Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty (2023)

Playthrough dedicated to an old friend.

R.I.P. Hereticked

Team Ninja, creators of Nioh and Ninja Gaiden, brought its signature challenge on ancient China with Wo Long. With Romance of the Three Kingdoms as a premise, the game reimagines history through a dark fantasy lens. Qi, the life force of all beings, becomes both a weapon and a curse, corrupted by a sinister Taoist whose quest for immortality throws late Han China into chaos. As a custom protagonist, you’re thrust into the Yellow Turban Rebellion, crossing paths with iconic figures from both history and legend rendered in less exaggerated, more grounded designs compared to Dynasty Warriors.

Combat channels Souls-like intensity but carves its own identity. A morale system shapes each stage’s difficulty - capture flags, land critical blows, and your power rises. The spirit system reworks stamina management: striking enemies boosts your spirit, while heavy attacks, battle arts and magic drain it. Mastering both systems is key to survival. Parry timing can feel inconsistent at first, yet perseverance pays off as the rhythm of combat clicks, transforming daunting bosses into exhilarating duels.

Across the main campaign and its three DLCs, Wo Long offers a moderately liberal retelling of the novel, adding nuance to familiar characters - some nobler, others more vengeful. Lü Bu and Sun Ce are my favorites there (the latter being more hot-headed according to his described nature). The story layer may be thin, but for Three Kingdoms fans it’s a treat to see beloved figures reframed in darker mythic tones. If you can look past the uneven parries and minimal narrative, Wo Long scratches that Souls-like itch with style, intensity, and cultural depth.

On a side-note, I designed the custom protagonist's appearance after my old friend by name of "Hereticked", who passed away too early last year. For nearly 2 decades, we had a share of interests in medias based on "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", making anime music videos and appreciating weird internet memes. He was also well articulated and socially engaged online, defining the critical and moral compass that I hold respect for. You will always be missed...

For anyone reading this review, I played Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty on my PlayStation 5…

I would like to consider myself a “souls veteran” as I’ve completed most FromSoftware games of this genre including the memorable experience I had with Sekiro Shadows Die Twice. I also would consider myself a lover of anything related to East Asian history. When I came across Wo Long on the PlayStation store and watched some reviews, I knew I had to give this one a go. I just want to put this statement out of the way so we can move on to my review of this game: WO LONG IS IN NO WAY SHAPE OR FORM A DEVELOPER TRYING TO MAKE ANOTHER SEKIRO YET SET IN CHINA. I’m sick of people saying that! Wo Long may have combat elements that are obviously based on FromSoftware’s masterpiece (in my mind), however Wo Long is indeed its own game with a unique plot, advanced combat techniques, yet it does surely fit into the “soulslike” category.

For starters, Wo Long was a rough start for me. I faced the tutorial boss 43 times before memorizing his move-set and being able to overcome his difficulty. Team NINJA probably had a field day throwing a two phase boss at you during the tutorial level. After that “wall” however, the game opened up to beautifully designed levels with interconnected shortcuts, difficult but rewarding bosses and enemies, and an ever evolving plot that didn’t really grab me, but still had me scratching my chin wondering what was coming next. Honestly, the first couple of levels in Wo Long just didn’t do it for me, and I contemplated dropping it, but once I reached this gorgeous level with waterfalls and mountains and green scenery, not to mention a plethora of new and exciting enemies, Wo Long had finally grabbed my attention and moved to my main game until it’s completion.

So yes, Wo Long’s world of ancient China, mixed with fantastical creatures and demons was a high point for me. The level design was on top form all the way through. Getting to the enemy variety however, once you get about halfway through, you NEVER meet anything new to fight, unless it’s a boss which becomes a regular enemy later on. I constantly found myself battling the same demonic cats and basic bandits which really was quite bland. Luckily the combat is so well done, that it didn’t really matter to me what I was fighting as long as I can employ my favorite strategies to overcome a higher morale enemy.

I don’t want to spoil any gameplay events in this review because I truly believe you need to experience the evolving combat for yourself. The game is laid out in traditional souls fashion. You have battle flags which serve as your bonfires, and you also have marking flags which are hidden around the maps for you to find. Once you find a marking flag it will raise your morale one point. Morale is basically a leveling system in Wo Long which restarts at zero on most levels. You do have your overall level which you expend Qi to increase your stats, but morale rank plays a huge part in enemy difficulty per that level. Let’s say your silent, unnamed character is at morale rank 12 for this particular level and you’re facing a Shigui that is at Maeson rank 14. The Shigui will essentially deal more damage to you and take less damage. Taking down higher morale enemies does increase your loot rarity I believe, and nets you more Qi. Most end level bosses have morale rank of 20, and the maximum morale you can get in a level is 25. So, if you decide to play Wo Long, make sure to find your marking and battle flags because if you die, your morale rank goes back down to the number of flags you have found (essentially).

Back to the review (just wanted to give you an idea of how levels play out) Wo Long frustrated me and captivated me. There were many times where I thought a boss was absolutely unfair, only to overcome him after retreating to raise my morale rank. Everything in Wo Long is over on able but it does require a lot of effort and patience. It has its moments though where you’re just playing and you are in the zone and you think to yourself, “man, this game is just so well made.” There are also times where you can’t beat a basic enemy group and want to throw your controller at the wall. The level design is beautiful. The Three Kingdoms period of China and its history, how it plays out in front of you as you play, are also wonderful things about this game. I cannot fully give this game a 10/10 because it does eventually get bland. At least it did for me. It’s the same thing over and over. You beat a main battlefield, clear up the sub battlefields, on to the next main battlefield. It never seems to go anywhere. But I believe if you just stick to it, by the time you defeat the final boss (awesome fight by the way) you will feel so happy that you stuck through it.

I gave this game 4 stars on Grouvee but my true rating for Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is:

8.5/10

Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoy the game if you’d decide to go for it!

P.S. I recommend a fire build with wood as a secondary. If you want to use magic, go with a metal build.

Thanks guys!

I went in to Wo Long basically only knowing that it was a cool new game that had some good reviews that I didn't even read. I didn't really know the genre or anything but thought I'd take the dive. My first night with it, I got through the first boss and thought it was pretty cool but I ended up taking a significant break from it for a good several months. But after coming back to it, I found myself really hooked on it. This is going to be a very long review, but that's primarily because while I've heard some mixed things about this game, I had an absolute blast and I want to document that for myself and anyone brave enough to read the whole thing. I found it super addicting and was happy to make it one of my 100% runs of 2023 and expect it will be one of the top gaming experiences I had this year.

If I were to pick a series that I used to play a lot but would probably find really boring today, it's Dynasty Warriors. I played so much of 2, 3, 4, and 5 back in the day, despite how repetitive they were. When I think of playing them now, I really don't think I'd enjoy that Musou style anymore, though I've considered giving one of the more recent entries a try. That said, with that background, I did get immersed pretty heavily in the Koei Tecmo depiction of the Three Kingdoms era and its related myths, legends, and historical accounts many years ago. I even started reading the incredibly long Romance of the Three Kingdoms, though I didn't make it too far. Wo Long technically mostly takes place prior to the real emergence of the "three kingdoms" themselves and instead covers the Yellow Turban rebellion, Dong Zhuo's seizure of the Imperial capital, and the fall of the Han Dynasty leading up to that chaotic period of de-centralization when so many legends were born and the people suffered from the fires (some quite literal) of war. While I don't think the characterization is especially great, it was admittedly quite cool getting to see these depictions of so many characters I used to spend hours and hours fighting alongside growing up, especially given their similarities to their Dynasty Warriors depictions. That said, Wo Long is a far more fantastical game. Dynasty Warriors has a lot of special powers and attacks that are basically "magic," and there's some mysticism, but it's otherwise supposed to be paralleling a real story and doesn't incorporate too much explicitly supernatural. Wo Long takes significant departures from these events and really ups the fantastical elements with flashy spells, dragons, and demons galore.

But while there are many overlapping characters and events, Wo Long is otherwise almost nothing like Dynasty Warriors. For one, it's primarily a soulslike. I haven't played Team Ninja's other attempts at the genre, so I'm not sure how much it is like Nioh, but this game feels very similar to Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice in gameplay with a heavy focus on speed and precise timing for deflection and parrying. One of the best things about the game is the combat feels extremely fast-paced, flashy, intense, and exciting. I tend to build glass cannons when I play a lot of games where you choose your character build because I really enjoy high risk, high reward gameplay and the feel of having to play very precisely so as not to slip up and get sniped. That's sort of how general gameplay in Wo Long is. As someone whose best stat was health, I could still die quite quickly any time I was not paying attention for a moment.

The resources of the game are very different from a lot of action and soulslike games. You don't have MP or limited casts of spells or even a stamina bar. Instead you have a "spirit" bar which is neutral by default but goes down when you cast a spell, get hit, attempt (and fail) to deflect, dodge, use a powerful spirit attack, or use a special martial arts skill. Spirit is raised by attacking or successfully deflecting attacks. This can dip into the negative but if you're at fully negative spirit and it goes down any more, you get stunned, so that's risky. When you have positive spirit, your attacks become more effective and you can use various maneuvers without dipping into negative spirit. Interestingly, much of the game is built around this mechanic since, as the above should indicate, most everything you do affects your spirit gauge in some way.

Another major departure from Sekiro's style is that you can level up your stats in this game a lot. However, you can't simply "up your damage" or just brute improve stats, at least not simply (weapons do scale with different stats, but not tremendously). Most all of the benefits of your stats are more subtle and in some ways are a bit odd and hard to learn. There are five virtues you can improve: Fire, Water, Wood, Metal, and Earth. Fire decreases spirit cost when using martial arts skills and increases gain from attacks. Water increases your stealth and decreases the spirit loss from failing to deflect and dodging. Earth increases your equipment load and the spirit gained from deflecting. Metal decreases the cost of your wizardry spells and maintains your spirit for longer. And Wood increases your health and the length of buff spells. The elements are weak and strong against each other in the following chain Fire > Metal > Wood > Earth > Water > Fire and increasing an element's virtue ups your defense against what it's strong against. I primarily specialized in Wood since that gave me lightning spells, which are sick, and made weapon buffs—which I used several of—last longer. I explain all that depth to note that this is not a typical leveling system. It heavily revolves around the unique spirit gauge mechanic and the buffs per level are quite subtle and minimal which, to go back to comparison, does feel a bit more like Sekiro in that you can't just min/max your way to victory. Now, I found this weird, but once I got the hang of it, I found it super cool and interesting. The only major downside is that since the stats mostly affect things that most players will use to some extent, it does feel like build variety is far more limited, but this didn't bother me much since I found the core gameplay so fun.

Lastly on the general gameplay, the game features a Morale system similar in some ways to Dyansty Warriors. Around the maps you can find stands where you can plant a battle standard. Some of these are "battle flags" which are your soulslike respawn points (like bonfires) and others are standards you can place to permanently raise your morale. Morale is raised when you defeat enemies and goes down when you're hit by spirit attacks. If you die, you lose all your morale down to your "Fortitude rank" which is determined by how many flags you've placed. Morale has a pretty significant impact on your strength relative to the enemies. If you have a morale advantage, you'll tear through them with ease. When at a disadvantage, even regular enemies can kick your ass. I thought I might not like this system at first since it tweaks so much of the encounters but ultimately it was kind of cool to have this swingy system that could really turn the tide in a fight and meant even on easier maps, I'd have to be careful until my morale was up. I also love that it really rewards exploring the levels.

Which brings me to the level design. I've seen complaints about the level design in this game and while I sort of get them, I generally think it was pretty good. Some of the areas do start to look same-y to an extent, but the actual layouts are often quite clever and interesting with a lot of exploration potential. The game could definitely use a bit more enemy variety but the ones they have are pretty good, especially since the soldier enemies have a variety of fighting styles from many different weapons. However, the boss fights are the core of Wo Long and where it really excels. There are a whopping 31 boss fights in the game and with a few notable exceptions, they are some really awesome fights that really test your abilities and perfectly nail the reward you feel from achieving something really difficult. There's a lot of variety and you can tell a lot of work was put into the boss fights. To some extent the levels feel like just something you do until you get to fight the boss which is the main point of the game, but that's okay with me. I loved the boss fights and I'd say if you didn't, that's probably a good indication this game isn't for you as that's where it's at.

As for things I didn't like, primarily it's that Wo Long is definitely a looter and I personally hate that style of gameplay. Honestly, this game didn't turn me around on that at all and the worst parts for me were sifting through and optimizing my loadout, I just find it such a chore that was really unneeded. My best remedy for this was to basically grab stuff as I saw it but otherwise ignore it and then every few hours go to the blacksmith and sort through what I had. I found doing this periodically helped a lot so it didn't get too in my way. The one positive I will say on this aspect is that I do like that you can transmog all of your gear so even if you get a really good drop, you can easily and cheaply make it look like your favorite style of gear that fits your aesthetic, which is important! Additionally, there are lots of different skins to choose from and phew, you can hide the helmet so my locks can flow freely. Another issues is that I don't really like how most missions force you to have an ally. While there was some character and story development from intermittent chatter, I generally prefer the solitary no-summons experience in a soulslike, however the fact most missions are a battlefield, it does feel more justified and it makes the characters a bit more interesting. My biggest issue outside of the gameplay is that the game has almost no women in it. I get that it's historical and sadly, the Romance of the Three Kingdoms didn't discuss the lives of women nearly as much as it did the men, but it's still very noticeable. And beyond that, this is a game with giant demons, where people have magic, can jump 30 feet high, and become monsters from drinking magic drinks. Is it really so crazy to have a few more women out there fighting? Apparently it is, as of the reinforcements you can call into battle, Hong Jing is the only woman, out of almost 20 options! There are a couple other women in the story of minor significance, but still, it's very noticeable that my choosing to play a female character increased the named female representation by like 33%.

In closing on the general gameplay, Wo Long is a game focused on two things: momentum and timing. These two themes run through pretty much all of the mechanics and their manifestation in the various encounters throughout the game. There are definitely some extraneous elements and mechnics, but the gameplay excels because it remains focused on these two key concepts. It's not a game to tune out to, but it is an extremely satisfying experience once you hit the right groove because of this.

This feels like a weird thing to comment on significantly, but I think this game has my favorite character creator I've ever seen. You can also change your appearance completely any time you want after you get a little ways into the game, which I took advantage of several times to tweak some things. I really enjoyed fine-tuning my character to be almost as pretty as I am irl (cough, cough). It's also quite easy to make a character look however you want. There's a lot of the usual sliders but not only did they feel more focused on the main things that really matter than some games are, but it highlights the area you're editing each time to be clearer what you're doing, which is not something you can always tell in a lot of character creators. With a click of a button you can swap between where you had the slider before you started moving it then back to where you have it for rapid comparisons of a change. Further, the hair is very customizable. You can choose between general hair styles but you can also adjust the length and curliness of multiple parts of it independently as well as customize hair dyes and their tone, intensity, and length. I also found the tattoos looked really sick and I liked that you can similarly combine multiple designs together such as this one where I combined the winding dragon with a lotus at the base of the neck to make a holistic design from multiple tattoos, which I thought was neat (probably should've gotten a screenshot somewhere less brown but alas).

On that note, I've seen some complaints about the visuals and aside from the framerate drops and the like, I thought the game looked really awesome. The character models look good and while some of the battlegrounds are a bit bland, the graphics are pretty strong. I found the environments made me want to inhabit and explore them for hours. I especially appreciated some of the beautiful nature imagery you get amidst and between all the bloodshed and destruction. The graphics may not be top-notch but overall I thought it looked pretty great.

The story is...okay, it's not the main draw of the game. I've heard people say it's "bad" and I don't know that I'd go that far, but it is a bit cliche and overly simplistic at times. You can call a lot of the developments once you realize how many chapters have the same basic plot structure. The characterization I think is also a bit weak, but here I'm a bit more understanding as I realize that the game is adapting historical—and in some cases mythological—figures to fit into this world. Considering Koei Tecmo's devotion to the Romance of the Three Kingdoms overall mythos, I understand being hesitant to give them very eccentric or striking personalities that don't align with that literature. Still, I ultimately didn't find the story too bad and I did at least appreciate the numerous cutscenes quite a lot. Hong Jing was easily the most developed character, which is telling as to my reading of the game given that she is a character that is more or less entirely made-up. It also alleviates a little bit the lack of female characters that she's easily the most interesting.

As of this writing, the first DLC, Battle of Zhongyuan is a few weeks old. I won't say too much on it but I overall enjoyed it. The new cestus weapons are really sick. I thought the missions were a good addition, even if the last boss was kind of bullshit. There were also a slew of quality of life improvements that really tweaked a lot of issues and fixed some bugs. While the reviews on Steam are of course mostly very negative due to even worse framerate issues in the DLC than the base game, I think the auxiliary fixes that came with the DLC update show that the devs are committed to improving some of the technical issues many have complained about.

I really don't have much more to say about this game that I haven't already ranted about above. There are several things about it that on paper I would expect to have bothered me, but overall my enjoyment of the good parts far outweighed them. I doubt it'll be my game of the year, but Wo Long is a surprisingly solid title in my eyes and will quite possibly make the top 5.

Notes on the PC Version: While I generally avoid letting a port's quality influence my rating (primarily because I'm simply more interested in discussing other aspects of the game), I do want to address it here as there's been a lot of negative press about the PC port and I expect it's almost entirely to blame for the "Mostly Negative" review status it currently has on Steam (which is abysmal by Steam standards). The main issues I've heard about were crashes and frame drops. Despite having a pretty high-end PC, I definitely experienced the frame drops people are talking about. However, I honestly didn't notice them that much given they weren't persistent or such that it made the game harder to play or even super severe. I'm not someone who tends to get overly attached to framerate, I don't lose my mind every time a game dips to 56 fps, so there is a bar to clear for it to get in the way for me. I think in the 71 hours I've played the game, I only really felt like there were really significant frame drops for an extended period once. Most of the others, while relatively consistent were not overly severe and were temporary enough I didn't really notice or mind. That said, as I mentioned, the first DLC recently released and the frame drops were extra bad there. As far as crashes, I had 3 crashes in that 71 hours of playtime. While that's more than I'd like out of a game, I didn't by any means find that an unplayable amount (plus, by sheer luck, all 3 crashes occurred right as I was about to close the game down anyway). My anecdotal evidence suggests to me that the whining is probably at least a little overblown, but there definitely are problems and I must admit that I can't speak for a weaker rig or for those more sensitive to frame drops. Given that, it may be best to go for the console version if you're planning to buy this. Do note that it's at least currently on Game Pass so you can try it for yourself on XBOX or PC if you have that subscription. As a final aside, I considered titling this review "Wo Long: Fallen Framerate." Since it ultimately didn't affect me very much I didn't do it, but please acknowledge how clever I am.

Wo Long is a very entertaining game with a clumsy execution. It's funny because it works flawlessly at times, but when it doesn't, it's awkward and heavily frustrating.

Wo Long's story is extremely forgettable and its presentation is... uh... bad, to put it simple. Also, I played it on Series S and by god that console struggled to deal with the most simples things. Nevertheless, the game is ugly and its environments are sort of repetitive. Without interesting characters and an engaging tale to keep you hooked, fun factor was foun in other things.

While the environments are dull, the level design can be pretty clever sometimes, with some main missions and sidquests being very well structured. I'm a sucker for shortcuts and hidden places and Wo Long is filled with them. It all comes to a full circle by the end of a level, as long as you don't miss out on anything.

Characters are very bland, but the way they help you during combat and their design is just really nice. Hero or villain, they look cool as shit. Hell, even the armors and weapons you get look super slick. The Divine Beasts are impressive as well but, unfortunately, not all of them are very useful. Monsters and bosses look nice too, but variety is UTTERLY low, killing the element of surprise.

But where Wo Long shines (and sometimes falters) the most is in its combat. I'm going to make the obvious comparison because there's no other way around it: this game tried to be Sekiro. Sometimes it nailed it, but sometimes it failed.

Fighting styles are sharp, every weapon is useful and has its own perks and strenghts, your character is highly customizable, learning damage partterns from enemies and bosses can be extremely fun, most spells are pretty sick and I loved the different kinds of martial arts you learn. This is where more than half of the fun in Wo Long lies and, like I said, when it works, it's amazing.

The problem is, it lacks a certain level of polishment, I think. From enemy placement to boss fights. In fact, ESPECIALLY in boss fights! This game really knocked it out of the park with bosses like the final one, Lu Bu, Dong Zhuo and Zhang Liang. Then completely dropped the ball with others like Aoye, Zhang Rang, Liu Bei and that weird demonic dragon. It is fun, yes, but also absolutely inconsistent.

I also feel like Koei keeps repeating the same mistakes since the first Nioh. An unnecessary amount of repetitive loot, too many systems and mechanics that could totally be cut from the game, the morale system can be quite inconvenient and the game feels bloated. The side quests aren't that good and rewarding as they can be very repetitive sometimes. So why keep it going for so long?

It may seem like Wo Long is a bad game from everything I wrote, but it's not. It's just... complicated. It is also a game that made me appreciate Sekiro even more, for inspiring more fun parry based combat systems like this, but also for how well it executed its original intricate formula.

If you're a fan of games like that, then do give it a go. Just do not expect anything near perfection.

Steam Curator

The modern team ninja game output of responding to From Software but bending it more towards action has finally made it to the Sekiro parallel; major parrying focus and glowy red circle indicators and all. And whatever reasons I had for not being quick to jump on it seem really silly after rolling credits, because Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is folded steel. It is refined and smart in ways I wasn’t expecting; narrowing its focus explicitly on combat and introducing mechanics that have you thinking about that combat in new ways.

The totality of the package is slightly weighed down by a story that doesn’t take full advantage of the setting and a loot system that inundates you with worthless garbage; but with it’s combat-first gameplay structure and a fighting system that makes that structure appealing, Wo Long has got it where it counts. It ditches and borrows convention in perfect service to its magic swordplay style, and its edge is among the sharpest in the genre.

The shift from Souls to Sekiro as our Ur Text manifests in Wo Long in a few different ways, most important of which is parry centric combat that encourages relentless aggression.

That aggression is woven into a unique magic and stamina system. Traditional sword swings don’t consume any. Instead, stamina is largely a defensive resource that prevents you from indefinitely blocking and rolling around in circles.

It can be replenished with precision parries, but aside from that there are two major twists: the first is that this same stamina governs magic usage rather than being beholden to some sort of separate magic meter, and you can also stamina yourself into the negatives…at the risk of a self imposed stun when you get hit at absolute zero.

The romance of these three mechanics results in combat that’s as fast as it is rich with choice. You’re never without options; magic spells can be cast with minimal resources, incurring a stamina debt you can pay off with future parries. But it also executes on a fundamental actiony tenant of just feeling good too.

A riposte isn’t a reward for a single parry but instead needs to be earned by building your opponents balance meter; requiring both swings to increase that meter and parries to reduce that meters max capacity. Huge bursts of damage will only be acquired after steel has met steel multiple times, and even the magical spells that get sent at you can be parried.

When mastered it is a satisfying game, one that rewards you for staying in there, being mindful of their swings, and budgeting for spells accordingly. Enemy and level design gives you tons of choice as well; Wo Long uses its mission based structure to its advantage by crafting intimate 40 minute long straightforward combat arenas. You’ll start to see their formula pretty quickly: move forward in a straight line, clear out relevant branching passages that offshoot from the critical path, unlock shortcuts that make navigating the paths easier, then get yourself to the obvious boss clearing waiting for you at the end.

What it lacks in surprises it compensates for with tight execution. For starters there’s a ton of verticality in these levels, letting you nab the high ground if you’re willing to seek it out and rewarding you with an insanely powerful descending strike that can one shot weaker foes or put a serious dent in the more elite enemies.

But the biggest reason to poke your head around everywhere is to partake in Wo Long’s twist on the traditional bonfire system and its relationship with leveling. Because Wo Long has two parallel leveling systems, inter and intralevel. The former is your traditional stat increases that comes with you from mission to mission, but the latter is a ‘morale’ meter localized to each map and goes from 1 to 25… and that’s whats at risk when you die and need to make a corpse run.

Make it back to the mob that killed you and return the favor to get it back, but importantly the presence of raisable banners throughout the mission will increase where your morale bottoms out at.

A fully explored map with all banners raised will reduce your death penalty; so you can bolt your way to the final boss if you wish you’ll just be fighting with higher stakes if you fail.

There’s also some smart little touches you’ll barely notice but contribute to the pleasure that Wo Long is to play: like how enemies in the immediate vicinity around a bonfire are marked in ways that prevent them from respawning.

Its a forgiving system if you give the levels the time they demand; couple that with generous bonfire placement that never has you repeating more than a few minutes and always lets you go right back to the boss you died at… it becomes clear that Wo Long is probably among the least punishing games in the ‘get good’ genre.

Which isn’t to say that it’s easy, only that its difficulty is laser focused on encounters and combat not exploration… the tension that comes with traveling unknown paths does exist, but once you’ve conquered a level and literally planted your flag in it… the increased morale thresholds let you travel with near impunity.

The shortcuts, bonfires, and increased morale floors stick with you even if you pop out of a mission and go back to home base…which affords you options when you get stuck. You can do the usual soulsy plays of summoning some Allies, NPCs or otherwise, but you can also just screw off and go level up in some side missions or reallocate your skills and gear to better fit the needs of the encounter.

You can even grind for more equipment and upgrade it if needed; though there’s probably way more than you’ll ever want or need being thrown at you to juggle.

It’s tough but fair and challenging but seldom frustrating. Between the unique take on stamina, fun “parry everything” gameplay system, and mission structure that encourages different approaches… Wo Long crafts encounters that are demanding in all the right ways and kept me hooked from beginning to end….I wish I could say the same about the story.

Maybe I’m in the minority, but I came to Wo Long with fervor for its Han dynasty conflict as much as I did for its action combat. Early exposure to Dynasty Warriors has skewed my appreciation towards these mythologized figures and heroes of the era.

And to its credit, Wo Long delivers on this via gameplay. Boss fights embellish the big names and make them larger than life, the early fight against Lu Bu is a particular highlight and its spectacle demonstrates that they know how to send fans into a frenzy.

But when it comes time to make those same characters interesting in the narrative, Wo Long fails.

There’s three decisions that the story makes that don’t feed off of each other well, first of which is the choice to make our protagonist a nameless faceless OC.

This is actually a departure from Nioh where we played a real dude with real motivations; and demonstrated by cover art that’s now a dudes back instead of a dudes face. our silent protag here is really just a factionless lens through which to view all sides of the demon infused conflict.

He’s just here to stop the bad guy from getting elixir and listen to what everyone else tells him to do, he’s a passenger in his own story which MIGHT have worked if the drivers were interesting.

And they should have been. The source material is rich with named characters with distinct philosophies and visions for China that they are hoping to lead.

Unfortunately we jump between them so frequently that we never get the opportunity to be invested in any one man’s story…but instead flip flop between dozens of characters who don’t have time to breath or make an impact on the goings on.

It’s a problem exacerbated by a big bad stringpuller that robs the cast of their agency and explains away nearly all conflict as the undue influence of dark Magics.

I can only assume it’s structured this way to give the messy conflicts of the era an easy and uncontroversial glowing dark bad guy that requires no knowledge of the history or setting to understand.

And that’s a shame because people would give a damn if Wo Long gave them a reason to. Peasant revolutions, the power vacuums they leave, and the conflicting philosophies seeking to fill those vacuums are the foundation of something compelling.

And the characters and motivations are already there, just woefully underutilized. Because sadly, Romance of the Three Kingdoms is just a skin that Wo Long uses rather than a meaningful story it tells.

It’s a theme park ride through Han dynasty China and it checks the boxes of the folks you’re supposed to meet and the places you’re supposed to go, but between a boring protagonist, an underutilized and constantly shifting cast, and magical realism that’s both the means and the ends…there’s no reason to care about the story beyond the superficial skin it applies to the action structure.

Thankfully that action structure is among the best in its breed. You’ve played something like Wo Long before and you’ve almost certainly touched one of its muses, but it’s relentless focus on fast paced combat and unique stamina system leave its mark and make it more than worthwhile.

A dull story keeps it from being the complete package, but that’s an easy flaw to overlook because of how masterfully it understands ‘The Art of War’.

Good game, but it ain't 'From software' good. If you haven't played Sekiro, do not even think about playing this one.

+I liked the battle mechanics -the variety of enemies is not too vast +/-boss design is hit'n'miss. Lu Bu is a great boss, but most bosses are quite easy after you are done mastering the main gameplay mechanics.

I will probably buy DLCs anyway.

It's one of those better Soulslike, but only by a small margin

I'm a fan of souls-likes and was looking forward to giving this a try. Unfortunatley, I bounced off this for a few reason that can all be summed up as not being friendly to players with limited time and way too many games to play anyway.

The plot didn't grab me. The combat was both too simple (you need to parry and get that damage) and difficult to pull off and repetative.

It wasn't a terrible game, but it has to be more than "not terrible" for me to continue on these days with so many other games completing for attention and so little time to dedicate here.

~David.

Demo impressions

Combat feels nice. Very deflect-heavy, with both you and enemies having a sort of "posture" meter, so at least somewhat familiar compared to Sekiro and some other games. That deflect/parry being on the same button as the dodge, with block on a totally separate button, feels a bit awkward to me. Otherwise I like the systems of the game, looks pretty nice, and it has a great character creator. Loot seems more tolerable here than in Nioh and Stranger of Paradise (felt especially pointless at times in the latter).

I think the main thing people will be talking about at first with this is the very first boss fight. I found this kinda jarringly difficult for a first boss, as it's a multi-phase fight that really demands use of that parry against things whose timing can be tricky. Your margin of error is pretty low in terms of HP, and you have to endure a lot from the boss until you get an opening to parry their most powerful attacks to actually get anywhere. In the first phase, normal sword swings and parries of basic attacks do very little to the enemy's stagger meter, so it drags on a bit.

This fight is supposed to have a scripted ending, after you've parried the second phase's big attack twice. A button prompt appears in the corner of the screen which ends the fight. I and the only other person I talked to who has played this, plus some other people I saw on Twitter, just did not notice this prompt, and I can say I personally wasted my time getting to that point where I could have finished the fight multiple times and then dying... Pretty frustrated by that.

I'll probably check reviews before diving deep into the actual game, since it will clearly be tough for me and I'll want to be sure it's worth it. While it seems easier to get a grip on than, say, Nioh 2, I still expect the more hardcore side of Soulslike fans will enjoy this more than the casual side.