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Welcome back to another installment of The Blog Unleashed. If you're puzzled by the title of this article allow me to explain just what “nakama” means. Actually, let me quote the good folks at TvTropes.org since they do it much better than I could:

Nakama" is a Japanese term that describes, roughly, the members of a group who are as close as a real famliy would be because of the circumstances under which the group of companions find themselves. As the term is not a uniquely Japanese concept, other words such as "comrades", “brothers in arms", crew, team, posse, war buddies, and clique are also nearly synonymous. The members of the group may not necessarily like each other, but know they can depend upon each other in crisis.

I'll hope you'll forgive me choosing to use a Japanese term here. I actually lived in Japan for almost three years and majored in Japanese in college. So I know my way around the language and honestly do feel that “nakama” expresses the idea I want to talk about better than any of the English terms mentioned above.

With that said, the idea of “nakama” is deeply rooted in SW lore. When Uncle Owen buys R2-D2 and C-3PO from the Jawas it's the start of the core “nakama” of Star Wars starting to form around Luke. In short order he picks up Obi-Wan who is quickly followed by Han and Chewie and then Leia. Loads of other SW tales go this way and so do many stories in general.

What does this have to do with SW: TOR? We already know that picking up party members and them reacting to the choices a player makes will be part of the story. We also know that in order to unlock certain things the player will need to get their relationship with members of their “nakama” up to 100%. I suppose now would be a good time to mention that in Japanese RPGs “nakama” is often the term used for what is usually translated as “the party” in English.

This brings up a lot of interesting questions. Is it possible to get 100% relationships will all your party members? What do you get if you do get a relationship up to 100%? Can having a 100% relationship with one character help or hinder you in building a relationship with another character?

One interesting thing to note about the idea of “nakama” in SW is that it might actually be a Force power. It's been noted that the Jedi Exile from KOTOR 2 and Zayne Carrick from the KOTOR comics both had a natural ability to form bonds and friendships through the Force. Whether there's an actual “Force Nakama” power out there or if doing so is simply a sign of a powerful connection to the Living Force remains unclear. But I think it's certainly a cool idea to consider and hope that BioWare expands on this idea in SW: TOR.

I've played a fair number of others games such as Star Ocean 2, Sakura Wars, Persona 3 and Persona 4 where creating a strong bond with your teammates not only improved the story be enhanced your ability to fight as team. Across the board I found that to be a great gameplay and story mechanism. So Force power or not I'm going to enjoy forming my own SW: TOR “nakama.”

Just don't knock my “nakama.”

Written by :

Skyrocket