Star Wars Jedi: Survivor review

By Adam Knox

Over the last few years, the world’s cinema and TV screens have been so swamped by Star Wars media that Yoda probably wants to live in them (a nice joke about Dagobah to show that not only do I know about Star Wars, but that I’m also incredibly funny). The same isn’t really true for our video game screens, though. In the 90s especially, Star Wars games were all over the place, but with a few exceptions, EA’s Darth Vader style stranglehold on the Star Wars video game license has lead to an unusual decrease in visits to the galaxy far, far away for the last decade or so. There were a couple of Battlefront games, which had mixed receptions, and then up popped Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. Respawn, developers of Titanfall, delivered a very entertaining game that, while perhaps a little samey as an action/adventure game, was completely refreshing as a Star Wars game, despite a few technical issues at its launch. Now, four years later, they’re having another crack and, in the words of George Lucas: “It’s like poetry sort of. They rhyme.”

It’s best to have played Fallen Order before heading into Survivor, but for those new to the series, the game plays similarly to something like the Arkham series or the recent God of Wars, a satisfying mixture of interesting combat mechanics, a little bit of mild puzzling and exploration, and a cinematic disposition that’s easy to get sucked into. Swinging a lightsaber at an enemy droid or stormtrooper is a ball that a surprising number of developers have managed to drop before, and though Jedi: Survivor does occasionally make you feel like you’re attacking enemies with a stick rather than hot plasma or whatever a lightsaber is, it mostly captures the feeling you no doubt imagined when you were a kid holding the cardboard inner tube of a wrapping paper roll. Combat is a mix between crowd controlling weaker enemies, and then blocking, parrying, dodging and retaliating against the stronger ones. It encourages you to use your whole arsenal of various lightsaber types and force powers, and there’s a very enjoyable flow-state that the game is pushing you to reach as you learn its in-and-outs. If you enjoy the combat in something like Marvel’s Spider-Man, you’ll likely be into this. 

The other side of the gameplay is the exploration you’ll be getting up to across the pretty large environments the galaxy has on show. The levels are well designed enough, but most of it’s not particularly taxing stuff: you’ll see a green door and can come back later when you’ve got the green door power to see what’s behind the green door. That said, the platforming is a step above the push-up-to-safely-climb-for-a-bit exploration of an Uncharted or a Tomb Raider. You’ll have to actually use your Jedi jumping abilities from time to time, and though it can control a little awkwardly at times, it’s a fair bit of fun. Respawn loves a good wall-run, and I’ve got to say they’re not wrong. Things like skill points and cosmetics are nicely placed as rewards for exploring, and customising your look is a good time. There’s a pretty wide variety of options for clothes, lightsabers, droid fashion, and my personal favourite - the ability to give one of the galaxy’s most powerful Jedi the absolute worst facial hair you’ve ever seen.

Picking the story up a few years after Jedi: Fallen Order, we find protagonist Cal Kestis running with a new crew who all establish themselves as having worked together for a while by throwing a “hey, this is just like the job on Florkflark” or two at the player from time to time. A heist goes wrong, a galactic threat emerges, and a ragtag crew have to explore the galaxy and save the day. It’s popcorn blockbuster through and through, but it’s delivered well with the sort of charm that remains pretty unique to Star Wars. A fun mix of prequel and original trilogy, the game does a great job of bringing the best bits of Star Wars’ flavour and aesthetic into the game. It’s a fantasy space western, with weird looking animals and tons of rusty pipes everywhere. Sometimes it’s majestic, sometimes it’s goofy, but it’s always trying to be imaginative and fun, and that’s Star Wars at its best. The game also manages to strike a pretty satisfying balance between exploring its own ideas and giving the player enough “hey that’s from the movie Star Wars!” moments. It’s a lengthy game too, the main story will run you upwards of twenty-something hours, and there’s a healthy amount of collectibles and side quests to dig up.

There are only relatively minor criticisms to be levelled at the design of Jedi: Survivor. No one element of the game particularly excels over its peers and the game isn’t reinventing any wheels here. But this is a really well built, enjoyable wheel, and unless you’re completely exhausted by this kind of entry in the action/adventure genre, you’ll probably have a great time. Beyond the design though, there are the technical aspects of the game which are, at this point, pretty rough for a big budget release like this. Having played the PS5 version for this review, the performance mode is the worst I’ve seen yet on the console in terms of both frame rate and image quality. The high-resolution quality mode fares a lot better, but still exhibits an awful lot of distracting slowdown in its cutscenes and certain areas of the game itself. I only had one proper game-ending crash, but encountered quite a few bugs (things like characters getting stuck or floating strangely away) during my time with the game. They mostly seem to be symptoms that suggest the game has come out a little sooner than maybe it should have, and it’s a bit of a shame, as the visuals are otherwise pretty incredible. The art and design is fantastic, and the game’s environments in particular are huge and beautiful. We’ve not tested it, but by all accounts the PC port in particular is not in a great state, and it’s probably worth waiting for some patching to hopefully get done before going in. 

Despite these (hopefully impermanent) technical hiccups, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is a fun game. It’s perhaps a little cookie cutter as far as modern action/adventure games go, but they’re good cookies that are made to satisfy the same dopamine hungry, sugar-loving part of your brain that enjoys a good Star War. In that way, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is a big, fun, crowd-pleasing joy.

8/10

Available now on PS5, Xbox Series X/S and PC. Reviewed on PS5.