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Review: Star Wars Jedi Knight II: Jedi OutcastReviewed By: Kirk Hiner Review Date: December 10, 2002
WARNING: Plot spoilers included. I'm going to buck convention. For the first time in my reviewing history, in the reviewing history of Applelinks, and maybe even the reviewing history of the world, I'm going to review a Star Wars game without offering my opinions on the movies or relaying some personal Star Wars anecdote from my childhood. No jabs at Jar-Jar, no homages to Boba Fett. Just the game. Well, just the game and Billy Dee Williams. I think I can follow this: Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast is the sequel to Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II, which was the sequel to Dark Forces. So, I guess the next game will be called Jedi Outcast II: Outcast Knight, or something like that. Either way, the series will never seem old because we'll forever be playing the second chapter. Fresh. Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II never made it to the Macintosh. Back when these things used to upset me, this upset me because Dark Forces was one of my favorite first-person shooters at that time. Still is, actually. I'm not sure if it was the familiarity with the scenario, the really cool and (mostly) intelligent level design, or the simple fact that it rocked. In it, you played Kyle Katarn, a rogue mercenary-type who was unfortunately named after a designer perfume, it would seem. It's not too difficult to imagine a scented, full-page ad in Cosmopolitan for Dark Forces: The New Scent by Kyle Katarn. It may smell perty, but Kyle himself looks a little too much like Kenny Loggins, if you ask me.  Anyway, although it's a bit hazy, I'm pretty sure Kyle wasn't a Jedi in Dark Forces. So, somewhere in Dark Forces II, Kyle must've become one. He also must have turned down the job, since we begin Jedi Outcast with no lightsaber; just a laser gun and a girlfriend. When that girlfriend is captured and...uh...killed (sure, we'll pretend we believed that) by another Jedi outcast named Desaan (the Jedis really need to work on their incentive program to keep their members happy), Kyle decides he needs the Force to exact his revenge, and he returns to The Valley of the Jedi--which is just a few miles from The Valley of the Gwangi, I'm told--to punch up his Jedi powers. He then goes to visit Luke Skywalker to get back his lightsaber back. Luke Skywalker is not played by Mark Hamill, but that's no big deal. The guy who does the voice acting sounds close enough. Now, here's what I like and don't like about this story. I like that Kyle seeks out the Force to seek out revenge. Sure, the revenge is to be exacted against bad guys, but we all know what happens when the Force is fueled by hate. Already, this is interesting. Luke, whom you'd think would know better, just gives Kyle some friendly words of advice and a stern warning, then lets him have at it. You'll see why in a bit. What I didn't like is that there's a Valley of the Jedi at all. How convenient it must be for the Jedi to just go fill up on the Force like it's gasoline or something. "Yeah, Luke, you fill up. I'm going to see if I can get the restroom key then pick up a bag of Combos cheese filled pretzel snacks. You want anything?" But whatever. I'll assume this was better explained in Jedi Knight. I'll assume that Kyle's dead dad was better explained as well. Perhaps it's just a Star Wars thing that everyone has to have a dead dad. That's very Disneyesque, really, the single parent thing, and I don't think it'll be too long before Disney buys the rights to Star Wars, anyway. Disney's Star Wars On Ice. Bring the kids. Ewoks everywhere.
Here's the benefit of all this: Desaan uses the Valley of the Jedi to create an army of...uh...sort-of-Jedis. These are guys with lightsabers (who manufactures lightsabers, by the way, and why are they so easy to come by?) and Force powers, but who aren't really Jedis. The cool thing about this is that it gives you plenty of guys with whom to have lightsaber duels, and the lightsaber is the best thing about this game. Actually, all the Force powers are the best thing about this game. You can push enemies down, pull them towards you, hit them with electricity, mind-trick them, and even do that super-cool throat grip thing that Vader did in Star Wars Episode IV. Let me tell you how cool it is to pick up a Stormtrooper with Force grip, swing him out over a precipice, and drop him to his death. I also enjoyed slamming them into walls, although that didn't seem to damage them. While dueling these fake Jedis (Reborn, I believe they're called) and other enemies, it becomes quite handy to use your Force powers in new and inventive ways. For instance, it was quite fun for me to Force Jump as high as possible, then Force Pull my enemies into the air with me. I would land safely, and they would...not. Perhaps that's not how Jedis are to behave, but I'm an Outcast, remember? Who knows if I'll turn to the Dark Side? The Force powers increase in number and in strength as the game goes on. Stormtroopers, Imperial guards and such become nothing more than minor annoyances despite their numbers (you can deflect their laser attacks back at them, so there's no need to even put your lightsaber away), but that's as it should be. You're a Jedi, after all. The Reborns, however, are quite a chore.
Although most of the levels looked and felt exactly the same, they were laid out well and were wide open. They felt big, like a Star Wars game should. Graphically, they performed as well as they looked. Even where some older games that don't look as nice give trouble to my 867MHz G4 with 640MB RAM and a RADEON 8500, Jedi Outcast performed nearly flawlessly. There were a few slow-downs in wide areas with plenty of enemies, but I was still able to get through them without having to lower the resolution or detail. Of course, there were some bad things, too. For instance, the comments from the enemies sometimes made no sense. Quite often, as I attacked a Stormtrooper, he would say, "Get behind him," although there was no one else there. Perhaps he was trying to use the Jedi Mind Trick on me. Or maybe Stormtroopers are only taught three or four battle strategies in Stormtrooper Battle Strategy School and he was just repeating them out loud to recall which would work best. And when they do try to get behind you, they will, come hell or high water. They would try to run past me, and if I backed up, they'd just keep right on trying until we hit a wall, or I killed them. I guess Stormtroopers really are stupid. They also had a habit of saying things after I killed them. At least none of them ever said they were my father. Perhaps more annoying, a lot of Kyle's comments were swallowed up by ambient noises. The sound of my lightsaber scraping against a communication console would drown out what I was supposed to hear. Okay, my fault, but a lot of times I'd be attacked while Kyle was commenting on something. No way to avoid this, no way to hear what he was saying. I should point out now that the audio in this game may be the best I've ever heard. The audio effects and soundtrack (is there a more instantly recognizable score than John Williams' music from Star Wars...other than Jaws, perhaps?) sound better than those from many big budget movies I've seen recently. Everything from the explosions to the hissing and popping of the lightsaber as it hits water sounds just as it should, I think...not overblown in an effort to sound cooler. Very well done.
The story builds to a decent climax, although the characters refuse to show emotion or react throughout. Kyle tries hard to react to Jan's death, and Jan tries hard to show passion when she and Kyle kiss, but they end up looking like kids in an elementary school Christmas pageant. Still, I guess that's the way George Lucas prefers it. Oh, and there's a multiplayer element. It has some interesting variations on the traditional multiplayer games, mostly involving the use of Force powers. Whatever. I found multiplayer to be more useful for practice than anything else. Set up a server, create a bunch of Reborn bots, then start hacking away with your lightsaber. Am I the only one who takes advantage of multiplayer capabilities for strictly single player purposes? Now, here's the thing I don't get. Actor Billy Dee Williams reprises his role as Lando Calrissian in this game. Good to see him. I liked Lando. But Mark Hamill couldn't be bothered to do the voiceover for Luke. Is he, as an actor, doing so much better than Billy that he couldn't bothered to do this? If so, how sad is that for Billy? Regardless, Star Wars Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast is as fun as I'd hoped it would be. Although it was plenty of the same thing throughout (I still prefer Red Faction for variation in a first-person shooter, although Jedi Outcast does let you control one of those AT-ST things for a while, and that was pretty sweet), the levels were big and fun, and the game remained challenging without becoming impossible; nearly every major enemy had a simple solution for killing it if you could find it. [Hint: Looking for an easier way to kill Desaan at the end? Use the environment to your advantage.] The characters may not have a lot of personality, but we're used to that with Star Wars movies and their by-products. Maybe this is done to make the action figures seem more life-like. Oh, I said I was going to avoid commenting on the movies. Sorry about that. I'll make it up with more praise for the game: With a couple rare exceptions, LucasArts has created some of the best action games available on any platform, and Jedi Outcast is no exception. Here's hoping that many more of them make it to the Macintosh...and that more of them feature Billy Dee Williams. Next time, though, I'd like to see him drinking Schlitz Malt Liquor.  [an error occurred while processing this directive]
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Kyle's kind of a bonehead, I guess, because it seems to me he should've known that Desaan, a Jedi dropout himself, would follow him to the Valley of the Jedi. Oh, did I not mention that only Kyle and his "dead" girlfriend, Jan Orrs, knew the location of the Valley of the Jedi, apparently? Well, now, so does Desaan. And Kyle told Luke, so now he knows, too. So, great, now everybody's going to know, and it won't be too long before they start putting up hotels and mini-malls and TGIFriday's restaurants.
Still, it's the lightsaber that truly rocks. There are three different methods of using it, each having its strengths and weaknesses against the various enemies. I found it best to stick with defensive mode, which allowed Kyle to remain relatively unharmed until I could figure out what were his enemy's weaknesses and decide which attack method would best exploit them (as with most fighting games, executing attacks in the proper order produces special attacks that are much more deadly). Defensive mode is also best for blocking attacks from the more "clumsy or random" blaster attacks. Lasers are useless against Kyle when he's armed with a lightsaber and he's facing the right direction. However, although the more aggressive methods leave you open to attack, they can shorten your battles (for better or worse), and the attacks look cooler when the game switches to slow motion when a kill is made.
Although the levels are quite fun, many of them really don't make any sense (and load slowly, but I guess that's to be expected). There are gigantic chasms in many of them that appear to serve no purpose other than to look cool and provide danger. Perhaps that's the way architecture is planned in the Star Wars universe, and I suppose there's nothing wrong with that. It may also explain why so few ledges, no matter how high up they are, have railings. Apparently, they don't have to worry about lawyers or workers' unions.