Once More Unto the Breach

It has been a long time coming, friends and strangers. I am continually posting my thoughts onto the net, day after gloomy day, and it soon came to my attention that my thoughts were being disseminated over a vast quadrant and I was unable to compile my ideas into a neat area for my own and other's perusal. So that is why I made this blog. Well, also because a friend of mine who shall remain Nameless for his own protection (from the government) made a blog of his own. Anyway, Nameless's blog is cool and all, but his taste is radically different from my own. For one thing, he showers with provolone cheese. He thinks this will defend him against bot flies, but I'm not so sure. Anyway, my blog is oriented towards video games and my great father, Andy Kaveti, from whose loins I literally sprung.

Tonight's topic is a video game that is very near and dear to my heart. It is called Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. From henceforth, it shall be called Kotor. Kotor is an RPG developed by the now-famous Bioware Corporation. Bioware is an amazing developer who has been credited with the creation of such games as Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Dragon Age: Origins, and Mass Effect. However, if you ask me, their greatest work was Kotor. Kotor wasn't an original Intellectual Property developed by Bioware, but basically a story based on the Star Wars universe. Bioware worked with LucasArts to develop a game that took place about 4 thousand years before the events of the Original Star Wars films (not the crap you saw from 1999 to 2005).



Anyway, Bioware did an amazing job of creating this RPG, so much so, that a non-RPG gamer like me became addicted to it. Hell, before I played this game I wasn't really a fan of Star Wars, either. Up until that point, I was a Halo 2 gamer. You know, the kind that thinks Halo 2 is the best FPS game ever made and refuses to play anything else. That was me. So one day in 2004, my mother and I went to Target because I wanted a game. I could have gotten Halo: Combat Evolved (I had only played Halo 2 up to that point). Thankfully, this 2001 game still cost 50 bucks, and I gloomily searched for a cheaper alternative. By a stroke of luck or divine intervention, I found Kotor for only 20 bucks. On the front cover, the game claimed to have receive more than 40 Game of the Year awards. I was quite skeptical of the game when I first looked at it because it had been released only a year before and cost only 20 bucks while a 3 year old game like Halo was still 50 bucks. But, not having any other choice, I purchased Kotor. The rest, as they say, is history.

I played the game, I fell in love with it, and this led me to appreciate Role Playing Games that much more. I can't laud this game enough. Kotor puts you in the place of an amnesia-afflicted character (who you can choose to be either a solder, a scoundrel, or a Scout). The choices I made with my character at the beginning of the game had a direct effect on my character's abilities and dialogue throughout the game. So far, I've played the game's campaign 11 times and every single time I have chosen to be a male. I've also never strayed too far from being a Good character rather than an Evil one. At some point in the game, you will become a jedi, so it pretty much makes this game even more badass. I cannot divulge too many parts of this story, but let me say this. Bioware could have chosen to make a generic cookie-cutter game over the backdrop of a popular franchise. Instead, they created very memorable characters that aided the player on his/her journey, and allowed the player to travel to many different planets which Bioware beautifully envisioned and designed. LucasArts was so pleased with the end result that the story Bioware constructed is now part of official Star Wars canon. That means it's legit, folks. It's not just a lazy spin-off like the kind old man Lucas himself is helping to churn out these days.



I won't say much more about Kotor except that Bioware was not very involved in the sequel. Kotor II: The Sith Lords was developed by another studio called Obsidian Entertainment. Now, Obsidian isn't a bad developer, at least as far as I know, but I hate them with every fiber of my being for essentially ruining the Kotor series. For some reason, Bioware felt confident enough in Obsidian that they let them have a crack at Kotor II and Obsidian couldn't complete the game in time so they had to cut out a lot of content, leaving the game feeling obviously incomplete and bug-ridden. This all happened in 2005. Since then, there have been no more Kotor games. Bioware has gone on to do bigger (though not better, in my opinion) things with the likes of Mass Effect 1&2. While the rest of the world is riding Bioware's jock over these 2 games, I am upset by their decision to not go back and develop a proper sequel to Kotor so we can finally end the series on a high note. Turns out, Bioware is doing something about Kotor, and I don't like it. Bioware is currently developing an MMORPG called Star Wars: The Old Republic. Supposedly, according them, the game is a spiritual successor to Kotor. I, however, feel the game will not bring justice to Kotor because MMOs never have the same tightly woven storyline as regular single player RPGs do.

Anyway, I highly recommend whoever is reading this, even if you are an extraterrestrial or a man who showers with cheese, to try and purchase this fantastic game. It was released on both the PC and Xbox in 2003. It will run well on the Xbox 360, but I recommend you purchase the PC version through Steam. That's all for tonight, folks.