Master Dahvernas

You know what is interesting? The outcome of some of these side-quests are actually MORE satisfying if you use DS tactics compared to LS... And I don't mean just being a selfish thug either. For example: Citadel Station - The Don Hetta/Dancer Quest What I did was buy the Dancer, but not take her back to her boyfriend who lost her in the Pazzak game. I told him (the boyfriend) that I couldn't convince Don Hetta to let her go (even though I already owned her) and then spoke to Luxa and had her goons beat the crap out of Don Hetta and had him pay me 2,000 credits to let him live... And I was a LS character as well! I did take a DS hit (as far as allignment went), but at that point I could afford it and it was just a more realistic approach to the situation because Don Hetta hopefully learned his lesson and won't enslave people any more (I think you can even have him pledge never to do that again if you let him live as a condition along with the 2000 credits). Unfortunately, this kind of quest is the only one that I could find where a DS option really IS worth it... Regardless of what allignment you are playing as. Some of the other side-quests have similar outcomes/options... But they aren't as satisfying as this one because most of the time you still get to kill genuine bad guys if you are a LS so there is no point in taking a DS hit if you are trying for LS mastery. === RE: Acting when you play a RPG... Acting is not pretending. Acting is reacting to the truth of the moment. Unfortunately, for me, I just can't "react to the truth of the moment" because it is in fact a video game as opposed to me responding to another living, breathing person and the situation we've been put into (like real actors do). Perhaps in 100 years when RPGs are like the Star Trek Holo Deck where we are physically standing in virtual worlds interacting with virtual people and put in virtual situations that have more "real" consequences. Hmm...

I agree that OE was rushed by LA's impossible, one-year deadline to get a game the size and scope of TSL done. It is a sad comment on the state of the PC Games industry now that publisher's are "Gods" and can demand things like this that ultimately hurt developers... Especially, first time companies like OE, Troika... As well as gamers/consumers and it only looks to get worse in the future if they (publishers) are allowed to gobble up smaller dev houses and crank out crap that we will have no choice but to either take, or just quit playing games altogether (and or just play console games exclusively that have less technical problems, but aren't as artistically and technically complex as PC games for obvious reasons). This quest, in particular, actually IS able to be completed, but it is not so straightforward as to how you do it AND it depends entirely on if you have Bao-Dur in your party and or if you have high Awareness or Repair for your main PC (Player Character); see spoilers below. These things are both a blessing and a curse as far as game design choices. They add a huge amount of replay value and depth to the game itself as it gives players an incentive to replay the game and invest in and value their party members (worth having them along) as well as how they level up their PC... But at the same time, as you demonstrated, a player can also completely MISS certain side quests and key pieces of information (like Kreia's backstory) if they don't have certain party members, skills or Influence with certain NPCs. Unfortunately, the latter is why you hear most complaints about on the General Discussion board and the Spoilers board with regards to game design and the overall story and it seeming "incomplete" because it is to some degree as it depends entirely too much on certain rules and conditions to convey vital pieces of info. to the player, right or wrong. Also, you may not be aware, there is a ton of content that had to be cut due to the XBox ship date deadline (Christmas '04). I am going to guess because of some kind of incompatibility problems more than time restraints, but I could be wrong. These cuts becomes painfully obvious in the third act once you reunite the Jedi Masters on Dantooine as a lot of NPC subplots are left dangling with no resolutions as well as your main PC in his/her quest to either save, or destroy the galaxy at the very end. Some of the cut-content is what would have, in my opinion, made this game inifintely better than the first KOTOR in every way as the resolved subplots also tie into the PC's main story arc and would have given the game more of an emotional impact and bigger sense of scale and most importantly, closure once the player reaches the end. This is why I am personally in favor of trying to convince LA to authorize and invest in a "director's cut" (or downloadable patch) that lets OE finish the game and restore a lot of the cut-content as I and many other gamers think it would put both OE and LA in a more favorable light than currently because the number one issue on all message boards regarding TSL is that the game is just not finished (meaning you can play it, but it is missing so much it is not an emotionally satisfying experience at the end and is almost a waste of time in that respect). Spoliers on Khoonda Milita Quest:

One last thing: From a purely esoteric perspective... We shouldn't even be having this conversation except that the devs made it a point that romantic options would be downplayed in this game compared to KOTOR and other CRPGS. We shouldn't be having this convo because as corny as this sounds... Any character that can travel across the stars, fight off mercenaries (or join them), help innocents (or destroy them), and even save the galaxy (or destroy it)... But who hasn't fallen in love really has no right to call themselves an adventurer. I know this seems really corn ball with all of us cynics here... But the point is that passion = love. Kriea is passionate about destroying the Force. Vaklu is passionate about taking over Onderon. Mandalore is passionate about rebuilding the clans. HK-47 is passionate about destroying all of his inferior clones (the lost Droid planet/factory). Handmaiden is passionate about learning the ways of the Jedi. Visas is passionate about the Exile's abilities and him/her to some extent. Atton is passionate about attoning for his past deeds. Mira is passionate about wanting to belong and fight for something again. And then we have the Exile. What is he or she really passionate about? And I don't mean just being a cynical war veteran. The most basic answer is that he/she is NOT passionate because they aren't allowed to have a romance with anyone in the truest sense (regardless of gender). I am going to call the devs on this because I think it really detracts from the story in hindsight. Especially, a story as dark and more ambiguous as this one (with or without the cut endings). I know that the target audience is teenage boys which is a big factor in this (most of them have experienced lust and not love or passion yet). Anyway, I just thought that from a macro pespective that I find this interesting that we are all talking about a lack of romance options in general, let alone female romance.

Even as a male (person in real life) I will play the game through as a female just to see the subtle differences. It seems there is even more humor in the female version compared to the male playthrough. Example, when you first meet Atton in his holding cell on Peragus. The male lines are basically, "Wow. When did the miners stop wearing regulation uniforms" or something to that extent. As you enter the room as a female the lines are more "suave" and cool: "Hey now. When did the miners stop wearing regulation uniforms... Not that I mind..." Also, when you find your clothes in the mining tunnels Atton actually says "Damnitt!" under his breath and then quickly corrects himself. It's subtle little things like that actually give the female playthrough more depth than the male one as far as humor and characterization goes in the plutonic sense. Also... I think some of the inter-party cut scenes *may* depend on how high you've leveled up certain skills. I'm actually using a detailed guide I found on the net with my female PC this time around and I have INT (Intelligence) maxed at 16 from the very start. This *may* be what is triggering (and not triggering) certain cut scenes because I am getting a lot more dialogue options than I ever did even with a male (which is by design how the game uses your skills to open up new options), so it might not just be influence on certain characters as well.

Yet another one to add (it's pretty obvious, but most of us seemed to have overlooked it): Mira about her and Hannhar's relationship: "I didn't kill him once. Biggest mistake I ever made". I suppose you can kill someone more than one time, eh? :D I know what Mira is implying -- She didn't kill him when she had the opportunity at one time... But it's funny because this is what we were talking about earlier about the English language being mostly based on connotation and not actual mechanics. Maybe I am nitpicking this one, but if people actually stopped and listened to what they actually said (say)... Half the stuff we say sounds silly if you take the literal meaning(s) and can be construed so many ways it's kind of unbelieveable we manage to communicate at all

System specs?

Good choices, everyone. I really like the Ron Perlman choice. Also, I forgot the Twin Suns and Visas (hey, it was like 12:30 A.M. when I made that list). Visas - Sarah Michelle Gellar Disciple - Brad Pitt (don't stone me!) Twin Suns - Anna Paquin (plays both; dual role) I don't know if I put Mandalore already or not, but... Russel Crowe (with real Austrailian Accent). I really like some of the non-American actor choices as well. I think the Atris one is perfect (Cornelia Francis). What is cool abot a thread like this is that not only do you get to see choices you normally wouldn't even know about, I.E. Foreign actors, but also, how particular people see the characters as being young, old, tough, etc, etc.

You have to go into Windows Explorer. 1) Select Tools>Folder Options. 2) Select the View Tab. 3) Uncheck the box next to "Hide Extentions for all file types". 4) Check the circle next to "Show Hidden Files and Folders". (This is why you are getting the "no page displayed" message) 5) Close. 6) Reopen Windows Explorer and go to your KOTOR2 directory. You should now see EVERYTHING that is in there.

The only real reason to get the PC version is because you can (supposedly) run it better depending on whether or not your system specs are better than an XBox. A game like KOTOR2 requires much, much more than what the XBox has to offer, so you should -- but not necessarily since this game was never finished both technically and artistically -- Have a much better gaming experience on a PC (better FPS; quicker loading times; better graphics). This is not a slam against XBox owners either. I have an XBox, but I also know the strengths and weaknesses of both the PC and XBox respectively and for a game of KOTOR2's scope, a PC should beat a console every time.

"Thank you" for telling me what I can and can't do, Master. If I didn't like the game that much I would stop posting. The problem is I can see the huge potential this game had IF it was given more development time and some of the things... Like perhaps the Influence system... Were refined more and players given more options (or perhaps the player given more options to use within the influence system itself). Your posts (in a lot of other threads) have this attitude that all of use "newbies" are irritating you since we don't have the "wisdom" of someone who is apparently smarter than all of us since you like the game and are obviously playing it "the correct" way and that we should all just shut up if we don't like it. Guess what? That comes off as fanboy talk and it isn't very appealing... Not that you probably care. I mean, this is the internet and all, right? In fact, I think I've been pretty civil toward you and others on this board a lot more than some of the treatment I recieved on the thread I started about the story if you really want to get down to it. Just something to think about if you want people to judge the OE fans on some of the attitudes I've seen around here lately, regardless of what I post or not.

This has been dealt with a million times (I'm not flaming you; I am agreeing with you). OE was rushed by LA to finish the game before last Christmas. As a result, all of the real endings and even resolutions to some of the side-quests can't be achieved because key elements (trigger events) that existed in the cut material just aren't in the game anymore in its current form (yet they left the beginning pieces to the quests in tact). This game needed at least another six months for proper testing and bug fixing before they shipped it... Story choices aside.

Oh. I'm sorry. I was just trying to have a little fun considering how tense these forums have been. Silly, me. It's a damn video game. We aren't allowed to have "non-serious" conversations about a video game unless they meet with your approval? I don't know who you are trying to impress, but no one cares. Do you have any casting choices to add? If not, drive on through please. Next...

My Picks: Kreia - Maggie Smith (this is who I thought it was before I found out it was Sara Krestleman!) Atton - James Dentton Mira - Katie Holmes w/redish hair Handmaiden - Cynthia Daniels w/white hair (they could also use her together with her real life twin sister Brittney for all the other Handmaidens) Atris - Charleze Theron w/White Hair Mandalore - Vladimir Kulich (Buliwyf in "13th Warrior") Azkul (Merc Leader; Dantooine) - Gary Oldman Zherron (Milita Leader; Dantooine) - Clint Eastwood Darth Scion - Arnold Vosloo ("The Mummy" films) Queen Talia (Onderon) - Ayesha Dharker (Episode II; Queen Jamilla) General Vaklu (Onderon) - Michael Wincott (main bad guy in "The Crow") Captain Tobin (Onderon) - Craig Bierko (bad guy in "The Long Kiss Goodnight") Lootra - (Nar Shadda; Reunification Quest) Don Cheedle Aidda - (Nar Shadda; Reunification Quest) Eva Longoria Captain Riken (Onderon) - Danny Glover Exile - Male: (White) Christian Bale w/beard - Male: (Hispanic) Antonio Banderas - Male: (Black) Taye Digs - Male: (Asian) Chow-Yun Fat / Jet Li Exile - Female: (White) Sandra Bullock / Naomi Watts - Female: (Hispanic): Salma Hayeck / Penelope Cruz - Female: (Black) Halle Berry - Female: (Asian) Ming-Na Darth Nihilus isn't listed because it would just be a big guy in a mask and suit like David Prowse was Darth Vader in the films. I included the Lootra/Aidda characters as a film version would have a subplot that would show the effects of the Jedi Civil war and this would be the best example of it in my opinion; those two representing displaced refugees. Who are your picks?

Please do not presume to know what I am doing as a justification for this flawed system. The main flaw is this system works at cross-purposes a lot of the time. The best example of this is if you are a LS player and have to take a lot of DS hits to get Kriea to open up a bit. And this is essential since she carries most of the narrative backstory that you need to put the pieces together aside from the "Scion Bad, Jedi Good" that you are left with without her influence. I don't see any other way to do it. And that IS roleplaying if I want to be a goodey-two-shoes LS player and don't want to take any DS hits. It is almost as if this game IS more for DS players from a design perspective if you really do want to know the "whole" story and I think this aspect is also another paradox in that the whole point of RPG is to supposedly choose your own path and in the KOTOR games, which allignment you wish to be more alligned with. See the paradox?

What I am about to post is Spoilerish... But I am not going to do it with the Spoiler Tags because it is very relevant to some of your problems: What is supposed to happen the second time you return to Dantooine after you reunite all the Jedi Masters is that Kriea reveals herself as the real villainess of the game. If most of you are crashing here... Or whenever you try and go to Dantooine when it is not the second (or third after Telos) planet your travel to... This is where a critical script is supposed to activate the tells the game one of two things: 1) That you are returning to Dantooine to reunite the Jedi Masters and thus, propel the final (act III) of the story where you chase Kriea down and kill her and the rest of the Sith Lords (regardless if you are LS/DS). 2) That this is in fact your first visit to the planet in order to get your lightsaber crystals and parts so by the time you leave Dantooine, you've got your Jedi weapon. It is obvious why this crash is happening here from a story perspective and a psuedo-technical reason as well. This is also evidence of where Obsidian had to make drastic cuts to meet the Christmas '04 deadline and why the rest of the game is pretty much a bunch of sequences that don't go anywhere and that has basically no ending. I think if OE didn't have to make the cuts... None of you would be having this problem. You've got to mail LA and specifically describe this bug as well as post it on the Bugs Thread that OE supposedly looks at (stickied at the top of this forum). As far as workarounds... I haven't heard of any. As I said, I was/am lucky enough not to get this bug... But I know a ton of people aren't, but like I said, I think I know why it is doing it, but it is something only the developers can correct internally because the last half of the game depends on Dantooine's correct scripts being triggered and this is why I think you are all crashing at this one specific point and this one specific planet.

I definitely think there should be more female developers. Especially, for CRPG games. I am a male... But even I get tired of the stereotypical "tough gal with a heart of gold" that Mira and the Handmaiden (to some extent) exhibit, or the passive-submissive routine that Visas represents. It is not realistic... Even in the RPG, fantasy-sense... And actually very unappealing to be blunt. I know that games are primarily targeted at teen boys... Especially, console games which is where the KOTOR series originates... And maybe these stereotypical romance options (for males) are "appealing" to them, but to someone like myself who is in their 30s, they just come off as childish and immature to be blunt... And I think it is because there aren't enough female developers to give their input on what a REAL relationship entails for both males and females, respectively. The best example would be ones that grow out of mutal friendship and trust and then evolve into something more. Obviously, for a game it will be accelerated, but that was basically how the romances in the first KOTOR were and it did seem more organic and natural then the obvious archetypes that TSL throws at you.

One possible solution (that obviously can't be done in this game) would be if you could actually comprise a party of MORE than three (PC + 2 NPCs) characters to something like maybe five, or possibly more. This way, the player would (supposedly) have more chances at gaining and losing influence with more party members at the same time, thus, possibly speeding up certain NPC influence while alienating others. The other benefit would be that the increased combinations of "party member dependant" influence matrixies would be increased about 10 fold as well giving even more replay value... That could also be viewed as a bad thing given the "hidden" nature of the current system as it multiplies the chances of NOT gaining and losing influence just the same as it increases it. The major criticism I have of the current influence system is that too much of the core story -- why you are doing thigs; who Scion and Nihilus are; who Kriea is, etc. -- Is hidden within the Influence system and is almost like the devs did this to justify the influence system since as others have mentioned, it's great to be able to "turn" NPCs to your will and allignment (which doesn't really work in the end)... But there is a very good chance that a player is going to miss a more fleshed out story because main story is too dependent on the influence to get it. And before some of you take the self-grandiose, intellectually superior route of "then stick to more straightforward games that spoon feed you everything"... The fact is this is a GAME first and foremost. It is meant to ENTERTAIN. I and many others are intelligent people and use our brains all day long. I am willing to think, but to be honest, somethings, like the current Influence system, have a lot to be desired due to its mostly "hidden" nature and this points more to a failure in implementation/execution than players just not being "smart enough to get it".

I think this is one of the bigger, abstract problems with the KOTOR games, continuity aside. You are supposed to be *be* the character(s) you are playing in a CRPG. KOTOR (I & II) actually cheat this to a big degree as they are more action-adventure/combat RPG hybrids than true CRPGS where you literally create whatever backstory you want him/her to have BEFORE you start out on your quest. I know a lot of people here don't like this example, but Morrowind does this the best in my opinion. At the start of that game YOU... The player... Decides who and what your backstory is going to be more or less and the rest of the game just takes that as FACT and none of the actual story itself or the sidequests are effected unless you specifically choose a class/profession where your skills would be more effective (thief comes to mind). The problem is that KOTOR is not just made for SW fans... But casual SW fans as well who NEED a constructed mythology for the character they are playing because it allows them to jump into the game faster. I think what people are saying is that this is working at cross-purposes here and I don't know if you can have a game like KOTOR (that isn't a "true" CRPG) that doesn't do this and still have it appeal to both non-hardcore SW fans, action-adventure fans and RPG fans as well. I would prefer if KOTOR III built on the Revan/Malak/Jedi Civil War and its fallout because that is what we have to go off of since the first game is already out there... But like is being said, that can be the backdrop and not necessarily the focus of the entire story and it still leaves a lot of creative freedom for the producers to make a self-contained SW/RPG adventure.

http://forums.obsidianent.com/index.php?showtopic=31165 There is a TON of content that was cut out probably due to either XBox incompatibility problems and or because of the rushed Dec. '04 ship date by Lucas Arts (LA). You'll see why a lot of people feel really let down at the end of this game (for various reasons) and what is worse, the devs actually left IN certain parts that lead to the cut material that make the game very sloppy and incomplete... Like the "Redemption" quest bug. They should have just completely cut it; the guy running off altogether... But either they didn't have time or just thought people wouldn't notice and this happens more frequently as you progress through the games (Side-quests are opened, but there is no resolution and you are left scratching your head).

This is what is called an emotionally satisfying ending and gaming experience. What we have now is just a plain old sloppy rushed ending that is nothing but a hack an slash fest until you face Scion and Kriea and then a feeling of "WTF?" when you are left all alone on a dead planet with absolutely no inidcations of what is to come and more importantly, for an RPG game... That the time you spent playing it was really worth anything in the end.... Which, for a lot of people, compltely ruins the entire game because the lack of ending(s) that we have now basically says the gamer spent all of their time gaining influence and other things for NOTHING. It is a cheap and hollow experience and that is the worst thing any game, but especially, an CRPG like TSL can leave the player feeling. Some people like the open-endedness to the current ending... But it is obvious it was not meant to be THIS ambiguous given the stuff that had to be cut as there is a difference between being ambiguous and down right unfinished and TSL is just unfinished anyway you look at it. Also, the "It's part II of a trilogy" is an excuse for lazy storytelling and a choddy product on OE's part because even the second part of a trilogy should have a self-contained story that has its own conclusion and TSL does not due to everything having to be rushed at the last moment. Just because "Matrix Reloaded" was literally part II or a trilogy... And the WORST one of the entire series in a lot of fans minds... Doesn't mean it is the right way to do a trilogy because it suffers from the same failings as TSL in that there is absolutely NO CLOSURE for any of the events that happened in that second story and that just leaves the audience scratching their heads in the long run in a bad way.

Question: If you play a female in TSL... Does Atris still have feelings for you as part of you (the Exile) and her backstory? I know if you are a male that it is inffered that you and Atris were an item and that she felt betrayed and abandoned (in not so many words) when you went to war with Revan and defied the Council. I'm just wondering because that would seem really... Well... "Controversial" (at least in the U.S.) given the Teen rating of the game... Just like Juhani's "admiration" for the female Revan was... But of course, they hid this "romance" so far into the game that it did come as a surprise if you played it right and didn't make a big deal of it as to draw attention to itself.

I was playing through the game again (second time) and more and more the grammatical errors just leap out at you even if you have the subtitles turned off for the human voice acted parts. Vrook (voiced by Ed Asner) said something along the lines of: "This is the Atrau Form. It is best used against single opponents. Use it wisely. It will serve you good." Shouldn't that be "It will serve you well?" Or is this one of those wierd English execptions-to-the-rule where it sounds wrong, but actually is grammatically correct (I can't remember)? There are more since I am now consciously on the look out for them as I replay the game. They seriously need to hire both professional copy-editors AND proofers because some of these things aren't stylistic choices (like I think the above example is) and just scream "basic high school English" which is very bad for a professional company that uses the English language, both spoken and written as a major part of their projects in my opinion.

Oh, sorry. I apologize. Vertex Buffer Objects is (in layman's terms) is basically an extention in OpenGL programming that is supposed to allow for certain things to be cached in the video memory of a graphics card in large "chunks" of data and therefore, help render things faster. KOTOR's problem is that somewhere along the way... Either in the core OpenGL code itself or the extention of the VBO it doesn't cache it properly and or doesn't do it as efficiently as it should and sends smaller bits of info. instead of bigger "chunks" that help speed up rendering. This actually might be an ATI specific problem due to their architecutre... But I've read that is in fact an error IN the Odyssey engine that only ATI cards use if that makes sense? I'm not a programmer, but this is the gyst of it from my limited understanding. I am sure more tech savy people on this board can do a better job if I completely buttchured what I am trying to get across.

You just answered your own question. Players are already into the "flow" of the game at this point, so they DO overlook this. But then again, anyone is an idiot compared to you I've noticed if we don't "get" or "like" this game in a lot of your posts. Whatever...

I have never recieved the option to level it up in my Force Powers screen (light or dark). I'm wondering if it was cut?