‘Black Myth: Wukong’ Arrives Next Summer and Could Be the Best Journey to the West Retelling Yet
Those who were excited at the prospect of a game entrenched in Chinese mythology with Souls-like gameplay have been made to wait for a very long time. The game was originally revealed on August 20, 2020. At the time, gamers were only a year removed from the well-received Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice and knew that the expansive Elden Ring was on the way. Black Myth: Wukong looked an intriguing concept truly inspired by FromSoftware games.
While Souls-like in its gameplay, the upcoming title from Game Science will be entrenched in the tale of Journey to the West. Nowadays, Journey to the West could be seen as a fantasy epic. It tells of a monk’s legendary pilgrimage of trials and suffering to Central Asia. Soon, Black Myth: Wukong will attempt to present itself as the very best retelling of the 16th-century tale.
A tale for the ages retold in many mediums
Recounting the outline of the Buddhist monk Xuanzang’s journey with Chinese folklore and myths infused into the tale, Journey to the West is as much a tale of spiritual enlightenment as it is an adventure story, while also being an allegorical satire of bureaucracy during the Ming dynasty. Still, it’s the characters who are the most eye-catching and fantastical of the tale. Tang Sanzang is the monk who takes centre stage, but it’s all about his disciples.
Sun Wukong (the Monkey King), Zhu Bajie (Pigsy), Sha Wujing (the river ogre), and White Dragon Horse are all with the monk to atone for their sins and, as you can see by their names, can be fantastically brought to visual mediums. This is best shown in an entertainment medium which doesn’t use any written words, slot gaming. The Journey to the West slot game is a high RTP game and can be found at some of the best payout casinos online. For instance, it is available at Videoslots Casino, which has a 4.3-star review score. The Journey to the West slot features Sun and Zhu who are depicted in a theriocephalic way – with a monkey and a pig head.
This is a big part of how and why Journey to the West can be such a superb story to be retold in more animated and fantastical mediums, like gaming and anime. That said, it can also be a firm foundation for a live-action movie. In 2008, it brought together two of the greatest martial arts movie stars, Jackie Chan and Jet Li, for The Forbidden Kingdom. The flick didn’t do too well in reviews, though. What did manage to stick with critics and audiences was the 1978 TV show Monkey. It is now considered to be a cult classic and draws heavily on the Journey to the West tale.
In video gaming, many studios have had a crack at utilising the characters and direction of Journey to the West. Most recently, throwback platformer The Crown of Wu received decent reviews, but didn’t appear to do as well on Steam as Journey to the West – the rogue-like deck-building game – when it launched in March 2022. As we detail in our review of the game, Monkey King: Hero is Back didn’t do the story justice, but you could always try to get a working version of the Enslaved: Odyssey to the West film from 2010.
Black Myth: Wukong to set a new standard for Journey to the West games
This may be Game Science’s first triple-A game but it has a tremendous amount of backing from goliath Tencent and has clearly been given as much time as needed to create the best possible product. Better still for gamers, it’ll be a one-off purchase (none of that live service or freemium tat) and will be centred on the Monkey King, Sun Wukong, as the “Destined One.”
Earlier this year, Black Myth: Wukong was given a firm release window of summer 2024 via a cutesy rabbit-focussed short film, but in the years since its announcement, we’ve enjoyed a lot of gameplay footage. The initial 12-minute pre-Alpha video was impressive but perhaps not as striking as the Unreal Engine 5 video from August 2021, which currently boasts over 9.1 million views on YouTube.
It may be a year until its release, but Black Myth: Wukong is deservedly holding onto a lot of hype and will hopefully be the most entertaining modern retelling of Journey to the West.
