Customer Reviews

Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy

5 star:		(69)
4 star:		(45)
3 star:		(15)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I realize it's marketed as "Jedi Knight 3", but this is in every possible way an expansion to Outcast. It doesn't really continue the JK story, and it has almost the exact same engine and force powers and weapons, etc, with very little modified. Movement is identical, etc. If you played Outcast, you'll be right at home immediately.

That said, this is one of, if not the, best games I've ever played. Every modification it makes to the Outcast engine is an improvement, however small they are. As with the original Jedi Knight, you now get to choose what Force Powers to receive (to a certain extent...half are given to you, half are by choice), and you also get to choose light or dark side at a certain point in the game. All of the JO multiplayer powers are now in single player, plus one extra (that lets you see people through walls and stuff like that), and all of the weapons return, plus a jaw-dropping new version of the Concussion Rifle from JK.

The most important change, though, is in the format of the game itself - instead of a linear progression of levels, there are three sets of five levels, within which you may do the levels in any order. Between each set is a plot-advancing mandatory mission. In each set of five, you only need to complete four, so you can continue on if one of them stumps you, but you'll miss getting another force star (one per level you play). For the first set, your core powers (jump, push, pull, sense, lightsaber defense, lightsaber offense, lightsaber throw, and speed) are at level one, for the second set they're all at level two, and for the third set and the whole endgame, they're all at level three. This means you get a HUGE amount of game in which you are an uber-Jedi, unlike Outcast in which you only had two levels at full power.

Also, this means that instead of having long missions with multiple parts, the game mostly consists of small "vignette" levels, short and sweet. There are good and bad sides to this, the bad being that you don't feel as involved with the storyline, but the good being that there is INSANE variety in level design. Almost every planet looks different, and levels range from working your way down a speeding train to escaping from jail (lightsaber-less) to leaping back and forth across a giant chasm that a jedi temple has been built into (and since been turned into ruins). The sheer variety of visual and gameplay styles is mind-boggling. Every major Star Wars scene or place that wasn't recreated in Outcast is back here, too, from speeder bike chases (exhilaratingly fun) to the ruined Hoth base. It's insane how much is packed in to these levels.

The best thing about JA as compared to JO, though, is that JO's first two missions sans-lightsaber are GONE. You start out the very first level with a lightsaber, and the one level where you're forced to be without it you have massive force abilities, and if you really hate it you can skip it anyway. The worst part of Outcast is gone completely, and all that's left is pure Jedi gaming goodness.

Multiplayer is also back, with a couple of new modes (including an incredibly fun 2-on-1 power duel), but fewer levels. It averages out to about the same amount of MP goodness from Outcast, not really better or worse. The improvements in this game are mostly single player.

Finally, a minute detail for most but extremely important for me, if you liked Force Lightning in the old game, your head may explode when you see this one. It blows people back, has more than double the range, and is just generally the most insane offensive ability possible. Everyone - GET FULL LIGHTNING AS SOON AS POSSIBLE.

Overall, an absolutely incredible game, fixing everything that was wrong about Outcast, my previous favorite game of all time. The only downside is that they didn't change enough - this simply isn't a full-fledged sequel. If you liked Outcast, you'll love this, but if you didn't, give it a pass. There's nothing terribly different to change your mind.

After a healthy wait, the third installment of the Jedi Knight saga continues in this latest release. Fans of the earlier games will be at home with the basic setup: run around lovingly crafted Star Wars locales, zwapping Storm-Troopers with a lightsaber and generally spoling the Evil Galactic Empire's plans. Where this latest installment differs from the older games is that for the first time you WON'T be playing as spy-turned-Jedi, Kyle Katarn.

"Horror," you gasp, "don't tell me he's gone forever!". Well no, he'll be making a special guest appearance, but this time as one of your Jedi instructors. As the title suggests, the game offers players the chance to join Luke Skywalker's Yavin IV Jedi academy - a sort of Hogwarts School of witchcraft and wizardry, but for Jedi. Instead of playing as a familiar Star Wars character, the game allows players to create their own, unique, Jedi apprentice by customizing your species, sex, clothing etc, allowing for literally thousands of configurations.

Even better, as you progress through the non-linear missions that you'll be dispatched on by your instructors, you'll be able to specialise in a particular saber style...the basic single-saber, the Anakin-inspired two-saber approach or the pyrotechnic staff-saber, of Darth Maul fame. Saber combat is the main focus of the game, but you can still grab a handy blaster to zap things with.

After you've sufficiently honed your skills in the one player game you can take the fight online (with your custom character, naturally). New multiplayer modes include an objective-based team game called 'Seige', and the ability to re-enact the climactic Qui-Gon/Obiwan/Darth Maul threesome from Episode One in the new 'Power Duel' mode - its a two against one saber showdown...what better way to prove your force mastery than by thwapping 2 birds with 1 stone?

So, loads of new tricks up the Lucasarts' sleeve, no doubt all wrapped up in the usual gorgeous graphics and sound. If Jedi Outcast is anything to go on, this game will be a must-have in any Star Wars fan's collection.

Star Wars, Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy is the 3rd installment of the Jedi Knight series, and could really be called 'Jedi Knight III'.

The game is fairly similar to Jedi Outcast in terms of gameplay, graphic and sound. The story in this game involves a young Jedi student at the Jedi Academy, studying under Kyle Katarn. The game follows a fairly standard setup, you participate in missions to achieve various goals, using your Jedi powers that increase with every mission to achieve those goals. But this game has one fundamental difference to Jedi Outcast, it allows a player to choose the Force powers they want to have more ability in, and those powers can be either of the light side, or the dark side. Towards the end of the game, the player is forced to make a choice to go to the light side or the dark side of the Force.

But the major new feature of Jedi Academy is that a player can now customize their character in the game, choosing gender, species, physical appearance, and, most importantly, lightsabre colour and handle style.

This is where I found the game lacking. I expected to have a wide range of character choices and options, instead there were only a handful of choices, Human male, Human female, Zabrak male, Twi'lek female, Rodian male and another male from a strange alien species. I would have liked to have been able to choose from a huge range of species, clothes and physical appearances, with enough options to ensure that every character is unique. This lack of options is one of the reasons that I gave this game 4/5 stars.

The lightsabre combat though, is where this game really shines. In additon to choosing blade colour and handle style, this game also features a whole host of new and cool lightsabre attacks and uses, such as a roll then quick lightsabre stab, and a move where a player can do an extremely fast twirling motion, essentially killing anything within the radius of the lightsabre.

Later in the game, the player must build a new lightsabre, but now there a 3 choices, single sabre, twin sabres, or a double sabre like Darth Maul used in Episode I. The new options are great, and allow for some fantastic new moves. Lightsabre combat is definitely the highlight of Jedi Academy.

Another point to mention is that the game is surprisingly short and easy. An experienced Jedi Outcast player could finish this game within 20 hours, probably less. The in game problems were surprisingly easy to solve, allowing a player to progress easily through the levels. After all the care and effort taken to customize a player's character, to finish a game that quickly just isn't satsifying. This is also part of the reason why I gave this game 4/5 stars.

In short, this is a good game, but not an outstanding one. I get the sense that it was possibly rushed through production, which may explain why it was so short. If you're a Star Wars game fan, you should definitely buy this. If you're just a casual gamer with a passing interest in Star Wars, I recommend you think twice before buying this one.

"Jedi Academy" is the latest in a long-line of Star Wars shooter games that began with "Dark Forces" (1994) and followed the adventures of Kyle Katarn, former imperial commando, free-booting mercenary and now Master Jedi Knight. As with last year's entry - "Outcast", "Academy" has you fighting various enemies across the Star Wars universe as rendered by the QuakeIII engine. Rather than play Kyle, you lead the fight as one of his assistants - an acolyte jedi (who ya' callin' Padawan!?). Looking and sounding little different than Outcast, Academy does allow you some flexibility. You can alter the appearance of your race, gender, skin color, dress and (because this was beginning to sound like some Supreme Court case) your lightsaber. Choose the color and style of your saber - single or double sabers, or the double-bladed single saber made famous by Darth Maul in "Episode 1".

The problem? While it's always fun to play "Star Wars", I spent much of my time just reminding myself that this was supposed to be a sequel to Outcast, with all the improvements that sequels should be expected to have. Using the same graphics engine as Outcast means that the game overall looks the same, while gameplay is otherwise little changed. Being able to customize your appearance is nifty, but it doesn't really add to the game - you're just a generic character in a generic Star Wars story (young and untrained Jedi students against former imperial forces and darker jedis who try and kill you with their fast moves and taunts). Anyway, players have been able to "mod" their appearance since the days of "Dark Forces", so even that feature isn't so new (I played that game as Boba Fett). Though a technological leap over the first "Jedi Knight" game of 1997, neither "Academy" nor "Outcast" match it in making you feel like you're inside a Star Wars movie. The levels (or maps) are compelling, but they always feel like maps - they don't connect in a way that suggests a single story the way the older game did (LA followed the older game's example when releasing "Mysteries of the Sith", a companion disk relying on a tweaked version of the engine used on "Jedi Knight"; though MotS looked shoddy, and its story was actually several loosely linked stories, the individual stories themselves never relied as heavily on cut-scenes to drive the game as Outcast or Academy did). Even forgetting about narrative, Academy is still less of a leap in technology over "Jedi Knight" than that game was over "Dark Forces". I'm not sure why it was even released at all (the only real effect is that the on-line communities that craft mods for Star Wars games have stopped working on Outcast mods, and have begun turning to Academy exclusively).

Being little advanced over Outcast, the same system specs should apply. I played this on my P4-2ghz, GeForce3, WinXP system (remember when that sounded like more horsepower than you'd ever need?) and had no problems. Remember to check LA's website to make sure your graphics card is on the approved list. In short, if you missed on Outcast, get Academy. If you got Outcast, Academy is still a worthy game, but not one that will rock your universe.

Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy was my second foray into the Dark Forces/Jedi Knight line of games. Since I really enjoyed Outcast and the demo for Jedi Academy, I decided to plunk down some money and buy Jedi Academy. I am not sure this was a good decision on my part.

I am now going to go over what I see as the good and the bad parts of the SINGLE PLAYER part of Jedi Academy.

First off, the good:
Since Jedi Academy (hereafter JA) does not revolve around Kyle Katarn, the player is given a new character that can be somewhat customised. Species, gender, clothing, and their lightsabre hilt and color are all modifiable.

The addition of dual lightsabres and double bladed lightsabres (ala the end of Episode II and Darth Maul respectively) available to your character and the enemy is also a nice touch.

Several times in the game I got into a particularly intense and enjoyable lightsabre fights that helped to draw me into the game, and I found that lightsabre fights seemed to be more fun than they were in Outcast, especially when I ended up fighting two or three enemy Dark Jedi, lightning bolts and force push being used in abundance.

JA allows you to customise your force power progression by awarding you force points to go towards your secondary force powers (Force Heal, Lightning, Grip, Absorb, Rage, ect). Each time you complete a mission, you get a force point that you can spend towards whichever secondary force power of your choice, a nice touch since it lets you concentrate on developing the force powers you care most about.

The Bad:
My major gripe about this game has to do with the basic storyline. I am not really concerned with whether or not they kept consistant with the Star Wars movies/universe, but I DO want to have a storyline that makes me interested in the character and the conflict that character finds him/herself in. Jedi Academy did not produce that for me. The game never really got me interested in my character. Your character is never given a history, and I found the character development practically non-existant. Maybe I am expecting too much, but I thought they did a fairly good job in Outcast, so I was hoping for more than I got.

The missions in JA were also a dissapointment. The game starts out with two short missions that seem designed to get you used to the game and to introduce the main characters more than anything. The real missions that follow are broken up into two categories: what I call "side missions," and the storyline missions. You are given five "side missioins" to choose from, and once you have successfully completed four, you can choose to go to the first storyline mission. This mission design is repeated several times for a total of roughly 15 side missions and 3 or 4 storyline missions. My problem with this setup is that some of the side missioins felt as if they were designed for another game. That is not to say that they weren't fun, only that I had no real sense of why I was going off to complete a mission that had no real impact on the game as a whole. They felt more like filler to me than well designed and implimented missions. Why do I need to run into a bunch of "Tremors" rip-offs on a desert planet in order to advance the storyline?

The character voices in the game left something to be desired. There is only one male and one female voice actor for the main character, and neither one of them really seemed to fit the alien species I could have chosen for my main character.

The force powers themselves came as something of a disapointment to me as well. Being able to force heal while fighting, or to use grip on an enemy dark jedi and fling them over the ledge of a cliff seemed a little anti-climactic to me.

Most of my battles saw me fighting a couple of dark jedi, taking some hits, defeating them, force healing, and then repeating these steps once I ran into the next one. In this way the game became very repetative. It seemed to deginerate into constant lightsabre battles without much rhyme or reason. I would have liked to have seen a better developed AI that reacted more true to life than as scripted as the game felt. At one point in my game I ran into three dark jedi whom I seperated by shooting at one of them (thereby activating that dark jedi) and then defeated him while the other two dark jedi just sat there, even though they were in visiual range of my fight with their AI friend.

My conclusion is that the single player version is a good buy for those of you who have to have all things Star Wars or those of you who love almost constant lightsabre fights and not a whole lot else. I personally think Jedi Academy is only better than Outcast in the area of lightsabre fights, and I think the story and missions are actually worse than they were in Outcast.

I first started playing this game when I was little. And a few months ago, I said, "I can't remember anything about Jedi Academy, so I think I'll play it." To make a long story short, this game is awesome. But I think you would probably rather hear my entire opinion about this game, so here we go.

This game had an enjoyable (if not unpredictable) storyline with fairly realistic characters. The levels were cool, and the creators of the game did an excellent job in making the planets and objectives different each time. The boss levels were really cool as well, and I thought that they did an especially good job with Vjun. I thought it was neat how the character creation was made. You can choose a main outfit color, a hairstyle, and the torso and legs of your character's outfit.

However, I'm not crazy about the fact that you can't choose your own name. I understand that this is for good dialogue in the cinematic parts, but I like making up crazy new names. The battles are a bit repetitive, with the mercenaries and stormtroopers the easiest. Although I have to admit that it was a nice change when they introduced the big stormtroopers. I found that there were two extremely difficult levels (the one with the sandworms and the one with the mutated rancor), but other than that, the levels were fairly easy. I especially enjoyed the level with the swoop bikes.

In short, I loved this game! I love to replay it over and over again. Plus, I found that it was cool that it works on Windows Vista. You see, my dad switched my computer over to Vista when I had just finished the game for the first time. I highly recommend this game. I also think it was good that there was no blood in the fight scenes.

NOTE: Amazon seems to have combined reviews for many separate games in one area. This review is for Jedi Academy.

In yet another chapter of the ongoing Star Wars gaming empire, you are a young trainee in the Jedi School of Lightsabers and Force Powers.

It seems that every new scene in this game has you running into one of the Classic Heroes of the storyline - Luke Skywalker, Kyle Katarn, Chewbacca, Princess Leia, etc. And each of the characters quotes their traditional lines - "I've got a bad feeling about this" ... "I sense a disturbance in the force" ... etc.

I'm a big, big fan of the Star Wars saga but I have to admit that it would have been nicer if they left those cameos as special treats, instead of making you feel like, even though you're a brand new trainee, you were plunked right into the middle of the most important characters in the rebel alliance!

The graphics are really great, with a lot of detail on faces and weapons. While it was nice that you could customize your main character, they only had 3 presets for male and another 3 for female - and they didn't match up. So while you could be a male Rhodian, you couldn't be a *female* Rhodian which is what I really wanted to be. There were only 3 faces to choose from and a few shirts. Most role playing games out there nowadays give you much more flexibility so this was disappointing.

You start out with simple training sessions to learn about lightsaber use, force pushes and pulls, and so on. Your master is Kyle, and soon you and Kyle are heading off planet to do various tasks for the Jedi.

While the game gives you a good mix of combat and puzzle, I have to admit I felt very much like Super Mario at times, working to jump-jump-jump up a series of blocks ... falling down if the jump wasn't timed just right and starting over again. The combat gets better in later levels but at the beginning it's easy for it to turn into a button mashing contest.

Definitely a good game for any Star Wars fan to get, but I recommend the MMORPG Star Wars Galaxies for anyone looking for a real RPG experience. The character creation, development and combat feels much more rewarding in Galaxies. But those looking for a quick fix will find it here!

I'll be brief, I played Jedi Knight 2 a lot. A lot of single and multiplayer.
I got this game just to be fair, as JK2 was getting old.

HOLY CRAP. This game is awesome. It fixed everything I disliked about JK2. The slow motion add on scenes are the coolest thing in any video game ever.
The plot rolls along smooth enough, pretty linear, but hey thats what multi player is for.

To those of you who aren't convinced.
Dual lightsabers.
Double sided light saber.
And new cool shock gun.

This is a great game for those with limited time to play, who want to be able to use force powers (and choose which ones they want) design a lightsaber to use from the get-go, and use a character template to design how you want your character to look (albeit with limitations).

May not be as interesting to those who want a more 'Knights of the Old Republic' experience to their game, with KOTOR being considerably more textured in story and possibilities, but great for those of us who want an easy to handle adventure in a comfortable universe, complete with a lightsaber to swing!

I have to confess that, even though I played the earlier Star Wars themed games like Dark Forces and Jedi Knight, I just couldn't get into them. The main problem I was having was that it all seemed too familiar. I know they were all well made games, but with all the blaster fire, puzzle solving, and platform jumping, it just felt like I was playing "Doom with Stormtroopers." Enter the battles of Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy.

From the outset, you realize this game is all about light saber battles. This may or may not be a big plus for you, but it's what I expected from the very first Star Wars themed game. Even as an inexperienced jedi, you can easily deflect blaster fire like it "ain't no thang." Since most of your opponents can do the same, your blaster quickly becomes second fiddle. You start off the game as a new student on the way to the academy to learn the ways of the force when you are thrust into battle against a cult of jedi (outcasts?) who seem to have developed a way to drain force power from the universe. Your training turns into trial-by-fire as you are sent to investigate this mysterious cult and learn what their plans are.

As you are assigned to different missions, you are given a choice of light sabers and various force powers to can add points to. These include Light powers such as Push, Pull, Protection, and Heal, and Dark powers like Lightning, Grip, Rage, and Drain. As you complete each mission, your skill levels increase and your force powers increase their effectiveness as a result. While this is a nice touch, you start to wonder what the purpose of the academy is, considering you're not learning anything there.

No matter, the focus of this game is on jedi battles, and that is where this game shines. We're not just talking one-on-one battles either, but against multiple opponents at times and Jedi Academy really blows the roof off close quarter fighting. You have multiple fighting styles you can specialize in, such as Fast (to defeat your enemies through sheer speed) or Strong (used to overwhelm an opponent's defenses.) Your fighting moves vary dramatically depending on which type of saber you select and, most importantly, the battles have the same intensity as they do in the movies. Blades crashing make the screen explode in color and kills cause a slow motion camera spin around the victim which adds a cinematic effect to the battle. As you progress through the game, the enemies get much tougher so it pays to learn combinations of force powers you can use with special saber moves. Simply hacking away at an enemy may work at the beginning, but it'll get you killed later on.

The story itself is a little ho-hum, but at least the levels are a treat to look at. Depending on which mission you select, you'll find yourself battling opponents on Hoth, Corsucant, or Tatooine and you'll even run into some familiar characters from the movies and earlier games.

Finally, I run this on a fairly dated 1Ghz Athlon with 512MB Ram and a Geforce2 Ultra without problems at 1024x768. If you do run into problems, turning the dynamic glow to off, turning the shadows to simple, and turning the anisotropic filter to low or off will give you the most dramatic performance gains.

As a quirky side note, it was a programmer at Raven Software who gave the cinematic effects to the now infamous Star Wars Kid video while this game was in development. While there is no official endorsement I'm aware of, I'm sure Ghyslain would be proud of this game.

Hope the review helped.