A Brief talk for the Game Black Myth: Wukong from Traditional Oriental Culture Perspective

Author: SHIYA ZHANG

The background of the creation of Black Myth Wukong is actually more worthy of deep thought, because it is derived from the novel Journey to the West, which was written in the Ming Dynasty of China. From 400 years ago to today, this novel has been a cultural treasure passed down by word of mouth by every generation of Chinese people. It is not only because the novel creates the peerless hero Sun Wukong like in the game, who defeats many monsters, but more importantly, it has a deeper meaning. This is actually a spiritual practice novel that integrates the three religions (Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism) under the background of Chinese culture. The journey to the West is not only to go to the paradise where the Buddha is believed in the hearts of the Chinese (like the heaven where God is in the hearts of Westerners) to learn scriptures, but also a kind of thinking about life under Chinese culture. The various hardships encountered by the four masters and apprentices of Wukong on this journey are actually symbolic of the various tests on the road of spiritual practice, such as the obsession with feelings, the desire for longevity, the fear of death, and the difficulty in giving up worldly fame and fortune. All these things have triggered our thinking about life. What is the most important thing, because at the end of life, we can't take anything away, and what is really important is what we can leave for this world, or what we can really change.

The unique Yin-Yang and Five Elements theory in traditional Chinese culture divides the elements of the world into gold, wood, water, fire and earth. These five elements are mutually reinforcing and mutually restraining, and they symbolize five different attributes of power, which correspond to the five internal organs in the human body (heart belongs to fire, liver belongs to wood, lungs belong to gold, kidneys belong to water, and spleen belongs to earth). For example, the birth of the character Wukong, because he is explosive, irritable but powerful, the Chinese classify him as fire in the five elements, which is related to the attributes of the heart. The reason why I connect this is because the novel Journey to the West itself is about cultivating the mind. The golden hoop (wisdom) that Wukong wears on his head is about using higher wisdom to subdue our inner demons, our binary views, prejudices, etc. Each of us who is on the path of cultivation should learn to use higher wisdom to control our temper and emotions, rather than being controlled by them.

This is just part of my opinion on this. Both Journey to the West and Black Myth Wukong contain a lot of ancient wisdom of Chinese culture, which is worth exploring one by one. This is undoubtedly the collision, exchange and integration of Eastern and Western cultures. It can be seen from the fact that this game is popular among GENY&GENZ gamers around the world.

There is no doubt that cross-cultural communication is the general trend of the future, no matter in which industry.

Well, I wish you all a good time, and I will stop here.

#crosscultural #blackmyth#gamification#GENZ#Journey to the West#YINGYANG#TAIJI