Jedi: Fallen Order won't let you dismember people with your lightsaber

Look, I get it. I might be a monster for loving that the original Star Wars Jedi Knight games let you occasionally hack the limbs off of enemies. It only happened rarely (unless you used cheats), but it was a gruesome reminder that even Jedi, for all their talk of control and peace, wield horrifically violent laser swords capable of doing catastrophic bodily harm. So I find it disappointing that Respawn's Jedi: Fallen Order is taking a decidedly PG-rated approach to combat.

It's disappointing because that's clearly not how lightsabers work and it feels like a weird concession to make considering how often the movies have depicted dismemberment via lightsaber. Respawn is likely aiming for a "Teen" ESRB rating for Jedi: Fallen Order.

Combat in Fallen Order doesn't looks bad—I'm really excited by how much Dark Souls DNA is evident in the way Cal fights. Fallen Order feels like it could be a welcome return to the glory of the Jedi Knight games, but seeing limbs fly is one of those little details I'm going to miss.

Correction: This story originally said The Force Unleashed and its sequel didn't have dismemberment but they actually do, so we've fixed that.

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With over 7 years of experience with in-depth feature reporting, Steven's mission is to chronicle the fascinating ways that games intersect our lives. Whether it's colossal in-game wars in an MMO, or long-haul truckers who turn to games to protect them from the loneliness of the open road, Steven tries to unearth PC gaming's greatest untold stories. His love of PC gaming started extremely early. Without money to spend, he spent an entire day watching the progress bar on a 25mb download of the Heroes of Might and Magic 2 demo that he then played for at least a hundred hours. It was a good demo.