Apart from Donnie Yen, the new PV of *Phantom Blade Zero* also revealed these...
Text by Er Ji
On August 12, the highly anticipated dark martial arts action adventure game Phantom Blade Zero launched global pre-orders, releasing an 11-minute-long gameplay trailer. The game is priced at the same level as Black Myth: Wukong, with the digital standard edition priced at 268 yuan and the digital deluxe edition at 328 yuan.
Pre-order prices and configurations
As of press time, the PV's view count on Bilibili has nearly reached 3 million. As what is likely the final PV before the game's launch, the content revealed this time can be described as "substantial and satisfying". In addition to new bosses, new characters, new scenes and new storylines, the end of the trailer also unveils the Lord of Dark Demon Sky Fortress: Moyuan, played by renowned action actor Donnie Yen. Donnie Yen not only completed facial and motion capture for this role, but also has served as the supervisor of Phantom Blade Zero since 2023, deeply involved in the game's creation.
Donnie Yen plays Moyuan, the Lord of Dark Demon Sky Fortress
The new PV opens with the familiar "carriage battle" that players know well, using a more cinematic approach to showcase action details and the exhilarating feel of combat. This scene once appeared in the middle part of the first reveal PV, while the new PV completes the full combat process, including shooting and dodging, close combat on both sides of the carriage, fighting with elite chain-wielding enemies, and finally falling off a cliff. The rhythm is tight and flows seamlessly in one go.
Screenshot of close combat on both sides of the carriage
Among them, the battle with the elite enemy wielding dual chain scythes is the climax of this segment. Players need to fight the enemy in close quarters on a fast-moving carriage with narrow space, making the sense of tension fully maxed out. The enemy's appearance and execution moves use multi-angle and multi-shot switching, fully presenting the character and action details in a cinematic way.
Screenshot of combat with the elite chain-wielding enemy
The PV later also shows multiple clips of boss fights, with weapons including swords, long blades, chains, fist gauntlets and shields all making appearances, each with completely distinct move styles. The art direction continues the game's consistent "Wuxia Punk" aesthetic: the boss's metal armor and gear structures are extremely visually striking. This approach of striking a perfect balance between realism and fantasy has long been one of the unique differentiated highlights of Phantom Blade Zero.
Another highlight of the PV is its narrative. Most of the previously revealed content of Phantom Blade Zero focused on combat, while the new PV for the first time unfolds the overall worldview of Phantom Blade Zero for players, starting to endow characters with backgrounds and emotions.
The world structure of Phantom Blade Zero is quite complex, with the Righteous Alliance, the Holy Mother, and the forces represented by Zuo Shang crisscrossing and playing games with each other. What is thought-provoking, however, is that the one who truly cares about ordinary people, women, children and the elderly is not any of the martial arts forces, but the male protagonist himself who does not have long to live — this contrast itself brings strong emotional tension.
The voiceover of the female lead Mu Xiao Kui points out the core proposition of the whole story: in the entire martial arts world, only "you" will care about the life and death of the majority of people.
Screenshot of Mu Xiao Kui's voiceover
The NPC companions traveling with the male protagonist also follow this design logic: they are not dignitaries or disciples of famous sects, but Xiao Zhang the skilled craftsman, the blacksmith, and the carriage driver who wander around the bottom of society. The two lines of the carriage driver are particularly thought-provoking: at the beginning of the PV, he complains that "if I didn't owe a huge amount of debt, who would want to suffer with the protagonist", while in the second half of the PV, the same person says "it's totally worth it for this carriage to carry you". This transformation makes people look forward to the characterization and character arcs of the protagonist and even the NPCs.
NPC Screenshot
NPC Screenshot
The portrayal of villains does not stay at a simple black-and-white opposition, but focuses on the dark side of the game of forces between different camps. For example, the boss that appears in the trailer once fought for the Righteous Alliance for half his life, priding himself on upholding justice, but his beliefs completely collapsed at a certain point, and he ended up standing on the opposite side of the protagonist. The story of Phantom Blade Zero is obviously not satisfied with a simple battle between good and evil, but deeply explores the relationship between martial artists and ordinary people: once a person masters power, how should they face those who have no power.
The final segment of the whole trailer is dedicated to Moyuan played by Donnie Yen. As soon as the character appears, the music immediately switches to rock style, with distorted guitars paired with a sea of fire scene pushing the atmosphere to a peak, where the protagonist and Moyuan launch a life-and-death fight.
Screenshot of the battle with Moyuan
It is not new for overseas 3A games to use real-life actors for promotion, or even deeply bind the character's image with the actor, and there are many win-win cases. Keanu Reeves plays Johnny Silverhand in Cyberpunk 2077, becoming the most representative visual symbol of the game; Sam in Death Stranding is played by "Daryl" Norman Reedus, forming a deep emotional bond with players; the unreleased Dragon Gang also invites famous Korean action star Ma Dong-seok to play the leading role, and uses Ma Dong-seok's image as the main promotional poster.
But Donnie Yen's participation in Phantom Blade Zero still has its special significance.
Donnie Yen joining Phantom Blade Zero is not to play an experimental protagonist, nor just a simple cameo. Instead, he has served as the supervisor of Phantom Blade Zero since 2023, leading the martial arts directing team "Donnie Yen's Stunt Team" to deeply participate in the game's creation. To a certain extent, he represents the action aesthetics and cultural heritage accumulated by Hong Kong and Taiwan kung fu films over decades, and is one of the important fulcrums of the "Wuxia" core of Phantom Blade Zero.
The depth and breadth of research on "Wuxia" is also one of the core competitiveness of Phantom Blade Zero. During the communication between 36Kr Games and Liang Qiwei in 2025, we learned that in addition to the long-term cooperation with Donnie Yen and his stunt team revealed this time, the team never stopped exploring traditional Chinese martial arts during the development period. These researches based on real history and culture will continue to feed back the content quality of Phantom Blade Zero, helping the game gain global market influence.
Conclusion
2026 will undoubtedly become an important year for domestic buy-to-play action games. At the recently concluded ChinaJoy, the trial play areas of Yuan Gong Sword, A Sound of Autumn: Imperial Guard, and Ancient God: Frisi were all crowded with players; at the upcoming Gamescom, Tide of Annihilation, Showa American Story, and the three aforementioned works will all make appearances, to be tested by the global market.
Among them, Phantom Blade Zero is undoubtedly one of the works with the longest preparation time and the highest R&D specifications, and is called by players the "second-generation college student" of domestic 3A games.
Image from the official website of Phantom Blade Zero
But today's domestic single-player game market is no longer the wild land it used to be, and it is no longer a stage where you can easily seize the first-mover advantage simply by relying on large-scale resource investment. In addition to production specifications and gameplay quality, how to establish a sufficiently distinct differentiation, and how to truly win global players, have also become questions that these works must answer.
Judging from this new PV, Phantom Blade Zero is already ready. What it wants to tell is no longer just a Wuxia story with exciting fights, but to use the new medium of games to re-tell the old saying "A great knight devotes his heart to the well-being of all under heaven" to today's players. The Wuxia theme that has been told for decades can still find its own new expression in today's games.
This article is first published on "36Kr Games".