Star Wars Jedi: Survivor - Exclusive Hands-On Preview | IGN First

ign.com:

As a fan of Star Wars, Soulslikes, and big-budget single-player action games, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order was a game that spoke to me on multiple levels. It successfully merged the risk/reward elements of From Software’s Souls series with the power fantasy that inherently comes with being a Jedi. That said, it wasn’t a perfect combination. Backtracking without any means of fast travel was annoying, exploration was rewarded primarily with underwhelming cosmetics, and I couldn’t help but wish I could do more with my powers than just push, pull, and slow.

I say all of this because my main takeaway from roughly five hours with the upcoming sequel, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, is that it felt like I was systematically crossing off the issues I had with Fallen Order. Survivor feels grander without ever letting the burgeoning scope compromise the exploration and sense of discovery that serves as its heart.

My preview time was broken up with me spending about four hours on the planet Koboh, a gigantic and wide open planet that largely serves as Cal’s home away from home throughout the course of Jedi Survivor’s story, and then about an hour on a moon planet to showcase some more traditional combat and platforming encounters that fans have come to expect. Let’s start off with Koboh, because it represents the biggest change in Jedi Survivor versus Fallen Order: A vast open world that sprawls out in every direction, with interesting encounters and rewards everywhere you turn.

We’ve already shown you 9 minutes of Koboh gameplay as part of our IGN First coverage, but what we haven’t really gotten to point out is the fact that most of that footage covers only the introduction to the planet, which is a fairly traditional linear portion