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From:2K Games , Take 2 Interactive ,
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See Product Page
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User Rating: Amazon Sales Rank:#677 |
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Not a bad game, 2008-09-30
Not a bad game. On the higher difficulties, it's quite challenging. I think the keyboard controls are a little clumsy: I found myself switching between having two hands on the keyboard and one on the mouse more often that I should have had to. The story has some good twists. The game is worth playing, but it's no enduring masterpiece (unlike KOTOR).
 Jade Empire, 2008-09-09
The game is great and I love playing it. The story is wonderful and the settings at times look like beautiful works of art. I was always focused and immersed when playing I could feel myself compelled to continue and play. The combat is one I thing might have to criticize. It can get repetitive using the same attacks over and over but the large list of styles helps. However it often comes down to deciding what is the most efficient style(Though opinion may vary). In combat if I had a challenging enemy I would often back them into a corner or switch between styles to prevent them from doing anything(Though the switching of styles is good synergy)Another problem I find is when comparing this game and Knights of the Old Republic (Another game developed by the same company) When playing I noticed something similar between the two characters. Inside the story they label the character with a title (In Jade Empire, Spirit Monk, KOTOR, Revan). Throughout the story your character is almost always referred to by that name (Though the character needs to be referred to some how besides "hey you" and the title does add some interest and value to the character). I just find it to be a minor annoyance and made me feel like the company recycled some parts from KOTOR. I would recommend this game to anyone who enjoys Rpgs and even to people new to Rpgs.
Good Solid RPG, Lotsa Yammering Included, 2008-09-06
I like Jade Empire a whole lot, I won't lie. It only took me about 15 hours to beat, and the graphics and music were quite excellent! About halfway, once you start consulting your little group as a whole, the characters really shine . And let's face it, you play RPG's because you want a good story. Jade Empire delivers!
My only beef is this:
There's just too much forced dialogue. Yes, you know my name. Yes, you've probably heard of me. Yes, I assume you have a troublesome past as well. Do we have to stand around and talk about nothing for 15 minutes though?
Normally I get into RPG's with heavy dialogue, but then it usually serves to advance the plot. With just about every character I met, it felt like I was trapped in another dumb script. And obviously, if you get impatient you can earn brownie points for being evil, but tiptoeing through and staying neutral or good in conversation doesn't really affect your moral standing as much as a side quest does. And even then, you don't have to try hard to sway either way, because halfway through the plot, the game decides to shift you right into the choice you're nearest to.
The benefit of swinging good or evil, by the way, only gives you different abilities and potential power-ups. I don't think there's any way the plot will change significantly by going "the alternative route."
Also, the voice acting is great (Nathan Fillion plays Lesser Gao; geek points!), but like a bad kung-fu movie, it's hard to get over how much the voices don't fit the visual profiles of the characters. Read into that as much as you like. I just wish it was a little more authentic, if you know what I mean.
Anywho, get it! It's like $6 at the most here on Amazon, if you buy it used, which I certainly couldn't pass up.
A combination of Myst and a rail shooter, 2008-08-29
Once upon a time, Bioware made RPGs. They had good stories and classic RPG mechanics. As time went on, their games emphasized story more and game play less. And that lead to Jade Empire, which is only barely a game but a pretty good story
i like RPGs. A lot. Design your character, wander the world, tackle problems in a hundred different ways and make decisions that affect everyone. This is the opposite of that. There's a world map but why - there's only two places on it. You start in your village and can't go anywhere else until the time you finally leave, at which point you can't go back. You go to a town that you can't leave, and when you solve the quest that let's you, you go to the third and final destination. You could go back to the town but there's no reason to
Within towns, there's basically one path ending in a circle (you can go right or left but you'll end up at the same place). You won't have to worry about getting lost - you have almost no choice in where you go
In Baldur's Gate, you controlled six people. In Star Wars you only got to control three, and technically you controlled one and the other two followed, although you could take direct control of them. In Jade empire, you control one person and have one followed. You cannot control the second person and you cannot set their inventory or control how they level up, although i don't think they do actually level up
In most RPGs, you have stats you configure and level up and you pick from all sorts of fancy techniques and weapons. In Jade Empire, you have three "stats" (hit points, magic points and a third thing) and you'll probably level all of them roughly equally, so there's not many choices here. You do get a dozen or so weapons and techniques to pick from but you probably won't - each technique has three stats that can be leveled up and so your choice ends up being to use the weapon, spell and hand-to-hand combat you start with and have leveled up or to use the new techniques you find which are much, much weaker because they aren't leveled up. You can also power up your magic necklace, which allows you to hold gems with exotic powers such as +5 hit points and +10 magic points.
You talk to a lot of people. You talk to the dozen party members you have (which almost always sit in a room talking to each other because the game arbitrarily prohibits them from joining you on adventures). Occasionally, between conversation trees, you will fight things. Fighting involves pressing the attack key over and over. Sometimes, if you want to get fancy, you could use the arrow key to walk backwards, but you probably won't.
There are many minigames. One is a Galaga-clone where your ancient Chinese jet fighter fights the oncoming enemy jet fighters. You get powerups allowing you to shoot three missiles at a time, recharge shields and regain health. This particular game looks absolutely awful, like some kids school project done in one afternoon. In another minigame, your jet fighter shoots down enemy jet fighters. In the 10th minigame, you fly a jet fighter through oncoming waves of enemy jet fighters plus there's a boss plane that requires several hits to kill. i think the final minigame is some kind of Galaga clone
You'll spend most of this game talking to people. Feel free to say whatever you want - it doesn't affect the game in the slightest. Amber played this, always making the opposite choices i did, and the only thing that ever changed was her profile picture (we looked roughly the same because there are only 6 pictures you can choose from and you can't customize them but if you're evil the background turns red and if you're good it turns blue). i was amazed at how you could pick any of the dialog choices given and you got the exact same response.
So why'd i give it a 4? Because it's a nice enough story and the artwork is nice. i especially like the fox spirit and her elephant body guard. As an RPG, this game is pathetic. In fact, as a game of any type, it's pretty bad. But the game clearly doesn't try to be a game. It's more like a movie, complete with a Galaga machine in the lobby. i was disappointed at first but one i learned to think of it as a Choose Your Own Adventure novel without the choices, it was pretty OK
entertaining, 2008-07-19
I bought this for my husband who is deployed in Iraq. He says it keeps him busy and is a great game to have.
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