Toreyn

I'm with Mark - nice that they finally did a bug patch, but I don't see the game worth replaying until some of the deleted content is restored, and the game is given a more adequate ending.

I'm glad I bought it and played it (3 times). Due to the rushed ending and cut content, not quite up to KOTOR 1 standards. But the parts Obsidian had time to finish are very good, and you have some memorable characters as companions. If you liked the first game, I'd say go for it...and hope LucasArts will allow enough time for a really great KOTOR 3.

I really hope these forums stay open. The level of discourse here is vastly superior to the LucasArts forums - the trolls derail the threads there before they even get started. THIS is the place we have for intelligent discussion about this game. Yes, it would be great to have more response from the devs, but I think we all understand the constraints on that. And the responses we HAVE gotten have been enormously heartening. I have learned that Obsidian (A) cares about the integrity of the story line within the Star Wars universe, (B) cares about our concerns with the unfinished content, especially of the end-game, and would do a content patch if they can, and © care enough about their customers to put up with all our ranting. :D PLEASE keep the forums open!

Making the mini-games optional - I absolutely hated them in KOTOR 1. Not having to dread another turret gun incident every time every time I jumped to hyperspace was wonderful. :D Making blasters a viable weapon, and DEX-based classes more powerful. Improved inventory screen. Skills opening up dialogue options. Prestige classes and lightsaber forms. Auto-save system. New animations for Force powers and alignment shifts. More moral ambiguity (Kreia, Visas, etc) in the plot-line. Influence system was interesting, but it was sad that it got cut from having any meaningful role in the end-game. Hopefully, a patch or mod will bring that back.

Lucas Arts is pretty darn protective of the Star Wars "canon" - it would seem they have blessed Bastila, Carth, Canderous, and HK-47 with continued existence. And Revan, of course. I doubt we will see any of the other NPC's from KOTOR 1 again, with the possible exception of Jolee Bindo. There was some reference in KOTOR 2 to his further adventures.

Actually, didn't Black Isle do this with Icewind Dale? Free downloadable expansion with new content - Tales Of The Luremaster, as I recall. So maybe there's more hope than we might think that Obsidian will come through for us. Reputation means alot in this business, and these guys have a legacy of goodwill I'm sure they don't want to tarnish. Look what happened to Troika - great games, rushed out before they were done. Do that one time too many, and its game over.

I have a hard time with it, too. In the first game, where I had to kill Mission, I just felt terrible...couldn't believe there was a Teen rating for a game where you dice up a 12-year-old girl with a lightsaber. The DS romance dialogue with Bastila was great, though. In KOTOR 2, it doesn't really bother me to kill the Jedi - they are warriors, after all, and I have a plausible reason to oppose them. But some of the civilians...Naddaa and her daughter, Aaida and her husband...I mean, yuck, you need a long shower to wash off the slime. And I have not yet been able to kill Queen Talia...what kind of honor is there in that? Its bad enough to help Vaklu and his goons. It seems to me the DS is about amassing power, not acting like some petty thug, butchering civilians for a few credits. You might not want to engage in acts of compassion, as that would show weakness. But being an errand boy for the likes of Visquis makes no sense - its beneath the station of a Dark Lord of the Sith. Come on now, its a matter of perspective...crushing the galaxy beneath your iron fist is the plan here.

If they want to sell us the cut content as an "expansion pack" or whatever, sure I would pay. This is such a great game, up until the missing ending - I really need some closure. Bring back the Droid planet, put in a few more side-quests, and a decent ending - that's value added over the XBOX version, and it would be reasonable to kick down a few more credits for it. Or they could take the Light Side approach, and make it a free content patch, because "its the right thing to do". You can still be saved, Darth Lucas...

I think the romances were probably *intended* to be developed more, but as with so many other parts of the story, they got truncated by the "XBOX for Christmas" factor. Black Isle could be every bit as good as Bioware with romance, as in the marvelous Planescape:Torment. The way they were setting up Handmaiden and Visas as choices for the male PC reminded me of Annah and Fall-From-Grace in PS:T. Its really a shame, because this game could have been so much more.

I don't think people are asking for a "nice little ending" - its just the shock of this really excellent RPG suddenly falling off a cliff, story-wise, after the Jedi meeting on Dantooine. After that its just hack and slash, cheesy spliced-in "prophecy" from Kreia, and roll credits. We know there was more to the story, we know that Obsidian didn't intend to leave all those plot lines dangling, relationships unresolved, and absolutely core issues - the Force bond with Kreia, the impact of the influence system on the end game - unaddressed. Even the parts that *did* make it into the end game felt strangely truncated - what the hell happened with Mira? how did the droids resolve their little dispute, on which the "fate of the galaxy" was hanging? We got nothin' Even the boss fights were just bleh - Malak in KOTOR 1 was a real challenge, these guys were all just pushovers. Somebody forced the game out on the XBOX before it was done, to cash in on the holiday sales. All we're saying is hey, its on the PC now - for the sake of artistic integrity, for the sake of the fans, patch back in the rest of the story.