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Advice for newcomer to KOTOR

kotornewbie

By kotornewbie
in Ahto Spaceport Cantina

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kotornewbie Newbie

kotornewbie

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Hello all,

 

I guess I'm probably the last person on this planet to have ever played KOTOR 1 & 2, but I have just got the games and I'm looking for a bit of advice.

 

I'm really tempted to play TSL first, but would that be a big mistake? Do the 2 stories intertwine or are they very independent of each other? Should I absolutely play the 1st one 1st as the makers intended or is the 2nd one so much better that I can come back to the 1st one at a later date?

 

Also mods! There appear to be a million of them! I have done a bit of homework and so far I have downloaded and installed the Halowan plug-ins for both stories along with fixes for widescreen and Windows 7. I've also downloaded the USM mod for KOTOR 2 as that seems to be very highly rated.

 

As I haven't played either game yet I'm not looking to add any extra content at the moment, but I would be interested in any mods that improve graphics and textures and gameplay etc seeing as both games are quite dated now.

 

Thanks for any tips or any mods you can recommend.

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Jae Onasi Newbie

Jae Onasi

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I would recommend playing Kotor before TSL, because there are some things that show up in TSL that you won't understand if you've not played Kotor. You _can_ play TSL without having played Kotor without trouble, but you'll miss understanding a few side conversations that pop up in TSL.

 

Mods--play the game with just the official patches first so you get a nice feel for the game, and then add in mods that suit your taste after you understand what's in the game. There are so many mods to try out that it really depends on what you like.

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adamqd Newbie

adamqd

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I envy you, KotOR is my favorite game ever, and the awesomeness of my first play through (Already being an OldRepubliphile) is something i'll never forget :)

 

Have fun, and yea, Play them in sequence, without mods :)

 

Oh and welcome to the forums too

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mimartin Newbie

mimartin

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I’ll give you the same advice I was given when I first came here. “Save and Save Often.” Not sure if it was stoffe or RedHawke that gave me that advice (most likely both), but those are words to live by with all games.

 

I would play KOTOR first, the stories are not that intertwine IMO, but TSL can give away the bigger and enjoyable surprise from KOTOR. Good luck and have fun.

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Ztalker Newbie

Ztalker

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Welcome to the forums! :thmbup1:

 

Good of you to pick up these 'classics!'

 

My advice:

Kotor 2 is a follow-up of Kotor 1. At the start of Kotor 2, a dialogue will appear that'll ask you to retell the story of Kotor 1. Set it to the way you have played the first game.

 

You seem eager to start playing and I doubt you want to play Kotor 1 twice (good AND bad) before starting Kotor 2.

 

One more word of advice:

Go to Tattooine first if you are dark sided. I'd hate to see you miss a 'certain' party member. :)

If you play light sided, go to Kashyyk first. For the same reason.

These two party members are one of the main reasons the game did so well and are frequently mentioned in Kotor 2.

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jrrtoken Newbie

jrrtoken

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Don't tempt yourself by looking at a plot summary or a synopsis. Trust me.

 

Don't take to heart any preemptive assessments of any of the game, or else there's a greater chance for your own disappointment. Hearing nothing about K1&2 beforehand is what made it so special for me.

 

Play both games multiple times, particularly the latter in the series. There is no way you will be able to fully comprehend and digest the full scope of it, both plot and gameplay-wise. It took me ~10 playthroughs of multiple styles to fully ascertain all of the content in K2, and that was all due to me *not* choosing that option in a dialogue, unknowingly discarding an entire plotpoint.

 

Patience. Combat can be rather tiresome in long bouts, so it will be a grim-and-bear it situation in many areas.

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True_Avery Newbie

True_Avery

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My Advise:

 

Unless really stuck, stay the hell away from forums, plot summaries, and mods. Stay Away. Just the front page of most mod sites can give away some plot points, and the forums like talking about the story quite a bit. Just install, patch, then run straight into it and don't stop till you finish.

 

Save everything else for later. A vanilla player should play vanilla Kotor.

 

Oh, and finally... why would you play the SEQUEL before the first...? That... makes so sense. I'll be one of the few on this forum that'll stand up and say the first is leaps and bounds better than the second.

 

BioWare capacity to write whiny characters amazes me. At least you can quickly pact Carth (KOTOR), Kaidan (Mass Effect) or Alistair (Dragon Age) away and use other better party members. [/mandatory response to Jae’s fangirlism]

B-but Alistair is the best thing about Dragon Age!

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JesusIsGonnaOwnSatan Newbie

JesusIsGonnaOwnSatan

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My Advise:

 

Unless really stuck, stay the hell away from forums, plot summaries, and mods. Stay Away. Just the front page of most mod sites can give away some plot points, and the forums like talking about the story quite a bit. Just install, patch, then run straight into it and don't stop till you finish.

 

Save everything else for later. A vanilla player should play vanilla Kotor.

 

Oh, and finally... why would you play the SEQUEL before the first...? That... makes so sense. I'll be one of the few on this forum that'll stand up and say the first is leaps and bounds better than the second.

 

 

^ agree with this 100%.

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Tobias Reiper Newbie

Tobias Reiper

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Stay away from mods.

Why?

One: They CAN spoil the game in the descriptions and chances are you'll screw up and read it and then the surprises will be RUINED.

Two:Stay away from skins, even if they look pretty. Why? Chances are what they replace might have looked pretty if not prettier than what you downloaded.

Basically, DON'T YOU EVAR TYPE IN KOTOR2FILES.COM IN YOUR BROWSER, unless you beat the game.

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Darth Avlectus Newbie

Darth Avlectus

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FULLY PLAY KOTOR 1 FIRST! Play it out until you are tired of it, then add mods. When you tire of that, wait for your interest to pick back up to play TSL and I mean a *long* time until you are practically begging for a play through of it. K2...without saying so much, some conversations in it will vaguely spoil K1.

 

Stay away from Wikipedia as much as possible. IF you must install mods, do it for TSL: Obsidian's TSL 1.0b patch (actually a requirement) AND (unless your machine has XP hardware drivers like emachines or similar) vista fix. Possibly the standing and walking animation fix for both K1 and K2--that glitch does sorta get annoying. That and the Cyan lightsaber fix.

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kotornewbie Newbie

kotornewbie

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Thanks again for all the tips! Since I first started the game I've restarted 3 times and had to reinstall! OK, I admit it, I'm the idiot for not taking your advice cos I did install mods and I screwed up! Anyway, now I'm back to a clean install with a character I really like and I'm playing the first game with just the official patches and it's perfect.

 

Considering it came out in 2003, it doesn't seem that dated to me or maybe it's just because the gameplay is so engrossing and I'm very forgiving. I guess I was expecting the graphics to look terrible and with the widescreen fix they actually look pretty good, so I'm happy.

 

I am going to stay away from forums, but I'll still check in here and I'm not going to look at any walkthroughs or anything like that. The only thing I've been doing some reading on is character creation because I just want to start off on the right foot.

 

So, back to the game........:)

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