A long long time ago, when the industry didn’t launch broken games……
(Queue Star Wars theme)
So I struggled with how to title this review; There were many quirky ideas for the subtitle, such as something something something dark side, It’s a trap!, or even This isn’t the star wars game you are looking for. But in the end, I decided to go with the classic.
Star Wars Jedi Fallen Order is probably one of my favorite games I’ve played. Combining Sekrio-esque combat with Star Wars theme was an amazing concept, with new pieces of lore added to already expansive universe. It had its share of flaws, including the rather sequel-baiting ending, but I thoroughly enjoyed my time with the tough combat. When Jedi Survivor was announced, I was over the moon. Finally I get to see what’s next for Cal Kestis, and visiting all the familiar and new planets while fighting against the empire. I usually don’t get hyped up for a game, but this one was gonna be the GOTY. The chose one.
Well, now I know how Obi-wan felt at Mustafar. I can’t completely hate it and the better part of me really like the game. Because just like Arkham Knight launch, under all the technical bullshit, there is something great. It still doesn’t save me from feeling sad, angry, disappointed, and hurt by how the game was released. The problem however I feel goes beyond technical issues. It was the chosen one. It was supposed to destroy the piss poor quality of pc gaming, not join them. Bring balance to the standards, not lead them to darkness.
Jedi Survivor takes place a few years after the end of Fallen Order. Cal and BD-1 is continuing to help the rebels fight against the Empire, while the rest of the crew have scattered across the galaxy. After an explosive beginning, Cal discovers an droid from high republic era, which leads to finding a lost jedi from the same era, who is of course bat-shit crazy and declares the Jedi order to be his enemies. So now it’s up to Cal stop the crazed man, and find the mysterious planet called Tanalorr that is virtually unreachable by the empire. I guess you can say he is the new hope for the future of the Jedi.
So playing once again as Cal, you explore various planets reconnecting with the original Mantis crew members, as well as meeting new ones. There are some returning characters from the first game besides the original Mantis crew, as well as some fun cameos of beloved SW characters.
The story is decent. I don’t think I enjoyed it as much as JFO. That game definitely gave the sense of Cal’s growth in his skills. Here Cal is pretty much Jedi Master level, and is trying to maintain his Jedi ways while fighting what seems like a losing battle. I did find it interesting how they incorporated High Republic lore into the game; I think this is the first time where HR era got mentioned in any of the SW games I’ve played so far. Still, I found the main villains to be not nearly as interesting as Second Sister from the first game…. Until I got to the halfway point plot twist, which I honestly did not see coming. It’s actually a revelation of two things, and while you can probably see the first point coming the second point will completely throw you off. You then spend the next half of the game chasing after this guy.
The pacing is kinda weird, because the game keeps having you travel back to Koboh, the first planet you arrive. And I’m not talking about going back because of optional stuff, but the game’s story keeps having you go back. As much as the game is nice enough to open a few new planets for you, It doesn’t matter too much because there’s only one other planet with an open area like Koboh, and the majority of the story takes place in Koboh as well. The main story bits are around 18.5 hours long, but the game artificially increases that time with the traversal and collectibles. Completionists are said to complete the game in around 53 hours, and I am really annoyed whenever a game does this; the extra stuff being longer than the main story. The story ends in a very conclusive way, but I feel there are lots of story bits that have remained unresolved, which may lead to the third game.
The movement, ways to explore with a grappling hook. Wall-running. Air dashing. They are all great. It’s actually really reminiscent of God of War, where environmental challenges combined with the abilities you have sets up nice puzzles and rewards. They improved a lot compared to JFO. I just wish grappling hook was somehow usable in combat, because that would've been fun. Also, while the obstacles come up quite frequent, these abilities are very much situational. Like, the maps are huge, but the parts where you can use those abilities are very limited.
The combat is super fun…. When it works. Now you have four saber stances to choose from; Standard, double-sided, dual-wield, blaster + lightsaber, and crossguard. They all have their own movesets, and you can tell the animators put a lot of effort into having each stance distinct from one another. You can have two stances equipped at a time, and they can be switched with a press of a button. They make for interesting combat gameplay, where different stances will be better suited for certain situations. Although I definitely favor the slow but powerful movements of the crossguard. Kinda like in Arkham Knight, sometimes a companion will join you in combat, and you can perform some cool finishers with them or command them for a special move. It’s a shame that unlike AK, you have no control over how companions fight. Sometimes they just stand there doing nothing.
Cal now has more force powers to play around with, with abilities like mind tricks, forcing enemies to be rooted or levitated. But because of this, The force slow that was available for a single tap of a button is now a super move. Granted it now affects multiple enemies, but even with the upgrade it feels too short, and half the time I forgot I had it with me.
Customizations are leagues better than JFO; You can customize Cal’s facial hair, his jacket, shirt and pants, BD-1’s design, and lightsaber color and design as well. For lightsaber, all the color options from the first game are here, plus the ones you’ll discover on the new game +. For the crossguard stance, you can control the angle of the crossguard as well.
So far, everything sounds great, right? This should be bought as soon as possible right? Well no. I’m sure all of you are well aware of this, but the game is a hot mess. Granted, it seems nowhere near as bad as what people made it out to be, but there are times when the frame rate goes to negative 60, weird texture and visual glitch (seriously, don't wear anything with a cape. Trust me), Cal’s hair starts freaking out when he’s in fall animation, the audio bugging out, hard crashes, and CPU temp going into high-80s. Frame rate drop is a BIG ONE, as it is tied to the timing for parry. I died so many times quite unfairly simply because the game decided to have a seizure the moment I needed to parry. The game still needs a lot of work before it can even be considered properly optimized. And this is after every time I boot up the game, it’s gotta “optimize game files”. I don’t understand why this needs to happen every time I boot up the game, but it certainly doesn’t help. It’s like the game was designed by a bunch of stuck-up, half-witted, scruffy-looking, nerf herders. By the time of writing this review, it received two major patches, and I’m still seeing technical issues.
I wanna briefly talk about the platform the game is on; FUCK the EA app. This shit makes EA Origin look like a saint; If you weren’t aware, EA has been forcing players to migrate to their new app and ditch origin. It needs an internet connection to work, and if your internet goes down or the app is going through server maintenance, tough shit, you can’t play. No achievements on the app either. This not only applies to JS, but other single player games like Mass Effect and Dragon Age. But that's a discussion for another time.
Back to the game itself. Above I said the combat is fun when it works. As much as I enjoy the combat due to my love of sekrio, there’s one issue that makes it not 100% enjoyable; the parry system itself. Aside from requiring a near-perfect timing, min-bosses and regular enemies with stamina/posture bar are pointless to parry. Unlike Sekiro where you can perform a lethal strike to get in some free hits, in JS all it gives you is ONE hit. That’s it. As soon as you hit them their stamina bar refills. But your stamina bar takes forever to recharge! At least bosses let you get in a couple of hits. Also, there are many regular enemies that can kill you with one hit, and Cal’s attack animation is too slow to damage them before they kill him. Even with dual wield, the supposed fastest attack stand, the enemies always feel faster. Because of this, Jedi Grandmaster difficulty feels really unfair, and some mini-bosses and regular enemies can be more difficult then the bosses themselves just because of those cheap unblockable attacks. If the encounter only has a few enemies the fight is fun, but sometimes the game will throw so many enemies it becomes meaninglessly annoying. I swear no one can understand what made the sekiro combat so great. There is no reason to play on Jedi Grandmaster difficulty other than to torture yourself. They can, and definitely will, strike you down many times over, but you certainly won’t feel any more powerful than you can imagine.
While the big open areas can be fun to explore and discover all the collectibles, sometimes it takes too long to get anywhere. And Respawn has some experience in designing big open areas in their past games, so idk how they messed this up. Every time you die, you are most likely to traverse such a big area all over again. And this is with mounts as well. The two planets with open areas are caked with this issue, and because they are so big you can tell the devs banked most of their map design efforts here. Honestly, I prefer the first game's more planets with glorified corridors, because at least you won’t have to waste time running back you where you died all over again. That’s another thing that makes the game feel difficult; Getting back to the mini-bosses and the enemies that killed you can be really annoying because everything gets resurrected again. At least boss fights they seem to have the courtesy to start you next to the arena. Why can’t that be the case for the mini-bosses? Are they expecting us to make a Kessel run under 12 parsecs to get back to them?
Should you get this game? Hell yes. Especially if you liked Sekiro combat enough or just love the IP. Plus it does add more SW lore and Cal feels more interesting here.
Should you get it RIGHT NOW? Hell no. This game needs at least a few more patches before it’s stable enough to play. If you aren't a fan of SW or Sekiro, that's more of a reason to wait for sale. A deep one. You can go to the tosche station right now, but you won’t find any good power converters.
And with that, I think I ran out of all the SW jokes and references I can think of. Remember; Trust in the Force, and vote with your wallet
(Star Wars theme fades, slowly panning to planet earth, followed by wallet being chased by EA logo)
Some additional nitpicks:
(Queue Star Wars theme)
So I struggled with how to title this review; There were many quirky ideas for the subtitle, such as something something something dark side, It’s a trap!, or even This isn’t the star wars game you are looking for. But in the end, I decided to go with the classic.
Star Wars Jedi Fallen Order is probably one of my favorite games I’ve played. Combining Sekrio-esque combat with Star Wars theme was an amazing concept, with new pieces of lore added to already expansive universe. It had its share of flaws, including the rather sequel-baiting ending, but I thoroughly enjoyed my time with the tough combat. When Jedi Survivor was announced, I was over the moon. Finally I get to see what’s next for Cal Kestis, and visiting all the familiar and new planets while fighting against the empire. I usually don’t get hyped up for a game, but this one was gonna be the GOTY. The chose one.
Well, now I know how Obi-wan felt at Mustafar. I can’t completely hate it and the better part of me really like the game. Because just like Arkham Knight launch, under all the technical bullshit, there is something great. It still doesn’t save me from feeling sad, angry, disappointed, and hurt by how the game was released. The problem however I feel goes beyond technical issues. It was the chosen one. It was supposed to destroy the piss poor quality of pc gaming, not join them. Bring balance to the standards, not lead them to darkness.
Jedi Survivor takes place a few years after the end of Fallen Order. Cal and BD-1 is continuing to help the rebels fight against the Empire, while the rest of the crew have scattered across the galaxy. After an explosive beginning, Cal discovers an droid from high republic era, which leads to finding a lost jedi from the same era, who is of course bat-shit crazy and declares the Jedi order to be his enemies. So now it’s up to Cal stop the crazed man, and find the mysterious planet called Tanalorr that is virtually unreachable by the empire. I guess you can say he is the new hope for the future of the Jedi.
So playing once again as Cal, you explore various planets reconnecting with the original Mantis crew members, as well as meeting new ones. There are some returning characters from the first game besides the original Mantis crew, as well as some fun cameos of beloved SW characters.
The story is decent. I don’t think I enjoyed it as much as JFO. That game definitely gave the sense of Cal’s growth in his skills. Here Cal is pretty much Jedi Master level, and is trying to maintain his Jedi ways while fighting what seems like a losing battle. I did find it interesting how they incorporated High Republic lore into the game; I think this is the first time where HR era got mentioned in any of the SW games I’ve played so far. Still, I found the main villains to be not nearly as interesting as Second Sister from the first game…. Until I got to the halfway point plot twist, which I honestly did not see coming. It’s actually a revelation of two things, and while you can probably see the first point coming the second point will completely throw you off. You then spend the next half of the game chasing after this guy.
The pacing is kinda weird, because the game keeps having you travel back to Koboh, the first planet you arrive. And I’m not talking about going back because of optional stuff, but the game’s story keeps having you go back. As much as the game is nice enough to open a few new planets for you, It doesn’t matter too much because there’s only one other planet with an open area like Koboh, and the majority of the story takes place in Koboh as well. The main story bits are around 18.5 hours long, but the game artificially increases that time with the traversal and collectibles. Completionists are said to complete the game in around 53 hours, and I am really annoyed whenever a game does this; the extra stuff being longer than the main story. The story ends in a very conclusive way, but I feel there are lots of story bits that have remained unresolved, which may lead to the third game.
The movement, ways to explore with a grappling hook. Wall-running. Air dashing. They are all great. It’s actually really reminiscent of God of War, where environmental challenges combined with the abilities you have sets up nice puzzles and rewards. They improved a lot compared to JFO. I just wish grappling hook was somehow usable in combat, because that would've been fun. Also, while the obstacles come up quite frequent, these abilities are very much situational. Like, the maps are huge, but the parts where you can use those abilities are very limited.
The combat is super fun…. When it works. Now you have four saber stances to choose from; Standard, double-sided, dual-wield, blaster + lightsaber, and crossguard. They all have their own movesets, and you can tell the animators put a lot of effort into having each stance distinct from one another. You can have two stances equipped at a time, and they can be switched with a press of a button. They make for interesting combat gameplay, where different stances will be better suited for certain situations. Although I definitely favor the slow but powerful movements of the crossguard. Kinda like in Arkham Knight, sometimes a companion will join you in combat, and you can perform some cool finishers with them or command them for a special move. It’s a shame that unlike AK, you have no control over how companions fight. Sometimes they just stand there doing nothing.
Cal now has more force powers to play around with, with abilities like mind tricks, forcing enemies to be rooted or levitated. But because of this, The force slow that was available for a single tap of a button is now a super move. Granted it now affects multiple enemies, but even with the upgrade it feels too short, and half the time I forgot I had it with me.
Customizations are leagues better than JFO; You can customize Cal’s facial hair, his jacket, shirt and pants, BD-1’s design, and lightsaber color and design as well. For lightsaber, all the color options from the first game are here, plus the ones you’ll discover on the new game +. For the crossguard stance, you can control the angle of the crossguard as well.
So far, everything sounds great, right? This should be bought as soon as possible right? Well no. I’m sure all of you are well aware of this, but the game is a hot mess. Granted, it seems nowhere near as bad as what people made it out to be, but there are times when the frame rate goes to negative 60, weird texture and visual glitch (seriously, don't wear anything with a cape. Trust me), Cal’s hair starts freaking out when he’s in fall animation, the audio bugging out, hard crashes, and CPU temp going into high-80s. Frame rate drop is a BIG ONE, as it is tied to the timing for parry. I died so many times quite unfairly simply because the game decided to have a seizure the moment I needed to parry. The game still needs a lot of work before it can even be considered properly optimized. And this is after every time I boot up the game, it’s gotta “optimize game files”. I don’t understand why this needs to happen every time I boot up the game, but it certainly doesn’t help. It’s like the game was designed by a bunch of stuck-up, half-witted, scruffy-looking, nerf herders. By the time of writing this review, it received two major patches, and I’m still seeing technical issues.
I wanna briefly talk about the platform the game is on; FUCK the EA app. This shit makes EA Origin look like a saint; If you weren’t aware, EA has been forcing players to migrate to their new app and ditch origin. It needs an internet connection to work, and if your internet goes down or the app is going through server maintenance, tough shit, you can’t play. No achievements on the app either. This not only applies to JS, but other single player games like Mass Effect and Dragon Age. But that's a discussion for another time.
Back to the game itself. Above I said the combat is fun when it works. As much as I enjoy the combat due to my love of sekrio, there’s one issue that makes it not 100% enjoyable; the parry system itself. Aside from requiring a near-perfect timing, min-bosses and regular enemies with stamina/posture bar are pointless to parry. Unlike Sekiro where you can perform a lethal strike to get in some free hits, in JS all it gives you is ONE hit. That’s it. As soon as you hit them their stamina bar refills. But your stamina bar takes forever to recharge! At least bosses let you get in a couple of hits. Also, there are many regular enemies that can kill you with one hit, and Cal’s attack animation is too slow to damage them before they kill him. Even with dual wield, the supposed fastest attack stand, the enemies always feel faster. Because of this, Jedi Grandmaster difficulty feels really unfair, and some mini-bosses and regular enemies can be more difficult then the bosses themselves just because of those cheap unblockable attacks. If the encounter only has a few enemies the fight is fun, but sometimes the game will throw so many enemies it becomes meaninglessly annoying. I swear no one can understand what made the sekiro combat so great. There is no reason to play on Jedi Grandmaster difficulty other than to torture yourself. They can, and definitely will, strike you down many times over, but you certainly won’t feel any more powerful than you can imagine.
While the big open areas can be fun to explore and discover all the collectibles, sometimes it takes too long to get anywhere. And Respawn has some experience in designing big open areas in their past games, so idk how they messed this up. Every time you die, you are most likely to traverse such a big area all over again. And this is with mounts as well. The two planets with open areas are caked with this issue, and because they are so big you can tell the devs banked most of their map design efforts here. Honestly, I prefer the first game's more planets with glorified corridors, because at least you won’t have to waste time running back you where you died all over again. That’s another thing that makes the game feel difficult; Getting back to the mini-bosses and the enemies that killed you can be really annoying because everything gets resurrected again. At least boss fights they seem to have the courtesy to start you next to the arena. Why can’t that be the case for the mini-bosses? Are they expecting us to make a Kessel run under 12 parsecs to get back to them?
Should you get this game? Hell yes. Especially if you liked Sekiro combat enough or just love the IP. Plus it does add more SW lore and Cal feels more interesting here.
Should you get it RIGHT NOW? Hell no. This game needs at least a few more patches before it’s stable enough to play. If you aren't a fan of SW or Sekiro, that's more of a reason to wait for sale. A deep one. You can go to the tosche station right now, but you won’t find any good power converters.
And with that, I think I ran out of all the SW jokes and references I can think of. Remember; Trust in the Force, and vote with your wallet
(Star Wars theme fades, slowly panning to planet earth, followed by wallet being chased by EA logo)
Some additional nitpicks:
- When traveling to another planet, Cal still needs to sit down on a copilot seat to complete the transversal
- The skill tree is very limited, you’ll probably max then all out soon.
- While the movements are great, Cal loses the momentum in his speed too soon
- Some puzzles require you to chain multiple abilities. But you don’t know that, so you come back to the challenge excited because of your new ability, only to find out you need another
- No need to 100% every planet, as most of them are gonna be for cosmetics, and you’ll definitely prefer some over others.
- No force lightning or force choke ability, still (just for cutscenes)
- There are button combinations with the block button. Sometimes you’ll trigger a move by accident when all you want to do is parry then regular strike
- Some planets are greyed out, indicating DLCs?
- All characters, different races and all, speaks human language. I think it would've been nice to hear other languages as well
- The rest of the inquisitor sisters are still nowhere to be found
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