Confusing scenes? Broken scripting?

[darrenecm]

I've just reached the part of the game where you crash at the arctic pole region and meet Atris and her frosty handmaidens and something seems wrong. In the first room you enter when you enter the complex from the surface, two of my companions, Atton and Kreia are behind me when this scene starts. However, when I click on Atton I get two confusing dialogue entries called "[Cheat Node] Jump to the PC confrontation with Atris" and another one called [Cheat Node] Continue with Kreia conversation". I don't know why it's saying continue Kreia conversation because I actually clicked on Atton to talk to him. When I click on Kreia nothing happens at all.

 

Can anyone tell me what the hell is going on here? I haven't activated any kind of cheat modes as far as I remember. Also, the conversation with the handmaidens implies that all my companions are detained somewhere in the complex, yet as I explained above, Atton and Kreia are behind me when we enter Atris' underground complex.

 

Also, when I eventually meet Atris and begin the dialogue, more strange crap starts happening. While chatitng away the camera keeps switching to views of the catwalk and other parts of the area I'm in. There's also a point in the conversation where the subject of your lightsabre, which Atris kept after you were exiled, comes up. The camera switches to another view of the catwalk and one of the options in the dilogue choices is "That's my lighsabre". I get the impression that the camera is supposed to be showing my character and Atris with Atris holding the activated lightsabre but all I see is a catwalk.

 

All these weird things suggest something is totally borked with the game or script at this point in the proceedings. Can anyone help make sense of all this and how it can be fixed

Edited February 1, 2006 by darrenecm

[BattleCookiee]

Stickies are da bomb!

[darrenecm]

Thanks for the link. It explained a lot

 

So to get things straight I have essentially screwed up the game by installing the official patch that has seemingly introduced more serios bugs than it fixes? That's incredulous.

 

I've also learned that the [Cheat Node] entries I originally posted about are apparently there to bypass a known bug. That's one hell of a lazy, dumb hack of a way to fix something, and in my case it never worked. I loaded a save and chose another dialogue option instead and that allowed the mission script to work without error.

 

I've now encountered more screw ups. I'm on Dantooine and have managed to find the will for a salvager's artifact collection. After hacking the will to allow me to gain these artifacts I now find I can;t bring up the dialogue to the militia NPC who you speak to in order to give him the will and collect the artifacts. I assume it's because I have already done the mission of defending the base from mercenaries?

 

I've also encountered a problem with the Handmaiden on the Ebon Hawk. I start the dialogue for her to train me in the final echani styles but despite lowering her health to virtually nil, I can not defeat her despite contnuing to damage her. The same holds for me too, she can deplete my health but it sticks there and we just keep fighting endlessly.

 

Was this patch Obsidian's official fix for the flaws in it's game? I find it hard to believe all these game-screwing bugs can be missed by any reasonably competent quality assurance team. I feel I've wasted money on a bug-ridden mess of a game that I'm amazed got any awards and high scores given these bugs. Presumably the reviewers never played much of the game in order to reach these problems

 

Anyone know if Obsidian going to do anything about these new bugs? Do any Obsidian exployees read these forums I wonder?