Fortnite’s Star Wars season has just dropped its biggest new skin yet from a galaxy far, far away — and stunned fans by locking it behind a 1.28 million XP grind.
Darth Jar Jar became available to buy from Fortnite’s Shop over the weekend, but only after you earn the ability to do so. And even then, after accruing that 1.28 million XP, Darth Jar Jar still costs 1500 V-Bucks (around $13).
Fortnite has locked skins behind an XP requirement before, but only done so once in recent years and not with a skin that had been anticipated as one of the key cosmetic releases of this shortened Star Wars season.
Several weeks in, there’s now less time for players to get the XP needed to nab Darth Jar Jar (Fortnite’s Star Wars season ends on June 7), and anyone who had managed to finish their battle pass already now has a fresh chunk of level grinding to go.
“I was so hyped for this skin and was fine with it being behind a pay wall, after all it is just another skin,” wrote one fan on redditin a long thread dedicated to Darth Jar Jar’s release. “But this whole locked behind an XP wall is ridiculous. You want me to earn the right to give you money? I immediately closed the game.”
Another common complaint is the fact that Darth Jar Jar has been released alongside a regular Jar Jar Binks skin, which does not have an XP requirement but still costs a separate 1500 V-Bucks.
Together with the various accessories for both Sith and Gungan variants of this skin, you could choose to pay 6,500 V-Bucks for everything Jar Jar Binks. Which is a lot.
“Regular Jar Jar alone is 20 dollars,” another fan wrote. “If you want both that s**t is 52 entire ass dollars for something that ought to have just been 1 skin with 3 styles.”
Others, meanwhile, have countered to say that Jar Jar is simply a cosmetic option — and there’s no need to buy him at all if you don’t want to. Ignore him, and your Fortnite locker will be as free of the character as George Lucas wanted to be after the backlash to Phantom Menace hit.
“It wasn’t that hard to earn the XP took me around 8/9 hrs,” wrote a third fan. “I had no plans on Saturday. I did it in 3 sittings, but all in one day. I played Rocket Racing and Ranked and did Alignment Challenges to farm as much XP as possible.
“Nothing is making anyone get every item in the Shop you can just pick and choose, and the fact he was just 1500 V-Bucks when Deathstroke was 1,800 V-Bucks I wasn’t bothered at all by the price. I was pissed off at first than I realised after a couple hrs that I had over 300,000 XP already.”
Fortnite’s Star Wars season continues this week with a focus on Mandalorian warriors, and the highly-anticipated release of a new customisable Mandalorian skin in the game’s Shop next.
Epic Games’ battle royale will conclude its time in the Star Wars galaxy with a live narrative event on June 7 — which fans believe will see them boarding the Death Star that has been hovering ominously over the game’s Island since the start of the season.
Earlier this month, Epic Games’ ongoing feud with Apple escalated after Fortnite was “blocked” from returning to the iPhone App Store in the US.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
