TLDR – 100 hours with BD1 is by far the best Star Wars thing you can experience.

I did not expect to drop 100 hours into this game. It’s a shame it released in the state it did (definitely EA to blame on that one, but also there was SO many incredible games in 2023 that they took what date would slot in best between RE4R and TOTK). I am glad I didn’t play it on release and waited until I finished my other games and got an opportunity to play this when it was mostly fixed and acceptable. Games shouldn’t be released this way.
This game embodies its title “Survivor” in every aspect of the story and gameplay. Every character and villain take a difference angle on how to best cope with tragedy in a broken world, with the playable Cal Kestis being the conduit for hearing and interacting with these different points, with his own arch. Though I prefer the more direct Fallen Order story, when viewed in a larger context, Survivor has so much to say and I think on paper it is the better story, especially if you go through with it steadily. I won’t spoil it; I think it’s best to experience it as blind as possible. I have gripes (mainly showcased below), but Respawn’s Jedi games are far better written than most of the Star Wars media we have received during the Disney era.

In regards to structure, this game choses to go with a MASSIVE main world and a few more linear planets, versus the more level/linear planets of the first game. At first, I wasn’t thrilled with this change. The massive planet “Koboh” is quite overwhelming and the combat feels different out in the open compared to its predecessor. I love a large world, but sometimes that can be a detriment in my opinion. You CAN choose to beeline the story, but how I play games I always end up trying to explore the world presented to me and forgo pushing for all the distractions, for one big experience. At first, this made the game feel tedious, but slowly and surely the world comes alive. I highly suggest playing the story for about 10 hours before really hitting the side content. This world is a giiant platforming puzzle. Once you unlock new abilities, even MORE opens up than you thought possible, and you can tell Respawn took great care thinking about how Cal’s movement and progression interacts with the world. Some call that metroidvania, I just call that great level design.
This hub design allows the Pyloon’s Saloon to be such an unexpected and rewarding part of the game. The saloon is a residing place where characters you recruit give you little story tibdits or side quests. It’s a blast to interact with all these characters. They have their own quirks and sense of humor, and they develop as you come back to the saloon. You feel that these folks are all just surviving in a cruel empirical state, and again, it reinforces the title further.

Combat this time around is similar to Fallen Order, but you now have 2 more stances to interact with. You can easily max out every stance and its special abilities by exploring the world and collecting upgrades, and I found myself switching up stances every 10-12 hours. It keeps gameplay fresh if you feel that you’re tired of using the same little combos. I bumped difficult up to the “Master” level because the “Knight” difficulty felt a little too easy to just button mash. I had my butt handed to me multiple times early game (and still late game) and if you miss some parries or your moments to get hits in, you will get clobbered. The optional boss fights were addicting to complete, where you can tell that you got greedy and weren’t patient (aka it’s your fault you lost) with only one of them feeling unfair (Looking at your double rancor fight with your massive hit box for your instant kill move).
Play this game if you can. If you passed on it because of performance, I understand! It’s much better now and easily this was one of the best games last year (which is a massive statement considering it was 2023!)

Just finished playing this with my girlfriend on the collection. These games definitely are better experienced with friends on a larger screen

The first four episodes are so fun, the writing is hilarious, the pacing is great throughout, and each episode has great characters that are off the wall. I love the slow building of the reoccurring characters or the one offs (Missile the Dog, we love you.) I screenshotted so many of the dialogue boxes, so many hilarious in and out of context pieces of text. It’s a very simple loop of a game, but it’s always fun seeing where it will take you and if treated like “watching” tv for an hour or two at a time, it’s an absolute blast

My biggest gripe is the “5th” episode Rise from the Ashes. I know it wasn’t part of the GBA release, but I’m including it here. It’s definitely way too long. It runs almost the entire length of the first game (a great value at the time for DS to justify getting the game “again”) but the pacing is off (Day 1 of the episode is SLOW and I almost quit.) It builds momentum and becomes really great at the end, but it’s a tale of two halves. Also, you can see the writing is very different since it was written after the first 3 games.

My final thought - the music for the first game is INCREDIBLE. Capcom GBA compositions at their finest.