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Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is here, and a whole host of players from all walks of life are now making their way through a galaxy far, far away as Jedi-in-hiding Cal Kestis. Whether you’re a Star Wars veteran, or a Respawn veteran, or a Soulslike veteran, or whatever else you might be, you’ll find plenty to love throughout this singleplayer story – but let me tell ya, this is one challenging game, particularly on the higher difficulties.
But that’s where our Jedi: Fallen Order guide series comes in! Below we’ve laid out our 8 top tips for players of all skill levels, and we’ve also linked to all other articles in our ever-growing Jedi: Fallen Order guide series. Whether you’re stuck on a particular boss battle, or wondering how to unlock the double-bladed lightsaber, or what the hell a Scomp Link is: we’ve got you covered.
Note: by necessity, spoilers are laced throughout all the articles in this guide series. You’ve been warned.
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order guide
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is a purely singleplayer experience – a third-person action adventure game with a focus on exploration and melee combat. It’s essentially Sekiro crossed with Uncharted – and from that, you’ll probably already know whether you’ll like, love, or hate the game – or perhaps all three.
The story of Jedi: Fallen Order takes place five years after the events of Revenge of the Sith. The protagonist, Cal Kestis, is a Jedi in hiding after the massacre of the Jedi Order with the Emperor’s infamous Order 66. A former padawan with a tumultuous past, Cal’s connection to the Force has become damaged – but he must use everything at his disposal (including his old master’s lightsaber) to fend off attacks from the Empire and the Inquisitors, led by the Second Sister, who are intent on taking Cal down.
As I said before, this is a challenging game if you’re coming from anywhere except Sekiro. You may think that this game will fulfill that old unstoppable Jedi Master power fantasy (and it will, with some practice), but you’ll often be met with some very unceremonious deaths until you get a handle on the game and its intricate melee combat system.
The below top tips will hopefully give newer players a push in the right directions, while also providing a foundation for players of all skill levels to build upon during their travels.
Look out for Save Points where you can meditate, rest, and learn new skills
Jedi: Fallen Order’s equivalent of Dark Souls bonfires, Save Points are scattered throughout every region of every planet, and are marked by a white symbol on the ground and a beam of light rising up from it into the sky. These Save Points are extremely important, because they serve not only to save your progress but also as respawn points if you die (which will happen a lot. Did I mention that already?).
You can interact with Save Points in two ways:
- You can Rest, which (just like Dark Souls bonfires) will replenish your Health, Force, and stim canisters, but will also respawn all non-boss enemies.
- You can learn new Skills by viewing your Skill Tree. Earning XP will earn you Skill Points that you can use to learn new Skills, which will drastically help you to stay alive during your travels.
For full details on all the skills at your disposal throughout the campaign, check out our Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order skills guide.
Damage the enemy that killed you last to regain all your lost XP
When you die, you will respawn at the last Save Point you meditated at, and you’ll lose all the XP you gained since your last Skill Point. But don’t fret! You can earn all that lost XP back by damaging your killer.
Once you return to where you were killed, your killer will be highlighted by a yellow tint, to show that they are the enemy you must damage in order to regain your lost XP. A single successful hit will immediately return all your XP, and it will also refill your Life and Force meters.
Deflect blockable attacks, and Dodge unblockable attacks
Combat in Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order takes lots of cues from FromSoftware’s masterpiece, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. One such cue is that many enemies have both blockable attacks and unblockable attacks, which (as you might expect) must be dealt with in different ways.
Blockable attacks can be dodged, blocked, or deflected. Of these, the most useful (but the trickiest to master) is the Deflect, because this will deal lots of stamina damage to your assailant, and for many weaker enemies will open them up for a one-hit-kill. As such, you should try to Deflect as much as possible to shorten fights.
Unblockable attacks can be neither blocked nor deflected, so your only choice is to dodge them, either by sidestepping, rolling, or just backing out of the way in time. Unblockable attacks are telegraphed by the enemy turning red just before the attack, so you’ll always know which attacks you can or cannot block.
For full tips and tricks relating to combat, be sure to check out our Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order combat guide.
Try to fight one at a time when possible, and avoid being surrounded
Another thing that Jedi: Fallen Order has in common with Sekiro is that you really, really don’t want to be surrounded. This is a game that focuses on intricate one-on-one combat, and when there are multiple enemies attacking you at once, things can get far more challenging in a very short space of time.
Until you gain full access to all your abilities (particularly Force Push, which as you’ll know from our Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order Force Powers guide is very good for crowd-control), your best bet is to approach each fight with a plan of action for taking on enemies one at a time, lest they quickly surround and overwhelm you.
Watch for when BD-1 climbs down off your shoulder and heads somewhere
BD-1 is your bestest buddy, an adorable and extremely useful droid that accompanies Cal throughout the majority of his adventures. BD-1 will take up residence on your back most of the time, but you should keep an eye out for when he climbs down and heads somewhere, because it almost always means there’s something interesting nearby.
Bear in mind that BD-1 won’t do this while there are enemies around, but once the space is safe, if there’s an interactive element nearby, such as something to scan for a Databank entry, or something to slice (once you have access to the Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order Scomp Link), then he’ll promptly climb down and head there, trilling for you to follow. And follow you most definitely should, because it can often lead to things of great value.
Heal up using BD-1’s stim canisters while your enemy is recovering
While we’re on the topic of BD-1 being extremely useful, he is also your source of healing during and between fights. Next to your health bar in the bottom-right of the screen, you’ll see a number next to an icon that might look like it depicts a lightsaber but actually depicts something called a stim canister.
These stim canisters are your heals, and you only have access to that certain number of them – but resting at a Save Point will replenish these heals. Now, onto the main tip: instead of always pushing the advantage during a fight while your enemy is recovering from that overzealous attack, it’s often a better idea to step back and use that time to heal any damage you’ve sustained. Force Slow is also extremely useful in this regard, particularly with one-on-one fights. Slow, heal, and then continue fighting. You’re welcome.
Go to Dathomir first
Once you’ve completed the initial story mission on Bracca, and your subsequent time on the first planet of Bogano, you’ll be presented with a choice of which planet to go to next: Zeffo, or Dathomir.
Head to Dathomir first. It’ll give you a much rougher time to begin with, but it’ll all be worth it. Not only are these tough-as-nails enemies going to give you some valuable lessons regarding combat in Jedi: Fallen Order, but towards the end of the region (the region that you can currently access, anyway), you’ll gain access to a lightsaber upgrade, which allow you to switch at will between single and double blades.
Our Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order lightsaber has the full details, but suffice it to say that the double-bladed lightsaber is fantastic for dealing with multiple enemies at once, and it makes all the hardship of heading to Dathomir first well worthwhile.
Don’t rush! Keep calm, keep your focus, and you’ll emerge victorious
My final tip is this: try to keep a level head. You’ll die a tonne in this game. It’s not because you’re bad. Well, it is really. But that’s fine, because everyone is bad, and it takes a while to become not bad, and quite a while longer to become fairly decent.
You can make up for your temporary lack of combat mastery with tactics. Assess the situation, and approach carefully. Don’t rush ahead, and play the super-aggressive button-mashing unstoppable Jedi, because unless you’re playing on Story difficulty, this game will punish you for it.
Next time you die, just take a step back, breathe, realise that everyone’s going through the same thing, and know that you’ll emerge victorious eventually, and it’ll feel so goddamn satisfying when you do.
But if you really are stuck on a certain boss, you may want to check out our Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order bosses guide for full walkthroughs of every boss in the game, along with full video footage by yours truly!
And that’s everything we’ve got for now for Jedi: Fallen Order tips – at least for this guide! Check out one of the articles below for in-depth explanations, tips, and walkthroughs for other aspects of this expansive Star Wars experience.