Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is here. Hard to believe there’s even a new, fully single-player Star Wars game on the market but it’s here and it’s good. EA finally put that license to good use for more than just shamelessly digging into fans’ pockets for every cent they have. It’s a step in the right direction for Star Wars in video games.
Is it perfect? No, but just about any game has its fair share of problems. When that euphoric rush of playing a new game starts to inevitably run out, you notice things about it that can be annoying as you keep playing. And you just can’t help but point it out or poke fun at it. Obviously, spoilers ahead.
10 10. How Fast Cere Connects Back Up To The Force
Cere acts as Cal’s mentor through the game. After having a rough run-in with the dark side of the force after seeing her former padawan go Inquisitor on her, Cere cuts herself off from the Force. Cal’s connection to the Force is also damaged and he basically spends the entirety of the game fixing it.
What’s annoying about this is just how fast Cere seems to connect back up to the Force and have little to no problem pulling off saber throws, Force pushes and even tapping into the dark side again. Meanwhile, it takes you three Zeffo tombs, a couple near-death experiences and a fight with a phantom version of your deceased master to fully heal your connection. Sure, she’s a full-fledged Jedi and Cal’s still just a padawan up until that point, but come on, wouldn’t she be more than just a little rusty?
9 9. Flash Grenades
Flash grenades are used by a sparse number of unique enemies in the game, but they become more apparently annoying in the final fight against Trilla, the second sister. These things seem to be able to blind you even when you’re standing yards away from it when it goes off. How much range do these things have? If they’re that potent, why don’t they blind your enemy as well? They really do give off the impression that they fill the entire room you’re fighting in with a bright light for about a second. At least they aren’t as annoying as the freakin’ flashbangs were in Gears 5 when it launched, but still pretty annoying.
8 8. Second Sister Fights Don’t Feel Earned
Boss fights serve as a test of the player’s abilities. Fallen Order’s main baddie is the second sister. Throughout the game, you fight the second sister multiple times. Each time, she adds a couple more moves to her arsenal. What’s annoying about each fight is that the game doesn’t let the player earn a win against her in them until the last one. Every fight ends prematurely before you even drain her entire life bar to zero because story. A minute detail, sure, but irritating for those that like to complete the challenge within the rules established by the game.
In Bayonetta, the player fights Jeanne four times as well. Each time she gets a little tougher. But the player still has to actively win each of those fights by draining her health to zero. The way Fallen Order executes this feels a bit hand-hold-ish for the sake of being ‘cinematic’.
7 7. Ordo Eris Enemy Gauntlet Is A Poor Man’s Version Of The Gorog Fight From The Force Unleashed 2
Say what you want about The Force Unleashed 2. It’s too short, it’s got a bad story, the level design is way too repetitive, Starkiller is OP, etc. But my goodness if that Gorog fight wasn’t awesome.
Sure, it’s a little repetitive and the endless falling part to finish it off is a little ridiculous, but it’s an absolutely over-the-top and fun boss fight. Compared to Fallen Order where Cal is in a similar situation—stuck in a fight coliseum—he faces a few enemy mobs before bopping a dinky little bounty hunter mini-boss. Lame.
6 6. Bounty Hunter Fights
Speaking of bounty hunters, after that enemy gauntlet, more mini-bosses of three different bounty hunter varieties start showing up across the game; regular bounty hunters, commandos and big boy bounty droids. Some show up alone, others in pairs.
It’s a shame that they start to get old kind of fast. Even though they’re all uniquely named, none of them fight any differently from each other to switch things up. Fighting a droid and a commando at the same time is interesting the first time, but the next three times after, you just want to exhale an exhausted sigh. When you see another bounty hunter, standing aimlessly in your way, you just go ‘I guess we’re doing this again,’.
5 5. 100% Exploring The Planet Maps
If you’re the completionist type, exploring some planets 100% can have you racking your brain against your head. Trying to figure out where that last secret or nook in a particular area is will drive you mad. It can be fine when you’re easily able to tell what you can and can’t explore with the abilities you have at that point. But once you have every ability towards the end of the game, your OCD will kick in and you won’t want to leave the planet, let alone the one specific area on it keeping that 95% from tuning into 100%.
4 4. How Whiny Greez Is
Look at this game’s cover art. Now, look at the theatrical poster of Return of the Jedi. Notice anything? The way Greez is depicted looks a lot like how Han is. They both pilot their own ships, receiving them under shady circumstances. They’re both reluctant to be a part of this grandiose journey but lighten up as it progresses.
Greez had all the makings of a wimpy-character-turned-hardened-adventurer arc in this game, but he never even touches a blaster throughout the entirety of it! Why he’s holding one on the cover art of this game, we might never know but, boy, is it irritating. And to top it off, he continues to whine to the very end. Maybe not as much as in the beginning, but still pretty whiny, especially after Merrin joins the crew. It is a little funny at least.
3 3. Enemy Placement
The first couple times a Scazz pops out of the ground at you for some cheap damage is an amusing ‘haha, you got me game,’ moment. Or when an enemy is deliberately placed behind a corner just to sneak attack the player or a Wyyyshock jumps you after walking into its web, it’s amusing the first two times. But during the late-game, it’s just down-right annoying. It feels like a cheap way for the game to get cheap chip-damage on the player just because they forgot about the jump-attack that happens at this specific part of each map EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.
2 2. Cere’s Switch On The Split Saber
After breaking his lightsaber in a fight against his phantom master, Cal receives Cere’s lightsaber as a means to fix up his own. With some ingenuity, Cal fuses Cere’s lightsaber to his own with the novelty of being able to split them apart at will.
It’s a neat idea, but there’s just one problem: the butt-ugly leftover switch from Cere’s saber ruins the entire aesthetic of your fancy, new sword. You can change both emitters on either end separate from each other now, but still have to deal with the out-of-place-looking switch on Cere’s end.
1 1. The Ending
For what the game is trying to accomplish, its story is alright. To be fair, 2017’s Battlefront 2 had a better idea but much worse execution of that idea. This story has okay ideas and acceptable execution of those ideas.
That ending though. Sure, it was foreshadowed heavily to the player that using the Holocron would result in a lot of horrible things happening, but after going through all of the trouble just to get your hands on this plot device, for Cal to just slice it right in half so casually is just a big ‘WHAT?!’ to the player. It’s not nearly on the level of Mortal Kombat 11’s ending, absolutely not. But, couldn’t we have gone against the will of the Force, even just a little bit, please? Maybe just for the sake of a better sequel set-up?