Regardless of how the original game ended, however, the beginning of The Sith Lords sees the Sith having almost completely destroyed the Jedi Order. The conclusion of the first game varied depending on the choices of the player, with either the light side or dark side of the Force emerging triumphant-at the beginning of The Sith Lords, players specify which of these outcomes they wish the sequel to follow. The game takes place approximately five years after the conclusion of the first game, and during the times of the Dark Wars, and focuses on a mostly different set of characters. The development team also wanted to create a story that would pull the player into seriously thinking about the difference in using the Force for good and evil and the consequences of those actions. The main goal was to give the player high adventure, lots of alien races and new worlds to visit. After the overall story had been developed, the game outline was divided up between the designers who would then go about filling in the details of their particular section of the storyline. The purpose was to throw the player for a loop, but allow enough foreshadowing so that the player would stay interested. The following phase involved devising the critical story points and filling in the story to link those points together. The question 'Why should the player care?' It was felt that each stage of the game should ask and answer For example, this could have been accomplished by revealing critical information, introducing a new companion or acquiring new special abilities. The player motivation involved providing the teasers that would stimulate the player into wanting to continue the game and encourage the player to explore the story and locations fully. Certain circumstances had severed the hero's connection to the Force, but the character was being given a chance to slowly regain that connection and rediscover what it meant to be a Jedi or Sith. In The Sith Lords, the character was a disgraced veteran of the Mandalorian Wars who was the last known Jedi in the galaxy and the target of dark side assassins who were determined to eradicate all Jedi. The first phase involved distinguishing the character, or the hero's motivation, from player motivation and how the story would develop to integrate the two. Only then did he feel it was time to look at the overall vision of the project.

To him, it was vital to understand what adventures had already been created, the parameters of the EU, and which bad ideas it was prudent to stay away from.

The next step was to watchД®very Star Wars movie, read every book and comic book about the Expanded Universe and even sitting through The Star Wars Holiday Special. He began with determining what was considered fun in the gameplay elements and what kind of story would have to be developed to complement those elements. Chris Avellone, Lead designer for the project, felt that it would be a challenging task to create a sequel to what he felt was an amazing story that BioWare had developed for the original Knights of the Old Republic and that there would be a lot of pressure created for the team. From the beginning, the production team had decided that the general atmosphere of the universe would be much darker than in Knights of the Old Republic and that the situation for the Jedi would be grim. Дevelopment of The Sith Lords began at approximately the same time that the original Knights of the Old Republic was released for the Xbox, on July 15, 2003. ' The first story draft was pretty terrible, mostly because we weren't allowed to play K1 before drafting it, so we really knew nothing about the first game and were writing in the dark (Revan who?).' вЂ• Chris Avellone, Lead Designer for The Sith Lords at Obsidian Entertainment, talking about story development.

Knights of the old republic 2