‘Black Myth: Wukong’ Director Laments Xbox Series S Issues, Contradicts Microsoft Again

The long, strange saga of why Black Myth: Wukong is still not on Xbox, now four months after its release, continues with a new update this week.

Once again, it seems to put Wukong developer Game Science at odds with Microsoft’s pushing back on the narrative of why the game is not on its platforms, continuing a back and forth that stretches back to August 2024.

This is based on a new Weibo message from Black Myth: Wukong director Feng Ji lamenting that the Xbox Series S’s limited shared memory was “impossible” to get the game optimized for without “several years of optimization experience.” And that has set off this entire conversation again. I’m just going to go through the timeline here:

Back in August, I wrote a piece about the odd situation where Wukong was not on Xbox despite being released on other platforms and instantly rocketing to become a massive hit. Mainly on PC (now the second-most concurrently played Steam game ever), but also on PS5. An initial statement from Game Science said the following about what was going on, citing optimization issues with Xbox X/S.

“We are currently optimizing the Xbox Series X|S version to meet our quality standards,” Game Science said, “so it won’t release simultaneously with the other platforms. We apologize for the delay and aim to minimize the wait for Xbox users. We will announce the release date as soon as it meets our quality standards.”

That could have ended there (which may be back where we are now), but I was contacted by a source (as were others) with very close knowledge of the situation, which was later corroborated by reporting from IGN and WindowsCentral, that this was not a technical issue with the Xbox hardware, and it was due to an exclusivity deal. Others like Jeff Grubb disputed this was the case, and no deal was in place.

After much back and forth, I got Microsoft to state its position on the record:

“As we have said before, we’re excited for the launch of Black Myth Wukong on Xbox Series X|S and are working with Game Science to bring the game to our platforms. We’d prefer not to comment on the deals made by our partners with other platform holders but we can confirm that the delay is not due to Xbox platform limitations that have been raised to us.”

Then, in November, Game File’s Stephen Totilo had the following exchange with Phil Spencer which can be described as cagey, at best:

Game File: Do you know if your getting Black Myth: Wukong on Xbox at some point?

Spencer: I do know.

Game File: Are you getting it?

Spencer: [Laughing]: I can’t announce that.

Now, we are back to Game Science bringing up the Series S, something Microsoft said was not an issue. Here’s the full (translated) quote from director Feng Ji:

“Although there were no big surprises, I still felt a little emotional after getting all of them. Everyone’s fighting power is so terrifying, but the only thing missing is the XBOX robe… It seems a bit wrong (but that’s 10G of shared memory, it’s really impossible to get it without several years of optimization experience) (sad emojis).”

Again, this contradicts Microsoft going out of its way to say it’s not a hardware issue, unless some bizarre back-bending is taking place along the lines of “well it is possible, they just don’t know how to do it.” That would not exactly align with the idea that Microsoft is doing everything they can to make this happen, which is what they claim.

However, no one, not Game Science or Sony, has commented one way or another about an exclusivity deal. This new statement by Game Science, while citing the Series S, still does not comment on any deal or lack thereof outside of that. Microsoft has not openly declared there is a deal that’s left them out, but has made sure its public statements heavily point in that direction and away from potential hardware problems. If an exclusivity deal did exist, as we were was told, and expired or is about to expire, these technical issues may still remain. Here’s Windows Central’s Jez Corden with his own update given this new quote:

All I know for certain is: they told Xbox there’s a deal in place, and Xbox believes there’s a deal in place. I’m reporting what Xbox believed to be the case at least back when I did my original report. They have so far declined to refute that.

The position some (extremely passionate console enthusiasts) take is that we’re all just getting played by Microsoft and they’re lying about what’s happening. There are certainly conflicting statements about the optimization problems, but Game Science and Sony have never actually denied the existence of a deal, past or present. Either way, it does not reflect well on Microsoft that the end result is that they did not the biggest game of 2024 on its platform at launch, and still do not have it now.

I have asked Microsoft for comment on this as this is getting utterly exhausting, and have been told it may take a bit of time for a response due to the holiday. Once again, I will update this when I hear back, and likely make a new piece if there is something significant to say. Hopefully there will be. I have also reached out to Sony and Game Science again, who did not respond when this story first broke.

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Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.