Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty Reviews
Head into Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty with the right frame of mind and you'll find an enjoyable adventure that refuses to pull its punches.
Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is an engrossing, dense, and hard-fought slog, but nevertheless a slog weighed down by some heavy recycling and inconsistent difficulty.
A hair-pullingly difficult journey through zombie-infested ancient China that left me Crushingly Defeated.DualShockers was provided with a copy of the game for review purposes.
Team Ninja has streamlined Nioh with dashes of Sekiro, but it stands on its own as a Soulslike with, arguably, the crispest combat out there.
Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is a thoughtfully constructed Soulslike that makes thoughtful use of its Chinese setting.
Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is a challenging romp through a dark fantasy version of Romance of the Three Kingdoms and works well as a Soulslite. Each level is a bite-sized Souls experience to be conquered and moved past. The tight, challenging combat will thrill fans of the genre, but the lack of an interconnected world might turn off those that love the thrill of exploration.
Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is almost great. Its unfair difficulty is its most substantial flaw, but this is something that could be tweaked in an update. Exploring the world is an immense amount of fun, its controls and movement are fluid, and the world has a definitive sense of style. But many players won’t get to experience all that it has to offer due to its overpowered bosses, especially at the start of the game.
The Battle of Zhongyuan DLC for Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty follows in the same footsteps that Team Ninja's prior games did, not in the form of actual new story content, but instead in the form of weapons, gear, and most importantly, a new difficulty tier. This is a no-brainer purchase for those who are a huge fan of the base game that are looking to inch towards true end-game, but I still recommend waiting for a sale or buying the season pass instead, which offers a reduced price per DLC.
Wo Long: Fall Dynasty is a near flawless game and what I hope is just an intro to this fantastic world. Team Ninja have crafted a game that takes the basic structure of Nioh and other Souls-likes and creates their own unique, rewarding, and brutally challenging experience. In its almost forty hour campaign I was constantly surprised by the amount of new locations, creative boss fights, and sheer ambition of the game. It may be early in the year, but I'd be surprised if any game beats Wo Long for the top of my year-end list.
Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is the fastest and flashiest game from Team Ninja yet, featuring awesome offense-focused melee combat with some distinctive twists. I'd have liked some slower storytelling and more unique pieces of loot, but overall, this is a must-play for any Soulslike fan.
More of a side-step than an evolution from Nioh 2, Wo Long is inventive and an adventure worth taking even if it’s technically suspect on PS5, but won’t live massively long in the memory once you’ve slain your final boss.
The act of swordplay is still quite fun in Wo Long, but as soon as you'll get to ending credits, the game will likely just evaporate from you brain entirely.
Review in Russian | Read full review
Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty pushes the boundaries of a Souls-like game by introducing refreshing and unique takes on otherwise overused formulas. The emphasis on deflecting and the new morale mechanic makes for a challenging and rewarding combat system only to be further enhanced by the dramatic backdrop of the Three Kingdoms.
Wo Long is a well-packaged, fun and satisfying soulslike in execution, however there is a general laziness, a lack of novelty together with assets and skins taken from Nioh, together with a game balance that manages to work only in the final stages.
Review in Italian | Read full review
A notable drop in depth compared to the Nioh games, Wo-Long still has some engaging additions inspired by Sekiro. I often enjoyed myself but repetition and a horribly uneven difficulty curve certainly don't help.
Wo Long has a wonderful rhythm and flow to it, and it always feels great to deftly deflect your way through a relentless barrage of blows, wearing down your enemy before breaking their resolve and landing that fatal blow. It's a bit of a shame that the achievements don't encourage you to engage with the Rising Dragon endgame mode as it's a hearty challenge, but hopefully, Wo Long's fantastic fundamentals and rewarding combat will be enough to get you to explore the post-game on its own merits... I know they are for me.
Like Sekiro and Team NINJA’s Nioh games, Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty demands a lot from the player, specifically persistence, creativity and let’s be honest, decent timing and reflexes. In lots of key areas it’s a pretty traditional Soulslike, with all the challenges and rewards that come with the genre. Wo Long’s particular brilliance lies in its new mechanics and the way they flow in and out of every encounter. While some moments and fights can seem like insurmountable, immovable walls, getting around, through, or over them is never boring. Wo Long both honors the genre and pushes it forward in an exciting way.
With its Three Kingdoms setting, fast-paced combat centered on the Deflection mechanics, improved level design, and renewed focus on action gameplay mechanics, Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is another solid action role-playing game by Team NINJA that all fans of the genre will enjoy. While the complex RPG mechanics and loot system of the Nioh games have been toned down for a much more accessible experience for newcomers, they also make the game easier than most of the studio's previous games, something that will undoubtedly disappoint those looking for a real challenge on their first playthrough.
Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is a solid foundation for a new IP with fluid combat and fun exploration but fails to topple its spiritual predecessor due to oversimplification of customization and a lackluster PC port.