anari_quun

I know this won't change but, like, why the heck are all thee doors so damned huge?? With the exception of a few small doors here and there, there are all these huge garage-door sized maws instead of regular person sized ones. Just seemed a little funny to me. If it's so your party can all squeeze through, how about making it so your party can walk single file from time to time?

Amen to that. I say, if you're gonna have any double bladed sabers, make them exceedingly rare and difficult to master.

Exactly. I can't say the logic defending my point is totally unflawed; I just don't like the double-bladed lightsaber. Actually, come to think of it, I don't like it for two reasons: 1: It's a Lucasfilm/Lucasarts gimmick (this one really makes my blood boil). ("Oooo...look...Darth Maul has a TWO bladed lightsaber...He must be REALLY COOL and BAD...) 2: Knights and samurai didn't have two-bladed swords (at least not in any of my trips to the museum), and part of the adventure of Star Wars is it's allusion to these eras of human history. Hey, there's a lot of kids out there who don't have the same relationship with the older films and original story as us older folks do. There comes a point where you begin to watch movies with a much more critical eye, and those who watched the newer films before this point will think them better than the old trilogy simply because they were newer, had more advanced special effects, current actors, etc. As they get older, they will realize how the older trilogy will stand the test of time and the new ones won't. I'm getting way off topic, but this relates to why I think that variants of the technological and mystical elements from what has already been explorered in the movies is mostly unnecessary. I'm not saying that there should be no variation, but that if a storywriter does "break code", they should have a very good plot reason to. *phew*

Well, when I think of Star Wars, I think of Samurai meets the old American West meets World War II, in ancient space, with telekinesis thrown in. What it really comes down to is the fact that a lot of writers (unfortunately the recent GL included), instead of thinking of a great story with the given milieu, technological background, and character base, invoke the use of "gimicks": -Midichlorians -Double Bladed Lightsabers (theoretically impossible to use, if you ask me, even with the aid of the Force, TPM notwithstanding, but I digress) -ysalamiri -Grievous -More and more technologically advanced ships (is there no end??) All of the above mentioned things could be stricken, as far as I'm concerned, in liu of much more interesting ideas and characters that don't push the audience's suspension of disbelief. I'll admit, I'm a purist; I think the Lightsaber should be as it was in the first three films: one blade, a few colors, and master to use it. The Dark Jedi/Sith aren't stupid and honorless; just evil. Darth Vader could have choked Luke into submission in ESB, but he fought him face to face with a lightsaber (of course, later, he started cheating, but hey...) I say get rid of any variant that strays from the above, but I'm sure I'm in the minority on this one. Yeah, yeah, everyone like Darth Maul's double lightsaber. Really, it's just a gimmick to sell more toys. Keep reading if you'd like to see my explanation on why the double-bladed lightsaber (or any other variant) is invalid; Stop reading and move on if you're already exhausted: In martial arts (kobujutsu), when using a bow to fight enemies, the fighter not only uses the momentum of the bow to perform maneuvers, he/she also is placing the bow on or against their body to push off from. Obviously this wouldn't work with a lightsaber. You might say the Jedi had designed a different fighting style to handle this kind of weapon, but then they'd be negating the benefits of using that type of weapon. On the other hand, one rarely if ever needs to interact with a sharpened single bladed weapon in this manner; it's held away from you and will cut you if you touch it. In my opinion, the duel between Darth Maul and Qui Gon and Obi Wan is total bulls***. If there were some element of reality in the whole fight, they would have totally schooled his ass.

Yes, but then you miss out on a ton of experience points. There are situations where the only way to get experience points is to make SOME decision, good or evil. The only grey area here would be to eschew the side quests altogether, which is of course, no fun. And yeah, the dark side stuff I even have a hard time doing. I'd like to be bad, but not a serial killer, you know? Using anger to kill the enemy is what I'd more envision the Dark side to be, not killing your friends and innocent people just for the hell of it. That may be fun for some (hopefully no one who lives near me!) but I think the Dark side should be more subtle, inviting you in. I have to think more about this; I don't have any good suggestions right now...

I agree. That guy is all over the place. But he's not a normal unassuming guy; he was this young guy with this bad haircut. Make him older, if at all possible, and more plain looking.

Although I'll admit that the Good side/Dark side morality/dialogue choices are mired in religious connotation, we should keep the unwinnable (and unprovable) argument of religion/god/"God"/atheism to an off topic forum. Getting back on track, I think the entire Good side/Dark side system that's in place right now should be reworked. Just because I do something bad doesn't mean I'm using the Dark side of the Force. Come to think of it, Force powers should not be restricted to the Good or Dark side of the Force. If I have to use lightning to kill a droid, I use lightning, good or bad. Luke chokes some Gamorreans in the beginning of ROTJ. It's how you use your powers, not which powers you use.

Not me. There are many weapons that can be held by hand; they don't all have to be turned into energy weapons. And there is a certain mysticism behind the lightsaber. Making more and more variants just takes away from that. Technical reasons don't matter; having all sorts of lightsaber-esque weapons simply violates the sanctity of the Jedis' weapon. "An elegant weapon, from a more civilized age."

Awesome! Thanks for the response, Akari. It'll make gameplay that much better. As for what could load automatically, I would say most recent save (of either kind), and if that is not possible, then last manual save. Unless most of you others use the auto save more? I wind up almost never using it, unless I went a while without manual saving.

If you can make it through the entire game without dying once, more power to you; you have my repect. You won't have to worry about it, though, whether the existing process remains in place or gets changed, because you'll never encounter this situation if you never die. However, there are parts of the game where you go solo, and in KOTOR putting off your leveling-up until you're a Jedi can also leave your character quite vulnerable. I died several times trying to beat Bendak as a Level 4, and it was frustrating having to wait for the menu to load up again and again. It's times like these that I'm talking about. They occur few and far-between, but it seems like such a simple change to implement, especially when you play the game the first time through and are more likely to get your ass handed to you.

Keep in mind that the point of changing this process would be to make loading faster after your characters die; if your characters were instantly respawned at another location, it might actually add time to the process of getting back to where you had your last save. Also, having set places where you can save and load would change the game considerably, way beyond what the devs could do at this point. However, simply adding a pop-up menu after you die I imagine could be relatively simple to implement.

Yeah, last manual save makes the most sense. Either that or as soon as you die, a message comes up: Continue from last save? : A button Load Game Menu: X button Quit: B button ...and from there if you didn't want to you could load an earlier game, quit etc. Maybe it could be a preference, set in the setup menu.

I agree with the notion that the gestures are simply indicators for the audience and also maybe helping hands to allow a Force user visualize their actions. There are cases of Force (in the movies) being used without gestures; Vader choking Ozell, Luke trying to fool Jabba, lifting rocks while standing on his head, etc. We're going overboard, though. I think it is sufficient to say that there is a consensus among us that restriction of the Force by armor is dubious. I would leave it up to the experts on balancing at Obsidian to work out the technical details, if they even consider changing this aspect of the game (which they probably won't, considering how far along the game is). But there's always hope.

Thank you. I think if everybody actually took this forum seriously it would help our chances of seeing some good player feedback come through in the game; that's what I'm trying to do. I posted another topic on the main list about loading after your party dies; I'd like to hear if anybody has the same gripe as I do!

I see what you're saying; I'm of the school of thought that says the Force can be controlled, armor be damned. Even if the Emperor was wearing armor (and who say's armor has to be made out of conductive metal, but I won't go down that road), he still would be able to use the Force lightning. I don't think the lightning is literally coming out of him; it's more that he's directing the lightning, similar to the fact that one doesn't need to wave his/her hand to use a Jedi mind trick- it's just a gesture. Really, the only one who "knows" is George, so you may be right. It's obviously just something to make the game more challenging. However, if you're the kind of person that really wants to customize your characters to personalize your gaming experience, it limits your costume choice considerably. Especially the females: as a male character you're supposed to be attracted to Bastila; she looks like an old woman in those Jedi robes, making it a little more of a stretch for me to believe an attraction could materialize. I didn't pay close attention, but does anybody know if Darth Bandon uses Force powers that are unusable by you when you wear his armor? This would drill a hole through any reasoning. Perhaps certain Force powers could simply be weakened instead of eliminated altogether.

One thing that would take the frustration level down a bit would be to immediately bring up the load game screen upon the death of your party. It takes forever to go back to the main menu and then load. Or else, in the few seconds immediately following your death (when the camera begins to move over your body) make it so that you can pause, go to the subscreen and load a game from there. It would save some time and controller hurls.

I'm glad there're others here to make suggestions and not just waste time and space. I guess we'll just have to filter out the rabble to get some real information. Thanks for the props Jennai; obviously, I believe your idea has merit.

Exactly. It wouldn't waste time because the drawing of the weapons would be, according to the underlying rules of the game that are dictating when and how damage is actually happening, instantaneous. An analogy: When buffed by Master Speed, you get an extra attack. You don't actaully SEE the attack, but it's there; it happens. Likewise, even should there be a frame or two of unholstering action, an attack would still occur at the same time as when your character already has his/her weapon in hand. We would see the characters pull out their weapons, but according to the rules of engagement there would be no penalty for this action. It would merely be graphical, aesthetic. As to the "holster": button, I've already addressed this by making it an item in the action menu. Does everybody understand now? If not, I don't think I can clarify this any more.

My suggestions are in my posts; however I do not profess them to be perfect; they are merely suggestions. I am trying to be constructive.

Whoa whoa whoa...I think some people are missing the point: Characters should holster their weapons when they're not using them, adding to immersion (realistic believable situations). However, this would not mean that the weapons aren't immediatly accessible. As I explained before, as soon as combat started, the weapons would be whipped out, ready to go, not wasting any time. I think this is perfectly understandable. It's not about taking weapons away; it's about concealment. There are large parts of any RPG where the player is not fighting; why should he/she have weapons in hand? Put 'em away for a while. If anyone seriously thinks I'm advocating making combat harder by adding an extra step to the engagement, you are mistaken. I'm just striving for reality. If someone attacks you, the weapons would be drawn instantly, automatically. Simple. The only argument I can see against this is that it would add significant time to the production of the game. In all other respects it is a reasonable suggestion.

These are merely suggestions; no one says if the devs are even reading them. Hopefully, if a change would add four months to the release of the game, the devs wouldn't implement it. And shame on us if we weren't nitpicky about the little details of the game; little things can add a lot to a game experience, especially if they make the game more plausible. While I realize that weapons can be "put away" via the subscreen, this takes way too much time and would become tedious. "Holster weapons" could simply be another item on the action menu, next to dialogue, thus allowing it to be selectable but eliminating the need for another button on the controller. Of course changing the dialogue and everything would take forever; I don't expect the devs to do this. But it does seem reasonable enough to change some animations. Maybe not.

I think we're on the right track with taking away other abilities instead of the user's Force capabilities. Dexterity for one, perhaps even strength (as it is used in the game)? Lugging around all that armor is heavy, likely to make attacks more difficult. Or...a player's Force "mana" could be affected due to his/her having to constantly lighten the load. Say, just a penalty on your mana as long as you're wearing the armor? Keep in mind that truly, the Jedi are supposed to be more powerful than normal people, and that part of the gameplay is how believable it is within it's own milieu. Well, suffice to say that it is kind of silly that most (esp. offensive) Force powers can't be used while wearing armor; as to what to compromise instead to still allow the game to be balanced and challenging remains. Anyway, I think it's probably too late to make such a big change like this to the game as it is right now (if it has not already been addressed), but possibly for future versions...

Dark or good side, the costumes could use some work, especially the Jedi robes. Jedi robes that look like Kenobi's robe in ANH and Anakin's outfit from the most recent Ep3 shots would really be nice. Of course, since these events are to take place ~4000 years before the NT+OT, there could be a little variance, but the long robe/cape thing seems to be missing almost entirely (until the very end) from KOTOR I. Like, I should be able to wear that cool Darth Revan guise at some point. Likewise the good guys should have something equally cool to sport, and lots of variants. There should be as high a level of customizability as possible. Part of the fun is personalizing your character; the further we can go with that, the better.

Regardless of the way the post is presented, Star raises a great point: Characters should not have their weapons drawn in non-combat situations. Lightsabers should be hanging on belts or diguised by robes; blaster pistols should be holstered, and rifles could be slung across a character's back. This could happen automatically after, say, 60 sec of no combat. There would be no penalty for not having weapons drawn should a combat situation arise; in addition there is a great opportunity for cool animations when characters draw their weapons. In KOTOR I, when weapons are changed in the subscreen, we then see the character do this cool fighting stance. This could instead happen when weapons are drawn before a fight. Having weapons drawn around civilians should have some effect: certainly change their dialog, or even make them panic, call for help, or fight you. If you ran into a shopping mall with a shotgun in hand, people would freak out, call the police, etc. I think this should be reflected in the game somehow. Maybe, people would just get down if things got ugly and get up again after everthing settled down again, a la Ben Kenobi in the Mos Eisley Cantina. Hey, I'm just throwing things out there. This might be going too far with the scope of this game, but I think the weapons should holster at some point in time after combat. I do think it looks silly when a character runs around with a pair of guns out or a lightsaber in hand, not using it for several minutes or even hours. And how do you open a box with your hands full, anyway? Remember Ocarina of Time: Link's sword was stashed away behind his back instantly and came out when he was ready to fight.

I haven't read all of the other posts; I don't know if this has been discussed yet: One of the things that removed me from the experience of KOTOR I was the concept of a character's armor restricing their Force powers. I think that there are other ways to guide a player into not using armor; simply not allowing the player to use his/her Force powers is silly. Darth Vader is armored like crazy (he can deflect blaster bolts with his hand!) yet he can Force choke somebody on another Star Destroyer. While I don't think it would be practical to allow this type of far-reaching ability, I don't see how it's beliveable that a Jedi wouldn't be able to push or stun somebody through his/her armor. According to EU, the Emperor is Battle Meditating the entire Imperial Fleet; do we really think that some armor would get in his way? And who says Jedi robes aren't armored to begin with? These guys are in danger all the time; I think their robes are probably made out of something fierce. Maybe not. Anyway, a suggestion would be to allow Force powers to be used regardless of armor, and find some other way to encourage/discourage armor use by said Jedi.