4 Reasons Why BioWare Owes Us A Star Wars Gaming Do-Over

By Dante R Maddox /

Just get off Taris. That was the advice for me as I waded into Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. Taris is the first planet my custom character landed on. I didn€™t know then that I was running through a six hour long tutorial that was a microcosm of the entire game, a game that would take me across the Outer Rim. This is also before I would devote a great deal of my free time to Dungeons & Dragons, therefore I had no idea that I was playing a D20 game that is still one of the most faithful transitions from D&D to the console. I didn€™t make it off Taris. My first foray into KotOR was brief; in honesty I just didn€™t have the patience and almost missed on what would be one of my favorite games of all time. The advice to soldier through the Taris missions came and I dove back in, and was rewarded with one of the most gratifying experiences in gaming. BioWare would go on to make several games that I only played because I loved KotOR that much. If you€™ve never played Jade Empire you are missing out on what Dynasty Warriors could be, and I won€™t bother to preach to the choir about Mass Effect. Sadly, BioWare wasn€™t involved in KotOR II: The Sith Lords, but they were nice enough to open their playbook for developer Obsidian Entertainment who would ironically spend a great deal of their future making games that were kinda like popular BioWare games, rendering themselves pointless. However I will risk angry reprisal by stating that KotOR II was more fun than its predecessor, but not better if that makes any sense. The sequel was rushed by the greed of Lucas Arts (big surprise there) to come out by Christmas and the game was chopped to pieces because of this. However what was delivered was impressive and like a lot of gamers I had hope that either BioWare or Obsidian would step in and make a final game in the trilogy tradition and seal the deal. I waited. And Waited. I€™m still waiting. No. That MMO mess doesn€™t count and here€™s why: