Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

This article is from the official account of Wechat: game Research Society (ID:yysaag), author: Qimu cake

Wolong is more like a happy adventure than ascetic.

At the Xbox & Bethesda press conference in June last year, "Wolong: the fall of the Heaven" attracted wide attention as soon as it was announced.

At that time, many players speculated on what a dark wind of the three Kingdoms game would be like. And because the ninja group of the development team already has two "Renwang" pearls in front, many people simply play tricks and call this work "Renwang 3".

However, due to the great influence of the culture of the three Kingdoms itself, it is not only action game enthusiasts who pay attention to this game, but also a wider group of pan-players.

Hardcore players want a deep action system, smooth movement design and first-class operation feel like "Renwang". For new players and light users, whether the threshold for play is high, whether it is easy to use, and which familiar characters of the three Kingdoms can be seen in the game.

Obviously, the ninja group has been thinking about these issues from a long time ago. As early as when Wolong was first released, producer Fumihiko Yasuda said in an interview with the media: "Team NINJA doesn't just promote challenging and difficult games. We want to make a new game."

After trying to play Wolong in advance, we also got the answer in our hearts.

1 "Wolong" started with an unparalleled series of old Dingfan-the Yellow scarf Rebellion. But the difference is that in this work, the player no longer plays a well-known general, but becomes an unknown volunteer.

However, this also leaves room for the free play of the plot, and players can wander between various forces, and all their favorite generals, Yi Jie Jinlan, can quite experience the sense of achievement of "the first person in the three Kingdoms".

Each on its own.

The familiar female characters of the three Kingdoms are not absent, and you can guess who this is. In previous interviews, producer Fumihiko Yasuda repeatedly said, "Wolong is a hermit, a talented person who is not yet known to the world, that is, a player."

But maybe every player who enters the game will feel that he is more like "Dragon proud" than "Wolong". All kinds of heroes who meet will blow a set of "dragon wanting to fly", "rare talents in the world", "not inferior to Yun Chang and Yide".

But on the other hand, compared with the heroes of the three Kingdoms boasting each other's pride, the game itself seems a little small, with the "benevolent king"-style box court map, which often produces some subtle sense of perspective in the map.

Players who played the final trial version last week believe that they have already had a preliminary feeling about the identity of the protagonist and the design of the worldview. And the specific trial process, but also let some "Renwang" old players' anger soar, criticizing this work is too simple.

For example, "if you like Renwang or other ninja works, don't expect Wolong too much," which is not uncommon in the player community and video sites.

In fact, the difficulty of the game is really a very subjective factor, which is highly related to the skill level of each player, but it is not the criterion to judge whether a game is fun or not. But for those players who prefer to challenge themselves, after the end of the classic game of the three Kingdoms, they will probably be able to find what they want-such as Lv Bu.

Judging from our actual play process of about 30 hours a week, it is actually difficult to judge which part of the game Wolong is aimed at: it has designed a gradual difficulty curve, giving most players a chance to learn step by step, which can also be seen in its action system which is very different from that of the King of Benevolence.

2 the action system of Wolong is the ultimate subtraction.

It leaves out the fancy designs of most traditional action games, leaving only something practical for each weapon-a light attack module, a heavy attack action, and one or two combat skills. And in the process of actual combat, the benefit of combat technology is much lower than that of heavy attack, and its positioning is more like a means of rapid pursuit and evacuation. In other words, without the pursuit of gorgeous operation, players only need two keys to play the basic performance of a weapon.

This design allows players to almost ignore the cost of each weapon, do not need to spend a lot of time to practice skills, tap the performance of different weapons, but also immediately experience the pleasure of operating an action game.

On the contrary, the ninja group that withdrew the complex action system from the player tilted a lot of resources on the enemy, making the enemy's design more aggressive, more aggressive, and lasting longer.

Players need to familiarize themselves with the enemy's movements more than learning the skills of a weapon. It's like telling every player that you don't need to be proficient in all 18 martial arts before looking for an opponent, go out and take risks first, reap happiness and then grow up in the training of a strong enemy.

And growth is to better manage the momentum bars that represent your own state and the enemy's state. No game designer wants players to be defensive against enemies, so Wolong's extremely simplified action system liberates the player's attention and makes room for the introduction of momentum bars.

Some players may feel a bit like the posture bar in Wolf, but in fact, Wolong's momentum bar encourages players to attack in a more positive way.

There is no difference between positive and negative in the posture bar of "only Wolf". If it is full, it will be straight. When the posture bar is on the verge of collapse, players who have no confidence in the perfect bullet knife will consider briefly withdrawing the battle, dealing with the enemy, and waiting for the posture bar to resume and then come forward.

In Wolong, the momentum bar is bounded by the middle, positive to the right and negative to the left. The growth of positive momentum can counteract the negative momentum. When the negative momentum bar is about to reach its peak, instead of dealing with the enemy, it is easier to launch an active attack to get out of the current predicament.

And when the player posture bar is positive, once you leave the battle, the positive posture will be reduced, there is no reason not to take advantage of the victory to pursue.

Of course, the enemy will not always be pinned down. While the ninja group encourages players to take the initiative to attack, it also designs a lot of large-scale movement movements for the enemy.

When the player has the advantage, the enemy will usually choose to retreat and distance himself, and then organize a counterattack. As a result, the core action mechanism of this work-"resolution" appeared.

Since the release of Wolong, producer Fumihiko Yasuda has been emphasizing in external interviews, "this is a combat system based on Chinese martial arts, and we hope players can enjoy the fun of changing attack and defense like a free flow."

From the final effect, the solution is really a good completion of this concept. As long as you can use the solution skillfully, players can easily deal with the enemy's normal attack and powerful "kill moves", turn the offensive and gain the upper hand again.

Most of the moves in the game, whether physical attacks, spell attacks, flight props and AOE, can be defused and even thrown back into an enemy fireball. After resolving the situation of turning defense into attack, people can quite understand the flavor of "four or two dialing thousands of pounds" in some Chinese martial arts.

(3) the simplification of the action system and the addition of "resolution" also make the learning process of the game quite comfortable in the early and middle stages (at least before Lv Bu). Wolong is more like a happy adventure than ascetic.

Obviously, the ninja team wanted every player to enjoy the adventure, so they added a multiplayer game element to the book that formed a team with NPC. But players who prefer to fight alone can also use "willow branches" to send them away at the back level.

Quite Chinese style design in addition to the battle, "Wolong" has a freer play experience. The map consciously increases the sense of depth, and for the first time, the player character has a second jump, and there is more room for exploration.

So the ninja group designed a way to compete for morale around the element of "player character death" in "freer Space".

Morale, can be seen as players at the current level of the player can kill the enemy to gain morale, but also by setting up "banners" scattered all over the battlefield to gain morale, but their own morale level will also be reduced after death.

This means that when exploring new terrain, players need to observe the morale level of the enemy while thinking about offensive strategies and ways to capture banners.

If the route chosen is different, the level will present a completely different difficulty. This kind of strategic thinking can also give players a great sense of achievement after overcoming many difficulties.

The Tooth Flag also boosts morale, but a more important function is archiving, but although it consciously deepens the map, this has never been the strength of the ninja team. In terms of the final results, it is a bit like for the sake of complexity and complexity, so that even in the limited space of the trial version, many players are once lost in the novice village.

In addition to the map, Wolong has many minor flaws. For example, the design around the momentum bar is unbalanced, the benefits of "resolving" skills are too high, and the use of them is extremely extensive. As a result, the important combat elements of "blocking" and "dodging" have been completely reduced to chicken ribs.

The priority of the "resolve" command is not higher than that of the attack, and the player cannot cancel the command that has been entered after pressing the resolution, which means that the player needs to stop and observe the enemy's movements from time to time during the attack. in case the enemy can't resolve it in time after using the "kill trick". And this just contradicts the momentum bar that encourages players to attack continuously.

But as Fumihiko Yasuda said, "there is no correct answer in the gaming world." good ideas are not necessarily adopted, and even if they are adopted, players may find it boring. " No one game can meet the needs of all players, and no one player can enjoy all the games.

When players experience Wolong, they don't have to think that it has a strong pedigree with other action games, but just regard it as the beginning of a new series. Although there are some flaws, as the first action game masterpiece so far in 2023, Wolong is definitely worth experiencing.

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