14th August 2004, 9:01 PM
Some of the KOTOR characters lack... character. Namely, the main man... what's his name... the guy who looks like.... um, well I equipped him with goggles the whole time.... Um, the guy who lost his wife and won't open up to you unless you force it out of him. Story for him is great, but wow what a stereotype as far as the appearence. Canderous is similar. At least in FF and other games everyone is so different they are almost another species.
As for the interface, what you describe is totally different from the console controls. I can't even relate. XBox used L and R to select a target and A interacted directly.
As far as your complaints.... Honestly, I can't understand a couple things about PC style inventory. First off, what's with that silly grid where you have to "fit" everything into place? I've SEEN those character sheets, you don't EVER do that in D&D, you just write it down! I get weight and limited inventory. I've dealt with both before in many console RPGs. However, as a general rule, people started hating that VERY quickly. Square soon realized limited inventory just wasn't fun so they let people carry 99 of everything in the game, if they could find it. Honestly, I want a PERFECT file :D, that means gimme gimme! At the very least, they should have some sort of bank system so you can still have everything, just not with you, thus presenting the same limited inventory challenge when taking on dungeons and such.
And another thing, before you say anything about how organizing things on a grid is somehow more realistic, it's not. C'mon, even with these limitations, these guys are carrying around several hundred tons of metal at any one time COMPLETELY out of sight. I know "magical bag of holding", but that's just a silly excuse :D. The only game that EVER actually explained how someone could really HOLD so much stuff, in an acceptable way, EVER, was, well, Pokémon (inventory is transformed into and stored as energy in a "backpack"). Not that it's a problem mind you, I don't mind little things like that being unrealistic. I just don't like when they try making a small PART of something annoying for the sake of realism when the very basis of that component isn't realistic to begin with.
As for the headings that actually say "persuade" and such, what's the complaint exactly? You want to know what you are doing and what stat it's based on, right? Why not just TELL the person that information up front? What's so wrong with that? Neverwinter does that too. I really don't see what's so stupid about it.
As far as combat, your complaints are PC version exclusive I'm afraid... I guess the controls really aren't better in the PC version as I had assumed...
Camera view... Honestly, the behind thing worked, most of the time anyway, very well. I will freely admit that there were a decent number of times where I wanted the camera more of a raised angle. Often it was just the monotony of being that SAME elevation back there staring at my character's backs the whole run (not exactly an awe inspiring view of heroism from back there...). There was a whole axis on that right control stick that could have been assigned to elevation, wasted. Understandably, there were likely a lot of things they would have to draw tops to if they had let you do that (think of rolling the camera up only to notice the top of that hill you ran by is nonexistant and you can SEE THROUGH TIME), but it's certainly something I would have appreciated.
The whole light/dark system was supposed to be unique, actually applying allignments to the quest itself in a major way. Tell me, are there PC RPGs that make use of the 9 way alignment system of normal D&D in such a way as the story is totally different depending on it? Probably so... But hey, Bioware is trying to sell it, and if that involves lying to a naive console gaming public about a "first ever" feature that isn't really first ever, they'll go ahead and do that.
Still a GREAT game though. Tell me, are you experiencing glitches right and left?
As for the interface, what you describe is totally different from the console controls. I can't even relate. XBox used L and R to select a target and A interacted directly.
As far as your complaints.... Honestly, I can't understand a couple things about PC style inventory. First off, what's with that silly grid where you have to "fit" everything into place? I've SEEN those character sheets, you don't EVER do that in D&D, you just write it down! I get weight and limited inventory. I've dealt with both before in many console RPGs. However, as a general rule, people started hating that VERY quickly. Square soon realized limited inventory just wasn't fun so they let people carry 99 of everything in the game, if they could find it. Honestly, I want a PERFECT file :D, that means gimme gimme! At the very least, they should have some sort of bank system so you can still have everything, just not with you, thus presenting the same limited inventory challenge when taking on dungeons and such.
And another thing, before you say anything about how organizing things on a grid is somehow more realistic, it's not. C'mon, even with these limitations, these guys are carrying around several hundred tons of metal at any one time COMPLETELY out of sight. I know "magical bag of holding", but that's just a silly excuse :D. The only game that EVER actually explained how someone could really HOLD so much stuff, in an acceptable way, EVER, was, well, Pokémon (inventory is transformed into and stored as energy in a "backpack"). Not that it's a problem mind you, I don't mind little things like that being unrealistic. I just don't like when they try making a small PART of something annoying for the sake of realism when the very basis of that component isn't realistic to begin with.
As for the headings that actually say "persuade" and such, what's the complaint exactly? You want to know what you are doing and what stat it's based on, right? Why not just TELL the person that information up front? What's so wrong with that? Neverwinter does that too. I really don't see what's so stupid about it.
As far as combat, your complaints are PC version exclusive I'm afraid... I guess the controls really aren't better in the PC version as I had assumed...
Camera view... Honestly, the behind thing worked, most of the time anyway, very well. I will freely admit that there were a decent number of times where I wanted the camera more of a raised angle. Often it was just the monotony of being that SAME elevation back there staring at my character's backs the whole run (not exactly an awe inspiring view of heroism from back there...). There was a whole axis on that right control stick that could have been assigned to elevation, wasted. Understandably, there were likely a lot of things they would have to draw tops to if they had let you do that (think of rolling the camera up only to notice the top of that hill you ran by is nonexistant and you can SEE THROUGH TIME), but it's certainly something I would have appreciated.
The whole light/dark system was supposed to be unique, actually applying allignments to the quest itself in a major way. Tell me, are there PC RPGs that make use of the 9 way alignment system of normal D&D in such a way as the story is totally different depending on it? Probably so... But hey, Bioware is trying to sell it, and if that involves lying to a naive console gaming public about a "first ever" feature that isn't really first ever, they'll go ahead and do that.
Still a GREAT game though. Tell me, are you experiencing glitches right and left?
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." ~ Charles Babbage (1791-1871)