JCarter426

JCarter426 reminisces on the M4-78 EP that never came to be

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Previously, on M4-78...

 

Discussion here led me - and Zbyl and others... I saw you guys messing about with the thread titles! - to start reminiscing about some ideas for M4-78 that did not make it into the mod.

 

One idea was the Sith survivor, as Zbyl mentioned, and another - am I allowed to discuss the others? Maybe we should do a post-mortem on M4-78. Well I'm going to discuss some of it now, anyway! Another one was about how the droids developed in isolation from their colonists for so long. In that undeveloped plot, the droids had divided into two factions - one that still followed their original programming to prepare the planet for the colonists, and another that didn't believe in the colonists anymore. There were a lot of ideas thrown around and would've had a more typical player choice for the planet, but like I said, it never developed into one cohesive story.

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am I allowed to discuss the others? Maybe we should do a post-mortem on M4-78. Well I'm going to discuss some of it now, anyway!

 

It's been long enough that I think we should be able to freely discuss the mod's development and content we scrapped during it :)

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But regarding your other point, about not having a big choice to make... we had discussed a more involved plot but I don't think we ever came to a consensus over the details, so ultimately that didn't make it in. One idea was the Sith survivor, as Zbyl mentioned, and another - am I allowed to discuss the others? Maybe we should do a post-mortem on M4-78. Well I'm going to discuss some of it now, anyway! Another one was about how the droids developed in isolation from their colonists for so long. In that undeveloped plot, the droids had divided into two factions - one that still followed their original programming to prepare the planet for the colonists, and another that didn't believe in the colonists anymore. There were a lot of ideas thrown around and would've had a more typical player choice for the planet, but like I said, it never developed into one cohesive story.

 

Phhhh, this last one made me go wow! I wish that one had been developed, though I know what it's like when ideas just don't line up.

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To be honest the idea that the world might have been stolen by Revan as a "prototype replacement" for the Star Forge, seems to be a reasonable idea to tie the game into both K1 and TSL. Since both K1 and TSL specifically state that Revan never intended to use the Star Forge to it's ultimate potential and never intended on keeping it active. Stealing M4-78 from the original "Colonists" to test the idea of hidden weapons factories would also line up with the HK storyline.  

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It's been long enough that I think we should be able to freely discuss the mod's development and content we scrapped during it :D

I never did sign that non-disclosure agreement...

 

Unfortunately I think all our discussions went down with LucasForums, so even if we did want to do a thing we'd be relying on everybody's memories.

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That's true, unfortunately, except for stuff that actually made it into some kind of design document or another. I actually still have quite a few of those, called storyline, storyline_old (written in '09! before TSLRCM was even a thing), storyline_ver_4_1... they could probably be mined for some interesting ideas we had back then. I think one of them might have another droid faction, similar to what you mentioned.

I've also got two different IZ.2_Draft_2_by_JC - but the Ind Zone ended up being pretty much what you described in it, IIRC.

 

And I've got this thing in M4-78 screenshots folder. Image dates back to 2010... anyone remembers what that was about? :P Because I don't.

 

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Hah, I have no idea. That color looks good on him, though.

 

I still have my documents too, actually came across them again pretty recently, but it sounds like most of the same stuff. I know my idea for the power puzzle was even more complicated than what ended up in the mod, so I'm sure people would've LOVED that.

 

 

JCs%20Old%20M4-78%20Power%20Puzzle%20Ide

 

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Huh, I don't remember that version of the puzzle. I've got a similar one though, which we scrapped for being too complex.

 

 

Sorry for the quality, that's the best I could get out of a word document.

 

I recall you being against even having a mandatory puzzle that late into the planet.

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Yeah, I love puzzles but Obsidian made them all optional so I voted to go with the flow. But since the rest of the main quest at that point was just talking to people, it does make sense to have gameplay there to mix things up... even if dozens of YouTubers in my inbox disagree. :P

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Yeah, I love puzzles but Obsidian made them all optional so I voted to go with the flow. But since the rest of the main quest at that point was just talking to people, it does make sense to have gameplay there to mix things up... even if dozens of YouTubers in my inbox disagree. :P

*cough* Nar Shaddaa T3 section *cough*

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And this is why I think you're all remarkable to work so hard for nothing but satisfaction.

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On one hand, the behind the scenes stuff is gutting my documentary.

 

On the other, you guys weren't giving me any new information despite numerous requests.

 

You may as well make things easier for me and do a walk through at this point.

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Well, I wasn't allowed to talk, as previously established. :)

 

But I thought you were still working through the original M4-78, before the Enhancement Project.

 

(Also, I did half a walkthrough already! I'm going to finish it, I promise...)

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(Also, I did half a walkthrough already! I'm going to finish it, I promise...)

You might be able to help Xuul with that actually. . .

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As long as I'm being gently coerced into reminiscing, I thought I should let you guys know that a buddy of mine is starting a KOTOR podcast series, and he's tasked me with bringing to him news from Deadly Stream. He's not as in touch with the modding community because he only played the games on Xbox back in the day. Jenko on the forums here is also editing the podcast with us. The first episode will be posted this weekend assuming we finish it on time - cue Sith Holocron's slogan - and one of the first news items is, of course, M4-78. Keep in mind that it's news FROM Deadly Stream so if you're already here well you probably know it already but stay tuned and we might have some more interesting bits for you.

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I tell you what would be great to have for my video series . . . people audibly reminiscing about doing voiceover work for M4-78.

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I was looking through our old design doc trying to find some interesting random tidbits I could share. I was going to make a post about a Sith Survivor, but I found something in a document from early 2009 that even I barely remembered... at some point, before I even properly joined a team, we were planning to have some Selkath/Manaan connections on a planet. I left a small reference to that in the "Interstellar Transport" side quest, but it used to be much bigger than that.

 

Following are unedited quotes from said design docs. I'm honestly not sure who wrote it (might have been Sharen Thrawn, or Stoney, as I believe it was mostly the two of them writing first version of the plot for EP).

 

Landing Arm:

 

 

Later on, and this is kinda linked to the "Sith Survivor" as you needed to get Kolto to cure him:

 

 

It doesn't explain how we suddenly got kolto on M4-78 though. Still would be kinda neat to have a cameo from a Selkath.

 

Tidbit from the Environmental Zone description:

 

More non-combat hacking options on that zone, linked to said ship:

 

Additional explanation for how Vash and Kaah got to the planet, which kinda contradicts the holo-recording we set up on Korriban.

 

 

Apparently there was another step before we could reactivate and talk to L5-65. I don't think anyone is going to be sad about it being cut out:

 

 

That's it for Selkath/Manaan references. There's a lot more interesting stuff in those docs, some if it good, some of it really bad, but it's interesting to read after all these years and look at various ideas we've had over the course of the development. I wish we could access the lucasforums and see the discussions we had on that group.

 

I'll post more random tidbits like that if people are interested.

 

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First, I have to say your group did a wonderful job of explaining the events on the planet. With the addition of the Selkath connection, there is more context to the chaos that took place shortly before you arrive.

 

Additionally, we get some perspective from the droids regarding their seemingly rash decision to flood the Environmental zone with radiation and kill everything organic. (I never understood the point of why the planet looked war-torn when all the droids were doing regarded building a large army)

 

The Selkath connection also explains what the Selkath did after the events of Kotor, and further connects the two games (Kotor 2 mentions nothing about Manaan in the entire game, yet it has connections to Kasshyyk, Korriban, and Dantooine; with the latter two as playable levels)

 

//I guess Tatooine is also completely missing from TSL, but maybe it could be added by some other mod to the list of suppliers for the Rodian merchant NarShadaa or as some sort of specialty items that connect them. //

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I remember we talked about a Selkath connection because all the assets were still there, and the kolto area was part of the mod from very early on, but I either didn't know about or didn't recall all the specifics. Interesting stuff.

 

I have more I could reveal from my end but I may be saving it for something else.

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It's from the oldest design doc I could find for the planet. Very next one has this instead

 

[CHANGES]Selkath related material was here previously and has been removed.[/CHANGES]

 

so it's very likely you don't remember it or never even read that one.

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I have one of Sharen Thrawn's design docs for M478 from August 2008, if that's of interest. It's labelled as version 2.1. There don't appear to be any Selkath, and, despite a note about how I was going to format my comments, I don't appear to have commented on it.

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