Belated KOTOR 2 run

[Domi]

TY, even more reasons to contemplate an MPC game. Obsidian is making me into a paranoid player, now I am starting to think the Disciple was a Sith student not Jedi.

My wee one absolutely adored Korriban environment. I loooved Obsidian's spoof of the student IDs in the Academy, made me laugh out-loud. Well done, Obsidian.

[Jarno Mikkola]

He is not... it has more to do with the over all story, than you can perceive just now.

I would actually say that he was very much in the between, while trying to be the historian ... and you can drive him to either direction, just like all the other nocs, which is very much related to the influence of the main character has with all the party members.

[Domi]

Nice. But the rest of Korriban was disappointing. Disciple stopped piping in, even when we were in the library (I had high hopes), but the most interesting part of him is his battle cries (my daughter loves them), and his voice-work is uneven (accent strengthens and goes away again). It was nice to hear Bao Dur's opinion on the welding job (hey, I take what I can get!). We did stop yesterday before investigating the purple glow, but being pulled out of the battle with Darth Sion was as annoying as always when the games do that. I am assuming that Korriban is more inspired for a dark-sider.

 

I think, I might not have the patience for Disciple to get interesting, and just stick to Atton and Bao Dur for as much as the game lets me. But, yeah, I will probably need to re-run with a more chaotic male, Visas and Mira.

 

Oh, and, yeah, doc told me I can start physio next week, so I better hurry, because once I start rehabing cardio endurance and strength, if flexibility is any indication of how much I have lost over 6 weeks, ye gods.

[Wisp]

I am assuming that Korriban is more inspired for a dark-sider.

Not particularly. IIRC, it's short because it was intended to be the stepping stone for a larger adventure, but that... (wait for it!)... got cut.

[Twani]

Yeah, Korriban had a lot of cut content, but unfortunately it was content that wasn't voiced and kept in the toolset, so there was really no way to know what to restore.

[Domi]

Zut.

[Twani]

From what I understand, actually, Korriban was supposed to provide a direct lead in to the extra planet/Droid Planet (Mx... whatever it is?) that the restoration content team also made. I guess you don't have that installed? So that hook isn't there. Then there are other random cuts- for instance, you were supposed to run in to Carth's son Dustil in the tombs- now there's just some fallen guy who looks exactly like Dustil but has a different name. No idea what he's doing.

 

This thread made me give in to temptation and caused me to install Kotor II again. >.> I'm vowing not to give in to temptation and refrain from playing until after my modding and my exams are done, but we'll see how well I hold to that.

[Domi]

Exams are important!

 

Ah, Obsidian, Obsidian. Korriban is officially the worst bit so far. Now, I understand what they wanted to do, but apart from Kreia's sequence, it was a jumble. The measure of the attachments I had to the characters (good job, Obsidian!) is that Kreia's sequence was emotionally hard, but they did not finish this either. I get the ethical dilemma of sacrificing the ones you love to save someone you hate, as the highest form of empathy. However, the game doesn't really make you dwell on Jedi's teachings apart from your no brainer choices beforehand, so it was hard to live the choice. Basically, I had my character stand and take the punishment, paralyzed.

 

But the 7-yo's, they have different mentality. Atton shows up, my kid pipes in.

"She's gonna marry him!"

Me: Hon, the guy is psychotic, cute, but psychotic. Doesn't go with marriage. Life lesson right here.

 

I regretted choosing Revan as a female. The avatar had nothing androgynous about it. Well endowed with menace (kiddo left the room after third or so try), but it was unwise to give the player the choice, and keep this avatar for both possibilities.

 

The best part about Korriban was that it unlocked Bao-Dur's sequence of dialogues for me. Thanks goodness, the guy does have a secret and a dark stuff in his past. We can't have well-adjusted characters, lol. But the voice-work, they gotta hire this guy again. My daughter was grabbing for the mouse to advance the sequence, and I was holding her off, and Bao-Dur was talking about fixing up the Remote. Not that she was any more patient about the war talks - Hurrah! finally, I get to find out what it was that my character did on the blasted Malachor V. An uplifting experience... as usual. Unintended romantic vibe (yay, Obsidian!): the longest you've looked at me, and said nothing, just nodded. Moving.

 

Kudos to Obsidian for at least trying to deal with the aftermath of the all out war.

[Twani]

I did some studying. >.> Exams are important, but I've got a pretty good start for them. Did some writing and modding, too. So I figure a bit of computer games can't hurt.

 

Random thoughts.

 

+ Atris is never as so lovely as during the exchange with Brianna at the beginning of the game: "Was she important to you once?"/"We all have our heroes. And when they fall, we die a little inside." Kreia's later line... 'she loved you as she loved a champion', or however it goes, is just so owch. Also, I'm seeing femslash, but considering Atris obsession goes even further if you play male, I'm probably just imagining things. Still, owch. I like it.

 

+ Does *anyone* on my ship get along? I guess Atton and Bao-Dur might be able to cooperate, since Atton went to Bao-Dur to ask him about the exile, but seriously, even the droids are trying to kill each other everytime I turn my back. I mean, I'm used to companions getting snarky and fighting each other- they've been doing it since BG1- but in this case, no one likes each other. At all. I can not imagine this group heading out to a cantina somewhere. I've heard Mira and Handmaiden get along, and Atton at least seems to respect Mira, but that's seriously it. Everyone hates each other. Well, Bao-Dur and T7 might be cool.

 

+ Master Vrook is such a jerk, as always.

 

+ I am having so much trouble with Kreia this game. Learn something from her? Bing bing, influence up! Say something light sided? Bing bing, influence down! I'm about at the point where I'm tempted to hack in a game editor and increase her influence, as this is driving me nuts. I can never get it below 40 or above 70 before I do something LS or learn something from her that pushes it back towards neutral. I remember she was difficult, but I didn't remember her being this difficult. So frustrating! I really want to hear her stories, because she holds most of the game's background... she's just refusin to tell me anything, mutter mutter.

 

+ I also made the mistake to get a bit snarky at G0t0, so now I'm going to have to do at least one dark side act to get back on his good side. Sigh. There goes my +6 con.

 

+ Does anyone know if the Restoration patch made it actually possible to get or lose enough influence with the companion on Onderon that it's worth it? In the original game, you could never learn anything from that person because there weren't enough influence opportunities, but I'm not sure if that's been changed.

 

+ I admit I'm missing KotOR the MMO's combat. Lots of jumping and flashy moves. KOTOR 2 is good for when it came out, no question, but I miss stuff like force leaping over enemies heads or twirling around in midair with my flashy lightsabers. And the cool graphics. Though KOTOR2 stands up pretty decently with a few texture mods installed.

[Domi]

I have never learned anything from Kreia, but the game background was "up-loaded" for me in the very end. Staying in the dark was not a bad thing.

 

Anyway, here we go, finished my run. I gotta say, despite a lot of criticism I have heard in regards to KOTOR 2 female player experience, with the cut content it was outstanding, as much as I can see why some of it was cut out - despite voicing the end of the game scenes just did not measure up to the charged situation. Overall though, KOTOR 2 in my opinion is that very same story/concepts Obsidian/Black Isle told 3 times (Torment and NWN2/MotB) using similar character archetypes, but it hit the right buttons for me, while neither Torment, nor the MotB did. Paradoxically, the game made a good shot at explaining why the NPCs ever so blindly stuck with a PC in the CRPGs, while casting the most unruly and cryptic set I have seen in my admittedly limited gaming experience. And it was endearing most of the time, again, thumbs us. Apart from Bao-Dur.

 

There are slips, most notably lack of romantic reactions to the game events (dancer's outfit, deserting the PC before the tomb on Korriban, opening the doors of the prison in the Proving Grounds), but I thoroughly enjoyed the 'es tu, Darth Sion' sub-plot (w/o Avelonne's interview it is hard to pick up on it, but with it, it's easy to interpret what was left of his dialogue). The ending sequence is not as cool as KOTOR 1 or BG epilogues, but then again, at the time, KOTOR 3 was still coming hot.

 

The only thing that made me want to add to a Howler (yeah, she loves Potter series) that my kiddo was going to send to Obsidian if 'Pure Pazaak' died was the completely blotched Bao-Dur's disappearance at Telos. I don't like spoilers, but I dug up Avelonne's interview at that point because I couldn't focus on the game, it was bugging me so much. What was so important you couldn't hang around for a day or two to save the galaxy? To my surprise in my game Atton lived to escort the PC from the Core, apparently largely due to my kid not being able to take his battle with Sion: Darth Sion leaped, PA'd Atton for 185 pts of damage and that was it, I was not allowed to run the game in the Normal mode, so Atton managed to get past Darth Sion - speaking of that encounter, another example of a short effective dialogue. I might replay from a save to let Sion finish him and see if I can trigger the cutscene with Atton's death (when the kiddo is not watching).

 

For the game-play, I have not seen the SWTOR, so I loved the game interface and graphics. Actually, if there is a TUTU for KOTOR, I would love to install it if I decide on a build your own Revan experience. The influence system is ingenious, but the game is far too short, and the party is far too small to get the most out of every companion. I was focusing on the hot male triumvirate, and I still feel that I have missed out on much of Dsicple's content and even some of Atton's.

 

I finished the game at Level 26, with a crappy build of a Consular/Watchman, and stayed on Normal level apart from 2 battles, both soloing that lovable rogue Atton Rand. I started a male game with a suggested power-gaming Consular built, and so far it netted me only one thing: crappy resolution of the voice-recorder quest on Peragus. But, yeah, KOTOR 2 requires a different strategy when playing. It is not an optimal party built, but it is an optimal built for every party member, and, in particular, the PC.

[Domi]

So, apparently Obsidian would still get a Howler, for not making KOTOR 3

 

Had to start KOTOR I yesterday, too bad my old XP can't run it on high res, kept crashing. I am reminded again why I am a rabid fan of BioWARE's. Tight, slick, professional. After all these years.

 

My wee one saw the heroic soldier of the Old Republic, Carth:

 

"Oh, new cute!"

 

So, we played the 'first dungeon', stopped for the night, asking her: "So, is Carth better than Atton?"

 

"Nooo. He doesn't tell jokes and all he cares about is that Baaastilla."

 

Here, in the nutshell, the womanhood's wishlist: handsome, has a sense of humor, and is seriously into me. Seven-frigging years old. Or am I projecting?

[Kulyok]

Kotor 3 can't hold a candle to SWTOR. Free-to-Play awaits you! Wait, can't post, my game loaded. For the Empire!

 

And I totally agree with the wishlist. Extra add-on: brings food.

[Domi]

I think one big plus Atton has in my child's mind is that he is always up for a game of pazaak. She loves it.

 

Yeah, I am interested in SWTOR, while it is still there. I am against creating her an account at this age to MP though, and she does want to play a game 'where we can both have characters'. It probably has Revan, in some way, shape or form, so I'd stick with a KOTOR replay (it has been good ten years if not more -scary!). I did not expect my kiddo to get interested, so if she loses interest mid-way through KOTOR I, I can do my own gaming which means more options. And, my maternal heart not skipping beats when the kid rejects a very nice med school grad with an interest in history in favor of a former specnaz on a redemption bend.

[Twani]

"It is such a quiet thing, to fall. Far more terrible to admit it."

 

Oh, Kreia.

 

That's basically the whole game to me- a bunch of 'oh, kreia's' and shaking of heads. All of this could have been avoided so easily, if everyone in the game wasn't in favor of NOT COMMUNICATING and being difficult. The hardest thing to take is Bao-dur's unexplained death: couldn't he just say, "Hey, General, it's important that we take care of the HK facility, and HK is ready to go- let's do that quick". Considering HK was able to shut down the factory while we were on the Ravanger and then get on the Ebon Hawk to go shoot G0t0 in time, it would not have been so hard to leave everyone but Mandalore and Visas (who were going on the Ravanger with you) with Bao-Dur to go do that so he doesn't have to die horribly and alone in a way not shown on screen that I'm still not sure I fully understand.

 

So, yes, I finished my playthrough. What it really stirred in me is an urge to play SWTOR, Jedi Knight Light Side (my own Jedi Knight is... ah... a bit more red leaning), which is as close as they'll ever get to KOTOR3. And yeah, Revan is definitely a presence of sort. You meet with him (...I still think Revan is a girl in my head) in two flashpoints, and the Jedi Knight is following Revan's path, to some degree.

 

Some random thoughts...

 

++ It was nice to see Visas and Mandalore bond. Two more of my team who almost get along! That's so incredibly unusual in this game. They also made a surprisingly good wrecking ball- I hadn't used either of them before save for when I had to use Mandalore on Onderon, and I was pretty impressed.

 

++ I ran in to a bug where the last scenes with Sion and Kreia weren't voiced, which was disappointing, as part of the appeal was the voicing. Reloading repeatedly didn't help. Wish I could find where to listen to the audio files.

 

++ I still have no real idea why G0t0 wanted to keep Malachor in tact. 'Because there are relics there?' Huh? But no one goes there, ever. 'Because the galaxy needs the Sith?' Really? I thought he was fine with the Jedi dominating, as long as someone was. As I had good influence with him, that completely came out of left field.

 

++ I maxed influence with all the jedi trainees, t7, and Kreia (Kreia I took some dark side hits for, by occasionally agreeing with her on manipulating Visas to find her master- interestingly, the line 'everyone can find redemption' you can take on Korriban gets points with her, though she herself refuses it). I got enough influence with G0t0 to unlock all his conversation options. I bottomed out HK's influence, so he would tell me everything, as well. Mandalore, I just plain cheated to get his one conversation, because I did Onderon last and didn't have enough people to go be nice to so I could lower his influence.

 

++ The only true decision that I had to think about was the whole Onderon deal. The Queen is the legitimate authority, but my character, while fully light sided, didn't much care for the republic one way or another so her wanting to remain Republic didn't help. Yet the people of the city, almost everywhere, unanimously supported the General. At that point, you don't know the General has sided with the Sith, just that Tobin is a jackass. So I could have seen siding with the General there as a whole mass mob democracy. Everything else was pretty 'be nice' or 'kick puppies' for me.

 

++ Kreia is up there with one of the most interesting characters Obsidian has ever created. I certainly didn't like her, but I enjoyed her as a character. At times, she's fun to disagree with, or grudgingly admit she might have a point. Kreia's addition almost allows the player to occasionally play 'smart dark side' rather then 'yay kick puppies'- in her conversations, you can generally be manipulative and cruel in an intelligent way. But then every other interaction in the game, you're back to kicking puppies.

 

++ Speaking of manipulative and cruel, I save reloaded just to see the scene where you sacrifice Visas to her former master. Walking away from her as she's dying and pitifully begging someone to stay with her? That's cold. That's not kicking puppies, that's just pure evil.

 

++ This is minor spoilers for you, Domi, but: okay, we know Revan and the Exile had T7 and HK with them when they met in the Unknown Regions. But did the Exile take Atton along? Supposedly, what was supposed to happen is Visas/Handmaiden begs the character to bring them with her, the character says they have to go alone, and then they meet up with Atton, Atton casually asks if he can come, and the exile doesn't reply. Does Atton go along too? If so, that's fairly cheap- female Exile getting to take Atton while Revan had to leave Carth/Bastila. Ah well. On the other hand, can the Exile fly a ship? We never see her doing it.

 

++ On that note, does that mean the Jedi are founded by Visas, Mira, and Disciple? As much as I like Mira and Disciple, I sure hope Visas is the one who did most of the writing the rulebooks and keeping things straight. Disciple is too naive, and Mira's a bit too worldly, there.

 

++ Oh, droid planet review! Hm. I'd say overall, the story was interesting, but in actuality, it was the worst planet by far. I can ignore things like the obviously amateur voice acting and the fact that every corridor looks the exact same- it's a mod. But those are really long corridors. Ridiculously long. The first part is a series of fetch quests to be done by one of the droids in your party (kind of amusing: T7 lines are all beeps and boops so you have no idea what he's asking about). The second part is a longer series of fetch quests and running back and forth hitting consoles and talking to random droids. Third part was giant combat in long corridors against droids, culminating in a boss battle against a droid with a few thousand hit points but only doing 25-30 damage... a tedious fight with no real enjoyment factor. Then a fairly easy puzzle, then some more talking. Just to add on to the ridiculous nature, the Master and Apprentice are shot and killed (by one shot, of course) and you can't even really take revenge for them, so it's all just a mess. About the only good thing about it was that you can get fuel from there so you don't have to deal with the Hutts. Otherwise, I mostly found it frustrating and tedious.

[Jarno Mikkola]

++ I ran in to a bug where the last scenes with Sion and Kreia weren't voiced, which was disappointing, as part of the appeal was the voicing. Reloading repeatedly didn't help. Wish I could find where to listen to the audio files.

Erhm have you considered that mayhaps the few extra lines that don't have a voice might not have ever been recorded ? Yeah, that's not a bug then.

 

++ I still have no real idea why G0t0 wanted to keep Malachor in tact. 'Because there are relics there?' Huh? But no one goes there, ever. 'Because the galaxy needs the Sith?' Really? I thought he was fine with the Jedi dominating, as long as someone was. As I had good influence with him, that completely came out of left field.

Well, G0t0 is a computer, it doesn't have the galaxy-wide communication network that informs it that there and here are Jedi that out balance the Sith there and reverse, remember the Balance coming finally to the Republic ? It wasn't the Sith that got killed.

The reason why it wanted to keep Malachor as is is that as of that moment, it had not unbalanced the power balance that was in the galacy as far as it knew... so G0t0's plan was to keep everything stable so one day the Republic was strong enough to face the next crisis.

Kreia's plan was to make the echo of power loose(originally in the Exiled General, as she is known now) resonate and possibly killing everyone in the galaxy... it wasn't actually "Dark" side, more of the F this system no one's going to be a jedi/sith at all. She actually might have done it... had she had stronger tie to the force, as she died, she could have been able to hold on the conection to the Exiles General through the bond they shared, killing her(as said in the begining) and possibly cheesing the whole of galaxy.

What's actually really interesting is that Kreia, was dead at the start of the game... and she was resurrected only through the force bond that was created at the presence of the General tabbing into her has-been-sith's aura/being/whatever star wars thingy it ever is. Should it not be clear, the General got her force connection by tabbing to Kreia's. The reason why Kreia doesn't attack as soon as possible can be understood by not her gratefulness of being alive, but by the scheme she comes up when you make your exit from the first planet.

Yes, it's the I'll learn to use your power against everyone, and thus gain more power... that obviously backfires... just like all the Iznogoud's plans.

 

++ The only true decision that I had to think about was the whole Onderon deal. The Queen is the legitimate authority, but my character, while fully light sided, didn't much care for the republic one way or another so her wanting to remain Republic didn't help. Yet the people of the city, almost everywhere, unanimously supported the General. At that point, you don't know the General has sided with the Sith, just that Tobin is a jackass. So I could have seen siding with the General there as a whole mass mob democracy. Everything else was pretty 'be nice' or 'kick puppies' for me.

Originally I chose the Generals side by accident of not knowing that it was the dark side and ended up killing the blarg jedi... I was light side all the way until then and I couldn't ever get it back, or try the dark either really. It's really the worst quest setup I have ran into.