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Published
by LucasArts
Developed by Obsidian Entertainment
Release Date: Out Now
Price: £39.99
2003
saw not only the best RPG released on Xbox so far but also
one of the best uses of the Star Wars licence in gaming
history. Bioware, who almost single-handedly bought PC RPG's
back from the dead managed to combine their expertise and
the Star Wars universe into a very impressive RPG experience.
The game was a huge success and it was excellent news when
a sequel was announced last year. With Bioware already working
on other titles though another development team would handle
the sequel. Usually this kind of news is bad news but when
this other development team, Obsidian Entertainment, is
comprised of people who've worked on some of the greatest
RPG's of all time you can rest assured that the sequel has
been in safe hands.
The
story for Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II –
The Sith Lords is set five years after the events in the
first game. You'll play as a former Jedi who was stripped
of his (or her of course) status as well as his powers.
At the beginning of the game your character is unconscious
aboard a heavily damaged Ebon Hawk. You'll control a droid
to get the Ebon Hawk up and running and be able to dock
at the Peragus II mining facility so that your main character
can receive treatment. Playing as the droid serves as a
tutorial which will introduce newcomers to the basic controls
of the game. Whilst it wouldn't be kind of us to give too
much away about the story, essentially there has been a
Jedi Civil War and all the Jedi are thought to be extinct.
The Sith for some reason think you are a Jedi and have put
a huge bounty on your head. As you can imagine this makes
you a target for all the scum in the universe although at
the start of the game you know little of this. After you've
been revived you'll encounter a woman by the name of Kreia
who will later join your party. Kreia is a mysterious character
who seems to be neither a Sith or Jedi although she obviously
has a dark past. That aside though Kreia is definitely one
of the better characters in the game.
Whilst
The Sith Lords is undoubtedly a very good sequel that fans
of the original game will definitely enjoy, there are a
few rough edges that take the polish off the game. The main
complaint with the game has to be the frame rate which can
dip very low indeed from time to time. It's not uncommon
for the action to become a temporary slide show in big battles
and this is disappointing. Fortunately though given the
virtual turn-based nature of the battles this doesn't cause
any problems despite being unsightly. You'll also find several
glitches such as characters just appearing from nowhere
and also disappearing. One instance springs to mind when
Atton (who comes across as a Han Solo wannabe) is sitting
in the cockpit of the Ebon Hawk and is typing away, however
he has his back to the console he's meant to be using, so
he's actually typing away on nothing which looks comical.
None of these issues are problematic or spoil the game in
any way but it's a shame that they exist given the production
quality of the first game and also because there is no Xbox
Live support this time around you know that an update for
the game is never going to arrive.
Although
The Sith Lords is in many ways similar to Knights of the
Old Republic in terms of how the game plays, Obsidian have
made a few adjustments. One of my niggles with the first
game was that when you had taken items from a container
it was difficult to remember if you had previously searched
it for items when you returned to that location. The only
way of knowing was to open the container again. This may
not seem like a major issue but throughout the course of
the game it proved to be a little irritating. In The Sith
Lords though the text description of the object will now
tell you that it's empty which is a small, but very useful,
improvement. You'll also notice that when you equip weapons
there is an alternate weapon equipping slot. Basically you
can equip weapons in both and press X to choose between
them. This is a useful feature carried over from games such
as Icewind Dale 2 and it's another example of how small
inclusions can improve the overall experience. You'll also
notice how your actions can either lose or gain influence
with other party members. Sometimes pleasing one party member
will displease another one. Saying the right things to a
party member might get them to open up to you and tell you
some important information. This is a great inclusion and
makes the game even more interesting and adds more depth
to the game.
Visually
the game is of the same quality as Knights of the Old Republic.
Indeed much of the artwork from the first game has made
its way into The Sith Lords. You'll recognise quite a few
character faces, objects and items from the first game.
I was pleased to see more options when creating a character.
As before you'll have a choice of a male or female character
and you can choose between three different types, Jedi Consular,
Jedi Sentinel and Jedi Guardian. After this stage you can
either choose a quick character or you can customise the
portrait of the character and the choices for this are much
better than in Knights of the Old Republic. Like Knights
of the Old Republic, The Sith Lords has some great cutscenes
that make the game a movie-like experience. There are better
looking games on the Xbox to be truthful but on the whole
the game does look good.
Knights
of the Old Republic was fine for deaf gamers and The Sith
Lords is also practically identical in this respect. Cutscenes
(apart from the advert-like cutscene that runs when you
first insert the game disk), conversations and tutorial
messages are all shown in text. Actually there is one omission
when you see a cutscene between the main enemy in the game
and one of his minions. His speech is garbled and can't
really be made out but there isn't any speech or caption
at all to convey this to the deaf gamer. Even the beeps
of the droids that don't speak are represented by nonsensical
words. During a battle your characters will make the odd
comment or taunt and these are not subtitled but this isn't
really important and they say the same things over and over
again anyway. You can access your journal at any time to
find out what you should be doing next and what quests are
available to complete.
Those
of you that enjoyed Knights of the Old Republic will really
enjoy The Sith Lords. Once again you can choose your own
path, good or evil, through the game which means that you
can double the play time of 30-40 hours if you want to see
how everything in the game plays out. The Sith Lords doesn't
make any radical changes but that's not really a problem
as none were really needed. Despite being handled by another
development team the game still retains that superb playability
that Knights of the Old Republic had. There are a few issues
with the game (which we mentioned earlier) but on the whole
it's a great game and a much sought after top quality Xbox
RPG (and let's face there's not that many).
Overall
Game Rating: 9.0/10
Another great Star Wars game as well as another top quality
Xbox RPG which is always welcome. The Sith Lords is just
as enjoyable and engrossing as Knights of the Old Republic
was although it could have done with a bit more polish in
certain areas.
Deaf
Gamers Classification:
(Click
the letter or here
for details)
The Sith Lords is almost identical
in its provision for deaf gamers as Knights of the Old Republic
and therefore is absolutely fine.
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