Behind the times (KOTOR)

[Stark]

A good game is about repeating 15 seconds of fun over and over again. Tetris, Mario, Halo etc game's developers understood this. Bioware did not; they made a movie in computer game form. Naturaly watching the same movie for 10th time is not usually enjoyable. KoToR is so fundermentaly broken in this respect it can not be fixed by any mods.

Absolute bullshit. Halo *sucks*, mostly because of the very fact it's the same shit OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN. That's BORING. I want games with SCOPE, and things like change and consequences. The 'Halo style' of game design absolutely disgusts me as lowest-common denominator bullshit. They freely admit they design their games to have no points of particular difficulty whatsoever. That means no points of significance, either. Halo3 literally had me snoozing in coop.

Frankly, comparing a twitch shooter like Halo to a goddamn RPG is absurd. I don't like storybook games either, but saying Halo is the One True Path is ridiculous.

So go on, appeal to popularity. I dare you.

[brianeyci]

People hoping to make the game more interesting should ditch lightsabers. I remember playing it years ago, and what I did was dual wield two pistols. The only fight I was forced to use a lightsaber was the final boss, and even then you can get away with it. Uncivilized my ass.

There's also a secret space station where you can pick up all kinds of cool shit.

To have fun in KOTOR you have to have a planned character, no experimentation. I knew this because I knew successful D20 characters have "life plans." I knew that these two blasters were the best two blasters in the game. I knew this armor was the best, this shield the best. I knew exactly where to max/min, and which one was my dump stat, and what implants to get so I'd have 60 agility or so. I kept drugs in storage for the insane fights to buff even higher. My entire game was focused on getting enough money and hunting for the right gear to make the most powerful Han Solo ever, and the reward was the insane blaster fights where I took out 20 Dark Jedis without going Yoda, proving Jedi and Sith are stupid fucks for using a melee weapon.

I expected collect the plot tokens, and I got it. Everything else was extra.

[Eleas]

To have fun in KOTOR you have to have a planned character, no experimentation.

KOTOR as a checklist. Intriguing. This is "fun"?

[Ghost Rider]

To have fun in KOTOR you have to have a planned character, no experimentation.

KOTOR as a checklist. Intriguing. This is "fun"?

Silly bastard, this is the face of RPGs!!

Ultimately I enjoyed KoTOR because the cinematic look. Having lightsabers flash was awesome, since I didn't have to click a button for every swing. But as for unique gameplay? I've played the game enough so I killed the finally boss with grenades and mines, screw your wussy guns, Force Powers, and Lightsaber. Really, the game was easy to manipulate and defeat...like 99% of the RPGs ever made. You found what made it click and you won. Underneath it was the same old, same old with one unique twist.

Sure there could been all sorts of things done, but Bioware went a tried and true route, and from sales alone...seemed to be the right business choice.

[brianeyci]

To have fun in KOTOR you have to have a planned character, no experimentation.

KOTOR as a checklist. Intriguing. This is "fun"?

Life is like a box of checklists.

Ok well it isn't as good as the original. You guys can experiment in these kinds of games if you want. Me? I'd rather not miss the most powerful skill translation good looking skill in the game because I'm one attribute point off, or miss the most powerful weapon/armor/trinket in the game because I didn't pick the right dialogue box. As long as games continue to be a stream of step functions, I'll have to play them that way.

But yeah, you enjoy the game for the look (blaster fights) and the story, both of which aren't hurt by max/minning. In fact, max minning will ensure your fights go smoothly and you aren't blocked at a certain point because you're too weak. Makes me want to play again since I forgot it all.

[Covenant]

How about rifles and two-handed weapons? Could I ditch the Jedi thing, hope for Sith Marauder for the damage range increase, and just hose out fire from a chaingun? Sounds kinda dumb but it would, at least, allow me an HK to go shoot stuff pretty good.

[Vendetta]

Going all gun is better in KOTORII than the first one. It's possible in the first, but a bit gimpy.

In KOTORII you can make a full on laser spewing John Woo Jedi, and watch Sith drop like flies.

[Stark]

Silly bastard, this is the face of RPGs!!

Ultimately I enjoyed KoTOR because the cinematic look. Having lightsabers flash was awesome, since I didn't have to click a button for every swing. But as for unique gameplay? I've played the game enough so I killed the finally boss with grenades and mines, screw your wussy guns, Force Powers, and Lightsaber. Really, the game was easy to manipulate and defeat...like 99% of the RPGs ever made. You found what made it click and you won. Underneath it was the same old, same old with one unique twist.

Sure there could been all sorts of things done, but Bioware went a tried and true route, and from sales alone...seemed to be the right business choice.

Sadly, what Brian describes really is how most nerds play RPGs. It doesn't help that they're either so easy it doesn't matter what you do or so hard you have to pull out a calculator to plan your shit.

Ironically, Witcher doesn't have this brand of stupid shit either. RPG reviewers hate it: Geralt has his swords, and he ain't picking up no lameass goblin sword! What RPG with loot-levelling? IMPOSSIBLE.

[brianeyci]

How about rifles and two-handed weapons? Could I ditch the Jedi thing, hope for Sith Marauder for the damage range increase, and just hose out fire from a chaingun? Sounds kinda dumb but it would, at least, allow me an HK to go shoot stuff pretty good.

Yeah sounds good, pick up a blaster rifle and shoot from the hip, never use pause. You will never get hit with a high enough dex. You'd probably need a 19 dex character to start with. For boss fights you can use drugs and crap and shields, all that stuff you don't have to care a shit about, to pump your attack bonus up to 70. You should only have to use consumables for bosses though: for almost all fights I was never using pause and just clicking and laughing and watching like a movie.

If you are ever forced to switch to lightsaber either through boredom or for a certain fight you can switch right away because of high dex. Strength blows in D20: it's all about the dex. You'll have less damage than a strength king, but if you're never hit who gives a fuck.

The only reason to go dual pistols is more attacks per round, but then again you might want a higher base attack bonus for hitting bosses. Honestly it's most fun if you start with certain goals, feats, and equipment for your "perfect character" in mind from the very start. People can laugh at checklist all they want, but it's basically how people go through real life anyway, make a list of shit and cross it out. Max min only ruins bad games: in good games max min allows you to breeze through fights and focus on the story and the plot and crap. And in KOTOR, Bastila's ass haha.

EDIT: Oh yeah, a bonus is you run around in normal clothes all the time since even the most powerful robes have a limit on the dex, at least from what I remember. So you look like a normal guy.

[Covenant]

Question--does the Sith Marauder 'extra damage' feat work on blasters, or only on melee weapons?

[Eleas]

Sadly, what Brian describes really is how most nerds play RPGs. It doesn't help that they're either so easy it doesn't matter what you do or so hard you have to pull out a calculator to plan your shit.

He did have a point though - it's exactly according to the official view on how d20 is intended to be played. In other words, you begin with a character lacking everything you like playing, and then, during the course of the game, you contort and exploit the system as best you can in the most unlikely ways until finally, you can get to play with the character you wanted in the first place.

At roughly this point, you bask in the end credits.

[Stark]

He did have a point though - it's exactly according to the official view on how d20 is intended to be played. In other words, you begin with a character lacking everything you like playing, and then, during the course of the game, you contort and exploit the system as best you can in the most unlikely ways until finally, you can get to play with the character you wanted in the first place.

At roughly this point, you bask in the end credits.

Wait, what? The pen and paper system just admits it's about being a munchkin? That's their design goal? How fucking retarded is that?

People pay money for that shit? You, sir, have boggled my mind.

[Pablo Sanchez]

I really find that aggrivating, since that attitude is really out of step with a so-called enlightened group. While being a Jedi means taking orders, stupid orders, being a Sith at the end of the day allows for more nuance even if the pre-req is kicking puppies and stabbing babies.

One of the weird things about the Jedi is that they're supposed to be these contemplative monkish types, but all of them still spend their time flying starfighters or jumping from one political brushfire to another. And you're either a Jedi, which means you run around basically being a super-cop for the Republic, or you're a Dark Jedi or Sith, which means you are a child-murderer and foul betrayer. It seems like there's no room in there for a Miyamoto Musashi style Jedi, who doesn't really care about anything but perfecting his combat arts, or for a Oda Nobunaga style Jedi, who is cold and ruthless and pretty much evil when it comes to getting what he wants, but is still courageous personally loyal to his allies.

All the Jedi characters are like archetypes written in crayon.

[Covenant]

One of the weird things about the Jedi is that they're supposed to be these contemplative monkish types, but all of them still spend their time flying starfighters or jumping from one political brushfire to another. And you're either a Jedi, which means you run around basically being a super-cop for the Republic, or you're a Dark Jedi or Sith, which means you are a child-murderer and foul betrayer. It seems like there's no room in there for a Miyamoto Musashi style Jedi, who doesn't really care about anything but perfecting his combat arts, or for a Oda Nobunaga style Jedi, who is cold and ruthless and pretty much evil when it comes to getting what he wants, but is still courageous personally loyal to his allies.

I couldn't agree more. The idea of an order of warrior monks that travels the galaxy solving troubles for people, seeking enlightenment and trying to arbitrate solutions to problems sounds like a kickass combination of Telekinesis and Shaolin Monks, and I always assumed that's how it used to be, with serene hermits and enlightened leadership like OT Yoda and Kenobi, opposed by brilliant, ruthless and trecherous thugs like Vader and manipulative scheming powerbrokers like Palpatine.

But when you see the prequel trilogy, you realize that most of the Enlightenment of Yoda and Kenobi must have happened between Episode 3 and 4 while they were talking to Qui-Gon, the only one who seemed to embody at all a warrior monk spirit. And while Maul was, I felt, an absolutely gorgeous villian despite his lack of personality, Anakin and Count Dookula seemed about as far removed from brilliance as possible, with the only thing they seemed to have down properly was getting limbs removed and dying like a bitch. Palpatine surely was the highlight of the Sith, but even he ended up seeming like a bit of a chump, requiring like 18 thousand apprentices just to accomplish what he and an ISD could have done by himself. And, apparently, Anakin's only advantage over Maul and Dookie was that he was easier to browbeat into fits of tears by making fun of his burnt willy and strangled wife.

I think what Sidious should have said about Anakin, instead of "stronger than any" should have been, "He's fucking stupid, trust me, he'll do what I say."

Ugh. Oh well--perhaps rolling through the game with the purging flame of a Blaster rifle will feel somewhat reassuring. I'm just baffled by the inherent moral questions that are posed by the Jedi existing at all. The Force's ethics seem extremely arbitrary, and yet it does have a great deal of power. It's probably what life would be like if Fundies were right--two dualistic worldviews, great power for aligning yourself with either, and the rest of us wishing they'd all just go and die.

[Sarevok]

Absolute bullshit. Halo *sucks*, mostly because of the very fact it's the same shit OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN. That's BORING. I want games with SCOPE, and things like change and consequences. The 'Halo style' of game design absolutely disgusts me as lowest-common denominator bullshit. They freely admit they design their games to have no points of particular difficulty whatsoever. That means no points of significance, either. Halo3 literally had me snoozing in coop.

Frankly, comparing a twitch shooter like Halo to a goddamn RPG is absurd. I don't like storybook games either, but saying Halo is the One True Path is ridiculous.

So go on, appeal to popularity. I dare you.

You confused level design with game play. What is the difference between the first red elite and the 500th red elite you kill through the campaign ? None ! Yet for the weirdos like me who play Halo 1 single player regularly to this day taking down a legendary difficulty elite is thrilling even after millionth time. That said it was a mistake to use a Halo as an example as 99 % of the internet hates it and the fanboys love it for wrong reasons like EPIC STORYLINE.

Star Control 2 would be a better comparison. It's one of few story based RPGs that is replayable. For those who like leveling up their digital pets to whacking things FPS style there are other ways to make RPGs fun to play.

[Stark]

Sorry, if you play a single samey game over and over, that's a personal problem. The suggestion that that is 'perfection' or a goal for all games regardless of approach, style or goal to aspire to is utter horseshit. Please note - Halo wasn't thrilling the first time: it was boring, easy, take-me-by-the-hand consequence-free nonsense. The idea of doing it over and over again appalls me. MAYBE PEOPLE HAVE DIFFERENT TASTES AND SAYING ALL GAMES SHOULD FOLLOW '15S OF FUN LOL' IS STUPID.

StarCon 2 DOESN'T follow this mindless trend towards incredibly easy, zero-player-input straight-line game design. Idiots hate it for just that reason - sometimes you even have to think about what to do next! If you don't make progress, you even LOSE! Heavens! Nothing like the Halo-explemar trend towards idiot-proof, repeditive games AT ALL. The fun of SC2 is in the broad strokes and decisions (or it'd just be SuperMelee), and Halo doesn't even EXIST on that level.

[brianeyci]

Repeating the same fifteen seconds of fun over and over eh. Well you can pretty much repeat the same fifteen seconds of fun over and over in RPG's too. It's called grinding.

Grinding not your style? Then maybe you should realize that your definition of what is fun or not limits you to extremely short attention span shallow games and comparing a Halo to a KOTOR and saying KOTOR is broken because it isn't a FPS is pretty fucking lame. Normally I don't agree with Stark's rants but this one he's right on. I wonder how you would last in tactical wargames like XCOM or Panzer General: would you consider them bad games because they don't repeat the same 15 seconds over and over? .

What about the new one, The Wicher? It doesn't repeat the same 15 seconds over and over and from what I read it's actually enjoyable to play more than once because of delayed consequences and alchemy. How the fuck do you explain that? Maybe, uh I don't know, KOTOR's failings in replay value have to do with lack of depth and nothing to do with lack of 15 seconds of repetition... in other words, the exact opposite of what you're saying, dur.

EDIT: Stark how could you have missed this gem,

It is sad the Star Wars games with best combat like Jedi Knight II were written by 10 year olds doing a class assignment while a masterpiece like Kotor has gameplay intended for creatures who lack ability to use a keyboard and mouse in intense combat.

You know the ability to pause and make thoughtful decisions is not indicative of an inability to play FPS games. Twitch shooters are not the be all and end all of fun.

[SilverWingedSeraph]

90% of the time, pausing and making thoughtful decisions isn't even necessary in KoTOR. The combat in it is fairly simplistic, sadly. Despite the ability to pause and issue orders, most of the time it's worthless, and you're better off just repeatedly clicking the "flurry" button, reducing the combat to something with all the strategy of Diablo.

This is for someone who played through the game and loved it, three times in the first month of owning it. I've finished the game at least ten times now... ah, good times.

My ideal game would be one with RPG-like elements, a KoTOR-esque plot, and a sort of Jedi Knight-combat system. That'd just be so fun... I'm going to go daydream about how awesome it would be, now.

[Covenant]

The "Everything Realtime" system I have it running on makes it feel a lot like WoW. It was kinda fun but now that I have a team I just get to sit back and see a lot of blasterbolts fly into the floor. Seriously, gamemakers need to design an accuracy system where a miss is actually a miss and not me randomly shooting my rifle directly into the floor.

And right out of the gates I'm level 12 or so, with a 5-32 or something repeating blaster rifle. Sadly, I do not have high hopes of weapons getting all that much better than that. I just picked up a disruptor from a dead dude and I'll give that a whirl, but I find it somewhat amusing that a powershot attack shoots once for high damage rather than like 5 times a round for 15ish. Worthless!

Am I missing something or is it really best to just get Master Flurry/Rapid Shot and spam that all day? Extra shots with no penalty works a lot better than less damage with a chance of knockdown or stun.

Also, while I've had no issue making myself awful nasty evil, I wonder what the effect of my ally's opinions is. I don't know what they think of me, really, but why do I give a fuck what Kreia thinks? Is it really important, or is it just a roleplay thing for people who want their team to be the exact same alignment as them, always?

[brianeyci]

Without the right feats in D20 you get -8/-6 for dual wielding. The reason why you don't is to save feats, because with the right ones you can go all the way down to -2/-2. You do get a penalty but I think it's hidden. Soldiers get a ton of feats to lower penalties anyway and IIRC the game has insane items that gives tons of feats off for free. It's been too long for me to remember if the KOTOR system completely simulates D20 like that but I think it does. The -8 is a fuckton: you need another 16 attribute points or many levels up in base attack bonus aka levels to make up for it.

If you have no problem hitting people you can go and take absurd penalties in everything, but that's where good monster design is supposed to stop you. If there's such a thing as "good" in D20.

[Covenant]

Regardless, you should either play it for it's story or not at all--the game's strengths are in the dialogue between the characters and the relatively plentiful options for doing things at least two ways. I'm basically sleepwaling through it at the moment with my rifle Jedi, on the most difficult mode, with a mod that makes the game even more difficult than it was before, and without using the pausing to help reorient myself at all.

Combat, no matter what you do, is a joke. At best, it's kinda like Star Wars WoW and at worst it's just a tiresome exercise of wandering along corridors mashing droids into a pulp repeatedly. And while I'm completely untouchably godlike in this mode against normal enemies, big hordes of bosses can hurt me fast, but always seem to die eventually anyway. I'd love if in the next one they had the good graces to remove grenades. I find them aggrivating. If you want to make non-Jedi able to damage me, just make Blasters worthwhile. I hate having 300 people throw grenades. They do a lot of damage, but I could just walk away from them. Ends up making them waste their time while my partners cut them up.

So while the storyline is incomplete, it's the game's only real selling point.

[Stark]

EDIT: Stark how could you have missed this gem,

It is sad the Star Wars games with best combat like Jedi Knight II were written by 10 year olds doing a class assignment while a masterpiece like Kotor has gameplay intended for creatures who lack ability to use a keyboard and mouse in intense combat.

You know the ability to pause and make thoughtful decisions is not indicative of an inability to play FPS games. Twitch shooters are not the be all and end all of fun.

Obviously, pausable-realtime combat which allows you tactical depth *and* action is simply moving further away from 'coast on through' Halo-style play. Thus it's automatically bad. JK2 is the 'best combat' because it's basically a FPS, which is the best type of game. Right? Mass Effect has pausable-realtime combat and a Starflight-esque overall mystery to explore at your own pace - this is TERRIBLE game design.

I played KoToR2 (no, really) and I found the combat very, very easy. Like Cov says it's just meandering and killing dudes, just like most D&D so-called RPGs. The 'puzzles' were the only thing the slowed my progress (that, and the physcial need to back-and-forth between points to finish fedex missions).

[SilverWingedSeraph]

Am I missing something or is it really best to just get Master Flurry/Rapid Shot and spam that all day? Extra shots with no penalty works a lot better than less damage with a chance of knockdown or stun.

Nope, you're right. Rapid Shot/Master Flurry is quite possibly one of the best moves in the game, and spamming it constantly will almost always result in success.

Also, while I've had no issue making myself awful nasty evil, I wonder what the effect of my ally's opinions is. I don't know what they think of me, really, but why do I give a fuck what Kreia thinks? Is it really important, or is it just a roleplay thing for people who want their team to be the exact same alignment as them, always?

Actually, having influence with NPCs in your party is fairly important, especially with Kreia. One of the biggest fucking mistakes they made in KoTOR 2 was that, if you don't have high influence with Kreia, and don't talk to her often, you'll miss large chunks of plot information, so everything makes even less sense than it already does. Also, gaining influence with certain NPCs allows you to train them as Jedi. In like, five minutes.

[Civil War Man]

Actually, having influence with NPCs in your party is fairly important, especially with Kreia. One of the biggest fucking mistakes they made in KoTOR 2 was that, if you don't have high influence with Kreia, and don't talk to her often, you'll miss large chunks of plot information, so everything makes even less sense than it already does. Also, gaining influence with certain NPCs allows you to train them as Jedi. In like, five minutes.

Not only that, but influence also allows you to gain stat bonuses from your companions. HK-47 in particular gives you some pretty nice boosts if you get enough influence.

Then there's T3, who turns into a fucking tank if you have enough computer and repair skill, and that's before including the T3-only equipment (the regeneration software and unlimited-charge shield generator).

[Covenant]

Quick question. I'm merrily butchering Czerka forces, because as my evil self I'm undiscriminating and self-serving sort sof evil that happily helped the Ithorians to spite the Czerka (infiltrator gauntlets ftw) but so far I haven't run into anything even moderately challenging. Does the difficulty ramp up at some point or should I just give him the CD's back because it's too darn easy?

And, are there better weapons than this repeater rifle? I'm not sure if I want to use a repeater set to Full Auto and just spam that, or if I want to build a Keen Disruptor with a lot of Massive Criticals (as I'm experimenting with now) and use nothing but Sniper Shot. Right now it's critical range is 15-20, and sniper shot maxed would make that pretty broad, and the secondary effects aren't so awful... but still, if this is as complex as it gets... meh? I'm not deliberately trying to be an ass, but is there a more exciting way to play? I figured the enhanced difficulty from using blasters would be good, but really it just seems to make the boring stand-and-shoot firefights more obvious, since now we're both doing it. I've been setting my main charcter to ranged assist and taking control of Kreia or Baodur instead.

I'm already playing with it maxed and I'm not savescumming or anything. Worst case I just activate knight speed and run. Sith Lightning basically kills anything that my blasters can't murder.