Wuthring Waves Notes

re: this whole theme of being a creation and having a heart...

Where was this energy for Avidius?!

Rover's being so kind to Denia because she's a puppet who questions the nature of her existence as a fabricated being. And coming up with these anime-worthy motivational speeches.

Do new quests in Wuwa feel like it’s just walking, exposition, and then cinematics. To clarify, I am not questioning the story, I am critiquing the gameplay.

Remember chapter 1 - we had the Court of Savantae and the time mechanism that we had to solve? Or those floor-is-lava like side missions? Or the banyan tree with the poison that needed to be neutralized? Those were soo much fun. I was actively doing something during the quests. And there were mini bosses or fights as well.

Now the fights are just, you’ll beat sigilum even if your health goes to zero (the game heals you). I’m your average player, sometimes I miss the dodge and get hit. I noticed the game makes it easy for you pass these quests. This is taking away the fun (atleast for me).

When I think about it, this reflects in the overworld exploration as well. Earlier, we had these in-world mini games to find and solve (which we still have) but it’s spoon fed to us? Travel here, boom solve the puzzle. Boom here’s the Soliskin. Boom, here’s the track challenge. Five mins you’re done. Exploring complete in a short span.

Like let me find some notes lying around with some info about the lore. Let me work for it. And not just give me all info after completing 100% of the area. Even finding the chests now is just a jump. 😭

I remember being sooo excited about the banyan tree, the whining aix area, even reinasita had that Fagaceae Peninsula area with that tacet discord that we had to fight after nullifying its buffs (it was a nice change of pace) or that town where there are tacet discords roaming during the night but normal people during the day. (On a side note do these things even have a significance to the story anymore? Like who is that lifer dude at Fagaceae Peninsula? How is it significant to Raguna? Or was it just an exploration thing for the sake of it?)

Or as someone else on YouTube pointed out walking and just discovering that the broken down car is actually a tacet discord in Hualong. That was crazy!! The whole idea that anything could be a tacet discord. Those signal ones, those were a nuisance when I had to do that one mission on blackshores. Or even just climbing atop a building in Guixu to find a note that give me some interesting information. That made it soooo satisfying. Atleast that’s what I think overworld exploration should be.

I don’t like comparing but remember those missions in Genshin where you could explore that Draginspine and find those red crystals which would upgrade the tree, which would in turn give us some rewards. Wasn’t that fun?! I think Wuwa had that at one point - pioneer association which gave us cool utility upgrades. It made the whole experience more tangible.

I don’t hate the bike, ok. But like it just took away from this experience. It just made things too easy to access? And the flight could really have been avoided. I searched sooo many roya settlements and most of them had nothing - they were just scenery with sporadic information (about the lore, the areas culture, Easter egg). And it’s easily missed if not paying attention- which again why would I be paying attention because everything is either being spoon fed OR just some unnecessary exposition - like some project is due and the student is just rambling on about it (Multiple times).

If I had to honestly explain, why even make an overworld at all if it’s going to be not be an integral part of your gameplay. And like spoon feeding is not it.

I am not saying that there is no effort put into the design. But I can say without doubt that it’s really beautiful, and a crazy load of effort must have gone into it from conception to execution. But there are games which don’t focus on exploration but other aspects. Do that and save me space on my device.

I think Kuro games has regularly released patches, great new events and fun and innovative mini leisure games, loads of new characters, areas etc releasing almost every patch. Man, they spoil us. And it takes effort obviously. But like sometimes it’s better to give 100% to 5 things rather than 50% to 10.

I know it sounds like I’m just cribbing/ being harsh. but think about it, I can only talk to so many NPCs before it gets boring because it leads nowhere. The game is not even rewarding me for talking to people (I know there used to be those stars we got if you spoke to some npcs - does that still happen?). It’s not that I am not trying to explore - I found that St. Nikolas guy in the Roya Frostlands and it was such a happy Easter egg? I even made a post about it!! Or that one student and a Roya person discussing science and spirituality (that was a cool conversation).

Take the treasure spots for example. 1.0 had no marker for chests; you stumbled onto a mini game and upon completion, were rewarded with 1-3 chests. With a variety of mini games, it was really interesting and a good challenge to not only find them but also finish them.

2.0 had marked locations and 3-5 chests in the same formulaic gameplay, but even with Sensor it could be tricky actually finding all of them. Not super memorable but a decent time killer.

3.0’s treasure has genuinely not even been a form of gameplay. You teleport to location, grapple up, spin the camera a few times, and bada bing bada boom you get treasure! I leave with zero impression of the environment because I didn’t have to interact with the location at all. It makes ME feel lazy even though clearly the devs are the ones not investing the time.

And I’ve been skeptical of the MSQ and its “quick time” events for a while now. The lack of a fail state is baffling, since you have to HAVE a fail state to even be considered a game. The boss fight invincibility is just another example of that.

1.0 wasn’t that bad. But everytime a new region came up in Rinascita - Boer Waters, Avinoleum, Riccioli Islands, and then the two regions in Septimont. I could see lesser resources, scenery, and probably some echos here and there (which at this point who cares if I find them in the open world, we already have areas which we can travel to and enter the tacet field). Previously, to get a nightmare echo I had to unlock and area and then get fight the boss then I got it. Now it’s another spawn area, that too that I can only once a day ?!

And then obviously the empty land. God I remember running around Boer Waters to see something worth interacting, wondering if I missed anything. Soo disappointing.

Or that dragon skeleton in Septimont, I thought there well be a more to that quest or something would happen with it. But all we got was a shitty two minute thing, I kept waiting for something to happen. It’s was genuinely just scenery.

I can genuinely see the decline every chapter. Hell, they have huge ass cliffs and a bike, make jumping a thing that give you rewards (like vice city). That’s a minimum they could have done.

Or like the time when we were inside the dark side - instead of just walking behind Sigrika and going through portals, Kuro could have actively used those concepts to make puzzles (like the game Portal). Dark side would have been so much fun playing.

Do new quests in Wuwa feel like it’s just walking, exposition, and then cinematics. To clarify, I am not questioning the story, I am critiquing the gameplay.

Remember chapter 1 - we had the Court of Savantae and the time mechanism that we had to solve? Or those floor-is-lava like side missions? Or the banyan tree with the poison that needed to be neutralized? Those were soo much fun. I was actively doing something during the quests. And there were mini bosses or fights as well.

Now the fights are just, you’ll beat sigilum even if your health goes to zero (the game heals you). I’m your average player, sometimes I miss the dodge and get hit. I noticed the game makes it easy for you pass these quests. This is taking away the fun (atleast for me).

When I think about it, this reflects in the overworld exploration as well. Earlier, we had these in-world mini games to find and solve (which we still have) but it’s spoon fed to us? Travel here, boom solve the puzzle. Boom here’s the Soliskin. Boom, here’s the track challenge. Five mins you’re done. Exploring complete in a short span.

Like let me find some notes lying around with some info about the lore. Let me work for it. And not just give me all info after completing 100% of the area. Even finding the chests now is just a jump. 😭

I remember being sooo excited about the banyan tree, the whining aix area, even reinasita had that Fagaceae Peninsula area with that tacet discord that we had to fight after nullifying its buffs (it was a nice change of pace) or that town where there are tacet discords roaming during the night but normal people during the day. (On a side note do these things even have a significance to the story anymore? Like who is that lifer dude at Fagaceae Peninsula? How is it significant to Raguna? Or was it just an exploration thing for the sake of it?)

Or as someone else on YouTube pointed out walking and just discovering that the broken down car is actually a tacet discord in Hualong. That was crazy!! The whole idea that anything could be a tacet discord. Those signal ones, those were a nuisance when I had to do that one mission on blackshores. Or even just climbing atop a building in Guixu to find a note that give me some interesting information. That made it soooo satisfying. Atleast that’s what I think overworld exploration should be.

I don’t like comparing but remember those missions in Genshin where you could explore that Draginspine and find those red crystals which would upgrade the tree, which would in turn give us some rewards. Wasn’t that fun?! I think Wuwa had that at one point - pioneer association which gave us cool utility upgrades. It made the whole experience more tangible.

I don’t hate the bike, ok. But like it just took away from this experience. It just made things too easy to access? And the flight could really have been avoided. I searched sooo many roya settlements and most of them had nothing - they were just scenery with sporadic information (about the lore, the areas culture, Easter egg). And it’s easily missed if not paying attention- which again why would I be paying attention because everything is either being spoon fed OR just some unnecessary exposition - like some project is due and the student is just rambling on about it (Multiple times).

If I had to honestly explain, why even make an overworld at all if it’s going to be not be an integral part of your gameplay. And like spoon feeding is not it.

I am not saying that there is no effort put into the design. But I can say without doubt that it’s really beautiful, and a crazy load of effort must have gone into it from conception to execution. But there are games which don’t focus on exploration but other aspects. Do that and save me space on my device.

I think Kuro games has regularly released patches, great new events and fun and innovative mini leisure games, loads of new characters, areas etc releasing almost every patch. Man, they spoil us. And it takes effort obviously. But like sometimes it’s better to give 100% to 5 things rather than 50% to 10.

I know it sounds like I’m just cribbing/ being harsh. but think about it, I can only talk to so many NPCs before it gets boring because it leads nowhere. The game is not even rewarding me for talking to people (I know there used to be those stars we got if you spoke to some npcs - does that still happen?). It’s not that I am not trying to explore - I found that St. Nikolas guy in the Roya Frostlands and it was such a happy Easter egg? I even made a post about it!! Or that one student and a Roya person discussing science and spirituality (that was a cool conversation).

Take the treasure spots for example. 1.0 had no marker for chests; you stumbled onto a mini game and upon completion, were rewarded with 1-3 chests. With a variety of mini games, it was really interesting and a good challenge to not only find them but also finish them.

2.0 had marked locations and 3-5 chests in the same formulaic gameplay, but even with Sensor it could be tricky actually finding all of them. Not super memorable but a decent time killer.

3.0’s treasure has genuinely not even been a form of gameplay. You teleport to location, grapple up, spin the camera a few times, and bada bing bada boom you get treasure! I leave with zero impression of the environment because I didn’t have to interact with the location at all. It makes ME feel lazy even though clearly the devs are the ones not investing the time.

And I’ve been skeptical of the MSQ and its “quick time” events for a while now. The lack of a fail state is baffling, since you have to HAVE a fail state to even be considered a game. The boss fight invincibility is just another example of that.

1.0 wasn’t that bad. But everytime a new region came up in Rinascita - Boer Waters, Avinoleum, Riccioli Islands, and then the two regions in Septimont. I could see lesser resources, scenery, and probably some echos here and there (which at this point who cares if I find them in the open world, we already have areas which we can travel to and enter the tacet field). Previously, to get a nightmare echo I had to unlock and area and then get fight the boss then I got it. Now it’s another spawn area, that too that I can only once a day ?!

And then obviously the empty land. God I remember running around Boer Waters to see something worth interacting, wondering if I missed anything. Soo disappointing.

Or that dragon skeleton in Septimont, I thought there well be a more to that quest or something would happen with it. But all we got was a shitty two minute thing, I kept waiting for something to happen. It’s was genuinely just scenery.

I can genuinely see the decline every chapter. Hell, they have huge ass cliffs and a bike, make jumping a thing that give you rewards (like vice city). That’s a minimum they could have done.

Or like the time when we were inside the dark side - instead of just walking behind Sigrika and going through portals, Kuro could have actively used those concepts to make puzzles (like the game Portal). Dark side would have been so much fun playing.

however, i do have some gripes about it. like the fact that the whole Aleph-1 arc was only 3 patches long. unlike the Leviathan arc. that lasted 7 whole patches. 3.3 was really rushed ngl, i wish the Aleph-1 stuff was drawn out more so characters had room to breathe, build up more to it so we had a proper long fight with the cosmic space demon posing as a Threnodian. i'd have liked it if we had Rover finding a few things inside Aleph-1 while looking for Aemeath about their past that Aleph-1 had eaten - if Aemeath could find stuff related to things the cosmic space demon ate then why couldn't Rover?

also, kiiiiinda annoyed that Rover's past is so heavily intertwined with Lahai-Roi. didn't the dude MAKE the Black Shores? you'd think there'd be more people who knew him besides Shorekeeper and Camellya there that could sprinkle in some Rover lore. like what was he like as the head honcho? but sure, ok whatever. the whole Denia thing was suuuper rushed and ya'll can't deny that. the Threnodian Resonator Denia reveal needed more time, both to explore it and to "resolve" it. the reveal was sooo rushed. that definitely needed more time, especially to be a bigger threat.

there's just so much story stuff that was rushed. like why add Chisa in the finale of the Aleph-1 arc if she wasn't going to have any lines? and that one line she got outside of the cutscene doesn't count since most people would already be running to go complete the quest, so they (and i) end up missing it.

also FOR GODS' SAKE KURO MAKE THE SHAPER PLAYABLE!!! his design is so fucking good like, IF HE WAS GONNA BE A NORMAL ASS NPC JUST MAKE HIM MORE BLAND or looking more like those other top Roya people, so much detail for a model that ain't ever gonna be used. like, you just established that he can leave his glorified prison so it's not like he's perma stuck there.

Honestly, for the first time I was sooo bored playing a patch. I was even tempted to skip all the dialogue (at one point I just tapped through Hiyuki and Lucille’s conversation and quickly read the whole thing at the end. That too because I didn’t want to miss out on something relavent).

Also, does it feel like quests have become us just walking/running and dialogue, there is really nothing more to it… I miss when we had more mechanics and mini games and ofcourse fights. I literally had to push myself to complete the last two quests.

The only thing worth mentioning this quest is Denia - last patch her characterization left me confused, because if they were setting her to a villain (or someone who is being used) they could have done a better job. Eg - cristoforo; or the whole arc with Lupa (With C pulling the strings) and even Carthetiya’s whole struggle (I was going to say the whole Augusta wanting to sacrifice herself arc but it really isn’t their best work. good but could have been better. But atleast I was emotionally invested in it and the story). Even, Nivora was better. And she seems to be working for the Fractsidus. In retrospect it might be because they can’t keep pulling a nivora again and again. It loses its novelty. Let see where it goes, hopefully Kuro has better plans for future.

Also, about Hiyuki, not that she’s a bad character, but at this point I feel so disappointed with the story that I am not really excited for her. What made it worse was the really boring side quest where we help that black shore girl out to know more about Hiyuki. God if not for the free astrites I wouldn’t have done it. I’m left that dissatisfied essentially.

Personally, this whole story quest/ chapter 3 peaked at Aemeath and Luuk and things have been going downhill since (in part because of kuro’s money making schemes but more on that in a minute).

Kuro might as well, cut down on the amount of quests per chapter and give us quality and a good chunk of time… honestly could have cut down on sigrikas quest and made it a character story quest. things don’t feel cohesive anymore to me but hopefully things take a turn after the anniversary quest release (kuro could have totally not released a new quest and focused on the anniversary thing 🤷‍♀️. Id not be upset. Kuro has been so good otherwise, don’t know what happened here)

So here’s a little rant (also this goes without saying I am your average player not the best at fights, and there are so many times I rely on my key smashing skills to fight a boss 🤷‍♀️😂)-

It feels like Kuro is slowly more focused on making people just give them money irrespective of the quality of content. Don’t ask me how rare it is to pull characters you want. Every time i am 100% going to get atleast one character from the normal Convene (that too after multiple pulls…) why are normal characters a part of the pool?! (Weirdly same applies for weapons)…

We now have hyper specific teams (you can’t play a particular character without their specific support) and most of the times even the healer. Not to mention all these characters release back to back, sometimes even the same patch. Fun… 🤩

And it’s become increasingly difficult to build your echoes because you’re not going to get the crit rate/dmg etc. percentages to even play the character. Their solution introduce something like a modifier which is again difficult to get without money.

And if that’s not enough, you can’t play the character without their weapons… because again it’s so difficult to reach the percentages otherwise. Moreover, you need to pull a character multiple times to unlock their best damage (s3 even in some cases). It’s so frustrating, I stopped playing Genshin for this reason and now this?!!

Honestly, I could do we a couple of characters and story quests less and more of better story.

Don’t get me started with how annoying it was when Luuk came out. He had so much potential. But Kuro decided to not give him a dedicated sub-dps (when that’s all they have been doing). And he has shitty crowd control. He then he comes out immediately after Aemeath (how many players are going to have astrites left after that?!) and immediately around the time of this release they subtly release info on the anniversary characters?! Worse part of the whole mess was clicking the wrong video on YouTube and ending up seeing gooners celebrating how much of a failure Luuk was and Kuro should learn a lesson🙄

It’s so rare to get a male character, even rare is that they are relavent to the plot and not just there in the background (Jiyan being the last one). They did jack shit with Brant.

cn wuwa posted a new content about luuk and this caught my attention. this message is pinned at the top of all of his messages and this was years ago and it says:

"everything at the academy is going well, so there’s no need to worry. the students are as enthusiastic and interesting as ever. the snowy scenery is also very beautiful, perfect for relaxing. how about you? have you been well lately?"

...and the red "x" said it was "failed to send"