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Star Wars How on earth did anyone think KOTOR is an acceptable game

Vatnik Wumao
Joined
Oct 2, 2018
Messages
19,464
I think a lot of the people here complaining about the story only reached the light side ending. It's bland as fuck, and same goes for the whole light side path. Play dark side, the ending is actually awesome.
Both are just as bad, with the dark side one being cartoonishly evil.
Particularly if you have the Wookie kill the Twilek.

And brainwashed Bastilla is cartoonishly evil which is an immersion breaker, but then again dark side is portrayed as cartoonishly evil throughout the whole game.
 

Grampy_Bone

Arcane
Joined
Jan 25, 2016
Messages
3,943
Location
Wandering the world randomly in search of maps
I've said this before. KoTOR's innovation was cinematic presentation.

Before a certain game, RPGs were slow, grindy, number crunchers for nerds. After a certain game, RPGs became cinematic spectacles. That game was Final Fantasy 7.

You may not think JRPGs are "real" RPGs or whatever, but that is irrelevant. Game publishers absolutely did not see that distinction in 1997. They only saw a game with stats and level-ups selling ten times the number of copies anyone even thought an RPG could sell. It was actually embarrassing to western devs, many of which were told to develop 'FF7-killers' ASAP. This inspired games like PST and Anachronox, but they failed to understand FF7's true appeal.

It was Bioware who succeeded at stealing the thunder from Squaresoft. They understood the game was about the cinematic look and feel, so they set about doing the same with Star Wars. Under the hood, KoTOR is the same game as Neverwinter Nights, but it looks and feels completely different. The shot-reverse shot camera angles, close up for dialogues, full VO, and the cinematic animations for battles make the whole game feel like you are playing a star wars film.

Story and choices are red herrings. The point of Bioware games has never been to have a deep or reactive story. It's to have a story that looks and feels dramatic. It's all smoke and mirrors.

The cinematic RPG is sort of dead now so it's easy to look back at KoTOR and say yeah it's not a great game (i've always thought the story and characters were trash). But that was never the point, while the use of full voiced dialogue and cinematic framing in every part of the game was quite revolutionary.
 
Vatnik Wumao
Joined
Oct 2, 2018
Messages
19,464
I think that Dragon Age Origins was much better in the story department, particularly in its 'evil' choices (e.g. the prisoner and the wounded soldier in Ostagar or Branka's character and the PC's ability to condone her actions). Then again, I don't know how much of the issue is on BioWare's part and how much of it is due to the setting. KotOR 2 also had its cartoonishly evil elements, although it also coupled them with philosophical themes due to which many people (me included) tend to look more leniently upon it.
 

Tyranicon

A Memory of Eternity
Developer
Joined
Oct 7, 2019
Messages
7,790
I think a lot of the people here complaining about the story only reached the light side ending. It's bland as fuck, and same goes for the whole light side path. Play dark side, the ending is actually awesome.
dark side one being cartoonishly evil.

Hey welcome to Star Wars. All the nuance was in the EU/Legends, but Disney yeeted that so Star Wars sucks now.
 
Vatnik Wumao
Joined
Oct 2, 2018
Messages
19,464
I think a lot of the people here complaining about the story only reached the light side ending. It's bland as fuck, and same goes for the whole light side path. Play dark side, the ending is actually awesome.
dark side one being cartoonishly evil.

Hey welcome to Star Wars. All the nuance was in the EU/Legends, but Disney yeeted that so Star Wars sucks now.
KotOR was theoretically EU as well, but I get your point.
 

Harthwain

Magister
Joined
Dec 13, 2019
Messages
5,413
Star Wars: The Old Republic (MMO) applied Light and Dark Side in a decent fashion. I turned off the point reminders in dialogue options and it turned out I came out fairly neutral in the end, while taking somewhat pragmatic approach as the Imperial Agent.
 
Vatnik Wumao
Joined
Oct 2, 2018
Messages
19,464
Star Wars: The Old Republic (MMO) applied Light and Dark Side in a decent fashion. I turned off the point reminders in dialogue options and it turned out I came out fairly neutral in the end, while taking somewhat pragmatic approach as the Imperial Agent.
SWTOR nuances the morality of individual force users much better than the two KotORs.
 

Nano

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Mar 6, 2016
Messages
4,817
Grab the Codex by the pussy Strap Yourselves In Enjoy the Revolution! Another revolution around the sun that is.
Who gives a fuck about "nuance" and other crap like that. I just want to wander around the galaxy causing anguish and torment to everyone I come across.
 
Vatnik Wumao
Joined
Oct 2, 2018
Messages
19,464
Who gives a fuck about "nuance" and other crap like that. I just want to wander around the galaxy causing anguish and torment to everyone I come across.
RPG devs cannot into proper grimderp either, so meh.
 

Poseidon00

Arcane
Joined
Dec 11, 2018
Messages
2,216
Every once in awhile some edgy bro makes a topic like "Why does generally liked game X ACTUALLY SUCK???"

As boring as it is predictable. Do we really need a topic to express your monocled preferences?
 

mondblut

Arcane
Joined
Aug 10, 2005
Messages
22,704
Location
Ingrija
Like FO:3 to NV, or NWN2 to MOB, it's only reason to exist is it's sequel.

If muh writing is enough to set a "great" sequel apart from a shitty game while both have identical shitty gameplay, maybe stick to the books and stop ruining this form of entertainment for everyone else?
 
Joined
Sep 7, 2013
Messages
6,316
PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 Codex 2016 - The Age of Grimoire Serpent in the Staglands Bubbles In Memoria A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire
How on earth did anyone think KOTOR is an acceptable game

Gameplay was irrelevant because it came out when action RPGs were in vogue thanks to Diablo + II. Sky's the limit when a click festival is your idea of engaging game play. Just spam Force Lightening or Force Whirlwind and you win. There's just a large group of people who don't care about any real challenge in their games (Diablo's whole game design is that of lottery that only challenges your patience, there's no strategy whatsoever), which is why mobile games are half the entire video game market. It just so happens, that demographic overlaps with a lot of people who also love Star Wars.

As far as all that goes, fair enough. There's no specific burden for Kotor to have well designed or executed game play, and simple games can be fun to play if you're busy and just want to phone it in.
 
Vatnik Wumao
Joined
Oct 2, 2018
Messages
19,464
Who gives a fuck about "nuance" and other crap like that. I just want to wander around the galaxy causing anguish and torment to everyone I come across.
RPG devs cannot into proper grimderp either, so meh.

The fact that there has never been a good Warhammer 40k cRPG is practically a crime.
I'm honestly amazed that no major RPG dev attempted it given that Games Workshop seems to give their license to pretty much anyone asking.

And hell, you don't even need one of the big studios. The devs behind Mechanicus nailed the aesthetic and made a pretty good medium (/low?) budget game, so doing a retro-ish RPG in the same vein seems certainly doable.
 

Tyranicon

A Memory of Eternity
Developer
Joined
Oct 7, 2019
Messages
7,790
Who gives a fuck about "nuance" and other crap like that. I just want to wander around the galaxy causing anguish and torment to everyone I come across.
RPG devs cannot into proper grimderp either, so meh.

The fact that there has never been a good Warhammer 40k cRPG is practically a crime.
I'm honestly amazed that no major RPG dev attempted it given that Games Workshop seems to give their license to pretty much anyone asking.

And hell, you don't even need one of the big studios. The devs behind Mechanicus nailed the aesthetic and made a pretty good medium (/low?) budget game, so doing a retro-ish RPG in the same vein seems certainly doable.

Making a RPG is a lot of work, with a niche audience (at least for good cRPGs) and slim profit margins compared to other genres. The new, hip thing is making a RPG-lite to monetize damage numbers (Ubisoft, you POS), fucking lol.

Why do you think BioWare stopped making RPGs? :lol:
 
Vatnik Wumao
Joined
Oct 2, 2018
Messages
19,464
Making a RPG is a lot of work, with a niche audience (at least for good cRPGs) and slim profit margins compared to other genres. The new, hip thing is making a RPG-lite to monetize damage numbers (Ubisoft, you POS), fucking lol.

Why do you think BioWare stopped making RPGs? :lol:
6f41e95e7f9df297bc59bfe44014a2f4.gif
 

Tyranicon

A Memory of Eternity
Developer
Joined
Oct 7, 2019
Messages
7,790
Making a RPG is a lot of work, with a niche audience (at least for good cRPGs) and slim profit margins compared to other genres. The new, hip thing is making a RPG-lite to monetize damage numbers (Ubisoft, you POS), fucking lol.

Why do you think BioWare stopped making RPGs? :lol:
6f41e95e7f9df297bc59bfe44014a2f4.gif

This is the closest you're gonna get to a 40k RPG anytime soon: https://rpgcodex.net/forums/threads/heresy-simulator-warhammer-40k-x-battle-brothers.136448/

I don't know if that makes you more depressed or less.
 
Vatnik Wumao
Joined
Oct 2, 2018
Messages
19,464
Making a RPG is a lot of work, with a niche audience (at least for good cRPGs) and slim profit margins compared to other genres. The new, hip thing is making a RPG-lite to monetize damage numbers (Ubisoft, you POS), fucking lol.

Why do you think BioWare stopped making RPGs? :lol:
6f41e95e7f9df297bc59bfe44014a2f4.gif

This is the closest you're gonna get to a 40k RPG anytime soon: https://rpgcodex.net/forums/threads/heresy-simulator-warhammer-40k-x-battle-brothers.136448/

I don't know if that makes you more depressed or less.
Doesn't fill that gap, but godspeed on your endeavors. :salute:
 

Tyranicon

A Memory of Eternity
Developer
Joined
Oct 7, 2019
Messages
7,790
Making a RPG is a lot of work, with a niche audience (at least for good cRPGs) and slim profit margins compared to other genres. The new, hip thing is making a RPG-lite to monetize damage numbers (Ubisoft, you POS), fucking lol.

Why do you think BioWare stopped making RPGs? :lol:
6f41e95e7f9df297bc59bfe44014a2f4.gif

This is the closest you're gonna get to a 40k RPG anytime soon: https://rpgcodex.net/forums/threads/heresy-simulator-warhammer-40k-x-battle-brothers.136448/

I don't know if that makes you more depressed or less.
Doesn't fill that gap, but godspeed on your endeavors. :salute:


Just for you, I'm gonna throw in a certain angry, yellow space marine chapter.
 

wahrk

Learned
Joined
Aug 13, 2019
Messages
216
The Brave Rebels (Americans) fight the Evil Empire (British).

I disagree, the Empire is based on Nazi Germany. Stormtroopers, grey/brown uniforms, Vader's helmet, speciesism etc.

It’s a bit of both.

Kreia is a morally grey force user, oh my god my brain cannot contain the amazement I feel.

Kreia manipulates and sabotages your crew for her own ends and openly tells you to treat everyone like disposable tools, intentionally sets up conflict and then murders the Jedi masters. That’s not really morally grey, I’d say she’s fairly sinister throughout. She’s not a cackling villain but she is the villain.
 
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