Highlights
- Star Wars Jedi: Survivor expands and improves on the already impressive lightsaber combat of its predecessor.
- The game introduces five different lightsaber stances, each offering a unique playstyle and movesets.
- The potential sequel could further enhance combat by adding more lightsaber stances, specialized upgrades, and branching skill trees for each stance, allowing players to specialize further in a gameplay niche related to that stance.
Just like any good sequel should do, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor took the already-great foundations of its predecessor, and continued to improve and expand on them in a plethora of different ways. Virtually every aspect of Jedi: Fallen Order, from its level design and unlockable cosmetics to its presentation received an impressive upgrade in the sequel, and the Star Wars Jedi series' lightsaber combat may have received the biggest and best upgrade of them all.
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order took heavy inspiration from the Soulslike genre when it came to its combat, giving players a slower, more methodical type of close-quarters combat that isn't often seen in the Star Wars video game landscape. Star Wars Jedi: Survivor doubled down on this formula, adding a number of improvements that ranged from brand-new lightsaber stances and powerful new abilities to smarter AI. But even with all of those improvements, the Star Wars Jedi formula isn't quite perfect just yet, and there are still plenty of potential features the next sequel could add.
How A Star Wars Jedi: Survivor Sequel Could Expand Lightsaber Combat
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order gave players two lightsaber stances to choose from, being able to switch between a double-bladed and single-bladed lightsaber on the fly. Star Wars Jedi: Survivor took this concept and ran with it, giving players a total of five lightsaber stances to choose from. While the single-bladed and double-bladed stances made a return, both received new movesets and specialized skills.
Three new stances were also added, including a dual-wield stance—available in Fallen Order only as an unlockable special attack—a crossguard stance, and a blaster stance. Though some Star Wars Jedi: Survivor lightsaber stances were certainly better than others, the vast majority of them had a distinct role in combat, and each one offered a unique playstyle.
For the next sequel, it would be great to see even more lightsaber stances added. With Star Wars Jedi: Survivor already covering the most popular lightsaber styles, a sequel might have to think outside the box a little, and a Force lightsaber stance would do exactly that. It's only been seen rarely in Star Wars media, but some of the most powerful Jedi and Sith don't need to use their hands to fight, they simply use the Force to wield their lightsabers. Adding this stance to a Star Wars Jedi sequel would not only show how far Cal Kestis has come as a Jedi but also look extremely stylish.
Another potential stance for a Star Wars Jedi sequel is some kind of lightsaber pike. Seen in The Old Republic and briefly in The Clone Wars, lightsaber pikes are essentially a staff with a shorter lightsaber blade on one end. This lightsaber stance would pave the way for some spear-like moves, which the current Star Wars Jedi games don't have. It would also be great to see physical stances come to the Star Wars JediSurvivor sequel, offering a defensive, offensive, and neutral moveset that can also be switched on the fly, adding even more strategy to combat.
Another excellent addition to Star Wars Jedi's combat would be specialized upgrades and abilities for each lightsaber stance. While both Fallen Order and Survivor have offered unique abilities for each lightsaber stance, a sequel should really double down on this and offer some kind of branching skill tree for each stance, similar to an MMO class tree, allowing players to specialize their stances even further into a specific category. For instance, the blaster stance could branch out into several different paths, each of which uses a different type of blaster, such as a pistol for one, and a repeater for another.
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is available now on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S, with PS4 and Xbox One versions in development.
