Since the very first Star Wars movie in 1977, fans have desperately wanted to wield their very own lightsaber. As Star Wars made the leap to video games in 1989, many fans believed that their dreams would soon be within their grasp. Unfortunately, the video game medium wasn't quite there yet, and technological limitations meant that true lightsaber combat, at least how it appeared in the movies, was still a ways off. Skip forward thirty years, and Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order has finally proved that lightsaber combat can feel both flashy and responsive.
Using FromSoftware's Souls series as a clear inspiration, Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order made each swing of the lightsaber feel suitably weighty and deliberate, and the game's dodge and parry mechanics helped to make Jedi Fallen Order's combat some of the best in any Star Wars game. That being said, there's always room for improvement, and with a sequel to Jedi Fallen Order confirmed to be on the way, Respawn Entertainment should go out of its way to ensure that the game's lightsaber combat sets the bar for future Star Wars titles.
The Long Legacy of Lightsaber Combat
Lightsaber combat has evolved pretty dramatically over the last few decades. Starting with titles like 1991's Star Wars on the NES, and the Super Star Wars series on SNES, lightsaber combat boiled down to essentially a single button press, which would make the player-character flail their lightsaber frantically in an arc in front of them. While it was certainly a novelty to be able to use a lightsaber in a game back then, and the visuals tended to be quite vibrant, it didn't really feel like an all-powerful Jedi weapon.
As Star Wars games headed into the realm of 3D, lightsaber combat started to feel a little more like its on-screen counterpart. Star Wars Dark Forces 2: Jedi Knight was one of the first Star Wars titles that gave players their own lightsaber and set of Force powers. Though swinging the lightsaber still felt a little weightless, automatically deflecting blaster bolts and slicing off Stormtroopers' limbs went a long way in capturing how fans thought a lightsaber would feel to wield.
The sequels to Jedi Knight continued to innovate on lightsaber combat, with Jedi Outcast introducing lightsaber stances that affected the speed and strength of a swing, and Jedi Academy introducing dual-wield and double-bladed lightsabers. These sequels really set the bar for lightsaber combat, with responsive controls and animations as well as a variety of possible attacks that made the player feel like a true Force-user.
Jedi Outcast and Jedi Academy raised the bar so high, in fact, that it would take 16 years before Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order would knock it off its pedestal (and to some fans, it still hasn't). By putting an emphasis on purposeful attacks, blocks, and parries, Jedi Fallen Order delivers some of the most grounded lightsaber combat across the entire Star Wars franchise. Further, by giving players the ability to switch between single-bladed and double-bladed attacks on the fly, Jedi Fallen Order offers the greatest range of attacks in any Star Wars melee-focused game.
How Jedi Fallen Order 2 Could Set The Bar For Lightsaber Combat
While many fans do consider Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order to have set the bar for lightsaber combat, a portion of fans still cite Jedi Outcast and Academy as the better-feeling experiences. Regardless of personal preference, a sequel to Jedi Fallen Order should definitively set the bar for future Star Wars titles.
One of the ways in which a sequel could improve upon the original's lightsaber combat is by giving the player the ability to dual-wield lightsabers. While the original technically allowed players to do this, it was only for a single move. Jedi Fallen Order 2 should make dual-wielding a fully-fledged third combat style, along with the single-bladed and double-bladed variants that have their own unique movesets. This would also let players customize their lightsaber even further, which has always been a beloved aspect of Star Wars games.
To give even more variation to combat, Jedi Fallen Order 2 could reintroduce lightsaber stances, taking the basic idea from Jedi Outcast and modernizing it. In Jedi Outcast, three stances were available: a fast form, a standard form, and a heavy form, which put damage ahead of speed. Bringing these lightsaber stances to Jedi Fallen Order 2 would add quite a bit of variety to the game's combat, with the player having to strategize when to use certain forms against specific enemy types.
Leading up to, and following, the original game's launch, some Star Wars fans expressed their disappointment that the dismemberment mechanics from previous games weren't in Jedi Fallen Order. While this was likely done to retain a T rating, for some fans, this lack of dismemberment made the lightsaber combat feel a little unrealistic, with some comparing the lightsaber to a baseball bat as opposed to a burning-hot blade capable of cutting through the toughest metals. Although it may be a little tricky to include while maintaining a reasonable age rating, Jedi Fallen Order 2 would certainly set itself apart from its predecessor by having some form of dismemberment, no matter how blood-less.
One of Jedi Fallen Order's strongest gameplay elements was its implementation of Force powers. Though the player was limited to just a few iconic Force powers, these abilities added quite a bit of variety to the combat, with some of the most satisfying moves being those that also integrated the lightsaber, such as Force pull being used to drag and impale a Stormtrooper.
Jedi Fallen Order 2 should double-down on this, and introduce even more moves that use both Force powers and the lightsaber simultaneously. Star Wars: The Force Unleashed had some moves that did this, such as an attack that imbued the lightsaber with Force Lightning. With just a few tweaks and additions, Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order's sequel could easily set the bar for lightsaber combat.
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is available now on PC, PlayStation 4, Playstation 5, Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
