Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order features a combat system akin to From Software games like Dark Souls and Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, in that it’s complex, precise, and demands patience. But unlike those games, you do have a choice over which difficulty you want to play. Whether you’re an action game veteran or a casual Star Wars fan, the game has a difficulty to accommodate your skill level.
For more Star Wars Jedi: Fallen order guides, check out our beginner’s guide and our feature on the best skills to unlock first. You can also read our full review. Otherwise, read on below for more details on how difficulty works and which one is right for you.
Choosing The Right Difficulty
Difficulty doesn’t work quite the same in Fallen Order as it does in most games. Instead of influencing how much health enemies have, the difficulty affects your parry window and enemy aggression. There are four difficulties in general: Story Mode, Jedi Knight, Jedi Master, and Jedi Grandmaster. The parry window shrinks, and enemy aggression increases with each subsequent difficulty setting. In the table below, you can see how these factors are measured in detail:
If you’re familiar with action games or dabble in similar fast-paced genres, we highly recommend Jedi Master for your first run; Jedi Knight is too forgiving and doesn’t provide nearly enough meaningful challenge. That said, if you’ve never touched these kinds of games in your life, we wholeheartedly recommend Jedi Knight and advise you avoid Story Mode, so you can at least get a sense of the tense thrills that Fallen Order’s combat provides.
For FromSoftware fans–particularly those who loved this year’s Sekiro–we recommend starting on Jedi Grandmaster first and seeing how you feel. Parry timing is a doozy to get used to at first, mainly if you’re used to Sekiro’s parry timing. Give it some time and see where the road takes you. It’s quite the challenge playing on Jedi Grandmaster, but it’s well worth taking on if you’re a sucker for punishment and got the patience and reflexes. Though note that parrying isn’t always the most reliable, so try not to come at this difficulty thinking you can be the Star Wars universe version of the One-Armed Wolf. Fallen Order welcomes parrying, but you can be just as successful with dodging and attacking at the right moment. If all else fails, switch down to Jedi Master and don’t look back!
Regardless of which you choose, know that there are no Achievements/Trophies tied to difficulty, and you’re not penalized for switching, which you can do at any time via the settings menu. So try the game on all four difficulties when you first boot up the game. You have nothing to lose, and it may help you figure out which difficulty is right for you.