Jade Empire, any good?

[deuxhero]

The combat is apparently something other than Bioware's normal god-awful method of combat (though is it just as god-awful?), and I heard the setting is uniquish.

 

[Admiral jimbob]

Probably the shortest game they've ever put out, there's only one real city, it feels more railroaded and with less sidequests than KotOR. The combat is basically rock, paper, scissors. You have normal attack, power attack and block. Normal attack beats power attack, power attack beats block, block beats normal attack. Isn't that exciting?

It's not absolutely woeful, but the only reason I bothered to play past the first couple of hours was having no internet for a week. I'd say avoid, there's far better games you probably haven't played yet.

 

[mugarod]

Got it on steam sale last christmass and while I dont really like latest bioware games I found JE to be interesting. Combat while being rock/paper/scissors was still fun to me mostly because I like martial arts stuff and I dont see a lot of games having things like that. Plus I liked ancient china setting which is also something I dont feel is overused. I definetelly dont regret spending 5 dollars on it and if I could take back 5$ for Mass Effect 1 and give it to JE I would.

 

[Sceptic]

The combat is apparently something other than Bioware's normal god-awful method of combat (though is it just as god-awful?)

True and true. Although, to its credit, it and ME1 are the only post-IE Bioware games where combat doesn't drag on forever to the point of making you pull your hair out. It "compensates" for this by being full of it, and by locking you into small arenas with invisible walls whenever you're in combat. Also, there is exactly one style per type (martial, weapon, magic) that you should max everything in and forget about all other styles. Well, except for the gun, which is almost a cheat against single opponents. The Codex review is pretty comprehensive in exactly what's good and bad about it. Oh, and it has a gay romance, a lesbo romance, AND a threesome with both chicks, if any of this stuff strikes your fancy.

Also, retarded minigames. Retarded minigames everywhere.

Where? the only one I remember is the flying bits, but you can skip all of them one way or the other. And the bridge fighting in chapter 6, which was terrible.

 

[commie]

Worth it just for John Cleese and the different setting.

 

[oscar]

Pro-Tip: jump around lots and no one will ever be able to land a blow on you. Short, but I enjoyed it. For five bucks it's probably worthwhile. Combat is pretty easy so go hard mode straight away.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

I liked it fairly well. It's a Bioware RPG so you know exactly what you're getting, and the combat is kinda simple but I still had fun with it. Sorta like beat-'em-up RPG.

 

[Dyskolos]

Pro-Tip: jump around lots and no one will ever be able to land a blow on you.

With constant jumping I think the only time I got hit after the first five minutes was against John Cleese. I just don't understand how so simplistic a combat system didn't account for such a cheap gamebreaker. Or maybe they just didn't give a shit.

 

[oscar]

Yeah I figured that out pretty quick. Stuff like this makes you wonder if developers ever actually try out their own games. If I remember correctly you can't even take damage while jumping.

 

[Satori (original)]

Play it just for the underused setting.

 

[Chuftie]

Play it just for the underused setting.

THIS

It's standard bioware.

But I fucking love kung-fu stuff so I played.
Fucking shame, that it's so damn linear, you really don't explore much around.
But no you just travel around to location solve whatever bullshit is there, then hop to the next plotpoint.

Lack of wandering makes me rage, because I wall FUCK YEAH MAGICAL KUNG-FU CHINA LAND! I"m GONNA WANDER AROUND AND FIND WORTHY OPPONENTS AND BEAT THEM TO A PULP! And I was alll
With the linear progression and easily telegraphed plot revelations

 

[Overweight Manatee]

Its the closest thing Bioware has EVER had to an original, interesting story and setting. Combat isn't great, but its bad in a ME2-esque bad but still serviceable way and unlike ME2 or especially DA it doesn't pile on 10000s of enemies just to artificially extend the length. Not much of an RPG but as an action RPG its Bioware's best.

 

[DalekFlay]

Only Bioware game I haven't played, other than that Sonic thing on the gameboy. Actually, the only Bioware game I haven't completed, I guess.

 

[Secretninja]

r00fles

 

[markec]

You can have a threesome in the end, so yeah its worth playing.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Possibly an incestual threesome I heard. Apparently one of the characters you can play is related to one of the fuckable characters. I never noticed so I could have been reading lies on the internet however.

 

[KalosKagathos]

Bio's best game, not that it's saying much. Combat is broken, but at least it doesn't take aeons like RTwP does; Open Palm/Closed Fist is an attempt to get away from saint/jerkass morality that actually works sometimes (you still get CF points for random bullying and general douchebaggery, but one time you can refuse a money reward for screwing over an entire town saying you did it to make the town stronger in the long run); the token plot twist is surprisingly well-executed.

 

[markec]

Possibly an incestual threesome I heard. Apparently one of the characters you can play is related to one of the fuckable characters. I never noticed so I could have been reading lies on the internet however.

Incline?

 

[Andhaira]

It's an excellent game/action rpg. The music especally is fantastic. The minigame is a classic; it's the best minigame Bioware has done yet. (though yeah that's not saying much, but hey)

Definately worth it, especially the price at which you can get it today. Two thumbs up.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

You know, maybe I'm wrong. Since googling "Jade Empire incest" doesn't turn up anything, and the Jade Empire wiki unfortunately doesn't tell you much about the playable characters. Could've sworn I read that somewhere (Bioware boards I think, when I was confirming that there were degenerates for every Bioware game) but maybe it was all a dream.

 

[Konjad]

Jade Empire might be cool if all you look for is a combat game like Mortal Combat with some dialogues and light blak&white story with some C&C where you choose either to be evil or good and sometimes it even has a choice to screw both good and evil sides (like with the Goddess and Cannibals which I really liked). It's an action RPG really focused on combat. Mediocre-to-bad writing and bland characters but I'd say it's still worth a try, especially since it's a very cheap game. The game's MQ is short but if you do all side quests it will took you about 30 hrs to finish (15-20 with MQ only). Play it, it's enjoyable enough as for action RPG and has pretty good combat system.

 

[Overweight Manatee]

Dawn Star was the daughter of

Spoiler

Sun Li,

who was

Spoiler

Sun Hai's

brother, who was Silk Fox's father, making Dawn star and Silk Fox cousins.

 

[Xor]

If you liked KOTOR you'll probably like JE, because they both have similar writing styles. JE is a much shorter game, though.

If you do decide to play it, turn the difficulty down to the lowest setting. Combat is extremely tedious and there is absolutely no reason to subject yourself to the harder difficulties since all they do is make you deal less damage and enemies do more, making combat take much, much longer than it needs to. Also health powerups drop less on the higher difficulties where they drop like candy on easy.

The setting tries really hard to be different, but it suffers from the same cliches that have infected all bioware games and there are stereotypes everywhere. Still, it has a few interesting quests and the plot is at least decent even if it's incredibly cliche.

One of the most interesting things to me is the romances. There's a gay and lesbian romance, or you can end up with two chicks if you're playing a male character, plus you can turn the romanceable party members evil (although you can only do it to one per playthrough) if you're going the evil route, which is an interesting twist that I wish more games had.

IMO go the evil route and romance silk fox, she's pretty hilarious when she turns evil, and the end of the game was more satisfying where

Spoiler

you basically become a god and rule over the world as a tyrant. It's funny because I hated most of the party members and they mostly get bad ends if you're evil

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Dawn Star was the daughter of

Spoiler

Sun Li,

who was

Spoiler

Sun Hai's

brother, who was Silk Fox's father, making Dawn star and Silk Fox cousins.

Well thank you Manatee.

 

[Commissar Draco]

Evil? You mean Sith Closes fist Amarite? It is not the same in this setting and as many quests including TOWN from chapter one, This one with slaves and dowry shows.

Game is same dish as always from Bioware but being 5 years old and pre EA shows in good way. Setting is Unigue, nicely showing the essence of Chinese culture and game is not bend to show Furrfaggotry down your throat.

 

[RK47]

nicely showing the essence of Chinese

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHA

I'm sorry.

Wait. I need a moment.

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAA