Company founders “looking for the right way” to bring back Xbox ARPG
Jade Empire is an exception on Bioware's resume. The Action RPG, based on mythologized ancient China and first published on the original Xbox by Microsoft, is one of the only titles never to see expansion into a franchise. However, the company's co-founders, Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuk, have confirmed that a return to the game's setting is something the company has considered often, and is “just looking for the right way to deploy” another installment.
Speaking at the Eurogamer Expo 2011 in London, Muzyka told audiences Jade Empire represented “a setting that we were really passionate about, and we still are. Both Greg and I were big believers in the IP... We don't have anything to announce on it right now, but it is a franchise that's near and dear to us." The title – which we gave 9/10 – showed the vaguest signs of life when Jade-themed armor showed up in the free-play iteration of Bioware's currently better-known Dragon Age series. But as for a real, actual sequel, Muzyka won't go any further than telling fellow Jade Empire admirers, “You never know.” Meanwhile the company's DS RPG, Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood, goes without the promised sequel and nobody says a damn thing – what on earth's the point of a good thing if you only get one of it?
