What's your verdict of Star Wars: Knights Of The Old Republic (PC)?

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Just saw that Star Wars: Knights Of The Old Republic has just been released. Anyone played it yet?, another title I'm thinking of buying...

some info: It is made by Bioware, RPG, uses a highly modified version of the Neverwinter Nights engine, you will recognize the point buy system, feats etc...
Anyway you have probably already heard about this game before as it has been out for Xbox for a while now...

[ November 20, 2003, 22:54: Message edited by: Kiranos ]

 

I don't have the pc version, but the xbox version is AWESOME

 

I get the impression that the PC version will be double awesome... An ass-kicker...

 

I have it now, and I really like it. I recently became a padawan, One thing that I don't really like is that I wanted to lean towards the dark side but not let anyone know, lurk in the shadows. I guess that can't or atleast I don't know how that can be done. As you get "dark" points from your replies to questions etc..

 

If my school would of put in $50 extra dollars for a radeon mobility instead of intel exteme pos, then I would actually be able to run the game.

*bitter*

edit: so involved in my small rant, that I forgot to say that it is awesome, stole a friends comp for the day and played it :-D

 

On a scale of 1 to 10 1 being close to POR2 10 being close to BG2?


edit: OH YEAH my 15th gems! ME ROCK!

 

Finished yesterday!

Great game, 10 on that scale!

Why?

I liked the story, even though i am not some big SW fan. I liked the movies when i was young, now i just remember them as some nice movies that i watched...

I dont want to spoil some interesting parts, but you could realise that you can choose between light and dark, but sadly, they didnt make 3rd option, playing some neutral char. Probably because there aren't much neutral char in SW space. There are lot fun parts, that are more often, as you play the game (or i didnt notice them before). Like a lady that REALLY misses her droid...

Battles are very easy on easy diff. so you can play the game as some sort of adventure game. If you don't like getting too much in char design, you can always choose automatic level up so computer can put points on level up, where he thinks is best (but i really like to level up, so i figured, you can get level 20 max). Also, 3rd edition rules are really nice implemented into the game, except that spells or Force powers work on easy "rechargeable mana" system (you have mana points which you use to "cast" spells, better if you ask me).

Few tips:
Forget the blasters, for your char, choose melee style. Two lightsabers (dualwield) are better than one, and double-lightsaber (Dark Maul like) also use dual wield feat.
For your char, at lev. up always put points in Persuade. Other skills like Computer, Repair, Science are better left to members of the party (max 2 party members, always i think), but all in all they are not much needed (skills).

Later you can travel to Yavin, there is just one old spacestation, on which lives one trader that is best trader in the game to sell stuff, you get best prices! If you want to sell something, sell it there!

I think that is all, good luck, and may the schwartz be with you!

 

I agree with most that's been said here. This game is great. I don't remember when I last spent almost 2 weeks in a row just playing the same game over and over again. I've now finished this game twice on the good side and once on the evil side.

Good things about the game is that all dialogue is spoken. And the voiceactors are quite simply the best I've ever heard. Sure you have your average guy doing some dialogue here and another there, but most of it is simply awesome. And there are certain voiceactors that blow your mind away every time they speak. Namely, one Jedi hermit has such a voiceacting and attitude behind him that he's making history in bringing the best character to life in a console-ish game up to date.

The graphics are good enough, and you can mold enough of your characters appearance through various items to make you feel unique. Also, the dialogues are well thought out. There's very little of the BG2:ToB dialogue where you always scream aloud wether you're good or evil, here. Many of the dialogues may even be misleading for being so realistic. Comments that would've been "evil" in other games, are accepted for sarcasm as appropriate, and sometimes it's actually surprising what you can say and the game still understands you're not being straightforwardly evil.

There are some great musical themes in this game, and generally the feeling of Starwars is better captured in this one than in any other game I've played before. But then there are the boring repetitive ones as well. Luckily, no music in this game is so bad you'd want to turn the speakers off.

The "force persuasion" is really an integral part of the game. Practically every time you need to convince someone of your something (lie, ask for help, information, raise of wage from some quest, you name it), you can use the force... assuming you have this ability (this is the only non-combat force). And most of the time these dialogues work exactly the same way as they did in the movies. It really perks up the atmosphere of the game.

Also, the quests and dialogues that potentially "change your alignment" also contain 3 choices. The type where you get light side alignment, dark side alignment, and neither. This is good as it allows you to balance between the two you want to. For example should you play a dark side character, you can do a good thing but in a slightly milder manner preventing you from gaining light side points from it. And same the other way around too of course.

This game has perhaps the cruelest dark ending I've seen up to date though. Especially considering this was originally a console game. Without spoiling too much, in the end before you jump to the enemy base and challenge the main baddie himself, you can (and at least some of the way will be forced to) kill half of the team you've come to travel with, and know as your friends. And some of these ways are quite cruel, beyond the normal sword-through-the-back things. When I used force persuasion to make the best friend of another of my companions strangle them to death as they were crying and wimpering that they wouldn't believe I was capable of it, I almost felt a bit of remorse.

As bad things, the game is too straightforward. The quests are all good and fun the first and the second time through, but no more after that. You can do virtually everything there is to do the first time you play the game. While there is much spoken dialogue, it's worth noting that spoken dialogue comes with a price. You can't even begin to compare the amount of dialogue in KOTOR with what you have in BG2, let alone PS:T. So if you decide to skip the speech and just read the text, the time you'll spend playing the game will be reduced significantly.

Also, the game isn't exactly planned for a more pacifistic character. While you can be quite strong as a supportive character, it doesn't go as far as for example Fallout did in allowing you to compensate for lack of battle ability with your mental prowess. The game forces you to several solo confrontations where it is clearly assumed you're of the fighting sort. By the time you reach your archnemesis, you'll see that winning the final battle requires heavy AI explotation and preparing before hand. As this guy happens to be resistant to about all force there is, and acts as an immensely strong fighter. In addition he has "powersupply's" lying around that require very specific force powers to be manipulated. So as I found out soon after my roommate, you can make a character that, without the right stuff, will find the "boss" impossible to defeat (literally, we checked all places around the net and after finding out about how you needed mines, grenades and force powers this and that and he had none, we realised the only way to get around was cheating). The level cap doesn't help this any bit.

Other things include a terrible AI. The more enemies you have on the screen, the more likely your characters will get stuck standing still while they're beaten to death. Even more common is the casual fight where you initiate combat and your aides do nothing to help you. Or when you stand still and wait for the enemy to run into your trap, and then one of your companions starts charging head on into mines and beyond, inviting all enemies in. Worse still is when you need perfect timing on using attacks and force powers in a battle, and your plans are ruined by sudden urges of attacking the enemy standing next to you, completely ruining any chance of shielding yourself from the incapacitating force attack coming from the dark jedi in front of you. This happens all the time, and I can't believe they didn't just straight out rip the AI right out of your characters and give you the full control. I suffered an incredible amount of headache and useless reloading because of this. The enemy works without lag or loss of control (though dumb it may be), which doesn't help the player's situation any.

Also, the NwN cursewords "scaling enemy levels" has made its way into this game as well. This means that leveling up is rather useless. You will find 3 sandpeople an incredible challenge when you're maxed out to a level that equates anything beyond jedi master. Because of this, you have no control at all at which challenge you want the last battle to happen. There's no use in doing all the quests in the game as you'll get more money than you need anyway, and the experience beyond the 3/4:ths of the game is useless to you.

Also, although they've done a good job in making this game accessible to both good and evil players, there's still work to be done. Or how do you explain that the only powerful robes (over twice as powerful as any other jedi master robe) you can get in the game before the ones you get 2 minutes before the final battle, are for light side characters only? Or how the nice unique ornaments that add to wisdom / charisma (essential for any jedi) are also for good side only. And how the bracelets, and other ornaments, and a stupid metal weapon that are for the evil characters give abilities such as "lightsaber proficiency" and "10 resistance to sonic". Any Jedi will have lightsaber proficiency anyway, and the 10 resistance to sonic really isn't that much. Obviously, it was a very conscious decision to leave the 25-50% extra power a light side character would have out of the game of dark side character. You have to beat the game with nearly no bonus to your abilities at all.

Well, in the end of this long novel I could say the conclusion.

SW:KOTOR is a good game, very good. But it has little replay value. I can almost guarantee that anyone who isn't too attached to PC FPS's will find the controls good and working. The feeling of immersion for the first time through is undoubtedly one of the strongest up to date. The main plot is well thought out, and invokes feelings of its own once you discover what's really going on. It has a nice lovestory to offer as well, and the characters in general are incredibly well thought out, better than in most games I've run into (no-one can't help but laugh at HK-47's love for killing). With a 50% increase to the amount of quests, a little more common things to do to work as good entertaining timesink, and a little more dialogue (and don't forget the damned improved AI), this game would easily have earned the title of "one of the best games ever". As it is, now it's just "one of the best games in a few years" (took some 35-40 hours for me to complete the first time, less than half that the second time). Which was enough for me. Undoubtedly I'll be playing this through the fourth time after a month or two.

 

I just got it and have been playing for a little while here and I have to say that my rather great expectations have been fulfilled. Gameplay seems to be like a mix between NWN and BG where they have taken the best from both. I havent seen much of the story yet but the graphichs, environment, music and gameplay are really sucking me in.

What is the level cap? 20? One drawback though is that you cant jump classes as in proper 3rd Edition but have to go full out in one class until I guess you can choose one of three jediclasses and then go all out in that one. Also annoying that the scout has the same bab progression as the scoundrel.

 

I have been playing this game for a few days now and can say it is a good game so far. I got slowed down by a nasty bug but that was fixed by the patch.

Graphics, music but so far the best thing for me is the story, I didn't get so much involved with the star wars universe but this game is doing it for me. so far so great.

Definatly a recommendation.

 

Sadly the game is buggy as hell, but no true gamewrecking ones, just annoying ones. It seems like all we should be happy if new games released nowadays are playable at all due to bugs. Sad sad.

I would have liked to see a KotOR forum here though! It is D&D in a way, it is based on D20 3rd edition. I dont think it differs more from the normal D&D norm than what Planescape did, and KotOR is a really good D&D CRPG. Just a different setting than Forgotten Realms.

 

And off it goes from my "things-to-buy" -list...

(can't stand bad AI, or low replay value)

 

I didnt find the AI that bad, and you can control your NPC's as much as you want Virne. There are also scrips but I have never tried them. The battle system is somewhat like BG's except that you can queue orders and that the NPC's fight even if you dont give them any orders. I just finished it and I am very satisfied, despite the the constant crashed but they were all predicatable. Area transitions were dangerous. I am going to replay it now right away.

Edit: I didnt find the end boss very challenging at all, true I had a melee geared character but not extremely so, started as scout and proceeded as guardian. In general so was the only challenging things in this game the puzzles, the battles were all pretty straightforward and easy. There were no real "Firkraag first meeting" like battles. I think I died three times in the entire game and that was due to extremely bad rolls in those particular battles and complete lack of preparation.

 

AI is not bad, it is just not perfect: your party members will throw good spells in right moment (i never saw this in BG ) and they will attack using good skills, but they will run into a visible mine

Also, you can't give orders to one char and then switch to another, because that first will automaticly clear hi "to do" list and continue on his own...

 

I wonder if this game is evil-friendly, I mean allowing you to do very, very evil act, not just some sarcastic and Bad speach. And is the dialog is realistic? oh! and does we have moral choice?

I seek thy wisdom as I have long to know in the fine art of KOTOR

 

I like this game. I have just been playing it for a couple of hours, but I have that good feeling you get when a game feels just right. And that's a long time ago....

I think that people who thought they were going to like NWN, but didn't will probably like this game. That's how it is for me anyway. I wanted NWN single player to be more like this game.

 

Indeed this is what NWN should have been. The graphics are fantastic, yet run better than NWN does and the story and action are balanced perfectly. There are tons of paths through the game and ways to solve problems. I highly, highly recommend this game to anyone who likes RPG's at all. This is easily the best game I've played in the past year. Enjoy!

 

Haven't encountered any bugs yet, and i'm doing my first missions as a Jedi right now. I don't know what kind of bugs some of you are talking about, but so far they haven't troubled me.

I like the game, great graphics, interresting storyline. The combatmode could have been better though, but i'm not complaining.

 

It freezes and jump back to the starting screen at area transitions. That is the main bug I have had problem with, it happens atleast once an hour for me.

 

Have you installed the 1.01 patch? I had no problems at all until i turned off EAX to see if it boosted performance. After a few crashes I turned it back on and no problems at all.