STAR WARS™: Knights of the Old Republic

KOTOR is an amazing (western) RPG, a game that took RPGs in a different direction when JRPGs were the standard. From start to finish, the game is well paced, with some excellent ideas. To me, if you're looking to only get KOTOR1 or KOTOR2, definitely pick up the first one, as KOTOR2 stumbled a little too much (unfortunately they didn't have time to finish it).

Just finished my first playthrough (Nov. 2017) - so nostalgia couldn't cloud my judgement. Knowing the developer Bioware from the Mass Effect trilogy, I took on the challenge and to tame that beast of an aging game. Never been a retro gamer myself - aside from replaying some Playstation 1/2 classics - but this game spoiled every contemporary AAA release to me. This game features the very best plot twist in video gaming history, and never before have I been immersed into a fictional setting where you can decide every single move you make. No matter your mentality or personal preferences, ethical stances etc., you will get to choose according options in the game and possibly affect relationships to other character or even alter the outcome of (sub-)plots. 50000000000000/10, would give 2857689473568234 stars were it only allowed

I just finished the game first time in my life, and i tell you! It's worth every penny!

KOTOR can be said to be an early modern Bioware style role playing game. Story-wise, there is a two part intro, with the first part providing a tutorial and the second part an intro to the story. Afterwards a consistent hub is opened to the player, where the NPC companions can be engaged in banter. These conversations don't impact the story, but do provide some backstory and worldbuilding. While there are some branching paths for which order to tackle the games stages, or planets, they all eventually converge. The writing can be said to be good enough - rarely jarring, but seldom engaging. There are some nice set-pieces and ideas, I personally was very fond of a quest-line where you set out to defend a man accused of murder. Some companions are also much more interesting than others - HK-47 is deservedly a fan-favorite. Your player class broadly falls into the classic categories of warrior, rogue and wizard. Sadly, none of them are very interesting to play, with each combat encounter consisting of the same procedure of buffing yourself, removing buffs from the enemy and then focus-firing one mob at a time while disabling the rest, or just nuking them all if they're weak enough. It all wears a bit thin a bit too early into the game. This is not helped by a clunky, unoptimized interface which seems to have been designed with console ports in mind. Overall, there are definitely some interesting quests and characters here. But is the overall quality high enough for it to deserve its status among fans? Not really, in my opinion. For every interesting quest and character there are two completely mediocre. Luckily, there aren't many big faults with the game either; the underwater/space walk sections being the only really egregious example. If you're into Star Wars, don't let this review stop you: go in, you'll have a blast. If you're not a fan, I'd recommend a run on the lowest difficulty where you just do the quests that seem interesting - you'll have a good time.

Old school classic with great story that keeps you playing until very end and keeeps you wanting more.