It’s become quite normal for Souls-like games now to have wide open spaces for players to explore and gather resources. WUCHANG Fallen Feathers takes that idea to a whole new level, boasting entire regions as dungeon-sized mazes. And all the while introducing ever more intricate sets of mechanics on top of the fast-paced, unforgiving combat. This is how I slowly lost my sanity reviewing WUCHANG.
WUCHANG Fallen Feathers is a Souls-like ARPG in the strictest sense. In terms of combat and gameplay, it is comparable to the Nioh series in many aspects. The game features weapon switching and spell casting, in addition to other Dark Souls-inspired features – namely poison swamps, traps, and mimics. Set in the lands of Shu during the waning days of the Ming dynasty. Players take control of Wuchang, a pirate who was on a mission to save her sister. Disaster struck the expedition, and she finds herself in an unfamiliar land, with no memories of her past.
Wuchang is a victim of the Feathering epidemic. This phenomenon is responsible for morphing innocent victims into the monstrosities that infest the lands. The infection also possesses an amnesia effect that strips the victim of all their memories and any sense of self they had. Wuchang seems to have been only slightly infected, and you discover the reasons why as the story progresses.
The overworld consists of several regions ranging from bamboo forest to poison swamps to frozen fortresses. Each area has its dominant element to be wary of. Status ailments like Corruption are present in all regions in some shape or form. The areas are connected in a wheel-and-spoke arrangement with connecting paths usually leading to the central hub area, the Shu Sanctum. From my experience, the sections are huge, possibly requiring hours of exploration to clear. It was quite annoying trying to guess which is the critical path. Thankfully, there are crows placed in strategic locations, indicating that we are going down the right path.
The skill tree reminds me of the Sphere Grid from Final Fantasy X, but instead of attaching spheres, you are consuming Red Mercury (souls) to unlock nodes. The craziest part with the nodes is that you reveal more parts of the grid when you unlock critical nodes. It’s quite intimidating when you look at all the possibilities. And just like in FFX, if you put in the time and effort, you can pretty much unlock the entire grid via Red Mercury, minus the ones that require a special resource for additional vials, vial potency, and weapon mastery.
The game possesses multiple endings that you can unlock depending on your actions through a playthrough. Your choices of who you save, don’t save, and who you kill will determine what ending you’ll ultimately see. From what I can tell, some endings have stricter requirements wherein you need to clear multiple conditions to unlock. All I can say is good luck trying to get both the good and bad endings, much less the more elusive true ending.
Describing the game’s combat is somewhat complicated. At the heart of the game’s combat is a resource called Skyborn Might. While it is active, your combat effectiveness is boosted, you have additional attributes to your weapons, and you can consume it to cast spells. It’s a Swish Army knife of a resource, and knowing when and how you consume it is a matter of life or death.
There are three ways to accumulate the resource: dodging, special items, and using specific skills. Of all the ways, dodging is the most consistent way of generating Skybor Might. In fact, dodging plays such a huge part in combat that common Souls tactics don’t apply in this game.
You see, bosses attack more frequently in WUCHANG, so much so that you can’t just wait for a combo to end and then deal damage. In most boss fights, the most effective way of combat is to dodge in rhythm with the boss’s flow and deal damage during small openings. This style, while fun when it gets going, completely upended the way I usually fight bosses in a Souls-like. If you make even a slight mistake, it’s practically over. This is the reason why I both curse and praise this playstyle. When it works, it’s amazing. But when you make a mistake, it’s an instant trip back to the bonfire.
There are 5 weapon types in the game with 25 unique options to collect. You can either master the one-handed sword, long sword, axe, spear, or dual blades. Being the Agility junkie that I am, I instantly gravitated towards the dual blades. I would have chosen other weapons as a secondary, but the brutal nature of combat insisted that I master one weapon first before even considering another style. I know I’m supposed to be good with two weapons as the game encourages weapon switching. But I learned that it’s better to be a master of one than a dead jack-of-all trades.
If it’s not complicated enough, each weapon has a keyword attribute unique to each weapon. All dual blades have the Clash keyword. When conditions are met, Clash would allow me to strike at the same time my enemy is attacking with no consequence. It’s a high-risk, high-reward playstyle that goes well with the game’s brutal nature. Deflect is another keyword that allows the weapon to parry an attack at the beginning of a well-timed block. There are other keywords there, but these are two I’m most familiar with.
Surprisingly, armor has no weight in this game. Meaning that you can mix and match anything to your heart’s content as long as you get the right physical and elemental resistance. Don’t worry about not looking your best. You can use the armor layering system to transmog the armor into any piece in your collection.
The Madness is another interesting feature that this game has. Essentially, the more Madness you accumulate, the higher your attack power is, which comes with the cost of higher damage received. You can look at it as a manageable resource that allows you to better your performance. You can keep it at a certain level to deal more damage and even unlock additional skills. It’s a system that rewards players who take risks for more rewards.
You accumulate Madness by taking damage, using specific items, and dying over and over again. Of all the actions, it’s dying that increases the meter the most. When the bar is full, a demon will spawn at the location where you died. You have to kill this white-clad dopelganger if you wish to retrieve your lost Red Mercury. Dying at any time will result in your losing everything.
Say what you want about the game’s difficulty, but the game’s strong art direction is coming across very strongly. The bosses corrupted by the Feathering are living horrors unto themselves. Their fleshy, rotting exteriors are the stuff of nightmares. This also extends to their environments. Doomwillow Beach looks like the Living Forest from Mortal Kombat if the violent trees were poisoned and set on fire. Otherwise, the game’s visuals look great, as any game made with UE5.
As for the game’s performance, it actually runs great on my mid-range PC. I was concerned that it would have the same hiccups that Black Myth Wukong had on launch. I’m glad that my worries were eased the more I played the game. It was still very hard, but at least the performance was rock solid. In fairness, I had to run the on an SSD and have DLSS on at all times. Those certainly helped with performance.
One of my biggest complaints with the game is the fact that there is so much crowd control in the game, as well as stuns. It’s ridiculous. When nearly every mob has a move that can pin and/or stun you, moving around is not fun. The game’s already difficult enough with the bosses and demons; the last thing I want to worry about is losing all my healing going from point A to B. Lifesteal accessories help with the issue. I just don’t like being pinned down so often.
Another complaint I have is that shrines, aka bonfires, are few and far between. Some of the areas are complex spider webs of dead ends and traps. I get what they’re going for with the whole extreme difficulty approach, but when I have to keep tracking around the whole Tang palace over and over again from Doomwillow Beach, that can be annoying. The entire underground palace is pretty much the same thing.
Beneath WUCHANG Fallen Feathers’ tough-as-nails exterior lies a mechanically deep game that allows for extensive build crafting along with its thrilling combat, provided you have the patience to suffer through soul crushing bosses and labyrinths of mazes. This game is not for the faint of heart. Those who are willing to commit to mastery over its layered mechanics will find a game that rewards them for their efforts and much more. I recommend this game to Souls-like veterans looking to up the challenge. Novices are welcome to try, but they should be well aware of their shortcomings.
WUCHANG Fallen Feathers Review
Beneath WUCHANG Fallen Feathers' tough-as-nails exterior lies a mechanically deep game that allows for extensive build crafting along with its thrilling combat.
The Good
- Deep combat mechanics
- Grotesque, yet highly impressive boss designs
- High skill ceiling
- Allows for creative freedom with enough skill
The Bad
- An elevated skill floor
- Crowd control and stuns everywhere
- Bonfires are few and far between
- Not for the faint of heart or those not used to Souls-like games
