[PC Games] My first 2 hours with Black Myth: Wukong were a flurry of demanding boss fights, unbelievably pretty characters, and a surprisingly sparse world

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We have some real souls game freaks here at PC Gamer, several of whom are deep in Shadow of the Erdtree preparation mode, but I'm not one of them. I like From's style of action RPG, but I like to believe I represent the everyman's experience with them—bumbling through the opening hours, just barely beating bosses on a respectable ninth attempt, often quitting in the final act where things get really tough and promising myself I'll get back to it (I don't get back to it). Maybe that's cope talking and I'm just not built for the souls life, but I do know that Black Myth: Wukong is way more my speed than Elden Ring.

 

If you're not one of the many soulslike fans who've rocketed Black Myth: Wukong to the top of Steam's most-wishlisted games, then you've probably seen it in passing. It's an action RPG loosely adapting the 15th-century novel Journey to the West (the latest of many adaptations, including Enslaved: Odyssey to the West). You play as the monkey king himself, Sun Wukong, taking on the world with his magic staff. It's only the second game by indie outfit Game Science, founded in 2014 by ex-Tencent devs. You might remember Game Science as the subject of a 2023 IGN report detailing a history of sexism from one of its founders as well as a wider company culture of misogyny.

 

My two hour demo at Summer Game Fest, which was the first time Black Myth: Wukong has been playable, centered around the Black Wind Mountain, an early area in the game adapted from a chapter of the same name. I'm not familiar with author Wu Chen'en's original vision of Black Wind Mountain, but Game Science's rendering is stuffed with wolflike henchmen, big-headed golem babies, and a gauntlet of challenging bosses.

 

Even as I steered Wukong toward a dozen early deaths, none of the handful of boss fights I found made me want to chuck the controller across Los Angeles—maybe because it was easy to dust myself off and try again when I never woke up more than 15 or 20 seconds away from where I died. Wukong's streamlined moveset reinforced my patience, too. Combat is narrowly focused on a single weapon, the monkey king's magical staff, a dodge button, and quick-use spells with cooldowns. It's closest to Sekiro and Bloodborne in this way, and yet there's no block or parry (at least not early on).

 

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