I played this game back when it appeared on a demo disc in a magazine. I remember being super interested in the demo that plays to a certain point in the story, and thinking it would be a really amazing experience. So I bought the full game, and unfortunately it left me a little disappointed. The game's main mode is a freeform adventure through a massive cyberpunk city - the districts have interesting designs and feel alive at first glance. People walk around, cars drive by, there are grocery stores and pharmacies and restaurants and bars. However outside of the main storyline, there really is not much to do in these areas save for a couple minigames and the soul transfer mechanic. There are however some nice Bowie concerts to see! That soul transfer I found to be a really nice concept, and the only down side I feel with it is that the different hosts you can inhabit don't seem to be particularly well fleshed out save for some of them have an apartment or a unique item in their inventory. So that leaves the main story. It starts out as a bit of a mystery, and develops along with a really nice mix of quest types that tie you into the game world a bit. It is a bit more linear than one might expect from a game like this, but it is nice - I found the last bit to be a bit off, personally. The combat is divided into hand-to-hand combat, similar to a simplified arcade fighting game and a 1st person shooter. While I found the hand-to-hand fun, I hated the shooter portions because of the bad clipping and hit detection, as well as some enemies spawning from corners you cleared already, for example. To summarise, the game offers an unfinished feeling experience, but one that is worth it in the long run if you enjoy a more unconventional game. The atmosphere really is pretty cool, and the soul mechanic is interesting as well. Where this game falls down are merely places where the studio got a bit over-ambitious, but I think the experience is well worth the drawbacks.
The story of this game is that it was rushed for release, and as a result lacked quite a bit of needed work. There is a ton of cut content, including another planet to visit, the resolution of a number of storylines that are left somewhat sloppily wrapped up, and a bunch of other stuff like that. Luckily, there's a mod out there that restores to the best of the mod team's ability a lot of this stuff using the very content contained within the game files that was never used, making the game much more sensible. Restored are things like dialogue, cutscenes, areas, and much more. But now onto the good. The story is a weird twist on the original KOTOR - lots of returning characters, nods to the previous game, but it definitely has its own atmosphere, which is a lot darker and haunting than the first. The bitter, thought-provoking dialogue of the old woman you will meet along with the subtleties of how all the different problems you need to solve play out are all designed for a different experience than the first game. The gameplay is almost identical to KOTOR1, but with enhancements like some new abilities, which give you much better choice of what to do. Your companions too now have better customization, and almost all have some unique items, abilities, and some can even be made into something different than what they start with (if you play your cards right). They can also learn to hate you, as the game adds the game's "like-meter" mechanic: influence. But maybe that's not a bad thing sometimes... Overall, get this game if you liked KOTOR1. But just be warned, this one will come will need some more work, from either piecing together what is going on at times or having to apply a mod or two to give the game what it is missing. But I recommend it personally.
