Akari

But then the game will just shut you down once you've killed a plot-critical character. Or do like Morrowind where it says 'You've killed someone that will keep you from advancing the story' but lets you keep playing with the knowledge that you're not going to get anywhere in the end. Either of those seem just as 'non-roleplaying' as making plot-centric characters invincible. Another way to keep the game from breaking is to keep the characer from killing everyone. Yet another approach is to just let you kill everyone that you want to, but make the story shallow enough that the game is still passable anyway (Fallout's approach). These are all valid ways, and all create very different gaming experiences. Anyway, I wasn't looking to challenge your point so much as just clarify your cited example. I have Torment on the brain a lot, having played it for the first time back in January. But I only played it through Neutral-Goodish, so I do wonder about the other approaches. I don't decide this kind of stuff internally. I'm just following the discussion because it's interesting. -Akari

I'm curious. If you go through Torment killing everyone you can find, is there even really a story to it? I can think of a number of critical path points off hand that seem like they would break were you to just slaughter every NPC. I could be wrong though, since I never tried it. How would you get to Ravel if you killed everyone in the Brothel of Slating Intellectual Lusts, for example? How would you get the portal to Ravel if you killed everyone in the Godsmen foundry? Were there actually ways to progress the game anyway? -Akari

We've done some changes to the way datapads work now, so there will be less of a need to dig through your inventory looking for them. They also have their own filter so that you can list just the datapads you have. Hope this helps some. -Akari

The code in KotOR1 was to go to the messages GUI and do: X, Left (on the directional pad), A, X That should print 'Punch it Chewie' in the messages. Press start to get out of the GUI panel and then press the Right analog stick down (like you're going into first person view). This should make it so you can fly the camera around freely. This works better on some stages than others. In KotOR2, it'll be Y, Left, A, Y (since X is used on that screen now). Enjoy! -Akari

Yeah, basically. Almost all of the PC cheats were just debugging commands that were made available in the release version. Some cheats are just bugs too though. Oversights in scripting or dialog design that players can use to pump up alighment, money, XP, etc. Those kind of cheats tend to go away with patching. I abused the money dialog cheat in the release version of Morrowind, myself. There is a freelook cheat for the X-Box version of KotOR1 that's fun to use to check out the entire level from any angle. It's an example of a code specifically put into the game for the end-user. The code that enables it actually only gets compiled into the Release build. I'll dig up the code for that cheat tomorrow. I've seen it mentioned on a few KotOR1 code listings, but they always have it wrong by one button so it doesn't actually work. Not sure how that happened. <_< Generally speaking, cheat codes don't take a lot of time to implement. But since they're almost never part of the design documents, they tend to make their way in when some programmer has too much time on their hands (and when does THAT ever happen ). The freelook camera one, for example, was actually disguised to look like something else in the code. The programmer at Bioware that put it in must not've wanted other programmers to even notice it. -Akari

There's a cheat code in KotOR1 that lets you turn on a free moving camera mode so you can fly a camera all around an area and look at whatever you want. Unfortunately, I forget what it is off hand. I'll have to check the code when I get back to work. Not exactly the same thing as what you're talking about, but it is a cool way to check out the level. -Akari

The PC interface hasn't been worked on extensively yet, so there isn't much I can say about it. But I do know that we'll not likely merge the levels together for the PC version, even though most PCs could probably handle it. Merging the levels would nearly be the same as starting them from scratch (for the artists as well as the designers and scripting). I don't know how your experience was, but I found the loadtimes for KotOR1 on the PC to be pretty negligible, and I have a pretty old computer at home. -Akari

Yes. Sorry, no. The overhead that would add to the already busy animators would be too much, I think. Not to mention a number of other technical limitations with the engine. No. There was a discussion about this sort've behavior when I was adding more variety to the enemy AI routines, but the consensus was that this wouldn't work too good in KotOR's combat. In what way? You mean in a 'sneak up on you' sort've way? Maybe. Otherwise, I'm not sure what else they could do with them, since you can't stealth while in combat, and that's generally the mode you're in when around opponents anyway. -Akari

There's no plans for a playback feature that I'm aware of. Unfortunately, playback is a complicated feature to integrate unless the engine was designed with it in mind in the first place. And this one wasn't. I don't think it'd be doable. Say over what? Over what the music is? I'm not sure. I do know that all sound effect placement in the actual areas (directional sound in levels, ambient noise, etc.) and music placement is handled on our end though. It will still be the Last Man Standing system a la KotOR1. Glancing over your earlier list, I don't think I can comment on any of that. -Akari

Just because this one is easy to answer before I get off to work: Yeah. I'm not sure off hand if it's implicit or if you have to do it manually (like Fallout). But there is definitely something in there. I'll look back later to see if there's any other questions in your Lists that can be answered. -Akari

That's a damn good question, which should be brought again, like in this post To save everyone some time, I really, really, doubt you're going to get an answer to that question. I also don't know what the expected playlength is compared to KotOR1. I'm not really sure how the areas compare in size either. Those are all design questions, and I imagine most of those details are going to be intentionally withheld for a long time yet. -Akari

I'm not sure off hand. I've jotted down a note to check on that. What if datapads weren't listed in the main list, but were only displayed if you went to a specific Datapad filter? Then would it matter? I get the impression that some of you keep your game inventories more organized than your desks. -Akari

I can only speak on the X-Box version, since the PC Inventory screen has not undergone extensive changes yet. We've resized things so that you can see more information at a glance and added more useful, applicable filters for the inventory screen. As far as getting rid of excessive stuff, I think the new item creation system mentioned in some of the articles will provide a simple means of disposing with your old, unwanted items by breaking them down into components that can then be used to make other items. Bioware has been a great help in providing us with the engine, tools, and assets from KotOR1. And without them, we wouldn't have this project. Beyond that, KotOR2 is our own work. No. At least, not as a function of the combat in the game. -Akari

Lots of questions! I can take a stab at a couple of them that relate more to programming issues. No more or less moddable than KotOR1 was when it came out. Of course. We're taking steps to make ranged weapons more useful. I'm pretty sure one of the articles out there said that they will all be optional. I don't know any different from that, personally. -Akari

It will be an all new musical score. I'm not personally certain who's doing it. -Akari

Unfortunately, there's technical reasons why we couldn't do it. Because the save games from the first game were not designed with this goal in mind, there's no way for us to load up a save game from KotOR1 to pull information from without having all of the KotOR1 data (areas, textures, models, modules, etc.) stored in KotOR2. And we'd rather use all that space for making KotOR2 content. Not to mention that we've changed the file format to better accomidate what we need to do, so our code wouldn't be able to load KotOR1 saves even if the old game's data was also included with KotOR2. -Akari

Everything will have voice-over like in KotOR1. I'm not sure what the Wookie population count is though. -Akari

He did, but doesn't now. -Akari

That would have looked incredibly cheesey. I dont know why people have such a hard time accepting that Yoda can actually fight And how they did it DIDN'T look cheesy? Just depends on who you ask. I can accept the fact that Yoda can fight. I just don't see why being able to 'fight' mandates that you be a pinball muppet. As I said, I didn't find the method they used to be all THAT bad. Just think a more Force-centric technique would make sense for him. Though I guess the Force could ping him around the room as well as it can anything else. -Akari

When your that height how else do you fight man sized opponents ? Yoda's fighting style removed both Dooku's height and reach advantage so regardless of how silly you think it looked it was very effective. I didn't really mind the Yoda fight of EpII, myself. But I thought a better approach would have been to have Yoda manipulating lightsabers in the air via the Force, instead of actually having to phyiscally spaz around the screen himself. -Akari

Add me in as a 3rd person that knows forth. -Akari

Ok, I definitely need to get a job like yours! I'd probably get shot if I even as much as looked at the computers at work during working hours.. The UT'ing goes on after work. The programming team really has a thing about shooting each other with explosive weapons. Prior to UT2k4 it was Halo many nights. -Akari

I started playing Planescape: Torment for the first time this Sunday. It's definitely my kind of game. So my current games in progress are: Medal of Honor: Breakthrough NWN - Hordes expansion as a multiplayer game. Planescape: Torment Planetside I typically keep a small list of games I play simultaneously, so I can switch depending on my mood. 1 FPS, 1 RPG, 1 MMO*, and 1 non-MMO multiplayer. Once I finish a game in any particular genre, I move to the next in the great Queue of Games that is my desk. I'm kind of looking forward to giving Lineage 2 a shot when it comes out, in hopes that it will satisfy my PvP needs better than SW:Galaxies managed. -Akari

While every person's experience is different, it was specifically my projects with text-based games that got my resume looked at for game programming. Which is why this topic caught my eye. Though the advice everyone keeps giving with regards to NWN module creation is a good idea too. The cool thing about NWN is that the toolsets that you get with the game are pretty much the exact same tools that the designers at Bioware have to work with. Which is nice since you can also use the tools to open up the modules that come with the game in order to see how they work (or fix the buggy multiplayer support in Hordes). -Akari

Depending on the extent of your design/administrating role in MUDs, they can definitely help. If by 'design' you mean you've handled building areas, placing stuff in them, and scripted events in them, then yes, that experience will help. Whether it's enough is always up to the individual looking at your resume, but every game-related thing helps. -Akari