Jedi Fallen Order: the almost great game.
The combat? Almost great! Frankly if this was just a normal fantasy game, no one would give half a shit. But because your sword is a laser and not steel, that automatically makes it better. Frankly, I don't think the "Dark Souls" approach (if this is even truly similar to Dark Souls) works. The last thing that comes to mind when you think "Jedi" is "clumsy", but you will constantly feel clumsy playing this game. When it works though, it does genuinely feel fucking sweet to slice up some aliens.
The Metroid-vania? Almost great. It does feel super cathartic to sweep through areas you used to be unable to access, double jumping and wall running without a care. But was it worth traversal feeling like absolute shit the first half of the game? Not really. Jedi double jump. Period. To make it something you unlock is incredibly annoying. Speaking of...
The platforming? Yeah okay, the platforming was consistently ass. Please stop Respawn, all these sequences look fucking dumb and play like shit.
The story? Almost great. I like Cal. I like Cere. I like Greez. I even like Merrin. But I do not for one second buy that any of them care about each other. You spend hours and hours on your own, and then all the character stuff happens in 5 minutes after you finally make it back to your ship. There are individually great sequences, like Cal's flashbacks, and fun world building in collectibles, but overall, I felt too divorced from the narrative.
I've already complained a ton about my gripes with the performance and polish of this game. I have to ask, is Jedi Survivor (on console) less janky? Because I can't understand what makes this game so janky. The graphics aren't great, the game world isn't huge, and Respawn's other games are well known for their polish and smooth performance.
Overall, I still enjoyed it. But I can say with 100% certainty that if this game didn't have Star Wars painted all over it, I would have never tried this game out, much less finish it.
