Wuxia is the ultimate of Chinese Kungfu. It’s a combination of martial arts, attitude towards the world and some ancient wisdom. As a Chinese player, I've played so many games based on this concept since I was a child, but from what I've seen so far, none can compete with The Scroll of Taiwu, a strategy, sandbox RPG, which swept China this summer.
High level of freedom has become an important aspect these years, since everyone wants to get involved in the world of game and take control of their own destiny. Besides, it helps players understand what the producer wants to convey and truly relate to characters. Built by a team of four part-time developers, The Scroll of Taiwu shows a lot of defects in music and art. However, its freedom of choices makes up for those defects and even turn them into a special feature of the game.
Everyone has a unique journey. Dividing world map into fifteen areas with their own special type of Kungfu and allowing players to decide which perks they want to unlock, the game then generates random local maps to ensure every time you play, it's a brand new start. The game then develops along the main story line, in which you are the successor of an ancient hero and need to find your missing stepfather. During this process, you are free to travel around the country and learn new Kungfu, or you can fight against bad guys and save the world from crisis. You can also help build the town to gain a good reputation and make enough money for traveling. What’s more, this game has a concept of reincarnation, which allows you to let your successor inherit skills and ability if you encounter with strong enemies and die.
To reach such a high level of freedom, Taiwu designs a rather detailed system for almost every single part of the game, which is supported by thousands of variables and values and rather complicated if statements. Some values are randomly generated, but most are obtained by calculation. All of those elements comply to Wuxia novels and traditional Chinese culture, which is exactly why the game is welcomed by the public. Take the upgrading system as an example. It contains three parts in total: read secret bibles of martial art, practice until you reach the limit and break through. Though whether you can master a skill is mostly decided by skill points, the game also adds some random factors that may cause failure. It reflects a kind of Dao philosophy. Players have to make up their own strategy and try not to be too greedy.
The basic logic of each module may not be very complicated. However, the whole system is too big and includes so many different branches that are connected to each other, so performance and code structure are rather important. Though the game does a good job at connecting each module, there is still some crucial weakness. For example, when season changes, a large number of variables, as mentioned before, playing an important part in deciding the setting of next chapter, are written into the disk at the same time, which causes long waiting periods, even triggers some bugs.
Despite the weakness, the game is really enjoyable. I truly admire the developers, for their love for Wuxia and bringing such a big and magnificent world to us. The game is still under development and the main story line twisted just to leave more suspense. I can’t wait to see the following chapters.
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