Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains Review

Ubisoft’s Monopoly is given the Star Wars treatment with team play, unique character powers, and shorter matches, but repetitive mechanics keep it from reaching its full potential.

For decades, Monopoly has been one of the most recognizable board games in the world. Whether you remember arguing over who got the car token or watching family members slowly go bankrupt after hours of gameplay, the formula has barely changed. That familiarity has helped Monopoly stay relevant across generations, but it has also created one of its biggest problems: matches simply take too long for many players.

Ubisoft tries to solve that problem with Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains, a licensed spin-off that reframes the classic board game through the lens of a galaxy far, far away. This isn’t just a regular Monopoly board with Star Wars characters pasted onto it; developers have included team play, character abilities, influence points, and a few new mechanics that affect the way matches play out. 

What you have is not a full-on replacement for classic Monopoly, nor is it simply a digital rehash. 

Like traditional story-based Star Wars games, Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains has no new story. Rather, it is a love letter to the franchise, with heroes and villains from various eras of Star Wars joining forces. Characters from the original trilogy, the prequels, the sequel trilogy, The Clone Wars, Andor, and The Book of Boba Fett all show up on the same board, a crossover that prioritizes fan service over story.

As you play, you’ll relive iconic moments from the Star Wars universe with special Go Events. Landing on or passing Go brings short scenes of notable moments from movies and TV series. These moments don’t advance the story, but they reinforce the Star Wars theme and reward you with extra influence if you complete their accompanying mini-games successfully.

Each match tells its own story as the Light Side and Dark Side battle for control of the galaxy, rather than a traditional campaign. Properties change hands all the time, teams fight battles for the most valuable ones, and your team's influence determines the eventual victors. The story is not a prewritten adventure but rather emerges from the unpredictable happenings of each match. 

The most significant change you'll notice is that victory no longer depends on bankrupting everyone else. Instead, you and your teammates battle for the most Influence before the match hits its predetermined number of Go rounds. This one change alters the entire pace of Monopoly, encouraging aggressive play rather than waiting for opponents to run out of money.

At the beginning of each match, you pick either the Hero or Villain team, and then you pick a character. The list is full of familiar names like Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, Han Solo, Darth Vader, Count Dooku, and Boba Fett, as well as characters from the more recent Star Wars projects. 

Although the selection is respectable, several fan favorites are missing, including Din Djarin, Grogu, Lando Calrissian, Captain Rex, Hera Syndulla, Ezra Bridger, Sabine Wren, Kanan Jarrus, Grand Admiral Thrawn, and a proper Light Side version of Anakin Skywalker. 

Each character comes with a unique ability that adds more strategy than traditional Monopoly ever had. 

Some characters receive discounts when purchasing locations, and others gain extra dice rolls, while abilities like Darth Vader's Stormtrooper deployment, Count Dooku sending opponents to prison, or Han Solo accessing the Cantina from anywhere on the board create opportunities that can completely change your plans. 

You also select a ship and a set of dice before the match starts. Ships tend to only show up in battle sequences, and the customizable dice add another small layer of personalization. The game also features local multiplayer for two to six players, couch co-op, and online play, so teams can work together instead of everyone competing individually. 

In a two-player game, each player controls one whole side. In larger games, teammates share control. This cooperation, where you can coordinate strategies instead of just focusing on your own turn, is one of the strongest features of the game. One of the best things about the game is that you can coordinate strategies and not just think about your turn; this is an element of cooperation.

The board itself also throws in some mechanics that freshen the familiar Monopoly formula. You’re not buying streets; you’re buying legendary Star Wars settings, such as the Jedi Temple, Senate Building, Hoth, Naboo, Coruscant, Tatooine, and more. Property ownership is no longer permanent. 

If you land on an opponent's location, you first pay the required credits before having the opportunity to buy that location away from them. Control of the galaxy constantly shifts throughout the match, preventing anyone from building an untouchable empire too early.

A few extra spaces help the game flow. Hyperspace routes take the place of railroads and allow you to travel quickly across the board. Instead of collecting rent, hyperspace routes create new strategic options. In cantina spaces, you're able to spend credits for special actions like stealing money, putting opponents in prison, or disrupting enemy plans. 

Gambling opportunities are available, allowing you to wager credits for a bigger payout.

Meanwhile, event cards continue to throw curveballs, such as permanently destroying locations or locking them to one faction for the rest of the game. The adjustable match lengths, from a few Go rounds to eight full rotations, make the pace feel much faster than classic Monopoly while still allowing for strategy.

Combat activates whenever you land on an occupied enemy location. While the trailers may suggest dramatic Star Wars battles, the actual system is much simpler. Both players roll dice; the higher number wins, and the victorious ship destroys the losing ship during a short animated sequence. 

Go Events work similarly. Each time you go or land on Go, you get sucked into a short Star Wars-themed mini-game based on iconic scenes from the franchise. These challenges mostly require you to match or avoid certain dice rolls instead of unique gameplay. While they fit perfectly into the Star Wars setting, the mechanics seldom get beyond simple luck-based dice rolling.

The greatest advantage of both systems is their accessibility. Anyone familiar with Monopoly will be able to understand them nearly instantly, so they are easy to introduce to friends and family. Other than that, character abilities add tactical decisions for moving, controlling properties, and taking special actions, giving matches more variety than standard Monopoly.

The problem is repetition. Every fight gets boring fast because nothing really changes from one fight to the next; it’s just the same process with minor visual differences. The same problem also exists in the Go Event mini-games, where the same mechanics repeat throughout the experience. 

You won't see any traditional XP or leveling system. 

Progression is not linked to leveling up but to completing objectives that unlock additional characters and cosmetic skins. Much of the core roster is available from the start, which makes later unlocks feel less rewarding. Skins are purely cosmetic, so they don’t change abilities, so unlocking them doesn’t have much effect outside of changing your character’s look. 

Visually, Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains delivers mixed results. The board itself is one of the strongest aspects of the presentation. Star Wars locations are recreated with care, holographic property displays look great, character animations are full of personality, and every hero and villain moves around the board in unique ways. 

The Go Event scenes that play in the cinema, and the space battle animations, aren't quite as good. Some players will enjoy seeing famous Star Wars moments recreated, but the visuals tend to look dated, and repeated animations become noticeable surprisingly quickly. These scenes repeat in every match, and the lack of variety becomes more obvious the longer you play.

The audio in Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains also has mixed results. C-3PO is the game’s narrator, and he comments on just about everything that happens in a match. The dialogue is amusing at first, but it gets old after hours of play. Other character voice lines are just as repetitive, and some dialogue is difficult to understand due to inconsistent audio mixing. 

The soundtrack is perhaps the biggest disappointment. 

It has the Star Wars license, but it's missing many of the iconic musical themes fans associate with the franchise, making the atmosphere less memorable than it could have been. The music itself is serviceable, but it often feels generic and lacks the unmistakable Star Wars identity that many players would expect.

Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains improves the game where it matters, making it much faster and more fun than the standard version. Team-based gameplay, character abilities, stealing properties, hyperspace travel, Cantina actions, and adjustable match lengths all modernize the formula without complicating it. 

At the same time, many of its best ideas lack sufficient depth. The combat gets repetitive, Go Events barely go beyond basic dice rolls, the unlockable cosmetics offer no real rewards, and the presentation starts to lose its appeal after you’ve seen the available content multiple times. It just feels a little incomplete without those fan-favorite characters and classic Star Wars music.

If you're looking for a family-friendly Star Wars board game that trims down Monopoly's biggest flaw—its lengthy matches—you'll likely have a good time playing Monopoly: Star Wars Heroes vs. Villains. It works especially well as a casual multiplayer experience that you can return to every so often. However, if you're expecting a major evolution of Monopoly or a deep strategic Star Wars game, you'll probably find that its strongest ideas wear thin sooner than expected.