|
KOTOR was released in late 2003 for PC. My choice not to get around to playing this game until now was a big mistake. I recall my friend Bert raving about the game. He told me about his escapades coercing people into doing his bidding or blasting foes with Force Lightning. In short, he had a grand time playing the game the way he wanted to play.
I found his remarks to be right on target. I found that different choices lead down different paths. This applied not only to the immediate conversations or outcomes, but to longer term consequences as well. In one case that i recall, having a successful conversation with a person made for an entirely different sequence of events later in the game. I know this because my PC crashed and I had not saved for a while, so I ended up redoing some parts, but changing my responses in a conversation, which, to my surprise, caused a different sequence of events later in a seemingly unrelated situation.
Aside from make more (and more meaningful) choices in respones and actions, I found the gameplay and storyline to be well done and enjoyable as well. The gameplay is manageable and like a roleplaying game, but fast paced with plenty of action to keep you involved and on your toes. You also get to outfit characters and focus on strengths for them as you choose. So, for instance, you might focus one character on strength upgrades and melee combat, or on blaster weapons abilities and ranged combat instead.
While managing your team member's individual character development offers you many interesting possibilities, the same cannot be said for the gear and items in general in the game. It is true that you have plenty of items and weapons and armor choices at your disposal. However, I found that most of the choices were simply determined by the combat focus of the character in question. Heavy armor with defense goes to the heavy trooper type, while dexterity and wisdom items go to the Jedi. Pretty cut and dried. Aside from the weapons and armor and a few power-ups, a huge majority of the items in the game are relatively worthless. Furthermore, since most merchants sell things that are useless or way overpriced, I found that I never actually interacted with them for anything. I didn't bother to look at what they were selling and I never bothered to sell them anything.
The story is great. Without giving anything away, let's just say it is very "Star Wars". If you engage in the side stories of the various characters on your team, you can find more stories and interesting things going on beside the main storyline, keeping things fresh and changing. That said, quite a few of the stories or side-quests seem to dead end or just fizzle out. As I approached the end of the main story (and the game), it became increasingly obvious that quite a large number of things had either gone unresolved or hadn't amounted to anything at all. This left quite a few loose ends untied and I felt that the game should have been about three times the size it was.
Overall, this was a very good game. It started off a little slow, but picked up with the action and storyline rather quickly. I was soon hooked and enjoyed it all the way to the conclusion. Aside from the minor issues with gear and the side stories, I found this to be a spectacular RPG and one that really does the Star Wars license justice.
|
