JJ Mazzucotelli
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is a great game with lots of little issues. The story works well, the combat is engaging, and the environments are beautiful. There’s only one problem. You’ve already played this game, but it was called God Of War, Dark Souls, Metroid Prime, or Uncharted. Fallen Order takes some of the best parts of all of these games and weaves them into something that does none of them perfectly. While managing to make this amalgamation of amazing games work, Fallen Order still falls flat due to sloppy controls and annoying bugs.
Difficulty
This game has four difficulties, and next to each one there is a little chart that explains exactly what the difference is. The game is fairly challenging for an unexperienced player on any difficulty except Story Mode, but the real challenge comes from the controls. Figuring out how to beat a challenging enemy is engaging until you can’t see where they are because the camera got stuck around the corner.
Story
The story has a solid start and is definitely a driving reason to push through some of the more annoying issues the game has. Cal, the Player Character, is interesting and becomes even more so as the story progresses. Jedi Fallen Order attempts to deliver an original story in the Star Wars canon. It does a fairly good job of delivering on that promise—even if the skeleton of the story is one we’ve all seen before. Customization options like building Cal’s lightsaber, finding new Ponchos, and skins for both your ship and droid help encourage exploration and expands on the already strong world-building.
Graphics
The environments in Jedi Fallen Order are absolutely breathtaking… when they load. There were a number of instances where I would be running in an environment and frames would begin dropping and the textures would just stop loading. This issue extended to the character’s faces as well, which would be detailed one moment, then blurry the next. The lip sync was also hit or miss at times, especially when the cutscene would begin.
Gameplay
The combat in this game is amazing, particularly if you are a fan of the Dark Souls style of combat. Jedi Fallen Order forces you to plan your assault before it begins, and every boss feels individual and important. Unfortunately, the exploration lets down the combat in some ways. It feels like a mix of God Of War’s different and unique environments, Metroid Prime’s map, and Uncharted’s puzzle solving. Some of these work, namely the various planets which all serve as the environments for the game. Each planet is unique and fun to explore with unique enemies. Unfortunately, the puzzle-solving is sloppy at best and simply hopeless at worst. There were two different instances in the five hours I’ve played so far where I found myself locked in an area where I couldn’t solve the puzzle because I didn’t have the appropriate skills yet, but I also couldn’t leave and couldn’t die, so I had to resort to restarting the game. This was… infuriating, to say the least.
All of that being said, the game is still an absolute joy to play. It certainly has its flaws, and I struggle to find an original idea in the game, but it still somehow works. Above all else, it’s fun to play. Cal is an interesting character, and the worlds are beautiful. It is by no means perfect, but the pros heavily outweigh the cons.
