Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order review

Trust only in the Force

Yea, I'd had the good fortune to have finally finished Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order on Jedi Master difficulty, the Respawn single player Star Wars game that was cited to be the new hope for EA single player titles everywhere. This was the game that felt designed specifically to counter EA's foolish mandate, from a few years prior, that 'single player is dead' and how the world needs to wake up and line EA's pockets quicker. Respawn, besides their quality multiplayer modes and titles, have always been unsung heroes of the single player genre, so their attempt to step up to the plate and make a single player title drew the attention of a few folk, and once these folk then learnt that the game would be a Star Wars game? Phew, anticipation flew off the damn roof. People were beside themselves as they learnt more and more about this game. "It was going to follow a Jedi in the wake of Order 66? Between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope? Sign me up!" Only the most cautious of the community, like myself, knew what it was liked to be burned by the big E and weren't exactly clamouring for this game with it's straightforward-looking combat, overuse of familiar universe locations and generic looking protago- oh wait, he's modelled after a real person who actually looks like that? I take that last point back. Now after picking up the game for Steam and going through a complete playthrough to put my theories of mediocrity to the test I can confidently say- I was absolutely wrong, this game slaps. 

And yet I must start with a compliant, because of course I must, but this one is aimed at neither the game itself nor Respawn. EA, I bought this game off of Steam using Steam money, so if that is the case, why in the 9 hells did I have to download and run Origin everytime I wanted to play the thing? I have to go through two launchers? Are you high? Is this your way of spiting at the community because no one could stand your ugly (and poorly coded) Origin Launcher and thus wouldn't buy your PC launcher exclusives until you bit the bullet and opened them up to other storefronts? Now everyone has to download your crap and try to be happy about it? Very classy. It even makes it so that everytime you earn an achievement you have to see two separate pop-ups celebrating your good fortune. One from Origin and one from Steam. Needless to say, I hate it and everyone who thought it was a good idea. You already got my money EA, why do you need my patience too?

Good, now that's out of the way let's start talking about the game that everyone calls the Dark Souls of Star Wars games. And whilst that may sound like lazy game journalist speak, it's actually rather apt this time around because Respawn were clearly, nakedly, inspired by Miyazaki's masterpiece series when they put this game together. The raw gameplay, whilst linear, features our Jedi Hero travelling from pre-placed 'meditation spots', whereupon they can spend skillpoints amassed from combat and from which they respawn upon death. Speaking of death- when you die all the progress you made toward the next skillpoint is lost and can be reclaimed from hurting the monster who felled you. (Or by touching a Force Cloud left behind if you died by non-creature means) It's a clear and obvious attempt to do some light Dark Souls parody mechanics and benefit from that style of game design. Once the level design starts to open up into a semi free-roam affair with Metroid-Vania style stopgaps, you really start to feel the heart of the Dark Soul laid upon this game and it really fits well.

But Dark Souls was by no means the only Miyazaki inspiration, because when we go to the raw combat, which looked deceptively straightforward in the previews; there's undoubtedly some Sekiro tucked away there. Born out of a desire to make the Lightsaber feel as deadly as it should, Respawn had it so that most grunt enemies either go down instantly or with little effort at all, making the player feel strong, but with little shades of skill behind the act so that players feel like they're achieving something too. Parrying is the name of the game here, and most every fight will, at-some-point, expect you to wait for the last possible second before tapping the block button and changing the tide of the battle. (They only have you press block, unlike Dark Souls which makes you perform a parrying move that, should you miss, leaves you completely open to attack. Again- Dark Souls lite) Sure, you can just block that laser bolt heading for you, but if you parry then that bolt will head right back to the sender; you can see the appeal of playing just that tiny-bit more dangerously.

Also familiar to Sekiro fans would be the stagger system which operates much as it sounds. Evert time someone blocks a blow, a bar fills up below their health bar which, once full, staggers the opponent and leaves them open to attack. (Such is the same with protagonist Cal Kestis too) This comes into effect in a small way with Stun-baton wielding Stormtroopers in the early game and expands with the talented Purge Troopers as you get further in. By the actual boss fights you might find yourself relying on the Stagger system as a primary source of getting in that damage opportunity, which is where the game can sort of remind you of that Sekiro aggression. However, as is becoming the theme, the system is nowhere near as hardcore and it's pretty plausible to take out most enemies without worrying about stagger-bars for them or yourself, same with the parrying. They're more just flavour mechanics to make the combat more interesting, instead of more complex and challenging. Which is certainly appealing to some players, but for others they might see it as a loss in potential for what we might have seen where the team allowed to go all out.

Another huge part of any Star Wars game is going to be the way they handle Force powers, and Jedi Fallen Order does a fantastic job of giving players access to the iconic abilities we all love (Force push, Force Pull, Force double jump) and makes them usual in both utility situations and combat ones. You may use Force pull during the exploration sections to pull a rope towards you that would otherwise be just out of your reach, and you might use it to yank an enemy from the ranks and into your waiting Saber. It demonstrates a distinct understanding of the Metroidvania inspirations and promises those that are looking for that sort of progression in their games the 3D AAA equivalent. I still find myself disquiet with the system for one key reason; the way they turn it into a resource. When exploring, the font of your Force abilities is bottomless and you can use them to your heart's content; as it should be, but when in combat, suddenly your Force hits a limited pool. (Fair enough, they wanted the Force to be powerful and so they cut you off; basic balancing) 

What gets me is that the resource pool can only be replenished by doing damage and actually drains from getting damaged, making it feel like special move heat-points rather than a integral part of the combat. (Dishonored had a similar problem with it's powers and switched to a semi-refill system in Dishonored 2) Consequently, you'll often be conserving force abilities more than you should need to even when they're designed to be played around with. Making your Force regenerate would require a full rebalancing of the game, no doubt, but it would also make players more inclined to experiment during combat and see just how robust and dynamic some of these powers can make things. (The first time I realised that I could force push a commando's grenade right back in his face I had a field day doing it; no one should miss out on those moments because they aren't encouraged to experiment.)

Of course, all of these combat mechanics and special powers are only really worth a damn if you have the enemies there to try them out on; and they should preferably be a mixed bag of fellows that encourage tactile actions and switching up of approach. Luckily the enemy composition of Jedi Fallen Order is actually quite solid. Between the Fauna of the planets you'll be exploring and the various ranks of Stormtroopers you'll be cutting down there's a great pool of variety which nudges the player to change things up without throwing up a wall and demanding they attack this enemy in this specific way. Most everyone dies by being stabbed enough, and there's no real right way to go about that, but some might require clever dodging on your part in order to get to that vulnerable moment, or maybe you'll be hit with a squad of enemies such that finagling that perfect opportunity takes a little active planning. It's still casual at it's heart, but intuitive and engaging in a way that will easily keep the invested and dedicated on their toes if they want to start getting flashy with their fights. By the end of the game, they'll be some actually challenging hordes thrown your way that might just have you expending all of your clever tactics and techniques to depletion.

Progression is handled much as you'd expect from a RPG-lite Star Wars game with Souls-like aspirations, Skill points are spent on a skill tree to get new powers or buff up the health bar and force meter. None, save for perhaps 2 choices, significantly changes up the standard flow of combat, and so most of these skills are extra little abilities to spice things up. I might have preferred skills that alter gameplay a little more, such as one that might regenerate health from doing damage, thus encouraging more aggressive play, although it's clear these skills aren't designed to encourage 'builds' as much as they're meant to visually represent Cal's journey to becoming a proper and powerful Jedi. A new lightsaber technique is added throughout the game, which adds some scant variety to how you handle situations, but with the casual-nature of enemy compositions you'll still find yourself picking your favourite style and just sticking to it. Oh and on a specific, and slightly spoilery note, the split blade technique you learn in the final third of the game absolutely ruined me. Firstly, it's a special move instead of a style and thus uses up Force power, for some reason. Secondly, the key binding activates whenever you try to attack with your guard up. Did no one on the team posit the theory that people might accidently activate that given how for the entire rest of the game doing that combination of buttons would merely cancel the guard and go into a standard, non force-depleting, attack? The amount of misclicks I did with that style damn near drove me insane.

Puzzles are another big part of this game for some reason, borrowing the environment-manipulation style of puzzle design from the Tomb Raider games. These make for breakups between levels that really lend purpose to your Metroidvania force powers, but rarely are they all that interesting or challenging to solve. None that I saw appeared to be optional, meaning that the team were limited by their requirement not to make the critical path too taxing (cause you know, games journalists have to beat it afterall) and that resulted in a slew of somewhat uninteresting puzzles. And yet I will say that only a couple were actively frustrating, and those were because of my personal misunderstanding of what the game was asking me to do. (and the hint system being effectively worthless) So a bit of miss on the puzzle system.

But now we go onto the big one, the bosses; that which gives a Souls-like game it's chest hair, and the offering for this title is- honestly disappointingly lacking. Each world has a world boss which is just a slightly stronger version of the mini-boss enemies you'll have fought throughout the game anyway, and the critical path only has three complete boss fights in it. (There are a few mini-boss fights that end prematurely; but for complete fight-to-the-death boss duels there are only three) Of those three, however, I will say that the three were all of my favourite Souls kind (Humanoid duels) and were well designed and conceived. (Even if they all commit the carnal sin of giving their bosses an unblockable ground pound AOE move. The final boss even pulls off said move in literal intimate proximity to you; just the cheapest of moves possible.) 

Oddly, the best boss fight isn't even the finale, but rather the first proper Boss fight about midway through the game. The final encounter is really static with only two stages to it that are similar enough that you don't really need to change any winning tactic you made for the start of the fight. The first boss fight, however, has three distinct stages, changes itself up significantly as you go, and feels both dynamic and taxing the whole way through. I remember beating that fight after around my 40th attempt and feeling just buzzing about the potential for the rest of the game. "If the first total boss fight was that good; what else am I in for?" Only for the other two fights to be either on par or lesser. (I actually think the finale was the weakest) It's not like I was expecting some sort of 'Soul of Cinder' style finale, drenched in significance and personally charged, as I literally fight my own various move sets in match-up to the death; but a little more dynamism to the fights would have worked wonders. Still all decent quality duels, though, don't get me wrong.

And last I come to narrative, a rather odd order of things for my blog, but I feel it reflects the intention of the game itself. They want to get people through the doors based on the gameplay, not the story; heck, that's how I ended up interested in the game myself. The story was bound to play second fiddle, but does that mean the narrative itself was half-assed? No, actually, I think that Respawn did a decent job. Cal Kestis' journey aboard the Mantis were very engaging and fun, and filled with a lot more personal drive than I expected. That being said, I still found the characters and their motivations to be a little cookie cutter and a bit bland. Cal is a survivor Padawan from the Purges, and acts exactly as you'd expect one in that position to: inexperienced, hope-driven and usually stoically amiable. Cere is the failed Jedi Master who lost her Padawan, so she's cynical, (but not too cynical. Honestly, she's a bit of dreamer as well) darker, a little beaten. (She's said to be 'broken', but the story makes no effort to really show that) and Greez is- well he's comic relief. (And pretty average comic relief at that)

They're not bad, by any stretch of the imagination, and they all fit neatly into the roles they were designed to play. They just lack that special little something which makes them real breathing characters that you want to route for and remember. They're about on par with the recent Disney Star Wars characters, if a little more fleshed out; and that means the emotional moments, which they all have, fail to really break the skin. (Kudos for trying, though) There is a huge highlight, however, and those are the flashback/forward scenes that Cal undergoes as he reconnects with the force, telling you the story of Order 66 from his point of view. These were great, and if the characters themselves had a little more meat to their bones I could see myself being genuinely effected by the grittiness of experiencing these people being brutally hunted down. (it was much more visceral than I'd ever imagined it being before; genuine congrats on whoever directed these scenes.) The ending is obvious sequel bait and I can see some out there feeling that the story sort of invalidated itself in the final moments, but I feel that (through the strength of those aforementioned flash scenes) the narrative just about justifies and redeems itself, and sets the characters up for what I can only imagine will be a kickass sequel. With everyone properly set up like they have been, the only place for them to go in the next title will be into real character-trial heights, and I think this cast both have the potential to pull that off and the willingness to go there. (This is just the beginning, and it shows.)

Ultimately, I started off acutely aware that Jedi Fallen Order was a good game, but around about the halfway mark I came to realisation that I was underselling it; this really is a great title. Great combat, wrapped around solid exploration, peppered with the odd truly gorgeous setpiece and strung along by a decent narrative. However, I feel that a lot of it's shortcoming just come from not committing enough in a few key areas. (which is why I hold a lot of hope for a sequel being an absolute showstopper) The bosses were either too few or lacklustre, the characters were just interesting enough to exist, but not unique enough to be memorable, and the overall story doesn't really achieve anything for the world of Star Wars. It's a game that proves Single Player EA games can exist, and that they need more room to take chances. With that said, I feel pretty comfortable giving Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order a Grade of B+, indicating a title just a hair's breadth away from true brilliance. Respawn are no slouches, and I just know that the oodles of potential this game lays out will not go to waste in the next title; it's just a shame we have to wait until then for the game this one could have been. Still, an absolute recommend for anyone out there who loves Star Wars or is simply into Soul-likes, because this is easily close enough to a Souls game to scratch that itch. Dear EA; commission more games like this one, please.