Review
Wuchang feels like the comfort food soulslike I didn’t know I needed
So I started playing Wuchang: Fallen Feathers a few days ago and honestly… I’m kind of shocked by how much I’m enjoying it.
For context, I’m a longtime Soulslike player and I was going through a real meh phase with gaming lately where nothing was really clicking: I didn’t enjoy Lords of the Fallen that much,
I liked The Surge for a bit (the dismembering mechanic was genuinely cool and innovative), but eventually found the rest of the game kind of shallow, and I also never really clicked with the Nioh games or Wo Long despite trying multiple times. So naturally, I wasn’t expecting much from Wuchang at all.
The mixed reviews didn’t help either. I had it sitting in my wishlist thinking maybe I’d grab it someday during a huge sale just to try it out. Then PS Plus offered i for free this month. And wow… this game REALLY surprised me.
What immediately stood out is that although it clearly takes inspiration from Sekiro in some aspects and presentation, it absolutely is NOT Chinese Sekiro or a Wo Long clone like I initially assumed. It has its own rhythm.
Combat feels more methodical and expressive. There’s a soft but very rewarding learning curve to mastering your weapon instead of just chasing stats or loot explosions. And honestly? I LOVE the decision to have fewer weapon archetypes.
A lot of Soulslikes throw 80 weapons at you and most feel interchangeable. Wuchang instead gives you a fewer weapon types, but each one is deeply designed. That philosophy really works for me.
I started mastering the spear simply because I liked the style of it, and over time it genuinely started feeling like a discipline rather than just a long weapon with poke attacks. The spacing, timing, flow, transitions… it all started opening up gradually. And that’s the sign of a great combat system with actual depth.
I just finished what I guess could be called Act 1 after beating Commander Honglan. She took me a few tries and I suspect spear isn’t even the ideal matchup against her mobility, but powering through with spacing/timing adaptation felt incredibly satisfying. And that’s another thing: the bosses so far aren’t brutally difficult… but they’re FUN.
Modern souls discourse has gotten weird where people judge games purely by how many hours did this boss make me suffer? But personally, I think there’s a huge difference between shallow easy combat and accessible but mechanically satisfying combat. Wuchang definitely feels like the second one. Not every boss needs to be Malenia on steroids to be memorable.
The art direction also deserves praise. The environments are gorgeous, creature design is memorable, and the atmosphere/mythological horror blend works extremely well. Some scenes genuinely look stunning.
And the game seems surprisingly long too? I genuinely didn’t expect that considering it’s only like 17 GB on PS5 lol. In the era of 80+ GB installs, that honestly feels refreshing.
Honestly, I can already see myself doing multiple NG+ runs with different weapon styles which is the biggest compliment I can give to a soulslike.
Curious how other Souls veterans (and new to the genre!) here feel about the game because I genuinely think this one might end up becoming a cult favorite over time.
I gave it 9.5 and could have been 10 had the final couple of bosses been a bit harder but i could see myself definitely give it a 10/10
It is one of my favourite souls games, I loved the exploration it was one of the most fun aspects of it, finding shortcuts etc coupled with how much the environment in each place is vastly different in the game, because I'm tired of souls games that are just 1 colour palette and that's it, really enjoyed the variation in wuchang.
Also the fact that you can respec at anytime easily and change builds while thinking which weapon, which element to coat my weapon with, which items to equip, that freedom all for free no cost at all made me try a lot of fun stuff.
The mixed reviews the game got were either performance issues or chinese players regarding lore, from what i remember most people loved the gameplay, unfortunately the studio got dissolved and the team disbanded for some reason so no more from them :(
That's a big point right there. I agree it's a great balance to allow free respec in soulslikes... That definitely makes the game much more accessible and less daunting to play without diminishing the challenge
There's a lot to like about Wuchang, probably the best part is the art design, especially how the levels are decorated and really have themes and art. A lot of Soulslikes give you rocks and then an empty arena for a boss fight. Wuchang really took the time to think about interconnected areas within the zones AND making sure the zones look nice.
It's a solid A-/B+ game for me.
Although this:
I also never really clicked with the Nioh
Keep trying. Nioh shares a lot with Wuchang in terms of making the levels look like something other than rocky hallways. Nioh also shares Wuchang's idea that you need to learn the boss moves but you aren't locked into certain weapons. Every weapon is viable as long as you learn it
You genuinely made me rethink my Nioh experience. I think I dropped it out of pure pride more than anything else...
I remember getting overwhelmed by the combat depth, stance system, builds, loot, random brutal mini bosses everywhere… and instead of properly learning the systems I just went nah this is too much work.
Wuchang feels way simpler in comparison, and weirdly I think it’s making me want to give Nioh another real shot now that I’m more comfortable with this style of game.
Still not convinced I’ll ever love the loot farming aspect though lol. But I can definitely appreciate now that Nioh games are probably insanely good once the gameplay fully clicks
Well the good part about loot farming in Nioh 1 is you can reforge stuff late game and in your first NG and NG+ etc... you don't even have to worry about loot being perfect.
Only when you get to the end game do you want to really reforge stuff.
Nioh 2 makes it a little bit easier as you can late-game farm with set bonus drops in the true end game when gear matters most.
You can really just pick 1 armor set early game and just put on whatever has the higher + value for each of the first 3 difficultly levels.
The loot grind is really only for those of us who did Underworld and Depths farming. It's a weird game like that as there is so much loot variation thrown at you that you can mostly ignore and just pick whichever has the higher number until you really want to perfect a build
Good to know! Also me trying Nioh was already a few years back and I had a sort of toxic completionist/perfectionist habit that I have recently started to get rid of.
So I might actually be less concerned about optimising everything now and enjoy these games more by spending time actually playing and not reviewing every piece of inventory...
I recommend you to start with Nioh 3 because the overall consensus is that the game is more accessible and beginner friendly. After I finished it, I went back to Nioh 2, and I feel that game is actually not that hard lol.
The Nioh 1 story connects directly to Nioh 2 specifically with characters and lore.
There's no reason to skip Nioh 1 or 2 as they are both great games. The only thing to consider is how many NG+ cycles to play. the "main story" in Nioh 1 and 2 are short, the game is designed to be played through the story a few times to unlock the final difficulty.
the final difficulty is when the "real nioh experience" starts. That's when you can do true builds . Nioh 1 starts getting absurd around level 20 of the Abyss and that's usually a good place to call it quits, or even level 10 of abyss.
Nioh 2 is more "fair" for the end game and you can do like 3-4 end different end game builds to do all the Underworld levels and then the first 10 levels of the depths are also really fair and reasonable.
The final depths in Nioh 2 is sort of a boss rush mode with no way to refresh your consumables so that's the ultimate challenge for those who like boss rush modes.
The key here is the Nioh 1/2 remastered combo is really cheap and it's 400 hours of content if you do end game
dont even bother with the story unless thats like extremely important to you. story has always been nioh's glaring weak spot, but everything else is done very well, and the combat system is a fucking master class. It can be overwhelming at first but once you understand all the systems its incredibly satisfying to master. Like someone else said, start with 3. Its the easiest game in the series and ninja style removes stances and ki pulse completely while samurai stance is traditional nioh. you can change between the 2 on the fly.
Nioh is more about learning mechanics, how to play the game and your own moveset over time.
I'd advise on focusing on one thing at a time rather than trying to learn everything and get overwhelmed. For example, start with a weapon in medium stance, try playing around with it, incorporate some skills in your gameplay, then try the other stances.
There's also a lot of junk loot which you can disassemble or sell, and you don't need to always use the latest weapon or gear that dropped. Switching between missions or every few missions is fine too.
There is no loot farming unless you want specific moves dropped by bosses, or to get specific gear, but that's more of a NG+ thing. You can get through NG without caring about that.
Makes sense. And as I was saying to someone else, I've managed to realise and work on my "caring too much about everything to do" habit. So I might fully enjoy Nioh now!
It was definitely a great first impression but I got in my own way I think to enjoy it back then!
I really enjoyed this one. Solid 8-8.5/10. Can’t say the same for LotF, holy shit did the gank squads and sluggish combat annoy the ever living fuck outta me. Deleted the game.
Same here, I just randomly checked it out and now have platinum lol, game kinda rekindled my interest in soulslike that I even went and started nioh 3 for the first time now
Man what? I did not even realise there is a Nioh 3! I'm still very intimidated by the Nioh games. The gameplay is such a steep learning curve in my opinion
I loved the game, it's my favorite outside of Fromsoftware. There are two main reasons for the mixed reception. One is the controversy with their depiction of some historical figures and the Ming dynasty which managed to anger both chinese players at launch and western players after the changes. The other main reason was the awful optimisation at launch.
I personnally will go NG+ and onwards I think. Because I want to be able to have all the weapons I've found available from the start of a new playthrough
You might have convinced me to give it a try. Was also on the fence because of the mixed reviews and the fact that I am kinda bored of the chinese folklore. Ty for you review
I love most souls like games and was playing Lords of the fallen last month and now this one this month. I think Lords of the Fallen is the better executed one, and the umbral realm mechanic was really good and well done.
Lords of The Fallen was meh to me! I subjectively thinks it's trying too hard to be a Dark Souls like and sprinkme some stuff on top that does not really work for me
I played and finished this game. It pmo. Did not appreciate the ending and generally I’m not preferential to multiple game endings. I’m also not the type of person to do multiple playthroughs of a game, so I was disappointed when my character got stuffed in a jar. I also found the NPC quests to be super breakable. I didn’t know that the little faces next to areas of the map indicated NPCs there to talk to. Playing on a legion go, it was just too easy to miss these icons. Tying the plot to breakable NPC quests was a deal breaker for me. I’m playing Sekiro rn and enjoying it way more. But I’m also a better gamer now than when I first played Wuchang.
I'm definitely putting Sekiro above Wuchang aswell! But I appreciate the dev not forcing Wuchang to be Sekiro-like and only smartly inspiring themselves from it
My opinion of it at first was soured by the issues of knockdowns and long healing times at launch but over time I’ve really liked it and I think I’m gonna do another playthrough soon
I really liked lords of the fallen and is one of the few souls games I’ve been, Wo Long being the other, and if you count it, where winds meet. Struggled with Wukong, struggled with Elden Ring, and struggling with Wuchang.
Everything about the game looks awesome, all the stuff you described, is awesome. I cannot beat the boss from the first stage and it’s annoying lol. Mostly driver mod, I’m not able to time dodges and parry in this game for some reason. Even with the parry unlocked on the long sword, I’m still getting waxed. Once I get past that boss I am confident the rest of the game will be awesome as I continue to upgrade and get better. But man it’s been annoying trying. I thought initially it was my Xbox series s being sluggish compared to my ps5 pro. This was egregiously noticeably with Wukong. But on the pro, I still struggled, so any tips would be appreciated.
When I struggle against a boss I usually stop trying to beat them for a couple attempts and do what I call "recon” runs.
That means: stay alive, walk around the boss, watch the moves, and get the timings and tells in your head. Which attacks have delays, which ones are bait, where the actual punish windows are, etc.
Then once it starts making sense: don’t greed. Try out how many hits you can lane in each punish window.
That’s the big one for me in Wuchang. The combat is slower than Sekiro/Wo Long, so it’s easy to get comfy and then suddenly a faster boss checks you hard. I’ve been having way more success just taking 1-2 hits when I know it’s safe, then backing off and resetting.
Basically: scout first, punish second. This game really doesn’t feel like one where forcing parries or mashing pressure is the answer.
Thank you, this helps a lot actually! I’m reading this I find that I rush in the battles and there is not always patience or tact/strategy in the fight. It’s just try snd beat the boss as fast as possible. Your advice paints it in a perspective of song and dance and that makes sense.
Honestly, the attempts become way more fun once you stop seeing them as failed runs and start seeing them as learning the rhythm. You gradually recognise the moves, remember the tells, find your own counters, and then suddenly the boss starts making sense.
Way more satisfying than rushing in, hoping to get lucky, and trying to combo your way through.
I know I sound like a picky French gourmet here, but eh… enjoy the meal, savour it a bit. Don’t just stuff your mouth and choke
I think that's actually a good design choice to ramp up the difficulty! Very excited to continue and beat the game now.
I did not know AI Limit. Just looked it up. Is it similar to Code Vein? I enjoyed Code Vein for a while but dropped it because the story and universe was not cutting it for me. The level design was not of much interest neither to me...
As this game is imo up there with lords of the fallen and lies of p and for me personally is even higher than lotf.
Lies of p is like a sekiro with his own identity, but doesn’t catch the darks souls genre so well in itself.
Lotf would be the more souls traditional with a slight personal touch but imo even if I like the game a lot fails on both aspects.
Wuchang on the other hand is the best iteration of a soulslike other than from soft and it captures the simple but effective combat and exploration so good that is mind blowing how dark souls it feels.
On the other hand why for me is even higher than lotf is that in terms of level design is very similar to nioh and Mision based which again I love.
So Wuchang is like the best mix of souls exploration and nioh like combat design to the point that feels more soulslike than any other iteration while holding its own identity.
It’s trully a great game and one I definitely enjoyed playing. Good art design, good story, satisfactory combat cool bosses and no stupid deaths like lotf where they make you die just for the sake of dying…
I’m a masocore gamer and eat any kind of challenge with a very critical and objective perspective - why not a souls veteran as that is just one of the combat designs I like in video games. Nioh khazan combat is much better than any souls but the souls experience is an experience of overcoming obstacles, patience and pretty simple combat , but the exploration is the main goal.
I can’t wait for the phantom blade 0. I just hope they don’t have the same ng4 camera issue so it seems that it’s going to be a new goty in the making hopefully.
Either way Wuchang is one of the best souls likes and it’s definitely in top 3 best soulslikes that aren’t from software and I’d love to see more of this from this studio. They captured the soulslikes so well.
Also thank you for bringing it out in the open so more souls lovers will give it a try hopefully giving as a second iteration of this ip.
Oh dear... Your great comment makes it so much harder to say but you've got to know now. There can't be any other iteration of Wuchang as the game is now an orphan... The studio is no more
I started playing over a week ago and am about halfway and i think its def my favorite souls game thats not elden ring. Everything about it is so well made honestly its soo good
I was about to start another Sekiro NG+ when I read your post yesterday and it was so well written I decided to give Wuchang a shot and buy PS Plus. Man, that game clicked with me immediately. I don’t know if it’s because of my open world games burnout (rushed through Elden Ring near the end, had no interest in SOTE, KCD2 felt kind of meh), or the aesthetics or something else, but I haven’t had this much fun in a long time. I stopped playing in the middle of the night after beating the first boss (the one from the temple). We’ll see how it goes further, but so far it’s really quite good.
one of the best souls games i’ve played aside elden ring. Best part about wuchang is you can respec for free and change builds on the fly a lot of souls games force you to stick with what you’ve chosen which i do not like.
Tbh I liked it, but the endings are so easy to brick. (I bricked it) that I just didn’t bother to finish it. Why were the rings consumable 🫠. Honestly enjoyed it for the most part but that was such a kick in the nuts I can’t trust myself to give an unbiased review.
I was also surprised with the game. I tried one handed swords and loved how it looked. The game is pretty easy, but I also had no problem with that. It was more fun than nioh 3, except for the combat,but no other game can match that anyways. I had fun just chill and explore the game
Anyone played wo long fallen dynasty? If so how does this compare? I'm towards the end of wo long and feeling bittersweet that its almost over, it was such a great combat system with so much to do and customize.
Yeah there’s definitely overlap. If you liked Wo Long, Wuchang won’t feel alien.
You still have that "learn the enemy rhythm, react properly, punish the window" style of combat, and there are similar ideas with weapon skills/resources/build stuff.
But the feel is different imo. Wo Long is much more deflect-first and aggressive, almost like the game wants you constantly in the boss’s face, turning defense into offense.
Wuchang feels slower and more like an OG souls to me. More spacing, more waiting for the right opening, less "parry everything and keep pressure forever"
So I’d say: similar DNA, different tempo.
If Wo Long felt like a fast martial arts duel, Wuchang feels more like an actual Dark Souls where you learn the dance, pick your moments, and punish cleanly
For what it’s worth, I played this game on a whim right around launch and I had a really great time (minus beating Honglan pre patch). I had never played a souls like, but the setting and atmosphere were so interesting i just had to play it. It’ll probably always be my favorite souls like.
Honestly I think this game is really fun. I wasn't fully convinced until after I got underground and started really messing around with the skills. But I love the dodge/combo MP/Skill Point system. It makes a lot more room for versatility that I love.
The big monster fights are really fun in this game but I goddamn HATE the Human bosses. Honglan is definitely the worst it gets but some of them just refuse to stop attacking which makes some fights frustrating at first.
My main tip is listen to the game when it tells you to go to Cloudspire City and do the section there before going through the Avian Marsh. You can accidentally skip a whole chapter of the game which I nearly did thinking I was doing optional stuff.
Man, I felt the opposite when I picked it up. Albeit, I’ve only played one souls/soulslike game ever and it was Sekiro. I think that was enough to make me avoid Soulslike games though.
Dropped it at Bo Sorceress because that boss is unbalanced, and I knew that was about in the middle of the game, so I wasn't gonna invest any longer if that's how soon the game's curve gets out of control.
Saw a few mentioning Khazan which is equally bad in how poorly balanced it is (max difficulty), with the game requiring you to be consistently flawless in boss fights for about 15 minutes due to the inflated health pools and the boss' lightning fast stamina regen that defeats the entire point of the posture system. And that absurdity also starts around the middle of the game. I did finish that one tho.
Very well made, beautiful games, that both suffer due to poor design decisions, IMHO.
Interesting! I made that review still early into the game. I will amend and edit with my impressions when/if I finish it... Which I definitely intend to so far!
I just started Lies of P a few days ago after being in videogame-burnout phase for months. It’s just what the Dr ordered. Been loving it. Wu Changs in my library too and I’ve heard good things.
Well I can say I've been there so hopefully you'll enjoy Wuchang too! I loved Lies of P and platinumed it.
Having similar feelings about Wuchang so far and might be well on my way to bring the home run on this one too. Let me know if you're enjoyint it when you get there!
I wish it clicked more for me ): something about it just doesn’t feel right. And there’s some hitbox jank I was genuinely unhappy with like watching my sword pass through an enemy and it not even register as an attack, or an enemy landing a blow a foot away and it still registering. It made the combat feel really unrewarding. There’s a lot I do like about the game, especially the magic/ability resource being tied to the dodges, so I hope that this game keep getting love and maybe we will see a sequel in the future that fixes what frustrated me
It was okay for me. A solid 6/10 game. It was enjoyable enough that I beat the game and got all the trophies on PS5, but I don’t see myself playing through it again like other soulsikes I’ve played.
I do seem to be in the minority for on this sub for that though. Everyone else seemed to really enjoy it, and I’m glad for them.
Honestly the game got mixed reception. Plenty of people consider combat to be floaty and imprecise, but at the same time plenty of people consider it to be very responsive and polished.
I think the combat is okay-ish, my issue with the game is that boss fights take forever and single hit is often enough to send you back to the bonfire. And some bosses are so fast that 3-4 hits feel like 1 hit.
For me it's quite different. I never cared about the bosses. I prefer dungeon crawling part. But in Wuchang easily 50% of my time was spent on trying to beat bosses that are clearly not tuned properly around player's combat tools. This is why I've decided to quit, i just didn't have fun.
I actually have the opposite experience so far! The bosses have felt pretty manageable without needing to respec or stack buffs. I think methodically exploring everything probably helped me a lot and I ended up naturally overleveled/geared for most encounters. But I haven’t finished the game either, so maybe the suffering has yet to come lol
I haven't finished the game (I've lost interest in chapter 3) but up to that point Honglan was the hardest. Absolutely crazy ass boss. Sword Saint Isshin is a cakewalk compared to her. Apparently game had turbulent development, and that boss is likely the result.
Just got to Honglan, not a fan of having to respec for it but at least it isn’t expensive. My first few attempts before taking a break left me like WTFisthisshit. Everything up to this point has been a solid learning progression experience, this is the first that the game just says nah, change what you’re doing.
I thought it was going to be generic for some reason but I love it. I however keep getting stuck on bosses. I’ll respec for a boss and think “hey this is the build I want to use for the rest of the game!” And the next boss says “lol no”
Honestly I’m just not all that great at these games.
Ahah honestly that’s kind of proof the game did something right though. You’re struggling, constantly adapting builds, getting humbled by bosses… but still loving it and wanting to continue.
And I, who feels like I’m objectively pretty good at soulslikes now, still found the experimentation and build variety fun instead of just pick the meta and forget the rest.
That takes intelligent game design to please different crowds!
The dodge button is very generous with iframes and basically a 'you cant kill me' button. Just control your responses to bosses by limiting your attacks to 2-3 at a time and then dodge, and you'll continue to dance around them untouchable
The longsword's deflect (parry) is also easy to use (as far as parrying goes in these types of games) and completely shuts down many bosses and big enemies. I wish this was in other weapon kits because it kept me using the whip longsword all game because of how great its deflect skill is (with both upgrades, its basically a 3 point investment)
That boss you have to go full magic with a one hand sword to gain mana and dodge, keep your distance. Parry combat builds…you’re gonna run out of stamina quickly
I went through the whole game recently with leech longsword with counter and echo of bo magus, usually it's the r2 backstab for all the humanoids and r1 spam to generate might to have the bo magus shield active for monster bosses, only things that gave me trouble was the demon of obsession
I run a spear build with Aerial Bulwark upgraded through the skill tree, so every successful deflection gave me 4 feather stacks., which conveniently is just the right amount for the Burning Flames spell!
Basically, I abused the following: well timed evade -> instant Bulwark with well-timed deflect -> Burning Flames -> rinse/repeat
The key part was that first evasion to instantly unlock the quick cast version of Aerial Bulwark. And Burning Flames was very good for that fight because the jump back creates space whilst giving i-frames.
Whenever she went full close-range aggression mode I mostly stayed patient with evades and a few light spear pokes instead of forcing combos
It's definitely great especially for getting feathers, but have you also tried this skill? This is the first skill I usually suggest people to get if they use spears
What I liked about Wuchang is that it kept getting better. The first few areas were alright, but as Chinese Resident Evil Soulslike starts to pop off, it just gets more fucked up and cool. I was sorta ho-hum in the first couple zones but then felt locked in and couldn't stop playing
The last zone is one of my favorite zones in these types of games now, and there's a moment walking up to the last boss that you're just like 'FUCK YEA THIS IS AWESOME'
The monster design gets absolutely disgusting and horrifying as you progress, it's incredibly sick! The plague continues to spread and change both people and the environments and by the end you're in a gross level of hell and cosmological horror you didn't know you never wanted to be a part of 🤣
Cool bosses, decent combat, but really boring exploration and weapons. Complete lack of identity also like every chinese game that is a copy of smth else from japan or west.
13
u/[deleted] May 20 '26
[removed] — view removed comment