So...how bout them videogames...and a KOTOR question (1 Viewer)

[Chris Bardon]

Geez, a guy steps away for a month or so to get married and finish off his master's thesis and all hell breaks loose here. Hopefully once the dust settles there are still people left here.

Anyhow, given the afforementioned non game diversions, I have some catching up to do, and KOTOR is definitely on the horizon...I just haven't decided for which platform. While I like the idea of being able to play on the Xbox, the reports I've seen of some of the game bugs worry me. How bad are they, really, and without giving too much of the game away, are there obvious ways around them that don't ruin the game.

Of course, the other option is to wait for the PC version, where these problems can be fixed, but that also means waiting... Anyone have any thoughts on this?

 

[Jay Mitchosky]

Hey Chris

Welcome back. Congrats on the Masters. It took less than a month, though, for things to go crazy here.

Re: your KOTOR question there's a thread on the bugs here. The official help thread can be seen here. Might be something there. For a game so time consuming you might consider Xbox as it will be easier to spend hours on a couch vs. hours in an office chair (for PC).

 

[JayV]

Chris, I've heard of tons of bugs, but I didn't really have any problems. Once I saw a buddy's Xbox lock-up during KOTOR. He restarted the machine and reloaded a saved game.

I didn't have any probvlems, but I understand that there is one game-stopper (it's well-documented, but I don't want to spoil the game).

Do you have surround on your PC? Or prefer playing lo-o-ong games on your couch? That might be what your decision hinges upon.

-j

EDIT: Yeah, what Other Jay said!

 

[Dave F]

I even did exactly what is supposed to cause that showstopper bug, but it didn't happen to me. Just lucky I guess...

-Dave

 

[Chris Bardon]

I did see the other threads, but wanted to avoid spoilers on the game. If you're actually able to get through the game without problems, then I think I'll end up going Xbox. Besides the surround and bigger screen, I just bought a new couch, and what better way to break it in than a long RPG. Besides, playing 90 hours of Morrowind on PC in 2 weeks killed my back, so it's probably for the best to get it on the box.

 

[JamesHl]

I played through it twice and I didn't run into any bugs.

 

[Tim Markley]

I enjoy playing KOTOR on my 65" widescreen TV with the DD 5.1 surround sound. There's no way I'd rather play the same game on my computer. I haven't finished KOTOR yet but I haven't run into a single bug either.

 

[James T]

All you people who never ran into any problems are lucky sobs. I had the game freeze so frequently, by the time I finished my second go, I had 4 save games running and I was saving after every 10 mins or change of scene.

When I was playing as a light jedi, I had a few problems with freezing. While playing as a dark jedi, I had more problems. I guess the dark side isn't as great as the empire made it seem.

 

[JamesHl]

I don't think random freezing is that common a problem. Isn't the biggest one the "carth takes 30 minutes to talk after escaping the ship" one?

 

[JohnE]

Count me in the no bugs camp. I've got about 22 hours into it as a dark side jedi and have not encountered a single bug.

 

[Morgan Jolley]

The game has glitches and minor bugs all over the place, but you probably have to do something relatively intentional to get the real bugs. For example, the game stutters a lot and will have characters get stuck behind your other party members in corners, or people will get stuck behind eachother in cutscenes, but most of these minor bugs are easily fixed or aren't big enough to cause damage.

 

[JohnE]

Yeah, I've seen the little gliches. What I meant was I had encountered no showstoppers. Fortunately.

 

[JamesHl]

Ah... I got blocked into corners all the time, annoying, but you just switch to another member..

 

[Dave F]

I wouldn't call characters standing in your way a "bug". Poor AI maybe, but not a bug.

-Dave

 

[Andy Sheets]

You know, I was playing Baldur's Gate recently and the path-finding in that was pretty bad too. As great as Bioware's games are, that seems to be one area that they haven't figured out yet

 

[BrianB]

people will get stuck behind eachother in cutscenes, but most of these minor bugs are easily fixed or aren't big enough to cause damage

I'd say the game hanging because it's waiting for a stuck npc to leave a cutscene (he's blocked by my party, purely unintentional) is a pretty major bug.

 

[Chris Bardon]

Well, I can tell you that from an AI perspective, path finding is not necesarily a trivial problem. Basically, the "drone" characters are probably on a fixed path, while the party NPCs are probably using some sort of follow and aviod behaviour. Since they're trying to optimize for speed, there are a few things that have to be cut (like some of the obstacle checks). That being said, it's a problem that they should be able to find a way around.

Look at something like Munch's Oddysee. I remeber that in a bit with Abe, you'll have a bunch of Mudokons on top of a cliff. You can just jump off, but the other Muds will actually meet you at the bottom by taking the ramp down. This is more likely a result of using predefined movement nodes (like in Unreal Tournament), but still seems pretty smeat. Granted, there weren't as many moving obstacles there, but it's still pretty impressive.

Anyone at Bioware reading this and want to hire a new AI person?

 

[Brian Kidd]

It's not a major bug if you save pretty frequently. There are minor qlitches here and there, but I have yet to run into anything that made me want to throw the disc against a wall. Go for the XBOX version. Give in. Come over to the Dark Side. Mwah ha haaaaa!!!

 

[Tony Whalen]

Been playing for 30-odd hours now... no problems that I'm aware of.

AWESOME game!!

 

[Max Leung]

I've gotten the rare black screen after dialog bug...saving and restarting the game fixes that. The other glitch I found was the apparent infinite reincarnation of Dak (a Jedi you meet on Korriban)...you kill him, leave the area, come back, and there he is again. A great way to make some quick credits.

Also, I can't seem to sell these stupid Desert Wraid Skull Plates...the buyer NPC just dumps me to the buy screen instead of buying my plates (which aren't selectable at all in the sell screen). Even going back to a save game where I just landed on Tatooine doesn't fix the problem! Oh well.

One complaint I have with KOTOR is the long and frequent loading times. The PC version should play much faster.