Part 54: Telos: The Puppy Holocaust
Last update, we met up with the world-eating Sith Lord, Darth Nihilus.
Nihilus wasn’t receptive to our peace offering of milk and pecan cookies. “I’m allergic to nuts!” he raged.
...and a fist fight broke out.
I think Visas gets a little shafted with this line – Nihilus was suppose to do a Force Wave and send everyone sprawling just prior to this, so it would have seemed like he kicking more a bit more ass. But it didn't get animated for some reason. Instead, Nihilus is just dead easy and Visas is whining for no reason.
Jesus implores Visas to stop mumbling about echoes and sight and actually do something useful for once in her life.
Kreia tolerated Visas on board for the same reason she tolerated the Handmaiden – they could be used as tools against their respective masters. Nihilus is a monster, but for some reason (maybe it was his last shred of humanity) he spared Visas and ended up sharing a Force bond with her, which turns out to be his big weakness.
Getting Visas to attack him mentally doesn’t do any damage, but it drops all his Force buffs.
This game has lot of musing on the nature of betrayal - Visas betrays Nihilus, Handmaiden betrays Atris, Revan betrays the Jedi, and of course Kreia and Atris betray everybody. When Kreia does it, it's a very deliberate act; she thinks it makes others stronger for it.
There's a famous quote by an Irish poet named Brendan Kennelly: "If you want to serve the age, betray it." Taken from a 400 page poem bearing the name of another famous betrayer, The Book of Judas, it brings up the question of where a Christian society would be today if Judas hadn't done what he did. It's not really moral relativism, but it does call into perspective the notion of 'another side' to history, where a betrayal often calls truth into light and serves a greater good, even if it's not the most popular decision.
When Kreia says, "The difference between a fall and a sacrifice is sometimes difficult", she's harping on the same sort of themes.
Here we go again.
After all the unarmed punching business, Nihilus just dies from the shame and embarrassment.
Before you ask, no. No.
No, you cannot wear his mask and run around pretending you're Darth Skeletor.
I’ve heard people complain about this line was a bit lame, but all I have to say is… she’s just speaking figuratively.
She’s not literally saying he’s a man, as in a male (I’ve heard people declare Nihilus wasn’t a woman because of that line), or saying that he’s a MAN, as in a human. After all, what kind of normal human disappears in a puff of red smoke?
As I've said, Nihilus was a larger-than-life figure to everyone who knew of him. Visas worshipped him as a deity. The line just meant she had overcome all that nonsense. That despite his world-destroying and Force-sucking abilities, he wasn't a god. He was just a mortal, and he could be killed like everyone else. It’s just a final beat on her character growth.
In one of extended universe Star Wars books, apparently they explained Darth Nihilus escaped death by storing his consciousness in his armour. Or something equally stupid.
I’m sorry EU, but I don’t see any armour left behind.
I also seem to remember reading Darth Nihilus’s entry on Wookieepedia at one point, and it said that in an early version of the game, his mask was created from the skull of Revan. I don't know who wrote that, but what the christ. Thankfully it looks like someone edited it out.
By the time the Restoration Project is done there will be like 5 different versions of the Nihilus encounter.
1) Fight him normal, Visas does nothing.
2) Fight him normal, Visas mindfucks him, Nihilus loses a bit of life.
3) Fight him normal, Visas kills herslf. Nihilus loses most of his life.
4) Offer to become Nihilus’s apprentice, say, “Psyche!” and attack him like normal.
5) Offer to become Nihilus’s apprentice for real, kill Visas, then kill Nihilus when he fails to drain the Exile.
Now if you’ve played this game before you’re probably wondering about #4 and #5 and thinking what the fuck. Those two options were cut out of the game. For example, #4 went something like this:
[Lie] “I... have... come to be your... apprentice.”
“No! Don't do this - he w-“ “...and I offer this one as a sacrifice to my intentions.”
*day no kash day nam temnay tari.* [Lie] “Master, surely you know I am unique. I could teach you to use the Force in ways never seen in the galaxy. Let me kill this faithless one, and I shall prove my dedication.”Visas and the Exile flourish their weapons and face off.
“If I read your intentions right, exile, then it seems surprise is to be our weapon.” “Then let's settle this. Follow my lead.”
And both of them turn to attack Nihilus, and the scenario goes on as normal.
Just to get you people to leave me alone, here’s the death of Visas video, brought to you by the flayed corpses of a thousand little adorable puppies.
http://video.google.ca/videoplay?do...667518305608566
There’s still the matter of blowing up this ship somehow. There are four points on the ship where we have to plant the bombs the Mandalorians brought aboard.
This first one is apparently in the vacuum of space.
I’m skipping straight to the the 4th bomb because frankly, planting them is pretty yawn-inducing.
Mandalore and Visas get so bored they start doing cartwheels and jumping jacks.
Careful with that bomb you’re carrying there…
Ohhh… that’s not pretty.
“Was it in the target zone?”
“No, Mandalore. We... have failed you. I offer you my-“ “Do we have another core?”
Oh Mandalore. Never change.
Welp, we have to improvise one last bomb. WWMD (What would MacGyver do)?
We go rig up a missile from the ship’s weapons bay, arm it from the computer, and re-purpose it as a bomb.
Our last bomb site is once again outside the ship.
I guess he really must be the Messiah. Forget the walking on water stuff, he can breath in hard vacuum!
In the retail strategy guide for this game, there was a movie that didn’t even make it into the game discs; it showed the Ravager crashing into Citadel Station, possibly knocking it out of orbit.
It’s speculated that this had to do with whether or not you finished setting up all the bombs on the Ravager before you left for good. I guess they took it out because if Citadel station went down in flames, the follow up scenes no longer make any sense.
Elsewhere…
A bunch of Sith assassins pop out to ambush Kreia...
And she takes them all out silently, sparing some artist in cubicle somewhere the effort of having to animate it.
We’ve seen this place before, in Kreia’s vision. It’s called the Trayus Core.
“Spare me? Ah, yes.” “No, you simply did not learn the lesson I sought to teach - that your strength is as meaningless as the strength of my hand.”Kreia then puts Sion in a Force Crush and raises him up in the air.
That was a nice bit to put a reversal on the scene at the very beginning of the game, when Kreia gets her hand cut off by Sion. It also explains why Sion went from being belligerent to meek pussycat in the blink of an eye. It probably got scrapped because the Force Crush didn't get animated in time or something.
It’s interesting that the supposedly climatic giant mega space battle between the Republic and the Sith was not the end of the game. That’s what happened in New Hope, KOTOR 1, Return of the Jedi… well, basically every Star Wars story ends with a big battle. Here, the most powerful of the Sith Lords is dead, the threat to the Jedi and the Republic is over. And that’s fine, but all that was just a sideshow. We’ve still got all these introspective conflicts and betrayals to resolve before we can call it a night.
To put a cap on the whole Telos business, we have to talk with Carth. Sorry, Admiral Carth.
“This time, you gave me a second chance. I owe you.” 
“I've read your records, how the Jedi sentenced you. For doing what you believed. You wandered past the Outer Rim during your exile. I ask you... did you find any trace of Revan?” “No, I did not see her again.” “I served with her, like you did. And we had to part ways, like you did.”
Maybe she just got sick of his incessant blithering and said, “Fuck it, I’m leaving.”
I’m sorry, I couldn’t resist. This is why I can’t do a KOTOR 1 LP, I’d just end up shitting all over Carth and Bastila the entire time.
“I would have done anything she asked. And when she told me to stay here, to try to keep the Republic strong, that was the hardest thing of all.”
“Whatever it was, I think she went off to find it... to fight it.” “How did you know Revan?”
“…We saved the Republic. But it was like the war didn't end for her. She would keep remembering things that she had done, and it kept driving her. And she kept using it as a wall between us.”
“Revan's ship?” “Yes, wherever she went, your ship's been there. If... if you return to that place, if you find some trace of Revan...”Bring her flowers? Sing her a telegram?
Now Revan was a bright gal, great strategic mind and all that, but the biggest mystery isn’t where she disappeared to. Rather, it was why she hooked up with this whiny twat who can’t even spell his own name correctly.
