Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty Review

ign.com:

At this point, it’s probably fair to say that Team Ninja has a pretty good handle on this whole soulslike genre thing. Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty may not reach the same heights as Nioh 2 did back in 2020, but it certainly scratches that same itch of lightning-fast combat, punishing-yet-rewarding difficulty, and deep build customization options that you can craft and tailor to your own playstyle. It’s great for the same reasons that the Nioh games are, and it accomplishes that feat even while completely changing up the fundamentals of its combat system to be closer to Sekiro than Dark Souls. But by that same token, it also falls victim to the same familiar issues nagging at those other Team Ninja soulslikes, including subpar storytelling and excessively fiddly loot mechanics. But when you consider that the things Wo Long does better than just about any other game in this genre, that baggage amounts to scratches on an otherwise pristine set of armor.

If you’re familiar with the Three Kingdoms era of Chinese history you may get more out of Wo Long’s story than I did (my knowledge basically begins and ends with the fact that you should not pursue Lu Bu), but I think even then it won’t be a highlight because Team Ninja continues to struggle with telling a memorable story with likable characters. This is a supernatural take on the final days of the Han Dynasty, where we take control of a nameless warrior who gets swept up in a power struggle between warring kingdoms and their pursuit of an elixir of immortality. In practically every level you team up with some sort of historically significant warrior to fight through a level, have a boss battle against an evil or corrupted historically significant warrior, and then move on to