4.5/5 ★ – OkamiGames's review of Star Wars Jedi: Survivor.

An absolutely fantastic experience that is unfortunately hampered by technical issues at launch. The game itself is a 9 but in its current state it's more like an 8. Several years have passed since the events of Jedi Fallen Order and Cal Kestis is now a grizzled mercenary and a full fledged Jedi Knight. With the promise of a new safe haven from the Empire, Cal and his team journey on a planet-hopping adventure to protect the other Force Sensitive children and build a new home for the Jedi and all those who have been persecuted by the Empire. The storytelling is much improved from Jedi Fallen Order. High production value cutscenes and thrilling action give way to tender characterization moments for multiple characters throughout the game. Cal has matured in the five years since Jedi Fallen Order and this is evidenced in the darker, more serious tone of the sequel. The writing is fantastic, and the story is overall a fuller, more cohesive experience than the first game. There is one major plot twist that I saw coming a mile away, but aside from that the main story is excellent. The biggest leap in Jedi Survivor is the world design and exploration. The planet of Koboh, where you'll spend most of your time, is a sprawling open environment filled with secrets. There are dozens of hours of content on Koboh alone and it's a stark difference from the mostly linear environments in the first game. Those are here too, but even they have a bit more freedom and open-endedness to them along with a wealth of secrets. These secrets usually amount to skill upgrades or new cosmetics from the greatly improved customization system but it doesn't matter. Figuring out how to solve these puzzles and exploring every nook and cranny is enough reward in itself. One highly touted new feature are the new combat stances introduced. Along with the three stances from the first game, we now have a crossguard stance and a blaster stance and you can freely swap between any two of them in combat. All of these stances are great, each with their own strengths and weaknesses. My personal setup was the Dual Saber combined with the Crossguard stancefor a balance between fast, agile attacks and a hard hitting, slower stance for those particularly beefy enemies. Combat overall is greatly improved but there is still some room for improvement in the animation and hit detection area. Once you get in the groove and nail down the right difficulty the combat is a blast. But it can also be frustratingly inconsistent. Although better than the first game, attacks feel like they don't quite have the weight to them that I would like. Enemy hitboxes can also be inconsistent which is perhaps why Respawn made the parry windows so generous. On the whole, it's a pretty good combat system but still not quite up to par with the Dark Souls titles it takes inspiration from. Still, it's easily the best lightsaber combat I've seen in a Star Wars game and Respawn deserves a lot of credit for that. The elephant in the room of course is the performance and technical issues that have been plaguing the game at launch. There's no nice way to put it - it's rough. No matter which way you slice it, it is unacceptable that EA released the game in this state; on all platforms but particularly on PC. However, after some patches on console and a few PC tweaks you can get it to a somewhat bearable level. Honestly though, if you can wait and play this a few months down the line, you'll be much better off and have a greatly improved experience. Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is an incredible game and one of the best Star Wars games ever made. For a AAA blockbuster, this is up there with the best of them. Stunning graphics, huge, open environments and excellent world design make exploration a joy. Combat is awesome, and the huge uptick in enemy variety makes tackling every location different, right down to the legendary bosses scattered throughout the world. The story is more rich and heartfelt than ever before and with a sequel all but confirmed, this is shaping up to be one of the best Star Wars trilogies ever. Final Score: 9/10* Playtime: 32 hours Platform: PC *Score is for the game itself. When factoring in launch performance issues it's an 8/10.