ESSAY: A Quick Look at Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic I & II

Released 20 years ago these games are regarded among the greatest stories in the Star Wars universe, easily up there with the films. An unfinished trilogy set 4000 years before the Original Trilogy, ignoring the, at best, mediocre novel Revan by Drew Karpyshyn, writer of the first game, which was meant to complete the story but instead reads as an attempt to murder KotOR II, written by Chris Avellone, and ignoring The Old Republic MMO which, being an MMO, goes completely bonkers with the story. These games have recently been released on Nintendo Switch and the first has a Remake stuck in development hell. There is no consensus on which is the better game and each has its fair share of fans. Both are good but they approach Star Wars in such distinct ways it can be hard to compare them but I'm going to try anyway by focussing on the writing, and a little on gameplay mechanics. From the outset I'll say I prefer the second game, it has a depth that the first lacks, and this essay is me figuring that out and trying to articulate why, enjoy! (Yes, the last thing I do is re-write my introduction.)

Do I have to put a Spoiler Warning for 20 years old video games? Well I've done it now, consider yourself warned!

Knights of the Old Republic is centred around two back-to-back wars, first the Mandalorian Wars (happening before the games) and then the Jedi Civil War (the backdrop to the first game). Jedi Civil War is a misnomer as it is a Sith war against the Republic and Jedi but from the view of the 'common man' there is little to no distinction between Sith and Jedi. The first game is a story about ending the Jedi Civil War while the second game is about the fallout and an altogether different conflict with Sith Lords that prowl Republic space without armies, without legions of ships, but instead with assassins and world-destroying Force powers. The second game is a set up for the greater threat, the True Sith, that Revan went to confront in the Unknown Regions and the end of the game has Meetra Surik, the Exile, flying off in the Ebon Hawk to join him. What really makes the rather quiet backdrop of KotOR II work is how personal the story is to the Player Character (PC), the Exile. She has been severed from the Force, possibly by the Jedi Council, possibly by the Mass Shadow Generator, but either way there is a wound in her that will only be healed by confronting the past and taking on responsibility rather than shirking it in the Jedi imposed exile. As Kreia says, “... conflict strengthens us, isolation weakens us.”

Lore aside when thinking about fiction I often default to games like Final Fantasy, KotOR, Pillars of Eternity, Dark Souls, or Baldur's Gate rather than books. Part of this is because I didn't start properly reading until I was in my 20s and partly because I may, at heart, be a frustrated Game Designer.

Every few years I return to Knights of the Old Republic II and enjoy it as much as the first time I played it at the age of 12. Sure the wonder and newness is less as I know the twists and turns and can recite Kreia's teaching like a mantra, though each time I find something new within her words. This year after half a Dark Side playthrough I thought it time to revisit the first game which I haven't played since around 2006. I originally played the first game after the second and always wondered why they felt so different, beside BioWare developing the first and Obsidian the second. Interactions with companions are less meaningful, there are less options, the influence mechanic is level-based rather than reaction based on what you chose in a conversation with them or they overhear you have with another character. Companion alignment is also fixed in the first game rather than like in the second where your actions and alignment influence that of your party. There is far less dialogue and ways to learn about the characters you travel with making the whole party feel rather stagnant and game-y. Or perhaps these dialogue and story differences are merely my perception, in how the game functions rather than in actuality. Reading back through Carth's dialogue there is a lot of well written stuff, his whiny character aside, but you don't really have to do anything to unlock it, just play the game and you'll eventually get a prompt that Carth wants to talk. This is true for most of the companion characters. In KotOR II without the right choices you simply won't learn about Atton's past, if you go Light Side you are unlikely to hear HK-47's definition of love or learn that his previous master was Revan and that he was built to kill Jedi. To be fair in the first game you need a good repair skill to progress HK's story, which is a lot better than simply stepping on and off your ship with different companions to see if they have something new to say. In the second game there's a whole bunch of dialogue about the Handmaiden's mother, Arren Kae, potentially Kreia’s name when she was a Jedi¹, that I didn't discover for years because I never quite managed to get enough influence or ask the right questions to both characters, alongside the fact I usually play a canonical female character so the Handmaiden doesn't join my party most playthroughs. The full tale of the Handmaiden's mother, Arren Kae, is split over three characters, Kreia, the Disciple, and Handmaiden. You can't have the Disciple and Handmaiden in the same party, Disciple joins female PCs and Handmaiden male ones.

Events that occur during the story can influence members of the party and so the game feels lived in rather than static. KotOR I has a tendency to feel like a set waiting for the player to come along and move something while KotOR II feels like a living, breathing world. The best example is Nar Shaddaa's refugee sector, whether you help the refugees gain space by convincing Serroco mercs or killing them, or convincing the Exchange to do so, or kill them too, OR convince the mercs to attack the Exchange and depending on whether they attack from the north, south, or both has different results. The mercs can get wiped out, or the Exchange can. If you want you can wipe out the Exchange, or side with them against the refugees or against Serroco or both or neither. Each movement causes different reactions from your crew and from a number of NPCs in the sector. Now obviously it's a game so it is literally a set waiting for you to push something but KotOR II presents it in a living way. Nar Shaddaa is a moon ready to pop. Tension is thick, with the refugees, the Exchange, the Hutts, and the Bounty Hunters. The PC's arrival tips the balance and the effects ripple outward. Compare to Tatooine in KotOR I where you land, collect the quests in town, head out to the desert, complete the quests, and come back to hand in. Nothing really changes, you get access to a Jawa shop and can turn in Tusken Raider gaffi sticks for credits but not much else happens in town. On Manaan, one side-quest in particular is done by simply progressing the main story and the solution is just handed to you in unmissable dialogue, this removes the weight, the risk, the point of having a quest in the first place resulting in flat, disappointing gameplay.

The story of the first game is similar to Return of the Jedi, find, access, destroy the big super-weapon and defeat the Sith Lord. There's the big twist that you, yes you, the player are in fact Revan after a memory wipe and the Jedi Council have manipulated you into retracing your steps to find said super-weapon, The Star Forge, which is now in the hands of your former apprentice, Darth Malak. It is a great twist and Malak is well-written in how he plays with you before the reveal. Though Malak himself is, in the words of HK-47, “... more like an angry club. ... given to grandiose displays of brutality and murder that seemed inefficient - and in many cases, unnecessary.” Bastila and the Jedi come across quite poorly in the whole affair yet the writing takes a stumble and Revan can never be Revan again, not in his dialogue choices at least. Gone is the tactical genius, the Force user who refuses to be Jedi or Sith, the cunning warrior. Dark Side options are often comically evil while Light Side often overly subservient to the Council. There is little nuance in Knights of the Old Republic I and this is my primary gripe with the game. Knights of the Old Republic II has depth to its companions, story, side-missions, all of it. KotOR I is an adventure story about defeating evil and rescuing the princess (twice). KotOR II puts the Force, the Jedi, the Sith, the nature of it all on trial. Both are brilliant, in their own way, but played together the contention is too much to bare. I imagine it is similar to when Original Trilogy fans experienced The Phantom Menace for the first time. Trade deals and politics in my Star Wars, how dare George Lucas ruin my childhood! I get it, it's a complete vibe shift, but both are great when given a little room away from each other. Perhaps wildly different styles struggle to share the same universe when telling a single story, but I digress. Knights of the Old Republic I's problems are often contained to its dialogue and characterisation. Not every line is bad but there were enough to make me not want to talk to my party unless necessary beyond Dantooine (2^nd of 7 planets), except for HK-47 with his history of prior masters all some how ending up dead by his hand and Canderous's war stories.

Stories live or die on dialogue and action. Two stories can have the same plot yet be completely different because of how the characters spoke and acted. There is nothing inherently wrong with KotOR I from a story perspective, it's in fact quite good, but the dialogue sometimes struggles to sell it. The best examples in the game for good dialogue are the two murder investigation quests, one on Dantooine and one on Manaan. On Dantooine you are only able to talk to two witnesses, a droid, and a Jedi Master who is serving as investigator, jury, and judge. The two witnesses are also the suspects and each tries to convince you they didn't really know the victim, that the other one knew him better, and they were innocently out for a run or hunting. Both are lying and one is the murderer while the other was attempting to murder the victim so both are guilty. Coming to this conclusion requires exhausting dialogue options and little else it is intriguing and could be expanded into a detective novella all on its own. The second murder investigation is on Manaan, a neutral world and the only source of Kolto (equivalent to Bacta healing fluid that Luke floats in in The Empire Strikes Back when he escapes the Wampa and is rescued by Han). As such both Sith and Republic have embassies and troops on the planet. A woman, Elora, will come up to you and plead that you help her husband, Sunry, get released. Elora knows Jolee and he promises to do everything he can to help. Sunry, a Republic war hero, is charged with the murder of a Sith official and many swear he didn't do it. The Player Character is appointed as Arbiter for the accused and so you are inclined in a variety of ways to see the veteran go free. If you are lazy in your investigation you can return this conclusion to the five judges that make up the High Court and the session is rather dull. However, if you dig deep, find and talk to everyone even tangentially involved, break into the Republic embassy, and interrogate his wife a little you discover the man was having an affair, that the Sith official was a Force user with a lightsaber, and that he did, in fact, kill her, while she was sleeping no less. Brutal. You don't need the video file stolen from the Republic Embassy to prove this but it makes it a lot easier when convincing the judges and refusing to do your duty as his Arbiter. Yet if your sympathies for the Republic run so deep as to lie in a Court of Law then you can convince the judges that Sunry is innocent, while knowing he isn't, by denying evidence, obfuscating the facts, and revealing that the Sith planted evidence purely to make it overwhelmingly likely Sunry would be found guilty and executed. The party found guilty also run the risk of being embargoed or outright banned from trading for Kolto, crucial in medicine across the galaxy. This quest has impacts across the rest of the story, requires the player to do something without much handholding, goes out on a limb to let you get it wrong and miss details. Making it satisfying to play and worthwhile to read and listen to all the dialogue. Then it has you actual make a meaningful choice, do you release the Republic hero and return him to his wife or allow the Selkath to execute him for his crimes. There are at least two contentions here, whether you're playing Light or Dark and how strongly you feel that justice must be done, and right there you have the D&D moral alignment chart to pick through. Is it more important to have a war hero set free for morale and because he killed a Sith apprentice, or does his murder need punishing regardless of who it was. Do you just convince the judges to set him free to spite the Sith? Regardless, you can play a role because of the quality of the writing and options open to you. This is rare in the first game and rife in the second.

On Dantooine, in the second game, there is a mercenary problem. Too many out-of-work mercs and not enough jobs to go around. The mercs are one angry blaster shot away from becoming bandits and what passes for government want them gone. The mercs, knowing this, plan on taking over the government. Now you can agree to help Administrator Adare, repair Khoonda's defences, lay a minefield, repair broken doors, rebuild some battle droids, and more. Or you can sabotage all of this stuff and throughout the quest are given numerous chances to switch sides, even right at the end after the main battle. These options create a dynamism to the game and story that make engaging worthwhile. You can mix and match your Dark Side/Light Side choices too based on what is most cunning, a very Kreia move, a very Revan move.

On Telos Citadel Station there is a twi'lek called Harra who used his girlfriend as collateral on a bet. He lost, of course, and the girl, Ramana is now a slave dancer owned by Doton Het. Harra wants you to free her as it will take him a long time to save up the money to buy her back. You can pay Doton Het 2000 credits or beat him in Pazaak, either way you end up owning Ramana. Now you can choose to keep her as a slave dancer, and come back to collect her earnings every level up, or return her to Harra. She doesn't want to go back to Harra after he gambled her away but you own her so she does as you bid. Free her and she runs off, blackmail her and she gives you 500 credits and runs off, or you can threaten her and she'll stay with Harra, for now. There's also a whole other way of completing this quest involving the Exchange that I've never done. This isn't a main quest, it's a side-quest that can be ignored but it's anything but straight forward and this depth is throughout Knights of the Old Republic II.

The whole thrust of KotOR II is about choice, Avellone says as much in an interview with Lightspeed where he also states how dialogue shouldn't make a player feel safe, that he is tired of “talking head conversations” and lack of choice in dialogue and action. He goes to say how the moral ambiguity of a lot of the game, and his other games, is because he wants the player to be able to make a real choice, to reflect on it, as this self-reflection is good for them. Kreia herself states “I am a mirror.” A reference, I am fairly certain, to the Renaissance literary genre mirrors for princes, the most famous of which is The Prince by Machiavelli. Sometimes Kreia will scold you no matter what you do and I believe this is why, she is merely trying to make you think about your actions rather than instinctively doing something. Similar to the Gom Jabbar test in Dune but never ending and with mental rather than physical pain, something Avellone and Kreia believe to be good for you, and I agree.

In an interview with PC Games in 2017 Avellone also talks about how the player should be able to make the character they want to and not have a Commander Shepherd-style railroaded story. Though in a Q&A session on the Obsidian forums he commends Mass Effect for making him stop and think because of some of the moral choices.

This could easily turn into a KotOR II essay, a Kreia essay, or even a Chris Avellone essay in fact, so instead we'll move on to characters.

Carth Onasi never stops whining, the whole game. He consistently says the wrong thing, ends conversations abruptly, refuses to share details, and comes close of accusing the Player Character of inevitably betraying him. He has plenty to moan about, his home planet was destroyed, his wife is dead, he believes his son is too, and his former senior officer and mentor betrayed him and ordered the barrage on his home. But he's a war veteran, around 30 years old, and seems completely incapable of talking about anything without getting angry and accusatory. The side-mission about his son is fine but so short and easy to solve that it feels like a non-quest. A mere tick boxing exercise. Coupled with Bastila preaching about how special and good she is and how you need to learn so much and listen to her it's a wonder how so many people continued playing the first game beyond Taris. Players complain about “the old crone” Kreia berating you but at least she's trying to teach you something, Bastila berates you just to tell you how special she is. Atton Rand, Carth's parallel, on the other hand is instantly likeable, funny, friendly, and always down for a game of Pazaak. Sure, it turns out he was a Sith Assassin, tortured Jedi for a living, and enjoyed it, but who cares – deal the cards Atton, I'll get the juma!

T3-M4 is a non-character in the first game and crucial in the second, full of personality with lots to say, even if it is all beeps and boops. Even the trash compactor was granted depth in the second game, brilliant.

Everyone's favourite assassin droid, HK-47, is iconic, possibly as iconic as Revan and Kreia. With his irreverent tone and infinite hatred for us “gland-driven meatbag[s]”. His imitation of Carth is on point. “Mockery: "Oh, master, I do not trust you! I cannot trust you or anyone ever again!" As is his imitation of Bastila, “Mockery: "Oh, master, I love you but I hate all you stand for, but I think we should go press our slimy, mucus-covered lips together in the cargo hold!"” Along with Canderous Ordo (aka: Mandalore) he retains his personality and style across both games. If anything HK-47 becomes more vicious and refined in the second game, more true to himself.

Mission Vao and Zaalbar are a package deal, young, angry, outcasts with a cheerful demeanour. Both have family problems and both need your help. This help is never questioned, by any of the crew, it's asked for, given, and that's it. Zaalbar's quest is tied into the main quest on Kashyyyk. His brother, Chuundar, has agreed to sell Wookies as slaves to Czerka Corporation, exiled his own father to the Shadowlands, and has his tribe fearing to say anything contrary. Zaalbar was exiled as a madclaw, having used his hands to attack Chuundar years prior when their father still ruled. The quest is either find the father, remove the brother and free the Wookies, or find and kill the father and allow the slavery of Wookies to continue. If you free the Wookies then Czerka leave the planet, Zaalbar gets a cool sword, and he makes peace with his father. There's a lack of weight to the companion quests and a lack of self-reflection in the Player Character's actions.

Kreia warns about offering too much help, about giving without considering, “Aiding them gives you strength by taking on their challenges but weakens them.” KotOR I simply has you help everyone around you, no questions asked, or be psychotically cruel. In KotOR II you can do both of these too but there are other options and some times the Light Side, neutral, or Dark Side option will align to Kreia's teachings about influence and ripples and the small threads. KotOR II is trying to make the player think, KotOR I is more of a power-fantasy. This comes down to a fundamental difference in game design philosophy, the purpose of a game even, and it's incredible that it can be seen in the same series, with the same engine and mechanics, and with some of the same characters at times. What's even more impressive is that Obsidian Entertainment did it twice. Once with Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords and then with Fallout: New Vegas, demonstrating a mastery of writing and providing player choice and agency when the prior developer in question, BioWare and Bethesda, did much less so in Knights of the Old Republic I and Fallout 3, respectively. But again, I digress.

Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords is a game where I'm not sure that I've discovered everything, similar to Dark Souls, it maintains an allure that pulls me back again and again. I'm sure I have found everythign after more playthroughs than I can remember but there's always the chance I've missed something. While Knights of the Old Republic I doesn't have that. I played it many, many years ago and didn't return until this year and I won't be rushing back. One playthrough was enough. While KotOR II I'll probably go back to within a year. KotOR II is much more satisfying to play, to engage with, to become immersed in, the choices feel like they matter, and there are genuine lessons to be learned. KotOR I is a fun adventure to save the galaxy. That these two games exist in the same series is astonishing and I will remain eternally disappointed that Obsidian's ideas for KotOR III were never greenlit for development.

---

Thanks for reading, more fiction next week. If you need a fix check out the Free and Paid Collections!

Please consider becoming a paid member, all subs support my family. Thanks.

1. This is a fan theory and when Chris Avellone was asked he said he couldn't comment but “good catch”. In the Fallout Bible “good catch” meant things he liked that were unintended. The lives of Kae and Kreia are similar, both trained Revan, both were exiled from the Jedi Order, both joined Revan in the Mandalorian Wars, and both were presumed dead but no body was ever found. Kreia became Darth Traya and Kae and Traya mix to form Kreia.