'll step into the underworld and take on jobs with criminal syndicates, with the aim to pull off one of the greatest heists the galaxy has seen."
"[Kay] hasn't yet really formed an opinion about the battle between the Empire and Rebellion ... just like most people in the galaxy during this time period, she views [the Empire] as an oppressive force that's spread throughout the galaxy. But they're really just an obstacle in her way as she journeys through the underworld."
This doesn't mean we won't have some big stakes, just more that we'll be stepping away from the typical melodrama seen in a lot of Star Wars stories between the Sith and Jedi. This means that the Empire will almost certainly be taking a backseat this time around.