Star Wars Jedi Fallen Order
EA and Respawn finally have something good.
This year has been a dry spell of sorts of games, but filled with tons of weird turns though, Gears 5 was a surprising hit being a Microsoft exclusive it helped end the dry spell and start the period of apparently good triple-A games. Even Control, was a pleasant surprise like no game other and even though it didn’t have the same advertising power as some of the other games it, it still had critical acclaim, but Death Stranding which had tons of hype around it ended up being smoke and mirrors sadly and fell short. The game that we’re talking about was created from literal hell, games were canceled or were released and were met with negative or mixed reaction before it, but this game called Star Wars Colon Jedi Colon Fallen Order (Star Wars:Jedi: Fallen Order) has been on a lot of peoples minds since its a Star Wars game and that it’s not like any of other Star Wars game — to a degree.
Ever since EA signed a ten-year deal with Disney to hold the exclusive rights to make Star Wars games, the company’s handling of the rights can be argued with Battlefront not to be confused with the 2004 release with the same name had a mix reaction, no campaign and only online. Developed by DICE the makers of Battlefield, this would be the perfect match, a game maker that knows massive battles on large scale maps, all they needed to do was to emulate the success of Battlefield and they could have a hit. The game wasn’t all that bad, playing on famous battlefields in the Star Wars canon was and will always be welcoming. Fast forward to 2017 when the sequel Battlefront 2 came out, again not to be confused with the same name that came out in 2005, this game was met with so much backlash because of its microtransactions that it even made certain governments look into loot box laws but it had a very good story as many of my peers will agree with, however, the story was overshadowed by the controversy of loot boxes, but years later the game honestly slaps, now mainly because those issues are either gone or fixed. Jedi Fallen Order is nothing like that, no multiplayer, no loot boxes and no microtransaction it’s on its own in the context of what type of Star Wars game it is, a single-player game focusing on the story only.
This being the first non-DICE or non-battlefront game which is made by Respawn, who is a young studio but already have an impressive resume, Titanfall 1 and 2 and the recent battle royal juggernaut Apex Legends they had a task ahead of them: to produce a single-player based Star Wars game, and pretty much delivered. Fallen Order borrows gameplay mechanics from other games so it’s not like anything groundbreaking but that’s not the point — it’s how they execute these mechanics and how they play into the world, for example there’s a lot of going back because of you now have a certain force power that otherwise wouldn’t let you go any further, very Metroid Prime, there’s a lot of exploration and platforming sequences like Uncharted or Tomb Raider and the combat which is something big and on its own is very much like Dark Souls and Sekiro. You play as Cal Kestis a Jedi trying to find a device which holds a list of the next generation of Jedi and the reason why he’s looking for it is because so is the Empire (the bad guys) this game takes place before episode 4 A New Hope and after 3 Revenge of the Sith, so the Jedi have fallen in the cannon and any remaining Jedi have to go undercover and not use their powers otherwise the Empire will sense it.
Events transpire that force our hero to go on his journey and meet his crew of characters who are connected to the bigger picture. You travel to planets on a whim and they have these open areas which you can use to fight enemies but then they become linear with wall running and more combat, the game is spread out almost equally while it isn’t a heavy platform based game it doesn’t overdo it much like the puzzle sequences they’re not too hard but will take some time figuring it out, the game is rather easy to pick up and that’s what’s so great about it, its not a hard game at first but does have a large learning curve which is another thing as why this game is doing well in this day of age. Fallen Order plays like an old school game where it doesn’t rely on long cut scenes or long set-pieces filled with quick-time events, but rather takes the Dark Souls and Demon Souls approach in letting the gameplay speak for the game itself through its game design.
The Combat isn’t your typical hack and slash like God of War or even Devil May Cry, it has a deeper combat system — one that forces you to adapt to combat different enemy types. Rather than running in and going all out, Fallen Order makes the player take a step back even when you’ve maxed out everything — all your attacks and your force attacks you still feel venerable. Fallen Order borrows its combat style from the likes of games like Sekrio and Dark Souls where it’s all about parrying, timing your attacks and dodging enemy fire. There are boss battles that follow the Dark Souls line where they’re massive and hard to kill so you spend hours figuring out to do it as I did, it makes to figure out new ways to beat the boss so you’re constantly learning
The melee-based storm troopers get harder to fight because they will block your attacks and are a struggle in numbers — that’s when your force powers come into play. You can use force push, pull and freeze the enemy, of course, all these things can be upgraded and meditating spots which are the same as bonfires in Dark Souls, you use them to reset your health spend skill points, however, they do respawn enemies so you have to be careful using them. The force abilities you get as you progress through the gameplay into the platforming, for instance, you can jump mid-air over a cliff and use force pull to bring a dangling vine closer to you allowing you jump that gap, it can also be used to help you in combat like force push blowing away enemies allowing you to have breathing room. As you progress through the game it gets easier to handle, you have a map provided by your trusty robot BD1 which if you were like me you’ll start using less and less and only bring it up because you’re very very lost, the map is useful though it’ll show you areas that otherwise you couldn’t go in can be accessible.
The upgrade system is both cosmetic and effects gameplay, with the cosmetics they’re all free and can be found throughout the worlds you can customize BD1’s color, your poncho, your ship the Mantis and change every aspect of your lightsaber even the color so you can make Cal’s lightsaber how you want it to look. His abilities are can be used to make his force powers stronger, get more health and more moves making “unstoppable”.
The issue of Fallen Order is the story, while the self-contained one surrounding Cal Kestis fits into the Star Wars storytelling template that almost all mainline Star Wars stories have: A hero or heroes and their crew going on some mission that will have a lasting impact on the bigger picture. Fallen Order makes Cal way more important and stronger than Luke, so a question that many fans may ask is why isn’t Cal brought up in the movies during the main trilogy, because indirectly or directly the Jedi wouldn’t have survived the same can be said about Battlefront 2 main character Iden Verso, who helps start up the plot of the 2015 Star Wars movie The Force Awakens. and Star Killer in the game series The Force Unleashed becomes as powerful if not more than Darth Vadar. That’s the issue of this game and it’s setting, that it should play into the main narrative because of its impact on what follows it if one were to watch the main trilogy Cal should be showing to some significant spots in the main story. That’s me though.
All in all this game is the definitive Star Wars game, this game makes you feel like a proper Jedi even when the odds are stacked against you and that to me is the best way to make a Star Wars game centered around the one the coolest characters in all science fiction and fantasy.
