The first Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic was a masterpiece. It should be honored as a great RPG as well as a testament that video games based on film franchises are not all that bad. With that said; Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 2 the Sith Lords surely did not live up to its predecessor and could have been better. Kotor 2 revolves around the Jedi “exile” and his/her mission to either save the remaining Jedi in the galaxy or destroy them. While Kotor 2 did have slightly better graphics and more fighting moves; it just did not have the heart of the original.

Yes, lightsabers and Jedi always seem like a good idea, but who else remembers Episode 1?

Kotor 2’s first pitfall was the story, it just couldn’t match up with the original Kotor’s storyline and it made the game feel less appealing. And that’s a tough act to follow considering that Kotor had one of the biggest surprises in gaming history (spoiler alert: you play as the amnesia ridden Sith lord Revan) and the story was also backed up by a devious galaxy wide conquest by Sith lord Malak and the race to find the Star Map in order to stop the destruction of the Republic, all in the grand tradition of an epic Star Wars plot. Kotor 2’s plot and characters just couldn’t match up to its predecessor cause there felt like there was no sense of urgency. Kotor 2 also could not match up with the plucky band of heroes from the first game as it tried to strike gold with the same trick twice of having 2 returning characters, HK-47 and Mandalore, but the other characters seemed so un-refreshing when compared to the likes of the originals such as the stern but beautiful Bastilla, curmudgeonly Jolee Bindo, and T3-M4 the resident lovable astromech droid. Kotor 2’s characters just seem like a bit of a cop out considering 3 of the characters are re-used. Also, almost everyone on your party in Kotor 2 is force sensitive and it really takes out the mystery and excitement that the first game had of having to battle with blasters. Kotor 2 felt like it had less variety and tried to hard to make Jedi/ force sensitive beings abundant, which is ironic since the game is about the near eradication of the Jedi.

The original Knights of the Old Republic had some bigs shoes to fill, and part two just didn't fill the void

All of the story or character problems pale in comparison to the real problem of Kotor 2 and that is the fact that it was rushed and incomplete. One obvious example is the final level of the game, Malachor V, should have been a difficult level for the Jedi Exile to fight through (much like the difficult Star Forge battle in the original Kotor) but instead it seemed too easy. While I understand that by the end of the game, the Jedi Exile should be very powerful; it would have been nice to have the final boss put up a better fight like Malak from the first game. It seemed too easy to be a final fight and to make matters worse; the final boss of the game (spoiler alert: it’s Kreia, your mentor) basically spells out the fates of all of your companions instead of having an epic end game cut-scene where the destinies of the other characters unravel. Instead, we are treated to the wise old Kreia, with her questionable methods, simply saying what will happen to all of the characters in a very anti-climactic fashion. Yes, closure is great, but I’d rather not have a decaying Sith narrate the future instead of a grand ending and cut-scene.

Let's just keep our hopes high for Knights of the Old Republic 3

We at G3 believe that there are just some things in life that do not live up to expectations, like meeting your childhood hero, or having White Castle hamburgers for the first time and the expectations are shattered mostly due to the hype or excitement. The same could be said about Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic 2 the Sith Lords mostly because it was unfortunate enough to follow such a great game that literally threw the curve for future RPGs and Star Wars games.