Finally finished the game

I'm late to the party but I finally finished my first play through and here are my thoughts that no one asked for:

I played and beat the first game when it first came out and I felt really underwhelmed by it's story so much so that I didn't really feel any excitement when this game came out hence why I didn't play it till recently.
l've been in a star wars binge recently and it motivated me to finally play this game... I'm surprised I didn't play it sooner. It's amazing and has made my craving even steeper for more.

1. The story.

The story for this game is much better than from what I remember in FO. Well written characters for the most part especially Cal. My only complaint is that some arcs I think are a bit rushed. Cere's arc as this mighty wise jedi is hard to buy into since she didn't even really go back to being a real jedi till the ending of the first game and got dog walked by Vader. The fight between her and Vader in this one was cool (though seriously unfair in the grandmaster difficulty), I just kinda don't like thats where her story ends as I feel like she could have contributed more to the story. On top of that, she was barely in this game so it was surprising and also just very awkward that we play as her as I didn't feel that much emotional attachment to her in this game... it was also pretty obvious she was gonna die at the end of that fight. It just felt more of a reason to push Cal to the dark side, which is cool but she should've been used for more.

Speaking of wise jedi, Eno Cordova's death also felt useless and was also just another stepping stone for Cal and honestly thats it (I really don't have anything more to say with that character).

Which brings me to another character: Bode. You really mean to tell me that the two wise jedi and as someone as powerful as Cere really did not sense anything from Bode being a jedi? Really? Cal too but I can excuse Cal since we do play as him. I would have liked it better if there was any hint throughout the story that Bode was not who he said he was. I always knew he was going to betray Cal and the gang, but making him a merc jedi (thats also for some reason not an inquisitor) was just so out of left field and felt really forced because it was so obvious he was going to betray Cal. Was it cool? Yes, but still just thrown in.
To top it all off that last boss fight was super super disappointing especially after a fight with Vader.

Side note: his reverse grip stance is just dumb to me but that has nothing to do with anything lol.

The rest of the characters I think are extremely solid and I have no complaints about them. Merrin and Cal's relationship is so damn adorable and I hope to see it more fleshed out in the next game. Greez is also a favorite of mine, I have nothing bad to say about him.

I only wish those characters would have a side quest or something to flesh them out even more.

2. Gameplay:

The gameplay is god damn stellar. The customization is deep enough to keep you engaged without overwhelming you with options.

Combat is mostly smooth and even challenging at times (mind you I did my first play through in the grandmaster difficulty), but I do have my gripes with it.

While I do feel that the challenge is balanced enough there are a few moments in the game that I think are just straight up unfair, for example the spawn of Oggdo fight… wth were they thinking with that boss. As cool as the boss fight with vader was, it was stupidly unfair of making you do this as cere with only FOUR FRICKEN STIMS with a MASSIVE HEALTH DOWNGRADE. Idk if the easier difficulties make this different, but the fight was still at least enjoyable.

One major major gripe I have with the combat is the parrying. I feel like im pretty good at parrying but for some reason I feel like the timing of this game is a bit… off. Im on a regular ps5 so they could have something to do with this but the parrying was very inconsistent. There would be times where I would hold down the block button only to end up parrying twice in a row. Maybe my controller is messed up but idk i almost felt like the frames are faster than the controller response. Skill issue? Maybe, but I’m unconvinced since Sekiro is a much harder game but I have a 1000x easier time parrying in that game than this one.

Another aspect of the gameplay I want to touch on is the exploration. Its fun but I’m not sure how I feel about the world’s overall design. Making it open world as opposed to FO’s more traditional souls like map design takes something away from me. I think I wish there more dungeons if they were gonna go for the open world nature like the abandoned shack. It also made going for the upgrades and chests a bit more annoying since koboh is kinda big. I found it to be a drag to have to ride the mount to most places as it wasn’t even that much faster than sprinting everywhere. Same deal with Jeddah. Shattered moon I actually really liked exploring but it was unfortunately small. This is subjective (as all reviews are), but I liked the more linear but metroidvania/souls like design of the first game more than i do the limited open world exploration of this game.

Other than thise gripes i cant really say anything else bad about the gameplay. Its fuckin fun and I just want more. But one more thing: WHERE IS MY KYLO REN SLOW ABILITY ON DEMAND GOD DAMN IT. Which I guess brings me to mention that some of the moves from the first game are missing and its a loss, but not a big deal imo.

The force parkour is awesome tho. I love air dashing.

3. The graphics/sound design.

What can I say? The game is beautiful. Hard to imagine it was possible to improve upon from the first game. Even though the difference isn’t that steep, it’s still very noticeable with the environments especially.

4. Final verdict

8.5/10 (very high for me)

It has some misses but its mostly hit after hit after hit and it makes me want to be a Jedi so damn bad. Why is there no DLC for these games man :(

Because I liked this game so much I decided to do a rerun of the first game which I haven’t played since I first beat it way back in 2019 after which I will play survivor again doing purity mode :3

Ty for reading if you did meign. Its been nice to share my thoughts on reddit on these things.