izigame.me

NOTE: This review is of the Restored Content version of the game, which to be frank, is the version that everyone must play. There's not ifs and buts to this, the "vanilla" version is just unfinished, plain and simple.
Sometimes I replay Kotor 1 because it has that fun "A New Hope" sense of Stars War adventure and silly tropey stuff, and one of the plot twists totally recontextualises almost everything on repeat playthroughs, but it's not super deep.
With Kotor 2 I just keep discovering these little tidbits that make me go "dang, how did I not notice this before" because the writing structure is just completely different.
It's all thematic and character focused as opposed to plot-driven, but the plot is still very complex and consists pretty much of nothing but galactic power players stacking gambit on top of gambit, all of them revolving around *you*, the player, and what your character has done nigh-on a decade ago. It's very much a "personal epic" — the plot events are massive, galaxy-defining, and yet none if it matters as much as your own journey of self-discovery, a journey of coming to terms with your past, your past deeds, and the main hurdle to overcome here is whether or not you can live with yourself, with what you've done, and who you are.
Granted it kind of doomed the game from a popularity perspective because it was all so ambitious and uncompromising — and that, in part, alongside LucasArts meddling, pretty much made it inevitable that the project will never rise above a "cult classic" status. A real "what could have been" type situation, but in the end KotOR 2 being a beautiful, flawed gem of a game ended up killing the idea of KotOR the series. In a way, it's appropriate.
Admittedly putting the pieces of the plot together and figuring out character motivations can be frustrating and confusing, and the limited development cycle and the budget allocated to this game meant that a lot of the more ambitious plot and character hooks end up being presented in a very undynamic form, especially compared to KotOR 1. However I found that in a way it contributed to the overall feeling of isolation and alienation that permeates the game: your character cut yourself off from everything that binds them to the world in an effort to avoid hurting others, and being hurt again.
The light side run is in the end, a story about overcoming trauma and learning how to open up to others.
One of the nifty ways Obsidian managed to write bits of Star Wars lore into that theme and use it for plot purposes, is how the Jedi Council in their reclusive dogmatism, lost their connection with their humanity.
The Jedi Exile is the most "human" of these Jedi because they were compelled to join the war effort because they could not stand idly by while others suffer.
And the simple ability to build camaraderie with their troops, other beings, and connect with them on a personal level, presented by the lore explanation of "force bonds", was what caused them to break during the pivotal battle of the Mandalorian wars — the experience of feeling every single life being extinguished there, especially those with whom they served, whose lives they held in the palm of their hand as their leader — someone they looked up to.
However that is just a nifty nerdy lore way of writing a character in terms of what you need for the plot.
Thematically however, it's just a representation of how any real person would feel after witnessing, participating in, or surviving an atrocity. Or tragedy. Or personal loss. Trauma. Getting into a fight where you get badly injured, surviving a car crash, getting bullied as a kid. Being alienated because of who you are, because of something you have no control over. The Exile is all that rolled into one package, and them being a war veteran that went through some of the most horrific battles of said war is just a compelling plot hook.
Probably one of the best "blank slate" protagonists ever created for an RPG, and one of the most cleverly-written protagonists in RPG history.
This game blew my mind when I was twelve years old and I barely understood it at the time, but it *felt* different to any other game I've played, and it still managed to resonate with me on an emotional level. Revisiting it now as a grown adult made that connection even more personal and deep. It is a sad, melancholy game exploring sad, melancholy themes, with quite a few of them hitting at times uncomfortably close to home, and it's not something many would expect from a Star Wars game of all things — but if anything it makes it that much more impressive that the writers of this game found a way to work with a setting defined by its Light/Dark dichotomy, and make it feel *complex* and real.
It's janky, outdated, the gameplay is simplistic, the AI is braindead, and overall the game's bugged to all hell. But this game conquered a chunk of my heart and called it home. Playing it was like reading a novel.
It may require one to reside in a particular mental place during a particular period of their lives to really feel connected to this game, and if you are, then I am sorry that you have been forced to go through that kind of thing. That said, trust me: it gets better. If nothing else, one can always carry on and see what's next in store, if only out of morbid curiousity.
"When one endures, it gives hope to others — and themselves."
— Jedi Exile.