The Matchless Kungfu

I originally gave this game a negative review due to a game breaking bug that was impacting controller users, but they have updated it within days of the complaint and now I've spent much more time playing it and getting a better feel for it. This game has a mixture of action adventure, light RPG elements, base building, and a heavy focus on kung fu and Chinese legends. I don't know anything about China or kung fu, but I've massively enjoyed this game so far. In a lot of ways this reminds me of rock paper scissors, Absolver, Kenshi, and EYE Divine Cybermancy. I don't want to say it leans into any particular one of these, because it only really reminds me of those games as opposed to being directly influenced by them. I really enjoy the game loop but some of the other elements are straight up esoteric. I have no idea what NPCs ask me to do regulalry even with a translation mod, some text remains in Chinese entirely, and UI interaction is very confusing. My experience originally was primarily playing with controller, and the combat and movement is very basic and easy to understand. You're basically playing a card building game with rock paper scissors style options with a bit of a variation, and while it's something I usually dislike, I find it enjoyable in how simple it is but rewarding once you figure it out. Some moves counter others, some moves counter multiple moves, all moves can be used in combos and stacked to unlock special moves that have their own associated rules. This makes sense, it's easy to learn, the issue is the rules of these moves are sometimes vague or mistranslated. You'll sometimes run into things like "inflicts heat" and then things "raises stacks of heat" while another says "causes burn status". It's a bit wonky but you work with it and just figure out what it does based on the status icon the enemy eventually gets. It works even if it looks confusing, but trust me it works. I bring Absolver up because this is a melee based game with clear counters, but the format isn't really the same. You still explore and level up and learn more moves, but the combat elements aren't comparable, which I prefer. Matchless Kungfu is a very much it's own melee based combat game, not the kind you run around slicing and dicing, but the one where you ask a guy to spar, or just assault him, and then stack your played moves to slice and dice. A fun thing you can do, level up a move to max level, then walk up to an NPC and click "skill" instead of "battle" to just do an unblockable 5000k damage move and probably instantly kill him then and there. That's partially why this game reminds me of EYE. You can just get insanely strong. Not on your first guy usually, and you will have follow up guys, but eventually. Rebirth and karma are a big part of this game. I know I just said you can one shot a guy with a sucker punch, but you'll get a pop-up saying sin has been added to your karma. I have no idea how to check how much sin I have, but I am unable to make a new character without the game focing me to equip the "ill fated" karma modifier. So I mentioned base building. You get a good selection of building types to make and you can stock them and sell inventory you don't need or want, but later you can also staff these buildings who will like prevent robberies and stop arsonists. How it functions isn't explained very well, but again it works. On that note, you can also lead guys around, why I mentioned Kenshi, but it isn't as in depth. Maybe you can swap inventory with your follows, I haven't figured it out. I gift the guy who got robbed a set of clothes and a weapon, but I never saw him put it on. I did see an NPC that wasn't following me get robbed and eventually restock their outfit and weapon, but never one of my followers. I don't do conclusions. This game is pretty good. In this state, 8/10. I hope to see they keep working on this. To the publishers: I would buy DLC for this game and am interested in future games like this one if you choose to continue the development of this game. To the developers: Very good, I appreciate the quick bug fixes. You have some confusing interfaces, but the overall design and execution is very very impressive and enjoyable. I think this game is very good.