Players had to observe different technical conditions in the expected products – Cyberpunk 2077 and Atomic Heart, as two extremes of the modern gaming industry, will not let you lie. But I’ve never seen a game that could cause graphical artifacts on the console and then lead to the “screen of death.” Jedi: Survivor should not have been released to market in this condition.
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor was one of the most anticipated games for me, because I am a big fan of the universe. A review of the project was also being prepared, but after recent events this preview appeared – it contains a preliminary opinion from completing almost half of the storyline and several side quests, as well as a warning: do not buy Jedi: Survivor – it kills even consoles!
Technical failure
Everyone seems to know about the state of the PC version of the game. Even on serious machines, with the latest iterations of processors and an RTX 4090 on board, “Survivor” runs disgustingly. Drops of up to 30 frames per second even with AMD FSR 2.0 enabled, and tracing is not even a question – personal computers start screaming in fear when Jedi: Survivor is launched.
It’s already common to buy modern AAA products on consoles – PC versions often come out unfinished, such a wonderful industry we have. And in the first two days of binge gaming on the PlayStation 5, the situation was tolerable: sometimes textures could be loaded with a delay after a ten-hour session, once the game crashed with an error and rolled back progress for half an hour.
Not fatal, because I really liked Jedi: Survivor. In Quality mode, the picture is immersive, and the response of the DualSense makes you feel the use of the Force, lightsaber strikes and different planetary surfaces. But what I didn’t expect was attempts to destroy my console.
Having once again arrived at the main planet of the game Kobo, where most of the events of Jedi: Survivor take place, and set off to explore a new corner of the map, the game froze. I decided that the game had crashed and was ready to start restarting, but then the TV screen turned green and had streaks and artifacts across it. And now it became scary, because I was watching this for the first time. Then the console behind the TV made a suspicious grinding noise and turned off – restarting it did nothing and I was greeted by a black screen. I had to turn it off from the network, and then start it “cold” using the button on the PlayStation 5 itself. Fortunately, the console survived, but I no longer wanted to play Jedi: Survivor until the patches came out.
There are still no comments online from Electronic Arts and Respawn. At the time of writing, two cases are already known, besides mine: to a person from the PSN Profiles forum, the game killed the console – this is attributed to defective hardware; Our author’s friend George Petrovich’s console turned off while playing Jedi: Survivor and will no longer start. I was luckier – other games, even after the incident, work without problems. The fact that the game almost fried the console is mind-boggling – are the studio’s technical specialists so bad that they couldn’t even optimize the project for a single hardware?!
Opinion about Jedi: Survivor
If we move away from the technical state of the project, then everything about it is great – this is a proper sequel that cannot be called a “70 dollar add-on.”
If Fallen Order was the beginning of the story of Cal Castis and his team, then Survivor is the culmination. The main character has matured and changed, just like his friends. The futile fight against the Empire leads them to the idea that it is time to find a place where evil cannot reach them. The protagonists find themselves drawn into a cycle of events that began back in the era of the Rise of the Republic – several hundred years before the first episode of Star Wars.
And even though I only saw half of the storyline, I am pleased with this approach on the part of Respawn – they are working with a new, unknown era and making an interesting story. And since the events take place on the outskirts of the Unknown Regions, the locations in Jedi: Survivor do not seem hackneyed. Yes, there is Coruscant and Jedha, but they are only part of the game space.
As for the gameplay, Western journalists did not lie in early reviews – the game is similar to Uncharted 4 and God of War of 2018 than Sekiro: Shadows Dies Twice. Jedi: Survivor has become a full-fledged metroidvania, in which you want to explore every corner out of banal interest: “What secret did the developers hide here?” The worlds are drawn in such detail that in photo mode I spent 10-15 minutes at a time, setting up beautiful compositions and taking screenshots.
The combat system has undergone a number of changes. The slow dueling movements remained in the first part – now it is a full-fledged action game with dozens of combinations, which allows you to choose your own fighting style. And what kind of animations of blows are there… I am writing these lines and want to see Kastis somersaulting with a double-bladed sword over enemies in the style of Darth Maul again! It was not possible to fully evaluate the new stands, but I definitely fell in love with the combination of a lightsaber plus a blaster – this is the ultimate, restraining force that allows you not only to respond in close combat, but also to keep other enemies at a distance.
The use of the Force has also changed. Slow Time, Cal Castis’ innate ability, has now become a super move that freezes all opponents in combat. But the developers added submission to the will of animals and opponents, and also diversified the telekinetic abilities of the Force: grabbing several opponents at once, throwing objects, pulling and pushing enemies with the Force to one point, using Jedi wisdom while performing a combo with a lightsaber.
The parkour and platforming sections remain at the same level – they do not cause irritation, and this is important in metroidvanias. Yes, the grappling hook and crawling on ceilings add a little variety, but such challenges test the player’s speed and reaction more.
Preliminary results
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor should not have been released in such a technical state – this was the first time we had to face such significant problems! Do not under any circumstances buy the game on PC or consoles – Respawn and Electronic Arts should lose profits for treating players like this.
As a longtime fan of the franchise, I want to play Jedi: Survivor – every game element is made with high quality, every mechanic and innovation hits the heart. Even compared to other 3D Metroidvanias, The Revenant, if not superior to them, takes pride of place in this niche. This makes it all the more disappointing that the publisher and crooked developers ruined a wonderful product – it’s unlikely that anything cooler than Star Wars Jedi: Survivor will appear in the Star Wars universe this year.