Summary
Respawn Entertainment’sStar Wars Jediseries has gone down as two of the bestStar Warsgames ever made, withJedi: Fallen Orderleading the charge andJedi: Survivorcontinuing the story of Cal Kestis and building on the foundation laid by the first game. However, whileStar Wars Jedi: Survivordid make some improvements to the first game’s formula, it simultaneously threw some things out of balance by increasing the size of its world in comparison. Now, the next game in the series, currently untitled and unannounced, needs to ensure that balance is renewed.
Very little is currently known about the third entry in Respawn’sStar Wars Jediseries, but it may be even larger thanStar Wars Jedi: Survivor. Should it truly end up taking this approach, though, and offering players a more sizable world than its predecessor, it will need to find a way to balance its size with its Metroidvania-style design, asJedi: Survivorsaw the two characteristics working against each other. The size ofJedi: Survivor’s world wasn’t necessarily the problem, as there have been plenty of open worlds that are much larger. Instead, it wasJedi: Survivor’s willingness to continueJedi: Fallen Order’s Metroidvania-style designthat ultimately brought the size of its world out of balance with its gameplay.
Star Wars Jedi Threequel’s World Size Can’t Trivialize Its Design
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor’s World Was Too Large for Its Metroidvania-Style Design
One of the most exciting aspects ofStar Wars Jedi: Survivorahead of its release was its expanded exploration in comparison toJedi: Fallen Order. With larger, more open environments like Koboh, players were promised a more rewarding exploration experience overall, with plenty of surprises to be found scattered about. However, as enticing as a much larger space was,Jedi: Survivorsuffered from a disconnected world design that felt out of balance with its size, particularly when it came to itsMetroidvania-style approach.
It wasJedi: Survivor’s willingness to continueJedi: Fallen Order’s Metroidvania-style design that ultimately brought the size of its world out of balance with its gameplay.
At the end of the day,Star Wars Jedi: Survivor’s worldwas simply too large for its approach to Metroidvania-style level design. It’s not impossible for the two concepts to coexist, so long as they take one another into consideration. Unfortunately,Star Wars Jedi: Survivorseemed to have increased the size of its map without reworking its Metroidvania-style design to complement its larger world. With a more sizable area to explore,Jedi: Survivorobviously encouraged exploration more than its predecessor, but backtracking felt more tedious than rewarding, with ability-gated areas turning out to act more like roadblocks than natural parts of the game’s world.
The Next Star Wars Jedi Game Should Implement More Meaningful Backtracking
Much of the flaw in this design came down toStar Wars Jedi: Survivor’s semi-open world structure, especially afterJedi: Fallen Order’s linear approach made backtracking feel much more purposeful. When players revisited areas inJedi: Fallen Order, it was often for more than simply unlocking areas that they couldn’t previously, with clear objectives or story progressions there to accommodate their return. InJedi: Survivor, on the other hand, players were frequently required to remember where each gated area was so they could return to them later, since the story and side quests would rarely take them back to those areas.
This made backtracking inJedi: Survivorfeel more like busywork than anything else. As such,Star Wars Jedi: Survivor’s sequeldoesn’t necessarily need to have a smaller world, so long as it has a more meaningful approach to its Metroidvania-style design. In other words, instead of simply unlocking a door that was previously inaccessible, returning to a location in the next entry should be relevant to the game’s narrative, whether that be the main quest or a side story. It could also feature new enemy encounters to make returning to the area feel like a fresh challenge.
The next entry incorporating even more valuable rewards than whatJedi: Survivoroffered would be another great way to make backtracking feel purposeful.
IfStar Wars Jedi 3wants to retain the series' Metroidvania elements, it arguably needs to ensure that exploration remains an engaging part of its gameplay rather than a chore. A larger world isn’t inherently a problem, but if the next game wants to build uponJedi: Survivor’s foundation, it should make revisiting locations feel like a natural part of the journey rather than an obligation. Whether through more meaningful story integration, new enemy encounters, or genuinely rewarding incentives,the nextStar Wars Jedigamehas an opportunity to perfect the balance between scale and structure.
