Star Wars: The Old Republic Revan Novel Announced

Following the success of the Fatal Alliance and Deceived novels, LucasArts and BioWare have announced plans to release a third Star Wars: The Old Republic novel – and it’s simply entitled Revan. This one will be written by BioWare’s Drew Karpyshyn, and there’s a Q&A about the novel up on the official website if you want to know more:

Q: The book is months away, but can you say how much of Revan will be revealed?

A: We called the book Revan because this is his story; he is the main character, and readers are going to see much of this book through his point of view. There are other characters, of course – some old and some new – but Revan is the primary protagonist.

Q: How much of this is material that had been developed earlier for KOTOR? Was Revan fleshed out at that point, or was he always a sort of a cipher to be filled in later?

A: Anyone familiar with the KOTOR games knows that we walked a delicate line with Revan: the legend and reputation of this great Jedi-turned-Sith were well established, but players were also able to define many aspects of the character as they played.

Obviously this wouldn’t have worked for a book with Revan as the main character, so I decided to focus on certain universally established elements from the KOTOR games while also reinforcing previously established canon from the greater Star Wars universe, such as Revan being male and choosing the light side/redemption ending of the game.

However, by coloring in these details I was also able to delve much deeper into the character than we did when Revan was the “blank slate” of the games. It was a difficult decision, but I feel the payoff was worth it. Fans want to know what happened to Revan after KOTOR, and now they’ll finally get to see that story.

Q: What other characters from Knights of the Old Republic and Knights of the Old Republic II might we expect to see?

A: You can’t tell a story about Revan without also exploring his companions; they were such a key element of the KOTOR experience that it wouldn’t feel right without bringing some of them back. Of course it would be impossible to include all of them in a novel in a way that would make a cohesive and fulfilling story, so I focused on those who felt most directly relevant to what happened to Revan after the KOTOR games. I don’t want to give too much away, but Canderous, T3-M4, the Exile and Bastila Shan all have significant roles to play in the novel (along with some significant characters who appear in Star Wars: The Old Republic).

As a huge fan of Star Wars: KotOR, this one might finally convince me to grab the books from Amazon.