Hraith

On 5/27/2025 at 1:58 AM, Snigaroo said:

I, as other have said, understand your viewpoint as regards restored content and how you would like to have as much of it as possible. There's no issue with that, or with recommending such content to other users. However, with that being said, saying something specifically like this does not do your viewpoint any favors, because realistically what you're suggesting is almost certainly false. To my knowledge--and I have had many, many years to look--no KOTOR developer has ever come forth and stated that any content cut from the basegame was removed due to time constraints. There is reasonable indication that SOME of the content was cut due to technical limitations (be they engine or enduser hardware) or persistent bugs/unintended consequences with attempts to implement them (such as the Iriaz), but the amount of content to which that does--or even could--apply is miniscule as compared to the volume of restorations that K1R makes.

As @N-DReW25 pointed out, fundamentally there are several parts of K1R which simply cannot be "intended" because there was not enough in the game files to even restore and most of the content as implemented is fanmade. But for the sake of making a good-faith argument I'll ignore those cases and focus solely on fully developer-produced content that K1R restores. Unlike in the case of KOTOR 2's development, KOTOR was not rushed. Indeed, far beyond not being rushed, BioWare actually deliberately took an additional six months of development time before the game's release to iron out bugs, polish content and ensure that the game released in a completed state. And I am not talking about the six-month delay after the Xbox release of the game before it was ported to PC, I am referring to a very well-documented six-month delay prior to the game's initial release, which BioWare employees specifically said was undertaken in order to deliver a fully polished and well-made product, even though the game was already A-Z playable at the time of the original intended release date.

With this in mind, why would all this cut content exist? Sure, perhaps there would be some here or there that BioWare couldn't have gotten around to in the six months of extra time they had, but not the amount left lying around that K1R has available to restore, and as Drew notes K1R doesn't even restore everything there is! Why might this be?

The most probable answer is quite simply that most of that content was cut entirely purposefully. This happens in game development literally all the time--if a sequence doesn't flow well (such as dragging on, or having an impact on the game's balance due to its existence); if a particular item is nonsensical or overbalanced; if a character is seen as superfluous or distracting. Game developers are not gods. Often they design things that they believe will be impactful and well-received at the point they design it only to discover in live testing that the implementation is simply poor, or functioning unintentionally. And game developers (especially game developers in the early 2000s, driven by a razor-thin profit margin) do not operate under the same philosophy of "any content is good content" that some modern players do. They have the entire scope of the playerbase to bear in mind, many of whom would prefer a trimmer, leaner and more coherent experience than one with more content but less direction. So what do they do in those cases? They cut anything they can which they believe doesn't work and would leave behind an ultimately more balanced, coherent and enjoyable experience.

Given that no BioWare dev I have ever seen has discussed any content cut from the game due to time constraints; the simple fact that the game lacked any meaningful time constraints at all, and even had an additional half-year of development time; and the reality that many of the things which K1R restores are sequences which one can easily see a dev viewing as disruptive (the third level of the Vulkar base would drag on to a casual player; the pillar reward on Lehon was overpowered; Major Hurka allows the player to bypass most of the Leviathan, which trivializes the game's design in that area, just to name a few), it is overwhelmingly likely that at least 50% of K1R's restorations, and likely much more than that, were cut fully deliberately.

This is not to say that that content is bad, that you are wrong for wanting to use it, or that others should not use it if they have a mind. Users should always play with what they want to. However, it is unreasonable to cite developer intent when wanting to use K1R where parts of K1R are entirely fanmade and at least half of it was quite probably restored in spite of the developer's intent, not in line with it. I say again: there is NOTHING wrong with wanting to use that content. The developers are not infallible, and the game they designed was, at the end of the day, the game they believed would be best-received by the widest audience. For those who view any amount of new content as a blessing, K1R is wonderful. But saying that it's all as the developers wanted is simply an unreasonable claim, unless you can dig up an example of a BioWare dev actually arguing that there were significant cuts made to the game that they didn't intend for.

I was going on the statement on K1R that the content restored was based on files left in the game, some of which had to be restored but if there's evidence it could have been there, I've played the mod thru many times, then it SHOULD be. None of it is out of place and while people have mentioned bugs I've never once encountered one. At least not one I didn't introduce myself with a mod. I think little things like Jolee Bindo's full advice on love and romance, Juhanni's full back-story, A drinking competition, some dialogue that's just a little more blunt and to the point; those little touches are what makes the game world immersive. It's been so long since I played without mods I honestly forget what's not there on, for example, the Switch. But meeting Bastilla's mother and that choice, Griff, Jolee's friend, Genohardan, pretty sure that's all stock/standard. I do really enjoy the extra stuff and spent tons of time of the old Bioware forums. There were "developer accounts" in that forum that said many times there was more content they wanted to include, more choices, like killing Marlene. That one specifically came up a lot. That's my only source, I've never seen a video of it either. While they didn't go into specifics on everything they wanted restored, and K1R certainly falls far short of that metric, K1R doesn't do anything that's out of line. That's my only point, originally. LOL.

I appreciate the long response, I actually learn stuff on this website. Reminds me of the internet in 2008,

22 hours ago, The_Chaser_One said:

@Hraith I'm afraid you're wrong. K1R is the one that's obsolete. K1CP still gets updates while no one's been working on K1R for several years. K1CP is also way more vanilla friendly than K1R as its intent is not to add content but to fix glitches, bugs and other issues within the game. You can see the whole list of changes here. Also, you might want to take a look at this if you like restored content. Come in the DeadlyStream Discord server for more information (PM me if you want the link to join).

@luj1 The K1CP is by far the most important KOTOR mod in 2025. It fixes a tremendous amount of glitches, bugs and other issues, while K1R only adds some (some good, some not very vanilla friendly) content. Its main goal is to restore content. The K1CP is not only newer and a better companion for your game, but it has this if your thing is restored content. Then you can add as many mods (restored and added content included) as you want, since most of the mods here and on NexusMods are compatible with the K1CP but not K1R. K1R is in fact incompatible with quite a lot of things, which is why I'm restoring the Manaan Pazaak tournament as a standalone mod in order to give the possibility to players to have it in their K1CP installation. Furthermore, there are already things the K1R restores that can be restored independently, which means on a K1CP installation. For example, this one. For the best game experience, follow this guide for Widescreen and high resolution (if you have any issue, you might want to look at this), then download the K1CP and the RC-K1CP then you can get back to this guide for the textures, skyboxes and everything else. You should also download this amazing and underrated cinematics overhaul.

May the Force be with you both, and if you need more help, I'm here.

KR1 isn't being worked on anymore because it's done. It's not obsolete, it's complete.  I can only assume you didn't link to the "other things that can be added to K1CP" because you couldn't find them either. I'm thinking of simple little things like the drinking contest on Manaan. K1CP doesn't include that, the developers intended it to be there, and there is no stand a lone mod to put it back. Some of the dialogue options are different, much worse, less real. It's cool that you're putting the pazaak tournament together for K1CP, but all the restored content in K1R is supposed to be there. Including Impossible difficulty. It's all Vanilla. I reject that claim entirely. That K1R isn't vanilla. It is the definition of Vanilla. The stock PC version of this game is the abomination. They cut so much stuff! We can still play the Xbox version to even see! Bastilla's bright blue eyes and slightly see thru lingerie, these things are vanilla and were on Xbox!

On 4/13/2025 at 5:37 AM, LusoJedi said:

Right. I meant content that was cut, not unintentionally inacessible due to bugs. 👍

Content that was cut due to scheduling, not developer intent. Just to be clear. 

What does this mod restore that KR1 doesn't restore? As far as I can tell the only real difference is this one calls the Vulkar base the basement the KR1 calls it upstairs. Otherwise this seems to restore less. No poker tournament. A few missing lines of dialogue. A few more bug fixes sure, but is there anymore restored content?

On 3/27/2025 at 3:53 PM, luj1 said:

Great timing mate, I was just getting ready to replay KotOR after 20 years

This list looks great. Does this make the Community Patch obsolete, or I should apply that at the end? Thanks

Community Patch is obsolete. Or at least, a completely different build. This build is targeted at original developer intent. CP does a lot of stuff I don't think should be done. 

Who sells the swoop bike upgrades on Manaan? Yuka Laka doesn't have them on Tatooine, but I beat that circuit already before installing your mod. Hadn't even visited Manaan yet so it should still work here right?

Found him, forget his name. Way down at the end of the map by the Sith Coumpound, that shop sells the swoop bike upgrades. He sells 2 upgrades that each cost 6k and reduce how much crashing slows you down. 

Correct

Summary of mods in build:

1. # KOTOR Restoration mod: https://www.nexusmods.com/kotor/mods/54 
2. # 1080p 60fps fix: https://www.nexusmods.com/kotor/mods/1287 

Patches

Included in the mod is two different versions of the guide, one you do everything manually and the other is mostly automated. If one doesn't work, try the other. This build has been tested on many different systems and the majority of it has been tested regularly for about 10 years. I am aware that the community patch is new and people are interested in it but it doesn't restore a lot of things the Restored Content mod does bring back and the two are simply incompatible.