Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order Review - I Tried to Find My Way Off of Zeffo. I Failed.
The only thing I found was myself powerless against The Game.
I was quite enjoying my time with Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order until I became irretrievably lost.
I had just finished a series of puzzles in a temple on the planet Zeffo. The Game told me to return to my ship in order to leave Zeffo, so I attempted to leave Zeffo. I wandered around for several minutes through the caves and surfaces of Zeffo before I realized:
I had no idea how to leave Zeffo.
I must be missing something, I thought. I opened my map and poked around a bit. I identified what seemed like a route back to the ship. I used it. It was not the route. I came to a bent bridge that I could use my shiny new Force Push ability to push down, but I was on the wrong side of it, across a canyon that was too large to clear with my standard jump.
I had to find another way.
So I wandered back through the caves a little more. Still, I couldn’t find my way back to my ship. I went spelunking for several minutes before I caved myself and looked up how to get out.
All of the written advice said to return to the ice caves. I opened my map of Zeffo and scanned for an area that looked like ice caves. The different sections of Zeffo weren’t labeled, so I wasn’t sure exactly where the ice caves were.
I had another thought: a video. That would save me.
I looked up a video, but all of them started from the end of the last cutscene, just after finishing the temple. But at this point I had already wandered to some godforsaken area way the fuck away from that location.
I popped open my map again. Maybe I could get back to that location and then follow the video from there. I spun the map around, zoomed in and out, looking for a way back to where I was before. The features on the map began to blur together.
My head began to hurt. I found myself growing thirsty. Water. That was what I needed. Some water would surely help me reorient myself. Some time away from the screen as well to rest my eyes. Both of those together would give me the key.
I poured myself a glass of water in the kitchen and stared at the wall, actively dissociating from my body. I was floating above myself while I thought about Zeffo. I was enjoying The Game’s combat and gameplay loop quite a bit. Soulslike, but with some nice polish and quality of life improvements. But Zeffo was actively diminishing my quality of life. I did not want it to do this. I did not want this to be the thing that kept me from continuing with The Game.
I finished my water, returned to my body, and went back to my PC. I picked up the controller and opened the map of Zeffo again.
All urge to continue had left my body. I looked at the clock. I had been trying to find my way off of Zeffo for an hour.
My backlog stalked my axons one at a time, flitting down behind my eyelids but still over my eyes as I stared at the map of Zeffo.
I closed out of The Game. Cal Kestis would be forever stranded on Zeffo. Because of me. I tried to forget him and called it a night, but he was in my dreams, running in circles across Zeffo.
I had failed him, and the entire Star Wars franchise.
But Zeffo had defeated me. There was no going back.
The Game was fun while it lasted, though.
