Pierce Tondry
Dec 27th, 2003, 03:43:58 AM
Game: Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
Platform: X-Box
Developers: Bioware and Lucasfilm Ltd.
Rating: 3/5 stars
Review:
From the opening credits, I knew this was going to be a worthwhile play but I wasn't certain how worthwhile. Rather than pitch right into gameplay, your first task is to design a character in the same fashion as you would in the current tabletop SW RPG. The stats you dole out, coupled with your equipment and later increases in level, determine whether or not you hand your enemies their buttocks in battle, or whether they beat you with your own limbs instead. There was enough built-in realism to show the characters dodge, weave, parry, and even kick their opponents occasionally so that I had visual representation of battle rather than just "Hit" or "Miss" constantly displayed on screen. At least if the enemy dodges, it's a decent excuse for my missing them even though really my character was just being weak.
The opening plot is fairly simple: the Republic, weakened after defeating the Mandalorians in the Mandalore Wars, now faces a resurgence of Sith in the galaxy. The Jedi hero Revan and his apprentice Malak of the Mandalore Wars have fallen to the Dark Side, turning their old Republic fleet into a Sith Armada and pitting it against their own galaxy. They have a seemingly endless supply of ships, droids, and weapons and to top it all off, there's an ancient and terrible relic named the Star Forge that has bolstered the Dark Side's ambient presence in the galaxy (but aren't there always evil relics?) Good news is that a Jedi strike team managed to defeat Revan in a critical battle, so things aren't totally lost for the good guys. Into this brief lull, your character is introduced. Your ultimate goals will be stopping Malak, breaking the Sith ranks, and locating and destroying the Star Forge, whatever it may be (gee, I wonder...)
The game is a bit tedious in actual play. There is a transit function that allows you to immediately return to your ship, and it's available in most areas. Conversation is done through a menu of options, and choices are also pretty obviously good/evil oriented. The battle system seems simple enough, but I realized eventually that the game is evidently meant to be played in a turn-based fashion. This is possible by pausing during battle and issuing commands to each character in your party that they will execute when you resume the game. I didn't really figure that out until I'd almost beaten the game, however, and then it was because I needed to. Otherwise, most of the game actually requires a simple and intuitive approach to it and it only gets boring after your fifty-thousandth battle with "Sith Wuss" or his friend, "Elite Wuss Trooper".
What I would have liked to see:
A better ending: After almost twenty-four hours of real play time, I got a sixty second blip of poorly made cinematic followed by a four minute run of game credits. Maybe it would be difficult to tailor an ending with all the potential endings to all the potential game quests, but if I've got some Jedi chick in love with me or I've rescued someone's son at the end, I darn well want to see some evidence of it when I beat the game instead of the universally adaptable boring drivel that I got. If you play games for their endings, you will hate KOTOR's.
General talking lameness removal: Designing a conversation interface as extensive as KOTOR's had to be difficult, and I give the developers props for managing what they did. Problem is that it really feels like you're being fed pre-programmed responses at times, and since the real point of KOTOR is to Star Wars Role Play, you lose some of the immersion factor.
Buggy play: Maybe it was only the X-Box having it's way with the cd in the drive, but there were some pretty obvious bugs in the battle simulation. Thankfully, there's also an autosave function that usually catches things right before you enter an important battle, so if you lose you can at least try again before realizing it's not just software incompetence.
What I liked seeing:
Alien Languages: In conversations, characters will speak their lines aloud. Aliens that don't speak Basic get playback from a couple different phrases in languages like Twi'Leki or Rodian.
Lightsaber customization: Green and purple 7-21 damage vs Dark Side is a pretty thing.
Storyline: Did I mention how involving the story was? Because really, you can't mention that enough. KOTOR is a journey focusing on getting to the next plot point, and the number of sidequests and party member interactions you can have is darn huge. You will play the game through at least once, and you will select the Light Side path options, because that is really how the game is meant to be played. Furthermore, you will enjoy it because you will feel like you are roleplaying Star Wars.
That's all for this review. I'll be tackling the task of rating the NJO soon, so watch this space.
Platform: X-Box
Developers: Bioware and Lucasfilm Ltd.
Rating: 3/5 stars
Review:
From the opening credits, I knew this was going to be a worthwhile play but I wasn't certain how worthwhile. Rather than pitch right into gameplay, your first task is to design a character in the same fashion as you would in the current tabletop SW RPG. The stats you dole out, coupled with your equipment and later increases in level, determine whether or not you hand your enemies their buttocks in battle, or whether they beat you with your own limbs instead. There was enough built-in realism to show the characters dodge, weave, parry, and even kick their opponents occasionally so that I had visual representation of battle rather than just "Hit" or "Miss" constantly displayed on screen. At least if the enemy dodges, it's a decent excuse for my missing them even though really my character was just being weak.
The opening plot is fairly simple: the Republic, weakened after defeating the Mandalorians in the Mandalore Wars, now faces a resurgence of Sith in the galaxy. The Jedi hero Revan and his apprentice Malak of the Mandalore Wars have fallen to the Dark Side, turning their old Republic fleet into a Sith Armada and pitting it against their own galaxy. They have a seemingly endless supply of ships, droids, and weapons and to top it all off, there's an ancient and terrible relic named the Star Forge that has bolstered the Dark Side's ambient presence in the galaxy (but aren't there always evil relics?) Good news is that a Jedi strike team managed to defeat Revan in a critical battle, so things aren't totally lost for the good guys. Into this brief lull, your character is introduced. Your ultimate goals will be stopping Malak, breaking the Sith ranks, and locating and destroying the Star Forge, whatever it may be (gee, I wonder...)
The game is a bit tedious in actual play. There is a transit function that allows you to immediately return to your ship, and it's available in most areas. Conversation is done through a menu of options, and choices are also pretty obviously good/evil oriented. The battle system seems simple enough, but I realized eventually that the game is evidently meant to be played in a turn-based fashion. This is possible by pausing during battle and issuing commands to each character in your party that they will execute when you resume the game. I didn't really figure that out until I'd almost beaten the game, however, and then it was because I needed to. Otherwise, most of the game actually requires a simple and intuitive approach to it and it only gets boring after your fifty-thousandth battle with "Sith Wuss" or his friend, "Elite Wuss Trooper".
What I would have liked to see:
A better ending: After almost twenty-four hours of real play time, I got a sixty second blip of poorly made cinematic followed by a four minute run of game credits. Maybe it would be difficult to tailor an ending with all the potential endings to all the potential game quests, but if I've got some Jedi chick in love with me or I've rescued someone's son at the end, I darn well want to see some evidence of it when I beat the game instead of the universally adaptable boring drivel that I got. If you play games for their endings, you will hate KOTOR's.
General talking lameness removal: Designing a conversation interface as extensive as KOTOR's had to be difficult, and I give the developers props for managing what they did. Problem is that it really feels like you're being fed pre-programmed responses at times, and since the real point of KOTOR is to Star Wars Role Play, you lose some of the immersion factor.
Buggy play: Maybe it was only the X-Box having it's way with the cd in the drive, but there were some pretty obvious bugs in the battle simulation. Thankfully, there's also an autosave function that usually catches things right before you enter an important battle, so if you lose you can at least try again before realizing it's not just software incompetence.
What I liked seeing:
Alien Languages: In conversations, characters will speak their lines aloud. Aliens that don't speak Basic get playback from a couple different phrases in languages like Twi'Leki or Rodian.
Lightsaber customization: Green and purple 7-21 damage vs Dark Side is a pretty thing.
Storyline: Did I mention how involving the story was? Because really, you can't mention that enough. KOTOR is a journey focusing on getting to the next plot point, and the number of sidequests and party member interactions you can have is darn huge. You will play the game through at least once, and you will select the Light Side path options, because that is really how the game is meant to be played. Furthermore, you will enjoy it because you will feel like you are roleplaying Star Wars.
That's all for this review. I'll be tackling the task of rating the NJO soon, so watch this space.