Genshin Impact has drawn attention for its overall boldness as an entity. This ranged from its overall design to mostly well-intention microtransactions.
Indeed, fans have praised the game for being a rather forgiving “gacha,” or loot-box-funded, game, despite its inclusion of various pay-to-play aspects. But that said, as Genshin Impact continues to introduce new characters and features, its players are beginning to worry it may be leaning too far back into its gacha roots. This is especially true with the game’s latest exciting release, Geo Archon Zhongli.
In short, Zhongli’s release has unintentionally highlighted some of the more unsavory aspects of Genshin Impact, most of which relate to the game’s content design being directly intertwined with its financial objectives. That is to say, at its heart, miHoYo’s hit is able to thrive as a free-to-play game because of the support it receives from players willing to spend money on the game’s “extra” features.
Unfortunately, the definition of “extra features” tends to get blurred, and games like this often eventually lock incredibly powerful or unique content behind paywalls. They accomplish this by making them wholly exclusive to paying players, if not otherwise ultra rare, or only available to the general public some time after their initial release. With the controversial release of Zhongli, a character who essentially goes from zero to The Hero after being summoned 6 consecutive times, fans are being reminded that Genshin Impact may be free to play, but it’s still gacha.
The particular concern with Zhongli is that he is basically a low-tier DPS character until players fully unlock his “Constellation,” something which requires the player to summon the new five-star character at least six total times. Once Zhongli’s Constellation is fully activated, though, he suddenly leaps ahead of nearly all other similar characters, and becomes the damage-dealing beast one would expect of a five-star Geo Archon.
Needless to say, regardless of money spent, the chances of summoning the same five-star character repeatedly are dauntingly low, even with Zhongli being featured on the current Special Character Banner. So in other words, most players would be lucky to even acquire Zhongli as a teammate, let alone receive him from a Wish a single other time. Very few players will manage to summon the new character 6+ times before his banner expires, and those that do, will likely have accomplished the luck-based feat by spending a fair amount of cash purchasing Primogems, which can be exchanged for Wishes.
miHoYo recently responded to fan Zhongli concerns, but their response was seen as laughable by most fans. In essence, the developers insisted that the five-star Zhongli is actually meant to function as he does (that is, as a sub-par pseudo-support), and that players are simply incorrectly assuming that he’s meant to deal insane amounts of damage. This is despite the fact that nearly all other five-star characters completely outclass him, until he’s powered up by his Constellation… at which point, he suddenly outclasses most other five-stars. As fans point out, this presents an interesting, and alarming, pattern.
Again, the issue isn’t just Zhongli. Earlier this fall, Travelers were able to meet the stylish Hydro archer known as Tartaglia, or Childe (or Ajax, actually). Childe sounded the gacha alarms when players realized his Constellation Lv. 6 upgraded him into an unstoppable Hydro DMG fiend. That being said, fans quickly discovered that his movekit actually allowed for an incredibly unique playstyle, even when freshly summoned and void of upgrades. Because of this, Childe is seen as an acceptable five-star release: the character presents a dynamic, unique, style of gameplay, and upon further unlocking their Constellation, players turn them into a matchless powerhouse. The full Constellation should be a superfluous bonus, not something integral to a character’s basic competence.
Now, if at Constellation Lv. 0, Childe lacked the ability to deal massive amounts of Elemental DMG, for example, and lacked his unique versatility, this would be a different story. A story much like the one being witnessed with Zhongli. Bluntly, his shield capabilities are put to shame by four-star favorites like Ningguang, Diona, and admittedly even Beidou, while his supposed ability to perform “crowd control” is severely limited by the lack of significant, or fruitful, Geo Element interactions.
Some fans are speculating that Zhongli may be the first of several incoming characters who utilize Geo reactions in exciting new ways, but again, the fact he possesses the ability to become the literal god that most expected indicates that this is simply a case of paywalling. Zhongli has the capacity to be exactly what people assumed he might be, it’s just tucked away behind numerous layers of complete luck, and probably spending.
To be clear, most players agree and understand that games like this- that is, free-to-play games- absolutely need, and even deserve, a way to make money. After all, the game wouldn’t exist without the blood, sweat, and tears, of countless artists, producers, and collaborators, who all deserve to be compensated. But without beating around the bush: players still expect bang for their bucks. A new five-star Genshin Impact character should be a five-star character from the get-go. A Constellation should take a character’s innate abilities and elevate them in a unique way, if not simply provide admirable stat enhancements. A Constellation should not comprehensively reconstruct a character’s movekit and playstyle, essentially changing their function within a team. This is especially the case when Constellations past Level 1 are generally reserved for high-paying players.
Of course, and again, Zhongli only represents one instance of this, but nonetheless, it’s a rather glaring incident of “disappointing fan-favorite character.” Players were ready to pay for Zhongli (in fact, they did,) and after accepting low summon rates and a rather steep price, they were left with what felt like a half-baked character waiting for maintenance. Given miHoYo’s specific response to the issue, and the fact that the previous character seemed to feature a design somewhat similarly profit-inspired, Genshin Impact fans worry that the developers will simply fall back onto the so-called “whales” supporting their game, so in other words – players who share this sentiment about Zhongli, and the game’s Constellation system, would be wise to make this clear in the survey’s miHoYo conveniently sends players every couple of weeks. For lack of better words, they’re there for a reason.
Genshin Impact is available now on mobile devices, PC, and PS4, and is currently in development for Switch.
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