Finally, the first playable demo of WO LONG: FALLEN DYNASTY, the highly anticipated soulslike developed by Team Ninja (Nioh) and Koei Tecmo, and whose bases are inspired by the classic Romance Of The Three Kingdoms, the famous literary saga that chronicles important events in Chinese culture and folklore.
And, although the content shown was not much, it already served to give us a fairly clear idea of what awaits us in early 2023, when the title is finally released.
IT’S LIKE NIOH AND SEKIRO HAD A SON
The influences of the title are very evident: on the one hand the franchise of NIOH, that saga of games that took many elements from the From games, but managed to gain their own identity, and I personally consider them to be some of the best Souls-like RPGs out there. From these titles they took many character building features, combat techniques and a strong emphasis on magical powers and the summoning of legendary beasts that help us in combat. The other muse of WO LONG is nothing less than SEKIRO, that revolutionary, somewhat controversial and difficult From title, which was quite detached from the formulas previously established by the company to introduce a multitude of new mechanics and not so much flexibility when playing. From the latter it also takes its attack and defense mechanics, with an urgent need to learn to dodge, block and counterattack with perfect timing if we want to last in the game.
Focusing now on what WO LONG: FALLEN DYNASTY showed us, the demo allows us to create our character from scratch, applying the physical characteristics that come to mind through a really very complete editor. Well adapted even to the current times, we can even choose the preferred pronoun of our character and even mix typically male and female physical characteristics in the same character, if our desire is not to settle for a “stereotypically binary” style.
The first thing that surprises about the game is the graphic quality and attention to detail already from this same editor, since the character models look beautiful. Once the physical configuration of our hero is finished, we can choose which class it will belong to (each one with different statistics in its attributes) and finally the element that it will carry, which determines which divine beast we will be able to summon and which special moves we will have at our disposal. In any case, the game warns us that all the choices we make at the beginning will be able to be modified later in the game.
BEAUTIFUL WHEREVER YOU LOOK AT IT
And yes, once we really start playing, the party goes on. The scenarios shown in the demo (a mountainous area with internal waterfalls, caves and suspension bridges surrounding temples) look really pretty. Details of elements such as water, fire or lightning are seen with enviable realism, and it is a visual pleasure every time one of these effects appears.
The character models are quite large and take up a large percentage of the screen. The combat is very fast, and at the moment our character does not have a stamina bar that is emptying, so certain movements such as running or attacking very often do not depend on this bar.
While there are many (MANY) moves to perform in combat, all the tutorials are clear and with a little practice it quickly feels super natural to control our hero.
On the one hand, we have two slots to equip two hand weapons, such as different types of swords or spears. Then, we can also carry two ranged attack weapons at the same time, including crossbows and bows.
These four items are the ones that we will use for physical attacks, both at short and long distance. Afterwards, our character will be able to perform two special martial arts movements and four different types of magic, all of them related to the weapon that we are holding and the element that we have chosen at the beginning of the game. Finally we have the invocation of the divine beast that we have chosen, which will help us in the most complicated moments, either by attacking the enemies or giving us some wow for combat.
If all this already sounds varied, also know that many of these movements can be combined, to create different combos, blocks and counterattacks (including even flying kicks), so the repertoire is very, very wide.
I JUST HAD FAITH
All the enemies that appear in the demo look excellent, and many of them will drop both weapons and armor so that we can constantly change our character and equip him better and better. How could it be otherwise, as we defeat them we can collect experience that we can use to level up at each checkpoint, represented here as flags that we raise to claim each part of the territory. Each level we gain allows us to raise the stat of our choice, and of course if we die before exchanging the experience for levels, it will remain at 0, although we can recover it (or not) in the next respawn.
Something very interesting regarding this feature is that during our journey we will find a kind of tombs, where other players have died, and if we manage to defeat the enemy that eliminated them, we will get extra bonuses. Other players can also defeat an enemy that has eliminated us, and it will also be beneficial for our game.
The coop system works through a consumable item, which can be used at each save point. The interesting thing is that not only can you try to summon another player to help us in battle, but we also have a series of NPCs at our disposal that will fulfill the same function in case we decide to call them.
ZAFASTE, ELDEN
If one is more or less experienced in this style of game, the demo lasts about an hour and a half and ends with a spectacular boss battle, with cutscenes, badass dialogues, second phases and all those elements that we like so much. And, of course, it cuts off at the best moment, leaving you wanting more (as every good demo should, ha).
This year that is already ending, he has almost decided what the GOTY will be, and personally I think that this year ELDEN RING It is practically unrivaled, especially for the revolution it generated both in video game culture and in the press this year, something that no other title achieved.
And it’s probably too early to tell, but WO LONG: FALLEN DYNASTY It seems that it is going to be a very solid title, with great gameplay and excellent technical characteristics. And it comes out next year, so if it had come out this year, I can even think that I would even have stood up to ELDEN RING. Only time will tell if I was wrong or not. Almost there.