Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order

This was on offer again on PS Store, so I bought it the other day. I’ve only played like the first chapter (got into the spaceship) but I’m quite disappointed.

I’m finding the controls and their feeling not up to the standards of previous Respawn games:

* character movement is abrupt, like if the default stick sensitivity is off and there’s lack of “transition” animation

* character doesn’t grab ledges

* when climbing you have to press a button to grab the surface - which is very odd IMO, since the character does stay attached to the surface for a second or two, so I don’te see why adding this complexity – is not like it’s an additional mechanic for I dunno, slippery surfaces, and is not like you have to hold the button to climb, you just press to grab… having the extra input makes sense in Uncharted once the climbing “needle” is added later in the game

* loading times are awful long

* default control settings seem awkward

i dunno if I am at fault for comparing this to Batman Arkham, but I thought Jedi was aiming to adapt that sort of experience to Star Wars, but those older games, also powered by (older!) Unreal tech perform better in pretty much all those points I listed.

Based on these expectations, I chose to play at difficulty 3 (of 4 levels available) and it seems pretty harsh, I might just lower it to see if I get more confident with the controls. Also there’s lots of accessibility settings, meaning it’s very customisable for a console game, I might just try changing the scheme or see if I find better settings. Still tho, I would expect a better default experience.

Quote from blackdog

On 7/5/2021 at 9:20 PM, blackdog said: when climbing you have to press a button to grab the surface

There is an option to auto grab in the gameplay settings.

I will say if your not interested in it by the time you unlock the other 2 planets your probably not going to be very interested in anything else. But if you do keep going the enemies and the planets themselves do become more varied and interesting to fight/explore and it can become a fun gameplay loop if you can get used to how it handles.

Quote from fewseb

1 hour ago, fewseb said: There is an option to auto grab in the gameplay settings.

I will say if your not interested in it by the time you unlock the other 2 planets your probably not going to be very interested in anything else. But if you do keep going the enemies and the planets themselves do become more varied and interesting to fight/explore and it can become a fun gameplay loop if you can get used to how it handles.

Yeah I explored the settings panel as it was one of the games brought up for good accessibility [in the GMTK roundup].

I’m glad they have the settings, but I think my critique stands in terms of game design: what is the point of making you press the button at all? I could understand if you had to hold it once you are climbing (like Assassin’s Creed - at least the first one) or time your press to grab of the ledge/surface, or if was a mechanic introduced later for particular surfaces (like in Uncharted 4). The choice doesn’t seem to pose any benefit, be it increased interaction to feel more immersed, or ramp up the skill. It’s just something you have to remember to do… so yeah, bless accessibility*, I was thinking I will do something I would never do and disable.

I hope I can get into it, maybe expectations are my downfall here… I was expecting something very like Batman Arkham in terms of combat (timed counters etc). Might just lower the difficulty while I learn the layout, or change buttons around.

It’s really annoying though how long it takes to reload once you die, it gives me the bad vibe of the cutscenes in Max Payne 3: something completely extraneous to actual gameplay that can break the experience to the point you just don’t want to (re)play it.

*was it added just so they could stuff the accessibility with an extra item and show virtuosity?