With the recent news of a Knights of the Old Republic remake, we thought it'd be fun to return to this look behind the curtains of BioWare's groundbreaking original. This piece was originally published in December 2017.

There are spoilers ahead for Knights of the Old Republic.

How do you follow a game like Knights of the Old Republic, the most famous original Star Wars tale a video game has ever told? Forget about Obsidian's sequel for a moment and imagine it was BioWare staring at a piece of paper wondering how to follow a twist like Revan's. Because once upon a time BioWare was - and it came up with an idea.

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In my mind, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic has loads of memorable planets, but I don't know whether it's because they were brilliant, or because this was simply the first time BioWare had done this: take me from one planet and land me on another. Mass Effect wasn't a thing then, remember. It was still a whole Jade Empire development away.

But 18 years later I can still remember Manaan. And by Manaan, I don't mean my nan, but the water planet in KOTOR you dived under the surface of, in search of secrets, only to be chased by huge alien sharks. And there was Kashyyyk, with three 'y's, the forest homeworld of Chewie's race, the wookies. And there was Korriban, the sacred Sith homeworld. A place like the Valley of the Kings in Egypt. A place of tombs and darkness, secrets and treasure.

But there's one planet in the Knights of the Old Republic saga which looms over all others (and I'm stretching out my net a bit here to include the second game too). And that planet is Malachor V.

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The unannounced Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic remake will be developed by renowned port studio Aspyr.

Bloomberg reporter Jason Schreier revealed the detail while a guest on the MinnMax podcast. It follows earlier whispers of a KOTOR remake which have swirled for some time, and which also suggested the project wasn't being handled internally by EA or original studio BioWare.

Eurogamer has separately heard of Aspyr's involvement, and that while the developer is known for often releasing straight ports, work is currently underway to make the project more of a remake instead.

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Five of the Best is a weekly series about the small details we rush past when we're playing but which shape a game in our memory for years to come. Details like the way a character jumps or the title screen you load into, or the potions you use and maps you refer back to. We've talked about so many in our Five of the Best series so far. But there are always more.

Five of the Best works like this. Various Eurogamer writers will share their memories in the article and then you - probably outraged we didn't include the thing you're thinking of - can share the thing you're thinking of in the comments below. Your collective memory has never failed to amaze us - don't let that stop now!

Today's Five of the Best is...

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One of the best Star Wars video game characters ever is now canon - again.

The Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker: The Visual Dictionary book references Revan from BioWare's wonderful 2003 Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic game, making the popular playable protagonist canon again after Lucasfilm wiped the extended universe slate clean back in 2014.

The book has a page on the Sith Troopers, which are organised into legions each named after "an ancient Sith lord". The third notable Sith Trooper legion is called Revan Legion, which makes Revan from KOTOR canon.

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Each week, Five of the Best gives love to the overlooked parts of games. The things you don't notice when you're playing because you're too busy doing more important things. But you remember them. They're there in your memory all the same. So much so that when someone says something like, "Which are the best caves in games?" Some immediately spring to mind.

So: which are the best caves in games? Let's give it a try, shall we?

I've been caving - spelunking - before, back when I was a teenager, and I'm not sure I could do it now. I remember having to swim in icy cold water under a stalactite and shimmy along tunnel-like passages. I don't know how I did it - it gives me the shivers just thinking about it now.

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I visited Obsidian Entertainment a couple of weeks ago for the reveal of the studio's first game for new owner Microsoft. If you remember, The Outer Worlds was published by Private Division, Take-Two's label for partnering with independent studios (Obsidian was independent when the deal was made). This was, then, a significant moment.

The game itself was a bit of an anti-climax - Grounded, a small-team survival game with a Honey I Shrunk the Kids hook - but I still got an opportunity to nose around the studio and see what changed post-acquisition and since I visited in August 2017.

The answer, in a nutshell, is "not a lot", which is encouraging. Obsidian still resides in the same office block in the eerily perfect city of Irvine, California, and still occupies the same amount of office space. It's still a bit tatty, which I like, and the only real sign there's now Microsoft money behind the studio is a pile of boxes with computers and monitors in them.

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A film based on Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic is in the works, according to a new report.

Buzzfeed said the script is being written by Laeta Kalogridis, who's worked on Shutter Island, Alita: Battle Angel and Altered Carbon, among other properties. Apparently Kalogridis is close to finishing the first script of a potential KOTOR trilogy.

As Buzzfeed points out, at Star Wars Celebration in April, Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy told MTV News: "Yes, we are developing something to look at," after being asked about KOTOR. "Right now, I have no idea where things might fall."

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Lucasfilm has shut down Apeiron, the ambitious Unreal Engine 4 remake of BioWare's classic role-playing game Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic.

"It's with a great sadness that I'm posting today," project leader Taylor Trotter wrote on Twitter. "I recently received a letter from Lucasfilm instructing Poem [Studios, the team behind the remake] to end production on Apeiron. After a few days, I've exhausted my options to keep it afloat; we knew this day was a possibility. I'm sorry and may the Force be with you."

Trotter posted a picture of the Lucasfilm letter.

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Microsoft is reportedly close to finalising a deal to acquire Obsidian Entertainment, the acclaimed developer behind the likes of Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II, Fallout: New Vegas, and Pillars of Eternity.

Word of the seemingly imminent acquisition comes via Kotaku, which cites "three people briefed on the negotiations" as sources. The deal between Microsoft and Obsidian is said to be "90%" complete, with one source stating that "It's a matter of when, not if."

Obsidian has remained independent since it was founded in 2003, so talk of an acquisition might initially seem unlikely. However, Kotaku notes that the studio has often faced "financial strain" over the years, almost completely collapsing in 2012 when Microsoft, under different leadership, cancelled an ambitious Xbox One exclusive called Stormlands that the companies had been working on together.

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