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Not converted
Jade Empire roundhouse kicked its way onto iOS this week, prompting a great deal of excitement. Here is a conversion of a forgotten gem from the developer of Star Wars:Knights of the Old Republic - one of the greatest RPG games ever made.
From the environments, to the voice-overs, to the cutscenes, Jade Empire creates an entire experience that more then justifies its cost. Jade Empire is another Bioware creation that continues their legacy as some of the best RPG developers around. Jade Empire is probably one of the best RPGs you'll play this year. We have every game from the GOG.com catalog available to download for free! Free GOG PC game downloads by direct link. 433.15 MB jadeempireostflac.zip.
Indeed, what makes Jade Empire's arrival on the App Store such a big deal is the fact that the mobile conversion of KOTOR turned out to be brilliant.
Jade Empire shares many of its core elements with KOTOR - it was built with the same engine and released just four years later. Surely it would be a similarly great fit for mobile, then. Right?
Well, no. I've spent only a little time with Jade Empire on iOS, but I can tell already that it's no KOTOR. It's not even a question of the quality of the game itself - that's for a review to reflect upon - but rather the fundamental nature of the conversion.
A long time ago... 2013 to be exact
A large part of the reason why KOTOR, in all its complicated glory, worked so well on mobile back in 2013 was because of the kind of RPG it originally was. While watching it in action might suggest a third person adventure with frenetic (if slightly stilted) combat, it's actually quite a laid-back, hands-off experience.
In particular, battles are semi-automated affairs that are more about your party set-up and strategic decisions than any sort of manual dexterity. If things aren't going your way, you simply pause the game, have a think, reshuffle your equipment or party approach, then resume and watch your new plan unfold.
Needless to say, this played out pretty well on an iPad screen, where the touch interface suits 'slow and deliberate' better than 'quick and reactive'.
Fighting style
Conversely, while Jade Empire shares its DNA with KOTOR, they're quite different beasts. KOTOR was a PC game first and foremost, but Jade Empire was a more streamlined action RPG for the console crowd.
You move your warrior around the battlefield and hit buttons to dodge, block, and initiate attacks in real time. You can switch to varying styles and pull out weapons - again, in real time.
This hasn't been mapped particularly elegantly to mobile. You're given a clunky set of virtual controls with which to engage in these (relatively) fast-moving battles. It's a bit of a mess, and flipping between attacks and modes feels clumsy.
There's an MFi controller option, but any time that's a solution to a mobile game's control issues, I'd argue that game has failed.
I (don't) like the way you move
Even basic movement is handled differently across both games. In KOTOR, you simply swipe up to start moving, then swipe left or right to steer your hero.
In Jade Empire you have to manipulate a virtual stick, and there's a creaky analogue system for differentiating between walking and running. There's an option in the menu to make your hero auto-run, but that gives you the turning circle of an oil tanker when wandering around villages.
It's all perfectly usable, but it's another area of frustrating disconnect between the game and the player. Over many hours, that might well lessen - but it's just as likely to force some to give up.
Bad karma
Little blame should be apportioned to the conversion specialists at Aspyr here. Bringing Jade Empire's mobile conversion in line with KOTOR's would have required a fundamental rewiring of its mechanisms, which I suspect was entirely impractical - and quite probably impossible.
Besides which, the game remains a sound one - if very much a product of its time. Also, I wouldn't deny that it's a good thing to see it on mobile. Jade Empire was always something of a black sheep in the BioWare family, and it's occasionally seen - somewhat unfairly - as a failure. That record deserves to be set straight.
It's just that I don't think playing the game on mobile does Jade Empire's legacy much good. This was originally supposed to be a more streamlined, accessible take on the KOTOR template, and on mobile that's not the case.
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Part 1: Character Selection
Episode 00: Character SelectionMUSIC: Jade Empire Main Theme
Welcome to Jade Empire! As soon as we hit the title screen we're treated to Jack Wall's wonderful main theme and a scenic shot of the game's starting area, which do a great job establishing the feel of Jade Empire before we even press start. One slightly unfortunate issue here is that the game wasn't quite optimized for widescreen; as a result things like the menus and HUD elements are stretched horizontally. The actual gameplay looks fine, so it's not a huge deal.
The character creation is rather streamlined compared to KotOR. We don't get to customize our appearance or anything like that, instead we have a selection of seven predefined characters (six in the original Xbox version; Monk Zeng here was only in the limited edition as well as the Special Edition we're playing)
The streamlining is obvious from the stats screen as well. We only have three main attributes to raise: Body, Spirit, and Mind, affecting your health, chi and focus stats respectively. These main attributes are raised using skill points from levelups. There are also three conversation skills, each determined by two of the main stats: Charm (Body + Mind), Intimidate (Body + Spirit), and Intuition (Spirit + Mind). We can find various ways to boost our stats and conversation skills throughout the game, but it is all very simple.
As for Monk Zeng himself, he is a Magic type character and by default he starts off with a boost to his Spirit, making him ideal for using magic styles and boosting strikes with chi. You can click on the Custom option to allocate the points yourself if you want to, which is what I'm showing off in the screenshot. You can also select which fighting styles your character starts with, or just stick with the defaults. Before we do anything else, though, let's look at the different characters.
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Wu the Lotus Blossom is a Balanced character, who as you might expect are decent at everything they do and have no advantages in any particular area. She's on the original box art and prominently features in promo materials, so she might be considered the 'canon' main character of Jade Empire if you care about that kind of thing.Furious Ming is a Fast character, which is also quite self-explanatory. He's not as strong as other classes, but makes up for it with speedy attacks and dodges. Fast characters get a boost to Focus, allowing them to use weapons for longer or spend more time in Focus mode (sort of a bullet time thing).
Tiger Shen is a Strong character. No prizes are awarded for guessing what his strengths and weaknesses are. He lumbers around and facetanks enemy attacks like no other. Literally no other, because he's the only Strong type character in Jade Empire. The other classes get both a male and female option.
Radiant Jen Zi is the female Fast character. She starts off with a slightly worse Body attribute than Furious Ming (possibly due to her lack of pants), but makes up for it with higher Spirit.
Scholar Ling was the only Magic type character in the original release of the game, here her counterpart is of course Monk Zeng. She's a bit less durable than Zeng, but her higher Mind allows for more Focus.
Lu the Prodigy is the second Balanced character and starts off with a higher Body attribute than Wu the Lotus Blossom. I'm sensing a bit of a trend here, not that it really matters because you can allocate the points however you please. Lu also has most boring design of them all, so nobody ever plays as him.
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In this LP, we're playing as Wu the Lotus Blossom. I kept the default stats and fighting styles because those will do just fine for now. You can also change your character's name, either by typing in DONGS or BUTTS or whatever or trying your luck with the random name generator. We'll be going with the default.
Let's begin the game then, shall we?