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Blooming proudly in the barren desert of AAA titles

8.5/10
Opening
For a long time, whenever talking about China's game industry, it seems that countless players have sighed and lamented. Though its market value is tremendous and cannot be underestimated, the entire industry is almost supported by online and mobile games, and there are few achievements in AAA single-player games. In this context, August 20, 2024, would definitely be an unforgettable day for Chinese gamers. The future of Chinese single-player games, Black Myth: Wukong, has officially been released. On its first day, it has already reached a stunning 2.2 million players, and as of today, its total sales have reached 18 million copies, not only did it set a new first-week sales record among its genre, but also became the single-player game with the highest peak player count on steam. As the Chinese saying goes, 'A big tree attracts the wind'. While Black Myth: Wukong has won a large number of fans, it has also faced widespread questions and criticism. Can the quality of this game live up to such outstanding sales and an incredible number of players?
Strength
Overall, Black Myth: Wukong is a work whose merits outweigh its flaws. Though its strengths and weaknesses are clear, we cannot dismiss it completely because of this. Games featuring traditional Chinese landscapes, realistic cultural scenes such as Buddha statues and temples, and Chinese Taoist Mythology are rare nowadays. Powered by Unreal Engine 5, this game showcases a level of visual refinement and scene interactivity that is beyond the reach of most previous AAA titles, the realistic and delicate scene interaction brings players an immersive gaming experience, and the stunning art is enough to allow players to indulge in this gorgeous world where every screenshot feels like wallpaper. Huge game worlds, rich game content, and a wide variety of enemies are ahead for players to explore, the game and combat in each chapter are unique and thrilling, the amazing music adds an immersive atmosphere to it, too. The movie-quality cutscenes are of extremely high standards in terms of camera movement and performance effects. The ending animations of each chapter, which are in different styles, are well-made and profound in connotation.
Though the plot narrative technique is rather obscure and difficult to grasp, the in-game journal fully supplements the worldview, characters, and background in the form of fables or stories. Reading thoroughly will allow you to unravel the plot's complex themes. Countless talents and a wide range of spells for players to freely choose from, thus evolving into numerous genres of gameplay. The game's transformation mechanism is a major feature, combined with the character's flexible body movements and gorgeous battle performance effects, Black Myth: Wukong remains consistently entertaining and engaging in each battle. The final boss and the final hidden boss battles have put a lot of effort into the design of the mechanism, the battle scene, and the artistic conception conveyed. The upgradable that can freely reset and no death penalty have all greatly optimized the player's gaming experience, most players will not find the game overly difficult to complete.
Weakness
Whether in good or bad ways, this game draws heavily on the design of many souls-like games. Even though the plot of Black Myth: Wukong is extremely profound, the overly fragmented storytelling hinders player comprehension. The plot based on the conclusion of the Journey to the West, is very familiar to Chinese players, however, the lack of clear cause-and-effect explanations will likely confuse many others. The journal also contains a vast amount of text, not all players may have the patience to finish it, let alone delve into the original Journey to the West. While the Chinese voice acting is excellent, the English voice acting feels a little lackluster, and misplaced and missing subtitles also show that Black Myth: Wukong still needs to improve in terms of localization. The developer may aim to encourage players to get rid of guides and explore on their own, but in a vast world with interconnected routes, extremely low scene recognition, and high similarity, without route guides and in-game maps, it is very easy to lose your sense of direction when actually playing. The frequent appearance of invisible walls since the third chapter makes it even more difficult for players to judge the true boundaries of the map. Player would find it hard to experience the complete game content without a guide.
The numerous skills and transformations vary significantly in strength, the character's fragile ability to withstand attacks also makes the game have relatively high requirements on the player's reaction ability and operational tolerance. The optimization of Black Myth: Wukong is extremely poor, with problems such as long loading time, frame drops, and crashes often occurring. In terms of the lighting transition between light and dark scenes, and the lighting effects in dark scenes, Black Myth: Wukong also performs extremely poorly. The design of the large bosses in the game, such as Captain wise-voice and The duskveil is problematic, the battle experience is frustrating. The design of the probability of dropping some collectibles is even worse, and compared to the earliest gameplay trailer, the officially released version has cut too much content. Even in the existing chapters, many story elements feel abrupt and lack depth, leaving too many gaps. Although the fifth and sixth chapters are also quite good, they are inferior to the previous chapters, and signs of development rush are extremely obvious.
Conclusion
In a market lacking AAA titles, Game Science has made unremitting efforts and delivered Black Myth: Wukong in 4 years, which is no small feat. Whether through its unique, realistic, and excellent art, or its satisfying and exhilarating comfort, it will definitely make you indulge in it. If you take the time and savor it quietly, you will definitely be shocked and leave endless aftertaste. It should be noted that no matter how good a game is, it will eventually have its audience, and this is especially true for Black Myth: Wukong as an action role-playing game. As the saying goes, 'seeing is believing.' if you can accept the shortcomings mentioned above, you still need to experience it for yourself to understand its mystery.
In the end, Black Myth: Wukong still benefits the vast majority of players on three major levels: in terms of game aesthetics, its success stands in stark contrast to the dismal ending of Concord, which implements political correctness and diversified aesthetics, and will inevitably sound the alarm for the art design of future games; in terms of the game engine, Black Myth: Wukong further demonstrates the massive potential of the Unreal 5 engine, more developers will likely turn to it for game development, which will surely bring games with more stunning visual effects and improved optimization in the future; in the Chinese game industry, the huge success of Black Myth: Wukong has overturned the previous monopoly of online games and mobile games in the market. The potential of single-player games will inevitably drive more Chinese developers to invest in it. Even if you discover that this game isn't to your liking, its popularity will surely bear fruit in the future and will be beneficial to the entire gaming industry.
I would like to express my special thanks to my friend WH.Z for gifting me this excellent work. I shall like to dedicate this review to him.
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