Black Myth: Wukong Review – A Compelling Journey Into Chinese Tradition

Black Myth: Wukong made more than a few heads turn with its reveal trailer released back in 2020, but it was with the switch to Unreal Engine 5 that the action role-playing game developed by Game Science entered most players’ radars. With beautiful environments and highly detailed characters enhanced by the engine, Black Myth: Wukong promised to be one of the first truly next-gen action role-playing games.

Being from an unproven studio, many wondered if Game Science had what it takes to create a compelling action role-playing game experience. After spending around 25 hours with the game, I can say that they definitely did, although the game doesn’t exactly try to innovate the genre, presenting an engaging but not particularly innovative blend of elements lifted from multiple Soulslikes, including the Team NINJA’s Nioh series, CAPCOM’s Monster Hunter and more traditional action games.

Black Myth: Wukong is based on Journey to the West, a novel published in China in the 16th century detailing the story of Sun Wukong, a monkey born from a stone who eventually learns the art of the tao, 72 transformations, combat techniques, and the secret of immortality. After becoming incredibly powerful, Sun Wukong challenges Heaven, only to fail and lose the artifacts that gave him power. Years after his defeat, the Destined One, who looks exactly like Sun Wukong, sets out to recover the artifacts that Sun Wukong had lost, getting to know more about the land and how the artifacts themselves have shaped the lives of those touched by them.

The Black Myth: Wukong story is a concise retelling of the traditional story, so those familiar with it will not be wholly surprised by the game’s story. Being not a direct adaptation, however, there are still some surprises along the way which manage to make the experience entertaining even for those who are extremely familiar with Journey to the West. Story presentation also makes the journey enjoyable, as do the personable characters accompanying the Destined One. The writing is solid, going for a different tone depending on the character or the chapter, although it gets a little confusing at times. Some of these characters are clear standouts, like the main character of Chapter 2, who delights the Destined One and the player with some catchy tunes in Chinese, but every character is well realized for the amount of screen time they get. Competent English voiceovers compound the solid writing, although the original Chinese dub should be the one to go with for an authentic experience.

The Black Myth: Wukong story is possibly made more enjoyable by the great amount of care developer Game Science put into world-building. Though hidden inside the menu, the game provides tons of information on the many Yaoguai the Destined One faces on his journey, painting a very vivid picture of the beautiful world they inhabit. The main story bosses, in this regard, receive special treatment, thanks to an assortment of special cutscenes that play after their defeat, employing various animation techniques that ecthes them in the player’s memory. The amount of love poured into the game’s setting is evident, and the whole experience greatly benefits from it.

While the story may not be everyone’s cup of tea, Black Myth: Wukong definitely delivers when it comes to gameplay, although it may feel a little lacking in depth compared to the games that inspired it. At its heart, the game is best described as a rather straightforward action game with elements lifted from the Souls series, such as stamina-based combat, bonfire-like checkpoints, dodge/rolling heavy defensive gameplay, and a main healing tool with multiple uses and some customization options like Elden Ring’s Flask of Wondrous Physicks.

Unlike the Souls series, however, the Destined One can only use staves as the main weapon, which all come with the same moveset, which is comprised of a light combo string and a heavy attack that changes depending on the chosen stance. The stance, which can be switched on the fly, also changes the Varied Combo, which is a special combo initiated by using a heavy attack in the middle of a string.

Despite stances not altering the moveset a lot, they do make quite a difference. In Smash stance, for example, timing the Varied Combo to intercept an enemy attack will grant the Destined One increased staggering power, among other advantages that are unlocked via the dedicated skill trees, available for pretty much every combat tool. This is quite reminiscent of the counter-heavy playstyle of the Monster Hunter series Longsword. The Pillar stance, on the other hand, grants the Destined One the ability to climb on its extended staff to avoid ground attacks and deal massive damage from a safe position, while the Thrust stance gives access to attacks with longer range.

These powerful abilities are balanced out by the Focus system, which prevents spamming. By hitting the enemy with light attacks and with the staff spin maneuver, which also repels projectiles, Focus builds up to the point where a charge is stored. The more charges are stored, the more powerful the heavy attack will be, and the less time a heavy attack has to be charged to gain more Focus for better efficacy. Focus can also be gained via perfect dodges and other means, so there are different ways to play optimally despite the single basic moveset.

While the Destined One can only use his staff as the main weapon, there are many other combat tools available, starting with spells. Belonging to three different types, these spells allow the Destined One to parry enemy attacks, immobilize enemies, create duplicates, and so on. These spells are rather powerful, and they are a central component in build-crafting together with the simple armor system, which grants different buffs depending on how many items from a set are equipped, similar to the Nioh series. Spirits, single attacks that can be unleashed by transforming into defeated enemies, also play a role in build-crafting, as they grant buffs that empower certain playstyles. Armor sets, alongside weapon upgrades that employ a weapon tree not too dissimilar from that seen in the Monster Hunter series, can be crafted from checkpoints using materials gathered on the field and special items obtained by defeating bosses.

Rounding up the combat tools available in Black Myth: Wukong are Vessels, accessories that can be activated at any time to grant different effects like improved resistances, and proper Transformations that turn the Destined One into one of the enemies he has defeated for a prolonged amount of time, giving access to different movesets and abilities. These options, like spells, have cooldown timers, so it is impossible to spam them repeatedly to win. Not that it is really needed, as Black Myth: Wukong is not a very difficult game. Most mobs are not a threat at all, and most bosses can be defeated the first time through, with only a few exceptions. Even then, a couple of tries should be more than enough for experienced action game players.

While this may sound disappointing, I’ve found Black Myth: Wukong’s approach to difficulty refreshing. Though enemy placement and certain movesets are reminiscent of the Souls series, none reach the frustrating difficulty of many of the enemies in Elden Ring, whose boss design gets really extreme sometimes. Here, no boss will unleash an arena-wide attack with multiple swings that must be avoided with very strict timing or deliver a cheap kill all of a sudden. Considering how much I was frustrated by some of the Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree bosses, I really welcomed this approach, which still kept me on my toes but never made me feel like I was at a huge disadvantage, no matter what I did. The fact that regular enemy design is super varied and the main boss design is extremely good makes it all the easier to forgive the game for an experience that is, maybe, too little challenging at times.

Level design is also competent, although not particularly inspired. The game’s very first chapter doesn’t leave a very good impression, featuring a mostly linear design, but things improve greatly from the second chapter onward, as locations become bigger and feature multiple paths, many of them including additional items for crafting weapons and gear, and Mind Cores, which are used to craft a special type of medicine unlocked in late Chapter 2 which grants permanent stat boosts, introducing a sort of Soulslike leveling system, and optional bosses, of which there are quite a few, and some can only be found with some thorough searching and with specific items. Some of them are variants of other bosses, unfortunately, but it is to be expected when having so many of them. Even when the level design gets a bit more open, it definitely does not reach the heights of the interconnectivity that characterized Lordran in the original Dark Souls.

Exploration is also limited, with very little verticality, which is surprising given the Destined One’s agility, and too many closed-off paths that look explorable at a glance, making it one of the less rewarding aspects of the game. That said, there are still plenty of secrets to be found for those looking for them. These secrets also extend the game’s total playtime well past the 25 hours needed to complete the main campaign, though this number may vary depending on the player’s skill.

Powered by Unreal Engine 5, Black Myth: Wukong looks great. Character models look highly detailed, while the environments succeed at fusing together natural landscapes with traditional Chinese architecture, giving the game a very charming atmosphere. The game, sadly, is not without some visual glitches, as I often experienced vegetation shadow flickering, which was a bit distracting. With full ray tracing support, the Black Myth: Wukong visuals get elevated to the next level with better shadows and reflections, but the improvements are, in my opinion, not really worth it due to the performance cost, which is rather big.

As many expected, Black Myth: Wukong sadly suffers from some performance issues, namely the stuttering issues that are sadly common in every current Unreal Engine 5 game. While the game attempts to reduce stuttering by pre-caching shaders before it launches for the first time, traversal stutters are still in. They are very frequent and sometimes very distracting, as some of them last for over one second, which is a massive problem when in combat. As such, I’ve found the benchmark tool a little misleading, as it shows no stuttering at all.

Generally, however, it is a decent enough representation of the performance you should expect during most of the game, minus the traversal stutters. Don’t expect to be able to play the game decently at native resolution with everything maxed out and full ray tracing, however, as my system (i7-13700F, RTX 4080, 32GB RAM] couldn’t average 60 FPS even at 1080p resolution. Thankfully, the game supports all three upscalers (DLSS, FSR, XeSS) alongside UE5’s TSR (which looks worse than the others) and DLSS Frame Generation, so with some tweaking of the settings and NVIDIA DLSS at balanced, my system averaged 115 FPS in the benchmark. I could have gone with DLSS Quality for better image quality and run the game at around 90 FPS average, but for a fast-paced game like Black Myth: Wukong, I preferred prioritizing framerate.

Black Myth: Wukong couldn’t have been a better debut for Game Science. Although their action role-playing game may not be innovative, it’s got great production values, it’s fun to play, it’s engaging, and it’s beautiful to look at. Some minor issues, such as a challenge level that could be too low for some and an experience that gets a little stale over time, hold back the game a bit, but in all honesty, I wouldn’t be surprised to see more than a few players name Black Myth: Wukong their Game of the Year.

PC version tested. Review code provided by the publisher.

Black Myth: Wukong

Black Myth: Wukong stands out as one of the strongest debut games released in recent times. While not groundbreaking in any way, it masterfully blends elements from several popular franchises to deliver an engaging action RPG experience that ranks just below the very best in the genre. Although stuttering issues and minor gameplay flaws hold it back slightly, these shouldn’t deter any action RPG or action game fan from picking it up. The Journey to the West has rarely been this enjoyable.