The Last Good Jedi Game
User Rating: 8.5 | Star Wars Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast PC
I'm yet another gamer who grew up playing the classic LucasArts SW titles: X-Wing, TIE Fighter, Dark Forces, Jedi Knight... you name it, I obsessed over it in grade school. Right around the time Mysteries of the Sith and Grim Fandango had come and gone, though, something happened to the company. Most hardcore fans remember how a raft of mediocre-to-awful Star Wars titles in the late 90's dragged LucasArts' rep through the mud. Star Wars games had become so formulaic, boring, and just plain bad that LA farmed out dev duties on the next installment of one of their most famed franchises to a third party, something that was fairly unprecedented at the time. While Raven had a respectable track record for their work with iD and on Soldier of Fortune, I worried that there was no way JKII could live up to its predecessors.
Well, this is one of those games that just seems to hold up with age. Despite the interminably drawn out pre-lightsaber section of the game, the occasionally obtuse puzzles, and the unremarkable firearms, there's a lot that hasn't changed: the glee of using your Force powers to throw an entire squad of stormtroopers or bounty hunters into bottomless pits, the excellent saber duels, the addictive multiplayer, and the giddy cool factor of getting to fight alongside Luke Skywalker for a couple of minutes. I wish LucasArts would make an honest effort to give us another Star Wars action title of as high a quality as this.
Nothing about this game was groundbreaking when it was released, nor is it really ahead of its time now. JKII is the equivalent of a $10 hamburger: nothing fancy or revolutionary, just straightforward and rewarding.
