FireWolf

Those pics seem to have really high contrast or exaggerated colours. The Ebon Hawk's changed colour scheme is interesting, the red and white may reflect the ship's status. Diplomatic vessels in star wars have a red colour scheme (see the blockade runner in A new hope, the vessel obi wan and qui gon arrive at naboo on in ep1 and the Jedi fighter in ep2). Just speculation. Might just be odd lighting or screen capture settings.

Probably helps old Jawas cross the space lane... Instead of rightfully force-pushing them into oncomming traffic. I wonder if you can take on multiple apprentices. So few master jedi about these days, why not? class field trip to the star forge. I wonder if you can get those fruit bowl helmets and blaster training droids...

I have read most of the NJO EU books. Not any of the ones immediately after OT. I might sometime. He might have been trying to tempt the anger out of Luke, but I doubt he wanted himself to be maimed in the process. The Emperor could have done without both of them really. Vader was too attached to his children, Luke too attached to his sister and friends. He was confident he could get them both to serve him. Look where that got him.

Sunry's quest was a test over what's the truth worth. Do you convict a man who's a Republic war hero? Damaging the Republic in the process? Do you serve justice or do you serve the Republic. Would you have come to a different conclusion if the victim was not a Sith? Does the fact that the victim was a Sith, but not only a sith, but a Dark Jedi, have bearing upon your decision? I quite liked the quest's test of moral character, however I did not enjoy all the running around it entailed. While more interesting than the general Fedex quests there's a limit to how many times you run back and forth. A test of moral character fits very very well into the Dark/light binary nature of the Star Wars Universe.

Vader didn't really fight luke? He got hammered. I don't think he willingly let luke run up to him, bash his ass to the floor and cut his hand off. Not after taunting him out. Control stifles the raw power of the force.

The climactic Saber battle on Bespin's cloud city... Vader: Luke, I know what you're getting for christmas this year Luke: No! That's impossible! How! Vader: I have felt your presents. Corny, but don't blame me. It was a tv ad. I prefer the idea of retaining your identity to be something learned rather than a question of power.

You become he-man and save the universe.

he did? Yes, he did. In the final Saber battle in ROTJ he gave in to hate and anger and beat the crap out of Vader, cut his hand off. Threw his saber away and confronted the Emperor.

He's refered to as Emperor Palpatine after The original Trilogy. Being able to throw lightning out of his fingertips also points, somewhat, to him being a dark-sider Not to mention that the political movements in the new trilogy show Palpatine gaining sole control over the republic leading to the disolving of the republic, the creation of the imperial senate etc. Don't forget the physical and oral resembelence either.

Of course, you don't know what Luke had drunk at that ewok celebration. Could have had anything in it, them being a tribal culture. Maybe he was just hallucinating?

Whatever policies Luke chose to base the NJO on, falling to the dark side remains the same path. I can't see how personal interpretation affects the path. If Luke decreed that using force lightning in defense of others was ok, it would still lead to the darkside, regardless of intentions. Problem with Qui-gon's example is that, if you look at the grand context of the Kotor game, the credits you "liberate" from people via force persuade can be used to purchase weapons and equipment which furthers your cause to save the galaxy. So is that a bad act? Its still forcing people against their will, exactly what qui-gon was doing. Regardless of the way you look at it, Qui Gon was trying to rob Watto since he was offering a currency that was not legal tender. He could have traded the droids or actually worked for the item. Taking the easy way is not necessarily the right way. Qui-gon was a rebel, more like Jolee with the whole neutral thing, but he still has to answer for his short term consequences as well as long term.

If you can stomach the "love scenes" in Episode 2, rewatch Palpatine talking to Anakin. Anakin considders Palpatine as almost a father figure/mentor.

Just found a snippet by George about this topic. Apparrently Blue Glowies are not supposed to be able to retain their identities, but Ben Kenobi spent a lot of his time in seclusion learning how to retain his personality for a length of time after his death.

Because the events are Galaxy spanning. A single planet would have a governer that you'd have to destroy, but they wouldn't be the most powerful, thus you'd probably get smooshed by some bigger honcho sent to put an end to you. Plus its more interesting.

It seems Jedi can retain their identity once they become one with the force, but not for very long. Obi Wan retains his identity until 4 years after the battle of Endor then finally becomes truely one with the force. Why some and some do not become blue glowies is unclear. Dark Side users seem more resiliant to losing their identity like Exar Kun on Yavin and so on. It could be something to do with the Dark Side using the force as a tool for their own ends, manipulating it, while the Light side uses it as a guide.

I've been thinking about this. I've been reading the New Jedi Order series from the Expanded Universe, I enjoy the books apart from one or two things which I feel were entirely unnecessary. I won't mention what, because that'd be spoiling things, and likewise no spoilers here from anyone else. One thing I have noticed in the books is the constant battle faced by light-side Jedi against falling to the Dark side. I don't think anyone can disagree that, in the original Kotor, you were using the force aggressively. There are some things which don't make sense. In the NJO series it points out how all Jedi use force persuasion to attain their needs. Luke, for example, uses a force "nudge" on his words to increase his persuasive powers. They use force persuasion to make guards forget their passing when it suits them and so on. Where does the line between light and dark blur? In kotor, if it followed the established means of going to the dark side (using the force to directly harm people, like force lightning) using those powers would send you down the dark side path. Every time you used that power aggressively, you'd be gaining dark side points. Conversely, when Qui Gon Jin tries to use Force Persuade to use Republic credits, that's not considdered a dark side move. But in Kotor, it would be because it's manipulating people for your own ends. Another discrepency seems to be that, in the books, normal actions don't send you down one or the other path. Its only the misuse of the force that truely sends you down that path. In Kotor, though, its through personal actions that you gain the most dark side points, not through power use.

I do like the "meanwhile across the galaxy" thing, not necessarily with those words, but those kinds of actions. Gives a game a more cinematic feel rather than just following your exploits. Flashbacks of your PC arn't fun. I just feel that using flashbacks to interpose your previous life is a bit of a waste. I'd rather your entire backstory be presented in an introduction in the manual than having random flashbacks. It disintegrates the story its just "oh, here's something you're supposed to know at this point to progress the game, but we couldn't figure out a better way to tell you now". Not in the case of the flashbacks with Revan, because those were the memories re-surfacing. I'm a bit cut on it really. Starship Troopers, one of my favorite all time books, has so many flashbacks that it's almost like two stories. One of Rico's exploits, the other of his education. It works well, even if it does disjoint the book and alter the pace dramatically. There are other ways to introduce your or other people's backstory. Look at the original star wars, no flashbacks there. You know nothing about Lando before bespin, but his relationship with Han becomes elaborated through dialogue and interaction with Han and the others pretty quickly.

Anakin skywalker was supposed to be the most powerful of the imperial era. Possibly more than Yoda. It's difficult to guage who the most powerful is, since they're spread over such a great time period so there's no common measure or standard to pit them against. For instance, Anakin solo could be the most powerful, or Jacen solo. Luke effectively beat Vader, who then beat Palpatine, does that make him more powerful than both? Hell, Luke almost got toasted by Lord Nyax even when his side outnumbered him more than 20 to 1.

Reminds me of fallout. When you were injured to get a stimpack you had to open the inventory (4 action points) drag a stimpack to the use slot, use the item on yourself (2 action points) until you were healed. You were saved having to go back into the inventory every time since the stimpacks reloaded into the use slot after each use. However, if you used the stim pack within the inventory screen you only used the 4 to open the inventory (less if you used a certain perk). You could also reload your weapons, use drugs/buffs and so on. Really this kind of thing should be weeded out during testing. Same with over-powered skills. Admittedly, 50,000 people playing a game are bound to find a bug or exploit that the testing people didn't, but this should really be reported and fixed in a bug. At least in a SP game this doesn't affect a lot of people (like the star wars galaxies currency bug) but would still be nice to be patched when found.

I don't like flashbacks as a story-telling medium. It's a bit of a cheat. It's almost saying "oh, we forgot to put this in earlier, so we'll shove it in now". It's a shortcut story telling device. In films it can be useful since it saves time, but in narrative and games fleshing out characters and telling us about people's past can be done in different ways.

Define your standards for guaging greatness? Accomplishment? force aptitude? skill with a saber? dress sense? longest reign?

Malak's a wussy. I just made faces at him and called him names until he broke down and cried.

It seems that dancing with the dark side does cause some kind of physical loss. Though Anakin Skywalker's fall to the dark side began before he lost his limb. It was, however, the result of that action. His brashness. Luke also had a brush with the dark side. On dagoba, in the cave, he failed the test against the darkside and struck out in fear and anger. In the subsequent battle with Vader, he lost a hand. The preview says five years, not 2 years. I don't know where you're getting 2 years from. That the dark side corrupts the flesh by itself is a bit odd, in my view. Its almost like the dark side makes you ugly, and subsequently the light side makes you pretty. Maybe its more to do with the mental effects of using the dark side that promote carelessness or a desire to become more intimidating.

GameSpy Kotor: TSL preview Just in case some of you missed this. Sion does not look to be in the best of health, anyone got some skin care products? Why do all sith have to be deformed? Palpatine went quite odd looking, vader got the whole bodysuit deal, maul had the tatoos (see how long he lasted), dooku seems to have all limbs intact, jerec had that odd visor thing and funny face tatoos, revan had the mask, malak lost the entire of his lower face... I dunno, they're trying to make out the dark side as a bad thing.

Many bothans are always dying. It's their chief occupation