Circa

Pure realism has been attempted by some games, yeah. There's a point where it just takes away from the fun factor. I'm thinking of survival games where you have to literally find food and water and sleep regularly or else you become sick and die, PLUS trying to progress in the game's story. There are only a few games like that and it's usually a bonus option rather than default.

As far as lightsabers go, I think JKA and JK2 are the only games to get it close. Turning on dismemberment helps with that, but that fact that you can take out a stormtrooper with one swing is pretty accurate, and is why I love SP as much as I do. I shouldn't need to spend a good 5 minutes button mashing the attack button to kill one person.

I was about to say that JK2 had a good explanation for taking long to kill enemies: The sith in the dark armor wear an anti-lightsaber alloy or whatever it was. But then again, reborns fight in robes and take a while, as do all the bosses. Bushido Blade is good, but wouldn't work in a JKA setting. Also, survival games are fantastic (arma), but again, they're more of a simulation than an action game and wouldn't work very well with SW.