Stunning New Game Packed-Full of Chinese Culture Goes Viral

Game Science showcased the game’s features in the first 13-minute gameplay video, which includes exploration, its combat system, stealth, boss battles and its different environments, according to IGN.

 

“Black Myth: Wukong” is being billed as the first AAA title coming from China and Game Science’s first attempt at making a premium single-player game, Eurogamer reported.

The game is a retelling of the Chinese epic mythology “Journey to the West.” Its story centers on the travel of Tang monk Xuanzang to retrieve Buddhist sutras from India, Nations Online said. Sun Wukong, who is also known in the west as the Monkey King, acts as the monk’s bodyguard in their journey.

Game Science’s operations director Lan Weiyi said they decided to create an AAA game after they realized there were more Steam users in China than the United States in 2017.

“At the time, there were already more than 1 million Chinese gamers playing Grand Theft Auto on Steam,” he said in his Zhihu post, South China Morning Post reported. “Then we realized that China’s premium games market was going through a transformation.”

“Black Myth: Wukong” received 10 million views on Chinese video site Bilibili and nearly 2 million views on YouTube in its first 24 hours since release, according to SCMP.

Created using Unreal Engine 4, Game Science plans to release “Black Myth: Wukong” on next-generation consoles and on the PC and aims to make it available on the global market.

The 13-minute gameplay video was also used as a recruitment tool to attract potential employees to join the company, Game Science founder Feng Ji said in a Weibo post translated by a ResetEra member and confirmed by IGN.

Feng also said he did not expect to get this much attention when they released the game. Their only intention for the “honest trailer” was to recruit more developers.

Although the team was delighted with the very positive reception towards the trailer, Feng made it clear this newfound fame won’t let it get to their heads. He even asked those who viewed the “Black Myth: Wukong” trailer to forget what they saw as this does not represent their best work.

In his post, Feng pointed out the flaws of the game in the trailer such as the low frame rate when the main character takes control of the heavenly warriors, the water not showing physical properties and the soundtrack not matching the events on the screen.

In his final message, Feng said the team will go back into hiding as they continue the development of the game.

No official word yet on when “Black Myth: Wukong” will be released as the title is still in its pre-alpha stage.