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Q: First can you tell us how you got into game designing? Q: What other projects have you worked on at Lucasarts? A: Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, Sam and Max Hit the Road, Afterlife,
and Escape from Monkey Island have been the biggies. Curiously, despite a twelve-year
career with LucasArts, Jedi Outcast is my first Star Wars credit. Go fig. Q: As the scriptwriter on Jedi Outcast, what part did you play in the development
process? Dialogue? Plot? Story? A: By the time I jumped onto the project, the story and most of the plot
points were a few swift kicks from being finalized. I was a part of a task force
of LEC and Raven guys that generously supplied those kicks, in a passionate
story refinement session that took a couple of days to complete. Once we were
all happy with the story, I was sent off to a cave for a couple of weeks to
write the script. Every few days I’d shoot scenes off to the rest of the task
force, which would correct my atrocious grammar, change all my goofy made-up
words to goofy made-up Star Wars words, and generally critique the heck out
of the thing. Within a month we had a final script. Q: What research did you do? Kyle Katarn is getting to have a pretty long
and involved continuity in the other games and the Expanded Universe. A: Research? Darn, I knew I’d forgotten something… Seriously, I deferred all the serious continuity questions to a small cadre
of people within the building who have a disturbing grasp on the ins and outs
of LEC’s Star Wars characters. Those guys are real whip-crackers…they wouldn’t
even let me HINT at Kyle’s dormant bantha jerky abuse problem. Q: Did you get to work with Billy Dee Williams or write dialogue for him? A: While I did get to write Billy Dee’s dialogue, I didn’t get to go down
to L.A. for the recording session. Rats. Q: Mike, Is there a patch in the works? The animations to things such as
the thermal detonator are incomplete. A: I don’t have the foggiest. A: No. A Jedi Knight sequel was always under
consideration since it’s one of our most successful game series. A: I don’t think so. Those are fairly common
scenarios for this kind of Star Wars game so I suspect it was merely coincidental.
A: At this point neither LucasArts nor Raven
are considering plans for an expansion pack. Thanks, Tom! Now back to your regularly scheduled interview with Mike Stemmle... [ The following questions contain spoilders ] Q: Why aren't Kyle and Jan married yet? The Dark Forces books hinted that
they intended to get married. A: You know how it is with working couples. A mission here, an uprising
there, and the next thing you know, you’ve been "engaged to be engaged"
for nearly a decade. Q: Where was WeeGee, Kyle's droid from Jedi Knight? A: One suspects he was off getting his enthusiasm simulators upgraded. They
kept burning out, leading him to constantly whine "Wee Gee bored! Wee Gee
bored!" Q: Why were Jan and Kyle the only survivors to know the location of the
Valley of the Jedi? During Jedi Knight, Jerec's fleet of Star Destroyers above
the Valley of the Jedi sending supplies down from orbit. Kyle and Jan never
destroyed that fleet. Wouldn’t someone in that fleet know? A: After the events in Jedi Knight, Jerec’s fleet got wiped out in a spectacular
cut-scene that LucasArts couldn’t afford to produce at the time. Q: Kyle's father, Morgan Katarn, was not a Jedi. So why did his spirit appear
to Kyle in the Valley of the Jedi? Why not use Rahn, the Jedi who's spirit guided
Kyle during Jedi Knight, instead? A: -- Mike snorts his afternoon whisky out his nose -- Okay, I’m back. I’ve been assured that Morgan was a Jedi. He had a lightsaber
‘n’ everything. Don’t scare me like that. Q: At one point, Lando asks Kyle, "Are you and Jan having another one
of your fights?" Is this intended to signify behind the scenes relationship
trouble? It could be why Jan wasn’t in Mysteries of the Sith, or why they’re
not married yet. A: That works for me. A guy like Kyle can’t be easy to work with/woo/tolerate
for long hours in a cramped cockpit. The way Kyle and Jan banter, it’s obvious
that there’ve been some legendary blow-ups over the years. Q: Was there any significance to the different hood colors worn by the Reborn? A: Blue is for Beta. Q: What was Tavion's intended fate after Outcast? Is she just another former-dark-jedi
running around the galaxy unaccounted for? A: In early drafts of the story, Tavion was slated to die like a good little
boss monster. After we’d adjusted the plot a bit, it was decided that it would
be more appropriate to let Tavion live as means to emphasize Kyle’s return (once
again!) from the very edge of the Dark Side. Besides, disgraced dark Jedi roaming
the galaxy in search of revenge and/or honorable deaths are great sequel fodder. Q: The Shadowtroopers' armor is supposed to contain cortosis ore making
it 'resistant' to lightsaber attacks. Cortosis was first conceived by Timothy
Zahn in The Hand of Thrawn books. Cortosis was NOT resistant to lightsaber
blades. But it did short out a lightsaber's circuitry causing the blade to shut
off. Why does it act differently in JO? Shouldn't Kyle's saber just shut down
when he strikes a Shadowtrooper? A: Gameplay reasons, mostly. In video games, lightsabers can’t be as all-powerful
as they are in the movies, nor can they be shorting out every time they strike
an enemy. I suspect that cortosis was used, despite the confusion, to keep from
adding another "saber foiling" element to the Star Wars universe.
If it helps, imagine the Zahn cortosis as being the standard "Green Cortosis",
and the JO cortosis as being the mutated "Red Cortosis." Remember
kids, Blue Cortosis only affects Bizarro Jedi. Q: This is a fairly minor point, but Jan tells Kyle she's been interrogated
on the layout of the Jedi Academy by Galak's men. Couldn't Desann have supplied
the information they needed about the Academy? He was a student there after
all. A: Desann hadn’t been there for years. The Academy could’ve updated their
defenses. Of course, this implies that Jan’s been to the Academy more recently
than either Desann OR Kyle, but maybe there’s a story there, too… Q: What was Desann looking for under the ruins of the Massassi Temples,
and what was the huge energy beam in the room you finally catch up with him
in? A: I have no idea. I haven’t gotten that far yet ( Q: Here’s the big final question that has been bothering many people on
the message boards… The game's intro text crawl reads that the events take place 8 years after
battle of Endor. (12 After Star Wars) The Star Wars Essential Chronology by Dan Wallace and Kevin Anderson
says that Kyle was one of Luke’s original students at the Jedi Academy. The
story of the game seems to agree with this. It also says that later, during
the novel Darksaber, Kyle participated in another battle at the Academy.
The date in the text crawl seems to contradict Darksaber. Is the text
crawl wrong? What is the correct chain of events? A: When in doubt, go with the explanation that’s the most vague. If you REALLY want the text crawl to work, say it’s been 8 years and 364
days, and that it rolls over to 9 years somewhere during the first mission.
In any event, as far as Jedi Outcast goes, here are the only timeline points
I consider to be of interest: Several Years Ago: Mysteries of the Sith happens (#23 of 3000 in the ever-expanding
"Sith Happens" lame joke series…collect them all!) A Short Time after That: Kyle drops the Force like a bad habit, and leaves
his saber with Luke. The definition of "Short Time" can be stretched
as necessary. Years Pass: Kyle goes back to being a hired gun for the forces of good,
with his partner Jan. He acquires, and successfully kicks, an addiction to bantha
jerky. His ability to wield the Force atrophies. Now: Kyle encounters the Jedi Outcast, and reclaims the Force in a fit of
rage. Strange? Pshaw. I get stranger questions from my long distance provider.
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