Drakron

The diference is smart publishers dont say "we have a patch candidate" and two weeks later ... nothing. They way nothing and only mention the patch when its avaiable to download. The reason people ask about the patch is this game recived well deserving backlash from its technical problems (like the "Fuel for Telos" that is impossible to complete due to a scripting bug) and in move that I can only descrive as "foolish" they anounced they had a patch in testing about a month ago. I dont mind the "patch whiners" since they at least care about the game and want to able to play it without issues (unlike us the "paying beta testers" that already moved into other games, games I hope we are not paying to beta test) so they have more right to post here because they at least CARE.

Only way to do that is making a the player wanting to rush. Its not easy but I remenber how I felt near the end of Silent Hill 2, I wanted to climb those steps and finaly end it. Timers are the worst way because they are a coop out, the player simply rushes because he have too and not because he wants too and when the timer reaches 0 he have to start again. Nothing really stops the game developers to force the player to go in a ceratin course of action by not allowing to leave that place, also nothing stops then from making scripts events to give the feeling of urgency and not running a timer that makes the player fail if he is not fast enough. I am not looking forward to Halo Racing in games ...

That is not the point. The AI of enemies will put then at the same time at advantage and disavantage over the player, their senses are better that the player senses but they lack the ability to make decisions, they act as they are scripted to act. The player having third person view is no diferent that enemies he faces since they effectively have third person view, they might have restricted FOV but they have exceptional hearing giving then the ability to "home in" on the player if he makes detectable sound. Besides you also want to remove things such "detect-o-meter" and other gimicks that tell the player how well he is hidden or remove then and force the player to figure out on its own if he is able to be detected or not? Since that is far more of a "cheat" that 3rd person view, if they place a enemy of a dark room there is no way the player can see it without raising the monitor gamma to a point were he effectively have "night vision". Also if you want to talk about cheating lets talk about how many times they use scripts events to undermine player efforts, I remenber playing Splinter Cell Train demo level were even if you knock a guard down or managed to pass my him he going to after you regarless the moment it steps in a certain area. Or how in Far Cry that the trangens mokeys are scripted to zoom in the player no matter what he does (I know because I disabled the AI and they were zomming in and following me but not attacking me) and how they had that "2 hits=dead" no matter how much health the player had.

And guards have a unfair advantage of never being tired or careless in their job, never needing to go to the bathroom or get bored and go do something else besides patroling the same corridor for the next 5 hours.

They appear to be including more content, I heard something like 33% more content but ... I dont feel that Fable is that bad, its not Project Ego and I feel a lot of Fable "let down" come from Xbox own limitations that from the game specs itself, they sould never "go console" on a project that required a great need of processor power and no matter what the PC is were games evolve.

Hardly. http://www.starwars.com/databank/location/dantooine/?id=eu Not KotOR cares about EU continuity or anything ...

Perhaps because they dont call it the Great War at all?

And yet being nothing but a abandoned old base in Ep IV ...

Dificult to say, he used the same basic drow that existed in Greyhawk but later autors expanded the drow. Still there is no Elistraee in Greyhawk. I included the dark elves in my setting not because I was "beat down", they are a center stone of a lot of my setting history. Its a very classic take on the drow, its similar to both FR and GH. One thing I avoided was making a underdark. True there are mining tunnels and underground cities in my setting but no underground world. Then you just have a alternative to orcs and goblins. That is very "classic" D&D inspired to create what basic is taller goblins. My take on the drow was simply made then dark elves, they are not the classic underground cruel evil but another elven varient (lacking spell resistence) that live on Maia style cities in jungles, even sociality religion is a departure from the drow standart and closer to the standart elves. Of course that lead to a problem, there was no room for the standart elves with then so they replaced the basic D&D elves, they do exist (well besides the wild elves that make a very large community, they could be the lagest race in my setting if they managed to count then all) but mostly in human nations. What I tried to do was a departure of D&D classic ideas of the drow without turning then into just another sub-race choice or another monster varient. Depending on were you play in FR you can end up in a low magic campain. I give that FR does have more easy access to magic and more types of magic but in the end there is only what the DM puts in there. Dont blame Ed for that, that was Elaine idea to make the Retreat LotR like ... then again my impression of her work is that she is too much LotR influenced to let it go and do something not lifted out of LotR. What Ed Greenwood did was giving dungeons to explore and loot a reason to exist, Myth Drannor and Undermountain were created as dungeons first and as cities later, you end up having a reaon of "why" of a certain dungeon exists and "emeny stronghold" only carries as far. I made the Glass Desert and the Crystal Tower for that purpose, if players really want to challange a nasty place full of loot they can go there, there are also some first era ruins lying around in the Moon Sea created during the Night of Dark Tears. Yes, expecialy when other autors started to make stuff for it. Ah but the issue ends up why? Pick Legend of the Five Rings and you see a complety diferent feel, the problem is that if you end up doing something that closely resembles the generic D&D world then there is not much of a point. Take the underdark for example, its something you can completly remove from FR and most people would not be affected by it because they dont go there, making a game "low magic" means little if the DM continues to use standart D&D rules in making the adventure.

Yes. A extra character and its combat style do not make much of extra content (like like BG2 with its extra merchants) and its only for pre-orders.

And so the "cheap tactics". I possibly could do the same if I had the patience (once I got anoyed over having to run by 10 orcs just to get in the castel and simply wiped that camp using such a trick) but I dont find that "fun", I dislike such tactics because they are cheap and simply a exploit of the weak AI and pathfinder. For that I just use cheat codes, less boring.

It shows.

I got one of those two ... one of the containers in that ship must be rigged to spawn overpowerful stuff. The longest I got with the mining uniform was until I reached Telos.

Baldur's Gate was a rare case, a game that managed to be good at most it tried to achive (I heard multiplayer was not very good). And IE combat system does not work very well in consoles because it needs mouse driven control and hotkeys to take advantage of it, it could be done with the tumbsticks but they are not very good for that kind of thing. I know there is a PS2 mouse and keyboard but I dont think any publisher wants to release a game that requires having then for the controls feel natural, it would be the same a GT series requires a wheel to not crash the car on every curve.

Well there is no point of creating seperate classes, classes are just to provide character stats advacement. In Star Wars there is no diference of being a Jedi Guardian or Jedi Consular besides what kind of abilities they have. I dont think giving the player the choice to start as a Sith or a Jedi would work, they cannot create two diferent story progression and maintain quality, at best you be playing the same story expect that diaogue would change at some time and at worst you end up with a half assed story because they dont have the time and space to do it.

Well drow is now pretty much a FR mark, the only other setting I remenber having drow is Greyhawk and no CG goddess there. Anti-magic nation also exists in FR As for the elves ... well I blame the FR novels to "LotR" the FR elves. Perhaps FR does have a lot of LotR marks. Anyway ... Monte Carlo and kirottu have a point. When I get feed up with FR I tried to break away from the D&D mold and come up with a very incomplete setting of my own and its hard, damn hard to escape doing D&D. I think the most radical thing I did was the wild elves religion that was a wierd varient of D&D druid with spirit totems, I would possible piss off a lot of people with the two major nations in my setting being non evil dark elven nations.

one orc, yes. Too bad they came in groups and makes then far too deady unless we use "cheap" tactics. That is the problem with Gothic for me, its not the enemies are hard but the game decides to just throw groups at the player that makes combat and exploration too anoying.

No. The Battle of Ruusan is in the Jedi vs Sith comics that were done to tie the Jedi Order and the Sith as shown in the new movies and the comics that shown a diferent Jedi Order and several Sith existing at the same time without being called Darth something. It takes place about 1000 years before Ep I starts and so about 2000 years after TSL. Not that LucasArts cares about Star Wars continuity (as the KotOR games so clearly shows) but the Battle of Ruusan was "borrowed" from the Valley of the Jedi that is from Dark Forces II: Jedi Knight.

It reminds me of Fallout. Fallout 2 simply had to decided what happened in Fallout 1, Kreia talking about the future does not mean what is going to happen expecialy since it does not matter what she says unless they want to use Dantooine and/or Telos again. TSL have no story besides "there were 3 guys that were killing stuff and they died" ... nothing in TSL affects much the Star Wars universe. Besides you really think that Star Wars EU is simply going to allow the Jedi Order to be destroyed at any point in time until the Great Jedi Hunt? What you think this game was? They used the name to sell the game, you think its going to be diferent in KotOR III when they realize they can put out anything called KotOR and it sell and get great reviews? Oh? Yoda said to Luke to not go to Bespin and we all know what happened. So who do you trust? A 900 years old Jedi Master or Kreia ... sure she have no reason to lie but in Star Wars you CANNOT predict the future since its "always in motion", the future is afected by choices and the best one can see is a possible future. Palpatine also forseen his victory at Endor and he lost.

Its very Forgotten Realms indid.

Leading to flooding the market with similar games, usually of substandart quality. Then the players get feed up with it and jump into something new that then becames "fashionable" leading to a endless circle. I dont know about publishers ... Komani invested in the Silent Hill brand that is a shadow to BioHazard (Resident Evil) series in japan and I dont think it sold that much to be allowed to be make into a series but then again they got scared over The Room and slap Silent Hill over it to sell it. Still getting someone to invest in a IE style RPG would not be easy, perhaps when RPGs became the latest fad they are more willing to go that way.

Well I think its a useless story ... its done to sell comics to the KotOR players and we already know how its going to end anyway.

Its not a quest, you get nothing from finding the datapads.

The Boss have eye problems, put in Snow cammo and she cannot spot you very well. I actually beat her in CQC, after she was down its MK.22 shoots to the head until she gets up. I got mad at Volgin and decided to just screw the Cold War camo and empty my auto weapins at him ... thinking about it I could have use stun granades. The only boss I got really pissed at was The Pain, I wanted his camo and decided I had enough of the "magical" food and just shoot him with a auto weapon ...

Just because she belives something does not make it true. You want a example? The Sith Empire was destroyed by the Republic in the Great Hyperspace War, Korriban was not in "the fride of their empire", it was their Tomb World and ignore by the Republic Fleet because there was nothing of military importance there. "True Sith"? What is that, is the actual Sith (that none of this "New Sith" are, they might be using Sith knowledge but that does not make then Sith) or is something else, the game dialogue is messy in that department. Another thing Yoda is clear saying "the future is always moving" since choices affect the future, what Kreia might have seen does not mean its going to happen ... no matter what Dantooine will be just ruins in Ep. IV time. Besides there is another problem, if OE ignored what BioWare made in KotOR (they re-writed a good part of the Mandalorian wars if we take what NPCs say as fact, expecialy when such NPCs were not even there in the first place like HK-47 that thinks it was build after Malachor V but in KotOR was send against Mandalore himself after being captured in Mandalorian space) there is nothing stoping who ever makes KotOR III applying the same treatment to the story? ... With I would prefere, this game storyline is too messy and inconsistence with Star Wars continuity, I know a lot of people have some ideas of how the ancient Sitb are but that was done in the Great Hyperspace War.