Back in 2019, one of the biggest gaming surprises of the year was Jedi: Fallen Order. The third-person action game from first-person shooter studio Respawn Entertainment was a glorious hybrid of the brutal combat of Dark Souls with the scale of an Uncharted game. Fallen Order did all of this while telling a fascinating story about loss and redemption set in the new Disney canon and in the process became one of the best projects released since their acquisition of Star Wars. Now nearly four years later, Respawn is back with Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, continuing the story of the redeemed Jedi Cal Kestis and his merry band of space travelers while promising to be a bigger vision than its predecessor.

That’s the most obvious quality I noticed when jumping into the game. There’s just MORE of everything here. Almost every single aspect of Fallen Order has been expanded on in some way or form. That’s expected with a sequel, of course, but it’s almost staggering to think of where to even begin when talking about Jedi: Survivor.

Picking up five years after the events of the previous game, Jedi: Survivor continues the adventures of Cal Kestis. After protecting every force-sensitive child in the galaxy by destroying the holocron that contained all their data, he wanders aimlessly with one goal in mind: take the fight to the Galactic Empire. In an opening set on a famous Star Wars planet, you’re introduced to the game’s controls and mechanics. This tutorial is by far the most lackluster part of the game. See, Jedi: Survivor at its core borrows a lot of design inspiration from the Dark Souls series, with levels that twist in on themselves and open new pathways and shortcuts as you fight to get to the next save point in the form of a Jedi meditation point. This linear opening sequence doesn’t do the game justice and is honestly inconsequential in numerous ways.

The game expands wildly when you reach Koboh, one of the game’s main hubs. Here, Jedi: Survivor shows its biggest upgrade in the form of a huge map to explore featuring numerous blocked paths, alternate routes, trading posts and hidden areas to discover. While levels in Fallen Order felt like taking a carefully crafted tour through Star Wars’ most famous planets, Jedi: Survivor makes them feel like real lived-in places with rich history. They’re absolutely gorgeous vistas that Respawn should be commended for as they accurately portray this galaxy far far away. 

These areas open up as Cal upgrades his traversal abilities. While he starts with most of the abilities he has at the end of Fallen Order, this game adds even more to his arsenal that makes platforming and exploration an absolute joy. Cal’s traversal is so fun to use it reminds me of the trademark traversal in Titanfall that made Respawn famous. Linking together wall runs, double jumping, swinging and other unlockable abilities is great fun and never feels like a chore; especially when used in expansive environments to cover ground easier. There’s also the addition of rideable mounts that clear even more ground with great speed and allow you to take in the scenery. Honestly, my favorite new element of Jedi: Survivor are these expanded areas. They allowed me to fully explore the Star Wars universe in ways I could only imagine before. There are also Zelda-inspired dungeon areas where Cal has to use the tools in his arsenal to solve environmental puzzles and combat challenges where he’s forced to encounter brutally difficult enemies with certain parameters activated. The rewards make these areas worth exploring and I never felt as if I wasted my time with them; but good lord a few of them will make you work for your reward.

Combat in the game is also widely improved across the board. In Fallen Order, Cal was equipped with his lightsaber that included a double bladed opening for crowd control. Players were encouraged to use parries and proper tactics and force powers (such as push, pull, and freeze time) to deal with situations and all of it felt very intentional if not a tad restrictive as it neared its ending hours. This time around Cal has multiple combat stances that he’s able to equip at any meditation point. Not a fan of the double-bladed saber? Swap that out for dual wielding blades Starkiller-styler. Want to focus on heavy defense? The crossguard stance mimics a greatsword from the Souls games and has a devastating attack. These new stances combined with Cal’s force powers keep combat feeling fresh throughout the entirety of the playthrough and allow for a greater deal of player freedom in how they choose to tackle combat situations. Worth noting that Cal’s time-stop force power no longer targets a single enemy but has a separate meter all its own that affects every enemy in an area. This power saved me in numerous encounters and boss fights when I was feeling overwhelmed; but being tied to a meter, it never felt like an instant win button.

Cal is also able to be customized using various unlockable cosmetics found in chests or at trading posts. Everything from his outfit, facial hair, lightsaber and blaster players are fully free to customize. This helped me feel far more invested as a player as I felt like he was my version of him continuing from the previous installment. It’s just cosmetics and don’t provide any gameplay improvements, but an option like this is always welcome.

The story is told expertly well in Jedi: Survivor. Fallen Order was a great surprise with its heavy emphasis on telling a well-crafted single player story and Jedi: Survivor continues this tradition. I was happy to reunite with characters such as Greez, Cere and Merrin. Overall though, the story is far weaker than it was in the previous installment. Fallen Order’s tight focus allowed me to get invested in its constantly moving story and in Jedi: Survivor, I’m afraid it’s a little too big for its britches in this department. It’s not bad, just weaker, but is still able to deliver on some absolutely jaw dropping moments I won’t spoil here. The new characters (especially the villains) are far less interesting than those that came before and I found the story to lack a sense of urgency as a result of the more open-ended gameplay. In a franchise that has given us wonderful middle chapters such as The Empire Strikes Back and The Last Jedi, Jedi: Survivor falls short on this front.

Performance on the game is acceptable. I played most of the time in the game’s performance mode that runs at 1440p/60 frames per second on the PS5. I ran into some alarming issues such as screen tearing and massive performance drops but I can confidently say most of these issues have been ironed out in the Day 0 patch. Still though, expect something around 50 frames per second in the game’s larger hub areas. The game also has welcome features such as an FOV adjuster and the ability to turn off motion blur and other effects. One thing I’m very much not a fan of is that the in-game cutscenes are locked in a 4K/30fps mode. It’s absolutely jarring to go from 60fps gameplay to a 30fps cutscene and back. I’m not sure if it’s just me but this causes a huge strain on my eyes, and I hope it’s something Respawn can patch in the future.

Overall Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is a LOT of game for better and worse. Nearly every single aspect of the gameplay has been finely tuned and improved across the board, but the story takes a massive hit because of it. Still, I enjoyed the absolute hell out of Jedi: Survivor and highly recommend it to not only Star Wars fans but action-game fans who are looking for a great single player experience. With talks of a planned third installment of this saga, we’re in for one hell of a great Star Wars trilogy, particularly if Respawn are able to nail the story next time.

As it stands today? Jedi: Survivor is an absolute must play.

Review code provided by the publisher.