KOTOR Knights of the Old Republic (2003)

I was like... Malak's apprentice...? Did... he have one?
I had to google him And I played the game 3 times!

I'm not sure I'd call it flawless.  But it was a good game.  Once I'm done with my K1 run, I might want to do a K2 run.  I've never beaten K2 with the TSL Restored Content Mod

Thats what I'd call it.  If they had completed it, before relasing it, then it might have been flawless.


And, I think I broke my K1 install.  I triggered one of my companions side quests, and visited all the planets trying to get the others to start as well.  Now I'm at the point where I should be doing the last planet w/out bastilla, but the next part isn't triggering.  So now I might need to reload, and do my second/third world all over again...

It's almost an entirely new game. Enjoy!

Yah, loved both games and have been replaying them regularly once or twice a year--whenever reality becomes problematic.

KOTOR I was the first game I ever played that I felt total immersion. I cared about the characters and their relationship to me. My actions were meaningful, and though the plot was simple, at least it held together in my estimation. As someone else pointed out, the ambient music and lush orchestrals really added to the immersive effect, especially in KOTOR I. My favorite of any game is the music for Kashyyk (wookie world). Whenever I replay K1, I always look forward to visiting that planet just for the music. The characters, actions, subplot of that "episode" are superlative. With Bware's focus on creating what amounted to interactive fiction, they succeeded admirably well, and to me, the gold standard by which I judge any game. Why? One guess, and I emphasize guess as I can find no basis in fact atm, is that BWare's desire to create a cinematic experience meshed with Lucas Arts' vision for the game. Also, another guess, BWare had connections with assets used by Lucas in his movies. That would explain the superb music and voice acting, some of whom were from the Royal Shakespeare Company.

KOTOR II was developed by Obsidian under the auspices of BWare, released about 1 year after KOTOR I. That's a very short period of time. However, by using the same engine, and really basically the same game mechanics, all Obsidian had to do was improve a bit on game play and develop another plot along with some interesting characters. They certainly created a deeper, darker characterization along with a philosophical exploration of an ambiguous force. For the first two thirds of this game, it surpassed KOTOR I by all measures, except the once lush music had greatly diminished but the voice acting remained superb. Kreia herself was directly from the RSC. But the last third of the game, the plot came undone. What killed immersion for me at that point was:



Then Obsidian ran out of time and money. To save costs of further development and get the game out in time for Christmas, Obsidian simply cut content before its release without reworking the plot. Fans were outraged and Obsidian shortly closed down its forums. Sound familiar? However, I wasn't the first or the only gamer to realize what they'd actually said: they'd cut content, which meant there was a good chance that much if not most of the content was still in the code and could be re-connected. Thus was born the Restoration movement. I worked with Aurora for a short time early on in this effort, but what seemed like a simple reconnection was anything but. 13 years later and the missing content was restored and ultimately refined by Aspyr after Disney bought George.

Anyway, despite those flaws, I still re-play the KOTOR games with enjoyment. I did have some hope that after Disney acquired LA, and especially after they paid Aspyr to remaster KII, there would be a KOTOR III, but those hopes are diminished after Disney recently handed it off to EA.

After KOTOR II, BWare came out with its ME Trilogy, which really has all the elements of the KOTORs, but without the SW universe. They've succeeded in entertaining me pretty much, especially the characters, but plot remains problematic. What was lost/gained in that transition from KOTOR to ME is largely a matter of taste. The one thing I missed from KOTORs was the sense of being together with the away team. In KOTORs my squad felt real--I could talk to them at almost any time. Sometimes they had nothing much to say, but they'd at least say something, which made it seem real.

Now ME:A. Since this is a KOTOR thread, I won't discuss general problems I have with the game, but some which directly are related to KOTOR. Whatever sense of working with squadmates is gone. In ME:A, I don't even know where they are half the time. All control over them has disappeared. I can only talk with them on the ship or when involved with a mission. The voice acting, in fact the whole sound palette, is subdued and the music unremarkable. The only characters in ME:A I'm remotely invested in are Jaal, Liam and Peebo. In the KOTORs, there were far fewer planets, but landing on them commenced a story of their own that contained a variety of activities, most of which held surprises and unexpected rewards. ME:A few surprises and little reward. The morality system seems gone in ME:A. I know there are dialogue choices, but it doesn't seem to make much difference except for the dichotomous ones. In KOTOR I, it was simply making the best LS/DS choices. In K2 it was a lot more difficult to make choices, especially when dealing with Kreia, who, despite re-playing the game many times, I could never figure out how best to respond to. The trilogy used Paragon/Renegade, which seemed similar to Kotors, and I guess players used them as such, but the developers said they couldn't see why gamers were so focused on choosing one or the other to follow. In other words, the P/R choices were about getting abilities and not who you'd become. So to "help" make gameplay more "natural" in ME:A, we have a written assessment of our choices, and a dialogue wheel that I'm not clear on what the choices are or will do aside with some obvious ones.

Okay, I've written WAAAY too much. All I can say is that so far, (I've played ME:A 70 hours and guess about 50% done) it's an okay game, but missing some of the things BWare got right in KOTOR, lo those many years ago.

This belong in KOTOR.

Have you tried using Force Wave over and over again. That always works.

Master Speed and Master Flurry can be pretty amusing if you're using a melee character.

I know that nexusmods transferred filefront mods to their site when gamefront shut down.

KOTOR modslink

KOTOR2:link

Yeah, I completely forgot who Bandon was during my first playthrough and that he was the one who killed Trask...

(I may have also had to look up who Trask was. Your sacrifice was totally not in vain, dude)

Feel like they could have built Bandon up more as a secondary antagonist who was always closely behind the character's journey and attempting to find ways to thwart their progress, even if not actually directly challenging them (due to fear of Revan). For someone who was Malak's apprentice, he should have had the memorability and coolness factor of Calo Nord, rather than being completely bland.

I'd have revealed a little more about his background, maybe via some of the Jedi Council or Bastila. Maybe even depict Bandon as something of a tragic character, a Padawan who always admired Revan and Malak and joined them in the hopes of impressing them, rather than actually believing in stopping the Mandalorians?

Perhaps his fall to the Dark Side was motivated in bitterness after feeling like he was being sidelined, something that drew him to Malak who equally began to dislike being stuck in Revan's shadow. KOTOR2 could have given him a brief cameo during the vision section, revealing that the Exile actually tried to convince Bandon not to join the fight, because they could tell that he didn't really believe in the cause, only wanted to try to impress his fellow Jedi?

Maybe revealing he was a bit of a toady might have ruined his character, but then again, he didn't really have much character in the first place.

I enjoy KOTOR1 nowadays on my Shield Tablet - I really love that Apsyr is porting entire games in this way. I sincerely hope DAO and other classics are on the horizon.

KOTOR2 was great as well and I really appreciated the little tweaks and conveniences they added to the gameplay. I was unhappy with the 3rd act of the game, and was happy to read that the missing content was eventually remade and added. Where does one download it?