The trend of the last decade is alive and well: Soulslikes are still all the rage. Even among the limited selection of demos at Summer Game Fest 2025, I saw numerous games that were either Souls down to their toes or took some degree of inspiration from them. Wuchang: Fallen Feathers, a self-described Soulslike action RPG, does feel very familiar in those ways, but it's also trying a few things different that could ultimately make or break its chances.
I got to play about an hour of Wuchang, essentially starting from the beginning. I saw scattered specs of its influences: the intro area immediately gave me Zelda: Breath of the Wild vibes, with an overlook of the land and a title sequence segueing into a climb down towards my first hub area. After a little bit of exposition, I was essentially left to wander and find my way through a dangerous land, trying to figure out just what was going on.
