Why do Codexers like KOTOR 1?

[Trotsky]

Codex should be taken with a grain of salt. They claim to hate, hate, hate, modern gaming yet buy the latest shit and have 10,000 post discussions on it. Still better than elsewhere tho.

 

[Bumvelcrow]

KOTOR 1 had a lame plot with a twist you could see coming a mile away, with the cheapest ending imaginable.

So people keep saying, but I didn't see it coming and I don't consider myself more than sigma below the average Codexer IQ. I thought it was a fun little game than pandered to my latent Star Wars fanboyism that hadn't quite been extinguished by the prequels and 'enhanced' editions. It was like an elegant relic from a more civilised age, crap combat notwithstanding. The ending was exhilarating and the companions not too annoying, as long as you don't try and look for depth where it doesn't exist.

It was eclipsed in every way by KOTOR II which is still the best Star Wars story ever told.

I played the re-released steam version recently and while parts of the story, particularly the protagonist's relationship with the force and the questions over the legitimacy of jedi teachings are legitimately thought-provoking and a step beyond anything in KotOR1, the films, and most other games, a lot of it was tedious missions, repetitive grind, and loose ends due to the tight schedule. If only they'd been able to take that core story conceit and embed it in something deeper with a decent combat system it could have been something very special indeed. As it is, after a couple of playthoughs back it was released I couldn't face going through the same slog again and abandoned it on that jungle moon, where the game really takes tedium to sadistic levels.

 

[Zarniwoop]

The gook resident of Codex say Jade Empire is okay. So-so. Unmemorable.

I tried it, couldn't get into it because of complete lack of interactivity. Literally Dreamfall and Fable-level walking simulator. It might have a good story or whatever but I couldn't make it far enough to find out.

 

[Zarniwoop]

KOTOR 1 had a lame plot with a twist you could see coming a mile away, with the cheapest ending imaginable.

So people keep saying, but I didn't see it coming and I don't consider myself more than sigma below the average Codexer IQ. I thought it was a fun little game than pandered to my latent Star Wars fanboyism that hadn't quite been extinguished by the prequels and 'enhanced' editions. It was like an elegant relic from a more civilised age, crap combat notwithstanding. The ending was exhilarating and the companions not too annoying, as long as you don't try and look for depth where it doesn't exist.

It was eclipsed in every way by KOTOR II which is still the best Star Wars story ever told.

I played the re-released steam version recently and while parts of the story, particularly the protagonist's relationship with the force and the questions over the legitimacy of jedi teachings are legitimately thought-provoking and a step beyond anything in KotOR1, the films, and most other games, a lot of it was tedious missions, repetitive grind, and loose ends due to the tight schedule. If only they'd been able to take that core story conceit and embed it in something deeper with a decent combat system it could have been something very special indeed. As it is, after a couple of playthoughs back it was released I couldn't face going through the same slog again and abandoned it on that jungle moon, where the game really takes tedium to sadistic levels.

No-one saw it coming, they are just being edgy.

Kotor 2 is an unfinished mess and everyone just faps to Kreia for some reason. She reminds me of that Futurama episode where they go to the neutral planet. Live free, or don't. It gets a lot better with the restoration pack, and yes there are some deep moments but it's still essentially just a rehash of the original. Ironically the Dex complains about Episode VII: The New Shit being just a rehash of A New Hope, but sucks KOTOR 2's cock for doing the exact same thing.

 

[Black]

No-one saw it coming, they are just being edgy.

Just because you don't recognize shit writing and terrible twists when you see them doesn't mean PER and INT were everyone else's dump stats.

 

[Zarniwoop]

No-one saw it coming, they are just being edgy.

Just because you don't recognize shit writing and terrible twists when you see them doesn't mean PER and INT were everyone else's dump stats.

I did recognise it, WHEN I SAW IT. Not magically before like all the edgetards are claiming.

 

[Black]

Gee, a sith lord goes missing, his corpse not found and you just happen to be force sensitive and amnesiac, I wonder where is this going.

 

[Hegel]

Certainly, it was less subtle than Gorion's affidavit: "You're the child of Bhaal".

 

[Bumvelcrow]

Gee, a sith lord goes missing, his corpse not found and you just happen to be force sensitive and amnesiac, I wonder where is this going.

It was one of my most memorable moments in gaming as what had happened slowly dawned on me just before the big reveal. I'm glad I didn't see it coming.

Just realised I over-bashed KotOR2. At the time I preferred it to the original, but it's almost entirely story driven and the major events require extreme patience to get to amongst the hoards of boring and time consuming combat. It's just, knowing the plot, I don't have the incentive to do it all again. It's one of those games where reading a lets play is more entertaining that playing the game.

 

[Kem0sabe]

I also didn't see the twist coming

 

[kwanzabot]

Gee, a sith lord goes missing, his corpse not found and you just happen to be force sensitive and amnesiac, I wonder where is this going.

It was one of my most memorable moments in gaming as what had happened slowly dawned on me just before the big reveal. I'm glad I didn't see it coming.

Just realised I over-bashed KotOR2. At the time I preferred it to the original, but it's almost entirely story driven and the major events require extreme patience to get to amongst the hoards of boring and time consuming combat. It's just, knowing the plot, I don't have the incentive to do it all again. It's one of those games where reading a lets play is more entertaining that playing the game.

didn't the first one have the same amount of boring combat? it's been a while since i played either game but i remember both being rly boring, didn't finish either of them

and ya the twist was a bit obvious from the beginning in the first 1 lol, i never made it to the end though but i could of guessed where it was going

i've also never been a starwars fan so i guess if i was i might of liked the games better :O

 

[Bumvelcrow]

didn't the first one have the same amount of boring combat?

It had the same type of combat. It's been a while since I played the first one but I seem to recall it was more dense - with less wandering around seemingly empty levels killing the same enemies. The world seemed more alive, whereas the world in KotOR2 (Nar Shaddar excepted) was practically empty. I think that having been eventually bored into a stupor by the combat in the first game (after replaying it a couple of times) I just had less energy to go through the whole thing again in the second. I wouldn't dispute that 2 has a much more thought-provoking plot and far more interesting and nuanced characters, but the game mechanics are utter shit. The story really deserved either to be fleshed out as a novel or dropped into a better game engine.

i've also never been a starwars fan so i guess if i was i might of liked the games better :O

I think that's at least a part of why I enjoyed the first one. The second feels less classical Star Wars, more some bi-polar nihilist's take on it after a particularly bad breakup, so I was less willing to forgive it for its obvious sins. When it's good, though, it's very, very good.

 

[Crooked Bee]

KOTOR 1 is unplayable after KOTOR 2.

 

[Seaking4]

Which is funny because K2 was unplayable at release and without a fan patch it still is.

 

[Trotsky]

The gameplay was good in both KoToR games I'm glad they didn't embrace some bare bones progression system and real time combat. Instead they struck a nice balance between depth and simplicity. What stands out to me is how much replay value both titles still have. I enjoy playing them again back to back after a couple of years. Very few games have hooked me the same way. The lack of replay value is one of the biggest problems in modern games. Not sure what the formula is but KoToR has it and others don't.

 

[Crooked Bee]

If not for KOTOR 2, Star Wars as a whole wouldn't even be worth paying any attention to.

The gameplay was good in both KoToR games

Lolwut.

And here I thought Witcher fans were as bad as it gets.

 

[Hegel]

Too edgy. Kotor I has many problems, having to visit each planet with different party members or the abundance of galactic fedex quests, a drop in quality around the final planet or Taris and some utterly despicable (since the combat wasn't challenging) forced sections. However, that's all stuff you won't care about during your first and second playthrough.
The game is fun, the overall result was good.

 

[Trotsky]

Too edgy indeed. Winning nerdpoints in the codex hipster circle jerk won't fix the problems in your life brah.

If you hate both KoToR games that's fine but despising the first while lauding the second is just really bizarre.

 

[Ninjerk]

The entire series of games with the player controlling Kyle Katarn are better first-person shooters than KotOR 1 is as an RPG. Everything about KotOR (perhaps save the music) can be described as shallow or mediocre--combat system, character building, art direction, you name it.

 

[Kem0sabe]

The entire series of games with the player controlling Kyle Katarn are better first-person shooters than KotOR 1 is as an RPG. Everything about KotOR (perhaps save the music) can be described as shallow or mediocre--combat system, character building, art direction, you name it.

Jedi outcast is tied with tie fighter as the best star wars game for me, that entire series is quite good.

 

[almondblight]

Just finished KotOR for the first time and thought it was flawed but overall pretty good. I'd probably rank it above the BG games (the only other Bio games I've played).

Sure, there are a lot of flaws in the game. The inventory is terrible. The levels are cramped (I guess because of console limitations?), and there's no overworld map so everything is made to be around the corner from from everything else. Which kind of works for an isolated planet like Tatooine, but is weird for a big planet like Taris (the headquarters for the two rival gangs are like a couple hundred feet away from each other). Taris is bad and nonsensical in general - several of the maps are just copy and pasted (the two bars, for example), you can just slaughter everyone in the Sith base with no repercussions (but a single Sith guard blocks you from going to the lower level), the zombies were stupid, the whole swoop race thing was silly, etc.

I thought the combat was about as interesting as the BG games. Mindlessly buff + attack for 95% of the encounters, put a tiny bit more thought into it for the mage/dark jedi fights. (Though I guess it didn't have as many handcrafted encounters as BG2).

One thing I liked was that the gameplay was fairly varied. For instance, the trial on the water world where you can choose or hide various pieces of information you collected in order to manipulate the verdict one way or another (with their not being a particularly right or wrong way to go about it). Or the variety of puzzles you that show up in the game (towers of Hanoi, the water jug puzzle, etc.). Or the various ways you can go about beating the other Sith students on Korroban (assassinating certain ones, convincing some to leave, the various ways to get prestige, etc.), or the riddle competition you get into. Overall there was a nice variety to the non-combat stuff (even if the execution was mediocre).

There was also some nice reactivity. In one part, the enemies won't de-cloak unless you're unarmed. If the sand people agree to a peace with you, try going back and talking to them without HK-47.

It was nice that you often had the ability to take out/reduce the power of enemies through hacking. Also that there were a variety of options when repairing droids to help you.

The writing was a bit mixed, but overall wasn't bad. Certainly a lot better than the most recent Star Wars movie. Korriban actually does a decent job at humanizing some of the Sith (Korriban is probably the best part of the game in general). Jolee makes some good points about how the "light side" isn't always right.

So yeah, not a perfect game, but there were a ton of nice touches (many more than what I mentioned) that helped make up for the more mediocre elements (of which there were a lot, admittedly). Overall I thought they did a pretty good job.

 

[Zarniwoop]

Above the BG games? Nigga you trippin, the Codex Edge Machine gon git you.

You're right of course, but here in opposite land Kotor 2 is better than Kotor 1, BG is better than both, and Alpha Protocol is not an utter piece of shit. Also System Shock 2 is an RPG.

 

[Atlantico]

Kotor. Mm. It was pretty nice back in the day but it has not aged well as a game.

The story was a sort-of retelling of the original Star Wars movie mashed together with the plot of NWN. It did capture something of the feel of the original Star Wars for me and that's why I appreciated it - and still do appreciate it.
For me Kotor makes a better retelling/reliving of the Star Wars original trilogy than the new movie, which was supposed to do exactly that (but failed imo)

It's a game made by the same guy who made Mass Effect and it shows. Kotor looks and plays like a Mass Effect alpha with a Star Wars theme.

But nowadays, Kotor feels slow, kinda empty environments and small somehow. I just didn't age gracefully - and well, it was originally made for the Xbox derpy crowd with their controllers and doritos.

 

[Cadmus]

Geez. I liked Kotor 1 because I like Star Wars and it was a very Star Warsy game. Kotor 2 expanded the game systems and everything but I hated Kreia and it dragged a bit more, you get your saber a bit later and I don't care for philosophical deconstructions of Star Wars. I think it's the best when it's a nice adventure.

 

[kris]

you can just slaughter everyone in the Sith base with no repercussions (but a single Sith guard blocks you from going to the lower level), the zombies were stupid, the whole swoop race thing was silly, etc.

This is Bioware design in a nutshell. All next content is locked out by something that can only be passed by fullfilling quests in a certain order. You will always see these doors and areas that you cant pass "impossible to open this door" with sometimes things that are completly nonsensical: "Welcome to Maanan, I see you are here on an important Jedi business to save the whole galaxy, but we will obviously not help you until you run an errand for us. That errand is to kill all the Sith in their base and be arrested. You really have no authority to circumvent this."