One of the best RPGs for the Xbox!
Jade Empire takes place in an imaginary world with an oriental theme, but it borrows heavily from Chinese history. The environments are beautiful with some amazing scenery and great graphics. It makes you feel like you are actually in an ancient asian country and it conveys a sense of a wide open environment. However, the gameplay isn't completely open ended and makes sure it steers the player in the right direction. The fighting system is very much like KOTOR, except it feels more natural. It combines turn based fighting with a real time system to make battle sequences strategic and action oriented at the same time. The main character can fight with weapons, empty handed, or with various magic skills you learn throughout the game.
Another trademark of these RPGs is the ability for your character to affect the storyline by the choices you make, good or bad. When you converse with one of the numerous NPCs you encounter, your choice of words can lead you down a path of goodness and righteousness or down the road of evil and wrong doing. Although this feature isn't a new one, it does create an interesting element. One of my minor gripes with the game actually lies with the fact that you have so many conversations with different characters to advance the storyline. I found myself skipping through most of the dialogue just to continue with the main story. This is a personal preference though, so many RPG fans would argue that it makes the story more compelling but I just found it too be a little tedious.
The graphics are very exquisite and I would often stop and just look around some of the areas just to take in the detail and atmosphere. The fighting and magic animations are also well done and give an organic feel to the battles that take place.
The sound and music do the job of adding to the atmosphere of the game, although nothing particularly stands out in my mind. The oriental music is nicely done but doesn't exactly make me want to run out and get the soundtrack to the game. It is enough to say that the sound in the game does exactly what it's supposed to do.
Replayability of Jade Empire lies largely in how much you enjoyed the first time through. The highly touted feature of gameplay change through decision making may make some want to play through the game more than once, both as good and evil, but I seldom play an RPG more than once and Jade Empire was not an exception. Renting is probably not an option for most due to the game length, but playing through the game once is probably enough for most. Jade Empire is pretty inexpensive, however, so it certainly is worth checking out.
Overall, I would have to say that Jade Empire is fun gaming experience which combines many different types of gameplay to provide one of the best RPG experiences on Xbox. Although I felt it was a tad overrated, I would still recommend Jade Empire as a solid addition to anyones collection.