The PC release of Wuchang: Fallen Feathers, the new Soulslike title from Leenzee, has presented a curious situation. While critics have generally responded well to the game, and initial player counts suggest a strong launch, a closer look reveals a more complex picture.
Wuchang has seen impressive initial activity on Steam, but a significant disparity exists between player numbers and player sentiment.
According to SteamDB, Wuchang: Fallen Feathers achieved a peak of 114,132 simultaneous players shortly after its debut. This represents a promising start, particularly for a completely new intellectual property developed by a relatively unknown studio.
While continued growth is always a possibility, especially over a weekend, the overwhelmingly negative feedback from users on Steam may hinder the game’s momentum. The user reviews paint a concerning picture.
Currently, only around 19% of the 5,100+ player reviews are positive. Such a pronounced divide between player activity and player satisfaction is more commonly seen in live service or online games, where launch-day server problems often lead to widespread dissatisfaction among a large initial player base.
It’s quite unusual to observe this level of negativity surrounding a single-player action RPG. The primary culprit appears to be the game’s PC performance.
Leading up to the game’s release, some players noticed that the published PC system requirements heavily relied on DLSS/FSR upscaling technologies. This raised concerns that the game might depend on these techniques to achieve acceptable frame rates, even on relatively powerful systems.
These concerns were unfortunately validated upon launch, as early players discovered that upscaling is enabled by default. Disabling upscaling, even on high-end gaming rigs, reportedly results in significant performance degradation.
Many attribute these issues to Unreal Engine 5, the game engine powering Wuchang. Games built with Unreal Engine 5 have developed a reputation for performance problems, including stuttering and frame rate drops, particularly on PC.
As of yet, Leenzee has not publicly addressed the performance concerns. However, it is likely that the studio will release updates and improvements to address these issues in the coming months, as has been the case with other recent Unreal Engine 5 titles.
For players diving into the PC version despite these issues (or playing on consoles), our comprehensive Wuchang: Fallen Feathers guide can be an extremely valuable resource. Beyond a general walkthrough and gameplay advice, we also offer specialized guides to game mechanics such as Feathering, and Madness.