Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains
Genre: Board Game
Players: 1-6 Team Competitive (Local / Online)
The Nintendo Switch 2 Difference
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Review:
I’ll preface this review by saying that I think Monopoly is an absolutely terrible Board Game, and it’s disgusting that its popularity has persisted and thrived for 91 years as of this writing. This isn’t exactly a radical opinion – I think most Board Game players over the age of eight likely share this view with me. It’s slow-paced, offers players too limited agency, relies far too heavily on the luck of random dice rolls and randomized card decks, has a built-in slippery slope where players who get an early lead have it far easier and players who have a bad start are unlikely to recover… when it comes to the sins of bad game design, this Board Game seems to be trying to collect them all.
Thankfully, Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains, released in 2026 on PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch, and Nintendo Switch 2, isn’t quite the same game as Monopoly. Rather, this is a spin on Monopoly that uses the Star Wars theming to reimagine the rules as a 3v3 team-based Board Game. Do the changes this game adds fix the fundamentally broken game design of Monopoly? And how well does this game use the Star Wars license? Let’s have a look…
When it comes to the presentation, this is really a mixed bag, so let’s start with the good… ish. To the game’s credit, this game has a polished presentation with some decent 3D animation for its characters, which are stylized similarly to the computer-animated Clone Wars cartoon. I suppose this makes sense, as the game is clearly trying to aim for a family-friendly tone. And you even have nice touches like characters caught by a “Go to Jail” effect getting frozen in carbonite, plus the game reenacts pivotal scenes from the films on occasions in this more cartoony art style, which is interesting at least.
On the downside… was this game only able to license the Star Wars brand and names of characters and locations, and nothing else? All characters are voiced with voice-alikes, which range from passable to outright terrible. The sound effects lack the distinctive flair of the Star Wars franchise’s sounds. And perhaps most egregious, the soundtrack doesn’t use John Williams’ legendary film score, instead seemingly having gone to someone else and telling them to come up with music that sounds vaguely Star Wars-y. Why even bother to use the license if you’re not actually going to use the license? And then why draw attention to this fact by recreating film scenes without re-using the sound from the films you’re drawing from?
Also, I should be sure to mention that the loading times in this game are pretty terrible and somewhat frequent, so when I talk about pacing later, remember to picture it taking even longer to get to anything interesting in the game thanks to this.
When it comes to the gameplay, this game shakes up the Monopoly formula by having players compete in teams (Heroes Vs. Villains, as the tile indicates), with each player selecting their character from a dozen or so characters in each faction, pulled from throughout the nine main film installments, along with a few extras from spinoff works. Each character has their own special ability that either confers a passive bonus, or must be activated when the player chooses, with a cooldown before using it again. These abilities can affect dice rolls, help to add more cash to your wallet, or give you other opportunities to improve your standing or hamper the enemy team.
The team-based play has promise, as it means that teammates can bust you out of jail, or use their abilities to confer bonuses onto you, and the entire team shares a pooled amount of money. Also, unlike traditional Monopoly, it’s not game over if you run out of cash, and the game won’t drag on forever since there’s a turn limit. Instead of playing until other players are all knocked out, you play to earn points, either by claiming properties or completing goal challenges when passing “Go”.
This version of the game also does away with trading. Instead, players can simply spend extra to buy away properties owned by opposing players. There are multiple other changes too, such as “hyperspace” taking the place of railroads and enabling players a bit more ability to move around the board, a “cantina” space allowing players to spend cash on various bonuses, and a “Canto Bight” space letting you… er, gamble away your cash on a dice roll.
Okay, so right from the start it seems like some of these changes are designed to address the major flaws of Monopoly. The character abilities, cantina, and hyperspace all help to give players more agency to make choices, the time limit means games won’t drag on forever, being able to buy opponents’ properties could help reverse the slippery slope… so does this mean that this game fixes Monopoly’s severe flaws?
No. Absolutely not.
While you do have more opportunities to act, you’re still extremely limited in your ability to do so, and can often only do so if you’re in the right place, or at the right time, and by removing trading this game takes away one of the ways players can interact with the game even while it gives them other things they can do. Being able to buy opponents’ properties may alleviate the slippery slope, but in place of that flawed mechanic now it seems like everything is just trading hands back and forth all the time with little thought or strategy behind it. The pacing is still dreadfully slow, and having nothing to do on opponents’ turns means you’ll be doing a lot of waiting. Then, most of your own actions will simply be determined by a dice roll. How far do you move? The dice decide. Who wins when players land on the same space and challenge each other (another new mechanic)? The dice decide. How do you win the minigame when you pass Go? Well, it’s hard to even call this a minigame because, you guessed it, the dice decide.
Oh, and if you’re one of those people who for some reason just wants to play a standard, traditional Monopoly game, perhaps with Star Wars characters in it… you can’t. This game only lets you play its team-based variant.
The result of all of this is that while Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains may bring some interesting ideas to the table and it may even be marginally better than traditional Monopoly, it’s still pretty terrible. It’s a slow-paced slog where most of the game you’re either waiting or rolling the dice rather than making any real decisions. And fans of Star Wars will be disappointed to find that while the visuals may remind them of some Star Wars animated content, the sound seems like a knockoff product that somehow got to use the Star Wars brand and characters but without any of the series’ soul. Please, if you enjoy Star Wars, there are plenty of other better Star Wars games on Nintendo Switch. And if you enjoy Board Games, there are better Board Games. Do not buy this terrible bantha poodoo. Highly-polished bantha poodoo, to be sure, but bantha poodoo nonetheless.
tl;dr – Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains reimagines the (terrible) Board Game as a 3v3 team-based game set in the world of Star Wars and featuring its characters. Unfortunately, while this game’s changes to the rules are promising, they ultimately do little do fix Monopoly’s dreadfully slow pacing, randomness, and lack of agency. And confusingly, the Star Wars license isn’t even well-implemented here, lacking the voices, sounds, and especially the music that the series is known for. As a result, whether you enjoy Board Games, Star Wars, or both, this game is sure to disappoint you.
Grade: D-
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The Nintendo Switch 2 Difference
Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains
Genre: Board Game
Players: 1-6 Team Competitive (Local / Online)
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Review:
I just want to take this moment to remind all of you to make use of your local library. Because picking up the Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2 copies of Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains from my local library meant that I could review this terrible game and compare both versions of it without having to buy the game twice, as there’s no upgrade path for players who own the Nintendo Switch version. Anyway, let’s see how the two versions compare.
Well, I can say that the Nintendo Switch 2 version of the game does have noticeably better resolution and framerate, with the latter of these being the more noticeable of the two. It’s not a massive, transformative change, but it is an improvement.
The loading times have also received a boost. On Nintendo Switch, it took me 1 minute 5 seconds to load to the main menu, and another 32 seconds to start up a match for the first time. On Nintendo Switch 2, these times reduced to 46 seconds and 21 seconds.
Finally, there’s one other change I noticed, albeit purely a cosmetic one – on the intro screen before the main menu, inside the cantina, you’ll see characters walking around on Nintendo Switch 2, where this was an empty room on Nintendo Switch.
Do any of these changes drastically transform the game? No, Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains is still a terrible game. But if you’re determined to get it anyway, it is somewhat better on Nintendo Switch 2.
tl;dr – Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains reimagines the (terrible) Board Game as a 3v3 team-based game set in the world of Star Wars and featuring its characters. Unfortunately, while this game’s changes to the rules are promising, they ultimately do little do fix Monopoly’s dreadfully slow pacing, randomness, and lack of agency. And confusingly, the Star Wars license isn’t even well-implemented here, lacking the voices, sounds, and especially the music that the series is known for. As a result, whether you enjoy Board Games, Star Wars, or both, this game is sure to disappoint you.
Grade: D-
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