Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is a new Soulslike adventure from Team Ninja. A spiritual successor to Nioh and its sequel, the game offers a dark fantasy twist on Chinese mythology with a formidable learning curve – and a comprehensive list of release platforms. We’re looking at PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S and the older Xbox One and PS4 machines for today’s tech breakdown. With seven consoles plus two modes each on the current-gen machines, that’s a total of 11 ways to play and perhaps predictably, some options are very much better than others. Series X and PS5 offer the best ways to play, but there are interesting wrinkles in the narrative along the way.
Normally, when we see performance and resolution modes on a current-gen game, we’d expect to see one 30fps option and one 60fps one – but, weirdly, both options run at 60fps in Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty. Graphical settings are identical amongst the modes and both have uncapped frame-rates too, so the big difference is the resolution they target. Performance mode has an internal resolution of 2240×1260 on both PS5 and Series X, while the resolution mode targets 2560×1440. There’s not a drastic visual difference between the two options honestly and the performance mode helps each console zero in on a tighter 60fps lock.
On PS5’s resolution mode, exploration and small battles hit 60fps without issue, but there’s no GPU headroom for more lavish effects work. Fire spells, terraforming moves and counter-attack particle effects trigger drops into the 50fps region, sometimes into the 40s. The game’s cutscenes are also capped at 30fps (with uneven frame-pacing) regardless of mode. Series X’s resolution mode is a similar story, but offers a slightly higher average frame-rate. For both machines, a VRR display to smooth out the uneven frame-rates in this mode goes a long way. However, the performance mode is the better mode overall, as it allows for much longer 60fps stretches and less severe frame-rate dips.
