Black Myth:Wukong is this year's Jedi Survivor. It's a souls-lite with stunning graphics and compelling exploration that'll challenge you without making you beat your controller against your desk like a pathetic man-baby (not that I've ever done such a thing). You play as the reincarnation of a monkey deity referred to as Wukong the Destined One, who is set on reclaiming his former powers while taking out his anger on yaoguai with his dexterous staff skills as well as magical powers. Supposedly based on Journey to the West, an epic Chinese novel, the story isn't so much a linear tale as a collection of folk fables. At the end of every chapter, you'll be treated to an artful film sequence that has some relation to the monsters you'll meet. My favorite featured a kitsune (a fox yaoguai) who is rescued by a man from a trap. The man has a dream that the fox turns into a beautiful woman who he then marries. Years later he comes home to her transformed, feasting on their children. When he wakes, the man skins the fox to prevent the dream from becoming reality. You'll later stumble upon her pelt, and you can grant her revenge.
Black Myth:Wukong has gameplay that will be familiar to Souls fans. You have a light attack and a heavy attack, and you build up Focus by dodging and hitting enemies. Holding down the heavy attack button charges a heavy attack, which spends Focus points. A heavy attack can stagger enemies, and special moves, triggered by hitting the heavy attack button at the end of a light attack combo, can chew up enemy health. Realizing when to use your Focus points can be the difference in a boss fight, along with your spells. Immobilize is one of the first you get, and it freezes enemies for a few seconds, allowing you to get some damage in or use your healing gourd. Cloud Step makes you invisible while leaving a decoy, so you can sneak behind the enemy and attack. Transformation spells let you transform into certain bosses, complete with a new health bar. Pluck of Many spawns a few copies of yourself to keep foes busy. Potions and various gourds with drinks and soaks allow you to customize your temporary buffs. There is a lot of complexity here, but it's simple enough to be understandable. Also of note are your three staff stances. There's a heavy stance, which launches a typical heavy attack, a pillar stance which lets you sit high above on your staff before swinging it downward, and a thrust stance, which treats your staff like a spear. I prefer the first two, but different play styles will gravitate to different stances.
As far as difficulty is concern, Black Myth: Wukong is a hard game, but on the easier side of the Souls-like spectrum. Think Jedi Survivor on the harder difficulty modes rather than say, Lies of P, which I couldn't complete. The spells, potions, and stances give you a lot of options, and you can always grind levels if you want in order to upgrade your gear, although I only had to resort to that method for the Whiteclad Noble, the first true skill test. If you've played Elden Ring and made it most of the way through, you'll not have too much trouble. If you're expecting something like God of War, you might be in for a rude awakening. One notable difference between Wukong and other Souls-likes is that you don't lose experience points (Will) by dying.
Graphically, Wukong is one of the best-looking titles of this generation, along with Cyberpunk and Alan Wake 2. Utilizing Unreal Engine 5, Wukong features dazzling environments of jungle, snow, and rocky desert. I'm currently making my way through chapter 4 (Wukong has 6 chapters), and the underground spider-filled caverns are startlingly realistic. Only a few low-resolution textures and some overly-shimmering shadows mar the experience. Performance-wise, my Ryzen 7 5800x had no problems, for the game isn't at all CPU-bound like some other more recent titles. My 12 gig RTX 3080 was more than capable of higher settings at 1440p with DLSS Quality upscaling enabled, with frame rates usually in the 60 or 70s, with only a few drops. Unfortunately, there are Unreal Engine transitionary stutters, along with a few shader compilation stutters that the initial compile didn't catch. It's not Jedi Survivor bad, but it's noticeable, especially in Chapter 3. As for ray-tracing, it's only usable on top of the line GPUs and CPUs, so don't bother unless you're rocking a 4090 and a 7800x3d.
All in all, Black Myth:Wukong is a thrilling action RPG with great graphics, gameplay, and exploration. Definitely check it out. I've already put more than 30 hours into it, so it's a fairly long game. Screenshots below:
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