Black Myth: Wukong would feel much more epic if it didn't always fake its size so badly

For the four of you who haven't bought it yet: Black Myth Wukong is a fun Soulslike variant of Journey to the West where you play a wonderfully deadly monkey. It received 87 points in our testing, a score PC Gamer doesn't often give to bad games. Wukong is at its best when it gives you a spectacular boss fight and the satisfaction of defeating it with a big baton and several delightfully over-the-top spells. Summoning three clones of myself and watching my ape doppelgangers completely freak out a boss is another power fantasy I can cross off my old wish list.

Wukong is stunningly beautiful even by 2024 standards. I had to turn the graphics settings down a bit to get my gaming laptop to stop screaming and still make it look spectacular. Lush green forests and blindingly white snow-capped mountains are gaming location tropes almost as old as the paddles of Pong, but that's a lot easier to ignore when they look this stunning. Until you try to explore them properly and realize how hemmed in you actually are.

Wukong is full of invisible walls. Boring, immersion-destroying barriers that successfully kill the fun of exploring. This is a game with 91 bosses, and some of the best fights lurk off the critical path. The same goes for important crafting materials, treasures, and meditation spots that will presumably give you serenity (yawn) and an extra skill point (yay!).

Essentially, it's full of motivation to explore, even if it doesn't offer a map. I don't think the repetitive level design is anywhere near memorable enough to survive without a map (and apparently at least 30,000 people agree with me), but I grudgingly accept that as a design decision. What I can't get over – literally – is nonsense like this entrance:

(Image credit: Game Science)

What is behind these doors? An epic boss fight? A powerful new weapon? Feminist propaganda? I will never know, because an invisible wall blocks the way through this huge opening. Who would have thought that an invisible barricade in a open door was a good idea? This is the game design equivalent of putting extra lives in a bottle labeled “Poison: Extra Deadly” or hiding an NPC you need to rescue in a bright red barrel.

Wukong didn't invent this age-old problem, of course, but it's disappointing to see it make a comeback in a big-budget 2024 release. These days, developers prefer more subtle smokescreens to disguise limitations, like having to squeeze through gaps in walls to hide loading times. This is also pretty old, but I prefer it to the time I trudged across a frozen lake in Wukong and realized the landmass in the distance was nothing more than a pretty screensaver. I spent the long walk back across the lake inventing new curse words. Why would I want to search this world for secrets when I know that boredom will all too often be my reward?

Wukong runs into an invisible wall on a snow-capped mountain in Black Myth: Wukong.

(Image credit: Game Science)

I can understand where the temptation comes from to get away with this nonsense. Visible barriers can make a game world seem smaller on the surface. But when I hit invisible walls, the world obviously feels both significantly smaller and more artificial. I'm not trying to single out Wukong specifically for this for some nefarious reason. I'm more concerned that in a year where great Soulslikes have started to break out of FromSoftware's shadow by doing their own thing, we might be seeing the beginning of Elden Ring's influence, and not for the better.

If Soulslike developers start thinking that they now need to match, or at least exceed, open-world size to compete, we're going to see a lot more invisible walls and pointless empty space. One of the things that makes Elden Ring stand out is how carefully crafted its world is despite its considerable size, and how much of it is actually interactable (there's also a map Note Note). It's an astonishing achievement from a veteran studio at the peak of its powers. If you think your debut Soulslike can be of a similar magnitude or pretend to be bigger than it is, And If you can achieve/surpass that in quality, then you are either incredibly brave or a bigger fan of tragic hubris than [insert clever reference to dark souls lore that will make about three awful people feel incredibly smug for getting it here].

Please don't think that Black Myth: Wukong isn't worth your time. I don't want this comment to result in all 10 million+ copies being refunded and the game becoming one of the biggest flops of 2024. It's a charismatic, surprisingly funny, charming adventure with some great boss fights and a stellar power set. Being able to freeze enemies in time and land a few incredibly cheap blows is a constant joy. And the ability to leave a small explosive shadow of yourself if you time your dodge just right is the inspired dose of Bayonetta injected into a Soulslike I've always dreamed of.

In Black Myth: Wukong, Wukong runs into an invisible wall in a ravine.

(Image credit: Game Science)

But these are above all outstanding features, because they are not in FromSoftware's games. If you copy that studio's homework too closely, you'll end up with something forgettably generic at best and downright awful at worst. I still haven't forgiven Lies of P's jump controls, which required you to hold down the run button and then click the analog stick (What). They're the direct result of a developer looking at the crappy jump controls of the original Dark Souls and saying, “Yeah, no notes.” And so one of FromSoftware's weirdest design decisions was given a grim second life.

Wukong has a nice, useful jump button, thankfully, but it's one that constantly makes you jump face-first into those damn invisible walls (every screenshot in this piece shows me running into one of them, by the way, although invisibility is oddly difficult to capture in photos). The chances of that happening are slim, but I'd love it if the inevitable sequel was an unashamedly smaller Soulslike that relied on the outstanding, creative magic that is that game's strength. How about at least a spell that lets us break down those invisible walls for good?

Black Myth: Wukong would feel much more epic if it didn't always fake its size so badly

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Black Myth: Wukong would feel much more epic if it didn't always fake its size so badly

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