Recently, I've seen a lot of people discussing "The Hungry Wolves Are Coming" on Qitan. As an experienced player who has been watching KPL for years and enjoys studying game stats, I naturally tried it out as soon as I could. Honestly, this game simulating the survival of wolf packs has a solid foundation, but if you examine its competitive environment and balance from an "eSports observation" perspective, there are several issues worth discussing.
Let's start with the wolf species design. The three basic forms — Gray Wolf, Coyote, and Black Wolf — seem different only in appearance, but in fact, there is a significant difference in initial attribute distribution. Gray Wolves are balanced, Coyotes lean toward agility, and Black Wolves focus on strength. This is reasonable differentiation, but the problem is that the later development system can completely erase these racial characteristics. As long as you spend time grinding attributes, even Black Wolves can max out agility higher than Coyotes, which leads to the meta slowly becoming "who grinds more is stronger," rather than "who makes smarter choices." The worst thing for competitive games is when effort can completely substitute judgment, right?
Next, let's look at the skill trees. In the current skill branches, the Hunting line clearly yields too much benefit, especially the Tracking and Ambush passives. Together, they almost turn exploration mode into a map-running instant kill cycle. In comparison, Social skills are mostly useless in solo play, occasionally useful only in teams. This "over-specialization" directly affects game pace — everyone stacks points in the Hunting route, and there aren't enough rabbits and mice on the map, making the experience poor for players who want to play wolf pack collaboration. If balance adjustments only buff without nerfing, the endgame environment becomes very monotonous.
Additionally, the resource distribution in Hunting mode maps is too random. Sometimes there are three foxes around your spawn point, and other times you walk half the map without seeing a single pigeon. For players focused on competitiveness, this element of luck overshadows skill and decision-making differences. I understand simulation games need realism, but since there are leaderboards and seasonal goals, there should at least be a mechanism for even resource spawning, otherwise early deficits can't be compensated by skill.
Of course, the game is still in its early version, and the developer Beijing Lejie seems willing to listen to player feedback. But I sincerely hope future updates can enhance competitiveness, for example by giving exclusive skills to different wolf types, or limiting the maximum attribute growth, so that each playstyle has space to shine.Otherwise, if everyone trains according to the optimal solution, this game would turn into 'the Gray Wolf family' 😂.
That said, the free cultivation setting does make casual players really enjoy it. It's just that if you want to hold a Wolf King Championship in Qitan now, the balance probably can't support high-intensity matches. I hope future updates prove me wrong.