2023-03-13
If Wo long is gonna follow the modern Team Ninja tradition, I should revalue this game later when all the DLC contents are released, but as it is now, I can confidently say it is “moderately good as a whole”, but not more than that.
It was apparent that Team Ninja had some interest in the Sekiro combat system, as the final fantasy origin was built upon the counter-based combat. But Wo Long takes it further and made the entire flow encourages you to do the timed counter. Blocking and deflection are differently mapped buttons, and the block option has generally fewer advantages than the counter. It is obvious that the block button solely exists as “use this when you can’t get the right timing”. The deflection button receives the direction input so that you can easily reposition yourself while countering the enemies. Every hitbox, including flame, air explosion, quake, and liquid can be parried if it is timed well. The successful counter gives you a morale boost, which can be used as a resource for your diverse special attacks. Enemies’ “red” attack can only be parried and there are no other options to negate that attack aside from running away from the danger zone (which is mostly impossible because red attacks are tracking-heavy attacks solely designed to hit you).
One button parry mechanic with a nice clang sound is the new black of the modern action game. With well-timed input, you can negate the attack at a close distance and maintain your position. But the mistimed input can damage or kill you. It’s a simple but satisfying risk and reward system. And I can confidently say Wo Long is the top of the parry mountain as it has the most liberating form of one button parry mechanic. As I said, you can parry ANYTHING, so there’s no “impossible to not get damage bullshit pattern” as long as you get the timing down. Counter-movement also gives you a nice amount of i-frame, and this shines thoroughly in group fights. Zhang Rang is one of my favorite boss fights and it is built upon that system. It’s a crowd-control boss fight, and what you have to do is removing the clone one by one while negating the projectile spam coming from the far back. This could have been a disastrous fight if the combat system was as dull as other souls-like games, but Wo long isn’t like that. Parrying the incoming multiple attacks, then using that to boost yourself to other directions to get close to the other clones and removing one by one felt satisfying.
Also, I would be lying if there were no other offensive attack flows other than counter & poking. Even though it is not on the Nioh 2 level, each weapon has a moderate amount of moveset, and as long as you are in the high morale status, pushing the enemies with the constant chain of normal attacks, martial arts, and spells is more beneficial than staying defensive. Jumping over an enemy is a good offensive positioning option that can be chained to a vertical drop attack. And the weapon swap attack has a parry window middle of the animation, so you can attack the enemies while deflecting if you are cheeky enough.
However, building the game MOSTLY around the counter movement also means there were sacrifices to be made. One is that the universal parry mechanic became the dominant strategy as a defensive option. There are many interesting things that can stem from the counter-movement, but the other options -block, and jump- felt rather static. If there were more varied jump attack options (like Ninja Gaiden did), post-block movements (again, like Ninja Gaiden did), or just the block-input attack branches (like Nioh did), they could have provided more reasons to experiment with, but right now they are just less appealing than they should be.
Another thing that was sacrificed is the nuanced spacing game, which was the best part of the Nioh series, the spiritual ancestor of Wo long.
My favorite boss fight from Nioh was Date Shigezane. Just like average bosses in Wo Long, he has an extreme amount of mid-range attack patterns that test your pattern memorization skill and timing skill, but the way he moves is quite different. Just like other bipedal enemies in Nioh, Date tracks you horizontally, but the distance of each footstep is fixed. This means, even without relying on a timed dodge, by knowing the attack pattern’s total movement distance, you can easily guess the safe zone of the attack and then position yourself. In this situation, your normal L stick movement is just as important as the dodge direction. Making a good space, and then lunging & punishing the opponent felt really satisfying in that boss fight, and if the iconic centipede-slash attack closed the gap towards you like a magnet, then the challenge would be harder, but less interesting because that would force you to use the timed-dodge only.
Wo Long opponents are -maybe not as infuriating as my hypothetical example- built just like that. From the small humanoids to the big creatures, all enemies have at least one or two gap closers (if it’s a boss, 75% of their moves can be a gap closer) and they are specifically designed to NOT have fixed movement distances. In a way, this is an optimal design that forces you to use the deflection, but there’s “generally” no interesting spacing game between 1 vs 1 boss fights because, at the end of their melee combo, they would be in front of you no matter what you do. I mentioned “generally” because there were some cases where you could bait out some attack patterns while maintaining the long-distance position, but you have to admit that there aren’t many cases where you could find the normal movement useful aside from finding a chance to heal yourself or distancing yourself to use the ranged spell. The fact that post-counter maneuver being diverse enough could carry the satisfying combat flow, but the lack of 1v1 spacing game left me a bitter aftertaste because it also shows that even with the diverse boss patterns, the solution can be reduced to one method at the end, which is the timed deflection. I would point at Zhang Liang, Lu Bu, Dong Zhuo, Zhang Liao, and the final-final boss and say they are ALL great bosses built with the finest Team Ninja production, but I also think the other enemies could have been the entities that work "differently" from those great bosses instead of being the “less” of those great bosses, if you know what I mean.
But this monotony can be reduced if Team Ninja focused on the dynamic multi-enemy fights as it showed the glimmer of brilliance with the assassin enemies, Zhang Rang, Not-ornstein & Not-smough, and the infamous side mission with the three warriors, but there are some issues.
One is that in the 25-hour of the campaign, there is only a handful of brilliantly crafted multi-enemy fights. And I think it is inexcusable considering that there’s an NPC follower that can help the players who have a crowd-control-skill issue. Sure, if you don’t use the stealth-kill at all and rush into the battlefield without thinking, it would lead to a multi-enemy fight, but I really don’t think that should be counted as a “finely crafted multi-enemy fight”.
Secondly, it doesn’t have enough supporter enemies. If you have played some action games based on multi-enemy fights (like Doom Eternal, Ultrakill, DMC, Ninja Gaiden, Bayonetta, Evil West, you name it) you’d know the importance of ranged harasser in a given combat situation. Without thinking that much, there is only a handful of dedicated harassers in the enemy roster, and they alone are not diversified enough to fill the long playtime. Instead of making bosses like…. Taotie, they could have allocated their time to make more interesting chess pieces. You could say that TN could use some miniboss tier enemies as the chess pieces, but I can confidently say most of them are not that apt for the grouped fight. Tigers and Mermaids are extremely aggressive so they will take all the priority, Crocodiles are awkward to fight in any situation, and we don’t talk about that stupid braindead giant statue.
Lastly, there are some minor issues with the control, and TN needs to deal with them as soon as possible to make even more fluid multi-enemy fights. Unlike the blocking system of NG or Nioh, the blocking animation doesn’t automatically track the threat when it gets hit. I mean, it is “realistic” that you get damaged when you are showing the back and the enemies hit your back, but god damn, this is already a classic Team Ninja game with extremely snappy animations. I have no idea why they designed the blocking like this, and it gives me more reasons to NOT use the block button at all. Also the execution technique should auto-target the closest enemy even if I’m locking on the other enemy. Picture this, while you are targeting Enemy A, Enemy B comes at you from the side with their red attack, so you parry it. Enemy B collapses right in front of you, but because of the manual target system, you CAN’T execute the enemy with the heavy attack input and you just start the normal heavy attack towards Enemy A instead. I never had to think about this issue when I was playing Ninja Gaiden series and yet the lack of a target priority system made some big annoyance in the situations like this. I hope they realize that their current combat system’s strength lies in the multi-enemy fights because while it is almost there, the current combat system lacks some polish to support the fluidity.
I’m mostly focusing on the combat system, because even in the big picture, there’s not much to say about Wo Long other than the combat system. I’m familiar with Romance of the Three Kingdoms, but aside from the reveal of the final-final boss’s true identity, the “twisted” story didn’t strike me that much, and I’m a person who enjoyed Nioh 2’s story. Bloodborne-ization of the characters looked cool in the first few hours, but as a whole, the visual design of the enemies wasn’t as vibrant as nioh2 which was a huge let-down.
Flag hunting is a cool concept that utilizes the verticality of maze-like levels, but there are some moments that made me think, “Is marking this flag that necessary?” because even as a player who did the solo run from the start to the end, with the moderate amount of street cleansing, I could exceed the morale level 20 threshold so easily, and make a boss fight a joke. But then the New game + slams the door open and introduces the morale level 25 bosses which kill you in one or two hits. What a GREAT balancing work.
Also, while I think the reduced amount of busy work of player customization is a welcomed feature, I think the martial arts being fixed per a weapon is a hot garbage choice from Team Ninja’s design department. I have no idea who thought it was a good idea. Fucking Elden Ring had a better weapon art customization if you ask me!
Even with the nitpicks, Wo Long is a good game that still contains the Team Ninja’s soul. I still think it is remarkable, and it is a good gateway drug that can seduce souls-like players to the “pure” action games. But in the end, it also made me think “Man, I wish I can transfer the Nioh2 save data in the PS4 to PC”. I’ll revisit this review after the DLC’s release and see if I’ll like it more or not.
2023-12-26
So the DLCs are all released. Didn't fundamentally change the game's central mechanism (like duh, why would they) but the new weapons and new contents built upon that foundation were fantastic. All the final big demon bosses were amazing, greatsword movesets are just dopamine rush, and I really liked the additional control/camera options and combat tools added with the frequent updates. I can bump it up to four stars for sure. But, please... I wish TN just never released games on Early Access state without the Early Access card.
If Wo long is gonna follow the modern Team Ninja tradition, I should revalue this game later when all the DLC contents are released, but as it is now, I can confidently say it is “moderately good as a whole”, but not more than that.
It was apparent that Team Ninja had some interest in the Sekiro combat system, as the final fantasy origin was built upon the counter-based combat. But Wo Long takes it further and made the entire flow encourages you to do the timed counter. Blocking and deflection are differently mapped buttons, and the block option has generally fewer advantages than the counter. It is obvious that the block button solely exists as “use this when you can’t get the right timing”. The deflection button receives the direction input so that you can easily reposition yourself while countering the enemies. Every hitbox, including flame, air explosion, quake, and liquid can be parried if it is timed well. The successful counter gives you a morale boost, which can be used as a resource for your diverse special attacks. Enemies’ “red” attack can only be parried and there are no other options to negate that attack aside from running away from the danger zone (which is mostly impossible because red attacks are tracking-heavy attacks solely designed to hit you).
One button parry mechanic with a nice clang sound is the new black of the modern action game. With well-timed input, you can negate the attack at a close distance and maintain your position. But the mistimed input can damage or kill you. It’s a simple but satisfying risk and reward system. And I can confidently say Wo Long is the top of the parry mountain as it has the most liberating form of one button parry mechanic. As I said, you can parry ANYTHING, so there’s no “impossible to not get damage bullshit pattern” as long as you get the timing down. Counter-movement also gives you a nice amount of i-frame, and this shines thoroughly in group fights. Zhang Rang is one of my favorite boss fights and it is built upon that system. It’s a crowd-control boss fight, and what you have to do is removing the clone one by one while negating the projectile spam coming from the far back. This could have been a disastrous fight if the combat system was as dull as other souls-like games, but Wo long isn’t like that. Parrying the incoming multiple attacks, then using that to boost yourself to other directions to get close to the other clones and removing one by one felt satisfying.
Also, I would be lying if there were no other offensive attack flows other than counter & poking. Even though it is not on the Nioh 2 level, each weapon has a moderate amount of moveset, and as long as you are in the high morale status, pushing the enemies with the constant chain of normal attacks, martial arts, and spells is more beneficial than staying defensive. Jumping over an enemy is a good offensive positioning option that can be chained to a vertical drop attack. And the weapon swap attack has a parry window middle of the animation, so you can attack the enemies while deflecting if you are cheeky enough.
However, building the game MOSTLY around the counter movement also means there were sacrifices to be made. One is that the universal parry mechanic became the dominant strategy as a defensive option. There are many interesting things that can stem from the counter-movement, but the other options -block, and jump- felt rather static. If there were more varied jump attack options (like Ninja Gaiden did), post-block movements (again, like Ninja Gaiden did), or just the block-input attack branches (like Nioh did), they could have provided more reasons to experiment with, but right now they are just less appealing than they should be.
Another thing that was sacrificed is the nuanced spacing game, which was the best part of the Nioh series, the spiritual ancestor of Wo long.
My favorite boss fight from Nioh was Date Shigezane. Just like average bosses in Wo Long, he has an extreme amount of mid-range attack patterns that test your pattern memorization skill and timing skill, but the way he moves is quite different. Just like other bipedal enemies in Nioh, Date tracks you horizontally, but the distance of each footstep is fixed. This means, even without relying on a timed dodge, by knowing the attack pattern’s total movement distance, you can easily guess the safe zone of the attack and then position yourself. In this situation, your normal L stick movement is just as important as the dodge direction. Making a good space, and then lunging & punishing the opponent felt really satisfying in that boss fight, and if the iconic centipede-slash attack closed the gap towards you like a magnet, then the challenge would be harder, but less interesting because that would force you to use the timed-dodge only.
Wo Long opponents are -maybe not as infuriating as my hypothetical example- built just like that. From the small humanoids to the big creatures, all enemies have at least one or two gap closers (if it’s a boss, 75% of their moves can be a gap closer) and they are specifically designed to NOT have fixed movement distances. In a way, this is an optimal design that forces you to use the deflection, but there’s “generally” no interesting spacing game between 1 vs 1 boss fights because, at the end of their melee combo, they would be in front of you no matter what you do. I mentioned “generally” because there were some cases where you could bait out some attack patterns while maintaining the long-distance position, but you have to admit that there aren’t many cases where you could find the normal movement useful aside from finding a chance to heal yourself or distancing yourself to use the ranged spell. The fact that post-counter maneuver being diverse enough could carry the satisfying combat flow, but the lack of 1v1 spacing game left me a bitter aftertaste because it also shows that even with the diverse boss patterns, the solution can be reduced to one method at the end, which is the timed deflection. I would point at Zhang Liang, Lu Bu, Dong Zhuo, Zhang Liao, and the final-final boss and say they are ALL great bosses built with the finest Team Ninja production, but I also think the other enemies could have been the entities that work "differently" from those great bosses instead of being the “less” of those great bosses, if you know what I mean.
But this monotony can be reduced if Team Ninja focused on the dynamic multi-enemy fights as it showed the glimmer of brilliance with the assassin enemies, Zhang Rang, Not-ornstein & Not-smough, and the infamous side mission with the three warriors, but there are some issues.
One is that in the 25-hour of the campaign, there is only a handful of brilliantly crafted multi-enemy fights. And I think it is inexcusable considering that there’s an NPC follower that can help the players who have a crowd-control-skill issue. Sure, if you don’t use the stealth-kill at all and rush into the battlefield without thinking, it would lead to a multi-enemy fight, but I really don’t think that should be counted as a “finely crafted multi-enemy fight”.
Secondly, it doesn’t have enough supporter enemies. If you have played some action games based on multi-enemy fights (like Doom Eternal, Ultrakill, DMC, Ninja Gaiden, Bayonetta, Evil West, you name it) you’d know the importance of ranged harasser in a given combat situation. Without thinking that much, there is only a handful of dedicated harassers in the enemy roster, and they alone are not diversified enough to fill the long playtime. Instead of making bosses like…. Taotie, they could have allocated their time to make more interesting chess pieces. You could say that TN could use some miniboss tier enemies as the chess pieces, but I can confidently say most of them are not that apt for the grouped fight. Tigers and Mermaids are extremely aggressive so they will take all the priority, Crocodiles are awkward to fight in any situation, and we don’t talk about that stupid braindead giant statue.
Lastly, there are some minor issues with the control, and TN needs to deal with them as soon as possible to make even more fluid multi-enemy fights. Unlike the blocking system of NG or Nioh, the blocking animation doesn’t automatically track the threat when it gets hit. I mean, it is “realistic” that you get damaged when you are showing the back and the enemies hit your back, but god damn, this is already a classic Team Ninja game with extremely snappy animations. I have no idea why they designed the blocking like this, and it gives me more reasons to NOT use the block button at all. Also the execution technique should auto-target the closest enemy even if I’m locking on the other enemy. Picture this, while you are targeting Enemy A, Enemy B comes at you from the side with their red attack, so you parry it. Enemy B collapses right in front of you, but because of the manual target system, you CAN’T execute the enemy with the heavy attack input and you just start the normal heavy attack towards Enemy A instead. I never had to think about this issue when I was playing Ninja Gaiden series and yet the lack of a target priority system made some big annoyance in the situations like this. I hope they realize that their current combat system’s strength lies in the multi-enemy fights because while it is almost there, the current combat system lacks some polish to support the fluidity.
I’m mostly focusing on the combat system, because even in the big picture, there’s not much to say about Wo Long other than the combat system. I’m familiar with Romance of the Three Kingdoms, but aside from the reveal of the final-final boss’s true identity, the “twisted” story didn’t strike me that much, and I’m a person who enjoyed Nioh 2’s story. Bloodborne-ization of the characters looked cool in the first few hours, but as a whole, the visual design of the enemies wasn’t as vibrant as nioh2 which was a huge let-down.
Flag hunting is a cool concept that utilizes the verticality of maze-like levels, but there are some moments that made me think, “Is marking this flag that necessary?” because even as a player who did the solo run from the start to the end, with the moderate amount of street cleansing, I could exceed the morale level 20 threshold so easily, and make a boss fight a joke. But then the New game + slams the door open and introduces the morale level 25 bosses which kill you in one or two hits. What a GREAT balancing work.
Also, while I think the reduced amount of busy work of player customization is a welcomed feature, I think the martial arts being fixed per a weapon is a hot garbage choice from Team Ninja’s design department. I have no idea who thought it was a good idea. Fucking Elden Ring had a better weapon art customization if you ask me!
Even with the nitpicks, Wo Long is a good game that still contains the Team Ninja’s soul. I still think it is remarkable, and it is a good gateway drug that can seduce souls-like players to the “pure” action games. But in the end, it also made me think “Man, I wish I can transfer the Nioh2 save data in the PS4 to PC”. I’ll revisit this review after the DLC’s release and see if I’ll like it more or not.
2023-12-26
So the DLCs are all released. Didn't fundamentally change the game's central mechanism (like duh, why would they) but the new weapons and new contents built upon that foundation were fantastic. All the final big demon bosses were amazing, greatsword movesets are just dopamine rush, and I really liked the additional control/camera options and combat tools added with the frequent updates. I can bump it up to four stars for sure. But, please... I wish TN just never released games on Early Access state without the Early Access card.