REVIEW: Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is a curious adventure through China 4fk2m

A Team Ninja is one of the most recognizable developers in the industry today, and over the last decade has become one of the studios that can make the most good experiences soulslike in addition to the creator of the genre, FromSoftware. Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is another one of those examples, taking everything they learned in the duology Nioh and improving exponentially – balancing frustration with great times. 1wyh

Check out the impressions of showmetech about the game in the following review:

Romance of the Three Kingdoms if it were a Vin Diesel movie 1n113s

The general premise of Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is the story of the legendary Romance of the Three Kingdoms, a XNUMXth-century historical tale that romanticizes the lives and battles of Chinese feudal lords. In the game, the situation is more romanticized, taking on shades of dark fantasy and the massage to tell his narrative full of mystical and adrenaline-filled moments.

But, as in both Nioh, there is a certain tired structure to this whole narrative, which makes many players – myself included – want to simply ignore it and just proceed to the intense combats. This is somehow justifiable since, after finalizing the title, gamers want to look for some video of lore from the game posted by a VaatiVidya (affectionately called free DLCs by me).

Being presented with a complete story in that framework, in my eyes, doesn't go well, and I've felt that way since the first two. Nioh. In WoLong, somehow, it managed to intensify, perhaps because of my love for the Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Seeing Lu Bu, one of the most decorated generals of the period, taking on the form of a centaur thanks to a fusion with a crossbow is somehow strange, and the narrative motives are honestly completely negligible: what matters is the combat.

Of course, this is my opinion, but I don't think that understanding motivations with somewhat corny cutscenes is good for the game. At one point, I was even skipping cutscenes: the bulk of the game is the combat, and the story just didn't pull me in enough for me to care about it. Is it me or the title the wrong one? We will never know.

dodging is the law 1s3q1s

While the gameplay is fun, feeding on the more positive points of Nioh 2, combat is clearly the part where the Team Ninja more changed the basic structure, excluding the ki system and also the stances for each weapon, creating something simpler to understand and that is much more dependent on the dodge button than previous titles.

In virtually every boss in the game, dodging is the player's most important weapon – even when the opponents' movement seems to be open to cuts and various combos, it is always important to have your finger ready on the button to dodge at any time. Enemy damage is intense, and this makes survival, by avoiding blows, of paramount importance in Wo Long's daily life.

But not only the dodge button lives the title and the possibilities in combat: your level design it's excellent, a huge and intense improvement compared to the duology Nioh. Thanks to the addition of jumping, the stages and boss arenas use a lot of verticality to allow the player to feel like a true warrior. wuxia (Chinese martial arts heroes), including the use of somersaults and intense maneuvers with swords or spears.

All of this, of course, needs a limiter – and that's where Wo Long's spirit bar comes in. Dodging, blocking and other evasive maneuvers negatively impact this resource, while being able to do a parry or striking a blow at the enemy has the opposite result, in a kind of yin-yang which, from what I researched, is very similar to the main combat system of Sekiro: Shadow Dies Twice, only From Software game I haven't played yet.

However, in Wo Long, things are not as fast or intense as in Sekiro, with a more analytical rhythm even in the most intense moments. Although our protagonist doll can jump in the air and perform various acrobatics, this does not mean that the fights have a breakneck pace – they are still reminiscent of those of Nioh and the titles soulslike like himself Dark Souls, being more an analysis of opponents' patterns than an intense struggle of skill in kenjutsu. 

Finally, we still have the mechanics of Moral, in which as the player eliminates more enemies on the map of the stage, the less damage he takes and the more he deals, which makes the famous speed runs for bosses are discouraged - especially if the doll is dying a lot, since its Morale drops and the opposite effect is carried out: the damage in every mission and in the climatic confrontation is increased.

It is a yin-yang interesting, although exhausting after a few hours – mainly because, when the dummy dies a lot, the frustration with the increased damage of the opponents starts to grow considerably.

Wo Long is a great game, but with some points that could be improved 4i301a

Wo Long, as you may have noticed from the text above, is a great game. It has some issues, like the frustration with the spirit system and also the questionable story, but overall it's a fantastic option for those who are missing games. Souls. 

The game came out to PS5, Xbox Series S/X and PC, and has been available since launch on Game – which makes it a fantastic option for service subscribers who enjoy a good challenge. 

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Text proofread by: Pedro Bomfim (16 / 03 / 23)