Kung Fu Punk

A massive perk of this job is the travel opportunities that come our way. I love traveling; I enjoy experiencing new cultures and seeing new places, and I love feeling foreign, alien, and comfortably uncomfortable in an environment I’ve never visited. When the opportunity to travel to both Beijing and Shanghai, China, for a week to check out Phantom Blade Zero, an upcoming “Kung Fu Punk” action game from Beijing-based developer S-Game, landed on Game Informer’s plate, I immediately responded to exclaim my desire to attend.

Truthfully, though I was excited for the game, I said yes because I wanted to travel to China, get an up-close view of the game development scene there, and yes, maybe eat one hundred dumplings along the way.

After playing through a roughly a one hour-ish long demo (five times, because it is that good), I’m thrilled to say that while nothing will top the feeling of countless incredible meals and Shanghai’s trademark soup dumplings galore, I left culturally enriched by a country I’ve always wanted to visit and thrilled to say Phantom Blade Zero is easily one of my most anticipated games on the horizon, whenever that sun might decide to rise. The game boasts completely motion-captured kung fu action to create stunningly smooth and precise animations, the likes of which I think will wow even the most ingrained action game fan. Its devotion and homeland respect to Wuxia is fueled by a desire to show not just Chinese players, but a global audience of gamers anxious for more from this massive country, what a Chinese triple-A game can be. And if 2024’s Black Myth Wukong is any indication, with its 25 million copies sold, 10 million of which were sold in just three days after release, players around the world are likely to eat this up.