GAME REVIEW: Star Wars Jedi - Fallen Order (Series X)

 (Ripples In The Sand - Hans Zimmer)

Regardless of how you feel about the places George Lucas took Star Wars after the original trilogy finished up with 'Return Of The Jedi' back in 1983, his impact on the landscape of video games cannot be debated.  Not long after the release of 'The Empire Strikes Back', the floodgates opened on the world of gaming. 1982's 'Empire Strikes Back' for Atari 2600 was a wonderful game for its time, one that I owned and played the crap out of. I did that because I wanted to be closer to the world that Lucas created.

Since then, over a hundred titles bearing the name 'Star Wars' have emerged, their quality varying as much as their difficulty. Star Wars has touched virtually every genre that gaming has to offer, from First Person Shooters like Dark Forces and Republic Commando to Real Time Strategy titles like Force Commander. They dominated the flight simulator segment for years through the 'X-Wing' and 'TIE Fighter' series, and are responsible for one of the greatest video game RPGs of all time, 'Knights Of The Old Republic'.

Now, Star Wars has entered into a new space: The Souls-Like genre.  For those not familiar, this genre is largely based off of mechanics found in games like Dark Souls and Bloodborn. These games tend to prioritize deep, precision-based, unforgiving combat mechanics, stiff difficulty, and high-risk/high-reward gameplay. Their sometimes punishing difficulty aside, Souls-Like games frequently receive some of the highest reviews in the industry. This, combined with the world of Star Wars, should make for some truly epic gameplay.

But does it?

THE SHORT VERSION:

I'd give it a C+. I played it on Game Pass. I'm glad I didn't buy it.

THE LONG VERSION

I had really, REALLY high hopes for this game when it came out.  The early reviews were very favorable and people were even throwing the word 'metroidvania' around a little with regard to its world exploration. You know how I feel about those types of games! Now that I'm actually playing it though, I must say that there are a few things about this game that are really standing out to me in that category of, "Wow...everything else about this game is SO good and yet somehow THIS made it in?" I'm getting ahead of myself though...

STORY

The world of 'Fallen Order' takes place around 15 years after the events in 'Revenge Of The Sith'. Order 66 has happened, the Jedi Massacre has taken place, the Empire is in full control, things are not optimal. You play as Cal Kestus, a padawan whose master was struck down during the events of Order 66. You've been forced into hiding, repressing your link to the Force in an attempt to stay as far off of the Empire's radar as possible. Naturally, things go wrong with this and you end up on the run. As things tend to do in Star Wars, you somehow end up embroiled in events that force (Hah! Get it?!) you to rekindle your Jedi training and accept your destiny as A Good Guy(tm). 

Without going into detail, the story in 'Fallen Empire' is not original, nor is it particularly clever. It wastes almost all of its really great shocker moments early on, saving only one for the final moments of the game in the form of an admittedly well-executed bit of fan service. No, what makes the story good isn't the story itself but how it's told.  The cast of characters in 'Fallen Order' is pretty darn good. Cameron Monaghan embodies the scrappy 'make due and mend' main character of Cal, which is an excellent jumping off point for our next topic of discussion.

GAMEPLAY

'Fallen Order' plays as an Over The Shoulder combat and exploration game that is very deservedly compared to other Souls-like games. The similarities are far too many to deny its influences. This ends up being one of the game's biggest strengths and also one of its biggest flaws. Combat in 'Fallen Order' is much harder than most people will be used to.  Gone are the days of you being able to charge into a group of Stormtroopers, lightsaber blazing.  This is not 'The Force Unleashed' or 'Jedi Outcast'. You are not a space wizard with god-like powers who can ROFLStomp whatever he comes up against. This is not to say that Cal doesn't grow more powerful as the game progresses; he absolutely does. The game leverages a fairly solid XP system to earn ability points that you can spend on various powers and abilities. That said, use of these powers and abilities comes with a learning curve. They don't immediately make the game easier for you until you put in the work to learn how to use them effectively. On one hand, this is awesome. Those who spend the time learning how the game's various toys work together are rewarded with a really, REALLY deep, satisfying combat experience. You walk into a room and clear it, not because you're an untouchable space wizard but because you've trained hard and put the time in.

...On the other hand, I don't want to have to work that hard to wreck a room full of bad guys. I want to feel more powerful than a Stormtrooper by the time the game ends. I want scrub enemies to flee before me in terror...and that never, ever happens in 'Fallen Order'. Even at the end, you can wander into a room full of Scout Troopers and get killed FAST...and that's just not fun at all. I want to feel like I'm getting more powerful and -- and I may be an exception here? -- I don't want to have to work that hard at it because I'M PLAYING A VIDEO GAME. This problem is reflected in the game's difficulty settings as well. Setting the game to 'easy' pretty dramatically decreases the damage you receive from everything. The larger impact that it has is to the game's Parry mechanic which we now need to discuss a little bit.

Parrying is blocking at the opportune moment. It's not enough that you block damage, because you can only block so much damage before you run out of strength and drop your guard...and inevitably take stupid levels of damage. If you time your block well and only press that button -- press, not hold! -- right before an enemy attack lands, you'll execute a parry. Parries not only prevent damage but they also stagger the enemy, giving you the chance to unload on them. Parries performed on enemies with low health enable instant kills. This makes parrying really, REALLY important.  If you do not figure parrying out, you will die. You cannot complete the game without figuring parrying out at least somewhat...which is another problem. The game kind of... shames you for this.  You can put the game in its lowest difficulty, Story Mode...but the game's all about this mode being for people who are here for the story, not the combat. Parrying in this mode is extremely forgiving. Like...if you panic block, you'll probably get a parry every single time.  That's lovely but the jump from there to Jedi Knight, the 'Normal' mode is just...really big, especially in the beginning. There's no real learning curve, no opportunity to hone your skill. You just die a lot. Over, and over, and over.... 

This would be a problem on its own but the heartache with parrying doesn't stop there because enemies don't behave consistently when parried. Some enemies stagger when parried, leaving them wide open to your own assault. Other enemies just sort of...keep right on coming, even after you parry. Mind you, proper parrying means your blocks don't take away from the very limited stamina that you have TO block, so any parry is a good parry...it's just hard to know when it's safe to attack AFTER a parry.  This is something that you can only learn through trial and error.  Lots...and lots....and LOTS...of error. LOTS of error. SO much error.

Most people will eventually get the hang of combat, and if that were the only problem with the game, I'd still probably be a giant fan of it. Unfortunately, that's NOT the only problem with the game.  There are several other things that 'Fallen Order' could have -- no, SHOULD HAVE -- done better:

- The map in this game is almost perfect but what it lacks almost ruins the whole thing. 'Fallen Order' is a HUGE damn game and this is reflected in those maps. There are tons of places to explore and the map actually does a pretty damn fine job of showing you where you've been, where you CAN go, and where you CAN'T go. Where the map falls down lays in helping you plot a course from one point in each of its five MASSIVE WORLDS to another. You have to way-find your way by rotating a huge, 3D map containing multiple levels full of twisting, turning paths and it can get very, VERY hard to keep things straight. This is agony on its own but there's another problem...

- Remember when I said this game was huge?  What I meant was, it's ... well, I meant that it was huge. Seriously, it's a big game that has you running all over the place. On foot. Over long distances. Without any kind of fast travel system whatsoever. This is only moderately irritating in the beginning but as the game goes on, you grow more and more weary of re-treading your old ground over and over again. Worse, enemies respawn every time you rest and recuperate your healing items so you just fight the same bad guys over and over again.  Get into a nasty battle? You get to look forward to it again if you rest! "But Steve," you cry, "How else are you supposed to gain the experience you need to buy new skill points?" There are...so many ways to gain XP in this game. I'm not opposed to grinding to do it either, within reason. I just want that to be MY CHOICE.

- There are several sequences in the game that have you sliding down hills and using your two analogue sticks to control yourself. I use the word 'control' lightly. These are horrible sequences that happen FAR too often and result in loss of health if you screw them up. 

- The game is loaded with collectables hidden within chests. These collectables are, all of them, COMPLETELY. WORTHLESS. "But Steve," you cry, "they all contain customization items for your lightsaber, your ship, and your droid!" True. COSMETIC customizations. They do nothing else. What a huge fucking waste of time.

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is one of those games that people would probably enjoy a whole lot on the second play through, once they've put the time in beating their head against a wall and learning how to Parry and use the other Force powers...but that's a horrible, horrible selling point for a game. A few small tweaks could have made a decent game into a much better one. I can only hope that they learn from this and do better with 'Fallen Order 2'.

...Oh, and by the way, I DID start a New Game Plus once I'd beaten this. (I dropped the game down to Story Mode to beat the final boss because I was finally so disgusted with it.) I told myself that this game would be much more fun the second time through, which is when I ran into what ended up being the last straw:

You can't skip cutscenes.

Fallen, indeed.