Much in the vein of my Avengers revisit, I'm going to get a chance to reassess my opinion 'Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order' due to a final trailer put out recently. (I won't change my opinion on the name however. It's plain awful.) True, there has been another trailer between my first blog and now, but it was mostly uneventful and full of footage we were already familiar with. What we have now is more of a story based affair and gives us a clue of what we can expect when from the narrative side of things. (So I'll put my combat concerns aside for now.)
The trailer actually starts off with a shot that perfectly sums up the driving force for the story. The pursed Padawan; Cal Kestis, willingly puts his life in the hands of former Jedi: Cere, and comic relief mini alien Greez. All in an effort to escape the claws of the intimidating Sith Inquisitor known as the Seventh Sister. It's an interesting mash-up of things we've seen done a million times over, with the party set-up, and cool lore bits that were introduced in the only Star Wars properties that aren't crap nowadays, The Dave Filoni series'.
I am encouraged that the story appears to be setting Cal up against this fellow force user. In the days following order 66, which just happens to be when this game is set, it is difficult to find worthy foils to a Jedi-lead due to the apparent lack of other significant former Jedi, with the obvious exception of ol' Darth himself. Previous games that have tried to pull of setting a story in this time, like the game that gets a lot of hate nowadays for some reason 'Star Wars: The Force Unleashed', had to create a whole new storyline that was haphazardly jammed into the events of the canon. I mean, I understand the desire to insert your story into the main canon, but literally having Starkiller sacrifice his life to jump start the Rebellion is a little bit self-aggrandizing. (This is why Disney erased the timeline, guys.)
By pitting the protagonist against one of the, newly introduced, Sith inquisitors, you pit him against a foe he can theoretically beat which immediately lends some agency and tension to your key story moments. (Somehow I didn't feel too invested in 'Force Unleashed' when Starkiller went toe-to-toe with the Emperor. Something told me that the old guy would be fine.) Whether that means that the Mirialan will make a good foe for Cal, is another issue entirely. That all comes down to the strength of the writing and characterization; something that Star Wars has been pretty trash at for the past few years. Personally, I won't be expecting anything great. I'm not saying that there can't be any brilliant stories in the Star Wars universe, just that one would need to take risks in order to achieve them, and this game doesn't exactly scream 'risky' to me. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
The trailer than moves on to show Cere introducing Cal to an old rundown Jedi temple and walking him through the ways of the force through some kinetic platforming that just screams 'Frostbite engine' for me. (Don't be fooled by how fluid the movement is, guys, it only looks that good in 4K.) There is one bit of this trailer that both intrigues and confuses me here. Cere remarks "I know you don't trust me", to establish some degree of offish-ness between her and Cal, and I just can't put my finger on why. This isn't the first time that this idea has been broached either, interviewee's have implied a similarly rocky relationship between the student and his teacher, and something just isn't clicking for me.
Why have the Padawan mistrust the Master who is going to guide him along his path to becoming competent? Isn't this just going to make the moment of her death all that more emotionless when you spend the whole time being reminded how you don't trust her. (And if you don't think that she is going to die then you clearly haven't seen the track record for black people in the Star Wars Universe...) I'm not sure if this is their attempt to 'subvert expectations' and deliver an a-typical 'becoming who you're meant to be' story, but I doubt in the writers' ability to make the most out of it. Plus, we've already had an 'untrustworthy tutor' example in the Star Wars universe.
Who remembers Kreia for 'Knights of the Old Republic 2'. Say what you will about the repressively linear structure of that game, the writing was absolutely top notch. There we got a master who, it is revealed very early on, has heavy ties to the Sith presence, and it clear that her teaming with you is more out of necessity than any desire to help raise you. The writers have mentioned how they did this in order to play on the 'wise mentor' stereotype that we saw in characters like Yoda and Obi-Wan, and to provide a twist upon the story that was as good as the moment in Knights of the Old Republic 1 when it is revealed that >redacted for being one of the greatest twists in Video game history<. I think that Respawn believe that they're treading new ground with this story device but in truth they're just follow in the wake of giants and trying to fill-in their treads. I know that there are some competent storytellers over at Respawn, they've proven themselves a couple of times, but I can't see Respawn's guys comparing to Bioware from their distant heyday.
From here the trailer starts to do the classic "You can't save them" line that is read infinitely better in the Doom Eternal trailer. (Okay, in that trailer the line was more along the lines of "They are no longer your people to save." But that honestly just makes it even more badass.) This is all accompanied with a highlight reels of Cal pulling off various heroic feats (If you consider murder heroic) and little snippets of his foes for good measure. We see some more inquisitors, Trico from the Last Guardian and- wait are those... They are! Deathtroopers once again!
Out of all the new bits of Star Wars lore that has been added on in these recent movies (The origin of Han Solo's name being by far the worst) the one snippet that I can't get enough of, is the Deathtroopers. They look so cool, they're mysterious and huge and you never hear their voice. They first showed up in 'Rogue One' as Director Krennic's personal guard but have since gone on to show up in 'Star Wars: Battlefront 2' as a special unit, but are even due to make an appearance in 'The Mandalorian' later this month. Them being here makes me giddy in ways I cannot accurately express through words, but rest assured I'm currently frothing at the mouth like a schoolgirl. (Schoolgirls do that, right?)
Overall, consider me agnostic towards 'Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order'. I will most definitely play it, but it won't be at launch and it will be second hand. (When I vowed that Respawn would never see my money, I meant it.) The game looks like it could be something interesting for the content-starved Star Wars gaming fans out there, but I doubt it'll hold a candle to the classics that we know and love so dear. Perhaps if the game were given a more unique premise or a character creation system, there would be something to get excited about, but as it is I'm little more than mildly intrigued. I guess I'll find out if I'm wrong on this title and it's an instant classic, but somehow I doubt that'll be the case.
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