Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic Review

Lightsabers. Check

Wookiees. Check.

Millennium Falcon-like spaceship. Check.

Compelling story. Check.

In covering those four bases, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic is not only providing one of the very best interactive Star Wars experiences, but it's tapped into the very soul of the Star Wars universe that drew hundreds of millions of fans to the franchise in the first place. Developed by Bioware, Knights of the Old Republic is stronger with The Force than any George Lucas-powered movie that's come out in the last 20 years and lands on the PC as one of the very best titles the system has to offer after a sterling launch on the Xbox. And the best part about this is, while the game may have the approach of a port, they actually fixed the interface to be fully functional and better for the PC as well as improving the graphics immensely, planting more items, and adding a new area that the Xbox version didn't have.

There's tons of character development, a combat probability system and a giant inventory to manage, so I guess KOTOR gets clearance as a role-playing game. But as both an RPG and a Star Wars title, it strikes a marvelous balance of hardcore authenticity and accessibility for the uninitiated. Pen and paper players can check the log of dice rolls used to calculate the success rate of every trigger pull or lightsaber swing. Freddy Fanboy can geek out for hours at how well the Jawa language has been adapted for a videogame. And even the coolest of the cool hip kids will be able to see the appeal of swinging double lightsabers and choking fools from across the room.

It all begins with a rock solid story that really does begin a long long time ago....

Normally setting a Star Wars game 4000 years before the events of the movies we all know would be a recipe for mediocrity. How many times have we seen a LucasArts game where the adventure is set somewhere "just next door" to what we know from the films, so we're getting to see what Lando or Obi Wan does when he's not hanging out with the superstars of the galaxy like Vader, Leia or that Hoth medical droid. But you've got to hand it to Bioware for mimicking the entire feel of the first Star Wars movie but with original characters and an original storyline.

All of the standards and paradigms of the Star Wars universe --Jedi vs. Sith, bureaucracy and politics-- are present in this game and both the gameplay and storyline work within those guidelines. You begin the game as a soldier who simply happens to be strong with The Force and throughout the game you're developing your skills as a Jedi, making decisions that not only affect your leanings to the Dark Side or the Light Side of the force but will also determine how your game's story unfolds. We could tell you exactly how the story for our created characters went and still not ruin the majority of your experience because stories branch and spread all over the place before coming back to a handful of very specific and critical crossroads, but it all fits within the Star Wars universe that we all know and love. We figured we'd just give you a few highlights.

Before you're done with KOTOR, you will:

• train at the Jedi Academy which includes learning the Jedi Code and the meaning behind a lightsaber's color.
• walk into a cantina on Tattoine where the bartender won't like you...and the bounty hunters won't like you either!
• find somebody's lack of faith disturbing.
• explore the forest world of Kashyyk and see what "Return of the Jedi" was supposed to look like if we'd had Wookiees instead of Ewoks in treetop villages
• face your former master again after all these years.
• space-walk on the surface of a battleship

There are multiple side missions that will help expand your understanding of the story as well. So in Knights you may:

• collect a few bounties that you've hunted down.
• reunite a woman and her droid so they can resume their extremely unhealthy relationship.
• fight alongside Wookiees in a struggle for freedom.
• try a murder case or two as a Jedi attorney.
• get thrown in and escape from prison once or twice.
• smuggle for the Star Wars mafia.
• get executed for insulting a native species.

The original characters and story are interesting enough, but being in a Star Wars setting just makes them like family. You've got your beautiful and mysterious female Jedi who shares a special bond with you. There are the two soldiers, one Mandalorian and one Republic, who don't see eye to eye on much but are always down for a scrap. You'll also pick up an old Jedi master who's spent most of his life as a hermit but is still powerful with The Force as well as a young and angry Jedi from the academy. Star Wars fans will know there's only one way to get Wookiee to follow a human around and you get one in KOTOR along with his Twi'lek companion. There are even a couple of droids to be found in your crew. Your astromech is a beeping mechanical wiz while HK-47 (my personal favorite) is your psychopathic assassin droid who just happens to provide most of the game's comic relief. Dialogue with HK-47 was funny enough to cause many of us to laugh out loud on several occasions and, like all characters, his lines evolve the deeper you get into the game. If C3PO ever grew a sack --of nuts and bolts, heh-- he'd be HK-47. Likewise with all of your crew members in the game; they each borrow recognizable elements from characters in the original Star Wars trilogy. Throw in a major plot twist or two, there's no way you'll see the first one coming, and it's clear KOTOR is built to entertain both as a game and as another volume in the Star Wars library.