Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 2 Updates Released

[EvilBob46]

Rather unexpectedly, it appears as if nVidia's nZone (http://www.nzone.com/object/nzone_kotor2_downloads.html) now offers the music and videos from Knights of the Old Republic 2 for the PC in an improved form. A lot of people were angry at Lucas Arts for including low res videos in the game and down-sampling the music unncessarily. An unofficial fan project has attempted to fix these problems (and more), but now someone has officially taken action.

The music patch comes in at "only" 150 MB, the videos are over a 1 gig though. Thanks Ve3d.

[FunkyPoopMonkey]

Holy crap!!! Time to actually play the game. I never thought this was going to happen!

[Stormwatcher]

The REALLY Pisses me off. So I pay premium for 4 freaking CD-ROMs. And now I need to download 1.15 GIGABYTES to play the game with decent media? Crap.

Why Didn't they release the hi quality version on a DVD-ROM to start with?

Why does ANYONE still release games on CDs??????

[FunkyPoopMonkey]

The REALLY Pisses me off. So I pay premium for 4 freaking CD-ROMs. And now I need to download 1.15 GIGABYTES to play the game with decent media? Crap.
Blame obsidian. Or better yet, never buy anything from them again.

[Wombat]

I doubt it was Obsidian's decision. After all, they made the high res videos in the first place. It was probably Lucasarts decision.

[neblig]

Blame obsidian. Or better yet, never buy anything from them again.
Yes, let's blame the developer, Obsidian, for something that the publisher, Lucasarts, is completely responsible for.

[Zeal]

KOTOR2 was horrible. If a KOTOR3 ever happens, I pray to God Bioware does it as a major project. One of my most wanted games.

[FunkyPoopMonkey]

Yes, let's blame the developer, Obsidian, for something that the publisher, Lucasarts, is completely responsible for.
I don't see how. Obsidian developed the game. It's their fault it's so full of bugs, and was obviously unfinished to begin with. Plus they won't even attempt to inform the people on their own forums what's going on.

[thecrazyd]

I don't see how. Obsidian developed the game. It's their fault it's so full of bugs, and was obviously unfinished to begin with. Plus they won't even attempt to inform the people on their own forums what's going on.
But... its LucasArt's fault for pushing for an early release, forcing them to release the game full of bugs.

[Morrolan]

Lucasarts pushed the game out the door to make the Christmas season. Obsidian was given less time than most companies get to make a normal-sized game, and asked to make a huge RPG in the tradition of Bioware. Then, when they somehow managed to be slightly on-schedule with that, they get their development period SHORTENED without notice.

Also, Obsidian has no control over the packaging, when dealing with Lucasarts.

[FunkyPoopMonkey]

Lucasarts pushed the game out the door to make the Christmas season. Obsidian was given less time than most companies get to make a normal-sized game, and asked to make a huge RPG in the tradition of Bioware. Then, when they somehow managed to be slightly on-schedule with that, they get their development period SHORTENED without notice.

Also, Obsidian has no control over the packaging, when dealing with Lucasarts.
....The game came out in February dude. Long after xmas. I've never heard Obsidian complain about Lucasarts bullying them like you say. They simply got lazy.

[thecrazyd]

I've never heard Obsidian complain about Lucasarts bullying them like you say. They simply got lazy.
Then you haven't been paying attention. Remember the KOTOR 2's ending? Well, they had a real ending that was butchered by being pushed out early. This is not Obsidian's fault, it belongs squarely in the hands of the second worst publisher in the industry.

[AspectVoid]

....The game came out in February dude. Long after xmas. I've never heard Obsidian complain about Lucasarts bullying them like you say. They simply got lazy.

Back when KotoR2 came out, the Obsidian forums had a number of threads where members of the developement team spoke about what they had to cut due to LucasArts being so intent on getting the game out by christmas (X-box version).

Here's a link to a site that has a solid list of things that were cut: http://tubertarian.com/kotor2missingcontent.php

[Stormwatcher]

Oh, don't get me wrong, I really believe in Obsidian and I think they can actually make great games. These guys made all the cool Black Isle games, ferchrissakes. I think it was all LA's fault.
IIRC, Obsidian is also making NWN2. I hope they are given a chance to make a really good game this time.

[EvilBob46]

....The game came out in February dude.

Uh, the XBox verion came out in December for Christmas, with the PC version getting a bit more time to resolve some of the bugs (as time allowed) and increase compatibility. They would not have been able to significantly change the game in such a short time frame because the Lucas Arts deadlines were pretty much set in stone from the start.

If you don't realize that Obsidian was rushed to get the game out judging from the amount of content that was almost completed and still included on the game disk but not implemented due to time constraints, and how a 1-year developement time allotted by Lucas Arts isn't exactly a ton, then...well, whatever.


I've never heard Obsidian complain about Lucasarts bullying them like you say.

Developers usually don't turn on their publishers like that, even though this bullying is commonplace in the industry it seems.

[FunkyPoopMonkey]

And so it remains the same. Neither me nor you all, have any evidence. I just have common sense.

Anyways, the movie patch isn't worth downloading. The movies look exactly the same. Hell, they aren't important anyways. They're all boring spaceship cutscenes.

[Magnanimous Gnome]

Why does ANYONE still release games on CDs??????

Because my desktop doesn't have a DVD drive, and I don't want to buy one. :p


KOTOR2 was horrible. If a KOTOR3 ever happens, I pray to God Bioware does it as a major project. One of my most wanted games.

Oh, we are getting a KOTOR3, and a 4, 5, 6, 7... :rolleyes:


This is not Obsidian's fault, it belongs squarely in the hands of the second worst publisher in the industry.


Wait, Atari published KOTOR2?? :confused:

[Kelegacy]

And so it remains the same. Neither me nor you all, have any evidence. I just have common sense.


What the fuck is that? You just proved that you have no common sense by blaming the developer for something that was out of their hands.

Daily Retard Award Nominee.

[thecrazyd]

And so it remains the same. Neither me nor you all, have any evidence. I just have common sense.

Anyways, the movie patch isn't worth downloading. The movies look exactly the same. Hell, they aren't important anyways. They're all boring spaceship cutscenes.
Except we do have evidence. Read the posts. Obsidian was forced their hand early by LucasArts which is why they could not implement the files they created.

[Orphiuchus]

Did they fix the ending?

[thecrazyd]

Did they fix the ending?
KOTOR 2 had an ending?

[neblig]

Thanks for the show of faith. I'm glad most people on Evil Avatar have a bit more perspective on the game industry than the aptly named "Poop Monkey" demonstrates.

I was one of the designers on KotOR2. I won't say anything bad about LucasArts, as they were kind enough to give Obsidian its first project.

I can speak personally of the dedication of everyone at Obsidian to delivering the best-possible game we could in the time allowed. One year was an insanely small amount of time to produce an RPG the same size and scope of the original KoTOR, which was in development for over 3 years. I think we pulled it off. This may provoke further arguments (to which I won't reply) but with respect to Bioware paving our way, I firmly believe KoTOR 2 turned out better than the original in almost every way.

Unfortunately, the demanding schedule for KoTOR 2 was not unprecedented. I used to work for New World Computing, where 3DO had us turn out the last two Might & Magic RPGs in 9 months.

All I can say is that if you continue to support Obsidian and other talented independent developers, it will ultimately help enable them to get better contracts from publishers where they can spend more time and resources to make great games.

So, head on over to the Bioware Forums (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com/) express your support of Neverwinter Nights 2! ;)

[The Iron Weasel]

I enjoyed KOTOR 2, not as much as the original but it was still a damn good game. Well except for the ending *shudders*