Just played through Jade Empire. A good game. Fun battles, interesting settings based on the ancient China and a good, epic story.
Not half-bad characters either, they're all interesting, not just those that you can romance (three of them, one for male characters, one for females, and one romanceable to both genders). You can romance both at once, BTW, if you go the indecisive route and pass a couple of easy skill checks. The triangle mysteriously disappears in the ending texts, though: you marry one and the relationship isn't mentioned at all in the other character's ending text. Anyway, too bad you can only take one character with you to the battle, it'd be more interesting with a group of 4, for example.
The story is epic, it concerns gods and emperors (you end up killing most of them, one way or another). The plot's not terribly unpredictable, but it's twisty enough to give you a pleasant ride. A satisfying story with a satisfying conclusion. Of course, I played the good guy, and I don't think I'll be re-playing any time soon, so I don't know how much changes if you play a Closed Fist character.
The world is based on our own: though names are different and there are a lot of fantasy elements, the culture and history of the Jade Empire are obviously based on China, and there is even a character who comes from a place clearly based on Europe. A very interesting world.
The character development system is okay: there are only three stats to upgrade, but at least there's a good selection of different fighting styles to upgrade as well. The battle system, however, is very good IMO. It's a lot of fun, fairly pleasing to the eye, and you can have a lot of variety by using different styles. Fists, weapons, magic, transformation, multiple styles in each. It'd be more fun with a group, probably, but at least there's one companion, and it's a lot of fun this way, too.
I kind of wish it was longer, or there was a sequel. The replay value isn't that great, at least I don't really feel like playing it again even though I enjoyed it so much. It's not exactly short, but I feel like it should have been longer. I kind of want to try a different character personality, romance only one character, stuff like that, but the thought of going over the story again so soon makes me give up the idea. There are not enough things to do differently, at least not without going Closed Fist (which is almost the same as evil).
Anyway, a good game, I enjoyed it a lot.