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Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is being review-bombed on Steam as a ‘total crap’ PC port

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Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is off to a bad start. The game launched to Mostly Negative reviews on Steam, with only 34% of the over 2,000 reviews being positive. That’s around the same level as the disastrous The Last of Us Part One PC port released in March, and it’s for the same reason: poor performance.

As pre-release footage showed, the game struggles to maintain a consistent frame rate even on a system equipped with an RTX 4090. Steam reviews claim frame rates around 30 frames per second (fps) at 1440p with an RTX 3090, and many are saying the game consumes upwards of 19GB of video memory with ray tracing turned on.

Star Wars Jedi: Survivor reviews on Steam.
Digital Trends

Low performance, particularly with ray tracing turned on, seems to be the key issue in Star Wars Jedi: Survivor. The game includes AMD’s FidelityFX Super Resolution (FSR) 2, but the high VRAM requirements seem to be leading to crashes and stutters regardless of the upscaling feature.

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Another common issue plaguing users is traversal stutter. Like the previous game, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, Survivor is built with Unreal Engine 4. Going between areas, especially on a large planet like Koboh, results in a massive dip in frame rate while the game struggles to load in new assets.

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In our Star Wars Jedi: Survivor review, we praised the game and the experience it offered on consoles, though noted the minor technical issues still present on the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 versions. The PC release only seems to amplify these problems.

We’ve been testing the early sections of the game with an RTX 4090 and Core i9-13900K and can confirm relatively low performance and consistent traversal stutter. We’ll need to continue testing the larger areas of the game to find out if the issues worsen as the game continues.

Developer Respawn promised a day-one patch to solve major issues, but it seems the team didn’t include some key optimizations. The developer is saying it plans to release patches that address bugs, improve performance, and add more accessibility features “in the weeks ahead.”

Cal’s newest journey in a galaxy far, far away has begun and we’re excited for you to experience it!

Our first patch will arrive on launch day across all platforms. In the weeks ahead, we’ll deploy patches that will:

– Fix bugs
– Improve performance
– Add more accessibility… pic.twitter.com/pUtyoGopP5

— EA Star Wars (@EAStarWars) April 26, 2023

Since the onslaught of negative reviews, Respawn as issued a statement saying it will look into the state of the PC port:

A note from the Jedi Team on the PC version of Star Wars Jedi: Survivor pic.twitter.com/C3bp78VICr

— EA Star Wars (@EAStarWars) April 28, 2023

Unfortunately, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor isn’t an isolated incident. It joins a long list of games that have experienced performance issues on PC that have released this year, including Hogwarts Legacy, Returnal, and Resident Evil 4 Remake. The common thread between them all is crashes and stuttering due to high VRAM requirements.

This new wave of games has pushed VRAM requirements far above what we expected in years past, with some titles consuming 16GB or more with ray tracing turned on. That leads even high-end graphics cards like the RTX 4080 to struggle to maintain a consistent frame rate.

Short of simply having more VRAM on tap, this issue mainly falls in the developer’s lap to find ways to save on VRAM requirements or wind down the scope of the game. As it stands now, it’s hard to trust that most major PC releases will launch in a playable state, even on the most expensive PC money can buy.

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Jacob Roach
Jacob Roach
Lead Reporter, PC Hardware
Jacob Roach is the lead reporter for PC hardware at Digital Trends. In addition to covering the latest PC components, from…
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor ending explained: What happens to Cal, Cere, and Bode?
Bode helps Cal up in Star Wars Jedi: Survivor.

Respawn Entertainment’s Star Wars Jedi: Survivor finally launched on April 28, continuing the story of Jedi Knight Cal Kestis during the Reign of the Empire era. Its predecessor, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, ended with Kal, his mentor Cere, Nightsister Merrin, and Mantis pilot Greez destroying a Holocron with the locations of force-sensitive children on it. Star Wars Jedi: Survivor follows Cal five years after the events of that game as he struggles to balance his well-being with his fight against the Empire and uncovers a new threat linked to The High Republic and a mysterious planet.
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is a lengthy adventure as it takes over 20 hours to experience a story with quite a few twists and turns. Whether you’ve beaten the game and are looking for a recap or want to know how Cal Kestis’ adventures continue, this is a rundown of what happens in Star Wars Jedi: Survivor and how it all coalesces into a somber ending.
This article contains spoilers for Star Wars Jedi: Survivor.
How does Star Wars Jedi: Survivor begin
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor begins with Cal Kestis seemingly captured on Coruscant. While it initially seems like he’s being turned over into the custody of a Utapauian senator, it turns out this is all part of an elaborate heist with a new crew that Cal has been running with since the Mantis crew from the first game disbanded. During this mission, Cal meets Bode Akuna, who tells Cal he’s fighting to protect his daughter Kata from the Empire.

They are eventually able to track down the Utapauian senator’s damaged ship, and all seems to be going well. Unfortunately, they are then ambushed by an Imperial Squad led by the Ninth Sister from the Fallen Order. Cal kills the Ninth Sister and escapes on the Mantis, but everyone but him and Bode is killed, and the Mantis is heavily damaged. With no other choice, he flies to the planet Koboh, where Greez is now living, and crash lands on the planet.
After fighting some of the Bedlam Raiders, led by a powerful Gen’Dai named Rayvis, Cal reunites with Greez. While Greez encourages Cal to settle down, Cal refuses and looks for a piece of technology in the caves beneath Greez’s Saloon. While doing this, he discovers an old ruin from The High Republic era, and frees a droid named ZN-A4 (or Zee) for short, who was sent on a mission by a Jedi Knight named Santari Khri during the High Republic era to find the “Key to Tanalorr.”
Cal investigates this, learning that Santari Khri and a Jedi named Dagan Gera found Tanalorr, a hidden planet beyond the dangerous Koboh Abyss, where they wanted to build a new Jedi base. Cal decides to free Dagan from his Bacta Tank, but he quickly betrays Cal after learning of the Jedi’s fall, adamant about retaking Tanalorr with the help of Rayvis, who owes him a life debt. Now, Cal, Bode, and Greez make it their duty to stop Dagan and potentially claim Tanalorr as a safe haven for themselves.
The quest to stop Dagan Gera
Following this encounter, Cal, Greez, and Bode, who found Cal on Koboh, decide to look for Tanalorr and make it their new home together. Looking for any existing information on Tanalorr, the group decides to go to Jedha, where Cal’s mentor Cere Junda is working with Jedi Master Edo Cordova to rebuild the Jedi Archives and support the Hidden Path, which protects force-sensitive people from the Empire.

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Star Wars Jedi: Survivor offers a big glimpse into Disney’s High Republic era
star wars jedi survivor high republic facility

After Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, it will be impossible for Star Wars fans to ignore The High Republic era. Once limited to books, Disney is starting to make the fictional time period matter a lot more to the overarching narrative of Star Wars. If upcoming shows like The Acolyte weren’t already an indication of that to you, then The High Republic’s presence and relevance in Survivor will be. Although the game isn't set during The High Republic -- it takes place in the Reign of the Empire time period between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope -- characters and locations heavily tied to that era play a major role in the game's narrative. 

For a significant chunk of Cal Kestis’ latest adventure, he’s going toe-to-toe with Dagan Gera, a Jedi from The High Republic era that was sustained in a Bacta Tank for hundreds of years after betraying the Jedi Order. Especially on Koboh and the Shattered Moon, players will explore a lot of High Republic facilities and learn more about how the Jedi Order functioned and trained new Jedi at its height, and be able to contrast that with Cal's current situation. 
So, what exactly is The High Repbulic, and why does it matter? This is what you need to know as the franchise looks to a new era.
What is The High Republic?
The High Republic is the third of nine Star Wars eras designated by Disney. It’s snuggled between The Old Republic, which we see in the aptly named Knights of the Old Republic, and the Fall of the Jedi era seen throughout the Star Wars prequel film saga. Disney first unveiled it in 2020, and Lucasfilm described it as “an era when the Galactic Republic and Jedi Order are at their zenith, about 200 years before Star Wars: The Phantom Menace" in a blog post.

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All perks in Star Wars Jedi: Survivor
Cal Kestis with BD-1 droid on his shoulder.

Star Wars Jedi: Survivor has a wide variety of skills to learn alongside its five unique lightsaber stances, ensuring you have no shortage of ways to customize your playstyle. The addition of perks bumps up those options even further, granting you the ability to equip badges that improve certain aspects of protagonist Cal Kestis' kit, such as increasing XP earned or improving his ability to break the guard of his foes. Some are found by exploring, while others are purchased from a particular vendor and unlocked fairly early in the game. A handful of perks are unlocked only after beating the game and starting New Game Plus.

Each of these perks uses a certain number of perk slots when equipped, so you'll have to make some tough decisions about which ones you want to have active at any one time. Luckily, exploring the galaxy will net you some additional perk slots, so you'll be able to equip more as you get further in your adventure. Even with all of the perk slots unlocked, however, you'll still want to strongly consider which perks will benefit you best. We'll make that a bit easier on you by listing all of the perks you can find in Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, what boons they offer, and how many perk slots they'll take up.
Perks discovered by exploring
These perks are found by thoroughly exploring the world and completing objectives. You may have to overcome some pretty tough challenges to find them all.

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