Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty Review: A Souls-like with serious bite

Playing Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is an excruciating experience. It’s not a bad game, at all, but it’s so disgustingly difficult, painfully intense, and horrifically stressful that I kept having to stop and ask myself if I was actually enjoying the damn thing.

Considering every time I died and walked off in a tizz I immediately came back to pick up the controller and go another round, I suppose I must have been having a good time.

Allow me to lay out my credentials briefly (not that they should be needed). I adore FromSoftware games. I’ve played through Bloodborne more times than I care to admit, I smashed through Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, and I believe Elden Ring is the greatest video game of the last decade.

Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is not a FromSoftware game, but much of the DNA is there. It has rest points that allow you to level up with the experience you’ve collected - experience that you’ll lose if you fall to an enemy and fail to retrieve it from that enemy on the second attempt. It has otherworldly bosses that will grind you into a sticky paste, and branching paths and hidden routes that encourage through exploration - and extreme caution. It has a level of difficulty typically reserved for gamers who hate themselves a little bit.

But for as much as Wo Long feels like a FromSoftware game in many respects, this is a Team Ninja creation through and through. And if you know anything about the iconic Tokyo studio, you’ll know they don’t pull any punches. Wo Long somehow manages to combine all the brutal brilliance of Ninja Gaiden with Sekiro, and the result is a game that will punch you in the face, stomp on your crotch, and spit in your mouth. In other words, it’s really feckin’ hard.

Team Ninja

Wo Long is a dark fantasy action game set during the Three Kingdoms period. This is not, however, a completely historically accurate game. Unless a single soldier really did have to fight through a Han Dynasty infested with beasts from hell dimensions. I’d have to Google that to really make sure.

That’s about as much as I’m allowed to really say about the story, but let’s be honest: you’re only really here to slay monsters and punish yourself. There are plenty of fun twists and turns on your journey, however, and Team Ninja’s approach to storytelling is very different to FromSoftware’s. By this I mean there’s a relatively straightforward narrative to follow that doesn’t require staying up till 3am watching YouTube videos.

After a brief tutorial and an incredibly detailed character creator (like, really detailed), you’re off to the races. Wo Long is all about exploration and fast-paced battles across a series of large levels rather than one big interconnected space. The way in which it blends these two major elements is inspired, thanks to an innovative morale and fortitude system.

In Wo Long, both the player and every enemy has a morale level. The higher an enemy’s morale, the harder they are to take down. This changes the flow of gameplay immensely. Rather than simply engage every enemy, you weigh up which ones you can take down, which ones you’ll need to sneak past, and which you can come back to later. Naturally, the more foes you vanquish the higher your morale level climbs until you kick the bucket, so you get to choose how much you want to explore and fight, effectively setting the difficulty level for the ultimate boss encounter at the end of the road.

Team Ninja

There are also optional flags to track down and hoist which can raise your fortitude, the level of which effectively dictates how far your morale can fall. Exploring every nook and cranny to raise your fortitude is pretty much vital if you’re not an inherently skilled action gamer. It’s a really smart way to help less-skilled players (hello, I relate) really get to grips with the world and make encounters easier for themselves at the same time. This is probably my favourite new idea in the whole game, and I can’t give Team Ninja enough praise for the way it really helps Wo Long to stand apart from the pack.

Combat itself is… a lot. Not quite as precise as Sekiro, or methodical as Dark Souls, there’s a chaos about it that I’m not sure will be for everyone. Unlike most FromSoftware games, Wo Long lets you block and parry as much as you want without depleting the stamina gauge. This keeps fights fast, focused, and aggressive. That’s the idea anyway, and it works for the most part. But the overall rhythm of it all doesn’t feel quite as rewarding to nail as Sekiro, and I often found myself pulling off parries through sheer luck more than anything else. I am, of course, willing to admit this is because high-speed action games aren’t something I’m used to. But make no mistake: Wo Long is more of a test of pure skill than any FromSoftware game.

It’s also worth noting that combat gradually evolves to incorporate lots of different weapons, spells, and martial arts, so even though I really struggled at first I ultimately settled into my own way of playing and started to have a much more enjoyable time of it. As with any Souls-like game, persevering to discover the secrets and tricks to combat is its own reward. And when you nail the perfect combo of blocks, parries, and attacks in Wo Long, there’s nothing quite like it.

Team Ninja

If I have one real issue with Wo Long, it’s the exploration isn’t quite as inspired as many of the games it takes its cues from. Sure, the fortitude system provides an incentive to scour levels for those flags, but if that incentive wasn’t there I’m not certain I’d have bothered anywhere near as much. Where much of the joy of exploration in games like Dark Souls and Elden Ring comes through the sheer thrill of discovery, Wo Long can’t quite match those highs.

Wo Long is a game that I suspect is going to be truly adored by the usual crowd of people who get very excited about games that secretly hate them and want to see them die. If you love Nioh, Sekiro, or indeed Ninja Gaiden, you’ll eat this adventure up. As for everyone else? Well, I’d certainly encourage you to give it a go some day… but it’s very much a hardcore action game in the old school mould, and that simply means it’s not for everyone.

Pros: Nail bitingly hard, spectacular bosses, brilliant twists on the usual Souls formula

Cons: Nail bitingly hard, combat rarely feels as good as its inspirations

For fans of: Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, Tenchu, Ninja Gaiden

8/10: Excellent

Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty releases for PlayStation 5 (version tested), Xbox Series, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC via Steam March 3 A review code was provided by the publisher. Read a guide to our review scores here.