 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
||||||
 |
|
|
|||||
 |
|
||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
  |
|
||
 |
|
||||||
| .: APRIL - MAY 2005 | |
BIOWARE'S LATEST RPG, JADE EMPIRE, BLENDS KUNG FU ACTION WITH MORAL CHOICE TO CHALLENGE PLAYERS AND PRECONCEPTIONS Far away and a long time ago, there was a land of myth, legend and unsurpassable beauty. Gods and demons still roamed the earth, while warriors lived and died by codes of honour, honing their skills and magical abilities until they themselves passed into legend. There is balance in this world - until a drought nearly destroys the land and its people. But when an emperor dabbles in sorcery to bring water back to the parched land, the balance shifts. The fate of China now rests in the hands of a single person... You. This is the world of Jade Empire, the latest creation from Bioware. The Canadian developers have watched their Edmonton-based company gain momentum with earlier titles like Baldur's Gate (PC), Neverwinter Nights (PC) and some itty-bitty game called Knights Of The Old Republic (Xbox), which some several million people purchased. Now Bioware have temporarily put aside the sci-fi/fantasy genre in favour of something a little more diverse. Fusing fighting, action and RPG (role-playing game) styles, Jade Empire takes place in a fictionalized ancient China, combining old lore and legends to create something completely original. The developers delved into old kung fu movies, great works of Chinese literature and even religious texts to create the perfect blend of tale and tradition. "We wanted to wait until the right time in Bioware's company history," says Dr. Ray Muzyka, Bioware's co-founder and executive co-producer of Jade. "We also wanted to wait until we thought the community - our customers - were more receptive to the idea. The success of movies like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Hero, House of Flying Daggers and so on actually seems to indicate that there's a receptive audience to this kind of setting. It was well-differentiated from our other kinds of settings as well, which were sci-fi and fantasy... and we'll do more of those, too, but this is a nice counterpoint to those extremes in the sci-fi/fantasy archetypes."
But the detail doesn't end there. As your character begins training as a martial arts master, he or she is faced with innumerable choices: how to interact with other characters and followers (who can be part of your group and used in different quests), who to help and who to trust. In short, what kind of person you want to be. Muzyka refers to these moral choices as the way of the Closed Fist (strong, cold-hearted) or the way of the Open Palm (generous and kind). "There's consequences to being open-palm, there's consequences to being closed-fist," he says. "They're not good and evil, either... Neither of them is perfect. They both have positive results and negative results." Fans of the Knights Of The Old Republic will recognize this concept of moral accountability, but Muzyka quickly adds that for Jade, Bioware really made an attempt to blur the lines between good and naughty behaviour. "We tried actually to make the consequences of your actions a little morally ambiguous - we wanted to make it clear when you are doing something really evil." Along the path you must take, you'll encounter a number of unusual characters - some who will challenge you, some who will aid or join you, and others who will hide their sinister motives from you. Whether it be the comic foil of your henpecked follower, the nastiness that lurks at the hands of masked uber-enemy Death's Hand and his minions (the Evil Lotus Assassins), or even a certain pompous, gun-toting conquistador voiced by John Cleese, choice beckons at every turn. "The game will actually end differently depending on how you approach things," says Muzyka. With over 30 fighting styles - all grounded in martial arts, weapons and magic - you can specialize in combat, developing your own technique (and even finding a few hidden ones) to defeat your foes... even if it means picking up a couple of hams and beating the hell out of an enemy. There are approximately 500 combat movies used in the game, all of which were created using motion capture - a first for Bioware, and an experience successful enough to convince the developers to use it again in the future. With a minimum gameplay of approximately 20 to 30 hours, minigames (such as a 1941-inspired Dragonfly game), individual challenges and even an arena mode mean that players can easily find themselves embroiled in the world of Jade Empire for hours and hours... even days. And somehow, Bioware manage to do all of this with a minimum amount of gore and graphic violence. Now, don't get me wrong - no one minds a little bit of the old ultra-violence when the game or situation warrants, but Jade Empire runs in a class of its own. "We don't think it needs it - it doesn't make the story better," shrugs Muzyka. "We actually put in things that make better stories and better characters, make the world more believable. "And it's a mature world. It's actually a very dark world. There's a lot of things going on we try to make realistic, so nasty things happen sometimes. But it's not gratuitous - just part of the story." Jade Empire is scheduled for release on April 14, 2005. |
.: ALSO IN THIS ISSUE |
|
BRIEF ENCOUNTERS STUFF BODY LANGUAGE MOVIE PREVIEWS ACCESSORIES CONCERT CALENDAR TECHNOLOGY SOUNDTRAX SCREEN SAVOURS REWIND/REPLAY
|
|
| .: ARCHIVE | |
|
|
|
| .: SUBSCRIBE NOW! | |
|
|
|
| .: ACCESSinfo Mailing List | |
|
.: JOIN the ACCESSinfo Mailing List to be notified of website updates! |
|
| .: current issue .: crossfire .: archives .: links .: about access | |
|
Copyright © 2005 Access
Magazine
|
|
It becomes immediately clear that the overall look of the game is substantially different from standard RPGs. In keeping with this idea of a myth, Bioware has created an idyllic world painted in hazy, rich colours, with softened lines. Leaves float lazily by. Even the clouds in the sky are painstakingly detailed.
