Jedi Outcast is where much of the inspiration comes from. :)
Jedi Academy expanded on a lot of the things with dual wielding / two handed darth maul things, but I liked the purity in Jedi Outcast better. The deliberate timing of the heavy stance rather than the chaotic flailing of the faster stances made for some really powerful play.
All in all I much prefer blocking as an automatic thing, even though many people are used to pressing a key. Since this game actually respects where you hit, it's harder to make a block that just shields you all over. Whenever you change your stance to block you're actually opening up some other area of your body to attack. A standard move in kendo is to feint to make your opponent block an overhead cut, then switch your cut to the wrist or stomach. Maybe that could be a fun thing to play with, but not having to worry about it leaves the player with more brain space to do other things. :)