Originally posted by Tzeentch._
When Kreia threatens to kill Mandalore if he doesn't roll with the crew.When Atton and Handmaiden talk about the Exile behind his back and Handmaiden talks about his moral integrity.
When Atris has flashbacks about the Exile's past, when she orders her handmaidens to do this and that for the Exile.
I've never seen those last two. Maybe they're from the cut content?
Anyway, I thought this was about actual exposition and major plot stuff. All/Most of the stuff you guys have listed is character stuff. That stuff isn't important stuff that the main character knows or that gets in the way of roleplaying. At worst it means that when you ask people why they're following you and if they lie to you about it and you can't call them on it.... thats... a little...... annoying?
Anyway lets go down the list:
Originally posted by Lord Lucien
On Taris, between Kreia and Atton. On the Ravager between Visas and her master (whoever he is, because no one actually speaks his name). On Dxun, between Kreia and Mandalore. On Nar Shadaa between Kreia and Hanharr.
Don't you think these count as being similar to the cutscenes with Malak? These scenes exist to show you how manipulative Kreia is, or to establish Nihilus to you. In the case of the latter its so that the player knows who Visas is talking about when she babbles about him to you and why she tried to kill you. In the case of the former, like you've pointed out, Kreia being evil is never a mystery. Her character is enthralling because of her personalty, and a good chunk of her dialogue exists so the player can learn about her and her motivations. The real mystery is whether she's actively working against or for you (its both) and why she is doing what she is doing. Were these scenes not to exist, she would be a far weaker character for it.
Originally posted by Lord Lucien
On Nar Shadaa between Hanharr and Mira.
Mira briefly takes over as the playable character on Nar Shadaa. It's important to establish what he deal is before this or the player would be utterly befuddled (great word).
Originally posted by Lord Lucien
Many times when cutscenes are activated by leaving or entering the ship. Even some tertiary characters do it; Chodo and his buddy on Citadel. Atris and one of the albino clones clone on Telos. The bounty hunters and G0-T0 on his ship (especially irksome since that one involves two potential crew members). The feud between G0-T0 and T3 (which apparently affects the main story by the end). And I know there's a few between the Jedi masters and other people--like the Onderon queen.
And how exactly do these things detract from the story, rather than enhance it by fleshing out the characterization of these tertiary characters? Chodo makes some obscure comments that aren't even important and who even cares? Atris is one of the villains of the game, it is important to establish her and her relationship with the Exile. This is done in dialogue as well, you are given the chance to talk about Atris with other characters. What that cutscene does is simply give a glimpse at her as well It's never a bad thing to have both sides in a conflict. G0-T0 sending bounty hunters against you is important to Nar Shadaa's story and serves to establish 2 (3 actually) potential crew members as well as the bounty hunters who are attacking you. Seriously, wtf is wrong with this scene? And yes, G0-T0's shenangans do come into play at the end. To not have these scenes in would only make it incredibly jarring when this happens.
Originally posted by Lord Lucien
These aren't minor characters or nameless henchman talking about something dismissive (maybe it's another drill), it's the main cast and villains discussing the main topics of the main story.
No it isn't. Very little of what you've said actually has anything to do with the main story.
Originally posted by Lord Lucien
Mainly. When you have only the one character acting as your avatar and input, you limit the amount of interaction. The Exile is the primary instrument, so being unable to respond to dialogue or actions that you (the player) understand and know about, is very bothersome, and breaks the flow.
You're arguing that the player knowing these things when the Exile does not detracts from the story and breaks your immersion. And... maybe? It didn't for me but I can see how that can be a valid criticism. However, whatever the negative effects are because of this, they are unfathomably countered by the strength of the characterisation we get as a result. The story is enriched by these scenes, in my opinion far more than any small break in immersion. Indeed, the interesting character dynamics can only increase immersion as much as they bend it.
It seems you just want more of the characters from Kotor, (mostly) a series of bland straight-forward assholes following you around like docile sheep. The characters in Kotor II are much more than that. You've complained that Kreia and G0-T0 do things off-screen. How can you not see how much better it is to have party members with their own machinations and goals? How much more interesting this makes them? In Bioware games, every character tells you their life story a moments notice. Obsidians characters are much more human than that. They try to hide things from you, they have fights with each other, they have their own personalities separate from just their interactions with the Exile. It makes them so much more than just characters. They are characters with character.
As I've said though, this is all personal taste. Some people do just want a group of merry friends adventuring around the galaxy. Others don't. Heres a comment from 2 days ago, the exact same day as when Blax was complaining about the characters not liking each other:
Originally posted by 2dop2fy
That was one of the things that made KOTOR 2 great: you're palling around with a bunch of people who hate each other, and some of them even hate you, and not only is it referred to in the story, it's an actual part of the story and foreshadowing for the big revelation at the end.
There are parts of Kotor II that do merit criticism. Paragus and Telos are too long and unconnected to the rest of the game and make the beginning a chore to get through on repeat play-throughs. Entire planets were taken out for time. The Disciple is a bland lump of kangaroo dick. Blah blah etc. It's just that too much of this is personal preference.
Originally posted by Lord Lucien
It also doesn't help that a lot of it involves Kreia, the most annoying person in either game. When she's supposed to be the Big Bad, and you get to hear her machinating and scheming behind your (character's) back, but you the player can't do anything about it (and shouldn't, unless you want to break the fourth wall and tell immersion to "go f*ck itself"😉, it really depreciates the value of her deception and "betrayal"---cuz we already knew it was coming. Imagine Bastila and Vrook discussing in secret that Revan didn't actually die--not flat out giving away the reveal, but something to that effect. The audience (the true receptacle of information) can't respond to that, but our character is still expected to be shocked by it. Kinda ruins the effect.
Again, this simply comes down to personal taste. As I've said Kreia isn't supposed to be this big mystery villain. Where it gets interesting is her character. Haven't you ever wanted to have a conversation with the Big Bad and really explore why he or she is the way he or she is? Thats were the interest comes from. Kreia is one of the most characterized villains I've seen and she's an incredibly strong one because of it.
Besides which it also is very clever of them to do this from a narrative perspective. They're never going to be able to top the reveal from Kotor. That one was just done too well and now audiences will be expecting it. The point of doing this is so that there is no big reveal, as Kreia lampshades at the end of the game. Instead all the cards are layed out throughout the game and as I've talked about above, it works.
Originally posted by Lord Lucien
This was a huge problem in the game for me. The unlikable characters, poorly paced story, lifeless personal journey, annoying dialogue and voice acting, technical failings (I've b*tched before about the bottomless pit of items available) and the retrospective fellatio of the One Called Revan---I could have put aside and still be immersed in the world they designed (expect for maybe the items--GOD that aspect pissed me off). But that method of expository reveal sealed it for me; the game is not fun, and never redeems itself. Rookwood can go on about why there are problems, but that doesn't excuse that there are problems.
There are problems. Just not the ones you've mentioned imo.
Originally posted by Tzeentch._
Any of you guys seen Valerian's bishi picture in his profile? lol wuuuut
You had to wait years to say it? It really took you so long to view my profile? I'm very sad now.
Originally posted by Lord Lucien
I don't know what bishi is, but that picture of of a sculpted torso has been in there for years. I wonder what he looks like now... hint hint.
Pffft, it's even better now.
Yeah, not really. Not anymore. 🙁
I am so sorry for... this.
Originally posted by NephthysShe already is a weak character, in her delivery, if not her depth. But yeah, it would make her even weaker. That this is all that stands in the way of that is pretty unfulfilling.
Don't you think these count as being similar to the cutscenes with Malak? These scenes exist to show you how manipulative Kreia is, or to establish Nihilus to you. In the case of the latter its so that the player knows who Visas is talking about when she babbles about him to you and why she tried to kill you. In the case of the former, like you've pointed out, Kreia being evil is never a mystery. Her character is enthralling because of her personalty, and a good chunk of her dialogue exists so the player can learn about her and her motivations. The real mystery is whether she's actively working against or for you (its both) and why she is doing what she is doing. Were these scenes not to exist, she would be a far weaker character for it.
Originally posted by NephthysThen we ask ourselves "Should she have been taken over?" I don't know about you but I can just meet HK or Jolee right before I use them to escape the Leviathon. I don't need characters to have character merely to use them for a combat-only scenario. That said, I think the Mira/Hanarr sub-plot was terribly underwritten and underdeveloped. Again with the likeability factor--neither of them are likeable, so sacrificing time and cutscenes in order to give them a fraction of "meh" storyline that went nowhere and meant nothing, is a waste.
Mira briefly takes over as the playable character on Nar Shadaa. It's important to establish what he deal is before this or the player would be utterly befuddled (great word).
Originally posted by NephthysI've been trying to stress how important I feel the correlation of character knowledge and player knowledge is. The majority of the game is dialogue and character-building, and deciding just what's going to happen in those regards. So when my character can't react or respond to something important that the game has gone out of its way to tell me about, I get pissed off. This wouldn't be so bad if the structure of the game didn't revolve around this one character whom I build and control and decide what they say and do and how they do it. So when I know something but can't respond because my character doesn't know it, the immersion's broken, and I get frustrated. And if the excuse is that these things need to happen for the sake of the plot, then... that's a problem best saved for the Prequels.
And how exactly do these things detract from the story, rather than enhance it by fleshing out the characterization of these tertiary characters? Chodo makes some obscure comments that aren't even important and who even cares? Atris is one of the villains of the game, it is important to establish her and her relationship with the Exile. This is done in dialogue as well, you are given the chance to talk about Atris with other characters. What that cutscene does is simply give a glimpse at her as well It's never a bad thing to have both sides in a conflict. G0-T0 sending bounty hunters against you is important to Nar Shadaa's story and serves to establish 2 (3 actually) potential crew members as well as the bounty hunters who are attacking you. Seriously, wtf is wrong with this scene? And yes, G0-T0's shenangans do come into play at the end. To not have these scenes in would only make it incredibly jarring when this happens.
Originally posted by NephthysIf they're talking about you, and planning to kill you, and pining over you, and reminiscing about you, and protecting you, and wondering about you, and you are told from the start of the game how important and awesome and worthwhile and valuable and pre-destined for Saviorship you are, and how everything that's happening now is all because of you and is going to be resolved by you, then yeah... it has everything to do with the freaking plot.
No it isn't. Very little of what you've said actually has anything to do with the main story.
So much is said about you, and revealed about the people closest to you, and decided what ought to be happening with you, that when you aren't there to hear it, it starts to matter to the player. I'm role playing as this character, so being privy to special information that matters to this character, while the character isn't, defeats the purpose for me. It's right about when those ex-Exile scenes start piling on that the weight of the game's faults break me and I give up.
Originally posted by NephthysFair enough, if that's your criteria.
You're arguing that the player knowing these things when the Exile does not detracts from the story and breaks your immersion. And... maybe? It didn't for me but I can see how that can be a valid criticism. However, whatever the negative effects are because of this, they are unfathomably countered by the strength of the characterisation we get as a result. The story is enriched by these scenes, in my opinion far more than any small break in immersion. Indeed, the interesting character dynamics can only increase immersion as much as they bend it.
On those characters' characterizations though... I can't agree. The KotOR II characters come off to me as the most pretentious, wannabe mysterious, faux-deep annoying roster of secondaries outside of the Matrix sequels that I can think of. I make an exception for HK and Mical. At least he feels like an OK guy who just cares a little too much, but even still, he's boring. Everyone else is all edgy, and dark, with a tragic past, and by God do they want you know it. Even Canderous became lame, I don't know how they pulled that one off.
Originally posted by NephthysThey don't feel real. I know I know, it's Star Wars with aliens, but that's a cop-out excuse that's built on imaginary sand.
It seems you just want more of the characters from Kotor, (mostly) a series of bland straight-forward assholes following you around like docile sheep. The characters in Kotor II are much more than that. You've complained that Kreia and G0-T0 do things off-screen. How can you not see how much [b]better it is to have party members with their own machinations and goals? How much more interesting this makes them? In Bioware games, every character tells you their life story a moments notice. Obsidians characters are much more human than that. They try to hide things from you, they have fights with each other, they have their own personalities separate from just their interactions with the Exile. It makes them so much more than just characters. They are characters with character.As I've said though, this is all personal taste. Some people do just want a group of merry friends adventuring around the galaxy. Others don't. Heres a comment from 2 days ago, the exact same day as when Blax was complaining about the characters not liking each other:
Again, this simply comes down to personal taste. As I've said Kreia isn't supposed to be this big mystery villain. Where it gets interesting is her character. Haven't you ever wanted to have a conversation with the Big Bad and really explore why he or she is the way he or she is? Thats were the interest comes from. Kreia is one of the most characterized villains I've seen and she's an incredibly strong one because of it.[/B]
The characters don't feel real. They feel like characters. I think sometime we (no specification there, just "we"😉 get hung up on the concept of "depth". Like that alone make a character good. Anakin Skywalker had as much "depth" as some of these guys, but the dialogue that conveys it, and the voices that speak it are fracking annoying. Yes Kreia has depth, but so what? That depth doesn't make her likable (in the broadest sense of the word, not just as a synonym for "nice"😉. She's otherwise one-note. Mysterious, mean, dark. That 'dark' thing was omnipresent; like they were trying to go the RotS route. Before RotS. "Dark" aside, what were the characters' actual characters like?
Atton: mysterious, sarcastic, prick.
Mira: myserious, edgy.
Visas: mysterious... nothing else.
Mical: calm.
Brianna: shy? I can't remember, she was forgettable.
Mandalore: mysterious, tough, manly, violent (go KotOR I for establishing this character!)
HK: (ditto)
G0-t0: mysterious, prick.
I'm not trying to be flippant or unfair here, I've just sat for 1/4 hour trying to think of these guys' personality traits. I'm actually worried I forgot someone.
The first game's emotional roster ranged from sarcastic to bitter, angry to humorous, hateful to remorseful, determined to resigned. And I'm just talking about Carth. The second game plays the few notes of "dark" and "mysterious" to death, and it gets old, fast.
Originally posted by NephthysTo an extent...
Besides which it also is very clever of them to do this from a narrative perspective. They're never going to be able to top the reveal from Kotor. That one was just done too well and now audiences will be expecting it. The point of doing this is so that there is no big reveal, as Kreia lampshades at the end of the game. Instead all the cards are layed out throughout the game and as I've talked about above, it works.
I was hoping for a reveal not because I think it ought to have one, but because I wanted my character to actually have a proper motivation for everything they go through. Yeah I know, they mention "revenge" or "healing" or "answers", but its not really focused on and explored. Every time I saw it as an option in the dialogue I was like "Oh yeah, that's right, that is a plot thread. I almost forgot." That's what worked about the first game. It didn't try to weigh the world down with messages and deep meanings. It was a straight-forward story with a clear, desirable goal that the main character(s) were invested and interested in. We (and they) all knew what the prize was, how they had to obtain it, and what was at stake if they failed. People call it simple? Sure. But it worked beautifully. Flowed smoothly. Resolved satisfactorily. The sequel felt like a bumpy, lost, clusterbomb of aimless plot threads and ideas shoved in for the sake of an unchanging tone of "dark depth."
All the secondary stories in the first game that happened on each planet--Kashyyyk's slavery, Manaan's neutrality, Korriban's academy--they all felt incidental to the plot. They actually felt like the side missions they really were. They provided obstacles along the way to the final showdown and were interesting and varied enough in their own rights, but didn't detract from the end goal or slow the pace of the game. But game 2's? They had to up the ante for every planet's side-quest by a factor of 10:
-Taris' Sith blockade and bombardment? Paragus Tommyknockers-esque emptiness mystery and Sith hunt with exploding asteroid field/planet.
-Dantooine Jedi training? Quest-riddled Citadel station, romp through mercenary/beast-infested Telos plains and crash-landing on to massive plateau of secret Jedi snow temple.
-Tatooine's cave search? Korriban's journey in to Force-induced hypnosis in a Sith Tomb that imparts a confused moral.
-Kashyyyk's Wookiee slave trade? Dantooine's establishment of a stable government and the defense of the capital establishment from (Sith-backed? I don't remember) mercenaries.
-Manaan's Kolto trade and neutrality violation? Nar Shadaa's bounty hunter war and the infiltration and explosive ending of a crime lord's space yacht.
-Leviathon escape and plot twist with first big boss fight? Ravager sabotage, twin twi'lek ambush, undead Sith Lord's praise splashed all over our face by Tobin, and said undead Sith Lord promptly dropping dead in the biggest anti-climax since Onderon. Speaking of...
-Korriban's... detour through Sithville? Rampage through Dxun's gargantuan Sith temple with Mandalorian allies followed later by a coup d'etat/defence of a planetary government via storming the royal palace and slaughtering everything.
The side quests came off as more important and more interesting (to every single character except Kreia) than the actual plot of Force death, Sith resurgence, and Life-eating undead demon spawn. Occasionally the game would remind us that that was a thing too, as well as the other plot about reconnecting with the Force and severing fatal bonds. But really, those were kind of brushed pass as a cursory reminder, rather than the driving heart of the game. I know it was supposed to be, but it didn't come off that way until the final act, when it was far to late to suddenly start giving a shit.
It felt like the game was trying to juggle multiple character arcs, a philosophically-driven theme, a mystery storyline, a complex narrative, and a sequel/expansion on a pre-established franchise's world. By trying not to top the original with no "reveal" they instead tried to top everything else, and wound up falling short. It's a cluttered, rushed, pretentious mess that... while typing this sentence just now I realize is also something much worse: it's passionless. I just now realized why I am so perpetually unenthused about this game--it's not enthusiastic about itself. The characters are boring and uninteresting and unreal. The general tone and atmosphere is dark and stifling. The main character(s) don't seem all too invested and inspired, like they're phoning it in somehow, just reacting to the shit that happens around them. No real driving motivation (other than "You're a leader and I'm enthralled"😉, just going through motions because "Hey, we're supposed to do this now, right?"
Originally posted by NephthysG0-T0 is a playable character and someone the Exile trusted enough to let hang around the ship unsupervised. A character who would pull that stunt he pulled at the end of the game for no good reason other than to have more drama.
Also having a scene of G0-T0 sending bounty hunters is no worse than having a scene of Malak sending Calo Nord against you. It is worse than the scene of Malak sending Bandon against you, but only because its Darth ****ing Bandon, the best character in either game.
Calo Nord was a guy who KO'd you if he counted to three and who wore really good armor. In fact, he provided exposition to Malak, off camera. And Bandon died.
No, it's much worse.
I played through KotOR 2 a bunch of times, easily 7 or 8 for each alignment. It turns out that a lot of "cut content" just means "obscure influence requirements." (There was some real cut content, like rooms you can't reach without warping.)
Obviously I liked it. I think what makes the game fun for me was the self-aware way that the interface of the game ends up being such a large part of it. When roleplaying, you are actually writing backstory. But like Lucien has pointed out, the major hooks for roleplaying aren't done in view of the player. At one point G0-T0 destroys the remote, and then I immediately rushed to go try to fix it. But there is nothing there; it is floating around Bao Dur like nothing happened.
That part pissed me off like no other.
The_Tempest
Anyone else catch today's TCW episode? It suffered from some of the prequel weaknesses (poor pacing & clumsy dialogue), but definitely a highpoint for the show.
Valerian omg hi
Neph don't be difficult.
Zamp don't get me stressed out about 30k.
Oh lord. 😆
