Over three years after the release of Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order comes the long-awaited sequel, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor. Releasing on April 28th for Xbox Series X/S, PS5 and PC, it sees Cal Kestis battling the Empire and being pushed to the brink. With new technology and lots of feedback to draw on, what sets the sequel apart from the original? Let’s look at 15 differences.
Darker Storyline
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order began with Cal Kestis on the run, rediscovering his Jedi powers while being hounded by the Empire’s Inquisitorius. The stakes were already high enough, but Jedi: Survivor promises a deeper, darker narrative. Speaking to Game Informer, actor Cameron Monaghan says Cal is faced with “challenges that are difficult, and there’s not necessarily any right answers.” “What is the story that will be the most exciting, where we can still find adventure, but also find something that is deeper and darker and more intricate and complex? So yeah, I think we have a bunch of really big questions we’re asking with this one.”
Set five years after the first game, Cal is wiser and stronger, but still facing an Empire growing in power. How he deals with that and how far he’s willing to go is one part of the story, but there are also other forces at work.
Brand New Planets
The first game’s story spanned seven planets, though only five were freely explorable. Though the number of planets in Jedi: Survivor isn’t confirmed, there will be some new and familiar planets in the series for players, including Koboh. The dust-filled planet features Separatist Droid enemies, seen in Attack of the Clones and The Clone Wars, along with other enemy types. However, it’s also teeming with new wildlife on a larger scale than the previous game’s planets.
Larger Worlds
One of the biggest selling points of current-gen exclusivity for Jedi: Survivor is larger maps with much more going on. The developer stated that by taking advantage of the CPUs, RAM and faster loading times on Xbox Series X/S and PS5, the maps offer “more detail, greater density, broader enemy/NPC variety, and overall fidelity.”
Some planets also have hubs containing towns, shops and NPCs to interact with, that change over time. The idea is to maintain what made the first game special while evolving and enhancing the experience.
AI Companions
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order had BD-1, who accompanied Cal throughout his journey and provided healing, scanning and traversal options. While it returns for Jedi: Survivor, Cal will meet other characters that aid him. One such companion is the mercenary Bode Akuna, who helps in combat, pulling off some cool double-team maneuvers. Other companions (if any) have yet to be revealed, but players can expect more new characters while old favorites like Cere return.
Mounts and Grappling Hook
While the larger maps in the sequel have more to dive into, they also offer new traversal mechanics to help players get around. There are several mounts that the player can tame and use, including one for gliding. You can even attack enemies while riding a mount, which is pretty cool. In addition to double-jumping and wall-running from Jedi: Fallen Order, Cal also gets a grappling hook for navigating platforming challenges. He can also stab his Lightsaber into a wall for a slower descent.
Fast Travel
Of course, there will be times when the player wants to get to their location the fastest way possible. Jedi: Survivor has a highly requested fast travel system, though it’s still point-to-point – you can’t just fast travel anywhere on the map. Regardless, it compliments the mounts quite well and allows for much faster-paced exploration.
Ray Tracing and Faster Loading Times
While Jedi: Survivor is graphically superior to the original, it also features ray tracing support and faster loading times on Xbox Series X/S and PS5 (which should apply to PC players with SSDs). Ray tracing was considered for the current-gen versions of Jedi: Fallen Order, and while ultimately scrapped, it led to improvements in the sequel’s implementation.
New Lightsaber Stances
Jedi: Fallen Order featured three Lightsaber stances – Single Blade, Double Blade and Twin Blade – but the Twin Blade stance was more of a follow-up move to the others. In Jedi: Survivor, there are five Lightsaber stances, with Cross Guard and Blaster being new. The former is the slowest but most damaging of all five, while the latter sees Cal using a Blaster and provides much more range.
You can only equip two Stances, but each has a skill tree to customize. So yes, Twin Blade is now a standalone Stance focused on faster attacks and dodging.
New Force Abilities
It wouldn’t be a sequel without new Force abilities, and thanks to Cal honing his skills over the years, he’s developed a few new tricks. In addition to Force grabbing enemies and using them as shields, he can disorient them with Jedi Mind Tricks, pick up and slam enemies, and much more.
The ability to slow enemies from Jedi: Fallen Order returns, but now it’s more like an area of effect skill that slows time, causing everyone to move in slow motion around Cal. Honing these skills is key to surviving, especially against tougher enemies.
New Enemies
The Stormtroopers of Jedi: Fallen Order return, ranging from the typical fodder to shield-wielding troopers, but Cal will face plenty of new foes. These include the Bedlam Raiders, a massive Wampa that can pick up and slam players, and several different kinds of Separatist Droids. Even among the Droids are some powerful foes like the DT Imperial Sentry Droids from Star Wars Rebels and the MagnaGuard from Revenge of the Sith. Of course, players will likely run into more Inquisitorius along the way.
Human Dismemberment
Jedi: Survivor is adding several things that fans of the first games will enjoy, including one highly requested feature: Human dismemberment. While you could dismember enemy creatures in Jedi: Fallen Order, human enemies went to the afterlife with limbs intact. Not so in the sequel, with recent gameplay footage showing Cal slicing off a Stormtrooper’s leg. It may seem minor, but it’s a nice addition, nonetheless.
Cosmetic Variety
Being able to unlock all cosmetics by simply playing Jedi: Fallen Order was a breath of fresh air, especially for EA-published titles at the time. However, Cal’s hastily scavenged wardrobe consisted of different varieties of ponchos which was somewhat underwhelming. Thankfully, Jedi: Survivor has a wider range of outfits and even some new hairstyles for Cal to equip. There’s even a Solid Snake-esque bandana, according to IGN.
Puzzle-Solving Complexity
Along with combat, the first game offered a decent amount of puzzle-solving and platforming. Jedi: Survivor is expanding on this with Jedi Chambers. These are large, optional puzzle rooms that the Jedi used for honing their skills – on Koboh, one such Chamber involved plugging in and removing batteries to create light bridges to progress. Each also has Force Echoes and Scans with lore for players to learn more about them.
Perks
Jedi Chambers are optional, but they provide brand-new Perks for Cal. These are essentially ways to customize your combat gameplay, though in what ways is yet to be revealed. Nevertheless, they should add even more variety over the first game.
Size
There’s been a lot said about the scale of Jedi: Survivor’s planets and how much more content there is to experience. And while the playtime isn’t confirmed yet, we at least know that it’s a far bigger install than Fallen Order, at least on PC. While the first game demands 55 GB of available installation space on the platform, Jedi: Survivor requires 130 GB, which is more than double. Long story short, expect a lot of stuff to do.
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