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View Full Version : My Next Gen Xbox2 Game Idea, KOTOR based.



Nath5000
03-15-2004, 10:03 AM
Ok I originally posed this on Teamxbox in a very old thread in a non-visited section of the forum, and didn't get any responses. This website is canadian (I think) so I might get cooler responses(or any response hopefully).

Some people have been mentioning that they want "Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 2" to have a new story based on the classic star wars movies and make it Knights of the New Republic. I don't know about a "New Republic" game personally. I liked how this game was seperate from the "Luke Skywalker Phase" of Star Wars, not because that phase was bad, but only because it's been so overdone (Milked to the bone). I definetly liked how it was seperate from "Jar Jar Phase" as most people probably do, but my KOTOR ideas aren't "Old Republic" or "New Republic" contingent per se, its more like a general idea for games, but KOTOR is the closest game to it. KOTOR was after all, Game of the Year. I say let the story makers make good stories and then theres my ideas.

First of all Star Wars:Knights of the Old Republic was an amazing game. Of course the RPGesque system may have seemed complicated and inaccessible to many mainstream players (like my cousin, a born and raised SW fan who never caught on to KOTOR), but overall it told a good story, made it interactive and kept the story interesting at the same time and tastfully implemented the action element to that mix (instead of basing the entire game on action based enjoyment like most games today). Overall Knights of the Old Republic, while it may be an RPG, it does RPG a lot better.
Enough Praising though.

While I was playing through KOTOR for the third time on my xbox, I thought of what even an "Xbox2" graphic level KOTOR would be like, you know, with better animations, (like half life 2 level physics maybe and lip synching quality) also with a "Doom3" style gfx engine and lighting in a KOTOR engine game, that was a nice thought.
Ive never played KOTOR for PC but I'm sure playing with antialiasing on a high resolution screen (graphics card permitting of course(meaning $500 later)) would be amazing. I like everyone else am a sucker for graphics and always have been, im the guy who gets yelled at by his friends who say "Theres more to a game then graphics man, it's all about gameplay." For Next Generation console/PC games, I personally hope theres more then graphics on the horizon. Heres my idea for a KOTOR 2:

Beyond those nearsighted and probable qualities (better graphics and physics) that KOTOR 2 (if made) will most likely have, I think that more next generation "stuff(meaning other then graphics and physics) can be done or at least a more visionary approach to next gen games can be taken.

Imagine KOTOR in a online setting, no im not saying MMORPG, (definetly not). Keep KOTOR in tact, keep the non playable characters which drive the story, keep the voice acting and so on. Make it so your team can be made up of your buddies over Xbox Live (maybe higher internet bandwidth in the future will allow this). I'm really only talking like 3 or 4 people playing on one server. But anyways, picture KOTOR, but your team is your friends, and when they talk, the voice goes out through the TV (more specifically surround sound) relative to their place in the game environment, just as the voice comes out of NPCs.
Then when interacting with NPC players make it so that simple commands such as "yes" and "no" can be said using voice recognition. More difficult commands should be perscribed. What I mean is, lets say you have the option to say "Sentance A" or "Sentance B", you would have to read the sentance out to the NPC and they will understand using voice recognition (next gen Processing capability will surely allow this as Dragon Naturally Speaking for PC is able to write sentaces from talking into the microphone today!)

So this is the whole picture, Kotor, online with 3 other people, Vast story and NPC's still in tact, you communicate with your team through the game world sounds (as opposed to through a tvvoice channel or headset) and you also communicate with NPCs using voice recognition. That way, when your team mate talks to an NPC and chooses the path of saying "Sure, I will be glad to run across the desert again to get you your spice" instead of saying "You will die!" you can stand there as his team mate and say to the npc and him as well "What the heck are you talking about, this guys dead, I'm not running back" and then the battle starts, and your friend will either be happy with the outcome or say "What the hell did you do that for, followed by a "cheating and lewdness" xbox live feedback deployment (ok all except for the last part.

Plus on top of that, imagine all the shiny Doom3/Half-Life2 and beyond physics and graphics and you've got yourself a next gen game worth more then good screen shots. And really if that technological feat is possible then why not apply it to other genres? "Team Based Voice through player to player/player to NPC interaction over an online network" could be implemented into other genres making them more rich and more social and interesting, Imagine Halo3, or maybe even a rebirth of the adventure genre us long time PC gamers remember from the early 90's?

Far Fetched? Well I've thought of way more far fetched games, and this is one of the few ideas that I've had that sounds feasible and possibly realistic for a future game that will innovate current genres and amaze us all once again as games like KOTOR have done on their pre-existing genres.

Anyways, I don't know if that made any sense, but I like it. and if I made games, I'd make that one. Just gotta finish university and see what I can do with an MBA or Business degree lol, which is nothing relating to that idea I just came up with anyways. So what do you people (meaning anyone who took the time to read my monstrousity of a post) think? I was gonna make my own thread, but I figured I'd just add to other peoples that were similar as there are probably already many threads like this one.

Edit: I just remembered that Lucasarts cancelled Sam and Max 2, So I highly doubt that they'll ever make something this creative. However there's still much much hope for Bioware, great company.

-Nath5000

Hard Boiled Cop
03-15-2004, 10:26 AM
Wow it seems as though you have put alot of thought into this. I mean most of your ideas are more than fantastic which gave me some ideas of my own. Anyway I don't think it will be made for the next gen consoles however the graphics and lighting effects could be used fully to the xbox's capabilities. And the story may not be the same without Bioware making KOTOR2. It wouldn't really be the same but at least they are handing it over to somebody who are close to the team. I really do hope that KOTOR2 will have real time fighting system. I didn't like the turnbase/real time fighting in no.1.

Nath5000
03-15-2004, 10:59 AM
Originally posted by Hard Boiled Cop
Wow it seems as though you have put alot of thought into this. I mean most of your ideas are more than fantastic which gave me some ideas of my own. Anyway I don't think it will be made for the next gen consoles however the graphics and lighting effects could be used fully to the xbox's capabilities. And the story may not be the same without Bioware making KOTOR2. It wouldn't really be the same but at least they are handing it over to somebody who are close to the team. I really do hope that KOTOR2 will have real time fighting system. I didn't like the turnbase/real time fighting in no.1.

Thanks, Id really like to hear everyone elses ideas as well. About the turn based fighting, well yeah, thats where it gets its RPG roots, but its also kind of what seperates the game from others such as Jedi Knight II, Realtime fighting (such as in JKII) could be a good feature to implement if done properly. When developers decide to make the game action based, or implement action, it usually overtakes the rest of the game and they feel that they can sell the game for its fun shooting element and usually leave out everything that made KOTOR good.

Stagliano
03-15-2004, 05:58 PM
If you were playing it online, with a party of friends, it would work to have pure real-time fighting. You could rely upon other humans (hopefully) more than AI to make quick decisions which are best for the team.

The premise of playing it online as a party is one I've thought would be a boon for games too. It's kind of like the way Phantasy Star Online works only considerably more advanced, I suppose.

To actually be able to make your way through a game's story with a group of people would be good. To date, any game you seem to be able to play co-op online doesn't have much of a flowing story. I guess the makers think it's asking a bit much to have the same groups of people available at the same time long enough to play through a decent sized game. Then again, it could be broken down into game sections and each of these smaller parts of the big picture could be played individually too. Sorry if that was a muddled babble.

Well, that's my tuppence worth. Sorry it was a bit of a garbled mess but it's probably better than if I had just written 'KOTOR rocks! or something like that.

Nath5000
03-15-2004, 06:23 PM
no no, that was good. lol

yeah PSO or even True Fantasy Live are all MMORPGs though, and those often have very weak stories, and are nowhere near KOTOR. Up until the makers of FABLE announced the cancellation of multiplayer FABLE features, i thought that they were in fact going to make this dream game of mine, but without the voice recognition part most likely. I still think it will be a great innovative game though. Just not what it could have been. KOTOR is more approachable though because its star wars.

Shadow20002
03-15-2004, 06:55 PM
Great...

Nath5000
03-15-2004, 09:07 PM
great...??? :watchout:

Stagliano
03-16-2004, 08:27 AM
I didn't even know Fable was supposed to have had an online multiplayer element until I read it had been cancelled. It's a shame they had to. It could have been a superb part of the game.

MikeMan91389
03-17-2004, 03:32 PM
heh, i just found out now! i just figured they werent gunna do it....


sweet ideas man..... u took time on those!