The appearance of more battle droids in Star Wars Jedi: Survivor could be a step in the right direction for a more authentic lightsaber-wielding experience, with its predecessor, Jedi: Fallen Order, lacking limb dismemberment of any kind. Although previous Star Wars games published by LucasArts featured limb dismemberment like in the movies (most notably Jedi Knight 2: Jedi Outcast and its sequel, Jedi Academy), efforts released since Disney's takeover of Lucasfilm have been tamer. Both EA's Battlefront games and Fallen Order featured lightsabers but little dismemberment, limiting it to its non-human foes in the latter title, which can be immersion-breaking.
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order offered challenging lightsaber combat that required timing and skill to master, rather than the typical hack-and-slash mechanics of past Star Wars titles, and players drew comparisons to the likes of FromSoftware games such as Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. The challenging yet satisfying nature of Fallen Order's gameplay was undermined by its lack of violence, however. While the game boasted some nicely animated finishing blows and showed non-human enemies like Bog Rats sliced in half or Phillaks losing their horns, it could then be jarring to see Cal's lightsaber bisecting stormtroopers only for their corpse to remain completely intact, making the lightsaber's power seem inconsistent.
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor Will Feature More Battle Droid Enemies
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor's TGA trailer saw Cal Kestis fighting several types of repurposed battle droids. Several droids were spotlighted in the trailer, with old Clone Wars favorites like the B2 super battle droid and BX droid commandos seen battling Cal, along with those used by the Empire, such as the K2 series security droid and D2 sentry droid. The trailer showed Cal dismembering these battle droids with brutal animations, and the fact there are more droid enemies in the game should go some way in making its various stormtrooper and non-droid confrontations less jarring than they were in Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order.
Much like Fallen Order and other Star Wars games over the years, Respawn's next effort will allow players to get away with more limb dismemberment if the enemies aren't human, and the trailer shows several instances of this both in one-to-one combat and as Cal takes on larger groups of enemies. Obviously, players will still be confronting armies of stormtroopers that won't show as much battle damage throughout the game's campaign, but the more droids there are in Jedi: Survivor, the more brutal the combat will seem overall, and the inconsistencies of the lightsaber combat should appear less noticeable in the heat of battle.
Cal Kestis' Lightsaber Combat Has Evolved In Star Wars Jedi: Survivor
As years have passed since the events of Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, Cal’s skills have clearly evolved as a Jedi in that time. As well as new enemy types, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor's official reveal trailer revealed new additions to Cal's lightsaber style as he wages war against the Empire, with the aged-up Jedi seeming more violent in his attacks. The trailer also saw various creatures being used as mounts for traversal and combat through the game's larger maps, with Cal seen riding through a battle sequence upon a four-legged mount with his lightsaber cutting through battle droids with ease.
In a particularly memorable moment, Cal combines his lightsaber skills with the Force to remotely control his weapon and wipe out a whole group of battle droids in one go, showing as they’re easily decimated as they're sliced in half with ease. While it's unlikely that Disney's Star Wars games will ever receive a M rating and lean fully into the destructive elements of lightsaber battles, this is more of the kind of combat players expect to see from someone wielding the iconic lightsaber. There may be some inconsistencies with how it's handled against more human-type enemies, but moves like this are sure to make up for it in Star Wars Jedi: Survivor.
Source: EA Star Wars/YouTube