So, I'm playing this game for the first time; pretty good story, decent graphics and combat system. There are a couple of technical glitches (such as cut scenes dumping me out to the desktop) and the speeder race minigame (which I'm hoping is a one-off,) but nothing I can't play through. Everything's progressing fairly smoothly, and I've completed all of the quests that are available on Taris. I get in my shiny new spaceship, take off through the atmosphere...

and I run face first into a brick wall.

Does anyone know how to disable or bypass or cheat through the stupid Turret Battle minigame? I've tried five times and I'm done; this isn't fun, it's just frustrating. If I'd wanted a first person shooter I'd have bought one, but I didn't. I bought a role playing game that has suddenly switched genres on me and won't let me progress any further until I get through this crap.

I absolutely HATE shooters, especially first person shooters. I'm no good at them and have no interest in getting better. That's why I don't buy them, but every once in a while I run into this bait and switch crap.

Usually I can grind and level up far enough to just muscle through it (which isn't an option in this game) or find a cheat that lets me bypass the content by making me invulnerable to damage or turn off any timers, but I can't seem to find anything like that here. The console command for invulnerability doesn't work on the ship, so within 45 or 60 seconds I'm dead and reloading. Then I have to sit through the cut scenes (which minimize the game) to get back to the "action" and a minute later I'm repeating it all over again. To make matters worse, when I enter the combat sequence the game slows the responsivness of my trackball so far that I can't control the aiming with any kind of precision. All in all this is a shit minigame.

So again, is there any way to bypass this crap? Otherwise it gets uninstalled and I'll have just wasted $8 on game I can't complete.

I don't know of a way to bypass the ship defense game, though I do know a trick to make it a little easier (see below). To warn you, this game pops up randomly when you jump from system to system - maybe one time in four, or so. I don't know if this will depress you that the minigame will come back or if it will encourage you because it doesn't happen every time.

Also a bit of advice on how to be better at it: take a look at the mini-map. Especially when you get it down to one or two enemies left, it can show you which way they are coming, when they are behind you, so you can get ready to shoot them as soon as they move to your front.
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Make sure that the fire-button is held down as the game starts. The badguys are clustered right in front of the gun at that time and you will kill probably 2 to get a good start.

Also get used to the Swoop bike races; you need to win a few of them on Tatooine.
I think you do. I forget if those are crucial to the plot thought I know they make up a lot of the planet activities.

Good news it they are much less prevalent in KOTOR 2 which is just as well because for me they were way harder in KOTOR 2.

I just noticed you said trackball? What are you playing on?

You might want to try changing the control to the arrow keys and try it like that.

The only swoop racing you have to do is on Taris. You can skip it elsewhere, if you want to.

Thanks, been a year or two. :D
And I remember the 1st time I tried the fighter thing with a mouse and I got killed over and over and over. It's for sure much easier with the arrow keys, and to repeat what you said, WATCH YOUR RADAR! :D

Nope, I'm done with this. I was dead serious when I said I hated this kind of stuff, and if it keeps coming back it'll just make me dread advancing through the story instead of anticipating it. Too bad, it turns what was a three-and-a-half to four star game to a ZERO.

As for your tip, it's a no-go here. As soon as the cut scene where Bastila tells me to go to the turret ends the game minimizes and dumps me to the desktop; by the time I get it back up the fighters are spread all around me. They swoop and zip around me so fast that I can't get a bead on them, especially with the way the controls slow down.

You also asked about my system. I'm playing on my HTPC on my widescreen in the living room, but it wouldn't make much difference even on my main system - all I use on any of my computers is a thumb-operated trackball. I've never had a problem with any of the games I've played... until this one

It's a shame I can't get through this, as KOTOR is one of the few games I can play on this system; almost everything else has fonts that are too tiny to be read from across the room. And, as I said, I was enjoying the game until it decided to change genres in mid-stream.

Thanks for the quick response - I appreciate the information (even though it wasn't what I wanted to hear.)

You're forgoing 30 + hours because of a grand total of 4 to 5 minutes of shooter and you aren't even willing to try using the arrow keys to see how if feels.

That's fucked up. XD

Yup, it sure is. Fucked up that they threw this FPS crap into the RPG that I bought with no warning before hand - if I had known that this unskippable sequence was in the game before I bought it I wouldn't have wasted 8 bucks on it.

I'm not going to get into an argument with you about my taste in games; if you like this stuff, more power to you. I DON'T like it. If this were a one-off I MIGHT spend an hour trying to get past it, but Alcaray says it's repeated throughout the game, so I'm not going to bother.

Have a good day...

I don't have a problem with your taste, but the very 1st screen shot on the game page is of a turret battle so you can save the "no warning" bullshit.

Just exactly how am I'm supposed to know that this is from a shooter minigame? Now that I've played to this point I know what it is, and I know what the FMVs look like, but before I bought the game that picture could just as well have been a screenshot from one of the cut scenes.

The game genres are listed on the product page as Role-playing, Adventure and Sci-fi. This is the description from that same page:

Included FREE goodies: manual

About: Choose Your Path!

Four thousand years before the rise of the Galactic Empire, the Republic verges on collapse. Darth Malak , last surviving apprentice of the Dark Lord Revan, has unleashed an invincible Sith armada upon an unsuspecting galaxy.

Crushing all resistance, Malak’s war of conquest has left the Jedi Order scattered and vulnerable as countless Knights fall in battle, and many more swear allegiance to the new Sith Master. In the skies above the Outer Rim world of Taris, a Jedi battle fleet engages the forces of Darth Malak in a desperate effort to halt the Sith's galactic domination.

Hundreds of Jedi Knights have already fallen in battle against the ruthless Sith. You are the last hope of the Jedi Order. Can you master the awesome power of the Force™ on your quest to save the Republic? Or will you fall to the lure of the dark side? Hero or villain, savior or conqueror... you alone will determine the destiny of the entire galaxy!

Learn to use the Force with over 40 different powers and build your own lightsaber.
Adventure through some of the most popular STAR WARS™ locations, including Tatooine and the Wookiee homeworld Kashyyyk.
Travel to eight enormous worlds in your own starship, the Ebon Hawk.
Choose your party from nine customisable characters, including Twi'leks, Droids™ and Wookiees.

That's all GOG has to say about the game. Where in the available information am I to infer that there is an uskippable FPS miigame included?

You can call "bullshit" as much as you want, but as far as I'm concerned there was no indication that this content was in the game.

Mini-games are common in LucasArts games and Sid Meyer games, etc. Now you know, I guess.

I do get the feeling that you either don't have it set up right, or that with the right tweaking you can avoid some of your problems. That resizing thing sounds like a bother that I would not put up with without a fight. You might want to scan the threads and try turning things on and off in the ini file and in your graphics card settings. You might be able to straighten it out.

In any case, I am so sorry you don't like the game (that I love). I wish I could have helped you more.

Isn't there a mod to get rid of this? I'm surprised if there isn't given all the crying about it over the years. The first sequence is forced, but I thought the later ones were random?

Here, this will get rid of the random attacks though you will still have to fight the initial Taris one.
http://webpages.charter.net/ytl/KotOR.html

Wait! You can remap to the arrow keys!??

I bought the disc version of KOTOR when it first came out but it only supported WASD for movement. For some absurd reason I could remap every other control but the movement keys. I ended up never actually playing the game, I may have even given it away. I never touched the series again. Was this fixed and nobody ever told me?

Nah, don't worry about it - not much help to be offered for something that's inherent to the game. But the thing is, I DID like it, until I hit this stone wall. If I could get past it I'd continue on till the end.

I don't know much about the Sid Meier games; the only one I've ever had is Alpha Cetauri, and I've never gotten into it yet, but I've played through all of the Lucas point-and-click adventures. I liked them, especially how it was nearly impossible to die or advance to a dead end. Before I bought this game I checked out a couple game-play videos on YouTube and it seemed fine. The adventuring looked like just an evolution of their point-and-click interface, and I liked the way the combat let you pause and make decisions, kind of like Dragon Age. But I didn't get too far into it because I didn't want to spoil too much of the story.

As for the FMV problems, I'm pretty sure it's down to the odd resolution of my display (1768x992) that I have to run to deal with the overscan on my TV. Not a lot I can do about it. From what I've read the minimization is caused by the program switching resolutions from the FMV back to the game.

Anyway, sorry about the Wall-O-Text. I do appreciate your suggestions. Thanks again.