SteveThaiBinh

Luke is the child of Anakin, the 'most powerful Jedi ever'. Anakin was fathered by the Force itself (it amazes me that the Christian extremists in the US let this one slide). And we learn in Kotor 2 that the Force runs strong in bloodlines, or at least I think Kreia said that with reference to the Handmaiden. Since the Jedi aren't supposed to have kids, doesn't that suggest that they're trying to breed themselves out of existence? Given that the Sith probably don't have any restrictions on sex, this may be a poor long-term strategy for Team Jedi.

Dump Kreia by all means. It won't help. She'll still 'chip in' every hundred yards with her own brand of helpful advice. As for lightsabers,

Yup, thanks. She's a broadcaster and comedienne in the UK, originally from Denmark, probably the second most famous Dane in this country after Hamlet. One of the many 'professional foreigners' who exist around the world.

Scandinavia is rather unusual in the West, but very much in tune with the rest of the world. Most people in the world are bilingual or multilingual. Europeans are the worst monolingual offenders. By the way, I often wondered ... is Sandi Toksvig famous in Denmark?

When I worked in Japan, the local city had four high schools, and each school had a native English speaking teacher. One was from the US, one from Ireland, one from England and one from New Zealand. After a year or so, when some kid came up to me on the street (they often do, to practice their English) I could often guess which school they went to because of the traces of the teacher's accent. My experience of Japan is that a lot of people know some English: after all, they've usually studied it for six years at school. What's rarer is to find someone with the courage and confidence actually to speak it to a foreigner. Well done for speaking up - it's always a great feeling when someone makes an effort to speak your language.

I taught English in Japan for three years, and remarkably this never happened to me or to anyone I knew. One Canadian friend had a male student grab at her breasts (she dodged), but this was treated as a fairly serious incident by the school. Nobody thought it was acceptable or normal behaviour. Sometimes kids do say things to foreigners they would never say otherwise. They're influenced by the TV 'Wide' shows, a kind of variety/chat show on Japanese TV all the time. This is the only time many Japanese kids see Westerners talking to Japanese, and it's always 'celebrities', and they're always asked stupid questions and made to do silly stunts. EDIT: At the risk of being flamed by opponents of 'political correctness', 'Jap' is a more offensive term than you might realise, at least in Japan itself.

Well, technically not. Part of Turkey does lie in the geographical continent of Europe, but only a small part I agree. Israel on the other hand is a bit further away. Still, why not? Another country with quarrels with its neighbours, some unusual ideas of Nationalism and a dodgy human rights record just adds more flavour to the mix.

Like a great many countries in Europe, at the point when they joined the European Union and maybe even today. I do take your point, and I don't want to sweep Turkey's human rights abuses under the carpet. What I'm saying is that it's a mistake to demand that all the changes take place before Turkey joins. Instead, membership itself will help improve the situation, and that's what everyone wants. Europe made a mistake in waiting 15 years after the fall of communism to admit Eastern European countries, demanding that they get their economies right before joining. Europe should be as inclusive as possible. I don't think that includes letting any country or leader get away with something as offensive as denying the Armenian genocide.

Turkey's human rights record is no worse than the UK's human rights record in Northern Ireland when we were allowed to join. Fixing human rights may take time, but progress is being made, largely because the prospect of EU membership is on offer. When Turkey does join, that will cement the progress that has been made and probably speed it up. And the idea that Turkey has human rights problems and we don't isn't very accurate. Where in Europe do the Roma receive fair treatment?

I agree, there's a danger that the civil servants in Brussels are trying to do too much too fast. I'm also worried that they want to harmonise too much, making everything uniform across the whole community. I always thought that diversity was the great strength of Europe: so many languages and cultures conflicting and co-operating. What the EU needs most of all is to allow Turkey to join. That will kill off the idea that we're headed fast towards a bland everyone-the-same future, and more respect will be given to all member states. Then we can slow down and relax a bit.

No-one says it's free. It's free at the point of delivery. That's what makes it fair. Why should one kid get a better education than another, just because his parents are richer? It's not about the parents' right to pay for what they want, it's about the child's right to get the best education possible.

Teething problems. Nothing to worry about. They'll get the rules right soon. The poor European Union, it's so easy to bash it (so much of the criticism is justified, too). But I still love it, and want to make it better. I'm a citizen of Europe. If the UK votes to leave the European Union, I know which side of the Channel I'll being staying.

Not sure. University was pretty much free until the 90s, then gradually the government contribution was cut back, and now students pay most of it themselves. Universal secondary education came in I think in the Labour (Socialist) government of 1945-51(?). Primary might have been before that, but someone else might know more. It is a phenomenal irony that World Bank experts (mostly from the US) go around the world pushing countries to adopt the US approach to education, but the US public school system isn't that great. Not that some schools in the UK are any better.

If I understand this right, you're asking if it's fair for small businesses to pay a decent minimum wage? Yes, it is, and it's right for the government to intervene to enforce this. Low-wage pay is having a devastating effect on families, leading to stress-related illness and poor child-rearing, all of which is a mess that the state will have to clear up in the end. Better to prevent the mess in the first place. The capitalist system places the investor at the centre, and offers her the maximum protection. But the workers in a small company are also major investors: they invest their time, their commitment, their acceptance of the risk of working for a small company. If a small business owner wants a stable and loyal workforce, of course a decent wage must be paid.

In the UK, education is free until the age of 18. Higher education (18+, university/college) used to be free, and mine was one of the last years to get it nearly free. It still is free in many European countries. However, education is becoming more capitalist across the world. The idea is that the state should make primary (up to age 11-12) education free, because the whole of society, not just the individual, benefits from that. Think about it, that's basically when you learn to read and write, and a modern society and economy needs literate citizens in order for people to be able to sign contracts, fill in forms, vote in elections etc. But for higher education like university, more of the benefits go to the individual (e.g. higher salary) than to society. So the individual should fund her education herself, through family savings or loans. The World Bank is pushing this model of education onto poor countries because they can't afford to fund their education systems any other way. Those European countries which are resisting are doing so because they see education as a fundamental human right, not as an economic investment. It's a better approach, but it's losing ground, I think.

If it isn't done in Obsidian's patch, then yes, definitely. For me, good quality music is a really big part of the gaming experience, and I'd appreciate hearing Kotor 2's music as it was meant to be (or near to it). But there are rumours (alluded to on your website) that this will be part of the official patch. Better to wait until that comes out, I guess.

As superficial as it is, I think the disappointment with the ending was more to do with the production value than flaws in the plot. What I mean is that keeping the same events and storylines is fine, they just needed to flesh it out more: cut scenes with your party members on the ship as you approach Malachor (or leave them behind on Telos); a substantially different dark side ending movie; dialogue and scenes of you with your party as you all flew away from Malachor; a visual representation of the fates of the planets as Kreia tells you (like they did with Arcanum). I realise a lot of this is just eye-candy, but I think it was the feeling of insubstantiality, rather than any deep flaws, that caused people to come away dissatisfied and to log onto these forums to express that. The order of events (ending at Malachor 5 rather than Telos), was logical I think, and probably not the main problem.

The idea of being stuck in a loop is fascinating. If you can get hold of it, you might like a Macedonian film called Before the Rain , which uses the same concept to good effect. It has an excellent soundtrack, too. The ending of Kotor 2 was rather rushed, with lots of loose ends and ambiguities, and this leaves the whole thing open to many different interpretations. Everyone has to fill in the gaps for themselves. Some welcome this as a refreshing change to the spoonfeeding of your average Hollywood movie, others think it's poor writing or lack of polish. Philosophy is the study of doubt and ignorance, and intersects with every branch of knowledge. As an instinctive 'realist' (I think that's the right term?), I find it hard to grasp a lot of the concepts involved and the subjectivity of much philosophical thought, but I still find it interesting and useful. From a realist perspective, the idea of Kotor 2 being in a loop doesn't stand up to the available evidence, but of course that's not the point, since the evidence itself is also in doubt. It can be rather humbling to learn how little we can actually know for sure about the world.

Sasha's language from Kotor 1. I don't think it was actually Mandalorian, more a hybrid/altered version. I was really impressed by that puzzle; I thought it was such an original thing for a computer game to have to figure out the basic grammar of another language. Don't know if another game has done it before.

There's a rumour going round that the patch will fix the music quality. They might do some of the movies at the same time, as presumably the originals in Obsidian's files are of decent quality. It would make the patch larger, of course, so maybe it could be an optional download.

That too. Nevertheless they share the characteristic of 'Oh look at me, I can float in the air and am completely pointless'.

It's GO-TO's long lost identical twin brother. Except for not looking anything like GO-TO.

Rationally, this and nothing more is known of the nature of the force. Force users in the Star Wars universe can observe and record these effects, and they are as 'real' as anything else your philosophical/ontological position allows you to accept. As it seems this cannot be proven or disproven, it's just her belief, founded on faith. She ought to have started a church. But I don't see how it could ever be more than one among many competing interpretations.

"I hope you saved your game."

Why though? If the Force has a will, it is surely that the peoples of the Star Wars universe should be free to make their own fates, and to make their own decisions about what is right and wrong. This at least is what appears to be happening in the movies. One aspect of religions in the real world is that God's will is revealed and known. Neither the Jedi nor the Sith make such a claim in the Star Wars universe. The Force does not really behave like a God. While the Force does not appear to have a will, it does have a nature. It is constituted from life, and favours life. Using it to kill twists and deforms the user. To equate the Force with life does not automatically make it good, I suppose, although in practical terms it might be hard to see the difference. I'm not sure if any of that made sense, but it's what occurred to me on reading the original post. Very interesting topic.