Realistically, how good was it for its time and how does it hold up today? Also, why? I guess I'm talking mainly the vanilla SP and MP, but it's hard to ignore mods and user-made levels in this question.
I feel like JK was genuinely a good game. It has aged rather poorly in various ways, but I think some of its greatest strengths still shine through today. The level design is pretty solid, the diverging duality between Jedi and Sith and how Kyle will end up in the player's hands is cool, the bosses vary in quality but are rather enjoyable with their introductions and all, the force powers are both a fun power trip and a set of useful tools, etc. The lightsaber is also great to have but I can never get over how much more fun that particular weapon was in JO/JA.
As for the multiplayer, objectively I would say Quake 2 was far ahead in those days. Still, I've played LOADS more JK MP than any Quake. But I'm also a guy who clocked most of those hours playing sabers nf, a way of playing the game which, by eliminating the Force powers, probably eliminated the one element that made JK MP special for a good portion of its players.
Then there's MotS. I've played so little of it that I won't say anything.
As for user-made levels and mods, well, we're on Massassi here. To us, that stuff kept the game alive for many years. Even quite recently we've had some level releases for JK that have been more than worthwhile.
All in all, I would say it's a heavily outdated game with strengths that are still apparent to this day to anyone looking past its quirks and clunky old mechanics.
But that may be just nostalgic bias talking.
I feel like JK was genuinely a good game. It has aged rather poorly in various ways, but I think some of its greatest strengths still shine through today. The level design is pretty solid, the diverging duality between Jedi and Sith and how Kyle will end up in the player's hands is cool, the bosses vary in quality but are rather enjoyable with their introductions and all, the force powers are both a fun power trip and a set of useful tools, etc. The lightsaber is also great to have but I can never get over how much more fun that particular weapon was in JO/JA.
As for the multiplayer, objectively I would say Quake 2 was far ahead in those days. Still, I've played LOADS more JK MP than any Quake. But I'm also a guy who clocked most of those hours playing sabers nf, a way of playing the game which, by eliminating the Force powers, probably eliminated the one element that made JK MP special for a good portion of its players.
Then there's MotS. I've played so little of it that I won't say anything.
As for user-made levels and mods, well, we're on Massassi here. To us, that stuff kept the game alive for many years. Even quite recently we've had some level releases for JK that have been more than worthwhile.
All in all, I would say it's a heavily outdated game with strengths that are still apparent to this day to anyone looking past its quirks and clunky old mechanics.
But that may be just nostalgic bias talking.
Looks like we're not going down after all, so nevermind.