My praise and complaints about JKII

[Xenon812]

Firstly, it is a great game. I do like it, and so for that reason, I have some issues with it.

 

1. When trying to exit to the control panel, I have to hit the escape button 3 or 4 times for it to actually exit.

 

2. The save function is messed up. I WAS able to save, and name my save points, but once I got to 63 saves (yeah I save often), it would not accept any more names, it would rename it to "63" on it's own no matter what I tried. And then, if I tried to load the game at "63", it would take it back to the original savepoint "63" in the previous level, not the point I had tried to create. It irritates the crap out of me.

 

3. My main objection is this: Why must Raven and LucasArts assume that everyone who buys this game will have a 50 Ghz CPU with 20 Gigs of Ram, a SCSI 30,000 rpm 50 terrabyte hard drive with an atomic powered video card and a Holodeck? I don't have a bad machine (AMD K6-2 550 mhz, 512 Mb Ram, MSI Mobo w/Via chipset, GeForce2 MX card, 7200 RPM Quantum Fireball Hard drives, HP Sony Trinitron 21" Monitor), but I have to set the game up as if I were playing with a 1990 machine running Windows 1.0.

 

It is quite easy to tell when I am about to get ambushed by a flock of stormtroopers, because my machine almost collapses. No I am not ignorant about my comp, I have it tweaked to death with all the latest drivers, and am running it with 98% resources free. The worst is the outdoor terrain around the mines, especially at the beginning of Level 5 where I have to save the prisoners. And any time there are large numbers of people around, the vid and sound gets choppy.

 

Normally I would not complain about how they created this game, as of course we all WANT detail out the ass, we WANT to be blown away by the realism....but when I have to set ALL the control panel settings to the LOWEST possible just to make it 30 seconds into a level and get killed, that is where I draw the line.

 

I have Jedi Knight: Mysteries Of The Sith, and it plays flawlessly. Actually, since I tweaked this machine to death trying to get it to cope with JK II, it plays better than flawlessly.

So all this hoopla about being built on a Quake 3 engine is a load of crap in my opinion. Granted..MOTS is a 4 year old game, but if they can build a game like that that plays great on my machine, there is no reason why they could not have built JKII to do the same, Quake 3 engine or not. See, I WISH I had a 300 dollar video card, and a 2.1Ghz AMD CPU, etc., but on the other hand my machine is not what you would call primitive. It SHOULD play this game rather well, but it does not.

 

Yeah I know....WAAAAAAAAAAAH!...

 

Seems to me they tend to ignore your average comp owner who does not have a game-level machine.

 

I am pissed off about that, because I think the game is great! Lots of kewel characters, etc. Great graphics (from what I can tell), and the story line is pretty great. That is why I complained in the previous paragraphs, because I want it to play well on my machine, just like MOTS did.

 

A couple of other items...I felt that in the earlier levels, there were not enough health packs and armour available. And I wished I had some of the weapons from MOTS (the hand held rocket launcher and heavy machine gun specifically). That is a minor issue though. And the Jedi Temple, where Kyle has to go to get his Force powers back is a GREAT tutorial, for people who have never played a Star Wars game before, and have no experience with Force powers.

 

Lastly, and this is kinda silly...I just got to Level 6 tonight, "Bartenders & Garbagemen". The bar scene caused my comp to lag so bad, I used a cheat to switch into God mode. Only problem was, that after trying to force jump to a ledge from the anti-grav car, I missed the ledge and fell to the ground. Yes, there is a ground. Thing is, when you look down from the bar level, it simply appears dark down there. That is no lie...since I survived the fall, I spent almost an hour wandering around in the dark down there, hoping to find a way to get back up to the action levels. I used up all the power for my light amplification goggles, and I had to try to feel my way around in the dark. I could not see JACK!! And my light saber would not light up anything either! And all the while there were occasional green heads still sniping at me.

Of course I had tried to create a savepoint long before that, but it did not take. I could only go back to the most recent checkpoint, which turned out to be the beginning of the level. So yes, the save feature is not very good, to say the least.

 

That is it for my review of the game. I know it is a bit long winded, and a lot of it is just my opinion, but this is giving me incentive now to go buy a more powerful machine!

 

 

[seanconnery]

If the bar is that bad for you, you should the the swamp on Yavin.

When you fall and survive, enable cheats and use noclip to get yourself back up.

[Zagadka]

Hm, well, your 550 MHz K6-2 and GF2 MX, I'm afraid to comment, are hella outdated. A GHz mainboard with processor and GF3 are ~$150 each. Since you have a 21" monitor, I don't think that that is outside your budget. The GF2 MX, in fact, sucks ass. A GF2 GTS is light years beyond it - the nVidia MX cards aren't even the same architecture as they are numbered. A GF4 MX is a beefed up GF3. MX is one of the biggest scams in brand name computer hardware.

 

One thing a company considers, and I'm sure LA/Raven did: People can play old games all they want. People will be playing JK2 when it is considered an old game, and their systems will yawn at it. Hell, the Q3 engine is almost outdated now.

 

Anyway, JK2 is absolutely beautiful, for anyone who can run it, and that is a huge draw.

 

As for getting stuck down there, use "noclip" and fly back up.

[oldi1knoby]

Any time in the game you want to Auto-save hit F12(Default), and to get back to it hit F9(Default). When you hit FIRE after you die it will NOT take you back here, but to the last time the GAME saved for you(it does this at various checkpoints). Hope that helps..

 

 

About your system... I had almost the Exact same system a few months ago, and I have to say upgrading you Board and Processor is all you really need to make this run great(maybe RAM too). K6-2 Processors were very good in the 90's but come on, it's 2002! Go to http://www.Pricewatch.com and find you a MOBO+Processor 1gig Combo for DIRT CHEAP.. if you live in Mainland USA then it's a great deal(I live in Hawaii so Shipping costs outweigh the deals there so I buy locally)

 

Anyways Good luck, and don't expect a game made 4 years ago to run anything like one made now. There are people out there with 2.2 GIG machines.. Expect to upgrade at LEAST every 3 years or you will be stuck playing Duke Nukem and Doom....

[VaderJM]

oldi, no kidding? I live in hawaii too, what part are you in?

[arctic_series]

Originally posted by Xenon812

I don't have a bad machine (AMD K6-2 550 mhz, 512 Mb Ram, MSI Mobo w/Via chipset, GeForce2 MX card, 7200 RPM Quantum Fireball Hard drives, HP Sony Trinitron 21" Monitor), but I have to set the game up as if I were playing with a 1990 machine running Windows 1.0.

 

 

 

that is a rather pretty bad and outdated machine.

 

your cpu and your videocard is way too slow.

 

im running 1.33ghz athlon + geforce 3 ti200 and i still dip under 30 frames in multiplayer.

 

this is a new game, it's taxing. it doesn't expect everyone to have 50ghz machines, that's what the lower graphical settings are for. you shouldn't complain about the games specs when your system is too old but you try to run it at max detail anyway.

 

what does it mean ? system overmaul man

[Clicker666]

I hate to say it - but yes you need to upgrade. Mainstream video graphics technology is pushed by games. If you want to play the latest games you have to have the latest tech. Just the way it is.

 

I actually owned a GeForce 2 MX before buying my new GeForce 3 Ti200, and I think with my system it would have managed Jedi. But, I also have a PIII 800, 40 GB 7200 rpm HDD. and 512 megs RAM running on Windows XP Pro. I'm still using the same old Abit BH-6 board I've used since my Celeron 300A. I've incrementally upgraded parts as I've gone along. Max Payne indicated to me I needed a new CPU. RTCW told me if I wanted kick a** graphics then I would have to upgrade video.

 

If you want to play you have to pay. You are going to have to upgrade your CPU first and foremost. A K6-2 isn't going to keep up in very many new games. You can probably get more life out of your video card this way.

[StormHammer]

I'm sorry to hear about your problems, Xenon812...

 

I think the others are right that you need to at least upgrade your CPU, because the Official System Requirements recommend...

 

CPU: Pentium II or Athlon class 350 MHz or faster CPU required.

Pentium II or Athlon class 400 MHz or faster recommended for Multiplayer.

 

Your current processor seems to be below the recommended requirements.

 

3D Accelerator Card Required

16 MB OpenGL compatible PCI or AGP 3D Hardware Accelerator required.

A 100% OpenGL compatible 3D Accelerator is required. Supported chipsets at time of release.

 

ATI Radeon

ATI Radeon 7500/8500

ATI Rage 128

ATI Rage 128 Pro

Matrox G400

Matrox G450

Matrox G550

NVIDIA GeForce 256 family

NVIDIA GeForce 2 family

NVIDIA GeForce 3 family

NVIDIA RIVA TNT2 family

PowerVR Kyro

PowerVR Kyro II

 

I agree with the others that the MX cards are not very good in terms of performance. I have a GeForce 2 GTS/Pro with 32Mb DDR and an Athlon T-Bird 850Mhz with 256Mb SDRAM, and I'm running the game on high settings at 1024x768x32. I do see a drop in framerate in large open areas, but I haven't experienced any problems with the number of enemies on screen thus far. The cantina scene ran as smooth as ice - except for a a couple of skipped frames when I walked through the door into that area.

 

Turning on volumetric shadows is suicide, of course, so make sure they're switched off. I tried it for a while, but I had to turn it off again. Also, my system ran more smoothly on 16-bit - but I don't mind sacrificing the framerate for 32-bit. I'm also running on the Detonator 21.83 drivers, which have proven stable on my rig. I had tried to use a higher driver set, but experienced general problems, and dropped framerates in lots of games, so I switched back to 21.83 a while ago.

 

The only problem I have with savegames is trying to remember if I quick-saved after a checkpoint, or whether I have to load a manually saved game from the menu. I also keep forgetting to save before doing something silly, like attempting a long jump across a yawning abyss, or accidentally stepping on a trip mine I set earlier. Oh...and I encountered a weird bug when I accidentally tried to load a Quick Save after already starting to reload from the start of a level...for some reason it corrupted one of the saves, and I ended up with two Kyles, one inside the other, with two heads, four arms, etc... Totally weird.

 

I hope you can get your system problems sorted out, because it is a very good game.

[Xenon812]

Yes, I do need to upgrade my cpu and Mobo, in fact that is next on my list (need a case too...only have an AT case). Being unemployed, I am not sure when I will be able to do this though. However, I was willing to shell out for this game, and (don't get me wrong) I LOVE it! I will probably get through the game before I can upgrade, but I do look forward to the day when I can play it at full speed!

You guys are really cool in helping newbies to the PC gaming world like myself!

[Xenon812]

I was unaware of Price watch.com.

Went there, spent all evening doing research on mobos and cpus (instead of playing the game), and decided on my next purchase...an Asus A7A266-E and an Athlon 1.4 Ghz 266 FSB cpu.

 

Had a job interview today, looks good. Probably will be able to afford to get this stuff soon.

 

I look forward to this with great an..........

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ticipation!!!!

 

[MechDeus]

Honestly, I say the CPU should be first. You're running specs close to mine, and I'm fine (aside from the swamp levels, ugh), so that has to be most of it.

 

My specs:

800 mHz Duron

32 MB Radeon All-In-Wonder

30 GB 7200 RPM

19" monitor

Trackball Explorer (I love that thing)

 

I actually haven't turned off volumetric shadows, maybe I should...

[Cassiel_Blaize]

I'm running a GF2MX which has no problems whatsoever running with the details cranked up. I'll admit to using simple shadows, but that's about the only concession. I do, however, maintain that game requirements in general do not correlate to my system- I can run every game I own (which includes about half of the current new release chart) in full detail, but the beast throws a hissy-fit when I crank Ghost Recon above 640x480. JK2 is in my opinion one of the most system-friendly games I've played in quite a while.

 

-JH.

 

[edit]To recap on the rest of the system for the techies out there: T-Bird 1.4 processor, 256Megs (133 bus), 52x CD and less HD space than I would like.

[Chanke4252]

Why must Raven and LucasArts assume that everyone who buys this game will have a 50 Ghz CPU with 20 Gigs of Ram, a SCSI 30,000 rpm 50 terrabyte hard drive with an atomic powered video card and a Holodeck?

 

ROFLROFLROFL, sorry I just liked your description there.

 

 

 

Anyway, on the Geforce4 MX issue, it is not a beefed up GeForce3 as I do not believe it has the NFinite Engine (volumetric and other shadow effects). I believe that its a beefed up GeForce2 actually. Anyway, yes it is a scam, and you get what you pay for. If it costs 110 and has a name of a brand new card type on it, examine it closer.

[Wicket the Ewok]

I can't see why you're having so much trouble. I'm running a P3-500, TNT2 32meg Ultra, 384MB RAM and the game runs very smoothly at 800x600 in 16-bit colour and with detail on high.

 

Upgrading will solve all your problems but I'm sure you could get it to run smoothly without having to spend $300 to run a $40 game.

 

[Xenon812]

Well...the thing is..I am running a Microstar board that is 4-5 years old, runs at UDMA 33 (got a Promise UDMA 66 controller card) and the board itself is maxed out with my 550 CPU.

 

So...despite (and thanks for) all of your kind words concerning this, I ordered a new Asus Mobo yesterday, and am getting ready to make a phone call to order an Athlon 1.4 Ghz CPU.

 

I have upgraded everything I own in the past year EXCEPT the Mobo and CPU, so now is the time!

I found the 21" Trinitron (an HP 4033) at a computer show (used) for $175.

 

Surely this is going to be an improvement to my gaming experience, but I also need to upgrade to do some serious audio multi-track recording. Since I cannot afford to have the cutting edge stuff, I figure if I can keep up with HALF of what the cutting edge is, then I am doing ok. My new Mobo will handle up to slightly more than 1.5 Ghz cpu, has 3 slots for sdram (will handle up to 3 Gb) and 2 slots for ddr ram (will handle up to 1.5 Gb I believe). The Geforce2 MX I have is about 1/4 of the current 128 Mb cutting edge stuff.

 

Anyway, JO plays great at 600 X 800...really smooth, etc. The problem is? I like to play at full screen. Full screen on a 21" monitor at 1280 X 1024 resolution with all options on is what has been causing my problems. It is the outdoor scenes that cause most of my problems, especially when there is a lot of action.

 

Soon, though, my problems will be pretty much behind me as far as performance goes.

 

I am constantly in awe as to the details in this game. F**king unbelievable!!!

[Emon]

First of all, Raven doesn't design games for low end system users. People don't wanna play a game that looks like ****, which is why they give you the option to totally max out the graphics with textures above 512x512 (most are higher I noticed) and awesome looking models.

 

Your PC IS that bad, hate to tell you, but it is. 550 MHz is dog slow, especially when it's an old AMD K6, those weren't as good as the P2s (Athlons now are owning the P4 though). You may have lots of RAM, but a GF2 MX is pretty horrible.

 

You cannot possibly expect to run any games that look that good on max detail with your machine, and Raven cannot just press a button that magically lets you run an awesome looking game with full detail on a PC like yours. It just won't happen.

 

63 saves? I don't even think anyone is to blame for that, other than you. Delete your old saves from previous levels (maybe keep the one at the beginning or something), you don't need that many.

 

Hit escape three or four times? Man your PC must be SLOW.

 

 

 

I can't understand why people are so cynical about this game. It's not supposed to be some revoultionary new game that's going to change PC gaming, and it's graphics are definatly better than any other Q3 game there is right now..I don't understand why people DON'T like the graphics; they are awesome! Too many people are expecting new games to have revoultionary new, ground-breaking graphics like Doom 3 or Unreal 2. A game doesn't have to be ground-breaking to be good.

 

[/rant]

[]SD[MasterYoda]

Originally posted by Zagadka

A GF4 MX is a beefed up GF3.

 

sorry, a gf4 mx is about equal to a geforce 2 (yes i said TWO) TI

[bunnymud]

my only gripe is in the garbage collector level......those guys can see my tonail poke from behind a corner and shoot it off:mad:

[Xenon812]

I don't understand why people are cynical about the game either.

 

It Rules!

 

Yeah so I have a horrible machine.

 

Not for long!

 

[Lucky]

LOL, Emon, take it easy.

 

Xenon, there's been so much ridiculous trolling on the boards lately people tend to snap at anybody that either has a problem, a gripe or any negative opinion. I've been guilty of it myself.

 

Don't take it personally man, and GL with yer new job and yer new hardware =P

 

Hope to see yah playing multiplayer sometime in the near future.

 

 

Lucky

[Xenon812]

Thanks for the encouragement.

 

I am not too bothered by any of the statements made above. Sure some of my problems are caused by a primitive machine, but it could be worse...I could be some unfortunate soul trying to play on a 350 mhz machine with 64 meg of ram.

Then I would deserve to be called a moron for complaining.

 

I guess it is just that after playing MOTS with no problems, I expected the same from JKII, and was disappointed that my machine was not up to the task.

 

As I said...by this time next week I ought to have my new machine up and running.

 

I look forward to doing wacked out stuff like spawning a whole fleet of atst's and other things and causing them to do strange stuff.

I had thought about putting Desann in a room full of a hundred of those little carnivorous creatures found in the mines, among other things.

 

I finished this game last night. Due to time limitations, and the crudity of my PC, I went through some parts in god mode.

 

I must say Raven did a fantastic job with the saber effects.....towards the end I was looking forward to seriously murderizing Desann. Had so much fun fighting him I went back and did it again!

 

4 Thumbs up!!!