Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

 PC
User Score
9.0

Universal acclaim- based on 2309 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 2,104 out of 2309
  2. Mixed: 116 out of 2309
  3. Negative: 89 out of 2309
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  1. Dalek
    Dec 7, 2009
    7
    It was an ok game, but not my type. I hated how it just pushes you into the game and it seems confusing, they kind of seem like The Movies characters. This is like World of Warcraft except Star Wars style and it's free. But I like the dueling arena and how you can go into peoples 'apartments' and steal their stuff. Evil or good?
  2. HashamA.
    Dec 21, 2003
    7
    Very little can be faulted about this game in terms of gameplay or storyline. The voice acting in particular is truly genuine. However, due to the massive amount of bugs in this game it can be incredibly frustrating. If i said a crash every five minutes (at certain points in the game, not throughout) I would not be exaggerating. Having said that I eagerly await KOTOR 2 (and sincerely hope Very little can be faulted about this game in terms of gameplay or storyline. The voice acting in particular is truly genuine. However, due to the massive amount of bugs in this game it can be incredibly frustrating. If i said a crash every five minutes (at certain points in the game, not throughout) I would not be exaggerating. Having said that I eagerly await KOTOR 2 (and sincerely hope they release something stable this time round).… Expand
  3. roboticsun
    Oct 7, 2011
    7
    I have to say it first this is not my type of game. I appreciated Bioware creating such a great story and awesome characters after the absolutely dull neverwinter nights, but the gameplay of this game is really bad. The problem I have mostly lies in the combat system. I've played D&D based games, so I understand this kind of RPG system however the combat in this game is boring,I have to say it first this is not my type of game. I appreciated Bioware creating such a great story and awesome characters after the absolutely dull neverwinter nights, but the gameplay of this game is really bad. The problem I have mostly lies in the combat system. I've played D&D based games, so I understand this kind of RPG system however the combat in this game is boring, repetative, slow and unrealistic. You end up selecting attack actions, and waiting for your character to do them over and over again. On the good side though this is an extensive role playing story line with a real cool light side/dark side choice system in place that lets you really develop a character.… Expand
  4. mrnice
    Nov 8, 2012
    7
    Good epic. It fills a lot of its time with combat, fetch quests and walking from A to B, so it cannot reach the highest game rating. But the story and the use of the license are outstanding and worth 10$ and 10 hours. But in my eyes not worth the 40-50 hours for campaign completion. It felt like transportation and fetching made up at least 20% of the game. That's about 10 hours of yourGood epic. It fills a lot of its time with combat, fetch quests and walking from A to B, so it cannot reach the highest game rating. But the story and the use of the license are outstanding and worth 10$ and 10 hours. But in my eyes not worth the 40-50 hours for campaign completion. It felt like transportation and fetching made up at least 20% of the game. That's about 10 hours of your time spent taking a virtual character from one side of a map to the other. Not deeply stimulating or exciting.… Expand
  5. timt
    Apr 14, 2014
    5
    It is 2014 and frankly this game is showing its age. Not only are the graphics dated, even the story, dialogue which many praise falls flat for the most part.
  6. Marc
    Mar 21, 2004
    7
    Awkward control and pretty clunky graphics detract from an otherwise sound and deep game. Not a big Star Wars fan...so the story bored me too.
  7. PrincessRose
    Jan 18, 2015
    5
    Even though it is an old game I decided to buy it as it received such praise and a high rating.

    I know KOTOR is an old game, I liked the Star Wars movies and enjoyed watching them, but have never been a rabid fan. My screen is 1920x1080, but there was no option for wide screen with 1280x1024 being the widest option with not even an option to play in windowed mode. I know the    Even though it is an old game I decided to buy it as it received such praise and a high rating.

    I know KOTOR is an old game, I liked the Star Wars movies and enjoyed watching them, but have never been a rabid fan.

    My screen is 1920x1080, but there was no option for wide screen with 1280x1024 being the widest option with not even an option to play in windowed mode.

    I know the graphics are old and don't look that good as it is, but the game looks even more terrible since I can't optomise the screen.

    Characters end up looking squashed, short and wierdly wide looking. Can't even customise how my character looks. Only get to choose out of several faces, a face I like best. Doesn't even give you minor choice of choosing hair or eye colour.

    Combat is boring. With a bug that sometimes after battle my character end ups frozen not able to move unless I reload. As well as occasional crashing, though the game only crashed around half a dozen times. I did not have any problems getting the game to run, I have windows 7 64 bit and my PC is only 3 years old.

    Quests are rather dull and unimaginative, mostly just fetch this or kill that.
    With a lot of endless walking down boring corridors.

    The game is sort of alright. Though Overhyped. To me it's not as good as most make out.
    There are heaps better more enjoyable RPG's out there, that aren't so flawed.

    The awesome story, imaginative deep star wars Universe and interesting characters is the only thing for me that makes this game worth playing.

    WARNING SPOILERS:

    Also in the last battle I did not have any offensive force powers, only support powers. As I made my character support and the other jedi's in my party more offensive. I did not realise this would be a bad thing till I got to the last boss.

    So since you can only fight Malak solo and he leeches health from the jedi trapped in the tanks every time I damage him, is annoying as the only way to destroy the tanks is with offensive force powers which I do not have, so this made the battle very long, frustrating and drawn out. I don't want to start the game again and don't have any previous saves. I just used master speed to run away and avoid him and lay down mines, so he gets damaged a bit then drains a tank to heal, kept doing that until he drained all tanks before facing him so the fight would be more fair.

    Then fought him with light sabre and master speed and healing, use stimulants and then run off when my force energy gets low and keep running until it replenishes and repeat until he goes down, it took quite a while though and finally managed to beat him and complete the game and get a rather dull game ending.

    I was originally going to rate the game a 7 but because of the game punishing you if you chose no offensive powers with no other way to destroy the tanks and no respec if you made a mistake which I did not realise would happen as I wanted to play as a support class, seems very flawed and seems to make it that you can only beat the game best as a soldier. This game is way too old and flawed to recomend anymore.    … Expand
  8. rastec
    Dec 30, 2015
    5
    I finished it but... it wasn't what I expected from the game with so many good opinions.
    My main complaint is about user interface and the way how we manage our character inventory and skills. Simply it was cumbersome for me. I have discovered also that I don't like RPG games without really open world. And here you won't find such...
    But still you can give it a try :)
  9. Zarniwooop
    Mar 5, 2014
    7
    A good story, but its just shy of passive entertainment.

    This was (for me) the beginning of the end of Bioware as a great RPG-maker. Baldur's Gate 2 is their final epic masterpiece. This was a good story, with prototype-level gameplay. When I was told about it by colleagues (console players), I expected the greatest game experience of my life. I was stunned to see how pathetic the    A good story, but its just shy of passive entertainment.

    This was (for me) the beginning of the end of Bioware as a great RPG-maker. Baldur's Gate 2 is their final epic masterpiece.

    This was a good story, with prototype-level gameplay. When I was told about it by colleagues (console players), I expected the greatest game experience of my life. I was stunned to see how pathetic the gameplay was and how great the story was.

    No doubt about it, its one of the most wonderful stories ever made into a game. And one of the most awful "games" ever made from a gameplay standpoint. I'll move it a bump over average based on the excellent story, but regardless of how much this generation enjoys passive entertainment, this game began a downward spiral in RPG gameplay that ruined the genre for almost a decade (with a few notable exceptions).    … Expand
  10. WilliamD.
    Nov 20, 2003
    6
    "The game's interface has been completely re-done for the PC." Lies. Where are the windows like in NWN? Did you guys know that the inventory/character screen/journal are all part of the same full-screen window and you have to use tabs to move around. You can't see all of those screens at once in "windowed transparent" mode nooo, that would be too hard to do. It gets better... I "The game's interface has been completely re-done for the PC." Lies. Where are the windows like in NWN? Did you guys know that the inventory/character screen/journal are all part of the same full-screen window and you have to use tabs to move around. You can't see all of those screens at once in "windowed transparent" mode nooo, that would be too hard to do. It gets better... I play at 1600x1200 and the inventory menu only takes up a quarter of the screen instead of stretching. Pure genius. "I've found that, so long as I equip my character's properly, I'm not using the pause functionality all that much." That's not a good thing... combat is supposed to have variety, a strategy of executing the right moves at the right time, and so far the only thing I see myself doing is changing to melee weapons when the enemy gets in point blank range of one of my party members. "While I haven't yet reached Jedi status, the atmosphere of the game manages to capture that 'Star Wars' magic than many other recent LucasArts games." Hmm, now should I buy a "Blaster" or a "Heavy Blaster?" What happened to the custom names that they have for armor or grenades (Cryoban Grenade sounds a lot better then Blaster to me). And of course there is also the fact that Darth Malak is completely made up -- Exar Kun led the Sith Insurrection of 4000 PBY. But why use something that was already beatifully created when they could make something absurd up? "it's that many of the models look similar to one another" Hmm, maybe it's because unlike many 2 year old RPGs or even the most recent Star Wars Galaxies you can't customize your face, AT ALL? You can't change your hair, or your hair color, or your ears, or anything like that. You choose a preset model and that's it. "Still, this may change once I escape from Taris and can travel to other worlds." Don't bet on it. "The new content and the PC-specific interface make Knights of the Old Republic feel like it was designed for the PC all along." Feels like an Xbox game with an Xbox interface to me. Why? Besides the facts already mentioned, you're also locked into "third person chasecam" whereas in Neverwinter Nights there was at least 3 perspectives you could play from, including the "Top down cam" that's missing in this game. To anyone wondering why I am mentioning Neverwinter Nights, it's because a) KOTOR uses the same engine (looks to be modified though), and b) the same company made KOTOR as NWN (BioWare). Of course there's a whole bunch of other things that Allen forgot to mention, but he probably didn't want to (Allen, did LucasArts buy you out?). Sadly, these are noticeable in the first hour of the game: There are only 3 classes (and 3 jedi classes which you can't unlock until far far into the game). As compared to NWN's 11. Sure, it's Star Wars, but Star Wars Galaxies has 20+ professions and at least 6-8 combat professions. You can only be human. Thought you could be one of those Twi'leks or Wookies? Well too bad, you can't even choose your race (NWN had 8). That's sad, because even in Jedi Academy there are 6 races you could choose from and that's an FPS. Maybe devs were too lazy to change some of the dialogue options... Haha! Pazaak? (Allen mispelled it as Pazzak) I wanted Sabacc...! This is a sad ripoff of Blackjack, playing like Blackjack except that you play up to 20 points, 3 rounds, and get a hand of 4 bonus cards that will lower or raise your total points per game. Like I already said, they didn't include Sabacc (and that's stupid too, because there is a free sabacc game out there so they wouldn't need to make up any rules). What about Dejarik (the chess game on Millennium Falcon) for playing with on interplanetary travels? Hahaha! In your dreams, KOTOR doesn't have this either. [Edit] Forgot to mention there is no multiplayer at all. Haha. Nor a construction set/module editor. Nor a 220 page manual (it's only ~75).… Expand
  11. p360assassin
    Mar 14, 2013
    7
    Now I am not gonna say its the best game ever made, it really isn't, its a good game, but nothing incredible. The story is decent, aside from the big twist (which I won't spoil, but is literally the greatest twist ever in a video game, and I mean that, its better then the Spec Ops The Line twist, the To The Moon twist, the black ops twist, seriously, its amazing) the story is a standardNow I am not gonna say its the best game ever made, it really isn't, its a good game, but nothing incredible. The story is decent, aside from the big twist (which I won't spoil, but is literally the greatest twist ever in a video game, and I mean that, its better then the Spec Ops The Line twist, the To The Moon twist, the black ops twist, seriously, its amazing) the story is a standard good vs evil, which compared to the sequels awesome shades of grey comparison of the different sides to the force, its nothing special. It runs fine on Windows 7 after some tinkering (its nowhere near as hard to get running as KoToR 2). The combat is ok, most people insulting the game seem to be because they were expecting an action shooter with melee combat. In reality, its a simplified D&D turn based RPG (yes, it has a under the bonnet D20 rolling your hit chances) with a small party of 3. The graphics are bearable modern day, and were nothing special when they came out. The animations in combat are incredible, with the enemy actually moving to parry attacks and attempt to block enemy shots, instead of just standing still when the enemy attacks, but outside of combat, it gets pretty meh, sometimes falling to bethesda level bad. It has a good amount of gameplay despite almost being linear (24 hours). You do have choices, but rarely do you get the best kind of choice where both options have significant downsides and upsides, making the choice difficult. The skills are ok, although security is completely useless (you can break every storage container open without breaking items inside like in the sequel). Jedi powers are powerful...if your character is completely based around them which can cause early game to be an ass since your not a jedi at the start. Even the immune to force final boss can have his immunity nuetralized. There is some character development, but it is nowhere near at the level of Bioware's later series Mass Effect. In summary, its a good game, but its nothings special. I do recomend it tho, since that twist is in fact something special, and you don't get the same shock value if you just look it up. (Seriously, its one of those incredible twists where its both completely unexpected, even tho the game CONSTANTLY hinted on it)… Expand
  12. shotcaller1
    Jan 12, 2013
    5
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. I am just a novice game player, but I enjoy it and play often. This game, while very intriguing and attractive in most senses, has a few MAJOR flaws. In the early game stages, information is difficult to come by and money to support the characters during the quests is next to impossible to acquire, making the game somewhat boring at times. I want to play the game not some stupid card game that you've got approx. 40-50% of winning, and the stakes are too low to be of much interest anyway. Or swoop bike racing that you can't beat the lowest time and dump 1000 credits trying . The money should be easier to come by without having to turn to the dark side and murdering people for it. Thats only the beginning of the problems. Sometime the characters just stand there while being mauled by a gang of sand people or other creatures that wind up killing your party before a light saber or blaster can be drawn. Something is wrong with the game command interface. Great story and respectable graphics, but the glitches and continuity are not very good, in my opinion.… Expand
  13. Absynce
    Feb 25, 2015
    7
    was a great game good story, somewhat clunky mechanics but worth your time. I spent a lot of time doing side quests and reading about things, worth your time.
  14. hulmej
    Aug 22, 2015
    7
    I thought this game was very good but I encountered many glitches playing this game like getting stuck and not being able to move and the game kept always returning to the desktop just before playing a cut scene which was frustrating.
  15. Voyou
    May 20, 2016
    5
    This RPG does a few thing right. One of them I will mention for its rarity: Companions fight as you expect, and are useful in autonomous mode (very useful in the case of the wookie, if you give him a sword.) I usually don't care about companions' AI since I always turn it off and manage individuals individually. A habit I probably caught in the old days of unreliable scripts. Here, becauseThis RPG does a few thing right. One of them I will mention for its rarity: Companions fight as you expect, and are useful in autonomous mode (very useful in the case of the wookie, if you give him a sword.) I usually don't care about companions' AI since I always turn it off and manage individuals individually. A habit I probably caught in the old days of unreliable scripts. Here, because of the 1st person view, I rarely switched to control a NPC directly, and letting them free worked just fine.

    What isn't so fine is the narrative. This RPG is based on a movie for the 12 yo, so it's not surprising that the game is for the 12 yo as well. It didn't have to be, but that's not the problem, and I won't blame the game for that. Still, everything is shoehorned, and rather unimaginative. Like in all bad SF, entire planets are described as a uniform landscape and biosphere. In my country, each of them would fit in a 100 square kilometres area. In a planet-sized city, your game map is limited to a handful of corridors.

    Like in all bad SF, aliens are not alien at all. They all behave like Americans, but with foreign accents, like Russian or Japanese. The alien languages, also very terrestrial sounding, are particularly annoying, and fail at being immersive. I don't expect much work on the construction of a language, but at least some consistency. Here, you won't even find a pattern after hearing one for hours: On the extreme contrary, you'll hear the exact same bollocks phrase, repeated over and over, on each different line of a dialogue, each time of course translated completely differently in the subtitles. Awful.

    Mechanics are generally poor.
    - My main character is maxed in every skill, while each of my companions knows only 1 skill, and is not as good as me. You can blame the ridiculously low number of skills if you like.
    - You can sneak, but only in solo mode.
    - And people shoot you as soon as you become visible. Before (yes, before) you strike.
    - Of course, scripted events keep taking you out of sneak mode at their leisure, because RPGs don't like RPG players.
    - Most doors are impervious to your maximised lockpicking skills.
    - Hacking computers or repairing robots costs more and is less rewarding than fighting, because RPGs are meant for barbarians.
    - Switching from a pistol to a sword takes about 7 minutes.
    - Your companions constantly block your way out of rooms.
    - Etc. You know the drill.

    But you know what I really hated ? KOTOR defecates on all your choices after a few hours, and forces you to becomes that thing with the most ridiculous name you could ever call someone: a padawan. And I don't mean that the bunch of patronising twits you are brought to meet, those Charlemagne paladin ripoffs, force you to become one of them by way of a severe beating, or blackmail, or bribes, no, I mean that the dialogue doesn't even leave you the option to say no, let alone **** off.

    Imagine if BG or PS:T let you play your own build for a while, then suddenly forced you into the most boring and unappealing fantasy class ever: the paladin. Well that is exactly what KOTOR does. Proving once again that most RPGs are not meant for RPG players. I tried for a bit, it was as I expected: my skill progression was over, my skill points gone, my strengths obsolete, in one word my heart wasn't in it anymore. Uninstall, delete, bury, forget.

    Still, unlike me, you might enjoy this game, and because of its clichés. It's a mixed bag of flaws and qualities, but not nearly as bad as most of the overrated RPGs reviewed on this site. On the other hand, it often feels like Deus Ex, but not nearly as good as Deus Ex.    … Expand
  16. BerserkSM
    Jan 15, 2016
    7
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  17. DrYellowJacket
    Dec 4, 2016
    5
    Not nearly as good as everyone says and does not hold up to the standards of today. The story is great but the games play is slow and boring. A traditional RPG or even an MMORPG battle system would greatly improve the experience for me.
  18. Vanco
    Jun 4, 2019
    6
    Excellent story, but gameplay is not as engaging. Graphics did not age well.
  19. Traxillion
    Jan 12, 2021
    7
    Despite being a great game even now there are too many features in the game that just do not pass the test of time.

    Still highly recommended for every RPG fan out there, just not masterpiece status.

Awards & Rankings

2
#2 Best PC Game of 2003
1
#1 Most Discussed PC Game of 2003
2
#2 Most Shared PC Game of 2003

Critic Reviews

All reviews »
Metascore
93

Universal acclaim - based on 33 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 33 out of 33
  2. Mixed: 0 out of 33
  3. Negative: 0 out of 33
  1. Game Informer
    95
    The level of control that you have over your characters' actions is truly remarkable... Simply put, this is the best thing to happen to Star Wars since the original trilogy. [Feb 2004, p.112]
  2. Total Video Games
    90
    This is a class act that builds and extends the Star Wars game franchise and PC gamers are getting something their kindred XBOX owners loved to bits and will not be disappointed in any way.
    Read full review
  3. GameZone
    95
    It offers some pretty fundamental improvements over the Xbox version and stands as one of the best PC RPGs out there.
    Read full review
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