Pure Xbox’s Craig Reid spent the last few days at the Summer Game Fest in Los Angeles, where he had the opportunity to preview a series of upcoming Xbox releases. Today we’re sharing his thoughts on the Black Myth: Wukong hands-on demo that allowed us to get stuck into two hours of an early chapter in Game Science’s ARPG 2024.
For most, Summer Game Fest ended once Play Days ended on Monday, but not for us! Game Science, the talented developers responsible for the upcoming ARPG Black Myth: Wukongmade time for Pure Xbox the next day and we’re so glad they did because the game is phenomenal.
Say what you like about SGF’s opening show, but there’s no denying that when the Black Myth: Wukong trailer dropped, the air left the YouTube theater and many got goosebumps. So you can only imagine the anticipation we felt as we climbed into the top floor suite at The Proper Hotel in Downtown LA for a private two-hour hands-on demo of the game.
For those who didn’t already know, Black Myth: Wukong is inspired by the 16th century Chinese novel “Journey to the West”, which is considered one of the most popular works of literature in East Asia. It’s not the first time the video game industry has taken inspiration from the shape-shifting Monkey King Sun Wukong – a notable example being Ninja Theory’s favorable 2010 release, ‘Enslaved: Odyssey to the West‘.
Our preview began with a scroll of an extremely detailed peach (you could even see its individual fluff) chilling on the forest floor. Before we knew it, the peach revealed itself as our shapeshifting protagonist, Wukong. It only took a few seconds to recognize that Black Myth: Wukong was an Unreal Engine 5 game, so for the next hour and 59 minutes we knew we were in for a visual treat.
The demo tasks Wukong with shrinking “Black Wind Mountain,” an early chapter of the game, and it’s a location familiar to those familiar with the source material. Our experience with soul-like games (which Black Myth: Wukong isn’t, but sort of is – more on that later) is that each location is a character unto itself. This is just as important – if not more so – than the charming Yaoguai who inhabit them.
We went through three locations during our time with the game. The first was a rich green forest where fallen leaves danced on the ruins of a temple as we whacked the wolf beasts with Wukong’s trusty staff. The latter featured several larger temples, swampy swamps, and boss encounters including a massive white wolf Yaoguaie with glowing red eyes – which elevated the whole experience to a spectacular level. The third was the peak of Black Wind Mountain at sunset. Here we faced a gigantic black bear with fire. No joke, this writer’s heart was pounding so hard he could feel it in his throat as the stage was set for this final confrontation. It’s fair to say that Black Myth: Wukong is absolutely bombastic in its scenic locations and doesn’t hold back on the excitement.
Our main weapon throughout the game is Wukong’s long staff: a nimble and fast-striking pole capable of hitting demons twenty times in a single combo. Wukong is an agile protagonist who chooses quick chain attacks to defeat his enemies and dodges to avoid enemy attacks. There is no blocking system in Black Myth. Instead, he focuses on perfectly timed dodges to avoid incoming strikes. Technically you be able to block with LB that tells Wukong to spin the staff, but it only seemed to deflect certain projectile attacks like arrows. If a physical blow was aimed at him, he would have to dodge, which you get used to rather quickly. We found that the perfect timing window was quite generous, which almost offset the limited defense options. You can spam ‘X’ for your quick combo, or hold ‘Y’ for a powerful attack. Both are at the cost of stamina… you know, pretty simple stuff.
Things get a bit more interesting when it comes to Wukong’s stances as they change his movement. During our demo, we were able to sample two of the three stances on offer. We started in the ‘Smash’ stance: a quick combo of moves that rewards you for your aggression by building up your focus meter so you can parry heavy attacks. The second stance was made available to us once Wukong reached level five. We like to think of the ‘Pillar’ stance as a hostile, sassy sh** move set. In the “pillar” position, Wukong sits on top of his staff. If you manage to hold this position and build a focus meter, the stick will get longer and longer, and looner. This propels his enemies into range before unleashing a mega ground attack, practically one-taping anyone caught under his staff. ‘Pillar’ was our favorite stance. We found ourselves giggling as we confronted the enemies perched safely atop our 20 foot long pole like some sort of motionless, screaming arsehat. The third set of moves is the ‘Thrust’ stance. It was still pretty far along as our time with the game drew to a close, only becoming available once we reached level 20. We suppose you can blame it on how long we sat on our black iron pillar like that brave monkey. we are.
Some final notes on combat are the spells and shape-shifting abilities offered by Black Myth: Wukong. Each of them offers a wide range of strategic options to control the battlefield to your advantage. By progressing through the story or by defeating specific enemies, Wukong can learn spells – such as the aptly named “Immobilize” spell, which when cast consumes mana to freeze an enemy in place for a limited time, opening them up to a barrage of bonks. There’s no exact number of spells we’re likely to see in the game yet, but there should be quite a few.
Of course, Wukong is known for his ability to shapeshift. In Black Myth, he uses these transformation skills to replicate certain Yaoguai special enemies. In this demo, once we managed to level up the mini-boss’s flame-wielding dad, Wukong could take on their physical form, weapons, and powerful attacks for a limited time. Being able to move into Yaoguai whenever the going got spicy (or when we wanted to capitalize on an immobilized enemy) changed the combat and enhanced the whole experience.
At first glance, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Black Myth: Wukong is a soul-like game. There are many similarities with Dark souls. Defeat the enemy? Gain willpower (soul). Do you need to top up your health? Drink from your gourd (flask)… you get the idea. Black Myth: Wukong draws heavily from the genre, but it’s actually more of an action RPG. Game Science opted for a more traditional skill tree instead of bundling character abilities with weapons and armor. Stances are unlocked by leveling up and upgraded by spending earned sparks on basic skills or stance upgrades. Also, rather than punishing the player for death, it encourages strength and power with an amazing amount of named boss fights. Black Myth is definitely simpler than your traditional Souls, but strikes a solid balance between that and an action RPG.
Now, there’s a lot we’d like to say about Black Myth: Wukong, but since the game is still in active development and subject to change, we’d rather wait for its full release before giving a definitive opinion on how we feel. And before you ask, while sharing a room with a handful of developers and PR for Game Science, we were advised that they would not be discussing the recent delay of Black Myth: Wukong for the Xbox Series X|S. Here’s hoping we don’t have to wait too long, because if our two-hour session is any indication of the whole experience, it could potentially be in the running for GOTY – it’s that good.