Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords
Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords is the next chapter to Knights of the Old Republic saga. It’s five years after the first game and the Jedi are being crushed by the Sith. The twisted wreck named Darth Sion will bring down the Republic, unless a lone Jedi can reconnect with the Force. You will guide this Jedi and make an important decision: Do you follow the Light or succumb to the Dark?   List Price: $ 19.99 Price: $ 140.54 |
The Sith Strike Back: Return of the Exile,
A New RPG
The first Knights of the old Republic (KOTOR), was one heck of a game. It took everything that people loved about the classic trilogy and expanded universe of Star Wars, and packed it neatly into an epic RPG where everything you did had either light side or dark side properties. Sure there was light-saber combat, but the game was more about storyline and immersion than anything else. The countless hours of voice-acting and intriguing dialog choices, to say nothing of conversations that would or would not take place depending on what you did, created an experience that sent shock-waves through the video game world. Of course there were also some bugs to be found (okay, a LOT of bugs), and some of the mini games were pointless (anyone else get tired of playing gunner when it’s almost impossible to lose?), but on the whole, that game was awesome, giving you everything from jedi mind-tricks and choking of smart-mouths with the force to dancing with twileks and finding out your own dark “Luke, I AM your father” secret. So naturally, the second KOTOR has a lot to live up to.
You Should Not Have Come Back
If the first KOTOR was A New Hope with the plot twist from Empire Strikes back, this one is probably Empire Strikes back with the plot and pacing of A New Hope. In a move that sits particularly well with me, the dialog and plot are both much darker and much funnier this time around. I knew that from the moment I found myself half-naked talking to a prisoner in a cell in a station where hundreds lie dead on the ground and psycho droids roam the halls. As the title of the game suggests, this time around everything revolves around the Sith (well, that and finding out why you were banished in the first place). Pretty much the whole has you playing cat-and-mouse with the Sith, trying to figure out who exactly the real bad guys are. Is is the tortured zombie Darth Sion, who is only kept alive by his own hatred and dark-side power, lusting for revenge on his old master? Is it Sith Lord who wears the creepy Sith Mask, so consumed with hunger for force energy that entire planets are devoured by his hunger as he roams the galaxy in his ghost-ship? Or is the true villain the one who manipulates these Sith fools, using them to make YOU stronger?
Pluck of an Old (Fashioned) Sith
Instead of the same old questions of simple “Do I kill the guy or give him ALL of my money” good and evil, a lot of situations in this game are gray areas. You COULD help someone, but it may hurt them more in the long run. You COULD listen to someone’s innocent comments, only to discover that they are pure evil. And you COULD hurt someone very much by allowing them to get too close to you. Really, if there is one thing that makes this game fascinating, is the way that puts such a wonderful spin on things, making you repeatedly question your actions and why you are doing the things that you are, forcing nice people to kill when YOU are the good guy, making people betray their master to serve YOU. Perhaps the ultimate question of the game (and it’s proved by the very end) is just how far are you willing to go in order to help someone you believe in or destroy something that you hate. Far more is at stake than just the Jedi and the Sith, or even just the Republic. What will you do? Sacrifice your soldiers or save the galaxy?
The Weapon of a Jedi Knight
Some people will undoubted become irked at the fact that they can’t have a light saber from the get-go. But storyline is key here, and now that almost all the Jedi are dead, and most of the Sith as well, light sabers are becoming a little rare. And what with people hunting Jedi down and all, well you get the picture. Consider this though, what is a Jedi without his light saber? Have you ever thought about it? A jedi who’s an expert marksman would be a dangerous foe, and a jedi with a sword is kind of like a samurai… And much to my delight, when you begin the game you DO have force powers.
I Want to Learn the Ways of the Force
When I heard about how this game was going to have all these new force powers, at first I was irritated. Great, more confusion, more head-scratching and decision making distracting me from the game. But as the game progressed I discovered something wonderful. Instead of forcing you to choose, the game helps you along by making the choices far more obvious. Certain types of Jedi gain certain abilities automatically (bonuses that come from leveling up in a certain style), and certain super-cool powers can only be obtained by types. In other words, a weapons master can’t throw lightening around like a jedi master. More choices, but the impossible ones aren’t shown, and the crucial ones are automatic. Nice.
Fastest Ship in the Galaxy
Really you’ve got to love most of the changes that have been made in this game. The card game…
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|Disappointing,
Knights of the Old Republic II is a good game. Maybe even a very good game. Which is a pity, because its prequel was one of the greatest games of all time. The sequel doesn’t live up.
The game mechanics are virtually identical to the original, which is fine. There are a few minor tweaks. The workbench can now be used to create items, not just upgrade them, and there’s a new “lab station” that can make medical items and explosives. Both of these stations are much more common than the workbench was in the original. You can now switch among several “forms” which give bonuses to some attributes and penalties to others. Pazaak has been improved with the addition of some new cards, plus the first play alternates between the contestants. Other than that, there’s not much in the engine that’s new.
Which, again, is fine. The original’s mechanics worked well and there’s no need to change them. But the original achieved legendary status by building a powerful and compelling storyline on top of those mechanics, and here the sequel falls short.
The characters aren’t as interesting. Your character’s motivations are far less clear. There are times when a character’s actions become cryptic for nothing more than the sake of being cryptic. The game shows you many cutscenes where your main character is not present, so you will gain knowledge that your character is unable to act on, which can be frustrating.
I found KotOR II much easier than the original. Virtually none of the enemies provided a challenge. I frequently found myself opening a door, facing up to a dozen foes, and slicing through them like butter, only to open the next door and do it all over again. There is an adjustable difficulty level, which I left on Normal… I can’t imagine what Easy must be like.
While leaving the engine pretty much alone, Obsidian abused it by throwing more at it than it can handle. Occasions where the frame rate drops are frequent, sometimes unacceptably so. In a few instances, it dropped to less than one frame per second. I also encountered one hard crash while playing. Fortunately, the game autosaves frequently.
Ironically, I was compelled to play the game almost continuously through and completed it in a single weekend. This was because I kept waiting for it to get better, waiting for the dramatic improvement that would make it a worthy sequel. It never came, and the ending was as disappointing as the rest of the game.
My advice to those who played and loved the prequel is to play KotOR II, but keep your expectations low. Perhaps then the disappointment won’t be as bitter.
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|You won’t have to force the fun.,
If you love KOTOR (Knights of the Old Republic) you will love this. Might be because this is KOTOR 2. It has the qualities that we loved from the last game. However, there are a few changes. For one I have not noticed any dialogue between my party while traveling. All dialogue between party members is now done on the Ebon Hawk. Workbenches now creat items as well as customizing them. Skills have more use now because they are used to create better items in the workbench. Speaking of customizing lightsabers are now much more customizable with 5 slots for upgrades. Party memebers gain or lose influence points depending on how you treat them and if they agree with you. The more influence you have over them the closer their alignment is to yours and also other benefits may arise.
Well I think you must’ve heard plenty of good things about this game, but here are a few things I didn’t like. The biggest of which is the ending. Don’t worry I won’t give it away. Suffice to say that it was highly anti-climatic as well as being a cliffhanger. In fact it is anti-climatic in a few more areas other than the ending. However, the story was still engaging if you can follow it. It is a bit cryptic at times and confusing, but if you could follow Metal Gear Solid 2 you can follow this. Another big problem is that it is glitchy. I didn’t have any problems, but I’ve heard many others complain about it. Especially those with modded Xboxes. The romance options in this game never really come to fruition. Except for one, there never seems to be any resolution to the romances. Also you do not get your lightsaber until a good long way into the game. This wasn’t a problem to me and added a sense of importance to obtaining one. Also lightsabers are much more powerful than in the first so it makes sense to make them rarer.
Despite all that this game is great! It is definitely worth buying if you are a fan of Star Wars and the first game. The quests are new and interesting. There are quite a few moral dilemmas. Not much if any of the quests from the previous game were recycled. Which is a good thing…
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