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Star Wars Jedi: Survivor’s Sequel Must Inherit Both Games’ Most Challenging Tradition

5 months ago
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Highlights

  • Star Wars Jedi: Survivor offers expansive gameplay with semi-open world exploration on Koboh alone.
  • Like its predecessor, Survivor features challenging optional bosses, such as the rancor on Koboh.
  • A third Jedi title has more to learn from Oggdo Bogdo than the rancor and can hopefully continue Respawn’s tradition of arduous optional bosses.



Enough time has passed since its launch and if that’s when most players beat it and moved on it can be difficult to remember precisely how expansive and lengthy Star Wars Jedi: Survivor turns out to be. Even without considering a third act that follows Jedha’s devastation and Dagan Gera’s death, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is a massive semi-open-world game considering the degree of exploration on Koboh alone. However, both games in Respawn’s Star Wars Jedi franchise share storytelling similarities, such as how they choose to make a tutorial out of their respective openings and introduce players to the larger galaxy ahead of them thereafter.


It’s expected that the third Star Wars Jedi game will do the same, and in doing so it must accept a responsibility its predecessors have wielded to great effect. Like Fallen Order and Survivor before it, a third entry needs an optional boss that players can test their might against in a fight that’s purposefully overwhelming due to it being available early on and intended for players to return to when they’re better equipped; in Fallen Order it was the infamous Oggdo Bogdo on Bogano, whereas in Survivor it was a rancor on Koboh that players are pushed into the direction of as one of the earliest optional side quests to embark on.

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Fallen Order’s Oggdo Bogdo is a Surprising Nuisance on an Otherwise Peaceful Planet


Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order’s Oggdo Bogdo is a vicious and deceptively quick foe whose move-set isn’t terribly distinct from regular oggdos, who are terrifying in their own right, and therefore it’s a wonderful optional boss because there are clear ways to eventually overcome it. Battling oggdos can prepare players for particular attacks the tongue-lashing threat will employ, for instance, and players will naturally be better equipped if they come back later on.

Oggdo Boggdo is by no means impossible to defeat the first time players arrive on Bogano, though. All it takes is patience telegraphing Oggdo Bogdo’s instantaneous attack patterns and a learned knowledge of the formidable creature’s hitboxes to succeed. Plus, Fallen Order actually gives players a big chunk of damage on Oggdo Bogdo for free if they perform a prompted plunging attack on the enormous amphibian from above.

Either way, players don’t have a huge incentive to kill Oggdo Bogdo early because they won’t be able to access the loot it guards—and the
revered pink poncho for Cal Kestis
within it—until players have retrieved the ability for BD-1 to slice locked chests, though there is also a third of a Life Essence.


Survivor then brought the nostalgia of this encounter back with a surprise encounter on Koboh against Oggdo Bogdo’s spawn, but unfortunately that special moment, however tedious, is doubled down on to horrible effect with a Force Tear that pits players against both the spawn and Oggdo itself. Nonetheless, Oggdo Bogdo remains a terrific optional fight introduced at the beginning of the original game and the sequel doesn’t disappoint with its own.

Survivor’s Rancor is an Early-Game Treat the Sequel Exploits to a Fault


It can take a little while to get to since Star Wars Jedi: Survivor’s opening on Coruscant is quite long and it takes Cal and BD-1 a lengthy bit of time before they finally reach the wide-open region of Koboh, but eventually players may encounter a rancor deep within a mine where Cal can be sent to search for lost prospectors. The rancor is introduced brilliantly—before players is a cavern where a boss fight is fully predictable given its arena-like stage, but the rancor waits to slowly creep out from behind a rocky pillar and reveal itself until players hop in.

Much like Oggdo Bogdo, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor’s rancor boss deals crushing damage with one- or two-hit kills and is tremendously tanky. Rather, the difference between them in terms of difficulty cannot be overstated as the rancor, if fought against tirelessly and diligently early in the game, can take much longer to slay. The rancor also doesn’t have an opening in a ceiling players can plunge down onto it from.

The only exploit players have is that they can pull a Luke Skywalker and Force Push a bone into the rancor’s mouth to temporarily stun it, though the damage players can deal in that small window likely isn’t enough to make a drastic difference.


The reward for killing the rancor is also much more substantial than the reward for killing Oggdo Bogdo—players complete the side quest they had embarked on, earn a ton of XP, and receive a perk that’s incredibly valuable in Star Wars Jedi: Survivor if they’re able to conquer the rancor that early in the game, which is precisely the reward an optional boss fight of that magnitude should provide. This rancor isn’t horribly iconic aside from its role as an arduous adversary, especially since more rancors are encountered later in the game.

In the same way that a cool and seemingly rare moment was robbed of Oggdo Bogdo for the sequel, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor also regurgitates its rancor with a double rancor Force Tear challenge. If the side quest rancor boss fight wasn’t grueling enough for players to begrudgingly lower their difficulty settings then this Force Tear will surely pressure that resolve, and it’s disappointing because the lone rancor could’ve been outstanding if it was the only one.


Instead, it doesn’t even end up being the hardest rancor encounter. So while Star Wars Jedi: Survivor’s sequel probably will and absolutely should reprise its early-game optional boss threats, it will hopefully make its own memorable and special like Oggdo Bogdo was in Fallen Order.

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