Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

The Good
Clearly SW:KOTOR is one of the best Star Wars games that have been recently released. One had to wonder whether LucasArts had lost their edge, respect, and credibility in game design…that is, until KOTOR hit. They were wise in privileging BioWare as the developers: BioWare is a highly talented design studio who (along with Black Isle) crafted the excellent Baldur's Gate, which this game seems to be heavily drawn from.

The best aspect of this game is the depth of the RPG system, seamlessly presented in an understandable, easy-to-pick-up format. Couple the game with its graphics that can be nothing short of amazing, and one can easily find the value in this title. Subquests are also varied (at one point, I was the lawyer and chief investigator in a murder case) and the minigames refreshing; minigame resembling pod-drag racing and futuristic intergalactic Blackjack fused with a bit of Magic: The Gathering.

Knights of the Old Republic also possesses a strong story that, while clichéd, is compelling and addictive; it will draw you in just as it had with me, complete with several good twists that will have you saying "why didn't I realize this before?". I especially like how thoroughly the designers worked in your actions with the game; I experienced the consequences of my choices hours down the line in several instances. Character interaction is another strong point: not only is every single line of text in the game voice-acted (something surprising for an RPG), but the acting is well done and quite convincing. I especially love Carth's voice; his performance is convincing and emotional and the diction alone lends a unique aura to who you perceive him to be. Equally cool are the alien languages, which are not spoken in accented English but rather their native alien tongues with subtitled text.

Speaking of sound, KOTOR's sound is excellent. The music is original yet retains the Star-Wars theme without sounding too clichéd. Any game I seriously consider hacking into just for extracting the music is surely worthy of a complement. The sounds themselves are pulled straight from the Official Star Wars soundbanks, so everything is realistic.

Another fine point are the character animations. You can tell everything was motion-captured and then refined, as the animations are varied, realistic, and wholly believable to watch. Sabreplay, a critical element of the game, is truly breathtaking to observe in it's full fluidity.

The Bad
That said, KOTOR has it fair share of flaws. Unfortunately, as good as Bioware is at storytelling, and as good, compelling, and solid as the game design is, it is also riddled with cliché dialog and half-baked plot events. The term "Battle Meditation" is used frequently--referring to one character and her unique ability, and you are given no clear indication as to what it specifically does, even to the game's ending.

The game is clearly tailored for the younger teenage audience. Most mature subjects are quickly skirted over, if not completely skipped altogether. While this isn’t such a bad thing, it takes away from the gamer’s experience and feeling of immersion as the superficiality of the virtual world becomes evident. As expected, there's no blood (is there any in Star Wars at all?). The game feels very family-friendly, which I suppose is an asset to many, but as I mentioned before, I see it as a downfall. Also present in are a couple of unnecessary political statements being made: the consequences of following the "right" way seem to be blown out of proportion a little too harsh. At one point, I was permanently banned from one of the game's cities for not acting as the EPA and PETA would have wanted me to act: I chose to play a morally neutral individual, and saw the quickest means to an end in deploying a sort of pesticide to rid the game of an objective-blocking nuisance. This in turn destroyed an entire planet's worth of important material and got me banned for life.

Part of the problem was compounded by the game designers’ city-centric method of designing the game’s location. The entire planet is a barren, useless wasteland, with the exception of the one inhabited city. Even though I was engaging in interstellar travel, I didn’t feel like the planets were truly worthy of their size; as in the above case, I was wondering, “Did I just wipe out the entire planet’s supply of _? Yeesh!”.

I also have a few complaints with the interface, that of which could have been further refined for the PC audience. All interface screens seem to be designed for low-resolutions--a necessity paying homage to the game's Xbox roots. The text inside this interface is extremely large, and on a 1024x768 game resolution I could read no more than two sentences' worth of descriptor text when looking at my inventory. The target size of 640x480 is apparent.

Sound wise, some of the alien voices become redundant. There are only so many suitable clips for each type of dialog, that in some cases, they become audibly redundant and mildly annoying. Also, (and this is just a really minor qualm) the crossbows sound like blasters. They had their own unique sound in every other Star Wars game I can remember, and I think I even spotted the crossbow sound bite being used for another weapon. That said, gunplay sounds are extremely generic: the same blaster sound is used for almost every gun. It just sounds...odd.

Finally, the game should have spent a little more time for debugging, as there were a number of problems I experienced. My system runs dual monitors--something unusual but not as different as you might think--and the game crashed on me constantly. The mouse cursor would not lock onto the monitor the game was running on, so frequently I would click on something on the other monitor without realizing it, and the game would minimize to the desktop. The fix is simple enough; open the game again and everything is fine.... usually. Sometimes, the game would become unbearably slow or just flat out crashed. I also noticed crashes whenever I went to unexplored planets in the first half of the game.

The Bottom Line
Knights of the Old Republic is to Baldur's Gate what Anachronox is to Final Fantasy. Both are Sci-fi RPGs, and both use a gameplay style that is both inherited and simplified from their ancestors. Both are excellent games marred with a few minor flaws.

Once you get past the game's minor quirks, you have a highly enjoyable Star Wars gaming experience. My save file registered almost 38 hours of gameplay from start to finish, and I still want to go through the game again, just explore the possibilities of playing the dark side. I think it falls just a few marks short of “Game of the Year”, but then again most of my complaints are either nit-picking or based on a unique playing style: all problems that are easy to overlook.

High in both fun factor, length, and replay value, KOTOR is a title not to be missed.

The Good
The people at Bioware have to be true masters in the philosophical art, that is game-design. "Knights of the old Republic" is the most powerful proof therefore, the design of that game is so clever, so smart, it's hard to believe sometimes. One of the most impressing things about this Bioware-baby is actually, how versatile it is, how intelligent it serves the needs of many completely different types of game-consumers...

"Knights of the old Republic" certainly has more mainstream-appeal than all previous Bioware-releases. Remember only "Baldur's Gate". You had to know the quite complicated AD&D-rules-system to have a chance in that game, otherwise you would have been lost without hope. Even then, combat was everything but easy, challenging you to the max. That sure was fun for experienced RPG-players, but frustrating for others.

"Knights of the old Republic" is much more flexible, offering the player three different grades of difficulty. Furthermore, the experienced RPGer can manually determine for each character of the party, which of the numerous attributes, skills, feats and force powers should be further developed – while others simply let an automatic routine do the work. Same goes for inventory-management: the newbies can simply click on a button to dress up the best way possible, while others have room to experiment.

To be honest, the tactical depth of the fights is on neither of the three difficulty-grades as high, as it was in "Baldur's Gate". But more important is, that you always feel, the designers are in control of the difficulty: there is a noticeable learning curve and the game feels always well balanced – this is certainly not a matter of course in roleplaying these days! And I haven't even mentioned, how great those battles are presented. "Knights of the old Republic" uses the well proven "Infinity Engine", which means real-time-combat, that can be paused at any time, to give orders to your party. And watching those combat-scenes sure is a blast, as they manage to resemble the well known movie-scenes in quiet an astonishing way.

But combat is in my opinion not the only thing that makes role-playing interesting. The game also features a really interesting RPG-system with quite numerous possibilities to shape your main-character the way you want. Apart from violent skills you can also learn, for example, to hack into computers for shutting down the security-systems of enemy-bases. Or you can reach your goals by persuading people, instead of killing them. The best thing about the RPG-system is actually, that it reflects the moral choices, you make during the game. Followers of the dark side will develop entirely different force powers as servants of the light. Last but not least, the opportunity to upgrade your equipment is executed brilliantly and allows nice experimenting.

"Knights of the old Republic“ is one of the very rare games, that I truly hold in high regard and that at the same time sold really well. Of course it is likely, that the name "Star Wars" on the box has contributed a lot to the games commercial success – but I don't believe that to be the only reason. Equally important is in my eyes, that people with less time or will to dive deep into the material, are this time not excluded from the joy. And the game manages to stay interesting for the hardcore-fraction as well – I consider myself an experienced RPGer and I can tell you, I had a lot of fun!

Let's go further and reflect about the things, the presentation of a game is important for. I would say, the presentation of a game should create and by all means adhere to a specific illusion. In this case though, the presentation rather recreates a specific illusion – the illusion of the Star Wars movies. And "Knights of the old Republic" does even more: it enriches this illusion quite significant.

A good example is the soundtrack. We hear a lot of familiar themes while playing, as the brilliant score by John Williams is used to a great effect. But there's also a huge amount of original music featured, that hits the typical Star Wars style perfectly – like the beautiful theme, we get to hear on Dantooine. Sound effects also do a lot to enhance the atmosphere: from the buzzing of the lightsabers to the bleeping of the droids, everything is there.

The graphics are beautiful. The game uses a better version of the graphics-engine already seen in "Neverwinter Nights", which means 3D-environments instead of an isometric view. I remember being on Tatooine, that desert planet you know from a couple of movies, and I really had the feeling of entering the world of Star Wars. Landing on Tatooine, you actually arrive in a mining colony first. Building stands next to building, there is a feeling of narrowness somehow. But that's used to a great effect, when you finally leave the colony and enter the vastness of the desert, giving you a fantastic view. And there is an image, that will evoke familiar feelings in the minds of all Star Wars fans: a giant, heavily damaged sandcrawler, just like we witnessed it through the eyes of Luke Skywalker in the very first movie. That giant object in that flat, beautiful landscape serves not only as quite an impressing image, it also recreates the atmosphere of the movies by discreetly referring to them.

So, the images, the game creates, truly breathe the atmosphere of Star Wars. But it does more than only citing the movies. We also visit planets never seen in any cinema, the most impressing one probably being Rakatan. I really felt like walking through a piece of art, instead of just standing in front of it. (I only wished, the Neverwinter Nights engine would allow me more freedom of view, while exploring this wonderful landscapes...)

Of course, the game world is not only depicted through images. You can speak to many interesting characters, you can complete an enormous amount of non-obligatory side-quests, you can always stop and enjoy the many amazing details. The movies simply had no time to show their world in such detail, as they had only about two hours to tell their heroes-save-the-galaxy-tale.

"Knights of the old Republic“ truly outshines the movies when it comes to attention for details. Let's take the games characters for example. Bioware was always great, when it came to characterization – and this time they really outdid themselves. As the game takes place 4000 years before the events of the movies, you won't meet any characters you already know. And trust me: you won't miss them at all, as they will appear flat in comparison to the ones you get to know in this game.

Darth Malak is a great example for a very well conceived main villain. He's not just someone you kill in the end, he's a distinct and almost tragic personality. A character, that can remind you of Shakespeare's "Macbeth" sometimes, as he is indeed a very intelligent person, who became terribly misguided and now spreads tyranny over his world.

The most convincing characters are of course those, that follow you on your journey. They all come with their own background-stories and they talk a lot to you. I was really surprised, when Carth Onassi, a soldier for the Republic, suddenly suspected me of being a traitor. It really gave me the impression of dealing with a living, self-thinking individual – something I rarely felt within the boundaries of a video game.

Adding to that is an absolutely convincing cast of voice-actors, that truly suit their particular roles. Mimics and gestures were also stunningly naturalistic – gotta give credits to the animators. But the most important thing are the dialogues, which are written with perfect style. I found it a pleasant surprise that some great humorous attempts found their way into this overall quite serious game as well. Love that crazy droid HK-47! And really funny are the conversations with the Jawas on Tatooine: those little guys had very amusing ways of expressing themselves...

I still haven't lost one word about the main-story, yet. I haven't forgotten about that. I just wished to spare the best part for the very end of this section.

Well, you could certainly summarize, that you once again have to stop the evil plans of some evil guys. But that is not, what the story is really about. The real theme of the story is quite actually ethics. That theme is at the bottom of every little quest, it hides in nearly every dialogue and is the centre of every single of the countless little stories, the game tells within its big one.

I recommend, you also read the review by JazzOleg, as it is most interesting, what he wrote about the ethical conflict and the behind-standing philosophies, comparing the Jedi to Chinese monks. However, my own thoughts went into completely other directions, as I found it most surprising, that even your worst enemies, the Sith, follow their own moral code – something, the movies never told us.

You actually not only fight the Sith, you get to talk to them, as well. And in doing so, you will discover, that they are still human, that they have still feelings, after all. They are misguided. "Knights of the old Republic" strongly emphasizes on the fact, that everyone can fall to the dark side, every person has that potential. The Sith are often portrayed as extremely selfish, they are actually quite focused on their career. A lot of their thoughts circulate around intrigues, around ways to climb up the ladder in their hierarchy. It fits to their Darwin-like philosophy of a natural selection, where only the strongest survive. That philosophy – the fact, that there's always danger from the lower ranks – makes sure, that only the strongest stay in leading positions. And when only the strongest are in leading positions, it strengthens the Sith as a whole.

It is actually quite easy, to see some parallels to reality here. We live in an achievement-oriented society, that works in many ways quite similar. And I believe, our society also tends to teach young people, to care for themselves mainly. So, were the movies basically just a science-fiction-fairy-tale, you can easily establish a more down-to-earth-like view on "Knights of the old Republic" and actually see "the dark side" more or less as a metaphor for self-centered real-life-behaviour.

What I was often asking myself, while playing, is the following: is it possible, that a game with such a strong emphasis on moral decisions can also lead to reflections about your behaviour in real life? And when that is true, can such a game actually teach people something valuable – especially the younger ones? I'm not sure about that. But nevertheless – call me crazy, if you want – I really see some deeper value in "Knights of the old Republic". Even if it's just a Star Wars game, it definitely goes beyond pure entertainment.

The Bad
There really isn't much to say in this section, at least nothing really important. But for the sake of completeness...

The role-playing-system is quite interesting and well executed, but not to be called perfect. There is a number of talents, that proofed to be rather useless. Why invest points into "security" (nothing but lock-picking), when you could easily bash everything open by using your weapons? Putting points into some passive force powers like "Force Immunity“ or "Force Energy Resistance“ was close to waste them, either.

I already mentioned, that the engine doesn't feed you with as much freedom in view, as I would have liked it. Also, the exploration of the planets was often restrained by rather ridiculous limitations. There you stand sometimes, having gained the maximum level in your "Force Jump“-ability, and a tiny little rock has the means of blocking your way. Very strange...

The Bottom Line
You might have already realized, that I'm extremely enthusiastic about this game. Normally, I don't use superlatives in such an inflationary way. But it just seems appropriate to me, when it comes to "Knights of the old Republic" - I simply call it a triumph for the video game industry.

You should really check this out, even if you don't like Star Wars. Even if you're completely new to the genre, this is no hindrance, as the game really takes not-so-experienced players by the hand. The only thing you should be sure of is, that you really have the time for this game, because it really is absorbing and once you're into it, it can be hard to find back into the real world.

The Good
First off this game is simply the best game I have ever played. The graphics are just as good as they were on the Xbox. The interface is a ton different from the Xbox version, but it is still well crafted and easy to use. The load and save times are so much quicker that even if you own this game for Xbox, like I do, you will want to buy it for PC simply because it loads and saves so quickly. I could go on forever, about how good this game is. The storyline is simply amazing. It is great to be able to become a light jedi or a dark master of the universe.

The Bad
The lengthy cutscenes between planets are a little anoying, but nothing to be overtly concerned about.

The Bottom Line
Star Wars games are gettin better all the time. I mean we have a halo like fps game called Star Wars Republic Commando, and a Battlefield 1942 like game called Star Wars Battlefront. Buy this game.