Hmm that sounds like a bet. Loser eats a sock?

blame obsidian eh:
KOTOR1 development time: 48 months
Released on: It was released for the Xbox on July 15, 2003
started work on: "Preproduction started in 2000, but the discussions started back in 1999,"
KOTOR2 development time: 15 months
Released on: "Released on December 6, 2004"
Started work on: Probably immediately after a release of KOTOR2 or few months before.
Blaming obsidian is like blaming Poland for WW2. Those f***kers should have fought better shouldn't they :D :D (yay for Godwin's law)
Obsidian should have fought Lucasarts more but you cannot blame them for not doing that. LA is huge, Obsidian is small and really didn't have much to say. It is really impressive how complex KOTOR2 was even with all that cut content. it is double in size to previous game.

And hence, there is no need for them to publish anything BUT Star Wars games.
They really do share the blame in equal measure. LucasArts for setting and upholding a ridiculous deadline, and Obsidian for agreeing to it.

Obsidian couldn't not agree. LA is huge. they are not. if they fought the deadline it would mean loss of the IP and for small company like that it would be tragic.
KOTOR2 was the case of small man being crushed by huge rich bastard.

It sounds like you're assuming I'm talking about when the game was nearing release. I'm not. As far as I know, that deadline was part of the deal from the beginning. Obsidian still agreed to it. They could have just not taken the job.

and lose the lucrative deal? nope.

See? Their own fault.
If a man offers you a million dollars on the condition that he can run a bulldozer through your house, and you take the money, you do NOT get to complain about the fact that he ran a bulldozer through your house.
If they took the deal, knowing that it wasn't enough time, then it's their own damn fault.
A bank robber can not use the excuse "but it was so much money, I couldn't help myself".

Obsidian's games have a bad rep because all they do is take existing games by other developers, re-use the engine/brand name, and profit from mediocrity.

they don't take a job tens of people might lose jobs. bad image for new company.
the fault is ENTIRELY Lucasarts. you don't develop a sequel to complex game like KOTOR which had three years development time in a year and half.
If obsidian said no other company would take it and they would f***k it up too. probably worse seeing how much they managed to make in barely 18 months.
Come on Wishbone. you can seriously be that naive and not know how the world works.

And since you can say that so confidently, you can of course provide me with documentation that the offer from LucasArts was the only one they had, and that they would have been forced to shut down the company if they hadn't taken it exactly as offered?
Of course you don't, anyone can see that. Even Obsidian.
Likewise. I submit it is you who are naïve, claiming that all responsibility lies solely with LucasArts, and that no blame can possibly attach to anyone else.

Again, if it is so impossible to work for LA, why do so many other dev teams succeed? And yeah, KOTOR 2 had a much shorter dev time. But Obisidian didn't really need to make a new engine, optimize a ruleset, create a world "from scratch", etc.
But either way, let's say that it really isn't Obsidian's fault that they failed to deliver, and that it was all LA's fault for daring to give them work. In that case, Obsidian are, at best, a bunch of people who care more about money and business than making quality games. I mean, if the reason they accepted the contract they knew they could not achieve (which is really bad business to begin with...) is that they were afraid of how it might impact their bottom line, clearly they don't have the love of gaming and desire to make beautiful works of art that everyone attributes to them. I don't really fault them for that (they are a company...), but it kind of sticks the kibosh in the whole "Oh, KOTOR 2 would have been perfect if it weren't for LA".
I realize it is fun to rally behind the little guy against the big mean corporation, and I am sure that LA and Atari had a lot to do with KOTOR 2 being half-done and NWN2 being insanely unoptimized (and of arguable completeness). But LA and Atari weren't the ones making those games...

The thing is it was their first game ever. they needed it. And were in a situation where refusal and admission that "they cannot do that" would be devastating.
That's why i shift the blame on LA. Obsidian had no real choice on that matter.
They needed the money. Saying they have no love for gaming is unjust.
They had a choice:
Big bucks and continuation of what they like doing, maybe in the future on their terms.
or
Loss of major client, damage to the image of company, strained relationship with Bioware (which gave them later NWN didn't it)
It is idealistic view that since Obsidian should refuse the offer since they should expect that the game will be unfinished before the deadline.
In reality they needed that job and were hoping for extension. LA didn't budge.
You also can't say they have no love for gaming as they tried to make great, complex game. even with the cuts the game is bigger than KOTOR1 and 95% of games released in past ten years.

So now the argument is: They just wanted to make money, make a name for themselves, and pay back their buddies.
All noble goals. But you still don't get to claim that they have a massive love of gaming that evil LA quashed.
And was KOTOR 2 larger than KOTOR? I thought they were about the same length. If anything, I felt KOTOR 2 to be shorter (but there was no Taris, so I could be biased :p). And as for being larger than 95% of games released in the past ten years: Probably. But compare it to other RPGs (that 5%), and it was about average, and may have even been short. :p
I am not saying Obsidian should or should not have declined LA's author. Unlike you, I wasn't at the negotiations. What I am saying is that they knew what their deadline was, and they couldn't even come close to keeping it. I am also saying that people don't get to call them idealistic heroes of gaming who care about nothing more than making good games while also using the "They are a company, and their first priority is to make money" as an excuse for why it isn't their fault that they worked on KOTOR 2 or NWN2.

I never said that. I believe they like what they doing and do care about quality of their products from artistic point of view too but money is the priority. with any company which wants to survive more than 12 months. saying that those people are doing what they are doing out of love is silly.
hardly average. In kotor1 you could choose the ending good or bad 20 minutes before the end. As far as i know you would have to replay whole game of KOTOR2 to see second ending.
there are back stories of your friends/slaves. Hundreds of side quests which i really don't see being completed on first playthrough (unless playing together with gamefaq)
Game was bigger than jade empire which i am about to finish and on my first playthrough saw practically everything, bigger than bloodlines, bigger than KOTOR1 (maybe similar length if you concentrate only on main plot, skipping everything else but sidequest, playing with workbench, seeing both endings for your and your team makes the game bigger)
Aren't we being unfair? not coming even close to keeping the deadline? the game was finished with cut content so what's your opinion about not coming close
Did i say they are idealistic heroes? when did i say that?