Ever since Respawn’s ambitious new Star Wars game was announced back in 2016, fans have been desperate to discover everything that they can about the newest addition to the ever-sprawling canon. At Star Wars: Celebration, we got our first look at Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, as well as the backstory and motivations of protagonist Cal Kestis (Gotham’s Cameron Monaghan.) On Saturday morning at EA Play, the first event of this year’s E3 Expo, we got our biggest look yet with almost 15 minutes of incredible gameplay that gave us a huge insight into the upcoming game.
If you’re reading this then you probably know all about Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order, but in case you’re just discovering the game, it is a single-player action adventure game that takes place in the wake of Order 66 and the events of Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith during a time where the Jedi are being hunted down and systematically murdered. You play as Cal Kestis, a Jedi on the run, who takes on the Empire with the aid of his Force powers and some unexpected allies. “Three hours after the game starts, Cal has built himself up, he’s no longer a lowly padawan but he’s not a Jedi,” according to the livestream.
The live gameplay demo took us to the wartorn Wookiee planet of Kashyyk as Cal teams up with Saw Gerrera, the radical rebel from Rogue One, who sends the young Jedi on a mission to save the Wookiees who have been enslaved by the Empire and forced to cut down wroshyr trees the resin to create “a powerful compound.” We saw a variety of Force powers, ranging from opening doors to creating bridges by pushing over obstacles to Force pushing enemies into one another. It’s a Star Wars game, so there’s also some satisfying lightsaber action with Cal wielding his own blue blade to slice through unsuspecting stormtroopers and Kashyyk’s “multilayered deathtrap” ecosystem.
There are plenty of deep-cut Star Wars references featured in the gameplay demo, including a sequence in which Cal is battling snarling Wyyyschokk, giant Kashyykian spiders that first featured in the Jedi Academy series, before being brought into contemporary canon in The Force Awakens novelization. We also got our best look yet at the newly created Purge Troopers who are under the control of the Inquisitors and Second Sister, one of the game’s major villains who you might recognize from the Star Wars comics. Clad in black armor, these intimidating enemies wield massive quarterstaffs that emanate a sinister purple energy at either end. However, the most exciting inclusion of all is Cal’s droid bud BD-1, who rides on his back like a little robot Yoda and can help provide important environmental information and hack into Imperial technology to help you navigate your surroundings.
The creators were quick to explain that the game is completely canon and the characters “will live in other places.” It seems like the game won’t give the usual choice from Star Wars games of being able to choose the light side or the dark but that doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll be light… as Cal is doing a whole lot of killing in the sequence we saw.
We will continue to report on Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order as the story develops. The game will release on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Windows PC on November 15, 2019. Be sure to stay tuned to Nerdist all week long for the latest stories coming out of this year’s E3.
Images: EA, Lucasfilm
