Over the years, there have been several games that have been difficult for me to review. Boring your opinion down to a poor figure isn’t always the easiest thing to do, and it doesn’t get any easier when the components inside a product fluctuate so much in quality and create monolithic to fragmented impressions. I remember Spiritfarer from 2020 being one such example, I absolutely loved the concept, world and music, but at the same time, I have to be content with awarding the game with a “only” 8/10 because the long playability ruined it An otherwise superb adventure throughout. The reason I’m telling you this is because Team Ninja’s new action-adventure Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is equally difficult to rate. The developers behind this Chinese fantasy drama have mixed a lot of interesting elements that bring life to an otherwise overcrowded genre with extremely poor technology and substandard narrative. Unfortunately, when these outstanding nuggets and They sink to the bottom in a frustrating way when utterly mediocre overall mixes.
After spending regarding 90 minutes with Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty, I’m not at all impressed by what I saw and experienced. The graphics are downright ugly, the world feels lifeless, and the combat system is most reminiscent of a low-level version of Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, a seemingly odd addition that left me scratching my head as much as I swore at the original high difficulty levels. The fact that I’m stuck on the first real boss of the game doesn’t explain it, and if it weren’t for needing to play more to write this review, I’m not sure I’d keep banging on this seemingly bland granite wall to hold it back out of my way. However, when the boss finally fell on my sword and I felt the sweetness of victory wash over my soul in true Dark Souls spirit, I admit it became harder to put down the controller. As I said, Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty has many flaws, but the rewarding gameplay and compelling progression system are still enough to keep you wanting to come back once more and once more.
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At its core, Crouching Dragon might be called a soulful adventure, but unlike FromSoftware’s masterful creation, it leans more towards classic action games where speed and agility are paramount, and it’s used in recipes far more formal than Hayao Miyazaki’s desolate nightmare world is cooked in a much more forgiving cauldron. Yes, I know I’m contradicting myself a bit now, because I’ve admitted that I found Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty difficult at first, but the challenge is really mostly regarding learning the different systems, and then realizing when you can take offense, Or when you need to be more computational in your method. In fact, most of Crouching Dragon’s content isn’t particularly difficult, and you won’t be put to the test like the aforementioned Sekiro or the Playstation 4 classic Bloodborne.
However, there are times when Team Ninja forces you to think twice before succeeding, and most of these occasions come in the form of bosses where you can’t just mash the attack button to win. For example, the first boss is a lesson in parrying incoming attacks, and since this is a fundamental part of Wo Long’s playability, I can understand why they chose to put this speed bump behind the start pit. Of course, not all bosses are equally difficult to master, but the best ones may be the ones that are more demanding of you as a player. Another example was a horseman who not only forced me to parry and push the spearhead forward, but also taught me how to use magic to suffocate his fire ability with icy ice, and when I took down this opponent, the joy was once once more immortal.
When these systems are in sync, Wo Long is an incredible adventure that challenges you and trains your reflexes, but unfortunately not everything it has to offer is as good as it gets. Speaking of bosses, there are a couple that are really bad. An example of this is a large monster that you can stand and slap on its legs until it falls over. Sure, it’ll jump into the air and occasionally slam into the ground (should add by far the stiffest animation in the world), but that only requires you to dodge a little before it’s back on its feet. Combat does have a second phase in the enemy’s defense, but it’s mostly regarding swapping the legs for the belly as the target for your sword, and then delivering what’s called a “killing blow” that wipes out the beast in one fell swoop. From time to time I confuse the difficult fight with the easier duster, but it’s really just a weird fight that ends before it even starts, unfortunately that’s not what I’m doing on my journey to the credits Worst fight ever suffered.
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The best thing regarding Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty, however, is the choices you make as a player. That said, you have several different weapon classes at your disposal, which can then have different types of special attacks and attributes. You’re not locked into these add-ons, though, and you can customize your add-ons to deal more damage, give more health, or provide elemental perks almost at any time. The same goes for your armor, and later in the game you can control many different elements to build your character, and there are many ways to decide how you want to play. Of course, the fact that you can also equip both weapons (plus ranged weapons) doesn’t make things any worse, and you’ll also be able to take advantage of some of the Phalanx’s abilities while altering its aesthetic, for those who want to be able to For someone who looks a certain way without sacrificing attribute perks, it’s a dream come true.
Another positive aspect is the level design and variety of different environments. Team Ninja have shown before how great they are when making levels in games like Nioh 2, and while it might not be quite possible in the case of Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty to make those levels, it offers lovely battlegrounds that are a joy to explore . In fact, you’ll visit everything from Chinese temples to abandoned ports and snow-capped mountains, and I especially love how the map starts out as a monster-filled prison and then evolves into an infiltration mission inside a grand mansion.
Exploration, by the way, is especially a key component of the challenges you choose to tackle. Because while your so-called level determines how strong your character is, it’s also meant to strengthen your standing on the battlefield. Each level has several different locations to find and conquer, which are then used to balance the ratio of power between you and your combatants. This way, you can benefit from mapping every nook and cranny instead of billing your boss as soon as possible. At first, I’ll admit that the system itself felt a little clunky, but over time I came to appreciate it because it both encourages you to explore as a player and to stand in front of battlegrounds you haven’t yet conquered, as well as feel vulnerable.
You also don’t have to conquer these desolate regions yourself, at least not if you don’t want to. In fact, Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty offers the option to play with friends, and while we weren’t able to test this out ourselves, I’m glad I got the chance to play Samurai with friends. For those who prefer single player, up to two NPC allies can be summoned per level, these allies can increase their confidence in your character by often fighting together, when you reach a certain bond with each other, you will be rewarded with their own equipment. It’s a smart way to bring a companion along for the ride, and while they’re rarely useful once melee strikes, they can at least serve as decoys or targets when things heat up.
There’s a lot to discover and learn to love regarding Crouching Dragon, but unfortunately we’ve now come to the part of the review where negativity reigns. From a technical point of view, this Chinese Dynasty certainly doesn’t look good, and sometimes I wonder if I’ve come across some old version from a few years ago. The graphics are acceptable at best and downright terrible at their worst, and when shoddy lighting effects and glitches are added to the mix as well, it’s hard to ignore all the mistakes that spice up this action-adventure. For example, many of the textures look lifted from games made a decade ago, while similar games like Mortal Shell (2020), Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (2019) and Dark Souls III (2016) look When it’s much better than Team Ninja’s latest, it’s time to start serious criticism. Biggest competitor FromSoftware may not be the graphics king either, but they get away with a lot thanks to great design. However, when 2015’s Bloodborne looked graphically better than Wo Long, the proverbial ax needed to come out and chop the production to pieces.
Of course, Dynasty of Wojiu has pretty good design to fall back on, but it’s not nearly enough given the technical glitches it’s trying to get rid of. BTW, I played on Xbox Series X, the game may look better on other formats, and a patch may correct some issues in the future. However, if we look at how it’s performing here and now, it’s far from an acceptable outcome for a full-priced game in 2023.
Aside from the purely visual aspect, as I said, there were some bugs and image update failures and lags, despite my choice to play the game in so-called “performance mode.” Virtually every cutscene I’ve seen has been chopped up in some way, and that same stuttering feeling (micro-stuttering) occasionally invades the gameplay, and everything freezes for a while before the game code catches up. It’s not something that makes the game completely unplayable by any means, but it’s clear that the technology isn’t optimized to work properly. And, once so bad that the whole image freezes and refuses to come back. While I might still hear my ongoing boss fight through the speakers, the image locked and forced me to close and restart the game from the start menu.
It should also be said that the stories in “Wolong” are not the best in terms of presentation and storytelling style. While I rarely like to say things are ridiculous, there were a few times during the aforementioned cutscene where I either looked like a scarecrow or laughed at the absurdity unfolding onscreen. The fact that the emotionless voice actors don’t help here, as they deliver every line with the composure of a freshly graduated and heavily articulated amateur actor, or they overact scenes to drive out emotions that aren’t there. Then the script mostly consists of cryptic one-liners and meaningless honour, friends and wicked talk, which doesn’t make it any easier to take the plot seriously when the interactions between the various characters are like Richard Nixon during the Watergate scandal It’s best to redo the entire story from start to finish when it’s just as believable. By the way, it feels like the developers know very little regarding how to move the story forward, leading to some really weird cuts between many different sequences. Things go so badly at times that it’s hard to shake off the feeling that the directors don’t know what they’re doing, and it’s clear they don’t know how best to let the plot unfold to create flow, intrigue, and suspense.
Ultimately, though, as I said, Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is a very difficult game to review and rate; in terms of quality, it’s a lot of a mix of highs and lows, and the whole can’t be described as very fragmented from start to finish. In fact, part of me wants to recommend this Ninja Gaiden-esque Dark Souls adventure because I find the concept, playability, and options interesting enough whether you’re a veteran of the game or a gamer who finds FromSoftware too difficult and Rigid. On the other hand, it’s hard to recommend something with as many flaws as Team Ninja’s new action game, and when the elements vary a lot like here, I don’t feel like there’s much to do other than settle between the good and the bad.
I think your ultimate enjoyment of Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty will depend entirely on how you choose to use the title. If you play with an active Xbox Game Pass subscription, for example, there’s plenty of opportunity to get a feel for the game, and the pitfalls are easier to overlook when you don’t have to cough up a wad of extra cash to join in the fun. However, if you’re going to buy it at full price, I can’t in good conscience recommend buying it, at least not until Team Ninja fixes the biggest problem (and even then, there are fundamental flaws here that are hard to swallow for this price tag). But if you like Soulslike games, here’s an exciting concept, and if you get the chance to try the game for a low price, you’ll likely be pleasantly surprised. Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty has a lot of great ideas, but the title is currently held back by too many bugs and poor execution to move up the ratings ladder.
