I’m going to preface this by saying I think that Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order is absolutely alright. Respawn has gone for Uncharted meets Dark Souls in the Star Wars universe and it has nailed its goals. It’s fun at times, it really is, but it’s not a whole lot more than that. That’s probably a claim which could be levelled at Disney’s Star Wars in general, to be honest, but that doesn’t mean the games have to follow suit.
Respawn are an incredibly talented bunch who have released two great games this year (Star Wars and Apex Legends). They are, like all developers of Star Wars games for the past six years, under the watchful guise of Electronic Arts. Outside of perhaps Activision, EA is the safest publisher around. EA loves a sure bet. Risks are for suckers, tried and tested concepts are for winners.
EA’s risk aversion is why, in the past six years since the publisher acquired the exclusive rights to ‘core’ Star Wars video games, all we’ve got is a couple of Battlefield-lite Star Wars Battlefront games and Star Wars Jedi, a sci-fi riff on Dark Souls. Just before the acquisition we had Star Wars: The Old Republic, which was solo-focused World of Warcraft, and Star Wars: The Force Unleashed I & II, the ultimate bog-standard action adventure games.
We haven’t seen anyone take a risk of a Star Wars game in a long time. EA may end up publishing some good Star Wars titles with the license but it certainly won’t publish interesting games. It’s simply not in EA’s DNA. We will not get the revelatory Star Wars experiences like we used to. Games such as Knights of the Old Republic, Dark Forces, Rogue Leader, Star Wars Galaxies, X-Wing, TIE Fighter, and more.
As good as Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order is, I personally cannot wait for Electronic Arts to give up the Star Wars license. Logically, Disney needs to be handing out this license piecemeal, rather than signing it over to single publisher for years at a time. Think of Wolfenstein developer MachineGames making a new Dark Forces, for example. A proper gritty Star Wars FPS, trudging through the Stormtrooper trenches. Or how about giving Obsidian a stab at KOTOR 3, or perhaps Frontier could make a new X-Wing v TIE Fighter. The choices are endless, they really are, and I can’t help but wonder how much better Star Wars could be represented in the modern era of modern games if it wasn’t locked down to a single monolithic publisher that thinks putting a sugar cube in their tea is risk taking.
So where am I going with all this? Well, first of all, do you, despite the success of Star Wars Jedi, think it’s about time EA didn’t have the exclusive rights to Star Wars games? And secondly, which developers would you like to see given a shot at making their own Star Wars titles?
Get voting and let us know your dream Star Wars games below!
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PC Specs
Its just Tomb Raider with a Star Wars skin over it. One button to win all fights pretty much. Force pull is too OP since you can just pull 90% of everything and impale them. And if you run out of energy "force" you can just use the robot to give you more. The game is also too short, just when it was starting to get going it just ends and it has a very anticlimatic ending. Its a very over hyped game and i dont get the praise for it. It also was stuttering and lagging like crazy for me but my rig is pretty **** so thats on me. The poncho thing has to go.
PC Specs
personally I enjoyed jedi: fallen order and still am, it has a ton of Lora Croft elements and Uncharted elements, and it does it well. The combat is good and doesn't really get old, do to the different ways you can go about that specific engagement. its just plain fun without all the gimmic's that modern ea titles have nowadays.
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Gonna have to say you shouldn't lump force unleashed with the 'mediocre' games. That game was awesome and one of the last great games for star wars, plus its canon so that a bonus too.
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True words.The first Unleashed is still on of my favorites.
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Neither of them was canon lol, but I loved both. The first especially.
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I'm pretty sure the first game was considered canon, even by George Lucas.
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It's part of the Expanded Universe which Disney slaughtered, sadly.
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Guys cut it out.. after all the deserved crap we gave to EA for the past Fallen Order is an actual game with no strings attached .. some positive reinforcement is a compete requirement from our side for them to end their evil ways and get back to making great games like this...
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One good game doesn't excuse for all the sht they've been pulling and all the sht they've been doing. It took them 7 years of exclusivity and 2 massive disasters to finally settle down and make a decent SW game. I'm not going to praise them for giving us a proper game because they did their best to take that away.
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I'm with you on the EA hate train but it's not EA who makes these games the studios that work on it don't deserve lingering hate for making a good game right? I'm saying EA sucks and what they did is bad but we did punish them and I feel telling them where they're right is as important as telling them where they suck.
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No they don't deserve lingering hate, and If I could somehow give my money directly to them I would do it.
If this becomes common I'll change my view, but as it stands now, it's an anomaly.
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It hasn't helped that up until Fallen Order EA insisted that any of the games were to be made using the Frostbite engine which helped kill production of new types of experiences. Instead of safer sequels to games like Dark Forces though I'd rather see different genres such as an immersive sim explored.
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I want EA to get the middle earth license back though. I need Battle for middle earth 3
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Remember though that EA has money to spend for a Star Wars Game. After the end of the movies i don't see the point to make a new Star Wars game. I think we have enough of Star Wars movies and games already.
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Imagine an open world, Witcher 3 style inspired RPG set in the star wars universe.
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Man, I can't stop thinking about Star Wars : Bounty Hunter as of late. This game was fire.
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Would love to get another Star Wars single player RPG set in a different timeline like KOTOR.
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Just think about a star wars game done by...CDPR!!!
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I agree. I think Disney should definitely be more liberal with their SW licences, and open up more deals to many different studios rather than locking down an agreement for a decade with only one. I really would like to see some indie SW titles but that's probably never going to happen.
That said, if Disney is to be believed, last time they were questioned about EA exclusive SW deal, they said they were completely happy with how it's going and they wouldn't change it.
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if they are going to leave the star wars licence in the hands of respawn and give them the freedom to make the games they want then i wouldn't mind, but if they decide to go back the battlefront route then heck yeah the licence shall be revoked immediately
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If EA actually put out more like Fallen Order I wouldn't mind. But this is the only decent game they've made. It's about time they let someone competent make games for the franchise.
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never was into start wars and never will probably
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I liked Star Wars Battlefront 2.
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Let's not forget about Star Wars : Republic Commando :)
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Yeah true that was a damn good one, I'd love a sequel to that
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Unless they can prove me they can make more games like Fallen Order, I still am voting for EA losing license. Yes, FO is good. And I would love to see them do more games like that in SW universe, especially going off beaten path and tell stories not told in movies. I wouldn't mind if they made good bounty hunter game, like one that got canceled... But under EA, I have my doubt.
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On a side note: I wish they would move on from the movie timeline. I love the movies, but there are a ton of games from that time period. Game developers need to look beyond.Past or future.
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I'd love Rockstar or CDPR make a KotOR3. It would be the dream sequel we're all longing for.