Games based on movies traditionally suck. It's a big word, no question, but it fits - how many games based on films or film licenses can you think of that also made it as good games? For every Golden Eye or Return of the King there are a dozen Fifth Element or Finding Nemo games, waiting to sucker you out of your cash.

The Star Wars license has not been immune to this trend. Over the years, almost since videogames first existed, there have been more than fifty games released based on the license. Some of them rocked - Xwing vs. Tie Fighter being a prime example. But most of them sucked - and sucked hard. Anyone still play Yoda Stories or Masters of Teras Kasi? Hopefully you have never even heard of them...

If you have read our Xbox review, you'll know that this is not one of those games. If you came in here just to see how well the game fares when put up against the Xbox version, fear not - it's just as good and you can play it with even better looking graphics, if your PC is up to it. For those of you who are not familiar with the game, read on...

Set some 4,000 years before the rise of the Galactic Empire, KOTOR tells the tale of you, a nice guy (or gal) trying to catch a break in the hectic Star Wars universe. Lots of bad stuff goes on around you and you have the option (most of the time) of either interceding or ignoring what is going on. Ultimately, there is a large back story going along and how you participate in the little day-to-day story won't directly affect your progression along the main story arc. It will, however, affect whether you become a light or dark side Jedi... Are you a nice guy? Time to find out.

First and foremost, KOTOR is an RPG. That's Role Playing Game for those that are unaware. The general gist of an RPG is to add depth and strategy to what would otherwise be an action adventure. As you go along, killing or helping people, you earn experience and find items. You can use experience to increase your characters attributes ("levelling up") and you can sell items you find along the way in order to amass enough currency to buy even better or more useful items from the many traders than line the highways and byways of the game. As you progress, you are given control over a large degree of what happens. You can control the way your character plays (i.e. Brute Strength vs. High Defence vs. High Intelligence and so on) and also what happens in the game itself. From minor side quests / events (do you help that poor, oppressed civilian? Maybe you ignore him? Perhaps even kill him?) right through to full blown plot arcs (light jedi vs. dark jedi is a good example). You have loads of control over how the game plays and how you progress.

Before you get underway, however, you'll need to setup your base character. None of this "you look like this and that's that" nonsense that you'll find in typical action adventure games, RPGs (and this one is no different) let you set up a character as you see fit. KOTOR's character editor is a thing of beauty; you have loads of options (from base class through to each and every minor attribute) and can genuinely customise your character to such an extent to make replaying it a very different experience. A few more different "looks" wouldn't have hurt, but the ones that are there are very "Star Wars" and as such completely suit the environment. Big thumbs up to the people that worked on this part of the game!

Once you have your character setup, it's time to start the game. The usual "A long time ago in a galaxy far far away" type scrolling text sets the scene, before dropping you into the eyes of your avatar as he (or she) is rudely awaken from their slumbers. Your ship is under attack and you have to do something! And so it begins. The first sequence (which ultimately sees you fleeing to the planet below in an escape pod) is pretty much a tutorial - introducing you to combat, the inventory, interacting with your environment and controlling your party. As such, it does a remarkable job - the excellent translation from Xbox to PC / Mouse control certainly doesn't hinder you either. You'll be up and running in no time, mixing it up with the bad guys like a pro.

One of the first major aspects of the game that you will encounter is the combat. Always something of prime interest to RPG gamers and something that is open to a lot of developer interpretation, combat alone can make or break an RPG game. Fortunately, the implementation in KOTOR is not only intuitive enough so as to be approachable for newbies of the genre, it's also good enough to stand up to the scrutiny of hardened RPG nuts. As an enemy enters your line of sight, the game pauses to allow you to make your combat decisions (you can disable the auto-pause if you want to). From here, you can select to bale out or click on each of the enemies and select the kind of attack you would like to perform. You can even jump out to your inventory (and those of any party members) and switch weapons around etc should you need to.

Once you are ready to go, just hit the space bar and combat proceeds. During combat itself, you can change your strategies (run away, attack someone else, use a grenade - etc) but you don't have any direct control on the assault itself; you dont aim blasters or bash the button to swing your light sabre, that stuff is all automatic. Whether you hit or miss (and how much damage you give or receive) is based on your stats (remember, from levelling up your character) vs. the stats of your opponent. It will feel a bit odd for those action buffs out there, at first, but you will adjust quickly enough and begin to think more about your strategy as you go into each successive combat scene.

The only downside is that you are unable to engage in combat with random NPCs. You will be able to choose to attack certain people, based on the path your conversation with them takes, but you can't just cruise up to a Sith or a random drunk at the bar and bust loose with your sabre or side arm. It makes sense, of course, because designers can't have you killing off people that are important to the story, in case you kill the only chance you have for progressing. But it still pains, at least a little, when you are trying to advance down the dark path - laying waste to random innocents would surely be a great boost to your dark side!

One of the most compelling elements of the game is the story. With a vast cast of characters, a strong plot and a sequence of side quests, all set against the rich tapestry of the Star Wars universe, the tale spun feels complex and real. It's rare that a game gets it this right, let alone one based on a license that would sell without the considerable effort that has obviously taken - you'll think back on it like it was a book, it's that good.

Graphically, KOTOR is almost without comparison. The city scapes, sewers, space ships and buildings are all incredibly detailed and incredibly Star Wars. The game does, in fact, feel more Star Wars than the recent movies! The music and atmosphere really steps up and says "notice me!" on this count too - you are never in any doubt that you are playing a Star Wars game. Every swoosh of a light sabre, screech of a tie fighter or wail of a blaster is immediately recognisable to anyone and everyone everywhere. It's just impossible to describe how impressively Star Wars this game is. Full marks here in every department - a truly spectacular audio visual accomplishment.

The bugs mentioned in the Xbox review are, sadly, mostly still present. The AI is apallingly bad at path finding (just watch any area with NPCs milling about and you will be confronted with it very quickly - it's bizarre how bad it gets some times) and your party members will still block you in (requiring you to switch to controlling them in order to escape) and warp all over the show if you leave them behind. Additionally (yes, new bugs to the PC version), the mouse interface isn't exactly perfect. When you want to pillage a fallen opponent for any goodies they might have been carrying, an icon shows up when you mouse over someone that has something for you to pillage. At least, it's supposed to. Sometimes it doesn't and you will need to move away and turn around, then look at them again or click on them to make the option appear. This frustrating shortfall of the interface means that you will either miss items that you could have nabbed or you will find yourself clicking and turning everytime you encounter a body - when only something like 50% of the fallen will have anything to collect! Frustrating, but it may well be fixed in a patch (there has already been one since release - make sure you grab it) - something that is just not possible on the Xbox version.