I’ve torn myself away from monitoring the NFL news wire for free agency news long enough to actually post…

I finished Knights of the Old Republic II a few days ago. About a day later, a storm of activity online formed as it was discovered that the PC version includes removed dialogue text & audio of a longer, more substantial ending. Presumably, the material may be on the Xbox version as well, but it’s much more difficult to dig through the game files than it is on a PC game. Naturally, people with nothing better to do with their time have labeled it some kind of travesty. My thoughts? People get far too hung up on “endings”. 30 hours of game and story development aren’t made or broken by a 5 minute final cutscene. And when something gets cut, it gets cut for a reason. The people who bitch and moan when stuff gets cut are the same ones who bitch and moan when things aren’t cut, making the game take longer to come out. Little Billy 14-year-old has no idea about software development.

After finishing Knights, I started in on Prince of Persia: Warrior Within. I began this game with the understanding that the direction of the game is very different from the beloved previous game, The Sands of Time (which easily makes my Top 10, and perhaps my Top 5 list, for best games of all time). Even still, there’s an initial shock to get over. While The Sands of Time was charming and ethereal, Warrior Within is grungy and a bit shameless. The magic is gone, and a heavy metal video is in its place. Not that I can’t tolerate that. I watch Headbanger’s Ball and sometimes Uranium. But when the old game was near perfect, it’s hard to accept a new approach that’s all about marketing to 15-year-old boys in stained Slipknot shirts. The evil broad wears a steel thong and the prince smolders with generic rage. It’s a good game regardless, but it’s not as good as it could have been.