#I love taking any opportunity to make the jedi little weirdos

[flyndragon]

I love the idea of jedi babies with psychometry just.... latching onto random things that have good memories attached and carrying it around like a teddy bear. Like baby Quin found a spatula with a memory of a kid and their parent lovingly making cookies in it and he slept with a dollar store spatula for the next 3 years. Cal found some silverware that a happy group of friends used for all of their special occasions, so his pockets end up full of comfort spoons. and forks. and butter knives.

[richsretroreviews]

Star Wars Knights of The Old Repbulic II Review

Release Date: NA; 6th December 2004 (Xbox) 8th February  2005 (PC) EU; 11th February 2005 (Xbox & PC)

Developer: Obsidian Entertainment

Publisher: LucasArts

I had gotten my Xbox Christmas of 2004. It was the crystal one too and I had been wanting one all year. I kinda spoilt the surprise for myself though because in a poorly chosen hiding spot by my parents I found the crystal box poking out of a bag. It was torture to occasionally look at it and do nothing with it but gawk and wait until Christmas and almost feign a reaction to it. Sorry mum and dad…

But Knights of the Old Republic II was the third game I got myself? I think? First two I can remember were Ninja Gaiden and Soul Calibur 2… let’s just say Kotor 2 was the third game I got for myself.

So I went down to Game, saw the cover with that haunting image of Darth Nihilus on the front, nabbed it, got home, played it for the weekend and got bored of it… Shamefully. There were parts that I liked but it played so differently to other action games I was already accustomed to at the time it threw me off. Little did I know how much of an RPG it was and the action was so different to what I was used to.

The initial problem I had with this game was it didn’t meet my expectations of what I wanted out of a Star Wars game, especially one where I knew you could create your own character and make them Sith or Jedi. Perfectly what I wanted. But after playing it for 12 hours and still on Telos and still without a lightsaber, I lost patience with it and gave up. How foolish my 13 year old self was. I then traded it in and got something else instead. If I remember right they even had Kotor there as well…

But so ignorantly did I miss out on one of the greatest games and greatest Star Wars games of my budding teenage years that it wasn’t until 5 years later I gave it another try and since then it might be one of my most played games without even realising it.

I got it again on the Xbox, played through it with a video walkthrough and I completed it. Although this first run through felt a little disconnected because I was almost playing it alongside the video and didn’t fully experience it all myself with my own choices and completely understanding what choices I was making. But the fact was I completed it regardless, I got my damn lightsaber—lightsabers even! Goddamn plural!—and loved the characters and every moment of it. The story was completely different to any other Star Wars story I was accustomed to which delved into themes I didn’t fully understand yet, but I loved it all the same.

I loved the planets, the characters, the combat I grew to love, the music, the voice acting, the twists, the scope it all conveyed and perspective it gave on the force and the Sith and what it is to be Jedi. All of it influenced me even and inspired my own Star Wars stories I want to write.

Since then I have played and completed it 3 more times. Once more on the Xbox, a save on the 360 I completed and a Sith run I started, and recently on PC. I’ve only ever completed it as a Jedi and the Sith run I still haven’t completed after… 6 years now I think? Maybe? Probably longer than that. But the best thing about all the times I’ve completed it is that as much as I have tried to stay close to what I will always do in the games I have always gotten a different outcome in the end. I’ve had an ending where no one survived, where some survived, and where everyone survived, and another where all survived but Atton died. And I know next time I play through it again I’m going to get another ending completely different. That’s the best thing about this I think, that each ending isn’t guaranteed to be the same even if you play close to the same as before.

So, how this game plays. It’s space D&D. The game uses a d20 system so it was akin to playing Star Wars D&D.  You can even see these roll stats in the game in the journal, message log and combat filter. Kotor also used this system. And you know what? The system works. Not only for its combat mechanics but for its character creation. You can have more freedom to play about how you want to build your character and class as you level up.

Want to be a Jedi Knight? Consular? Sentinel? Just be a Scoundrel or Scout and be allergic to lightsabers? (Weirdo, how would you not want a lightsaber?) A Techie? Sith Lord? Jedi Master? Sith Assassin? All these classes and builds gives such freedom and variety it begs for multiple playthroughs with its open ended opportunities for how you want to make this story go and develop your character. You can go on with a single lightsaber or sling dual lightsabers, optionally with a short lightsaber in your off hand (it works better that way), or go all Maul and swing about a double edged lightsaber, mow down rebel and Mandalorian scum with a mini minigun. You can rely solely on force powers and go all Palpy or completely ignore using the force and stick to your guns. (Seriously, why not use the force or lightsabers? Goddamn weirdo you are.)

You get a multitude of gear to equip that can help out your stats further, naturally. And you can modify your own lightsaber! When you’re on Dantooine, the home of the Jedi Academy that has long since been abandoned, you can delve into the Jedi caves that house the crystals that all blossoming Jedi in training go to when it comes time to build your own lightsaber. And in this crystal cavern you can find your own special character specific crystal. Of course you can find other crystals in this cave to help power up your lightsaber and other colours (I’ve always gone dual orange and yellow), but this crystal holds a special connection for your character both narratively and gameplay wise. As a gameplay mechanic; when you level up or change alignment from light to dark, or just get lighter and become Keanu Reeves or more darker and go goth, you can take the crystal out of your lightsaber, take it to Kreia and she will enhance it to better reflect your character’s growth. So if you’re majoratively light you can gain more damage to dark side, or if you’re dark you gain more damage to light, more attack power, more damage etc.

As a narrative device, it works for the Exile’s lost connection from the force.

Which, now I think it’s time to get to the main appeal of this game.

Knights of the Old Republic II is possibly the best Star Wars story ever told next to Knights of the Old Republic and the films themselves.

You play as The Exile, a Jedi exiled by the Jedi council because you chose to defy them and go to war with Revan and Malak against the Mandalorians before they slaughtered everyone. The bastards. Who’s the bastards? The Jedi council or the Mandalorians? Maybe both? You be the judge.

Seriously, you get to decide who the bastards are. Disagree with the council? Agree with them? Resentfully chose to fight the Mandalorians? Or gleefully sided with them and fell to the dark side because everyone are bastards and you wanna watch the galaxy burn?

Hell, maybe you’re the bastard…

Anyway!

That’s all you’re given. You get to weave your own story throughout this. If you’ve played the first Kotor then you know the deal with Revan and Malak. If you’ve read the Revan book as well then you will know too that this Exile is canonically Meetra Surik. You can make and choose whoever you want easily. Want to be Revan again even? Go for it. But she’s the main character of this story and it finishes on the light side.

As Meetra, you wake up on a Peragus mining facility in your undies with amnesia. You run into a cranky old woman called Kreia and an imprisoned dodgy scoundrel named Atton. You eventually come across this game’s resident R2, T3-M4, returning from Kotor. You escape the doomed planet with the repaired Ebon Hawk-- also back from Kotor-- as the Sith arrive, who is led by the walking zombie Darth Sion. You arrive on Telos, get your barings, either help some environmental Ithorians or corporate Czerka, solve a few security cases before you’re off and on your way to the big wide galaxy ahead and the story opens up.

Now, you’re being chased by Darth Sion because he and Darth Nihilus believe you to be the last of the Jedi (ha.) But you are not! Your task is to find the remaining hidden Jedi masters and, depending on your alignment, gather them together at the ruins of the Jedi Academy on Dantooine or kill them.

Along the way you’re going to meet new party members and Kreia will train you in the ways of the force.

Then, you get four planets to choose from to find these masters; Dantooine, Onderon, Korriban, and Nar Shadaa. And you can go to any of these planets in any order you like. Though, my order has always been Dantooine, Nar Shadaa, Onderon, Korriban.

I’m not going to go through each planet and explain what happens and spell it all out, but you find more party members to help you along the way, find the masters and then shit unfolds in a greatly unexpected way…

Mandalore, another returning character from Kotor, at one point on the Onderon moon of Dxun has a confrontation with Kreia and tells a fellow Mandalorian “Forget the Jedi. Keep an eye on her…” Which, seriously. Keep a very close eye on Kreia, pay attention to what she says, what she does and how she can influence others. She’s the most curious of all your party members…

Which, speaking of, as Kreia teaches your character and you grow and you attract more followers, you eventually get the chance to train your party members into becoming Sith or Jedi. Those who are force sensitive are the Handmaiden, Mira, Bao-Dur, Atton and the Disciple. Although, the Handmaiden is a character who you can only recruit when you play as the male. Taking Handmaiden’s place when you play female is the Disciple, someone you meet in the Jedi ruins on Dantooine.

And then comes the romance options! Because what RPG game wouldn’t have one. As the male character you get Mira, Visas and Handmaiden, and as the female you get Atton and the Disciple.

I’ve always gone the way of the male and choosing the Handmaiden. Helps she’s voice by Grey Delisle…

Anyway.

Time to get into the story more.

So, you’re trying to find these Jedi masters while running halfway across the galaxy from a zombie Sith and a gluttonous Sith.

Sion is a man who should long ago have since died, but is using the force to keep himself held together. His body is decayed and falling apart, he’s got one working eye, his voice is dried and husky. That is a man whose sheer force of rage and anger and willpower to control the force as such to keep himself together and alive is incredible. I’ve never seen something like that nor someone use the force so creatively.

And then there’s Nihilus. A man no longer who feeds on the force. A wound in the force who feeds on all life throughout the galaxy. He sees not the form of flesh and sinew in front of him, but the living force around him and all is his for the taking, to consume and draw on until there is nothing left. He is a vampiric, poisonous leech the likes of which no Sith has ever matched before. Again, something I have never seen before in how a character, or even how the game’s developers, has ever used the force, to bend it to his will and develop the force more into something greater and more mysterious and powerful than the films have ever elaborated on.

And that leads me into my next point; the force and Kreia. Which, spoilers for the twist and ending. (I know I said earlier I won’t spoil but this needs talking about! At least I’m leaving some mystery.)

Kreia is a Sith… Or is she?

Well, she is truly Darth Treya. If Sion is the Sith of pain, and Nihilus is the Sith of hunger and annihilation, then Treya is the Sith of betrayal. And therein lies the twist.

Kreia is seemingly a Jedi at first, perhaps even a grey Jedi the more you talk to her. I mean, her alignment on the character screen is permanently neutral, no matter which side you sway to the heaviest or how much you influence her. Until eventually you come to learn she was once Darth Treya, a powerful Sith Lord who once had the galaxy firmly in her grasp accompanied by her pupils Sion and Nihilus. Until those two overthrew her and imposed her into her own exile. Now, where else have we heard of that…?

So naturally, with Kreia wise to the force and of the Exile’s being, she works to control Surik and do her bidding no matter which side she may fall on. She manipulates all that occurs right up until the game’s final stage; Malachor V, the final battleground and graveyard of the Mandalorian wars, where so many Jedi died and where Meetra Surik became a wound in the force herself.

Once you have defeated Nihilus and convinced Sion to finally die and let go of the force, you face Kreia. Or, Treya, rather. And it is here you learn more about the force, its sides, its control, Treya’s motivations and the why of everything.

Treya, hates the force. The reason why she does what she does is because she hates it. She wishes to see it dead and destroyed because of the hold it has on all those in life. And, as much as she betrayed Meetra Surik, she holds a special kind of love for her. She doesn’t wish her dead or any kind of harm or anything like that to have happen to her. But for her to understand more on the force.

This is where the best part of this whole game and story culminates, the reflection on the force and what the force is.

The force is a powerhouse. The force is a living beast. A galactic behemoth that is almost a deity or living entity that is all that lives. It is not these midichlorians, this kind of blood bacteria. It is not this mysterious magic. The force is an all-consuming, all controlling, all illuminating and suffocating creature that presides in everyone and everything. It controls the motion and flow of everything. It is reactive to emotion and try as they all might, the Sith and the Jedi may never really fully understand what the force is other than be a slave to it or try to control it to their will.

There was once this one interesting theory I read about what the force is and related it to a swimming pool. The Jedi only swim in the shallow to middle part of the pool. They can see how far the pool stretches and understand its breadth but dare not delve deeper into it else they get lost or drown within it, and so stay safe and respect the shallow part of the pool. While the Sith dive deep into the pool and swim far and wide into the deepest parts and soon find that it is really an ocean and discover all these other monstrous beings deep below. And that makes total sense honestly.

I love more the concept of the force being this uncontrollable being, this literal special force that is everything and there are a special number who are sensitive to it and can control and use it. And not just for magic tricks like lifting things and confusing chumps, but to use the force to manipulate, influence and shape things as sizeable as an entire galaxy. To control something on that scope with that kind of a power is intangible yet fascinating.

And so, regarding that, Treya hates that people in the galaxy might not have full control over themselves and she wishes to see the force die. And that is an immense ambition. How could you kill the force? Could you? Darth Nihilus fed on it and wiped out star systems, Meetra Surik was a wound and brought death and suffering to those around her and amassed a loyal following that fought when she fought (a very, very clever piece of writing to implement a simple game mechanic such as levelling up into the story as for each enemy you defeat or kill the stronger you become), and Sion relied on the force to live until he gave it up. There are those who rely on it who perhaps shouldn’t be around and those who are a poison with the force.

And, perhaps, even all of Treya’s ambitions aren’t really her conscious choices either? Maybe in that, the force controlled her choices because that is what the force wills and dictates…

Maybe the force wills to die too but learned it cannot…

Who knows!

It’s this writing and Sara Kestelman’s acting as the conflicted Sith Kreia which helped this game win awards and cement Kreia as one of the most recognisable and compelling video game characters ever.

And that’s another one of this game’s strengths; the voice acting. Everyone does stupendously and there’s not a wrong word put out or spoken.

Either way, Knights of the Old Republic 2 is an incredible Star Wars game and an incredible Star Wars story that is critical and self-reflective on itself, superbly creative, immersive, poignant, and did more to develop the Star Wars lore than it is recognised for.

Do yourself a favour and play it and play it again.

If you’re playing it on PC, get the Restored Content mod that fixed everything Obsidian didn’t have time to fix and which includes all cut content. Go fulfil your Sith or Jedi dreams and get lost.

I have spoken.

Where to Purchase:

7/02/10

Steam: £7.19, $9.99

Amazon: £2.33 - £15, $17 - $70

Ebay: £1.25- £59, $7.67 - $325

GoG: £7.69, $9.99