Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order

Fallen Order is a very polished experience with great AAA production values, it's definitely at the top of the curve when it comes to budget and cutscenes. I quite like Respawn and thought Titanfall 2 was a great game, so it's for sure that this game was of some interest for me even tho I'm not so much into the Star Wars franchise.

It doesn't take long to realize that Fallen Order borrows a lot from other games. The combat and XP system is compared to Dark Souls a lot, and that's a pretty fair comparison as when you die you'll have to run after your XP like you would do in most Soulslike games. But the game is also a Metroidvania with a lot of backtracking to do, and new abilities gained will unlock new places to go in areas you've already visited. Plus all this jumping and climbing makes me feel like I'm playing Uncharted (or insert other Action Adventure game that does this), mixed with a lot of small puzzles to move forward in the game. Is Fallen Order entirely original? Absolutely not. But while all these elements can easily be traced back to other games, the game does combine all of those pretty well together into one fluid experience. Plus along with the AAA polish, it does make for a pretty entertaining experience.

There is some disappointing aspects to the game, and I think the biggest one is the loot. There's all these chests to find throughout the planets, and some of them are not that easy to get to. The game wants you to backtrack and go get them back, along with the sense echoes which are like flashbacks of other people which are somewhat related to the story. The problem? All the chests contain cosmetics 90% of the time! In the rare occasion you will find a chest that will give a piece (3 needed) to increase your health, the other times it's just lightsaber skins and whatnot. I'm not that much into customizing my character so it makes loot hunting pretty irrelevant in the game. The game isn't really an RPG despite having an XP bar, you get to unlock some skills but that's pretty much. There is no currency, no equibable gear and none of the things you'll find in an RPG.

Fallen Order is certainly not the best game ever, but it's also far from being a bad game and I've enjoyed my time with it. It's really a good display of late gen capabilities, I've played this on the Series X and it's got really good graphics from the world, the battles and the cutscenes. The game is also quite challenging even on the "normal" mode, some of these bosses will get you retrying them one after the other. In the end it's true that I would probably would rather play a great Souls game or a Metroidvania, but as far as Action Adventures I think this does a pretty good job but this isn't quite on the level of Titanfall 2 however. I'd say it's worth giving a shot, especially if you can get it cheap like on gamepass.