Jade Dynasty

Through my Crossover Games program, I decided to try out "Jade Dynasty".  This would be my first exploration of the Asian mmorpg genre.

What Asian mmorpgs have in their favor is a mythology that is fresh, centered in asian folktales.  This is enjoyable because I feel the european medieval myths used frequently in US/European based mmorpgs are played out.  I mean there are only so many times one can be a stalwart knight.

Jade Dynasty begins straight forwardly with a simple character creation page.  A new player will only decide what their avatar will look like when entering the game.  Choosing a class for the avatar will only occur later in the game (Lvl 15).  The opening area is lovely, it consists of a beautiful city called Sunstream surrounded by fields, temples and mansions.  Each game area has wonderful graphics and design.

The opening quests are simple basically consisting of talking to another character, finding items or killing so many of these enemies.  Your avatar is given a variety of different weapons to use.  It really doesn't matter which weapon is chosen because gameplay will change once you choose a character class.

The hook in the game mythology is about a hero called Shaw Danon.  At some point in time, he fell from grace and it is up to the player to find out why and perhaps redeem him.  Players also discover that a thwarted love is also a part of Shaw Danon's history.

The game interface is simple with icons for attack moves.  However there is also an extra bar for a special attack called the Esper.  The Esper attack bar also allows a bot function in which the user can go AFK while still essentially playing.  Believe me, you will need that function.  Another bot function to gain experience is called Meditation.  Essentially the player is able to go AFK in a home city, click on the meditation button (a small Buddha icon at the top of the screen) and then gain experience.  Average experience gained from meditation is about 200 points a minute.  I've read as characters gain levels, the experience for these bot functions will lessen in value.

The bot functions are extremely necessary because what you have read about asian grinders is true.  Jade Dynasty has an extremely large number of levels to master.  And leveling is slow...very slow.  What is worse is that the storyline quests are used in cliffhanger fashion.  Each area consists of 15 levels each avatar must grind before moving on to the next.  Usually the major quest lines end about 5 levels into an area before advising the character to move on.  However your character will need to level up 10 more levels before being able to follow the story into the next game area.  Which means the game crashes into a wall with the story on hold while your character will be forced to do dailies in order to catch up to the next part of the story.  I gamely tried to work with this mechanic but truthfully its worn me down after only hitting level 35.  

The game is free to play with a cash shop that has numerous interesting items.  But unlike other free to play games that give you a lot of bang for your buck, Jade Dynasty cash is on par to the dollar.  1 dollar equals 1 gold piece in the Jade Dynasty cash shop.  So most items are extremely expensive.  Interestingly the game does not allow you to supplement your in game money with real money.  I don't understand this, because the cash shop in other F2P games allow this essential function.  In Jade Dynasty you must grind for your money as you grind for more levels.  There is also a strange player to player sell mechanic.  In the major city, Sunstream, players put their items for sale in cute little cat treasure boxes.  But there are no rules about where to put these boxes so they are laid out willy nilly.  Many times there are so many of these player boxes that it is hard to see NPCs or even your own character toon.  I've looked into these boxes and they are filled with things that were of no value to my low level character.  And it would take a day or so running to each box to find something I could use.  This game needs an auction house in the worst way.

Despite the many things Jade Dynasty has going for it, it is killed by the grinding mechanic.  Which I've read is a standard in many Asian mmorpgs.  Apparently Asian audiences don't mind being forced to do hard time in their games.  Honestly, I wouldn't make real felons play this game or others like it.  Its soul killing.  I don't believe that I will be going back to Jade Dynasty with any regularity.  But if you have the patience to keep with it, it will pay off with a lovely high level character, beautiful fight graphics and other goodies.