Black Myth: Wukong review – an excellent, approachable Soulslike with fresh ideas

Wukong joins Lies of P in the list of Soulslikes that are actually good

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Black Myth: Wukong is a playable kung fu movie. Inspired by the Chinese novel Journey to the West, you play as a mute reincarnation of the Monkey King as he searches across the land for various MacGuffins, using your staff and magical powers to battle creatures from Chinese mythology – crouching tigers, hidden dragons, and plenty more. 

It plays like a fast-paced Soulslike – checkpoints you manually activate, NPCs with vague quests, respawning enemies, and tough bosses – but it’s more forgiving. When you die, you respawn at the last checkpoint you activated, but you keep all your experience points, allowing you to grow your strength even through failure. It can even be paused… imagine that. Of course, there aren’t any multiplayer invasions here so pausing makes more sense. 

I found it refreshing to advance even when I wasn’t making direct progress, and every stat increase, move unlock, and crafted weapon feels like a significant buff – you never change “class” or playstyle, you just get stronger in one direction. I found most of the bosses (there are loads of them, with plenty of variety) fairly easy. When I did hit a wall, though, I just found myself re-exploring the biome I was in, grabbing a few more level-ups, finding a few secrets, and heading back to the boss arena much stronger than before – sometimes with a new magical power that can change the tide of battle. 

Like the Souls games, combat is simple. You’ve got light attacks, which you can string together for a combo, and a heavy attack, which can interrupt a combo or hit hard on its own. But you also build up energy when attacking to make the heavy attack a guaranteed stagger move – learning when to deploy this (the wind-up can be long depending on how much it’s charged) is key to winning tougher fights. Mixing this up, there are also different stances with their nuances and varied heavy attacks, such as one that pokes from a distance and another that allows you to perch on top of your staff, away from danger, before slamming down. 

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Despite the lack of a traditional parry, there’s an almost Sekiro-like rhythm to combat. There is an ability called Rock Solid, where you can turn to stone to parry an attack – like in Mortal Shell – but most of the time you’ll focus on dodging and weaving. Dodge at any time and you’ll roll away. Dodge at the last second with perfect timing and you’ll slip an attack, get a few invincibility frames, and leave a mirage of your body behind to confuse the enemy. It feels incredible when you get into the flow of it – especially once you’ve unlocked an ability that stops a dodge interrupting your combos. Every fight feels like a dance where you hit, dodge, hit, hit, and dodge, pirouetting through the enemy’s attacks before spinning your staff and connecting with some demigod’s jaw. 

Enemy variety keeps things fresh throughout, forcing you to adapt to new threats, and there are a few mechanical twists I enjoyed. Particularly fighting a bipedal tiger in a pool of blood, and battling a giant warthog in deep, wet mud – in the latter, you roll slowly because of the mud, so you’re forced to time those dodges perfectly to initiate the slip and avoid those massive tusks. 

It looks incredible, too (so good that players thought Black Myth: Wukong was a scam when it was revealed). During that tiger fight, the enemy’s fur reacts and sways with every movement, its belly wobbles as it swings at you, and the blood ripples and splashes. Environments are gorgeous and there’s a beautiful vista around most corners. My only complaint here is that it’s a bit uninspired. You’ve got the forest, the desert, the snowy mountains, a dark cave, and an ashen mountain with molten lava pools. It’s a bit archaic and ultimately makes the environs forgettable despite how high fidelity and painstakingly crafted the art is.  

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Level design is another weak point. While levels do open up and there are alternate routes and secrets to find, none of it will make you gasp. It’s all a bit disjointed and attempts to make the areas feel interconnected are often pointless shortcuts that don’t need to exist because of checkpoint placement. It’s also arbitrary where you can and can’t explore, with invisible walls boxing you into each region. In some areas, you can hop up and discover another path, while others will just look like they’re climbable but lead nowhere. 

Still, these imperfections don’t detract too much from an otherwise stellar experience. Black Myth: Wukong is one of the best non-FromSoftware games in this genre, joining the likes of Lies of P in the pantheon of excellent Soulslikes. Instead of copying Dark Souls’ homework, it carries you through this journey with plenty of ideas and charm of its own. 

Score: 8/10

Version tested: PC.

Check out our article on Black Myth: Wukong's release time and pre-load information to see when you can get stuck in.