Jade Empire - Interview @ Firing Squad

I'm actually pretty much looking forward to this title. I've always liked BioWare games, and this one seems pretty popular on the Xbox, meaning it can't be that bad, either. And martial arts is pure fun, I guess. I just hope they stick to the "sometime around January 2007" tentative release date.

Firing Squad had a chance at an interview with Diarmid Clark, Bioware's project director for the PC version:

FiringSquad: What can you tell us about the graphical upgrades that are being made for the PC version?

Diarmid Clarke: We’ve upgraded a lot of the textures and effects, so you’re getting ultra-crisp visuals, smooth frame rates and it all loads very quickly. It looks absolutely fantastic on a high resolution, widescreen monitor, but it’s completely scalable so it will also run smoothly and look great on lower end machines as well.

More information.

I'm expecting a more linear, Fablish experience which wasnt that bad. Fable was pretty fun for a good 10 hours before I called it.

Jade Empire? Isn't that like, 1.5 years old? And then this:

FiringSquad: How hard was it to port the content of the original Xbox game to work on the PC?

Diarmid Clarke: To get something working on PC from Xbox is pretty straightforward. The hard work comes from adding all the enhancements to the PC version so that they make the game closer to the original design vision. For example, I’m very happy with how the game has been re-balanced to make the players’ second-to-second gameplay experience more enjoyable.

Conclusion: Xbox gets in the way of the quality that were possible without it. As a pure PC gamer, I hate the Xbox. First, developers design games for them with a control scheme they'd never use for a PC version, and when they eventually port it over it's too late, because the game has already been designed around that control scheme.

And then they even develop titles exclusively for Xbox. Gah.

I love Martial Arts movies and was anxiously awaiting Jade Empire when it was in development. But when it was clear that there wouldn't be a PC version for who knows how long at the time, I felt cheated. I may try out this title now that's it's finally going to be available for PC, but my initial excitement has waned a long time ago.

Here is an opinion from a game mag writer I respect on Jade Empire:

Not to be a jerk about it, but Jade Empire separates the "I play a few hours and write my review" people from the "I played the whole damn game before I wrote my review" people.

I don't do a lot of RPGs because they just take too long to complete and if you don't complete them, you can't really see how good the combat holds up over the million hours of gameplay you get before the end. Jade Empire was something I knew was a little shorter but also something I really wanted to play. I played it to the end and it just doesn't hold together. If I had to guess, I'd say they rushed it to get it out when they did. If 360 launches in 2006, Jade Empire is out now and it's probably a better game because of it.

Also…

Quote:
I'm not so much 'asking' as wondering … the game stands in very high regard in some places, is criticised in others. Combat is brilliant to some, 'meh' or worse to others. That is the type of diversity of opinion I'd expect in a mediocre game, not a high-profile, high scoring game like Jade Empire.

Asking and wondering are close enough for me.

Finally, you just answered Not to be a jerk about it, but Jade Empire separates the "I play a few hours and write my review" people from the "I played the whole damn game before I wrote my review" people.

I liked the game actually. It's definitely a bit different from the standard PC RPG from Bioware - but then again, who wants to play the same games over and over again? Personally I like when things changes a bit - it keeps the experiences of playing fresh

The game has a lot of focus on martial arts combat, but it's actually quite fun. In the beginning the game is very linear and you might feel you're travelling down a narrow path. But later in the game it opens up and you *will* get to rather large cities with lots of subquests that you can do in any order. And all over the place there are lots of people to talk to (and there is a *lot* of dialog in this game, like all Bioware games

The item/stats system has been toned down a lot - some might say it has been "dumbed down" because its an xbox game, personally I think its just a design issue. The designers decided to put focus on story and combat rather than the more traditional RPG elements. So don't expect too much from the item system if you play this game!

All in all I really enjoyed the game - I think I would give it somewhere between 8.2 and 8.7 if I were asked. Note that I'm mostly a PC gamer. Been gaming on the PC since the eighties, first PC I gamed on was a 4,7 Mhz IBM (yes, MHz not GHz . I bought an xbox because I wanted to try something new and because I was doing an xbox game at work - and then because a few RPGs came out on the xbox first such as Fable, Kotor2 and Jade Empire.

I've played the original on the xbox 1. It's a good rpg on that platform for the time since there really weren't many rpgs on xbox 1 to speak of.

But I really think that the "tech" window for this game has long past (even though it's only over 1 year old). They really should have scrapped plans to release this on the PC a year later. Instead focus on a JE 2 with an updated engine.

Because quite frankly after playing Oblivion and Gothic 3, JE on the PC will seem quite ancient in comparison. It's hard to go back after the bar has been raised by these two games. Even Final Fantasy 12 looked aged compared to Oblivion and Gothic 3.

For me, Jade Empire was the best of last year's CRPGs (was there another?). Usually I favor certain platforms for certain genres (like PCs for CRPGS/shooters/adventures and consoles for beat'em up/jump'n run games), but if I want a game badly enough, I'll buy it for whichever platform gets it out first, no regrets.
Jade Empire was such a game; I'm somewhat wary of Bioware games in general as I found BG 1 and 2 so boring (and the setting so bland) that I swore never to touch another game by the company, but I absolutely wanted a game in a mythical Chinese setting…
Luckily, I enjoyed Jade Empire thoroughly (romance options, anyone?) and was fully satisfied. I'm not going to buy the PC version as I lack the time to replay newer games - if I continue to play Dark Messiah with the current speed, I'll finish it next February.

Originally Posted by lastlaugh
I've played the original on the xbox 1. It's a good rpg on that platform for the time since there really weren't many rpgs on xbox 1 to speak of.

But I really think that the "tech" window for this game has long past (even though it's only over 1 year old). They really should have scrapped plans to release this on the PC a year later. Instead focus on a JE 2 with an updated engine.

Because quite frankly after playing Oblivion and Gothic 3, JE on the PC will seem quite ancient in comparison. It's hard to go back after the bar has been raised by these two games. Even Final Fantasy 12 looked aged compared to Oblivion and Gothic 3.

I couldnt disagree more. Games like Gothic 2, Morrowind and (dare I say) Fable run smooth as silk with a dozen of combatants on the screen and the graphics are far more than simply "acceptable".

I'm sick and tired of playing games like Oblivion where my first thought when I see 4 or more combatants is that my frame rate is going to drop to 18-22 FPS! Now people with top end hardware even in SLI are accepting 18-25 FPS as "standard" in Gothic 3 and report that freeing towns is "choppy".

I like pretty games … I like 'big boom games' … and I like RPG's.

But I don't begin to equate quality of graphics with quality of story or game.