KOTOR2 Early Review aka Bashings, Smashings, & Cursings

[Sol Invictus]

ROFL. You're calling the game short because you skipped all the sidequests and probably skimmed through the dialogue and didnt bother with the NPC advancement? That's retarded.

 

[Volourn]

"well, no... strength ain't useless in kotor. fact of the matter is that for a male pc, dex is useless, and is only a little better for most female pcs."

Strength is pretty useless except in a few areas - when fighting the handmaiden it can be useful and fighting in the Mandolorian pit of honour. Otherwise, it's just not needed. I have astrength of 10, and my sabre does upwards of 40 damage.


"most of vol's initial comments is not worth going into. he got wacked with the ati ugly stick... which obviously made him a little bitter to begin with. peragus can be a bit stale, and as vol were already angsty 'bout the potential of game he kinda jumped the gun a bit. kotor2 gots some good stuff and some bad stuff but we largely ignore vol's initial impressions."

Eh. I agree with there being good, and bad part sof KOTOR2. Heck, i even mentioned a few in my review. However, as for my feeling for the potential game; if you had read my thoughts from when KOTOR2 was first annoucned I always assumed that KOTOR2 would be easily better than KOTOR1. However, the x-box reviews and then now my experience with the actual game has proven that round. It's about equal with the original - other than peragus which I stand by initial assessment - it sucked.

As foryou 'ignoring' my initial impressions; better luck next time. Afterall, when one ignores something they tend not to mention at all. And, for some reason, I bet when you clicked on this thread you read the first post. Nice try; though.

 

[kris]

spoilet alert... about conversations.

While I think the dialoge in general is better in KOTOR2, i was immensly let down by the lack of conversations. when it came to most of the characters (Kreia big exception) I finished away all conversation within minutes or even seconds. I heard Visas was a dark jedi by someone, but for me she was blue... which either means I heard wrong or I made her into a good jedi after talking with her twice, to short talks.

Also, you can convert several characters to become jedi, but after that you can't say anything more to them. you supposedly are their teacher, but can't tell them or teach them anything. Lame.

Otherwise I like most the things about the game. I like the character you play much mroe than the last game as he is more in your hands now.

 

[Rhombus]

ROFL. You're calling the game short because you skipped all the sidequests and probably skimmed through the dialogue and didnt bother with the NPC advancement? That's retarded.

Err... since when did I say I skipped all the sidequests?.. "not doing all of them" is not the same as skipping all of them.. you know.

Skimmed dialogue, no. Unless it was the second or third time I entered the same dialogue tree because I died or something similar.. Like asking the followers the same questions again at a later level to get to that point were you needed the influence to move forward or so...

As for not talking to every npc.. I was talking about no followers..

One thing that probably cut away some time was not bothering with Pazaak playing or swoop-racing.. which I could care less about.. since I got the game to swing a lightsaber and use force-persuade..

"These are not the droids you are looking for."

But yeah, I'm a retard.. so sue me.

 

[Gromnir]

"As foryou 'ignoring' my initial impressions; better luck next time. Afterall, when one ignores something they tend not to mention at all. And, for some reason, I bet when you clicked on this thread you read the first post. Nice try; though."

sorry vol, but we started scanning your post and noticed that it was kinda a nonsensical stew o' gripes... so we kinda skipped ahead to the other posts in this thread. maybe you wants to quibble over semantics and suggest that simply noticing the title means that we obviously paid it some attention… were not truly ignoring, but such a retreat into semantics is silly. we read very little of your initial post… we largely ignored… we did ignore. if after you finish the game you puts together something a little more meaningful, then we will read... maybe.

*shrug*

btw, the game also ain't near as skills driven as some of you folks suggest... not in any meaningful way. the workbench can be used by any member in your party and the number of times where you gets MEANINGFUL dialogues that is enhanced by skills(other than persuade,) is few and far between in the game. upgrading t3 requires computer and repair... but other than that, most skill-related dialogue enhancements in game is simply ejaculations or non-sequiturs. is almost no new quests available ‘cause of skills… and those that there is require very low skill checks.

play a sentinel just to get as many skills as possible is as wasteful as playing a guardian for the extra combat feats. 1 point in demolitions and 1 point in security were all we ever needed in those skills. there is 'bout a dozen items that boost demolitions skill, and there is only a couple times in game where the pc (sans party mates,) would need demolitions skill anyway. security? most doors and lockers require only a bare minimum in security... and those that require more can be opened by your joinable npcs. treat injury? we can think of a couple times in game it is required... and usually your wisdom modifier is 'nuff for most jedi characters to pass the skill check. awareness is nice for catching folks in lies, but again, you tend not to need big points.

the developers did to skills what they did to combat... they marginalized. for combat they made generally easy and they gave all classes the same bab... you not gonna have problems with combat regardless of your character class choice. same goes for skills. they made so that regardless of whether you choose sentinel or guardian or consular, you will still be able to make use of pretty much all the skill related stuff in game. even a guardian/weapon master with a int of 12 or 14 will have as many skill points as he needs... though he is gonna have to wait a little later in game to upgrade t3 all the way.

oh, and we would not choose sentinel if we were a powergaming person... or a person trying to squueze every ounce out of the game. a consular/watchman would probably be the way to go... with an int of 12. put all points into wisdom and your wisdom based skills is gonna be more than sufficient for any dialogue... though you can raise those skills to 10 if you really feels like maximizing. you gots repair as a class skill early so you can get most benefit from workbench... and you can do most of the repair side of the t-3 dialogues... you probably wont have 'nuff influence to finish off the t3 stuff til midway through game anyways, and shortly thereafter, when you gets watchmen prestige class you can dump a few points into computer skill. heck, all you need is 'bout five points in sneak and you can have a functional 30 sneak skill by late in the game. the consular gets the dc boost to force powers, and the watchman gets sneak attack... personally, we likes to see our force powers actually work on boss characters... so, 'pon reflection, we would do consular/watchmen.

HA! Good Fun!

 

[Volourn]

"if after you finish the game you puts together something a little more meaningful"

Wishful thinking. I'm gonna put as much effort into my review as Obsidian did with the game.

R00fles!

 

[Gromnir]

wow.

we could be waiting a long time. 1 year of time and thousands of actual man-hours of work... was not expecting a doctoral thesis.

oh well.

HA! Good Fun!

 

[Volourn]

Not talking about time. I'm talking about effort. I can spend 10 years sitting in a room. It wouldn't require any effort though.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

on a critical your opponent must make a save dc that is modified by your strength.

Wait a minute. Are you sure that when finesse is used, the dexterity isn't used as the check there?

 

[Gromnir]

on a critical your opponent must make a save dc that is modified by your strength.

Wait a minute. Are you sure that when finesse is used, the dexterity isn't used as the check there?

the save dc for critical strike line o' feats is modified by strength... only strength. you can see results in the combat feedback section of the messages menu if you so desire.

as far as combat goes, dex boosted weapons and lightsabre finesse only modifies the chance to hit... nothing else. does not modify damage and it does not adjust the critical strike line of feats... 'less something has changed in the pc version... and very little seems to have been changed in the pc version.

as an aside, there is some nifty unarmed combat gauntlets in the game, and the handmaiden gots some particularly good unarmed combat feats... however, there is no analogous finesse feat for unarmed combat. melee weapon finesse does not alter unarmed bab. is not a big deal for most players as unarmed combat is not used much (though it is quite viable if you got high strength and those ridiculous lightning gauntlets.) the handmainden, in particular, is an attractive choice to make into an unarmed specialist, however, the bug whereby her soldier level and jedi level do not stack for unarmed proficiency was not fixed in the pc version... just as the workbench bug were not fixed. even so, using the handmaiden as a strength based unarmed combatant was pretty fun as she gets knockback and bonus damage for echani training... with force speed and master flurry she would get four unarmed attacks per 'round doing 'round 45-50 points o' damage per hit. through much of the game we had very few lightsabres... and not many of the powerful crystals to makes 'em really effective. having an unarmed specialist in the party reduced our need for lightsabres... and oddly 'nuff, unarmed specialists is only useful if they is strength focused.

HA! Good Fun!

 

[bryce777]

Well, maybe I am crazy, but I tend to agree with volourn's assessment this time, at least as far as I can without having played the game (which it now looks like I will not be doing).

The first thing I notice is that even he complains about the easya nd boring combat. If thta is the case, it has to be pretty monotonous.

Also, it looks like your character is simply way overpowered for any situation skillwise...if there are no challenges to overcome, then what is the point in playing.


The biggest thing has to be the story. Amnesia, again? That is incredibly stupid. Then a character just like the malak person from the last story? Eh, that is not so good. Then the whole you are the last jedi...and will constantly meet other jedi thing, and you also have the same plot structure ie going to 4 different planets to build a widget. The story is the only selling point the game would have had for me, and it sounds unbelievably stupid.

 

[Volourn]

"Amnesia, again?"

Your character doesn't have full fledge amnesia. However, the way they give information out that your character should know can be very convoluted and can easily be mistaken as amnesia.

Don't get me wrong. The story is okay. Maybe even good; but some things really hurt it and make it seem so silly.

My final review well probab;y explain the good and bad stuff clearly (imo, of course)..

 

[NeverwinterKnight]

why oh why did they decide to take this stuff out of the final product?

http://forums.obsidianent.com/index.php?showtopic=29764

 

[Volourn]

"why oh why did they decide to take this stuff out of the final product?"

Totally irrelevant. Every single game ever created has thinks cut. I can't think of one game that hasn't.

It's just another way for Obsidian fanboys to make exuses and blame LA for KOTOR2's negatives but still heap loads of praise upon Obsidian for the good parts. Not saying that that's what you are doing; but I've seen it done before including on the BIO baords, and it's pathetic.

I judge games based on what they are; not what they could be.

 

[NeverwinterKnight]

"why oh why did they decide to take this stuff out of the final product?"

Totally irrelevant. Every single game ever created has thinks cut. I can't think of one game that hasn't.

It's just another way for Obsidian fanboys to make exuses and blame LA for KOTOR2's negatives but still heap loads of praise upon Obsidian for the good parts. Not saying that that's what you are doing; but I've seen it done before including on the BIO baords, and it's pathetic.

I judge games based on what they are; not what they could be.

not irrelevant at all, especially because, as you said, im not doing it to place blame on anyone. i simply posted that link because i think the game would have been much better had those things not been cut, regardless of whether it was lucasarts or obsidian to blame.

 

[bryce777]

"why oh why did they decide to take this stuff out of the final product?"

Totally irrelevant. Every single game ever created has thinks cut. I can't think of one game that hasn't.

It's just another way for Obsidian fanboys to make exuses and blame LA for KOTOR2's negatives but still heap loads of praise upon Obsidian for the good parts. Not saying that that's what you are doing; but I've seen it done before including on the BIO baords, and it's pathetic.

I judge games based on what they are; not what they could be.

not irrelevant at all, especially because, as you said, im not doing it to place blame on anyone. i simply posted that link because i think the game would have been much better had those things not been cut, regardless of whether it was lucasarts or obsidian to blame.

If they put in too much 'dark' stuff then they feel they are limiting their audience. I guess they want to have 10 year olds play the game too, and feel that is too much for them.

 

[Sol Invictus]

Your character does not have amnesia. GameSpot was stupid for saying that in their previews.

 

[Volourn]

Knight: My point; though; is that every game has that occur. That's why it's irrelevant. We can't use what ifs in judging games. I'm sure I would have loved TOEE if Troika was able to do certain things...


"Your character does not have amnesia."

No; but the knowledge the character should have is given to the player in such convoluted, and raetrded wyas due to POOR WRITING; it's not surprising that it can eaisly be mistaken as amnesia or faulty memory.

Afterall, the number of times, I basically had to respond with 'I don't remember you' or 'Yeah, I remember you' lines is silly.

 

[NeverwinterKnight]

Knight: My point; though; is that every game has that occur. That's why it's irrelevant. We can't use what ifs in judging games. I'm sure I would have loved TOEE if Troika was able to do certain things....

to that degree though? i know kotor1 had some stuff cut out, but not to the extent it would drastically alter the story such as those things they left out of kotor2 would.

i know all games eventually end up leaving stuff out, but the stuff that kotor2 left out drastically changes the story, especially how the ending plays out, and i think the ending that would have happened had they not cut all that stuff, looks much better than what we got.

 

[Volourn]

Yes.

One example from KOTOR1 IIRC is that Carth is supposed to sacrifice himself for you (if you are a girlie). IIRC as well, both KOTORs had planets not make the cut as well. That's pretty significant.

 

[Gromnir]

"to that degree though? i know kotor1 had some stuff cut out, but not to the extent it would drastically alter the story such as those things they left out of kotor2 would."

actually, kotor1 had lots cut out... bioware were just much better at going back and cutting out references to the missing parts. was an entire planet cut out of kotor1... were a hutt planet. however, unlike with kotor2, kotor1 did not have any stranded quests or nonsensical dialogue to make us wonder 'bout the absence of the hutt planet... though we expect that bioware had far fewer time limitations than did obsidian.

the main difference 'tween the toee situation and the kotor2 one, at least as far as we can tell, is that troika agreed to do a game in X months. they ended up getting X+3 months... and the game still weren't finished. obsidian, on the other hand, were given Y months in which to complete kotor2. obsidian were actually given only Y-2 months to complete. is hard to tell if obsidian would have failed to deliver a game in the amount of time they originally agreed 'pon to do so... though they still bear some responsibilty for final condition of kotor2.

HA! Good Fun!

 

[NeverwinterKnight]

i see.

well maybe its because my biggest problem with kotor2 is the ending, and the stuff they cut out would have gone a long way towards rectifying that part. whereas the stuff they cut out of kotor1, like sleyheron or whatever, while it took away some of the quests, didnt seem to really alter a lot of the main part of the story.

but thats just opinion. i just feel kotor2 was hurt more by the stuff they cut than kotor1 was hurt by the stuff they cut.

 

[Volourn]

"but thats just opinion. i just feel kotor2 was hurt more by the stuff they cut than kotor1 was hurt by the stuff they cut."

Yup; which is why what Grom says make sense - the cut stuff in in KOTOR1 was covered up a lot better. The cut stuff in KOTOR are seemingly in your face - ie. HK50s.. Sadly, for me, that's one of the more intriguing subplots in the game and actualy makes sense...

 

[Trash]

What irks me most is that the ability to script my characters seems to be gone. I just don't like setting up long sequences when the pc could do that just as well. That and the jedi masters quest is rather akin to the star map quests. Still, the game has had me enthralled for quite a bit longer than most these days.

 

[Eclecticist]

Okay. I am annoyed.

Over the last three days I've invested 24 hours into the game. I've beaten Korriban, I've beaten Dantooine, I've beaten Nar Shadda and I've beaten Onderon. I won the support of three Jedis, who said they'd go to Dantooine when I'd found them all, and I found the dead one on Korriban before defeating the Sith lord.

So, my problem now is...nothing changes. Dantooine is the same old map, ruined enclave and all. I've checked FAQs, and nothing like this has occurred. I've been enjoying the game a lot, and it burns even worse now that I can't finish it due to some kind of bug. I am assuming it was something to do with Korriban, as I didn't get a Journal log saying 'blah blah will meet you at Dantooine' - but dammit.

I can't go back to an old save unless I want to do all of Korriban and Onderon again. Anyway, if any of you wonderful people have any suggestions for an infuriated fool, please let me know. I am hoping I have made a simple mistake.