Astatine

Not really on topic, and kind of reinforces the viewpoint I'm sure many people here share that you're one to jump to conclusions, eh? There could be all sorts of explanations for it. It's simply an "interesting signal", AFAIK. That's not to say I think the sightings in Mexico aren't intriguing. But for bystanders like ourselves there really are no trustworthy sources, since if you accept the idea that extraterrestrials really have been monitoring us all through the civilized age then the fact that we've been kept in the dark about it validates pretty much every wacko theory about governments conspiring hush it all up and mislead us! You really can't know without personal experience, can you... <{POST_SNAPBACK}> How is posting something possible jumping to conclusions? I never said we we're contacted by an alien race based on that link. lol. And your right, without personal experience, most people wouldn't know. Speculation is all the average citizen has. And if one investigates certain things, that speculation becomes more and more likely.. And ETs monitoring us has nothing to do with conspiracy theories in the government IMO. If I saw a infantile developing race I would be interested to watch and study as well. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Good points. If we assume that ET is monitoring us and that ET takes the form many of the stories converge to (i.e. at least a few of them are likely to be correct), the idea that Governments know about this and are conspiring to keep the general populace in the dark about it starts looking more likely simply because of the number of these tales that involve government cover-up. For the governments, I can see motivation to cover it up were they aware of it: to avoid panic in the short term, and because many people in those positions tend to be set in their ways and to have personal interests best looked after by maintaining the status quo. What possible motivation, however, has ET in this scenario to make our world leaders aware of their presence whilst concealing themselves from the rest of us? ET appears to get nothing out of Earth apart from observational data, whilst the Government-conspiracy theories also involve alien technology being given to the US government in particular, a large amount of it ending up in military hardware. If ET is tampering to help us grow and improve as a species, offering us better ways to blow each other up isn't going to help! The only thing I can think of at the moment is that ET do need something or other we have, badly, and don't wish to just rip in and take it; the secret negotiators sent by our Governments realised this and bargained hard, extorting weapons technology out of them in exchange for it, ET seeing us blowing each other up a lesser evil than them blowing us up. This is completely mad :D :D Whaddayathink?

The Zabrak is reportedly very LS. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Interesting. Makes a change from Maul Where did that info come from? It's the first I've heard of the Zabrak.

Does KOTOR1 actually depict these "forms" correctly? There was that big thread on the Suggestions board about the way they got the lightsaber grip wrong... Or does the knowledge of which "form" Bastila uses just come from the Star Wars Databank

*takes deep breath and ignores the way Hades has been posting this sort of argument ever since... ever! * Not backwards, more sideways. The narrower the character creation options, the more the devs can "know" your character and thereby weave story around them. An excellent example of this was that fabulous Revelation moment in KOTOR1, which needed a pretty tight character creation scheme in order to work. (The PC couldn't have been an Ithorian, because it'd have broken the cutscenes; (s)he couldn't have been as young as Bastila, because she was trained at an early age and still a Padawan at the time of the Mandalorian war; etc, etc.) Catering to lots of fundamentally different sorts of characters broadens the game and thereby costs in depth, since there's a finite amount of development time available. With the converse philosophy you get games like Morrowind (which I enjoyed just as much as KOTOR1, truth be told). You can do anything and be anyone, but there's comparatively little flowing, told-out story for each character concept: it's a different experience. Planescape: Torment (which, shockingly, I've never completed) is kind of the ultimate in character creation restrictiveness, although in a sense I don't understand why. Is there a reason why the Nameless One starts as a 3rd level fighter rather than a 0th level nobody who has to find some way of recovering one memory or another before he becomes an adventurer of any worth (giving you the chance to pick which path to go down somehow, thereby choosing a class from the get go)? (No, don't actually tell me: but does that get explained? I might be spurred on to playing more of the game if I know it will be...)

(snip) LOL :D Haven't a clue, I haven't been to a KFC for about four years!! KFC gives me flashbacks to staggering out of a nightclub in Ibiza at about 6 in the morning seeing all sorts of colours from the pills someone dropped in my drink while I wasn't looking: there was a KFC just opposite the club and I wandered in and attempted to clear the chemicals out of my system by having too much breakfast :D As for what's in the playlist, there's currently a "Deeper Shades of Euphoria" trance compilation in the CD player and a set of remasterings of the DOOM soundtrack (of all things) in the pile underneath it...

Yup... Yup... Check... That's spooky <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Spooky? In what way? You like them? <{POST_SNAPBACK}> In that I read the list, looked at my CD collection and thought "yup, that one's there, that one's there, that's in that album, etc..."

Yup... Yup... Check... That's spooky

Not really on topic, and kind of reinforces the viewpoint I'm sure many people here share that you're one to jump to conclusions, eh? There could be all sorts of explanations for it. It's simply an "interesting signal", AFAIK. That's not to say I think the sightings in Mexico aren't intriguing. But for bystanders like ourselves there really are no trustworthy sources, since if you accept the idea that extraterrestrials really have been monitoring us all through the civilized age then the fact that we've been kept in the dark about it validates pretty much every wacko theory about governments conspiring hush it all up and mislead us! You really can't know without personal experience, can you...

All right, own up, who voted Blank? :D :D *giggle*

Aha, yes. I posted this a while back. No official answer of course... <_< Doom 3 supports widescreen modes? That's news to me. When I tried it only had a selection of 4:3 ratio modes (plus 1280x1024) and didn't support changing the aspect ratio at all (1280x1024 was actually slightly distorted). Have they patched it?

T3 had potential, just Bioware hardly developed him at all. I'm expecting a lot more personality this time around

What is this "Halo 2" thing and why is it usurping TSL's place at number 1?

Strange mechanical being that sometimes turns up on these message boards

Nah... "Strong am I with the Force... but not that strong" :D

I don't think that, not at all. I didn't like when Kotor just stopped at level 20. I felt kind of ripped off. I don't want to be some super duper killer god jedi person, I just don't want the game to stop my character development for no good reason. If it's a rpg, I just want to be able to advance as much as I want, be it to level 20, or level 50. I don't think the game should tell me when to stop. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> KOTOR1 was designed so that you reached 20th level right before the final battle, I suspect, just that it worked out that people did more sidequests than expected. The "20th level ceiling" makes sense in that Star Wars d20 only goes up to level 20. Unless there's an equivalent of the D&D Epic Level Handbook for Star Wars d20 somewhere, they'd have had to concoct their own class stats for levels >20, which would be quite an undertaking to get right. I wonder where Obsidian are getting theirs for KOTOR2? If they're making it themselves, I doubt they'd do so just so we could reach level 21 or perhaps 22 right at the end like we did in Bioware's game and so I think we can expect to spend some while with that sort of power... Could be interesting.

*puts finger in where he shouldn't* Nur Ab Sal appears to have not actually said anything for quite a few pages. We know your opinion. Thank you, thank you! I disagree and I'm fed up of seeing it all over these message boards, it's gotten to the point where I see "Nur Ab Sal" against a thread and think "Oh no, not again..." Ahem. No personal offence intended, of course...

From what I've heard, Vader was level 18 and Palpatine level 20, not sure about Yoda. (In the Star Wars d20 system handbook, anyway. Which I don't own a copy of.) I thought it was already official that we will go above level 20, just they hadn't decided whether to cap it. ISTR seeing "30" bandied about... Certainly that would make the PC very powerful. Well, so long as it doesn't become silly I'm fine with that, and my inner powergamer really enjoyed the high level dark Force powers in KOTOR1 and wants more :D

I understand your grief but everything must be coherent in SW and if TOTJ was earlier bioewaree should respect its vision of star wars.... That's unsustainable: every new work in the Star Wars universe creates more backstory that every subsequent writer must know first in order to avoid trampling on it. Eventually it would become virtually impossible to add anything without causing an inconsistency, and so Star Wars would die. Even before that ultimate form of the "rot" occurs, having lots and lots of random (and often crap) backstory you have to remain consistent with just because it was written first will frustrate a writer to the extent of making them pull their hair out. As DM of a long running, plot heavy pen-and-paper D&D campaign with some players who are very good at doing the unexpected (causing me to have to make up lots of stuff on the fly) I know this can start bogging one down even if you're only dealing with your own work (I keep finding obscure little plot twists concocted on the spur of a moment that I forgot about that break things later, etc, it's sometimes fun to work around but sometimes very annoying). Dealing with lots of other people's work is going to be much worse. Bioware had to draw the line at some point, stop cross-referencing the EU and let their imagination loose. I do agree that a few things appear to be rather obviously wrong, but the story was fantastic and that's what counts. Alternate timelines is a perfectly acceptable alternative in these circumstances

Though the DS ending of JA isn't very satisfying, if only because you can't make yourself a red lightsaber. I didn't get any attacks of conscience DSing KOTOR, I just laughed manically all the way through. I worry myself sometimes :D

The DS ending is worth it just for the smirk on Revan's face. Not to mention everything else. Much better than the LS ending... Muahahahahahahaha :ph34r: :ph34r: :D

We're hyping it up though, I'm expecting TSL to be the best game for ages

Podracing hasn't been invented at the time of KOTOR2...

Whilst by the Sith mantra as I have seen it (and all I know of Star Wars is the films, KOTOR and bits of the later EU from the Jedi Knight series, never read any of the books/comics, I'm told they're of variable quality and I have lots of other stuff to be reading ) those who have the strength, seize power. Who is some dead Sith lord to "appoint" me, I say, when my own strength makes me leader :ph34r: :ph34r: I prefer that one. What does a Sith lord need of "laws" except his own? :ph34r:

Slightly psychotic? Slightly?? HK-47 is slightly psychotic in the same way as Darth Sidious is slightly evil!! :D I'm too much of a meatbag to own an HK droid though Definitely looking forward to more of that in KOTOR2 though.

It was indeed that colour in the originals too. I was expecting him to fix it this time round, but it must have been too obvious