Star Wars Zero Company has received strong reviews for its tactical gameplay and story. Still, technical problems across PC and console versions are raising concerns about the game’s long-term future. The title currently holds an aggregate critic score of 85 on Metacritic, placing it among the better-reviewed Star Wars games in recent years.
Developed by independent studio Bit Reactor and published by Electronic Arts, Zero Company combines turn-based tactics with a Star Wars setting. It has been compared with the X-COM series. While critics have highlighted its characters, story, and strategic gameplay, player reports point to stuttering, crashes, input problems, and other bugs that can significantly affect the experience.
Performance issues affect players on PC and consoles
On PC, Zero Company has been criticised for performance problems commonly associated with some Unreal Engine 5 games. Players have reported traversal stutter, input lag, crashes and bugs that can interfere with missions. The problems appear to affect systems across a wide range of hardware, rather than being limited to lower-end gaming PCs.
The reported issues are particularly notable because the game can struggle even on powerful hardware. Player reports indicate that upgrading to a high-end graphics card does not necessarily eliminate stuttering. On Steam, Zero Company has earned a “mostly positive” overall rating across nearly 9,000 reviews, although many negative reviews focus on crashes, stuttering and game-breaking bugs.
One player described the situation in a negative Steam review by writing: “Started off having a great time. Then came the crashes. Crashed almost every hour, so needed to save every few minutes. When I forgot to save, I had to replay the entire section again. Of course, it only ever crashed as I was about to complete a mission.”
Console players have also reported problems. Discussions on Reddit include complaints about crashes and stuttering on console versions, while YouTuber Daniel Owen has highlighted PC performance problems in a video. Although experiences can vary between platforms and hardware configurations, the number of similar reports suggests the technical issues are not isolated incidents.
The situation has drawn comparisons with Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, another recent Star Wars release built using Unreal Engine 5. That game suffered from severe PC performance problems at launch, including traversal and shader compilation stutter that could affect even high-end computers. NVIDIA users also initially had to contend with the lack of DLSS support.
Bit Reactor’s staffing situation raises questions about future updates
Jedi: Survivor eventually received numerous major patches, although reports indicate that significant stuttering remained on PC long after launch. The comparison matters because Zero Company could require similarly extensive post-release work, but the circumstances surrounding its developer could make that difficult.
Unlike Jedi: Survivor developer Respawn Entertainment, Bit Reactor is an independent studio rather than an EA-owned development team. That distinction could affect how much support Zero Company receives after launch, particularly if sales do not meet expectations. A game that requires substantial technical fixes can demand months of engineering and testing resources.
Concerns about Bit Reactor’s ability to provide that support increased after Game File’s Stephen Totilo reported that the studio had furloughed most of its workforce just weeks before Zero Company was released on 27 August. According to sources cited in the report, as many as 80 per cent of the studio’s employees were not being paid at the time.
Another source told Totilo that only a skeleton crew remained to handle the game’s post-launch problems. Bit Reactor said it hoped to bring furloughed employees back and restore their pay, although employees contacted for the report reportedly expressed doubts about whether that would happen, even if Zero Company became commercially successful.
The studio is also involved in a legal dispute between its co-founders, with a trial not expected until early 2027. The combination of staffing uncertainty, ongoing legal proceedings and the game’s technical problems has therefore created questions about how much development capacity Bit Reactor currently has available.
The game’s future depends on the support it receives
Bit Reactor has acknowledged some of the problems affecting Zero Company. On launch day, the studio posted on the game’s Steam Community forums that it was aware of “emerging issues (crashes and CPU threading)” and was working on fixes. It added: “We’ll let you know when we’re able to provide an update.”
The statement offered little detail about the scale or timing of future patches. It was also published before reports about the studio’s staffing situation emerged, and no subsequent update was included in the supplied material. Electronic Arts and Bit Reactor had not immediately responded to requests for comment about the game’s post-launch support.
That uncertainty could be significant for players considering purchasing the game. Strong reviews of its story and tactical systems suggest Zero Company has a solid foundation. Still, technical problems can substantially change a game’s value when they cause repeated crashes, lost progress, or persistent performance issues.
Other recent releases show that independent studios can still deliver substantial post-launch updates when they have the resources. Cold Symmetry, the developer of Mortal Shell II, announced a substantial “Week One” update shortly after its release, showing what a fully staffed independent studio can accomplish soon after launch.
For Zero Company, however, the question is whether Bit Reactor will have enough staff and resources to deliver comparable support. The game may ultimately receive the fixes needed to address its current problems, but there is no guarantee it will happen quickly or comprehensively. For prospective buyers, the safest assumption is that the game’s current technical state could persist for some time.
