KOTOR 2 : sith lords

[LARUTO]

i just read that the second kotor game is scheduled for a Dec 2004 release, how cool is that? new developer Obsidian said that they built on the original engine developed by bioware in an effort to ensure that they got the game out on tim, thank god for that. Lucasarts said in an interview that they had some specific guidelines to the plot that they asked the developers to follow, but all in all it is Obsidian's story being told. with respect to characters, a few characters will be returning from the original, either as cameos or actual party members, but not all, i mean chances are you may have killed off charactes like mission, bastilla, jolee and juhani when you attempted the darkside. one confirmed returning charcter is T3 M4. as for new charcters, well there is one guy called Aton, who is the ultimate scoundrel, meddeled after Han solo, this guy is a survivor, they say his saving throws increase with the more damage he takes ( he cannot be knocked out in battle unless he is the last man standing. )

http://www.lucasarts.com/games/swkotor_sit...characters.html (http://www.lucasarts.com/games/swkotor_sithlords/characters.html)

the above link has a couple of decent pics of game charcters.
next we have 2 of the more important characters in the game : The Sith Lord Darth Sion is a twisted, physical wreck whose torn flesh and shattered bones have him in constant pain. His rebuilt skeleton and body, held together only by the force of his hatred and the power of the Dark Side, are far from pleasant to behold. In stark contrast, Mira is definitely easy on the eyes, but she's not the kind of woman who uses her looks to get ahead. Indeed, her chosen profession, bounty hunter, is one that would surely challenge either gender of any race. Although motivated by material gain, she nonetheless chooses not to sell her services as a contract killer or to perform assignments for the Exchange, and has only taken the lives of others when her own was threatened. When necessary however, she's lethal with her weapon of choice, a wrist-mounted rocket launcher.

[rumbelly]

nice ..

the first game won many accolades including game of the year from some gaming sites

was a great game, this one looks to be even better !

[LARUTO]

better than the first? thas a hard task to accomplish, but i do like the way you can now pay special attention to your other party members, in that they can now independently go off on side quests unaccompanied by yur main charcter, this would allow you to pay special attention to their development unlike the 1st, also it would give the game a more star wars-y feel with respect to the adventure aspect. i hope that this time the sip actually moves during combat, i mean it was kinda dull shooting from the turret with the ship heading on a straight course, where were the evasive maneuvers?

[rumbelly]

http://xboxmedia.gamespy.com/xbox/image/article/562/562500/star-wars-knights-of-the-old-republic-ii-the-sith-lords-20041101023944851.jpg
http://xboxmedia.gamespy.com/xbox/image/article/562/562500/star-wars-knights-of-the-old-republic-ii-the-sith-lords-20041101023943288.jpg
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http://xboxmedia.gamespy.com/xbox/image/article/562/562500/star-wars-knights-of-the-old-republic-ii-the-sith-lords-20041101023948366.jpg
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http://xboxmedia.gamespy.com/xbox/image/article/562/562500/star-wars-knights-of-the-old-republic-ii-the-sith-lords-20041101023942507.jpg

[Paradoxxx]

Yall think that since Obsidian working on the KOTOR project, the sequel might not live up to expectations?

[LARUTO]

while i cannot say that i am a follower of obsidian's work, i still believe they will manage to surpass the original.
their method is simple and sweet, don't re-invent the wheel, rather make it prettier and give it more value.

the following was found on gamespy


GameSpy: The original KotOR had a few homages to the movie and expanded universe characters. Can we expect to see more of that in KotOR II, and will they just be cameos or do any of the major characters have connections to the larger universe?
Feargus Urquhart: We've spent a lot of time and effort trying to use as much of the Star Wars universe as possible in various ways. Hopefully, there will be things that hearken to both the movie lover and the super-hardcore-reads-every-Star-Wars-novel fan. Those kinds of things are all over the game in the naming of the items, to the look of certain areas, to one-liners that are spouted off by many of the characters in the game.


As for the major characters, some have ties to the larger universe, but like the first game, those ties aren't direct because the game is set some 4,000 years before the movies.
GameSpy: The original game included really cool short-bladed lightsabers as a usable weapon, are you planning on including any new twists on the lightsaber this time?
Feargus Urquhart: One of our focuses was to put a lot of effort into the weapon and item upgrade system, so not only will people be able to upgrade the crystals in their lightsabers, they will be able to upgrade the hilt with six different types of upgrades. As well, one of the major quests in the first half of the game is to get your lightsaber. I don't want to reveal too much about the why, but we wanted to make getting your lightsaber an important achievement.

GameSpy: Can you talk a bit about the game's "deconstruction" system? Is it similar to MMO crafting? How will it work and are there items that are only available as "recipes?"
Feargus Urquhart: It's not going to be as complicated as something like in Horizons. When you "deconstruct" things like weapons and armor you get components; while medical supplies, mines, and grenades get you chemicals. You can use the components at work benches to make all types of items, including those you can only get by making things. When it comes to chemicals, you can use them at lab stations to make extra med-packs, thermal detonators, etc…
GameSpy: The original game had a problem in that the Jedi tended to be a bit overpowered -- to the point where players missed some of the storyline because they weren't using all the available characters. How are you changing the game to make sure that all of the player's NPC allies are useful this time around?
Feargus Urquhart: There are a number of things that we've done to keep your other companions interesting throughout the game. Some if it will be a part of the story, while others will be useful in what they can do for you on the Ebon Hawk. What has also turned out be a great way to keep your favorite companions around is that depending on what you do in the game, you can convince many of them to become Jedi.

The biggest change was having specific quests in the game where only a certain character or characters can do them -- and those characters are not the PC. So for certain portions of the game, while you character is off doing one branch of the story, a small group of NPCs will be in a party of their own taking care of a different branch.
GameSpy: Why did you decide to make this a single-player-only game? Was a co-op mode ever under consideration?
Feargus Urquhart: We thought about it quite a bit when we were first looking into making KotOR II, however we felt that the game really is centered on the story. If we added multiplayer in with multiple main characters, the story would have started to make less sense and would probably get confusing at times.
GameSpy: Sound was one the strongest parts of the original game, especially the music. What do have lined up for us this time? Who'll be doing the sound effects and composing the score?
Feargus Urquhart: Over an hour of new music was composed by Mark Griskey, a composer for LucasArts who has composed an excellent score for the game. We have also made a large effort to use musical stingers to accentuate dialogues and expanded the engines capabilities with all types of sound to make the audio landscape deeper and more engrossing.
GameSpy: When designing characters and settings for KotOR II, what inspirations and resources have you drawn from? The original movies? The prequels? The first game? The books?
Feargus Urquhart: All of them -- and I do mean all of them. Our lead designer and one of Obsidian's owners, Chris Avellone, set out to read everything. There are books, guides, modules, young adult readers, and graphic novels jammed into our Star Wars cabinet. If I had to pick a couple specific inspirations I would say that other than the KotOR I, we relied a lot on the Knights of the Old Republic graphic novels and the original movies.
GameSpy: Whether the player went Dark or Light Side in the first game should have a huge impact on the universe five years later. You, as the developer, however, won't know. How specifically will you address the problem of not knowing how the player decided to play the first game?
Feargus Urquhart: What we've done is allowed the player to tell the game through dialog, revealing some information about what happened during their play through of the first game, and some key things about Revan. For people who didn't play the first game, they can just say they don't know and the game happily continues after that.
GameSpy: Will we find out what happened to Revan, and will it be different based on how you played the first game?
Feargus Urquhart: Sorry, but we have to keep quiet on this one.
GameSpy: What kind of new character customization options should we expect? Will we be able to play as a race other than human this time, and how will that impact your character's abilities and how the storyline plays out?
Feargus Urquhart: We've stayed with keeping the player human, however, you get to start out as a Jedi and then later on in the game you can choose a new Jedi prestige class to become based upon whether you've traveled the Light or Dark path. Other than that we have added a lot of special abilities that really make each of the classes and companions feel different. On top of that there are more Force powers and feats to get and more levels to move through.

GameSpy: Will the two versions eventually be fundamentally identical?
Feargus Urquhart: Both the PC and Xbox version will be the same in the end; however, we have put in a lot of work on the PC interface. It will now work in multiple resolutions in full screen. That not only includes the menus, but the in-game buttons and graphics as well. So, when you take the resolution all the way up, the interface won't just be smaller in the middle of the screen with a nice border.
GameSpy: Will you have more variety in the building appearance and NPC heads?
Feargus Urquhart: We've really tried to put in all that we can into each of the areas and we are paying for some of that right now. However, were using every trick in the book that we've learned through the years to keep all of those cool things in the levels and not have the Xbox start smoking. I would say that we've increased the number of heads in most of the areas by at least half and hopefully doubled it in others. I think you'll also notice that the areas in KotOR II are a fair amount larger as well.
GameSpy: Will there be a plot twist, and if so, how do you plan on topping the plot twist of the first game?
Feargus Urquhart: We have never set out to make a newer, better, and more improved plot twist. Our goal has always been to craft a story that the player loves and enjoys playing. There will be all sorts of different twists and turns in the story, but we never set out to craft an entire story around making a bigger twist than KotOR, we set about making a story that stood on its own and was as deep and intriguing as KotOR. We think we've done that and hope all the people out there will dig it.
GameSpy: Will KotOR II implement the d20 system in manner different than its predecessor?
Feargus Urquhart: We kept the fundamentals of the d20 system in place and expanded on it as much as possible. As we've balanced the game out, though, there are some divergences from d20 that we introduced to try to make the gameplay better for the player. This is especially evident at very high levels in the game. Did I mention we removed the level cap so you can go above 20? Above level 20 is really where we have made the most significant tweaks to the system.
GameSpy: How have the last game's Jedi classes changed? Will there be any new Jedi classes available?
Feargus Urquhart: We've played around with the Jedi classes to have them feel a little bit more distinct from each other, and like I said above we've added the prestige classes that are going to allow each person to pick a new class dependant on which side of the force they have decided to follow. One of the areas where we have spent a lot of time is to balance the amount of skill points that the different Jedi's get. You'll feel a big difference now between Jedi's when creating them and distributing skill points at each level.
GameSpy: Can you talk about specific Jedi powers new to the sequel?
Feargus Urquhart: There is certainly a whole list of them, plus we've also changed powers from the first game here and there. One of my favorite new powers is Crush Opposition which requires that you are Dark Side to even work and is given free to the Sith Lord class. It disrupts the attention of all of the Dark Jedi's enemies in a pretty large radius around them making them miss more of their attacks and less able to other kinds of powers that the Dark Jedi has. It's a great power to get off early in a fight to be followed up by more target specific powers.
GameSpy: What information can you give regarding the secondary characters?
Feargus Urquhart: We're not talking about all of them yet, however, each of the companions is not only going to have very distinctly different personalities and roles to play in the story, they also each have special abilities that no other character can get.

[rumbelly]

Nov 23 rd -

LucasArts announced today that the Xbox version of Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords has gone gold

Approximately five years after the events of the original Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, the Jedi, nearly brought to an end by the Sith, are on the brink of extinction. The galaxy is in turmoil and the Republic no longer has the strength to protect its worlds. Sith Assassins are hunting the one they believe to be the last of the Jedi, the one who holds the fate of the galaxy ... you. Bringing a new chapter to the Star Wars series, this sequel to the blockbuster RPG again delves into the saga's founding lore that was explored in the original. The Sith Lords features an all-new, more perilous storyline, new characters, classes, locations and force powers.

Knights of the Old Republic: The Sith Lords will be in-store on December 6, 2004.

[Paradoxxx]

another game released for the console b4 the pc, ve very happy that im not interested in this game... although i might take a shot @ it and not say anything

[LARUTO]

well i have a contact who works within microsoft, so i am definitely getting this game release day.

[Paradoxxx]

Laruto, im sure you just counting the days before the release

[LARUTO]

at last we shall reveal ourselves....
at last we shall have our revenge!

i'm terribly sorry to say this to the guys that did sudeki and fable but (ahem) you got KNOCKED THE F@*& OUT!
summary from IGN
Knights of the Old Republic II may look and feel like the original, but considering the first is among the best RPGs of all time, that's not such a bad thing at all. Obisidan has delivered with an interesting story, great dialogue, and strong morality system. There are aspects of KOTOR II that are stronger than the first and one or two things that are perhaps a little weaker, but overall The Sith Lords is one of the best RPGs on Xbox. Though it seems more rewarding to be Dark Side (who could resist using Force Crush to destroy their victims?), playing Light Side offers a different experience and can be just as satisfying. Star Wars games are plentiful, but none come close to the KOTOR series in feeling like the good ol' Star Wars universe, even if it all takes place 4000 years before the movies. KOTOR II is the perfect holiday treat and shouldn't be missed.


for the full review click the link http://xbox.ign.com/articles/569/569096p1.html

[Paradoxxx]

Originally posted by LARUTO@Dec 8 2004, 04:30 PM
at last we shall reveal ourselves....
at last we shall have our revenge!

i'm terribly sorry to say this to the guys that did sudeki and fable but (ahem) you got KNOCKED THE F@*& OUT!
summary from IGN
Knights of the Old Republic II may look and feel like the original, but considering the first is among the best RPGs of all time, that's not such a bad thing at all. Obisidan has delivered with an interesting story, great dialogue, and strong morality system. There are aspects of KOTOR II that are stronger than the first and one or two things that are perhaps a little weaker, but overall The Sith Lords is one of the best RPGs on Xbox. Though it seems more rewarding to be Dark Side (who could resist using Force Crush to destroy their victims?), playing Light Side offers a different experience and can be just as satisfying. Star Wars games are plentiful, but none come close to the KOTOR series in feeling like the good ol' Star Wars universe, even if it all takes place 4000 years before the movies. KOTOR II is the perfect holiday treat and shouldn't be missed.
for the full review click the link http://xbox.ign.com/articles/569/569096p1.html
Quoted post



Dont know how i missed this post, thx for the heads up Lars.

[LARUTO]

after an unfortunate delay i finally managed to snag a copy of the game and i must say it was a good week of gaming.

but first, the bad, the game is filled with bugs galore, (i think that lucasarts asked obsidian to speed up the game to the december release so that it would not clash with bioware's jade empire) the bugs are all visual annoyances for the most part, there are several times during ingame cut-scenes where you find yourself looking at the back of a key characters head during a conversation with them. also when viewing the item equip screen sometimes you will notice flashes of wepons appearing on weapon slots that were left empty. the bugs would have only taken a couple weeks to fix. another thing i didn't fully like was the weak final bosses, i understand that this was purposely done to properly illustrate the ascension of your character to the elite prestige classes, but i just didn't like the fact that i could have run through the last level with so much ease, at least the bosses should have had a power bonus to give a challenge of sorts.

the plot is a very solid adventure that portrays the force and it's teachings in a way that was never done by any previous star wars game, the character kreiya always has alot of input that makes you want to learn more about why the force works the way it does. there are alot of subtle improvements in the game that make the gameplay better than the first, things like new lightsaber stances that vary in strength based on you are up against. new feats are available and alot of new animations which accompany the always ground breaking star wars soundtrack.

all in all it is a really good rpg, best on the xbox since the first installment

i give it an 8 out of 10