Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic Convinced Me Xbox Was the New Home of RPGs, and I Think It’s Better Than Even the PS2’s Genre Heavyweights

This is an IGN opinion piece from Ryan McCaffrey, who worked at Official Xbox Magazine from 2002-2012 during the original Xbox and Xbox 360 era before joining IGN, where he remains “the Xbox guy.” In the run-up to Xbox’s 25th anniversary, he’ll be sharing his memories from the platform’s first quarter-century. Back in its day, the original Xbox was known as the “shooter box” – a reputation that wasn’t unwarranted. But if you ask me, Microsoft also deserves a ton of credit for popularizing Western RPGs on consoles. The countless incredible Japanese role-playing games on Nintendo and PlayStation platforms dominated the genre back then, but when Xbox came around, that began to change. Bethesda’s Xbox port of The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind was the first salvo in 2002, but it wasn’t until the following year when Xbox very loudly proclaimed to all RPG fans: “You need to buy an Xbox.” In July of 2003 – historically a barren desert for major game releases – Microsoft and BioWare launched Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. It Force-pushed away any challengers, becoming not only my personal favorite RPG of all time, but one of the greatest games on the Xbox. And, dare I say, it was bett