The action RPG Black Myth: Wukong is already a huge hit on PC and made it into the list of most played games on Steam within hours of its release.
The game, developed by Shenzhen-based studio Game Science and based on the Chinese novel Journey to the West, was released on Tuesday for PC and PS5.
According to tracker Steam Charts, it attracted over 1.44 million concurrent players on Steam within hours of release, meaning it is already the fourth-biggest game on the platform in terms of concurrent player count.
Wukong is ahead of recent single-player hits such as Cyberpunk 2077, Elden Ring, Hogwarts Legacy and Baldur's Gate. Only Counter-Strike 2 (1.81 million), Palworld (2.1 million) and PUBG: Battlegrounds (3.25 million) have ever had more concurrent players.
As noted by a Chinese business analyst on X, Wukong dominated the trending list on Weibo, China's X-style social network, throughout the day, with 6.7 million discussions at the time of publication.
Crucially, Tuesday's numbers do not include players on WeGame, where Wukong is sold in China, nor on PlayStation 5. An Xbox version of the game is also in development, but its release has been delayed.
The successful launch came amid controversy surrounding alleged requests for influencers interested in covering Wukong to keep politics, COVID-19 references and “feminist propaganda” out of their coverage.
Some game science developers have previously come under criticism for making sexually offensive and misogynistic comments on social media in the past.
In VGC's final impressions of Black Myth: Wukong, the game is called “a nice, if somewhat boring, boss rush” and states, “It's absolutely gorgeous and technically powerful, but the gameplay and narrative leave a lot to be desired.”