Jade Empire 2? Dean Takahashi says....

[AlNom]

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I talked with someone who saw code for Jade Empire 2. It’s coming for the Xbox 360, and it’s real.

I never played the full version of Jade Empire, but my friend liked it a lot. Does it warrant a sequel (in the sense that the story left some areas that could be expanded upon). Thoughts on story?

Did the game sell well? Dean mentions multi-platform, but BioWare has ever been focused on one platform at a time. I would think that if the game were to go multi-platform, that one of EA's studios would handle the porting ala Orange Box. In which case, things might go more smoothly (than Orange Box) if BioWare uses their highly tailored Unreal Engine 3, post-Mass Effect.

 

[PARANOiA]

I quite enjoyed JE, though it was definitely overrated by some reviews - IGN gave it a 9.7 IIRC. I would put it as a 9 on the patented "Paz Whole Number Out Of Ten" scale.

The game had a decent gameplay mechanic in the open palm/closed fist choices - particularly in the way it tried to get across the concept that the outcome of the choice wasn't important so much as the reason for the choice. There were also some classic NPC characters that made the game quite fun - anyone else remember the John Cleese skit?

I'd like them to move away from the brawler-type combat in a sequel. The setting itself is quite fun and somewhat original for a WRPG.

In terms of a plot, they'd do best to move away from the characters seen in the first game. There was a definitive arc revolving around the main character which traced his whole life, from the time he was first raised by his village. Trying to tack more onto that character would be a bit silly.

The FF games have a great way of keeping things fresh every time while keeping a few in-jokes for series fans - chocobos, Cid, Wedge. I don't understand why more games don't go down this path.

 

[DuckThor Evil]

I think Bioware should consentrate all their resources into making Mass Effect trilogy the best it can be and leave JE 2 to somebody else, like what happened with Kotor 2.

I still have Jade Empire, haven't really played it though. I'm sure it's a good game, but space rpg is more fun :smile:

 

[Kzin]

I realy didn´t like the first game.

The real-time combat was just boring. It felt slow, and you could get by by just jumping over the enemy and attacking him from behind. Sure, you could do some combos by shifting between styles but it was more of a hasle and not realy worth it. If you dodged an attack, what you wanna do then is to strike a back fast when you have the advantage (isnt that like the foundation av ALL fighting games?). But when you dodged you would end up to far away, and for some strange reason you could only walk up realy slowly to your opponent. If they´re keeping the real time combat (wich a realy hope they dont) they need to rebuild from the ground and get the basics right.

I realy hated the leveling system. You had 3 attributes: body, mind and ki (or something like that). You needed body to use your fists, mind to use weapons and mind to use magic. There was also different kinds of enemies wich could only be killed with either fists, weapons or magic, so you basicily needed everything. Having a character where you didn´t spend 1/3 of your xp on body, mind and ki each did´t make any sense. A pure mage would be useless since he wouldt be able to fight 2/3 of the enemies. To qoute angry video game nerd: "What were they thinking!?"

Leveling fightingstyles was also broken. You might find a cool pair of weapons later in the game, but by then you probably already have spent alot of xp on the first weapon you find, and there´s no point in having two gimped weapons so you just keep leveling you first weapon. So finding new weapons (wich usaly are realy fun in all games) was just pointless.

You couldn´t find different armour and stuff like that to change the appearence of your character, one of the things i realy like about rpgs.

Seems to me they didnt have time to finish the game. You are told of alot of cool places but you never get to go there. It seems the game is over when it should be getting started.

An rpg in an oriental setting wich martial arts, weapons and magic is realy cool though and it might end up realy fun. I just hope they get fix the flaws of the first game. I didnt like al those ghost, i would rather see more kung fu fighting and stuff.

 

[Skrying]

Bioware is doing a number of projects, one of which is much more expensive then the entire Mass Effect trilogy and JE2 combined, their MMO.

 

[AlNom]

Right, let's not forget the existence of even multiple teams within BioWare Edmonton. The JE team was different from the KotOR team, which worked on Mass Effect. They could be working toward a similar release schedule as KotOR and JE -> ME and then JE2 ?

Interesting you bring up the FF formula, Paranoia. I guess there aren't too many RPG series besides FF to go down that route though (none on consoles at any rate). My impression of JE was that it was a bit of a stand-alone story, and the use of multiple playable characters (besides male/female) might have left things too complicated for an actual sequel.

Hope to see more about the 360's general line-up though now that 2007 is over...

 

[archangelmorph]

I realy didn´t like the first game.

The real-time combat was just boring. It felt slow, and you could get by by just jumping over the enemy and attacking him from behind. Sure, you could do some combos by shifting between styles but it was more of a hasle and not realy worth it. If you dodged an attack, what you wanna do then is to strike a back fast when you have the advantage (isnt that like the foundation av ALL fighting games?). But when you dodged you would end up to far away, and for some strange reason you could only walk up realy slowly to your opponent. If they´re keeping the real time combat (wich a realy hope they dont) they need to rebuild from the ground and get the basics right.

I realy hated the leveling system. You had 3 attributes: body, mind and ki (or something like that). You needed body to use your fists, mind to use weapons and mind to use magic. There was also different kinds of enemies wich could only be killed with either fists, weapons or magic, so you basicily needed everything. Having a character where you didn´t spend 1/3 of your xp on body, mind and ki each did´t make any sense. A pure mage would be useless since he wouldt be able to fight 2/3 of the enemies. To qoute angry video game nerd: "What were they thinking!?"

Leveling fightingstyles was also broken. You might find a cool pair of weapons later in the game, but by then you probably already have spent alot of xp on the first weapon you find, and there´s no point in having two gimped weapons so you just keep leveling you first weapon. So finding new weapons (wich usaly are realy fun in all games) was just pointless.

You couldn´t find different armour and stuff like that to change the appearence of your character, one of the things i realy like about rpgs.

Seems to me they didnt have time to finish the game. You are told of alot of cool places but you never get to go there. It seems the game is over when it should be getting started.

An rpg in an oriental setting wich martial arts, weapons and magic is realy cool though and it might end up realy fun. I just hope they get fix the flaws of the first game. I didnt like al those ghost, i would rather see more kung fu fighting and stuff.

Good analysis.. It's like you read my mind..!!

I thought the game was good overall it just left much to be desired.. The combat was fun for a minute & then just became shallow after the first 3 hours.. All the weapons seemed to play the same way too which didn't help.. I would have preferred a much more deep & diverse fighting system which could have also made the game a bit more dramatic..

Overall I think a sequel should add more depth to the combat & RPG elements & rework the enemy AI to help you employ some form of strategy to combat instead of being able to defeat every oponent by jumping over them & hitting, jumping over & hitting, jumping over... (ad infinum)

Also a larger world with more places to visit & more diverse locations/NPCs would help..

Oh & bring back the mutants & the rat men.. Best video game characters ever designed, hands down..

 

[Kzin]

Oh & bring back the mutants & the rat men.. Best video game characters ever designed, hands down..

Well, you know the old saying: "You can´t go wrong with rat men."