If you’ve ever wanted to step into a classic wuxia movie and start cutting through bad guys, Burning Sword: Death Sun is ready to hand you the sword.
Nomadic Games and Rising Tide Publishing have released a brand-new demo for their fast-paced wuxia hack-and-slash, and it’s free to play on Steam right now.
Made by a 25-person team in Bangkok using Unreal Engine 5, the new demo gets straight to the good stuff: fast, precise swordplay inspired by classic wuxia cinema.
You play Zhang Yixian, leader of the Crimson Dust Demon Sect, who has returned from the edge of death with revenge on his mind. His target is Gao Tianqi, master of the deadly Death Sun poison and the most powerful man in the martial world. Getting to him means fighting your way through plenty of masters who would rather see Zhang stay dead.
Combat is built around a handful of flashy but meaningful abilities. Build up the Burning Sword to make every strike hit harder. Use Qi to unleash powerful attacks, drain your enemies’ life force, or launch blasts from a distance. You can even grab objects from the environment and hurl them at enemies using Rebound.
And then there’s Qinggong, because apparently ordinary running and jumping just isn’t dramatic enough. Wall-running and floating through the air let you move around the battlefield like a proper martial arts hero.
The new demo also introduces light roguelite elements, giving you different ways to approach each attempt without taking away from the game’s skill-based combat and difficulty.
Throw in a skill tree, brutal boss duels, masked assassins, chain fighters, and plenty of sword-swinging chaos, and Burning Sword: Death Sun looks like a promising new take on the wuxia action genre.
The demo is free on Steam now, so if fast swords, flying martial artists, and revenge stories are your thing, this one is worth putting on your radar.
