The Crown of Wu PC Review

There have been many attempts by many games to usurp the soulslike throne. It is an immensely difficult throne to usurp, and one that has yet to be usurped. The same is true here. The Crown of Wu is a soulslike game, but it doesn’t quite manage to stick the landing. There is a lot of promise there, but the game ultimately does not manage to succeed where it wants to succeed. Instead, the game is simply fine.

Soulslike games, especially the pedigree version of this form as pioneered by various From Software games, are based around tight controls, tough enemies, stamina systems, intricate worlds, and a necessity to learn your surroundings and how best to survive. These games demand a lot of their players, but there’s nothing else quite like it. Nothing else quite manages to leave a player with the sense of accomplishment that can only come from succeeding against insurmountable odds. The same is not the case here.

 

The Crown of Wu is a budget soulslike game, and it should be treated as such. For this reason, the game’s less-than-stellar visuals cannot be judged. They convey what they need to convey and even though the visuals are not particularly great, the game does manage to have environments that, while not particularly enchanting, are creative enough to be worthy of some note. However, while visuals are often the primary aspect that we tend to focus on when it comes to the realm of AAA games, this is not solely the case.

Indie games may not have the budget to look like the most gorgeous thing that has ever existed, but they also lack the kind of critical polish that can distinguish a good game from a great game. Without polish, a game can easily become a janky experience. This is the case in The Crown of Wu. It is a competently put-together product that could have done with far more polish than it now has. This does also mean that the game could, with enough patches and updates, lose this jankier feel. But we cannot discuss this game based on what it could be after some updates, we need to discuss what it is now.

The Crown of Wu is a third-person hack n slash game that makes use of all things you may have come to expect with a few other additions. As this game is a soulslike game, you can expect enemies who have movesets that can be analyzed and learned so that you can more competently face off against them. You then need to navigate a system based around stamina, striking when the enemy is open, and managing your health.

 

Some of the principal differences here lie in the fact that the combat in The Crown of Wu is simply adequate. There’s nothing particularly involving about it. You keep your distance, dodge, when necessary, use heavy strikes because the regular attack is immensely weak, and then repeat. However, as enemies do not have particularly sophisticated movesets, there is no dance with your foes. There’s no struggle.

Unlike many soulslike games, The Crown of Wu has difficulty settings. However, even when playing The Crown of Wu on the highest difficulty setting, it isn’t particularly difficult. The only real difficulty comes in the form of platforming and boss fights, both of which will be explained soon. So, if you want a challenging soulslike game that sticks to the formula quite closely in that regard, this game is not that.

Instead, the game’s differences come in the form of some of the other systems. There is a far more comprehensive magic system than ordinarily exists in these kinds of games. The magic system allows you to regenerate mana through special destructible crystals that you can find throughout the world. These allow you to heal and use special abilities. These special abilities include things like a special wind power that allows you to double jump and shoot wind blasts at enemies or in puzzles.

 

More magic is unlocked as you explore the world of The Crown of Wu. Although, that said, the exploration does not yield all that much. This is a game with a far more linear structure than you’d find in many soulslike games. Soulslike games are, very broadly, inspired by metroidvania games in which new shortcuts and routes become available once you have attained new abilities or found new locations. This is not the case here.

The Crown of Wu is a linear experience. It’s a game in which you explore a world with little to find, as the only real thing to find is collectables, and they don’t add much to the proceedings. The environments themselves are rather pretty and well-constructed at times, and it incorporates a kind of techno-fantasy aesthetic where the world is very clearly more along the lines of a fantasy, but there are also sophisticated and ancient technologies lying around. In many ways, it’s somewhat similar to something like the first Jak and Daxter game, in which the world is fantastical but there are ancient machines left behind by a long-gone civilization. Although The Crown of Wu has a far more Asian aesthetic considering its influences.

So, The Crown of Wu is a game with fairly standard soulslike combat in which you lock on to your enemy, dodge their attacks, and strike when the time is right, but something that was not mentioned before was the enemy variety. Many soulslike games put enemies in your path who have very specific ways of moving and fighting that turn every combat encounter into its own kind of endurance-based puzzle.

 

Well, the same is not true here. The Crown of Wu is in love with spongier enemies who are essentially just humans, for the most part. The enemies tend to be very simple in their overall presentation and they fight in a very simplistic manner. They don’t really dodge or do anything of particular note, and one enemy after another is essentially the same enemy. The enemy variety is only really at its widest when some magic-wielding or shield-carrying enemies show up. Even then, they’re not particularly difficult to deal with, even at the worst of times.

All of this basically means that The Crown of Wu does not have a particularly robust or original combat system. This is not to say that it’s a bad combat system. It’s simply an adequate one. If it had received a little more attention and there was some more variety in the way that enemies conducted themselves, it could have been a lot better. However, the only real variety in enemies comes in the form of boss fights.

Boss fights are generally an integral aspect of soulslike games. Each boss is its own puzzle that needs to be determined or else you’ll be crushed. However, the way to beat the boss in The Crown of Wu is always quite obvious and the only real difficulty comes from it having some kind of an annoying contrivance to elongate the battle.

 

Let’s have a look at the first two bosses to illustrate this. These bosses will be spoiled to explore why they are a problem. So, if you don’t want them spoiled, skip this and the next paragraph. The first boss in the game is basically a regular guy, but he’s protected by a magical shield. This magical shield can only be turned off by attacking a certain item in the world, which then drops the shield and allows you to deal some damage until the shield goes up again. The problem here is that all you do is sprint around the arena, attack the obelisk, and run around again and again as you hit it repeatedly until it’s down. So, you know how to do it, but you’re forced to run around in circles as you deal with the boss.

The second boss is a robot with an expanding moveset. This is good. It’s much better than the first boss. You need to learn its moveset and anticipate when to strike. However, it also has a move where it jumps onto the ceiling and shoots an instant death beam at you. You have to hide behind some pillars to be able to survive it, but if you’re in the middle of the room when it gets ready, you’re going to die. This kind of gameplay only serves to elongate the battle rather than make it interesting in any real way. The bosses are aggravating, not actually difficult, but full of irritating gameplay that bogs the game down.

The Crown of Wu does not have good boss fights. They are fine, but they can be aggravating and have attacks with mechanics that only serve to artificially lengthen how long they take to beat. However, the game also has rather weak platforming.

The platforming tends to involve a lot of floating platforms that then disappear, but it’s immensely easy to either jump too short of or entirely over the platforms you’re jumping to. Sometimes you need to sprint to make a jump, but then you’ll just launch your way too far. Other times, The Crown of Wu doesn’t tell you that an area cannot be reached. You can follow the platforms, but it’s a pointless dead end.

 

The platforming in The Crown of Wu is not necessarily bad. There are lots of bottomless pits and, thankfully, there’s no lives system so you can just try the ump over and over again. But you don’t really want players to do the equivalent of save scumming to get through a game. So, that also isn’t great, but it is fine.

The puzzles are similar. The puzzles are typically rudimentary and shouldn’t stop you for too long. They don’t particularly add anything and as soulslike games often don’t have puzzles of this variety, it may have been best to focus on the central combat loop instead. The environment itself forms part of the gameplay as puzzles, platforms, and traps comprise much of the world in which combat is both the best part of the game and also decidedly adequate rather than good in presentation.

So, what about the story then? Well, The Crown of Wu is loosely based on Journey to the West, the famous Chinese text featuring the Monkey King, Sun Wukong. In this game, you are Sun Wukong, hence the game being named after the crown worn by “Wu.” The narrative is essentially based on Sun Wukong’s need to retrieve his magical crown, but the game is mostly gameplay focused rather than narrative-focused.

 

In fact, the game is clearly not made by a first-language English team, so there are many small errors. So, it may be that effort was put into the gameplay over any story as gameplay is more of a universal language than actual languages are. This is also not the only game based on this text, as 2010’s Enslaved: Odyssey to the West is also a loose adaptation. Other inspirations that have come from that book include things like the character of Goku from Dragon Ball.

In addition, in a true soulslike fashion, the game has a strong focus on lore that can be found. This lore is often found in the few collectables that can be discovered in the environment. The lore of the world is also not particularly engaging, but for those who want a narrative along those lines, The Crown of Wu may be the game for you.

Before we finish though, it would be best to look at two of the biggest, more technical issues. Firstly, The Crown of Wu is not the best-optimized game, and while there were no game-breaking bugs, there were slowdowns and jittery issues. These could get fixed in the coming days and weeks, so they may not be present in the game forever.

 

The second more technical aspect is the fact that even though the game has difficulty settings, the hardest mode does not offer much of a challenge There are constant checkpoints and no system like the bonfires in Dark Souls. So, even if you die repeatedly, you’ll never be far from exactly where you just died. It can lead to a bit of an underwhelming overall experience.

In the end, The Crown of Wu is, sadly, just a bit dull. It’s an adequate game, but it doesn’t offer anything particularly new or different. It’s a game that may be worth getting if you’re really into 3D soulslike games and you’ve been having some trouble finding new ones worth playing. Otherwise, this is not a game that can be particularly recommended.
 

Justin van Huyssteen (@LC_Lupus)
Senior Editor, NoobFeed