This IS the Star Wars Game You've Been Looking For - A Deep-Dive on Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order
Post by Steve Farrelly @ 10:12pm 29/07/19 | Comments
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is shaping up to be a franchise in waiting and exactly the sort of Force experience we've been craving for a number of years...
Sometimes being an industry verteran co-editing the longest-running independent gaming website in Australia has its perks. For example, I/we were nominated as the first Aussie representatives for the Game Critics Awards across both E3 and the end-of-year Game of the Year awards Geoff Keighly put together as an attempt to craft the “Oscar Awards” of the games industry. A massive honour for us as a whole, and one that supplanted so much hard work and consistency over a number of years. In fact, this year we had the largest number of representative AusGamers staff judging games for the Best of E3 Awards.
Three.
But that’s still awesome. It gave us the broadest view of available games for judging, and as an indie, it helped us maintain both an authoritative and analytical voice for what so many companies, publishers and developers hold so dear. The sheer love from the likes of heavyweights such as CD Projekt RED, Infinity Ward, Techland and more, through to smaller mobs such as Oddworld Inhabitants (and Lorne Lanning in particular) is incredibly reinforcing when you’re always up against overly-coddled ‘Content Creators’ and the IGNs and Gamespots of the world.
Which is why our VIP pass into a hands-on judging session for Respawn’s upcoming Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order was not taken lightly. And to be clear, any such invitation is not a guarantee for an ‘upvote’ for the game from us -- we take this judging caper, and all games coverage seriously. But thankfully what we did play was incredibly in-depth; developer by our side and challenging enough, what we played helped paint a picture for what’s in store for Star Wars fans come November. And you should be charged for something special.
First of all, the game’s combat is excellent. As a Batman: Arkham series expert (as I always remind people), Jedi: Fallen Order is within the same league. In fact, ahead of the hands-on proper, the waiting lobby had an ‘arena’, of sorts, setup to get each player up to speed with how combat works; presented in waves not too dissimilar to horde modes now permeating most action games. The final wave, which came at 25 IIRC, you face an AT-ST (aka ‘Chicken Walker’) along with each enemy type thrown at you up until now. Using your Force powers alongside basic combat aggression, defense and evasion now becomes apparent, and the mode is not lenient. I took out every enemy type and had just the Chicken Walker left. And am not too proud to admit I died a few times. And with just under 5% health left on the machine and its crew, I was tapped on the shoulder to go into my session, but not before I was told I was one of only a few people to have made it that far all E3 -- and this was the last day of the show.
*Brushes shoulder all casual like*
One of the things that struck me early was the game’s dedication to gameplay dispersal; puzzles here, shooting there -- light saber fights galore. In coalescence with the above, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is a game that wants to give you the experience you deserve. Gamers will be happy, because systems stack and the eventual sandbox presents opportunity as much, but largely what I got out of the experience was that this is a Star Wars journey. And these gaming ‘experiences’, or ‘journeys’, are few and far between -- TIE Fighter, KOTOR, Rebel Alliance, Rogue Squadron... et al -- they’re countable in less than double digits. Fallen Order might be the game to take the ‘journey’ into the doubles.
How this will happen depends on your stance on all things Star Wars. You’ll pilot vehicles. You’ll use the Force and learn how to harness it. You have a personal Droid far more agile than R2-D2. A lightsaber. A double-jump (?). The lot. It’s cinematic without being overbearing in that it tells a Star Wars story, but still gives agency and knows how to play to its strengths. A lot of this is going to stem from the combat stacking -- and your Force powers -- as mentioned earlier, but the other side comes from both exploration and environmental puzzle-solving. Our demo was relatively structured early, as you can see in the video embedded below, but the point here is that this thing truly opens up. There’s almost a Metroid Prime feeling about it, and that’s about as high praise as I can personally offer.
It’s also just really hard. Not soul-destroying like the Souls games, but in a way that elevates it to what it’s already representing; you’re a fucking Jedi. A Goddamned intergalactic superhero, for what it’s worth… act accordingly. And Respawn has nailed this side of the game. Much was said about the main character, but given his digital avatar is him, and he’s actually very good, I’m of the mind it’s all very moot and petty. Instead, what he shares with the series’ history across all media is that he represents the youth in all of us; lost and found all at once. Yeah that sounds trite but the movies, books, comics and games have always centred around rebellion. I mean, almost always you’re a Rebel in the Rebel Alliance -- I don’t know how much more on-the-nose it can get. But it’s here and it’s represented in positive spades in Fallen Order.
It’s also just incredibly gorgeous. Again, watch the embedded video, and in 4K if you can, but I stand by YouTube or any form of online video being less representative of a product in the flesh, so to speak, and want to let you know this just oozed Star Wars. And in the best way possible. Audio and art-direction were in the modern representation spectrum (read: original trilogy). Moreover, each moving and sounding part just comes together to deliver on the promise of a game set A long Time Ago, in a Galaxy Far, Far Away.
And where I’d be comfortable finishing this up is a little while ago, in a console (gaming) generation not so far gone, is that right now, Fallen Order feels like a proper spiritual successor to the first The Force Unleashed. And this takes nothing away from Respawn’s creation here; Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is forging its own path, but not since the The Force Unleashed have we had a third-person action-adventure Star Wars game that so absolutely pulled us into this evergreen universe.
The game also paces itself similarly while also giving us a sense of power not too many other Star Wars titles have. And after the mess that was The Force Unleashed II, as well as the upsets that befell a few cancellations of late, and maybe some questionable models in existing Star Wars titles, Fallen Order presents as a fresh, new droid we’ve all been looking for.
Three.
But that’s still awesome. It gave us the broadest view of available games for judging, and as an indie, it helped us maintain both an authoritative and analytical voice for what so many companies, publishers and developers hold so dear. The sheer love from the likes of heavyweights such as CD Projekt RED, Infinity Ward, Techland and more, through to smaller mobs such as Oddworld Inhabitants (and Lorne Lanning in particular) is incredibly reinforcing when you’re always up against overly-coddled ‘Content Creators’ and the IGNs and Gamespots of the world.
Which is why our VIP pass into a hands-on judging session for Respawn’s upcoming Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order was not taken lightly. And to be clear, any such invitation is not a guarantee for an ‘upvote’ for the game from us -- we take this judging caper, and all games coverage seriously. But thankfully what we did play was incredibly in-depth; developer by our side and challenging enough, what we played helped paint a picture for what’s in store for Star Wars fans come November. And you should be charged for something special.
"I took out every enemy type and had just the Chicken Walker left. And am not too proud to admit I died a few times..."
First of all, the game’s combat is excellent. As a Batman: Arkham series expert (as I always remind people), Jedi: Fallen Order is within the same league. In fact, ahead of the hands-on proper, the waiting lobby had an ‘arena’, of sorts, setup to get each player up to speed with how combat works; presented in waves not too dissimilar to horde modes now permeating most action games. The final wave, which came at 25 IIRC, you face an AT-ST (aka ‘Chicken Walker’) along with each enemy type thrown at you up until now. Using your Force powers alongside basic combat aggression, defense and evasion now becomes apparent, and the mode is not lenient. I took out every enemy type and had just the Chicken Walker left. And am not too proud to admit I died a few times. And with just under 5% health left on the machine and its crew, I was tapped on the shoulder to go into my session, but not before I was told I was one of only a few people to have made it that far all E3 -- and this was the last day of the show.
*Brushes shoulder all casual like*
One of the things that struck me early was the game’s dedication to gameplay dispersal; puzzles here, shooting there -- light saber fights galore. In coalescence with the above, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is a game that wants to give you the experience you deserve. Gamers will be happy, because systems stack and the eventual sandbox presents opportunity as much, but largely what I got out of the experience was that this is a Star Wars journey. And these gaming ‘experiences’, or ‘journeys’, are few and far between -- TIE Fighter, KOTOR, Rebel Alliance, Rogue Squadron... et al -- they’re countable in less than double digits. Fallen Order might be the game to take the ‘journey’ into the doubles.
"It’s cinematic without being overbearing in that it tells a Star Wars story, but still gives agency..."
How this will happen depends on your stance on all things Star Wars. You’ll pilot vehicles. You’ll use the Force and learn how to harness it. You have a personal Droid far more agile than R2-D2. A lightsaber. A double-jump (?). The lot. It’s cinematic without being overbearing in that it tells a Star Wars story, but still gives agency and knows how to play to its strengths. A lot of this is going to stem from the combat stacking -- and your Force powers -- as mentioned earlier, but the other side comes from both exploration and environmental puzzle-solving. Our demo was relatively structured early, as you can see in the video embedded below, but the point here is that this thing truly opens up. There’s almost a Metroid Prime feeling about it, and that’s about as high praise as I can personally offer.
It’s also just really hard. Not soul-destroying like the Souls games, but in a way that elevates it to what it’s already representing; you’re a fucking Jedi. A Goddamned intergalactic superhero, for what it’s worth… act accordingly. And Respawn has nailed this side of the game. Much was said about the main character, but given his digital avatar is him, and he’s actually very good, I’m of the mind it’s all very moot and petty. Instead, what he shares with the series’ history across all media is that he represents the youth in all of us; lost and found all at once. Yeah that sounds trite but the movies, books, comics and games have always centred around rebellion. I mean, almost always you’re a Rebel in the Rebel Alliance -- I don’t know how much more on-the-nose it can get. But it’s here and it’s represented in positive spades in Fallen Order.
"Audio and art-direction were in the modern representation spectrum (read: original trilogy)..."
It’s also just incredibly gorgeous. Again, watch the embedded video, and in 4K if you can, but I stand by YouTube or any form of online video being less representative of a product in the flesh, so to speak, and want to let you know this just oozed Star Wars. And in the best way possible. Audio and art-direction were in the modern representation spectrum (read: original trilogy). Moreover, each moving and sounding part just comes together to deliver on the promise of a game set A long Time Ago, in a Galaxy Far, Far Away.
And where I’d be comfortable finishing this up is a little while ago, in a console (gaming) generation not so far gone, is that right now, Fallen Order feels like a proper spiritual successor to the first The Force Unleashed. And this takes nothing away from Respawn’s creation here; Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is forging its own path, but not since the The Force Unleashed have we had a third-person action-adventure Star Wars game that so absolutely pulled us into this evergreen universe.
The game also paces itself similarly while also giving us a sense of power not too many other Star Wars titles have. And after the mess that was The Force Unleashed II, as well as the upsets that befell a few cancellations of late, and maybe some questionable models in existing Star Wars titles, Fallen Order presents as a fresh, new droid we’ve all been looking for.
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