Star Wars Jedi: Survivor (PlayStation 4) review "I survived and even had fun doing so. Beats real life!"

I can’t say I’ve ever been the biggest Star Wars fan out there. I did watch the original trilogy and enjoyed the hell out of Doom clone Dark Forces for a time, but I’m not going to lie and act like I’ve binged on all the more recent films and TV shows or read any of the books or have a bunch of collectibles or even know who most of the characters in this stuff actually are. I was, however, really intrigued by Star Wars Jedi: Survivor.

So, why would I be really want to play a particular video game when I’ve spent my entire life being mostly apathetic towards its source material? Simple — when reading a few blurbs about it, I noticed comparisons made between its combat and that in the typical Souls-like game. And that’s enough to hook me!

And that is largely true. Protagonist Cal Kestis is a skilled fighter with his light-saber and force powers, but isn’t some super-durable force of nature. You’ll regularly need to fight defensively, using your powers and dodging ability to evade attacks, while looking for the proper opportunities to unleash your own assault. Or you can have a lovely time getting stomped into the muck by giant beasts, skilled combatants or hordes of random droids and troopers.

But this game isn’t just a Souls clone. Exploring the handful of worlds that Cal will find himself visiting involves a fair amount of platforming, puzzle-solving and lots of lots of climbing various surfaces. Oftentimes, getting from one place to another felt like traveling the land in an open-world take on the classic God of War games, with Cal regularly scaling walls and climbing on ceilings and manipulating devices to unlock new paths. Also, this game has a pretty robust story that is delivered via cinema and dialogue, as opposed to flavor text on equipment and items.

Now, before I get started on that, I should let you know that this is the sequel to an older game called Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. On the menu screen is a link to a synopsis of that game. A synopsis that probably is completely worthless to someone who didn’t play it, as it’s nothing more than a brief collection of cinema scenes delivered with little-to-no context, but it exists!

Currently Cal’s working with a team of freedom fighters, being annoying flies buzzing around the Empire’s head. As the game’s opening hours show, this isn’t the safest occupation, as a powerful Inquisitor who seems to have been an important adversary in Fallen Order shows up and it isn’t long before all of his team with the exception of new guy Bode is dead.

So, after dispatching that threat once and for all, Cal and Bode decide to meet back up on the planet Koboh, where one of his Fallen Order allies currently resides as the owner of a bar. While exploring this green, forested world, the Jedi makes an amazing discovery. A long time ago, a pair of Jedi — Dagan Gera and Santari Khri — discovered a very secluded planet named Tanalorr that could become the perfect hiding place for the Jedi order to give them a chance to rebuild and become more of a nuisance to the Empire than that current “annoying fly” status. Even better, Cal also finds Gera suspended in a tank and frees him to gain an invaluable ally in his quest for Tanalorr.

Wait, that’s not what happens at all. Seems Dagan got really obsessed with Tanalorr and when setbacks caused the Jedi Council to shut down that project, he snapped, killed a few allies, turned to the dark side and had to put down by former bestie Santari. And now Cal just woke up a very pissed off dude who isn’t going to let anything stop him from regaining Tanalorr and remaking the Jedi in his own “not that different from the Empire” image.

This sets off a race to reach Tanalorr that spans Koboh, a giant base on that planet’s moon, the desert planet Jedha and a couple other places. Along the way, he’ll fight the Empire’s troops, Gera’s band of mercenary followers and all sorts of hostile animal life. Some of these foes like the comic relief droids and Stormtroopers are only dangerous in large groups; others, like the durable and powerful Rancor, will kill you so damn quick you’ll be thinking they must hand out Jedi status to anyone who shows up to sign their name on the line.

At least the game gives you the tools to keep your head above water and even thrive in these treacherous and hostile lands. As a Jedi, Cal will eventually learn five different lightsaber stances, of which two can be utilized at any one time. Each stance has its own style and special attacks, so you can focus on speed or defense, add a blaster to your arsenal or deliver slow, but powerful, attacks. You’ll also gain a number of force powers, such as being able to push or pull enemies or temporarily mind-control them to attack their pals. Another useful ability is to temporarily slow down time — great for getting in a couple attacks against a powerful foe without fear of reprisal.

Several enemies have a stance bar and will be able to block your attacks until it’s depleted. An easy way to do that is by parrying their strikes, although some caution must be used. The average enemy does have at least a couple moves which can’t be blocked, so over-reliance on a defensive style can be just as dangerous to Cal’s health as mindlessly going all out.

Overall, this was a fun game that provided a pretty robust experience. The assorted planets have a lot of places to explore and there are a number of side quests (known as “rumors”) that encourage you to visit distant locations, take down massive beasts or battle a large number of bounty hunters. A few flaws prevented Jedi: Survivor from being a truly elite game, though.

One issue might simply have been the technology I used. Like many games released in 2023, it was intended for the newest generation of systems, but also was ported to the previous. So there I was, playing it on my PS4, where it crashed a couple times and likely didn’t perform at its intended level. Entering and leaving the game’s de facto hub of that Koboh bar involved lengthy load times, while any confrontation with a large monster in any sort of confined area had the potential to mess with the camera and make things more difficult than necessary. Nothing game-breaking, but as far as the ever-important “Do things work like they should?” category goes, I’ve played better.

Also, late in the game, this game brought me straight to the rage-hate-murder level. You’ll get some huge plot revelations dropped on you and then get to briefly control another character against a very tough boss. This person only has one of Cal’s five stances, so if you fell in love with a different one, have fun adjusting your style. Also, the ability to slow time is replaced by a different power i didn’t find as useful and I only had four health refills instead of the eight I currently had with Cal. Not ideal when going against a durable boss with a wide range of attacks that tend to hit like a truck!

That felt like a misstep to me. A very frustrating misstep that came close to having a very adverse effect on my opinion of this game. But it was the only such screw-up and the rest of the game proved to be really fun. Cal can learn a lot of moves and it was a blast using them to do things like pull enemies off ledges or push them off cliffs. The story was fun and cinematic, the action was challenging, the landscape was tricky to navigate and some of the puzzles forced me to put thought into things. Star Wars Jedi: Survivor isn’t a perfect game, but it did keep me entertained enough that I can mostly forgive it for putting me at my rage breaking point once!

Staff review by Rob Hamilton (September 02, 2025) Rob Hamilton is the official drunken master of review writing for Honestgamers.