In a space as crowded because the soulslike style, it may be troublesome to stand out, however after two hours with the uber-difficult Wuchang: Fallen Feathers, it appears the oldsters at Leenzee Games could also be onto one thing. Taking place in a magical reimagining of dynastic China, you play a pirate warrior who has some critical strikes, making use of intricate and lethal spells, an arsenal of weapons with potent movesets, and an improve tree that’s a lot more concerned than your typical action-adventure game. This makes for an journey the place, more usually than not, I felt just like the scary badass the remaining of the world needs to be afraid of, fairly than the opposite approach round. Of course, the higher restrict on simply how a lot I might make myself really feel like an overpowered Dynasty Warriors character was my own ability stage and understanding of Wuchang’s extraordinarily advanced methods, which I might solely dive so deep with during my restricted demo. But what I’ve seen to date has me fairly optimistic.
The major approach Wuchang: Fallen Feathers appears to distinguish itself from its friends is that right here, as an alternative of a few primary sword strikes, a handful of meager spells and talents, and a tiny well being bar, you’re given a fairly intensive toolkit of formidable instruments to play with. Each weapon means that you can unleash distinctive flurries of assaults that ship you hovering into the air, darting throughout the map, and performing insane feats of dexterity which can be far past what’s doable in most soulslikes. It obtained to the purpose the place I felt like the realm boss stomping my enemies flat, fairly than a scared, cautious adventurer going through unbelievable odds.
That feeling of superiority may need one thing to do with how these skills are acquired: by harvesting them from fallen enemies. That’s proper! Every defeated foe is more than simply a handful of improve supplies. You truly get to study their strikes and put them to make use of in opposition to future opponents, finally turning you into a lethal reflection of everybody you’ve bested in battle, and in my time with it I already started to really feel like a power-stealing badass in short order. And this was simply the opening areas of the journey too – I can solely think about how wild issues get later on if you’re squaring off in opposition to more highly effective opponents and presumably unlocking even more insane skills.
Don’t get me flawed: there have been nonetheless loads of cases the place my eagerness or lack of consciousness obtained me completely smashed to items, however I additionally felt like I had approach more choices for chopping the enemy down to measurement. For instance, one transfer I used to be given whereas wielding a big ax let me leap straight into the air to ludicrous anime-level heights, then smash down on my opponent, stomping them flat and leaving a minion-shaped impression within the earth. Another weapon, fast-paced twin blades, gave me the power to fireplace off a bunch of small, sticky explosives each time I dodged, which then exploded doing a small quantity of injury, however more importantly, interrupting enemy motion.
These skills and weapon combos, mixed with spells that allow me do issues like hearth off a lethal disc of hearth, allowed me to play a lot more aggressively than I’m accustomed to, and it’s clear there’s simply a entire lot more to study with Wuchang basically. I didn’t have almost enough time to totally wrap my thoughts across the numerous ability bushes, capability customization choices that allow me alter how my weapons functioned, and spellcasting system, but it surely’s clear this borrows fairly a bit from RPGs and can need to be thought by way of if you wish to max out your ranges of badassery.
That might be fairly useful to do too, as a result of of the 2 bosses I took on in Wuchang, one of them was extraordinarily aggressive and equally beefed up with fancy movesets. It took me fairly a few tries to study her fast, convoluted assault patterns, and grasp the timing for parrying her assaults, particularly within the second half of the fight when every swipe of her blade despatched out huge gusts of wind that knocked my on my butt and did approach more injury than I assumed the wind was succesful of. Eventually, although, I stood triumphant in opposition to her devilish tricks. Rather than a feeble goon hopelessly outmatched by an enemy clearly above my energy stage, Wuchang’s boss fights made me really feel a lot more like a peer locked in a duel with robust weapons and damaging skills to see who was more worthy of success.
If there’s one half I didn’t get a fully robust learn on, it’s Wuchang’s story, which facilities on a illness spreading all through the lands that drives people mad and makes them sprout feathers. I didn’t see enough to say whether or not or not that is more likely to go the space, however I’ll say I’ve misplaced depend of the quantity of soulslikes previously few years which have leaned on that extremely drained trope. I get that having a illness that turns people into monsters gives a fairly simple cause to make every little thing on this planet wish to kill you, which may be very useful on this sort of game, however man am I ever drained of seeing it. I’d actually wish to see Wuchang break away from some of the story cliches in the identical approach it appears to be switching issues up on the subject of fight type.
It’s additionally value noting simply how visually spectacular Wuchang is, which is by no means the norm for the style. Even if I used to be dying half a dozen instances to the identical boss or misplaced amongst a sea of disgusting, mutated enemies, I used to be at the very least capable of content material myself with how downright attractive every little thing appeared, ruined and deeply troubling because the world was. That mentioned, I did discover considerably long load instances after every humiliating defeat that respawned me back at a checkpoint, and I’ve to surprise how a lot of that cling time is owed to the world and characters trying so dang good. In equity, there’s little or no probability this factor’s been optimized enough to be consultant of the ultimate product, however since I used to be taking part in on a PC that appeared pretty highly effective, it’s positively one thing I’m going to wish to preserve an eye on as I take a look at future builds.
With solely a short exploration space and two boss fights to cope with, I solely caught a small glimpse at Wuchang: Fallen Feathers, however I already really feel fairly good about its probabilities at being more than simply one other soulslike so as to add to the ridiculously overflowing pile. The movesets are intricate and attention-grabbing, the RPG mechanics appear deep and offer a lot of freedom (even when I can’t declare to grasp some of them totally), and the boss fights gave me a critical run for my money that’s uncommon nowadays. All that’s already obtained me fairly excited to play more.