More Thoughts On Star Wars Jedi: Survivor

There will be minor spoilers later on in this post.

Man oh man oh man oh man oh man, this sequel ****ing rules. I'm not talking just a great game, I'm not talking just an improvement from the previous title, I'm talking great ****ing game. From my first impressions post, you already should know how the game kind of gets going and what sort of things you have available to you. And even at the time, I was like "yeah, this game is a great game." But, as I've spent more time with it, I have come to the conclusion that every single little part of this game whether it's the new skill tree, the way combat has been refined, the environments, hell just the graphics alone are breathtaking at times, and just everything in between has been reworked or improved to a perfected state.

I think the last time I felt this strongly about a sequel was when I played Middle Earth: Shadow of War and subsequently finished it 100%. That is another fine example of what it means to take what worked about its predecessor, and simply improving it to the max and adding things that don't hurt its integrity, but instead gradually improves it without even realizing that the improvement needed to be made. I said this before as well, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is a great game, but now that I have seen what improvements have been made for its sequel, it's hard to go back and play it now. Thankfully I did a full playthrough right before this one came out so I won't be needing to play it for a while if ever again.

I am doing my best in this post to keep away from spoiling too much after giving a good look into the start of the game in my previous posts because it is simply not the same as coming face to face to it in the game. There have been several upon several moments in my time with this game where I simply either had to stop because I was so engaged with it, or got really really into it to the point that I nearly fell off my chair. It's been a very long time since I had this feeling for a game to the point that I really do want to try and complete it in its entirety. The only games that I can think of in recent times that had a same or similar effect would have to be both Elden Ring and Hogwarts Legacy, both of which I have talked to death about. I love both dearly.

As far as Star Wars games are concerned, I think this could easily be the best Star Wars single play experience we've ever gotten. It succeeds even the likes of KOTOR and KOTOR II, and both of those games respectively are great games, and I have a deep love for them. But even I have to admit that Star Wars Jedi: Survivor hits too many good notes for me not to consider it better and even better than a lot of recent releases. That sounds crazy to say, and maybe I'm overselling it a little bit, but this is genuinely not just a great game, but a great sequel, and well worth your time if you just didn't get what you wanted out of Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order.

My Xbox app tells me that I'm sitting right around the 9 hour mark as far as gameplay time goes, but I don't think that's very indicative of where I am in the game because I spent a lot of time on the first real open planet that it's simply impossible to gauge where I am story wise. Let's just say I'm early on. But that leads into my next point of "holy **** there is a lot of stuff to do". And I want to add to that by saying that this isn't like Assassins Creed or games like that where the collecting aspect gets stale or boring. In fact, each time I have gone off the beaten path, the reward has always been worth it. Whether it's a really cool cosmetic for Cal and BD, or a health upgrade. I'd say going everywhere you can on the maps is a good idea. The cosmetics are really nice too and adds a nice individuality to your character instead of looking like everybody else's version of Cal. You can have a beard and long hair if you want, or just short crew cut and a beard. The choice is yours once you find the cosmetics that you like.

In those 9 hours of playtime, I have also taken a lot of screenshots. Simply because I want to be able to look back at this post once I finish the game and just be able to see visually what I saw and how the game progressed. Lemme tell ya though, these screenshots don't do the game justice. It is absolutely beautiful and really should be played on your own time. But these will just give you another good idea as to what the game looks like. Keep in mind I've had literally no performance or graphical issues aside from the occasional hiccup.

The images below contain minor spoilers















As you can see, I'm having an absolute blast with Star Wars Jedi: Survivor. Had you told me that this game would be quickly one of my favorites a few years ago when they were slightly teasing bringing back the single player Star Wars experience, I probably would've laughed. But from the get go, even with Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, I enjoyed the game despite it having some obvious flaws. I'm not too overly critical on games in general, but I can usually tell if a game wins or loses, and I would be surprised if this game in particular is not up for some kind of award. It would definitely take my choice for game of the year despite having said that about Hogwarts Legacy earlier this year. Hey, I didn't know this game would be this good. I haven't had this much fun with a game since Elden Ring, Hogwarts, and even Breath of the Wild to an extent. Which, speaking of which, I am all prepared for Tears of the Kingdom, I just need to wait for release day. Until then, I'm going to finish everything I can in Star Wars Jedi: Survivor before I truly let it go.

Play this damn game, it's ****ing great.

Originally Posted by RoxyRollah IMO I don't know jack-**** though so don't listen to me.

Originally Posted by Franco Pepe Kalle The problem is that most police officers in America are psychopaths.

Originally Posted by The Batlord You're a terrible dictionary.

Originally Posted by djchameleon Hey Ki did your oled tears of a kingdom switch arrive yet? I got mines in the mail on May 4th.

Originally Posted by Key Yeah! I got it a few days ago and I love it!

Originally Posted by RoxyRollah IMO I don't know jack-**** though so don't listen to me.

Originally Posted by Franco Pepe Kalle The problem is that most police officers in America are psychopaths.

Originally Posted by The Batlord You're a terrible dictionary.

Star Wars Jedi: Survivor - Full Review

A word of caution: There will be massive spoilers in terms of gameplay and story so if you are not interested in having the game spoiled for you, I do not recommend reading on. However if you are curious of my overall thoughts of the game now that I have officially completed it, read onwards

Well, I have done it. I have completed the main story of Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, and now it is time to finally give this game a full review and give my final thoughts on what I think of it as a whole. And what do I think? Well, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is a ****ing amazing game and should be played by anybody who is either a fan of Star Wars, a fan of the Star Wars Jedi series, or just a fan of gaming in general. There are many reasons that attributed to me basically giving this game an 11/10 as my final score. I'll be going into those reasons here in this review, but yes, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor gets an 11/10 score from me. Long story short, this game exceeded every expectation I had for it and threw in some more to make game even sweeter. We're talking amazing gameplay, platforming, landscapes, everything. If you look at the positive reviews for this game, you'll see that what I'm saying is not too farfetch'd. And as you've seen from the past few posts of Jedi Survivor that I put up during my time with it, you can already see the positive momentum of this game and how it was honestly really easy to want to keep playing it. When I looked at the stats of my gameplay, I came in at about 21 hours which is pretty standard based on what I've seen from other reviews. You'll see a lot of the end game screenshots at the end of this post, but let's get into the story for a little bit.

First things first, I did really enjoy the story and the overall feel of Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. I felt that Cal Kestis had a really good introduction as a character in a new game series, but I didn't come out of the game thinking that the potential was fully met for the game. Not saying Fallen Order is any sign of negative in any way. In fact, it's quite a fantastic game in its own merits, but now that I have a game like Jedi Survivor to compare it to, it's hard to really recommend playing it again now that I have experienced Jedi Survivor in its entirety. We basically find Cal being captured early on, but soon realize that he can't be help captive for long, and we meet a new character in the form of Bode, who throughout 95% of the game, is leading us on to believe that he is one of the good guys. Though as we find out at the end of the game, Bode turns out to also be a dark Jedi capable of giving Cal a good whooping, which in turn leads to Bode being the final boss in the game. And perhaps it's my experience with Elden Ring and fighting those bosses and learning how to take them down, I didn't have too terrible of a time with Bode as a final boss or any of the bosses in the game for that matter. What we'll get to next is why that is, and it all boils down to gameplay. But basically, as you fly throughout the galaxy, you bring back together your team from the previous game minus Cere whom we later find out is also aiming for the same overall goal as we are, to find a safe haven in Tanaloor. At the same time, we are also met with an unexpected though very welcome romance between Merrin and Cal, and simultaneously seeing Cal struggle with his feelings for her and also his feeling towards attachments in general. Jedi are not allowed to form bonds. However, in this case, we are in a time where there is no more Jedi Order so there's even more disconnect between his connection to typical Jedi ways and going with his own feelings. Fortunately, we do later find out that he does give into his feelings for Merrin and we see more of a romantic connection between the two. And honestly, it doesn't feel too forced or anything of the sort. It feels natural as they are two lone survivors with a similar past, and they wrote Merrin in such a way that she feels strong connections towards those she connects with, so the connection between herself and Cal just feels more natural given that they are both very emotional characters. All the other characters like Dagan Gera, and the other bosses were also very well written, and much like the show Andor, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor truly made me feel for the characters throughout the entire game. Even if they offered little assistance to you, they still shined and the entire cast should be proud of how they created such a story that elicits such emotion through a game. The cutscenes also just add to this even further as you'll see in the screenshots later, but god damn there were moments where I was just sitting back in my seat sort of in awe of what I was watching. At times, it honestly felt like I was watching something that was meant for a TV show or even theaters. Hell, I'd love to see Cal Kestis as a character being written into a movie. I'm sure it would be fantastic. All in all, we do succeed in making it to Tanaloor accompanied by Kata, Bode's daughter, Merrin, and Greez. Cere unfortunately gets struck down by Darth Vader later on in the game. I enjoyed the story and thought it was very excellently written and again, all the characters that were in the game were very well thought out and had good scripts to accompany them. An overall great story that lends itself to a really great sequel. Seeing as they are expecting this to be a trilogy, I'm excited to see what they can come up with with another sequel. No doubt it'll be amazing.

Enough about the story, let's talk about the gameplay. When I made previous posts about Jedi Survivor, I also talked endlessly about the gameplay, but the reason for that is simply because the gameplay is just so so so good. It took everything that made Jedi Fallen Order great and just boosted it by like 500% and consistently throughout the entire game, I felt satisfaction in how they managed the level designs with platforming sections and combat sections. The combat was simply the most satisfying it's ever been in a Star Wars game and it really makes me feel like I did when I figured out the combat for Marvel's Spider-Man for Playstation 4. From the boss fights down to just taking down swarms of stormtroopers, the combat mixed with the new stances and skill trees really allowed the gameplay to shine bright overall. There were very few moments where I couldn't figure out what to do or how to progress and that was simply because something was just out of frame or a command didn't show up properly. Otherwise, traversing the landscapes and levels and dungeons and figuring out the puzzles weren't terribly difficult, but I did have moments where I had to sit back and sort of look at the puzzle and figure it out, which I eventually did.

Overall everything just feels massively improved from the predecessor which is obviously what you want out of a sequel. But Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is not just a sequel, it's a great sequel. And aside from it being that, it is also a great game that really warrants at least one playthrough if you're curious of it. If you're not interested in playing Fallen Order beforehand, they do give you a pretty nice recap as to what transpired during the time in that game, but experiencing it first hand is always better, obviously. To each their own.

And while I know I'm writing this review having not had any performance issues whatsoever, it is still rather unfortunate that PC players are not able to get the same experience because honestly, it is one of the most beautiful games I've ever played on my Xbox and on top of that, just plays so smooth and really allows the game to feel alive throughout. Whether you're going through a small tunnel or riding on the backs of creatures to traverse the land before you, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor makes the game far larger than its predecessor, but the things that make the games interesting is not lost in this big space. In fact, I'm sure I'll be going back to the game at some point to finish exploring the maps and collecting everything. However, the new Zelda will be coming out in a couple days, so I won't have time. But, it is on my to do list, so Jedi Survivor is not entirely finished yet.

I mentioned before writing this review that I'm giving the game an 11/10, and I want to explain further as to why. I usually don't rate games that low unless it's an overall poor experience. My average for rating games sits right around the 7/10 and 8/10 range. So, basically it doesn't take much to impress me with video games. However in this case, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor was not only worth of a 10/10 but it exceeded all my expectations much in the same way that Middle Earth: Shadow of War did when it came out. It's just so good that it's hard to put simply how good I think this game is. And it's been pretty well received other than the obvious PC port issues.

I hope I made it pretty obvious in this review that I think Star Wars Jedi: Survivor overall is a great game, but if it wasn't entirely obvious at this point, I'm probably going to conclude this with the added thought that this game will be in my top 5 favorite gaming experiences of all time now that I have finished it. I haven't been this excited to write a review for a game since I wrote my review for Breath of the Wild, and with Tears of the Kingdom soon coming, you'll probably see another full review in the same respect as this one and the one for Breath of the Wild. I'm happy with my experience with Jedi Survivor but I definitely will miss playing it. I really enjoyed the story and the gameplay and everything just allowed for a really nice feeling overall that it's the kind of game that just doesn't come by too often. And when it does, you want to enjoy it as much as you can. I will miss it, but I enjoy it as much as I feel I wanted to. Highest recommendation.