Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy

"Welcome to the Academy"

Jedi Academy is the sequel to Jedi Outcast. It's a great game, with the same lightsaber action and Star Wars excitement.

Story 10/10
You play as Jaden Kor, a new student to the Jedi Academy. Simple, learn the ways of the force and become a jedi. But the training is thwarted by a Sith cult known as the Disciples of Ragnos, who are stealing force energy from different planets. They plan to revive an old sith lord, and it's up to the Jedi Knights to stop them. It's a really interesting story.

Gameplay 9/10
The gameplay is exactly the same as Jedi Outcast, so there's nothing that's really new to the combat. A cool feature is that you design your own character. You can make him a male or female, and either a human, Kel Dor, Twilek, Rodian, or Zabrak. You choose their head style, tunic, and leg clothing. You can now pick your own force powers, which is a good thing. You start off with jump, push, pull, speed and sense as your neutral powers. At the start of each level, you can choose your own powers, light or dark. So you can go totally light side or totally dark side...it's your choice. Another cool new feature is that later in the game you can choose your own lightsaber type. You can now have dual sabers or a staff (2 sided). This adds a whole new combat experience to the gameplay. But if you want, you can still choose a single lightsaber. There is also some new weapons, such as the concussion rifle and the heavy blaster pistol. A mission select system also lets you pick your own missions.

Sound 10/10
As always, Star Wars games have excellent sound and music. Lightsaber locks, blaster shots, everything is really good.

Graphics 8/10
The graphics aren't as good as modern games, but they're still ok. The lightsaber is nicely detailed, along with the weapons. The character models are good, although their animation may lag from time to time. The environment is also well done, although some areas look flat. For those of you who aren't bothered by things like this, then it shouldn't be a problem.

Multiplayer 8/10
The multiplayer is better than Outcast's. You can choose more characters (not to mention designing your own character), your own lightsaber style, and set up custom rules. You can also play with up to 8 people LAN, or 10 on Xbox live. There is 2 new modes. Power duel is when 2 players team up against 1 strong player. This is cool because you need to use teamwork to defeat the lone opponent. It can be 2 human players against a cp, a human with a cp against the other human, or 2 cps against the human player. The other mode is called Siege. I never tried this mode yet, since it only for LAN or Xbox live games. But what the game is about is that 2 teams compete against each other by doing several objectives. One team tries to accomplish the goals, while the other team tries to stop them. The only bad thing about the multiplayer is that you can't pick your own bots, which is really junk. They are always random, unlike Jedi Outcast where you can pick your own.

Overall 8/10
Jedi Academy is a good game with lots of action. It's a must for Star Wars fans, but to others it is just a repeat of Jedi Outcast. I recomment buying this game.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 02/13/04