I managed to pick up 2 PC games from Steam’s Black Friday Sale: Devil May Cry 5 and this title, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. After a 45-minute play session, here are my thoughts and breakdown.
NOTE: there are some small spoilers.
Setup
The first thing that I noticed is that the PC version of SWJ:FO recommends that you use a controller to play it. I had never seen this type of recommendation before; I had to ignore it, since I am sans controller.
There were options for keyboard and mouse, thankfully. I could map movement, interactions, and attacks/defenses on my computer, but the mouse options only allowed for the left, middle, and right buttons to be mapped (I have 2 extra side buttons that I can’t use). Otherwise, the mapping options, along with Audio, Visual, Game Difficulty, and Networking options, were easy and pretty straightforward.
Game Play
The opening Prologue game play is your ‘Tutorial’ stage. There are 4 difficulties to choose from: Story Mode (more story than combat), and the Normal, Hard, Expert modes (I do not remember their names). You learn how to move and look with your character. You also learn how to interact with the environment (more below). Near the end of the Prologue, you learn a couple of attacks and basic defenses. Those first attacks are pretty easy to pull off; the defense require some timing but nothing overly complicated. Yet.
Environment
You can interact with the environment in different ways, such as jumping onto ledges, climbing fencing, swinging across gapes with ropes, and sliding down steep ramps. Some of these ledges, ramps, and climbable walls have red and yellow painting; however, a game tool tip warned that this wouldn’t be the cases, once we’re out of the Prologue. Use a combination of the Jump button, Movement buttons, and the Interact button to make these climbs, swings, and jumps, but you can’t ‘hang around’ – I died at least 4 times because I pressed the Interact (“Climb”/”Hang”) button too late, and fell into a chasm.
The visuals of the environment are astounding! The Prologue takes place on a scrapyard planet; there are ships of varying size and makes all over the place, in very clear detail. There are warped doors, cracks between ship hulls that you walk/squeeze through (or fall off of…), looming transport carries in the background, and so much more. It was pretty cool to look at!
Prologue (Slight Spoilers!)
(note: I haven’t looked up any detail of the plot, other than how to spell the player’s character’s name)
You are playing as Cal Kestis, a Scrapper /Junkyard worker on the planet of Bracca. You and a companion (name?) are navigating through a junkyard for fighters from The Clone Wars, with other Junkers welding this, splitting that, and generally are keeping busy. You two run, jump, and climb your way to a ramp (your ‘basic movement’ tutorial), when the ramp falls apart after your companion climbs it. Time to find your around the broken ramp!
After squeezing through tight spaces, jumping around, and even sliding down a ramp (your ‘advanced movement’ tutorial), you then start swinging, swing-jumping, hanging (CAREFULLY!), and balancing across some narrow beams, until you get to the top… and realize that you have found a Rebel ship of some kind. Before you can process it fully, the ship starts breaking apart. You slip, slide, and fall down to the ground (with a timely intervention of… The Force?!?). Your partner realized what just happened… as a patrol ship lands. Soldiers from the Galactic Order come out, round up you and a few other Scrappers, and declare that a Jedi rebel is among you. Your partner gives a concerning speech denouncing the Empire, and gets a circular blade-saw in the chest for it. You pull out a Lightsaber (WTH?!), attack the soldiers, gets absolutely embarrassed by their Captain, and end up detained on their ship. This begins a section of exploration and combat that I won’t spoil. I will say that I died more via a rain the side of a train (6+ times) than I died to the enemy (0 times).
Overall
This is going to be a fun game, made much more difficult by the fact that I’m playing with a mouse and keyboard. The visuals are awesome and the movement, once you get it set how you like, seems pretty simple. Combat might be trickier, as I go along. I’m looking forward to it!
The Nexus 
Great write-up! Your breakdown of the game’s early mechanics and visuals really captures the feeling of stepping into Fallen Order for the first time. The movement system sounds both engaging and a bit unforgiving—those mistimed jumps must have been frustrating! The combat’s difficulty curve also has me curious—does it feel more like a Souls-like challenge, or is it forgiving enough for players new to action-heavy games? Looking forward to hearing more about your experience as you progress!
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It’s not quite Souls-like. Some of the enemies are fairly easy, but most do put up a challenge.
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