Release in 2005, Jade Empire is the last Bioware RPG made for the original Xbox system. I picked the game up earlier this year, finally dusting it off to play over the holidays.

The game is Bioware’s ode to Chinese Mythology and the eastern movie cinema. It contains all the elements you would expect: A fight in a tea house, transforming martial art styles, an lone orphaned warrior, mysterious companions, and many many other ideas ripped directly from Action Movies of yore.

You start out as a Student of a mysterious master, dueling another student as you familiarize yourself with the tiny village you grew up in. You will be shown the basics of the control scheme and techniques that will be used throughout the rest of the game, and used often. You eventually learn that you have a mythical heratiage, only to have your master kid napped by the Empire… You and your students vow to get the Master back, and thus starts one of the most engaging and frustrating gaming experiences I have ever had.

The controls fore the game don’t really change much through out the rest of the game, highlighting one of the weakness’ of the whole package. This game wants to be an Action RPG that puts the control of a master of the marial arts in your hands, but it ultimate just ends up feeling repetitive and a big boring…which is kind of odd. I’ve never had that experience with a Bioware game before; even Knights of the Old Republic has a battle system that made you think as you used all your party.

This brings up another point: You only have on other party member at any time; they can be either set to attack others via an AI routine or set to support mode. In support mode the other party member cannot be attack by enemies, but cannot attack enemies either. It just boosts your health, or attack power, or chi, or whatever the Ally is set to do.

This is not a mode I used very often as the game progressed.

I did beat this game, I spent 30 hours on it. Yet I found the whole experience disappointing, especially in light of the historical Bioware properties. I think part of this is because there wasn’t enough: You start out in a village, go to another village, do some quests..then go to the empire’s capitol, do some more quests, then the next few chapters are a rush to the end.

There wasn’t enough content.

I think the problems I had with the control scheme could have been addressed if there I had more things to do: I could see a refinement of the control scheme being great..but it felt to me that it was poorly executed. The game didn’t seem to want to know if it was a Turn Based RPG or an Action game, and that led to a bit of frustration.

I honestly wouldn’t have minded if the battles had been totally turn based, like the great ps2 game Gladius.

The story was a bit disappointing to me, also. I guessed most of the story from the start…and this is something that isn’t normal for Bioware games either. I loved parts of it, I really liked some of the back story that fleshed out your companions. (The Hulking Black Whirlwind was great.) But honestly there just wasn’t enough; I wanted more. It also, in parts, felt like a retread of Knights of the Old Republic. Once you get to the Lotus Assassin’s Fortress you will feel a totally dark side Deja Vu. It almost feels like Bioware was on a time cruch when creating this game and had to cut the whole story short, just to ship the game.

I have seen this in other developers, but never in Bioware.

There was one level I loved. Shortly after you get to Tien’s Landing, you are asked to rid the forest of some spirits. When you get to the forest you end up being taken up to the Fox Spirit’s “heaven.” This, in my honest opinion, is the very best level of the game. It is beautiful with music to match. You have a variety of tough enemies and the level just shows off the very best the game has to offer… It is one level I remember for years to come. You could see hints of this quality in the rest of the game, but honestly they were few and far between.

I enjoyed the game for the most part, I mean I did finish it, but honestly it could have been so much better. Like I said earlier, it was both enjoyable and frustrating and I hope they address many of these issues in Jade Empire 2.

I can’t wait for Jade Empire 2. I hope that Bioware will take the game in to a total action style complete with the RPG trappings that we know and love. If a game like Rogue Galaxy can do it (and does it well) then Bioware, a great developer, can find it in themselves to overcome this short-coming.

While they are at it, maybe they will write a story that is worthy of the Bioware name, using the unique and awesome universe they have created with this game.

Buy it or don’t buy it: Buy it, since you can probably find it for 5 or 10 dollars at a local gamestop or game crazy. It is worth playing, but not one of Bioware’s finest.

- Warren

 

 

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