Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

Ave!

The fact is that I spent quite a long time in the hospital, and during treatment I started playing Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic on a tablet in order to distract myself somehow.

A bit later, I came across an article with several ideas by Chris Avellon about the plot of the 3rd part (translation of the full version of the article). I liked the ideas (especially against the background of what was done in SWTOR), and I wanted to find out something else about Obsidian plans, and why many consider the 2nd part of KotOR to be a failure, and the third part was canceled altogether.
')
This is a longrid about game design, development difficulties, and my subjective thoughts about Star Wars and games in general, but if that does not bother you, then welcome to cat.


^{- Darth Malak and Darth Revan}

About Star Wars and Knights of the Old Republic games

Star Wars games began to be released back in the 80s. The first games appeared on the consoles Atari 2600 and ollecovision (it seems that this was what they were), and home computers: the ZX spectrum, Commodore 64 and Amstrad CPC a little later. On YouTube there is a video with the gameplay of games from 1982 to 2018, though not everything is there (but there is Star Wars (1987), a game on NES, released only in Japan, there Darth Vader turns into a scorpion, apparently from some Japanese versions of films).

In general, LucasArts monitored the quality of the games, even though outright rubbish appeared, but a lot of great toys came out:

• Jedi Knight series, which no one could surpass the coolness of the lightsaber fighting (by the way, the engine of the last parts is open ). There is a multiplayer mod for Jedi Academy - Movie Battles 2 , servers are supported by fans. Having played a bit, I can say that the implementation can be crooked, but it is very fun to kill Jedi in mass batches by driving a droidk (no sociopathy, it was bad (evil) Jedi, honestly). Its fencing system is in fashion, and in order to be a successful Jedi, one must literally foresee the actions of enemies, i.e., be a Jedi irl (or Sith)
  
• X-Wing series (simulator of space battles, I personally didn’t go down, but was highly appreciated by fans)
  
• sturdy strategies for Galactic Battlegrounds and Empire at War (in general, this is nothing special, but many hours were played in childhood)
  
• old Battlefront 1 and 2 (by the way, not so long ago the steam-version of Battlefront 2 got working servers, but I still could not play, all the servers on which the players were lagging terribly)
  
• Republic Commando - tactical shooter, it is a pity that the second part, which was supposed to be the storming of the Jedi Academy, did not come out
  

For me in these games there was one drawback after all - a weak plot, in addition limited by the time frames of the war clones on the one hand, and the Jedi Academy Luke Skywalker on the other.


In Knights of the Old Republic, created, which has already become a cult studio Bioware, under the leadership of Casey Hadsen and James Ohlen, much was familiar, but all the characters are new, worlds have not yet been investigated, and the story tells about the Mandalore wars and the Jedi Civil War, occurred thousands of years before the events of the movie saga. BioWare very successfully recreated the atmosphere of the classic trilogy, essentially a western in space, while the game itself turned out bright and imbued with the spirit of adventure and exploration. But most importantly, for the first time, players were given the opportunity to touch the mysteries of the history of the Star Wars universe.

^{- poster of the game Knights of the Old Republic}
Of course, now I see objective shortcomings of the game: these are unpretentious dialogues and fairly straightforward characters that can’t be particularly surprised (straightforwardness is KotOR’s main problem in general), but how cool it was to get to the Jedi Academy on Dantooine or visit Tatooine in which only - Only the first colonists appeared. The level design in the game is simply wonderful, which only costs a walk along the bottom of Manaan or the Valley of Dark Lords on Korriban.

^{- a selection of memorable moments to the music of John Williams *}
The gameplay is classic for DnD games, i.e. closed locations and step-by-step battles, but the boevka doesn't feel inhibited like in Neverwinter Nights and some other games.
Many abilities (feats) and techniques of power, 6 classes - 3 available when creating a character (soldier, scout, scoundrel) and Jedi classes that appear after training in the academy (guardian, sentinel and consular).
But the skills turned out to be quite useless, and the whole game is easy to complete with 0 skills, except for repair (since in this case you cannot complete the quest HK-47). But nevertheless, you can feel like a real Obi-Wan by washing the soft brains of weak minds with Force, or with the help of persuasion, and this is perhaps the only Star Wars game in which this is possible (except for KotOR 2).


We should also note the original soundtrack for the authorship of Jeremy Soule, which, of course, is not as epic as the works of John Williams from the movies, but this melody will surely be remembered by everyone.

Role system and engine

All calculations use the classic DnD system d20 (3rd edition), created by Wizards of the Coasts and opened under the Open Game License (you can freely use it in your games).

General mechanics d20:

• In the desktop, a 20-sided dice is used, and in computer games, a pseudo-ordinal number generator is most often used (but not in all, in the same Fallout 2, you could easily drive off the first ant having missed 10 times in a row, having a chance of hitting 90%, but there and the system is different)
  
• 6 attributes (strength, dexterity, endurance, intelligence, wisdom and charisma), giving modifiers to different actions (modifiers can be both positive and negative)
  
• Similarly, bonuses from armor, weapons, abilities, saving throws, etc. are considered (the system was simplified compared to the 1st and 2nd edition, where for many cases there were specific tables and mechanics)
  
• If the numerical result of the action is greater than or equal to the value of the complexity class (Difficulty Class or DC), then the action is considered successful.
  

The game was made on the engine Odissey, modifications of the engine Aurora (Neverwinter Nights, The Witcher, CDPR licensed the use of the engine, and made some pretty serious modifications). The main feature of Odissey was support for the Xbox platform and, in fact, starting with KotOR, Bioware developed all the games for the console, and then ported to the PC (with the exception of SWTOR and possibly Dragon Age: Origins). Also, 3D backgrounds, facial animations, first person views and water reflection effects have been added to Odissey.
The Aurora engine itself was created by Bioware as a replacement for the Infinity 2D engine (the Baldurs Gate, Planescape: Torment and Icewind Dale series), was fully three-dimensional, and supported dynamic lighting and shadows. For image rendering, OpenGL is used, and the engines themselves are written in C ++.

Port on mobile devices and cut content

The port on android and iOS was released by Aspyr Studio, which specializes in Windows ports of games on various platforms, ranging from Macs and GNU / Linux to GameBoy Advance, Nindtendo DS and PS4. The version for android was created using Android NDK , a toolset that allows you to translate parts of code into native libraries and load these libraries using Java wrappers and JNI .
Not to say that the port is very well optimized, even on current smartphones, serious lags appear periodically. The game has been reworked interface, and added adaptation for touch control, but for mini-games there is no separate control, no alteration of these games themselves, and in some cases it is very inconvenient or impossible to play the mini-game. There is an opportunity to connect the gamepad. If you ( like me ) do not have Google services on the device, then you can buy standalone .apk on Amazon, well, or buy at w3bsit3-dns.com, if you know what I mean.

^{- screenshot of the Android version of the game}
What is really cool: the port supports mods and saving from the PC version, i.e. you can play on the PC, throw saves on the phone and continue, for example, in a train. To put mods on a mobile version (it is recommended to first install mods on a PC using TSL Patcher) you need to copy / modules, / override and the dialog.tlk file from the game directory in /Android/data/com.aspyr.swkotor/files/. But keep in mind that the android version suffers from problems with memory overflow, so it’s better not to install heavyweight mods on the graphics.

In contrast to the second part, Knights of the old Republic was not heavily cropped on the release, but, of course, scissors and this game are not spared. For example, due to censorship restrictions, the scene with Malak and Bastila’s torture was cut out, so it’s better to install Restoration Modification v1.2 mod, restoring most of the content and fixing many bugs. Planet Sleyheron was also completely cut out of the game, where the player had to feel like a gladiator, but restoration work is going very slowly, and it’s not a fact that they will ever be completed.
If you are going to play on a smartphone or tablet without a gamepad, then I recommend you to put on mods to facilitate svup races (since you are unlikely to race on Taris, you can do something with touch controls) and to delete random battles in space ( again, terrible control).

About Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords

This game was released unfinished, buggy, a ton of interesting content was cut out in it, and the beginning was terribly boring, and ... well, let's take one after the other.

In the spring of 2003, even before the first part of KotOR appeared on store shelves, LucasArts had already begun preparations for the release of a sequel. Negotiations with BioWare were a failure: LucasArts did not agree to postpone the release of the game and gave only 1.5 years to develop (the game was to come out before Christmas, the first part was developed from the year 2000), the timeframes are rather small, in addition to serious fines for failure. Guess who agreed to the development? That's right, the company consists of 7 people, with global headquarters in the attic - Obsidian Entertainment.

^{- screenshot of an early version of the game KotOR 2}
Obsidian was founded shortly before the events described by Black Isle Studio natives - Fergus Urquhart (this was his attic), Chris Avellon, Chris Parker, Darren Monahan and Chris Jones, who worked on projects such as Fallout 2, Planscape: Torment and Icewind Dale.


(note: Urquhart was still from Interplay Entertainment, where he was involved in management)

The development was problematic from the very beginning: none of Obsidian saw the first part, and because of bureaucratic delays LucasArts could not provide a game disc before signing the contract, nevertheless, Obsidian created their story concept blindly for about 2 months. The concept turned out to be so bad (the player had to free his world from the matriarchs, led by a figure resembling Creait with the help of the Maid), in comparison with the BioWare game, that Chris Avellone, having played, immediately sent all the developments to the basket.

Wow, yes to me Khan. Serious to be an example to follow! Hike, I have to go into unknown jungle.

^{- Chris Avellone in the Eurogamer [1] podcast , which brought together Obsidian developers and members of the Restored Content Mod team.}
The new plot, in my opinion, turned out to be quite intriguing - you are a former Jedi, a veteran of the Mandalore wars, who lost contact with the Force, and the devil who knows where and why, in addition, all those who are not lazy hunt for you: from psychopathic droids and gangster syndicates to collapsing on the part of the Sith Lord (by the way, the plot was partly inspired by the film “Chinatown” by Roman Polanski). KotOR 2 in its gloomy atmosphere does not even resemble the prequels, but the last season of the Clone Wars: conspiracies, betrayals, murders, enigmatic and unprecedented aspects of the Force. However, at the very beginning of the game, a serious mistake of game design was made: passing Peragus is corny not fun and not interesting.


In the first part, we were immediately thrown into battle, and with a partner (this is important), everything exploded around, the Sith were shot at with the soldiers of the republic, and even in severe difficulty Endar Spire ran at a rather comfortable pace and, what can we say, was cool, we even showed a duel between two Jedi.

But in KotOR 2, the first level is very tight, there are only 4 characters with whom you can talk to in the whole of Peragus, and they are not very inclined to talk (except for the HK series droid, this one is ready to chat without ceasing). Although the character of Crea and intrigued by the fact that she was dead at the first meeting, but to get out of her at least something does not work. A separate problem is the battles: the bouts are simply incredibly slow, the character is not able to do anything, and there are quite a few enemies. The situation could have been straightened by the partner, since the boevka was obviously not designed for a long passage in the solo, and even an imperfect character, but we are not given anyone in a couple for quite a long time.
Not surprisingly, many fans of the 1st part of this and ended their passage.

Chris Avellone admits that the real problem was still in Obsidian ambitions ^[1] :

There are a number of design solutions that we could apply, reducing the direction for the development of the game. We should have deleted all the mini-games ** - a huge amount of time was spent on them. And all these cut-scenes that we had, including on the game engine - the construction of all this was a huge pain in the ass, and it was also impossible to fully rely on them.
The reason why so many cut scenes take place on the Black Hawk also has a reason - this is because Obsidian could surely make sure that the players would be in the right places when the scene worked. Oh, and the user interface redesign turned out to be “a huge waste of time.”

^{** - mini-games means shooting from turrets from the first person and racing on a swoop bike, but there are no small puzzles like in the first part of the game}

The UI redesign, in my opinion, turned out to be extremely unfortunate - it looks much more outdated and heavy than in the original. The blame for this lies with Chris Parker, who was not able to formulate the idea initially, but at the same time spent months of work of programmers who do not understand what they want from them (judging by Avellon, similar to Parker in general was a normal mode of operation).

^{- UI comparison, on the left the 1st part, on the right the 2nd (clickable)}

One day while working on KotOR II, Parker collapsed when Chris wanted to find out what time frame his team would allocate the previously promised designer. He worked exclusively on the UI, but the time was up and he had long had to be redirected to help the content department. In response to a question, Parker went berserk and said that, despite the promise, everything would be as it was, and Chris would have to cope on its own.

^{- Chris Avellone on the RPGCodex forum [2] ( translation )}
In general, the game is accelerated by the time of arrival on Telos (or Tilos, as you like), the world destroyed by the Sith invasion led by Darth Malak. Interesting quests, a lot of characters and the first moral dilemma appear here: two competing organizations are engaged in the restoration of Telos - the evil Zerk corporation (Czerka) and the community of blessed Ithorians sensitive to the bright side of the Force.

And here the differences between the first and the second part become obvious: if in the first part the bright characters are all kind, honest and take care of others (and the evil, well, of course, evil), then the good leader of the Ithorians on Telos immediately starts feeding you tales he does not know how to cure you, but he wants to use the help now), the Zerk corporation promises to pay and in addition explains that in the conditions of the financial crisis in the Republic, the Ithorians will soon run out of money, and Telos will remain dead world, not only after such failure and other destruction of the planet do not shine. At the same time, Zerk will develop the natural resources of the planet, and spend a portion of the profits on a restoration project.


KotOR 2 shows the Jedi, the Force and the events in the galaxy from a different, more controversial point of view:

Much of this was the result of deep-rooted feelings and opinions about the Star Wars franchise, which were both positive and negative. And this is especially true of the feeling of what was a Jedi or Sith in this universe. I always had a problem with the Force because of its aspects to predestination, and I wondered if any of the Jedi or the Sith wanted to rebel against her ... and completely abandon her connections with her (and thereby depriving herself and the power she offers). Nihilus in Kotor II is a creature who has completely surrendered to what is Force, and the fact that he is completely absorbed in the Sith self-destructive technique sums up my questions about the Force.

^{- Chris Avellone in the now remote blog on the Obsidian forum ( translation )}
Someone may say that this is not in the style of pollutants, but for me so a departure from the binary ideas of the struggle between good and evil in favor of shades of gray (but not those, though ... Vizas clearly has some masochistic inclinations, khmmmm ... sorry) the world is more alive.

Cut content

Despite the fact that Obsidian began to receive financial support from LucasArts, and the staff grew to 30 people, many of the developers had no experience. The engine had to be mastered on the go, there was no professional equipment for recording and editing video, and the testing department was completely absent.

Even a job search was a test. Our first office was the attic of Fergus, and his wife, Margot, was more than patient with our activities — and when I say “patient,” I rather mean “Samaritan woman.” That is, she could even bring us food. It was hot in the attic, it smelled of developers (I don't know how it tolerated the smell). And with a dozen computers warming up to a peak, he sometimes turned into a steam room. After staying here for several months, we moved to the office area nearby, inhabited by rats and adjacent to the stinking pond for ducks (unusually aggressive ducks that could sneak up at lunch). There were also dubious neighbors from a nearby room who raided our kitchen and shelves with soda.

^{- Chris Avellone in an Aggrogamer interview ( translation )}

Someone could turn on the microwave, leaving all animators without electricity.

^{- from the memories of Anthony Davis, who worked on the gameplay. Podcast Eurogamer [1]}
And yet in Obsidian they continued to work hard, but they could not finish a lot (and start something).
In the vanilla version of the game you constantly come across traces of the cut out quests, doors that were supposed to lead somewhere, and, moments, a very strange and fragmentary narration.

Most of all went to Korriban and the ending as a whole, but the list of the cut is so large that it is probably worthwhile to list only the most interesting:

• On Telos, quests related to the investigation of corruption in the SS station were cut, Geno-Haradan was completely cut out (the top-secret order of the assassins, the search begins with the fake Batu Rem), and the capture of the docks by Zerk Corporation.
  
• Many dialogues related to mercenaries and quests about Jedi holocrons were cut out on Dantooine, revealing some veils over the secrets of the Jedi (instead we get a fake holocron, which is ironic). The assault on Kunda was also cut out due to performance problems on the Xbox (replaced by a dull video clip).
  
• Nar Shadda - missions for party members were cut off, and quests related to Geno-Haradan: this was how we should have been shown an expanded version of the cut scene with Goto, where he mentions why he does not want to work with the most elite order of assassins, and the storyline with the explosion in the cantina, which was replaced on a more primitive scene with gas.
  
• Onderron - everything is not so bad here, only Mandalore's dialogues about his past were removed from the game (this is Canderus from the 1st part, all of a sudden) and small skits with General Vaklu.
  
• Korriban - the planet itself, in general, was conceived about in this form, but the results of the search for a member of the Jedi Council should have been brought to a separate planet - m4-78EP, a colony of droids, which, in fact, was the main plot, the scenes in the tomb were also cut off (for example, you should have met your own dark copy).
  ^{- the core AI of the planet m4-78EP}
  
• The ending is that a fight scene between Darth Nihilus and Zion is cut out without a swearing , the dialogues on the Avenger (Nihilus flagship Ravager) are cut off, the battle with the maids on Telos, the HK droid factory, the mass of plot scenes on Malacor are removed 5 (therefore, in the vanilla version it is not at all clear what is happening). , . .
  
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And that's not even counting the little things: the appearance of the characters, the design of the levels, the dialogues and everything else that adds to the game atmosphere.

According to Avellon , the developers did not have an ultimatum from the publisher regarding the release date, however, the later the game came out, the smaller the percentage of sales from the company. Apparently, a smaller percentage was due to the fact that it was the publisher who paid for the continued development. Fergus Urquhart decided to release the game by the originally set release date. ^[2]

What did work out really well

The game was implemented a lot of really interesting ideas, and a significant proportion of the content was made very high quality:

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• Companions and a system of influence are well-defined characters (except, perhaps, the curtailed Mandalore) and interesting dialogues, in addition there is a variation, and the player gets different companions depending on the gender and his path (light / dark).
  
• Excellent voice acting characters and actors play (especially impressive Kreia).
  
• Companions can be taught the tricks of Jedi art (there is no such thing anywhere else).
  
• The soundtrack of writing Mark Griske. Very well reflects the gloomy and burdensome atmosphere of the game.
  

Companions and Antagonists

I met the opinion that the characters from the second part are cardboard and uninteresting, but in my opinion the opposite is true. Each companion keeps some kind of secret and does not hurry to share it with you, and this is logical, in the end, they all either pursue certain goals, or follow you because of some personal motives. So, for example, the Maid is watching you on behalf of Atris, Bao-Dur is afraid of his own dark manifestations and tries to find himself after the Mandalore Wars, and Kreia really wants you to become very powerful.


^{- companions when playing for a bright female character (clickable)}
The game has a new influence system, and now each partner has the Influence characteristic, which has a value from 0 to 100 (50 initial), which can vary depending on your actions, and in order to get influence you need to know the character of the character and perform certain actions. New dialogs open at both high and low Influence values, i.e., if you play a dark character and your companion is bright (and the companion likes good deeds), you can still go through his / her quest and do, for example Jedi. But there is inconsistency, in this case the companion will become a bright Jedi, although in the dialogs you will talk about the power of the dark side. This is due to the fact that the influence determines the "color" of the companion, i.e., if influence == 100 and you are dark, the companion will also be dark, and if 0 (i.e., you lose influence), then the light is equal and vice versa. This, of course, is a bug, but in my opinion, quite funny. Remember the good Uncle Palpatine and how sweet he always was in public. Therefore, the player can popritvatsya to seduce some unstable good-natured.

Separately worth mentioning Kreus. In fact, she is engaged in our training in the ways of the Force throughout the game. Kreia is neither a Jedi, nor a Sith, and hates both. I, personally, never liked to play a completely insane psychopath / psychopath, and indeed senseless violence, even virtual, but Kreu's neutral-evil teaching, was disgusting, I liked it. Yes, it is still dark, but if a player performs violent actions without any real purpose, then Kreia will be very unhappy, because she believes that this has nothing to do with "true power."

As for the villains, they are just awesome cool. The monster, plunged into the depths of the dark side so that it lost not only the human appearance, but in general the physical body, and at the same time already unable to experience anything but an all-consuming hunger. Darth Zion (or Zion, Sion), experiencing incredible suffering every moment of its existence and supporting life in itself solely by an effort of will. Sly manipulator, preferring to act out of the shadow by intrigue and betrayal.

^{- Sith triumvirate (fan art Hyperion127 )}
Admittedly, with the appearance of the villains, not everything turned out: Darth Nihilus, by design, should not have anything under the mask at all, only a dark void. And Darth Sion was supposed to create the feeling that he was holding parts of his body with Force, but in the game he rather resembles a half-decomposed corpse. It is clear that Odissey simply did not support the necessary technologies, such as bump mapping. But, nevertheless, antagonists turned out to be extremely charismatic and memorable.

Restoration work

All the content acquired and cut out by Obsidian was left on the game disk (apparently there were some dependencies, so the developers did not risk cutting resources), so it’s not surprising that this content was soon discovered by curious players. The first who seriously announced plans to restore was Team Gizka, but the years went on, and nobody saw anything but stories and publications patch of laptops on the mod, which they did not lay out for free access. As well as at least some developments (except for a few promotional videos ). Nobody returned the money collected from donates.

But over time, the TSLRCM mod team consisting of Stoney was formed (it is known that he tried to work alone for quite a while and released the so-called Stoney Patch), Zbyl2 (Sbigniew Stanevich), SWfan28, Jinger, Hassat Hunter and VarsityPuppet. And in September 2009, the first release of the beta version of the mod.

^{- sample recovered content, HK series droid factory}
The current version of the mod (1.8.5) introduces hundreds of changes into the game, bug fixes, restores quests and removes many characters (for more relevant entourage). Just look at these colossal lists of changes .

You were able to fix what we could not. We were not allowed. We just ... just appreciate it.

^{- Ethnoni Davis, Eurogamer podcast [1]}
It is very doubtful that LucasArts was forbidden to release updates and patches to the game legally, it is more likely that the Obsidian management simply did not want to finish the game for “free”, without an additional contract. LucaArts himself was clearly not in the mood for games, since in the midst of it was hard work on the 3rd Star Wars episode.
Currently, some good developers have been supporting their projects for years, releasing either free content or a curtailed free update along with paid DLCs. And there are not so many examples: Terraria, Sins of Solar Empire: Rebellion, Cities Skylines, and the same Pillars of Eternity.
But in the early 2000s no one was engaged in such activities, although the same Obsidian could clearly get more revenue from a percentage of sales if they had somehow brought KotOR 2 to mind. In any case, some Obsidian developers were very grateful for the work done:

Many people who bought the game for the first time, for example, on a sale on Steam or somewhere else, will be told by their friends - “yes, go download The Sith Lords Restored Content Mod, and put it on - this is what it should have been” . And it is right. And in general, really, thank you guys, from the heart, I'm serious.

^{- Anthony Davis, Eurogamer podcast [1]}
To date, the work on the mod has already been completed, but unfortunately, not all of the content was restored due to the fact that Obsidian either did not have time to start implementing part of the plan, or made some very small fragments. Actually for this reason, the mod team did not think out for Obsidian and left some of the ideas that could not be restored to other modders. So there were some mods that make content from scratch:

• M4-78 Enhancement Project , which adds the M4-78 droid planet, is pretty good in my opinion, although there are certain problems with level design and some droids speak fluent English for some reason (I'm not sure if this was intended or the developers forgot to screw the voice -morpher, but in version 1.5, it seems, fixed most of the problems).
  
• Extended Enclave adds new dialogs and cut-scenes on Dantooine.
  
• GenoHaradan Legacy - tells about the secret order of the Assassins, who retrained from the defense of the Republic to hunt personally on you and other Jedi.
  

If you play on Linux and you have a native Steam version, then, as I understand it, it is impossible to put mods on it using the TSL patcher, so you can either not bother and download TSLRCM + M4-78 from the workshop, or you will have to install the legacypc version (game properties> beta versions), patch and play through Wine \ Proton (and the game will most likely work better than the native version).
Windows users also should take into account that the mods delivered through the workshop are incompatible with those that need to be installed using the TSL patcher.

Plans for KotOR 3

According to the Obsidian sketches (the development did not go further than pre-production), the players had to continue playing for the Exile / Exile from KotOR 2 and go to the true Sith Empire in search of Revan.

^{- art created in Obsidian}
These were supposed to be truly dark worlds, ruled by the horrible and incredibly powerful Sith lords:

Part of the fun in working on their design was that if you had such extremely powerful adepts in your hands, and they had a whole lurking possession in remote corners of the galaxy, then the Sith Empire really looked like ?
If they could form whole planets, galaxies or nebulae, and they would have all these enslaved races in service, how would it be cool then to get into the very heart of darkness? Are you in the role of a lonely Jedi and / or one of the New Sith who opposed these guys? What would it be? I think it would be pretty epic.

^{- Chris Avellone, Eurogamer podcast [1]}
But LucasArts suspended work with Obsidian, having decided to transfer the development to one of the internal divisions, and soon the project was completely closed.

Somehow, the appearance of new consoles - PS3 and Xbox 360 could be mixed up, which would require the development of new engines, and this would already be costly in terms of time and money.

^{- from a comment by Dan Spitzley, who worked at Obsidian as a senior programmer. Podcast Eurogamer [1]}
Also, it is likely that this decision was influenced by the release of unfinished KotOR2.
Perhaps, if Obsidian initially proved to be a team that makes quality projects, and always brings the work to the end, then LucasArts could invest money to create a new engine.


Instead of KotOR 3, we received MMORPG Stars Wars: The Old Republic with a vague plot, and mechanics copied from WoW (and this is the best thing in the game). The game was developed, which had already begun to go downhill, Bioware (the studio was bought by EA in 2007, SWTOR was released in December 2011, by itself before Christmas), but rather by the new department of Bioware, opened in California.

SWTOR plot unfolds 300 years after the events of the Knights of the Old Republic and uses the Obsidian idea of ​​invading the real Sith Empire. But the game seems to have been done according to some “secret documents” of Avellon, because neither the horrors of this Empire itself, nor the powerful Siths, which arouse fear of whole galaxies, are shown in it, and even in the game, instead of HK-47, they give calls sacks of meat organic (disgusting).

What I didn’t like the most is that the heroes of the original games are killed in a stupid way (and Revan twice). After all, this is some Revan, who defeated the Mandolorians and brought the Republic to his knees, and the Jedi Exile, who destroyed the Sith Triumvirate for everything. Therefore, the heroes of the plot rush into the throne room to the immortal Emperor together with T3, the Exile and poor T3 perish, and Revan is captured for 300 years, then to ingloriously die where.

^{- Emperor Valkorion Vishate, in his shell from the Eternal Empire, the main antagonist of SWTOR}
Then, in 2014, the addition of Shadow of Revan appeared, in which it turns out that Revan did not die, but teleported (and that it could have been so ?!), but in reality only dark Revan did not die, but light Revan did die and we need to kill dark Revan so that he can merge with light Revan. If it seems to you that I am talking nonsense, then you are absolutely right, I think so too, but there really is such a plot.

Starting in 2015, EAware began releasing storyline solo content for high-level characters.


The update policy, which adds uninteresting solo content, and every small thing, instead of the normal end-game content (raids, PvP modes, etc.), fix bugs and balance, led to the final outflow of players, and at the moment we can say that the project is dead (in the evenings the PvP match is searched for 20-30 minutes, in Movie Battles there are more people). Although Bioware is preparing a new update, in which, suddenly, for the first time in 5 years, they will add a new raid, and even redo the system of abilities, stats and armor, but I very much doubt that this game will suddenly become interesting to play. Oh yeah, in the plot again the characters will be resurrected and the war will begin between the Republic and the Sith Empire (well, this time for sure the True!).

Conclusion

The Knights of the Old Republic games are probably the best games in the Star Wars universe, and certainly the best ones in the story. Yes, the second part came out unfinished and terribly unstable, but the main thing was that it had a wonderful foundation: interesting dialogues, elaborate characters, and an exciting story. And thanks to this, around the game has developed its own community of fans, who began to finish the game on their own, and according to the results completed everything they could.

Obsidian planned to make the best game on Star Wars, but the lack of time, the inexperience of developers and, not very adequate guidance, led to one of the most famous failures in the modern gaming industry. Obsidian themselves have long been entrusted with the status of bag-makers of people who make interesting, but very funded games.

This is what created Obsidian. This is the reason we are here. How would I say this, for me, KotOR 2 just personifies Obsidian as a whole.

^{- Dan Spitzley, Eurogamer podcast [1]}
For many developers from Obsidian, KotOR 2 was the first serious project, and for some even an unforgettable experience:

I was in the same boat. I ended up doing business at Interplay, and when this project started, and they had the opportunity to start bringing Obsidian to us from those of us who were miserably draining behind ... It was like a fresh start, and this feeling turned into a real sense of brotherhood, probably it was so exciting, and I myself felt so happy being a part of it all. To be honest, for my career - more than 20 games, this one is probably in the top three selected moments in my life.

^{- Brian Menze, Eurogamer podcast [1]}

It was just a shocking, awesome experience. And now, even now, when I left the gaming industry, after almost 9 years in it, I sometimes look back at all this, and remember a lot of bittersweet moments. I wish we did more, but I am proud of what happened.
I miss the people. I miss those nice times and the hard work we did.

^{- Anthony Davis, Eurogamer podcast [1]}
As for the continuation, there is a feeling that the scriptwriters and game designers were chained to the MacBooks somewhere in the dungeons of EA, and were given some rice for only the next 10 thousand characters, so they sincerely hated what they were working on.
But seriously, it is clear that SWTOR was released solely for the sake of monetization. A new studio was created, and the developers didn’t understand very well what they were doing and why.

Fans also made a remake of Part 1 on the Unreal Engine 4, but LucasFilm was banned from using its intellectual property (in fact, LucasFilm no longer exists, only a few copywriters were left there).

Considering that franchise rights do not change the owner (EA / Disney) for a long time, then there is no need to rely on good RPGs (it would be better if nothing came out of the next Andromeda level). At the expense of other genres, it is difficult to say, at least in the Fallen Order there is no feeling that instead of a lightsaber, the Jedi have a baton from Futurama, as in the rather mediocre Force Unleashed. But this is still the same console game with double jumps and wall climbing.


And may Mediochloriana Force be with you .

* - in fact, this is my remix made on the basis of another remix, but I do not remember where I found it and who the author is.

Used materials:

1. Eurogamer podcast 2003 + translation
   
2. Forum RPGCodex + translation