SWG Legends dev diary previews rendering upgrades, PvP hunts, and a Gundark boss

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SWG Legends’ October developer diary lays out several in-progress updates for the Star Wars Galaxies server, including a major graphics rendering upgrade, restored creature behaviors, new Hunt Board quests, and more Bespin content. None of it has a release date yet, so this is more of a look at what the team is building than a patch preview.

The biggest technical change is a rendering pipeline update from developer Tukk, who has been working on it since May 2026. The goal is better performance in busy areas like cities, events, forests, and other object-heavy scenes. According to the diary, more rendering work is being moved off the CPU and onto the GPU, or skipped when it doesn’t need to be done every frame.

  • Longer view distances are planned as part of the rendering work.
  • New atmosphere, lighting, and water reflection effects are in development.
  • Far-distance tree sprites have been reworked so distant areas keep tree coverage without a big performance hit.
  • FXAA support is being added for windowed and borderless clients, which previously lacked anti-aliasing.

Creature AI is also getting attention. Reign is working on reintroducing old pre-NGE animal behavior that was removed or disabled around the CU and NGE eras. The examples include mock charges from higher-level animals, carnivore roars that can scare nearby creatures and NPCs, herding behavior, stalking prey up to 128 meters away, resting animations, and combat assist changes so NPCs can join fights they witness again.

The Hunt Board is getting more content too. The team says at least 20 additional space and ground quests are in the works, along with fixes for older quests such as Lancer and Nebulon. PvP Hunt Board quests are also being developed, with their own tab separate from PvE and Space. Those will include objectives like eliminating specific professions or taking out players in certain zones.

On the boss side, the older NR-N99 world boss project is being revisited with new rewards and enemies. Bespin is also getting a Gundark world boss tied to pre-quests, where players help prepare for its arrival before things go wrong. Once the setup quests are complete, each player will be able to trigger the Gundark once per day, though they can join the fight as many times as they want.

Terrain Shadow Caster - Dev Diary

Further reading: Official SWG Legends Developer’s Diary