Review: WUCHANG: Fallen Feathers

Developer – Leenzee

Publisher – 505 Games

Platforms – PC, Xbox Series S|X, PS5 (Reviewed)

Review copy given by publisher

Wuchang: Fallen Feathers enters the crowded Souls-like scene with a fearless confidence, pulling you into the tumultuous heart of late Ming Dynasty China. Does a world brimming with misty mountains, haunted temples, and the creeping corruption of a mysterious illness entice you enough? Hope so because you’re about to find out.

You play as Bai Wuchang, a female pirate who awakens with amnesia and is afflicted by the supernatural Feathering Disease. Struggling to maintain her sanity and humanity while resisting the disease’s effects, Bai embarks on a journey to seek a cure, unravel the origins of Feathering, and recover the fragments of her lost past, including searching for her sister. While not particularly groundbreaking, the narrative does enough to keep you invested until the end.

In terms of gameplay, it’s classic Dark Souls. The combat is stamina-based and offers you a remarkable degree of freedom to experiment with weapon types, abilities, and spells. The skill tree, dubbed the Impetus Repository, allows you to respec for free and contains deep customization for character builds. You can switch between 5 weapon types, each with their own unique skills, movesets, playstyles: single handed sword, longsword, axe, spear, and dual blades.

With that being said, Wuchang: Fallen Feathers suffers from some clear derivative elements. Does this Souls-like add anything new to the overly saturated market of FromSoftware clones? For the most part not really. However, the game uses a signature resource called Skyborn Might, which rewards perfect dodges with charges that can be spent on powerful weapon abilities and spells. Unlike typical Souls games, magic is always available and useful, not requiring special builds or items, making for aggressive risk-reward gameplay. Then there’s the “Madness” system that rises with deaths and specific actions. Entering Madness boosts damage output but also increases the damage you take. 

But did you also know that there isn’t a universal parry or block system? Parry, or deflect in this game, is an unlockable skill that must be unlocked on the long sword. There’s also a mechanic known as clash, where you mitigate damage by “meeting” an enemy’s weapon strike with your own attack at the right moment. This is tied to the dual blades only. Lastly, only the axe can block attacks. It’s an interesting design decision to assign key gameplay mechanics to weapons, but it kind of works!

Encounters with both normal enemies and grotesque bosses are challenging to say the least. Some bosses are frustratingly over-tuned and can even be considered as unfair, but the diversity and variety of boss battles is highly commendable. There are incredible difficulty spikes, such as Commander Honglan, who ultimately serves as a skill check mid-game. 

Getting up from a knockdown is also notably slow, leaving you extremely vulnerable and frequently unable to heal or retaliate in time. A quick tip is that charging a heavy attack behind an enemy will usually break their posture or stance, causing them to stagger and fall to their knees for a visceral attack. Skyborn Might charges can be used to perform even more powerful charged attacks, increasing both HP and posture damage dealt during backstabs.

Where Wuchang truly shines is in its design of interconnected, labyrinthine levels, filled with shortcuts and secrets. The game is structured into five distinct chapters, each set in unique regions with their own bosses and NPCs. Areas are seamlessly connected, allowing for exploration that reveals secrets, shortcuts, and valuable loot. Take your time talking to and finding the game’s rich network of side characters, as progressing their side quests can allow them to directly aid you in boss battles.

In a day and age where games are reaching $80 pricepoints, Wuchang costs a humble $50, and provides an incredible amount of content. A single playthrough should last you around 30 hours, even more if you choose to get all 4 available endings and engage in New Game Plus, which comes included at launch!

The biggest thing holding this game back is its technical performance. There’s often freezes, stutters, subpar framerates, blurry visuals, and long load times. Thankfully it seems like the developers have acknowledged these issues and are actively addressing these concerns.

Putting all the negatives aside, Wuchang is undoubtedly artistic. It draws inspiration from classic Chinese landscape painting, imbuing its world with a haunting beauty. Sculpted trees, swirling fog, crumbling pagodas, and the gloom of disease and ruin surround you every part of the way. Each zone is distinct and atmospheric, pulling the player deeper into its universe. 

On the audio front, the game delivers solid work: weapons ring with satisfying heft, spell effects are crisp, and there’s a surprisingly good English voice acting cast. Music and ambient soundscapes further reinforce the atmosphere without ever feeling intrusive.

To address the elephant in the room, we need to talk about the depiction of several female characters. There are often extremely revealing outfits including deep cleavage and jiggle physics. Hey, if this is your cup of tea, more power to you because there’s lots of it here. But there is also plenty of armor and clothes that do not reveal any skin. These design choices are a visible part of the experience, though they are not the central focus of the game’s content or narrative. Positive or negative? Take it as you will.

Leenzee Games has created an ambitious debut that, for all its rough edges, manages to be a solid contender in the Soulslike genre. Atmospheric and challenging, Wuchang: Fallen Feathers captures the essence of what makes these games enduringly popular, even as it struggles with uneven balance, difficulty spikes, and poor technical performance.