Pure Xbox’s Craig Reid has spent the previous few days at Summer Game Fest in Los Angeles, the place he is had an opportunity to preview a sequence of upcoming Xbox releases. Today, we’re sharing his ideas on a hands-on demo of Black Myth: Wukong, which allow us to get caught into two hours of an early chapter from Game Science’s 2024 ARPG.
For most, Summer Game Fest got here to a detailed as soon as Play Days wrapped on Monday, however not for us! Game Science, the proficient builders answerable for the upcoming ARPG Black Myth: Wukong, discovered time for Pure Xbox the next day, and we’re so glad they did as a result of the sport is phenomenal.
Say what you want about SGF’s opening present, however there’s no denying that when the Black Myth: Wukong trailer dropped, the air left the YouTube Theatre and goosebumps have been felt by many. So you possibly can solely think about the anticipation we felt while ascending to the highest flooring suite of The Proper Hotel in Downtown LA for a personal two-hour hands-on preview of the sport.
For those that didn’t know this already, Black Myth: Wukong is impressed by the 16th century Chinese novel ‘Journey to the West’, thought-about certainly one of East Asia’s hottest literary works. It’s not the primary time the online game trade has been impressed by the shapeshifting Monkey King, Sun Wukong – a notable instance consists of Ninja Theory’s beneficial 2010 launch, ‘Enslaved: Odyssey to the West’.
Our preview started by panning down on a particularly detailed peach (you might even see its particular person fuzzies) chilling on the forest flooring. Before we knew it, the peach revealed itself to be our shifty protagonist, Wukong. It took only a few seconds for us to acknowledge Black Myth: Wukong is an Unreal Engine 5 recreation, so for the following 1 hour and 59 minutes we knew we’d be in for a visible feast for the eyes.
The demo duties Wukong with scaling the “Black Wind Mountain”, an early chapter of the sport, and it is a location acquainted to those that know the supply materials. Our expertise with soulslike video games (which Black Myth: Wukong isn’t, however kinda is – extra on this later) is that every location is a personality unto itself. This is simply as essential – if no more so – than the charming Yaoguai that inhabit them.
There have been three places we pilgrimaged by means of throughout our time with the sport. The first was a wealthy greenwood the place fallen leaves danced atop reclaimed temple ruins as we pummelled wolf-like beasts with Wukong’s trusty employees. The second housed a number of bigger temples, swampy marshlands and boss encounters together with an enormous white wolf Yaoguai with glowing purple eyes – elevating the entire expertise to spectacular ranges. The third was the summit of Black Wind Mountain at sundown. Here we have been confronted with a huge, fire-wielding, black bear. No kidding, this author’s coronary heart was pounding so laborious he may really feel it in his neck because the scene was set for this closing confrontation. It’s truthful to say that Black Myth: Wukong goes full bombast on its set-piece places and doesn’t maintain again on the thrills both.
Our essential weapon all through the sport is Wukong’s longstaff: an agile and quick-hitting pole able to swatting demons twenty-odd occasions in a single combo. Wukong is a nimble protagonist, choosing speedy chain assaults to finest his foes, and dodges to keep away from enemy assaults. There isn’t any blocking system in Black Myth. Instead, it focuses on completely timed dodges to evade incoming blows. Technically you can block with LB, which orders Wukong to spin his employees, however this solely appeared to deflect sure projectile assaults like arrows. If a bodily blow have been to move his means, he’d need to dodge, which you get used to pretty rapidly. We famous the perfect-timing window to be quite beneficiant, which nearly balanced the restricted defensive choices. You can spam ‘X’ in your fast-hitting combo, or maintain ‘Y’ for a heavy assault. These are each at the price of stamina… y’know, fairly easy stuff.
Things get a bit extra attention-grabbing the place Wukong’s stances are involved as they alter his moveset. During our demo, we managed to pattern two of the three stances on provide. We started in ‘Smash’ stance: a fast mixture of strikes that reward you for being aggressive by increase a spotlight meter to tug off heavy assaults. The second stance was made out there to us as soon as Wukong reached stage 5. We’d like to consider the ‘Pillar’ stance because the antagonising, cheeky sh** moveset. In ‘Pillar’ stance, Wukong sits atop his employees. If you’re in a position to maintain this place and construct your focus meter, the employees will get longer, and longer, and looonger. This goads his enemies into vary earlier than unleashing a mega floor slam assault, virtually one-tapping anybody caught underneath his employees. ‘Pillar’ was our favorite stance. We discovered ourselves laughing as we squared as much as foes perched safely atop our 20ft tall longstaff like some kind of immovable, heckling, arsehat. The third moveset is ‘Thrust’ stance. It was nonetheless fairly far out of attain when our time with the sport got here to a detailed, solely changing into out there if we hit stage 20. We suppose you possibly can blame this on how lengthy we sat on our black iron pillar, just like the courageous little monkey we’re.
Some ultimate notes on fight are the spells and shapeshifting talents on provide in Black Myth: Wukong. Each gives a variety of strategic choices to regulate the battlefield in your favour. By progressing by means of the story or by beating particular enemies, Wukong can be taught spells – just like the aptly named ‘Immobilize’ spell, which when forged consumes Mana to freeze an enemy in place for a restricted period of time, opening them up for a barrage of bonks. There’s no particular variety of spells we’re prone to see within the recreation but, however there needs to be a good few.
Wukong, after all, is thought for his shapeshifting means. In Black Myth he makes use of these transformative abilities to duplicate sure particular enemy Yaoguai. In this demo, as soon as we managed to finest a flame-wielding daddy of a mini-boss, Wukong may undertake their bodily kind, weapon and highly effective assault patterns for a restricted time. Being in a position to shift into Yaoguai at any time when issues obtained spicy (or once we fancied capitalising on an immobilised foe) different the fight and elevated the entire expertise.
At first look you’d be forgiven for pondering Black Myth: Wukong was a soulslike recreation. There are quite a lot of similarities to Dark Souls. Vanquish an enemy? Gain willpower (souls). Need to replenish well being? Drink out of your gourd (flasks)… you get the concept. Black Myth: Wukong attracts rather a lot from the style, however in truth is extra corresponding to an motion RPG. Game Science opted for a extra conventional talent tree as a substitute of tying character talents to weapons and armour. Stances are unlocked by reaching ranges and enhanced by spending earnable sparks on basis abilities or stance upgrades. Also, quite than punish the participant for dying, it encourages power and energy with an superior quantity of named boss fights. Black Myth undoubtedly feels simpler than your conventional soulslike, however strikes a strong steadiness between that and an motion RPG.
Now, there’s lots extra we’d like to say about Black Myth: Wukong, however contemplating the sport continues to be in energetic growth and topic to alter, we’d want to attend till its full launch earlier than definitively expressing how we really feel. And earlier than you ask, while we shared a room with a handful of builders and PR for Game Science, we have been suggested that they would not be discussing the current delay to Black Myth: Wukong for Xbox Series X|S. We hope we cannot be ready too lengthy, as a result of if our two-hour session is indicative of the entire expertise, this might probably be within the working for GOTY – it’s that good.
