PoetLorien
2004
The single most well-paced video game ever created. Valve have said that they only make these games when they feel as though they can push the industry forward with them, and while press at the time was focused on the physics (and more importantly, the sterling facial animations), HL2's real legacy is that pacing, how Valve prove themselves masters of every conceivable type of shooter.
The intro levels are the first game, reborn. Then we do survival horror in Ravenholm, post apocalyptic shooters on the Coast, sci-fi corridor shooters in Nova Prospekt, modern squad-based military games in the uprising levels, and then something entirely new in the Citadel itself. Each area full of little crescendos and climaxes, all perfectly spaced. It's a game I have played more than 10 times, a game I know as well as some books, and yet I'm still thoroughly excited by all the big setpieces, still thoroughly engaged by Kelly Bailey's terrific score, still thrilled and excited by every single second of this masterful experience.
The intro levels are the first game, reborn. Then we do survival horror in Ravenholm, post apocalyptic shooters on the Coast, sci-fi corridor shooters in Nova Prospekt, modern squad-based military games in the uprising levels, and then something entirely new in the Citadel itself. Each area full of little crescendos and climaxes, all perfectly spaced. It's a game I have played more than 10 times, a game I know as well as some books, and yet I'm still thoroughly excited by all the big setpieces, still thoroughly engaged by Kelly Bailey's terrific score, still thrilled and excited by every single second of this masterful experience.
This review contains spoilers
KotOR is my favorite video game. It's not the most polished, well paced, tautly designed or even most viscerally fun game I've ever played. It's not even, by most traditional standards of the form, the most complicated or mechanically enriching RPG.
What it is is the ultimate and perhaps final reaffirmation of the Campbellian monomyth that exists in the recent history of Western culture. It's the ultimate Star Wars experience, embracing every aspect of the Star Wars concept as Lucas first envisioned it back in the early 70s. It's spectacularly well written, well acted and well considered, from the dingy streets of Taris to the gleaming power of the Star Forge. Basically every idea BioWare had for a game from Baldur's Gate through Neverwinter is brought back, but adapated or mutated to fit Star Wars, and the amount of concepts, ideas and pure content, all of it worth considering and driving some new understanding of the universe, is just staggering, and puts even games like The Witcher to shame to me (that game in particular owing a huge debt to this one). Taking something as mythic and spiritual as Star Wars and adapting to the classic fantasy RPG set up is such a patently obvious idea in retrospect that it's a miracle it took until 2003 for someone to do it.
This, more than any other piece of Star Wars media, is the foundational text of the Expanded Universe, and the reverberations of its existence are still being felt through the Clone Wars show, The Mandalorian and even some visual designs in Rogue One. It's simply the most important Star Wars thing of the 21st century, and I will likely never stop playing it every few years until the day I die (or until it's taken off the Xbox Store).
What it is is the ultimate and perhaps final reaffirmation of the Campbellian monomyth that exists in the recent history of Western culture. It's the ultimate Star Wars experience, embracing every aspect of the Star Wars concept as Lucas first envisioned it back in the early 70s. It's spectacularly well written, well acted and well considered, from the dingy streets of Taris to the gleaming power of the Star Forge. Basically every idea BioWare had for a game from Baldur's Gate through Neverwinter is brought back, but adapated or mutated to fit Star Wars, and the amount of concepts, ideas and pure content, all of it worth considering and driving some new understanding of the universe, is just staggering, and puts even games like The Witcher to shame to me (that game in particular owing a huge debt to this one). Taking something as mythic and spiritual as Star Wars and adapting to the classic fantasy RPG set up is such a patently obvious idea in retrospect that it's a miracle it took until 2003 for someone to do it.
This, more than any other piece of Star Wars media, is the foundational text of the Expanded Universe, and the reverberations of its existence are still being felt through the Clone Wars show, The Mandalorian and even some visual designs in Rogue One. It's simply the most important Star Wars thing of the 21st century, and I will likely never stop playing it every few years until the day I die (or until it's taken off the Xbox Store).