I finished my third playthrough

[Corona Scurrae]

And since this one was on PC instead of console, I wanted to share my thoughts about this compared to the sequel and maybe help people who are hesitant about the value of this game compared to it's sequel.

First let me get the performance out of the way. It's not terrible but if you have a console then definitely play it on console because on PC there are still many glaring visual bugs and most of the stuttering I witnessed happen on kashyyk during the climbing sections. Outside of that my 1%lows were solid. Obviously this is unreal engine and traversal stuttering is part of the deal however it happens outside of combat or important sections of the game.

Second combat leaves a lot to be desired for anyone who played this after sekiro. It's not a smooth experience no matter which platform you choose to play fallen order. I've had many instances in which enemies attacks would not register or said enemies would get stuck in place and made it easy for me to get rid of them.
Additionally ranged enemies tend to constantly lose aggro and regain it, making some arenas an uncomfortable experience on grand master difficulty.
Enemy variety is commendable however not all of them are fun to fight. In some cases the devs forget what they learned in sekiro - namely to keep the player constantly engaged - and have you waiting until the opponent is ready to strike again. For example some bosses will ignore already established rules in order to - what I imagine - make it "difficult". The last boss in particular suffers from this.

Level design is not good either. Linear hallways with the occasional "open" area that have you discover gaudy looking skins for your character, ship and robot companion. You certainly don't require to look up every nook and cranny - similar to sekiro's mediocre level design - since most of the skins - imo - don't look good and the occasional extra life, stim and force meter upgrades are not required to finish this game.

Next is the story... Which is bewilderingly awful. You'd think a padawan on the run, cut off from the force for years and in constant fear of prosecution, reconnecting to his past and partaking in the fight to overthrow the empire, is a foolproof premise.
However for reasons I can't explain they fail hard at delivering a good narrative. You spent most of the game finding the coordinates for force-sensitive children and then for a minute the protagonist has an epiphany - what if we endanger the kids on the list? - and destroys the object you spent the entire game to find.

But I gotta give them credit where credit is due. Music, atmosphere and the scenery are top notch. Despite the fact it's a last gen game, it looks stunning at 4k.

In the end it's still a relatively fun souls-like with some minor and major issues the devs fixed and improved in the sequel. It's not something you would tell your friends to play or - imho - worth considering to acquire during a sale when the sequel improved and elevated the experience