Age is no reason to ignore a possible source of adaptation like Journey to the West. Here are 5 reasons why it’s still perfect for adaptation.
Adaptations have always been a part of video games. The developers took stories and themes from many sources. Recently, a Chinese developer Game Science Interactive Technology Co, announced the release of a new adaptation of Journey to the West called Black Myth: Wukong. While this isn’t the first time the series has been adapted, it reinforces the text as being perfect for gaming, but why?
Journey to the West was published in the 16th century, and writer Wu Cheng’en is considered by many to be the original writer. The story follows the monk Tang Sanzang as he travels from the eastern lands to the western lands. On his journey, he is joined by Monkey King Sun Wukong. An iconic work of literature that has inspired countless stories, Journey to the West is perfect for video games.
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The world
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The world presented in Journey to the West is a world filled with gods and magic. The lands the group traverses are varied, with towering mountains and vast inland seas. In this world, humans rub shoulders with demons as giants traverse vast valleys. The geography itself is never constant either, with Wukong and the monk traveling through mountains, forests, and deserts on their journey.
The enemies
Video games work if their locations are epic but maintain a level of realism. For example, the giant snake in Sekiro was amazing in part because the area was designed with that in mind. In the few trailers we’ve seen for Black Myth, many different locations have been exposed. There are vast rocky deserts, perilous mountains, and even the clouds of heaven. The locations created in the book allow players to explore perfect arenas.
The majority of enemies Sun Wukong faces in the original are demons, but that’s not as overwhelming as it sounds. Demons are a varied enemy, no two are exactly alike. Some creatures look like animals, some are a living wasteland and somehow in between. Wukong has also, in his own story, faced the armies of the heavens themselves. The battles depicted are magical, action-packed, and as exciting to read as they would be to play.
Powers of a Monkey King
So far, Black Myth has shown several different enemy types. We saw strange animal-like humans, oddly deformed giants, and towering insects. The game’s trailer features a boss fight against a beautifully animated wolf-like creature. The books have a wealth of art that could give the developers a huge library of fascinating and varied creatures for the player to battle.
Sun Wukong in the original text is one of the most powerful creatures that ever existed. Partly through his trickery and skills, he gains immortality, super strength, shapeshifting, clones, a flying cloud, and a shapeshifting staff, to name a few. Part of the story is his constant battle with demons and the actions of the heavens to try to find a way to control him.
Sun Wukong’s Journey
Black Myth gave some insight into the kind of abilities their Wukong possesses. We see him transform into many different forms. We see him create a group of clones to fight a boss and even see him ride his flying cloud. All of his skills would allow for varied and interesting gameplay. Players love having a varied set of abilities, and Sun Wukong certainly has that and more.
Sun Wukong could never be described as just a character. In the original text, it shows various emotions and reactions that could be easily understood and even empathized in our modern times. He’s never really bad, but he has a short attention span and more power than he really knows what to do with.
Familiar, but different
Black Myth didn’t tell us much about the story or the character of the protagonist, but there is a wealth of information available and plenty of ways to show it. If the developers followed the main story, they could show the Monkey King both his most hubristic and his most respectful. A good story requires the character to grow and change, and Journey to the West has that in spades.
Journey to the West is not widely known in the western world, at least in terms of text and story. However, aspects of it have been adapted into many different media that we know and love. An example of this would be Son Goku, who shares many traits with Sun Wukong and is often seen as a tribute to the character. We know the character, but we don’t know him in this form.
This allows developers to show something new but at the same time make it somewhat familiar. The lore behind Journey to the West runs deep, and as such can seem a bit impossible to understand at first, but having recognizable characters can mitigate that. Hopefully Black Myth gives players the information they need while relying on character familiarity to make everything more digestible.
One of the reasons for adaptation is to use a known story and allow people to experience it differently. Journey to the West is one of the major works of literature, and it’s perfect for adaptation, not only because of the world and the creatures it contains, but also because of what it could teach. Black Myth has a chance to show a side of culture rarely seen in Western media, and from what we’ve seen so far, it manages to create an interesting world for players. Hopefully more developers see Journey to the West as the big source of potential new stories.
Keep Reading: After Mortal Kombat, Red Dead Redemption Deserves A Film Adaptation Next
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