Wuthering Waves First Impressions: Is It Good?

Wuthering Waves just released today, and I got to experience it for a couple of hours before putting it down and deciding to share my thoughts and views about the game.

I won’t touch up on everything and will try to cover my first impression of the story, combat, and exploration of the game while also giving my opinions on the good and the bad.

Let’s not waste any more time and get started.

Story

Before starting, I want to point out that I experienced the game with the text in English and voices in Japanese.

Starting with the story of the game, I honestly have mixed feelings about this one. My initial impressions weren’t great, to say the least.

The story in Wuthering Waves is presented in a decent way with various expressions from the characters, something we haven’t seen in many other gacha games before, and a ton of amazing cutscenes that show just how much effort Kuro put into those moments. However, that is as far as it goes.

The English localization of the game seems cheap and can certainly be improved. As it stands right now, a lot of the dialogue seems uninspired and quite bland. It is worded in a bad manner, and most parts do not flow smoothly, nor do they give you the feeling of wanting more. 

It seems like it was rushed and just done to get it over with, which is sad given that Kuro Games tried to make a decent story here, and we won’t know if it is good because of the awful localization.

I have seen a lot of negative feedback about an information dump happening right as the story unfolds, but I believe that this can be seen as positive or negative depending on the person, so I won’t touch upon it.

All in all, here is a summary of the pros and cons I have for the story in Wuthering Waves:

PROS:

• Nice cinematics
• Great character expression

CONS:

• Awful localization
• Cut cutscenes

Combat

Moving onto the best feature of this game, the combat, Wuthering Waves has without a doubt nailed its combat system. It’s smooth, responsive, satisfying, and overall an absolute joy to play.

Each character has a unique playstyle with combos, intro, and outro skills that just open endless possibilities for team building.

I personally like the fast-paced tone that Kuro has taken here, and the addition of the break mechanic and perfect dodge just make the combat feel very satisfying to play.

I cannot comment on the difficulty as I’m still in the early stages of the game, but as of right now, combat feels absolutely amazing, and I do not currently have any gripes with it.

Exploration

The exploration of Wuthering Waves is another win in my book. The ability to run around everywhere without consuming stamina when out of combat is honestly a genius move by Kuro. This helps you explore the world a bit easier while not feeling like it’s super overwhelming, which is what I feel like when playing Genshin Impact.

The addition of wall climbing, parkour, and, most of all, the Grapple Utility, which you unlock a bit into the main story, makes the exploration feel great and rewarding.

The chests around the world, the enemies to fight, and the simple puzzles also add to this experience. For me, this fast-paced exploration is right up my alley, and I can see myself going around the world more just because of the movement.

The Bad

I would’ve loved not to include this part in the impressions, but we just can’t end the article without it. To be honest, the launch of Wuthering Waves wasn’t the greatest. The word that I would use to describe Wuthering Waves right now is unpolished. There are various bugs that have been spotted by the community, including:

• Atrocious localization
• Cut dialogue scenes
• Cut text inside text bubbles

It all makes it feel like the game was nowhere ready for release, at least on the English part of things. I honestly do not know how the experience is in other languages, so I cannot comment on that.

All in all, the overall core of the game feels great, but what would otherwise be an amazing experience is ruined by the awful choice of the localization team and countless bugs.

I am hopeful that Kuro Games will address the issues and tackle them head-on, as they have done in the past. Despite the slightly negative experience I’ve had, I’m still having a blast with the game and will continue to play it while pumping out content for everyone willing to read it.