Trending
There's hardly a gamer in the world, be it a professional or a casual one, who has never heard of the Souls-like subgenre. Those games have become so popular lately that more and more developers decide to try the Souls-like waters; some of them succeed, some don't, but regardless of the game's quality, if it is a Souls-like, it is almost guaranteed that it will get recognition, or at least people will try it, for the worst-case scenario.
During the first half of this year, we've got a respectable number of Souls-like titles, with some of them being even strong GOTY contenders, but among this genre's fans, Wuchang: Fallen Feathers set out to be probably the most anticipated one because of its concept, very interesting main character, and the overall setting (Ancient China), which seems to attract gamers nowadays.
After the critical acclaim of Black Myth: Wukong, Wuchang: Fallen Feathers is poised for success, right? Similar setting, similar gameplay style and stunning visuals should be more than enough for another hit. Well, I must tell you right now: those two games are oceans apart, and if you were looking for a similar experience here, you won't find it. Wuchang: Fallen Feathers is a unique game that did its own Souls-like thing.
Story
A good and mysterious narrative was always the backbone of every Souls-like game. Sometimes the developers take this premise to a whole different level, making a story so complicated and so perplexing that you must employ a real effort to explore item descriptions and follow overcomplicated side quests just to make a bit of sense of the story the developers are trying to tell us.
Luckily, it isn't the case with Wuchang: Fallen Feathers. It would be an overexaggeration to expect some Telltale-level storytelling, but the story is actually told in a pretty straightforward way. Wuchang (the protagonist) is not a mute person, but for the entire game, I've heard her say only a couple of words on the same number of occasions.
The story will be revealed mostly through the interaction with the NPCs and cinematics. The main quest is a really simple one. The game takes place during the period of the late Ming Dynasty in China. Wuchang is a pirate who catches a very dangerous, even deadly, disease called the Feathering.
This disease slowly eats human memories and turns them into man-eating monsters. However, our heroine is affected a bit differently by the illness than the others. She lost her memories, yes, but her sanity is still very present, and the infamous feather on her left arm (the main symptom of the Feathering) is starting to give her special powers.
For the rest of the game, Wuchang will roam the lands of this chunk of Ancient China to look for the cure for the Feathering, fighting very dangerous enemies along the way, the monsters that attack everything that crosses their paths, and the humans who don't believe that she is not dangerous because they simply don't trust anyone with the Feathering.
One aspect of the story, though, that is a Souls-like one, true and true, is the side quests. Every now and then, you'll meet an NPC that will have something to say to you. Those conversations, in a true Souls-like fashion, will be as perplexing as they can be. There will be talk about people you know nothing about, as well as the requests from those NPCs.
Some of them will require you to bring them some items you'll find on your journey. Luckily, all those NPCs are located inside safe places, and you can always check if some of the items you found are the ones they require. It is confusing, yes, but the wider picture featuring those items and their descriptions will widen the lore.
The story will feature unexpected twists and turns and many characters you'll meet along your journey, but most importantly, it will never get boring, because every new region, every new level, and every new location will have something new to discover that will enrich the story. Even if it is quite different from the other Souls-likes, you'll genuinely enjoy it, or at least it will hold your attention; I'm pretty sure of it.
Gameplay
As I said earlier, Wuchang: Fallen Feathers is a true Souls-like game, with all the elements characteristic of those games, including shrines (Dark Souls bonfires), where you can pray, rest, upgrade your character, and do many other actions. Furthermore, the game doesn't feature any difficulty settings, meaning the gameplay is tough, but taking many build and weapon options into consideration, it can be a breeze if you know how to approach those aspects properly.
I don't know if my Souls-like experience, which is quite huge (no bragging, really), came forth, but I really didn't find Wuchang: Fallen Feathers to be an overly difficult game, or at least not at the beginning of the game; late-game segments are a completely different story, to be honest. Some bosses can be very challenging, that's for sure, but the game is designed in a way that every obstacle can be overcome if you know how to approach it in the right way.
I've mentioned in the standfirst of this review that Wuchang: Fallen Feathers is a Souls-like with a pinch of its own special seasoning, and you might ask, what is so special that sets this game apart from all other Souls-likes?
Well, as I said earlier, it is a classic Souls-like, but with a small twist, and that twist is special abilities, or skills you unlock while playing. Okay, now you'll say every Souls-like has such mechanics, and you would be totally right. Only in Wuchang: Fallen Feathers are those abilities directly linked to levelling.
Let me explain. As you kill enemies or gather different items, you collect Red Mercury (Souls equivalent). Once you have enough of those, you can level Wuchang up. You do that inside shrines. Yet, nothing unusual, really. However, the twist is that the ability tree is directly linked to levels.
One level gives you one Red Mercury Essence, and different abilities can be unlocked using those essences. For example, if you want to add the parry ability to longswords, you'll have to follow the longsword skill tree to find this ability and unlock it. If you want some more attractive abilities added to your weapons, you'll have to sacrifice the other abilities, and that's probably the biggest flaw of this system.
While aiming for some major abilities, you'll be forced to unlock some small ones that will upgrade stats of your character like vitality, strength, agility, and more—those characteristics are common to all other Souls-like games.
Wuchang will have the ability to wield five different types of weapons: longswords, one-handed swords, axes, spears, and dual blades, and each weapon will have its own skill tree. Depending on your preferences, you'll be able to invest in a specific skill tree and build your character in that direction.
Also, if you want to change your build and try something else and different, you can always respec your skills totally free, which gives ample room for experimentation and ultimately a great replayability value.
This segment definitely gives Wuchang: Fallen Feathers a special twist that sets this game apart from all other Souls-likes, but apart from that, it is still a Souls-like left and right, that will challenge your nerves, reflexes, and virtual combat abilities to the last breath.
I've mentioned bosses earlier, and regarding this particular segment, I want to add a couple of lines. The bosses in Wuchang: Fallen Feathers are beautifully designed, and not just bosses, but common enemies as well; sadly, that doesn't mean they are perfect.
The boss fights in this game have one huge problem that probably no patch will be able to fix because the problem is in the game's very core, and it is a big imbalance between the challenge and fairness of the combat. This problem won't be evident early in the game, but as bosses become harder, you'll see more and more the meaning of those words of mine.
For example, there's a boss quite early in the game (the first one that is actually tough), where you'll have to devise a very tedious strategy to defeat her (yes, it's one of those Chinese flying ladies). If you want to defeat this boss, you'll have to learn to parry her attacks in the first phase (no other means of defeating her), and inside the second phase, you'll have to dodge all the time her endless combos and punish her with the magic attack once the gauge fills up from doing perfect dodges.
If you, by any chance, miss just one of those dodges, you're history. Or another boss (a lady as well), where she constantly attacks, leaving you no room at all, even for popping the flask to heal yourself.
Those games are called Souls-likes for a reason, and comparison with the original From Software titles is just inevitable in those situations. When you, for example, take Dark Souls 3 or Elden Ring bosses into consideration, you can see that they are probably even tougher than the ones from Wuchang: Fallen Feathers, but nonetheless, they are definitely fairer.
This imbalance is definitely something many players will get frustrated by. I have a feeling that the developers of Souls-likes are in some kind of unnamed race where they're all trying to make those bosses as challenging as possible, forgetting the simple fact that the boss battles don't have to be hard for them to be remembered, just well-designed and fair, among all things.
Apart from the special abilities that make this game a bit special among the other Souls-likes, one more feature is interesting and worthy of mentioning, and it is the madness mechanic. I'm not completely sure when in the game I managed to comprehend this mechanic because it is quite confusing, but it can be beneficial if you know how to get the best out of it.
As you die during your gameplay, you'll lose your Red Mercury, but unlike the other Souls-likes, you won't lose all of it; your loss will be directly proportional to your madness level. Each time you die, madness rises, and once it reaches the peak, in the place of your death, the inner demon will appear, and you'll have to fight it to reset your madness.
However, there's a little twist here you can take advantage of as well. The inner demon will not attack only you, but everyone around you as well. So if you're stuck with, say, some hard mini boss or something and keep dying on that particular segment of the game. Once the madness reaches its peak, you can appear at the place of your death and provoke the fight between the mini boss and the inner demon. Once they hurt each other enough, you can jump in and finish the job.
Unfortunately, this strategy doesn't work with bosses, and the demon won't appear inside the boss arenas, but some bosses will allow summons, so this is a small consolation at least. Speaking of summons, in this game, they are part of the story, and only with a couple of bosses, you'll have the opportunity to summon the NPCs for help during the fight.
Regarding level design, I can be both satisfied and disappointed at the same time. The levels will feature this famous interconnectivity both between the levels and inside a particular level through various shortcuts, like deployable leaders, doors that can be unlocked only from one side, and more.
However, the way the levels are designed leaves a lot to be desired, in the lack of any stronger word. First of all, the levels are quite linear, and that's okay, especially for this kind of game. Still, several open areas, like those marshes in Dark Souls 3 where you can explore freely all around, wouldn't hurt, really.
Moreover, every level has paths, and then those paths branch to several different paths, sometimes leaving you utterly confused with the question mark above your head saying: where the heck am I now, and how am I going to get back where I was earlier. I tell you, the levels can be pretty complicated and sometimes even poorly designed.
The combat itself is very responsive, precise, and very snappy, and no complaints here, really; like the way it is supposed to be in every Souls-like game out there.
Graphics, Sounds, and Performance
Now for the star of the show, the visual presentation. I dare to say that Wuchang: Fallen Feathers is one of the better-looking games of the current generation, and I didn't even blink when I said that. Seriously, Wuchang: Fallen Feathers is a gorgeous game, a real sight to behold.
The designers really managed to grasp all the beauty of Ancient China, and the best part is that you won't have to wait long to see all its splendour; the first sequences of the game showcase the best they have. Beautiful bamboo forests with bamboo trees waving in the wind, huge Buddha statues carved next to the stunning waterfalls, all those scenes will really take your breath away.
And not to mention Wuchang. She is really beautiful, a true role model of the beauty of a Chinese woman. The details in which she and all the other characters are presented are really impressive, including all the outfits you can equip her with.
However, all this beauty isn't enough to mask all the technical problems the game is facing, and trust me, those problems are very big. First of all, the PlayStation 5 version of the game has a big problem with the presentation quality cuts. I've played both the PlayStation 5 and PC versions of the game, so I can obviously judge.
The PlayStation 5 version has three graphical presets: quality, balanced, and performance mode. As hard as I tried to see the difference between those three, apart from the FPS limitations, I couldn't find one. The game looks gorgeous in any mode seen from afar, but when you look a bit closer, those aforementioned cuts in quality are insanely evident.
For example, the textures of the background images indoors, or the walls with some ornaments, look so awful, you won't believe your eyes. When I saw those sights for the first time, I thought how it was possible that this beautiful game could turn into such a technical mess.
The PC version, on the other hand, doesn't have those problems—everything looks amazing, really, but the problems of this version are, regardless of configuration, performance drops. I say regardless of configuration because I made comparisons with a colleague who owns a high-end PC, and he has the same problems as me, even though his PC is way more powerful than mine.
The latest patch, combined with new Nvidia game-ready drivers, smoothed things out a little bit, but it is still far from perfect. The performance drops take place mostly during the encounters. Exploring isn't a problem, but once sword-clashing starts, everything goes haywire, sometimes even stable 60+ FPS can drop to 15, which is completely unacceptable.
Regarding sounds, Wuchang: Fallen Feathers can go hand in hand with the greatest From Software titles because the music, especially the one during the boss fights, is a real piece of artwork. The soundtrack is really great, and the rest of the sounds, including weapon sounds, battle cries, environmental sounds, and everything else, are of top-notch quality.
The voice acting, at least the English one, which was the only one I tried, deserves high praise too. Every character is voiced properly, and it is evident that this segment of the game is something the designers really paid attention to.
Overall, the audio-visual presentation is top-notch, and if it wasn't for the performance problems and quality cuts in the PlayStation 5 version, this would be the star of the game that shines the brightest. Now we can only hope the upcoming patches will do their thing, and we will ultimately get the game we deserved in the first place.
Conclusion
Wuchang: Fallen Feathers is not just another Souls-like trying to ride the wave of the genre’s popularity—it’s a title that brings enough of its own flavour to guarantee attention. Wuchang: Fallen Feathers wisely carves out its own identity through unique mechanics like the madness system, a flexible skill-based progression tree, and its haunting, historically inspired world.
The game nails many things with precision: fluid and responsive combat, a visually stunning world steeped in ancient Chinese mysticism, and a stunning soundtrack that elevates nearly every boss encounter to a new level. But for all of its ambition, technical shortcomings on both console and PC, along with a few design flaws in boss balance and level complexity, keep it from reaching the same heights as the genre’s best.
Still, what Wuchang: Fallen Feathers does well, it does with confidence. It’s a flawed but brave take on the Souls-like formula that fans of the genre will likely appreciate, especially those looking for something both familiar and distinct. With more polish, things could end up much better, but even now, it’s an experience well worth your time.
The Good
Unique twist on Souls-like gameplay- Flexible skill progression with free respec
- Beautiful visuals and atmospheric world
- Excellent soundtrack and sound design
- Fluid, responsive combat
The Bad
Unbalanced boss difficulty- Performance issues on both PC and PS5
- Confusing level design
- Graphics inconsistencies on console
