Way back in 2020, I missed out on the initial Genshin Impact release and the subsequent gacha RPG goldrush, so I was determined – purely for science – to get a jump on Wuthering Waves (or, as I like to call it, Wuthering Waifus) to truly understand what all the excitement and obsession was about.
After putting a half dozen hours into it, I came away convinced that the core of Wuthering Waves is a great example of such a game done right – if it weren’t for the absolutely nonsensical story that developer Kuro Games wrapped it up in.
I’m a firm believer that the sooner games throw you into gameplay, the better. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild – the action RPG that Genshin Impact was often compared to – is a great example of this: Link wakes up, picks up a strange tablet, and wanders out onto the great plateau with little exposition. You’re set free to explore and learn, to truly immerse yourself in that world.
Wuthering Waves has a deep core that deserves showing off but unlike Breath of the Wild, it’s locked behind dialogue box after dialogue box. Playing it reminded me of the first time I played Skyward Sword on the Wii: the abysmally long opening dragged on and on, taking about an hour of puttering around Skyloft before the adventure truly began.
The tutorial itself wasn’t too bad. I chose to play as Darkly Dressed Anime Girl with amnesia instead of Darkly Dressed Anime Boy with amnesia. Three Anime Women taught me the ropes. They gave me a decent grasp of combat and I also learned how to absorb monsters in order to equip them as Echos for passive buffs and new skills. I was then set free to explore the gorgeous world, but I soon understood I wasn’t going to get very far without pursuing the story first.
This is where Wuthering Waves lost me. Upon arriving in the main city of Jinzhou, I had to wander around activating beacons and meeting with magistrates. To cure my amnesia, I was given five mundane items that related to my character’s backstory, ranging from candy to fruit. In order to unlock some memories, the quest marker guided me to a lab where several characters rambled on about the history of said candy, puzzle boxes, databanks, filing systems, and health checkups.
This was far worse than anything Skyward Sword put me through back in 2011.
Of my two hours of playtime, I’d say I spent 75% of it reading nonsensical science-fantasy dialogue. Even then, I had little idea what was going on: Tacet Discords, which look similar to the Prometheans from Halo 4, spawn from rifts and wage some kind of war – or maybe the rifts are called Tacet Discords, and the Prometheans are called something else. Regardless, I powered onward, mashing through dialogue and determined to see if the action RPG combat could make up for all the nonsense.
It wasn’t meant to be. When I overcame all the exposition dropped on me in Jinzhou, I rushed to leave the city to beat up some monsters. However, soldiers blocked the way, and my companions had another lengthy dialogue session explaining how dangerous the frontlines of the war are and arguing semantics as to whether we should be let through. I survived this onslaught of inane chatter and experienced some promising combat, until once again a narrative thread murdered any fun I was having in cold, boring blood.
I put in a few more hours, pulling new characters – including a rare 5 star one. I could see the appeal of accumulating the overwhelming amount of currencies to roll for more characters and weapons while farming experience boosters to increase the level of everything in my inventory. Even better, swapping between three different characters, mixing and matching equippable monsters for active skills and passive buffs, and exploring the bright, gorgeous environments all felt incredibly slick…until the story once again pulled the rug of fun right out from beneath me. At that point, I considered myself lucky Wuthering Waves is free-to-play, and I never spent a single cent.
I’m certain there’s a post-story endgame without exposition that could keep me busy for months, and the inevitable future updates could turn that into years, because the action RPG combat works incredibly well. Even writing this I have the itch to login daily so I get the bonus times required to roll for more characters. I understand how such a game, like with Genshin Impact, could become an all-consuming obsession. But with such a nonsensical story mixed with overwrought dialogue, playing more Wuthering Waves felt less like a rewarding way to spend my free time and more like a chore.
Wuthering Waves is available now.
