Star Rail Story Still Doesn't Compete With Honkai Impact 3rd. 

I think you hit the nail on the head when you brought up the lack of consequences surrounding the whole Firefly and Xueyi thing. I think that what makes the most impact in HI3's story isn't even the deaths themselves, it's the fact that the deaths don't mean that a character's presence vanishes from the story. in fact, I would say it's often the opposite! The major characters who die become even more integral to *other* characters' development; they push them onto different paths, change the way they think and approach problems, inform their sense of morality. The people who are passed continue to teach and support the characters still living. Kiana's story would not have gone down the same path if Himeko hadn't become such a persistent source of trauma to her, making her keenly aware of the consequences of everything she does. Mei who came out of the Elysian Realm was pretty much a different person from the one who'd gone in. She hadn't even expected Elysia and the other Flamechasers to become the torch she would carry for the rest of her life. If it hadn't been for those experiences, Mei would never develop an acceptance of Kiana's path, or understand why the world is also worth protecting. The authority of Origin cuts the threads of destiny; it frees humanity to pursue a path that wasn't laid down by the Finality. The pre-ER Mei could have never attained it because she was always reliant on someone else (be it Kiana, the bomb in her chest, Kevin or Elysia) to give her a direction, to control her destiny. It was only after realising all the tragedy in the world can be defied, like the Flamechasers did, that she became capable of facing and overcoming her own weakness. And even the story of Bronya and Seele is also about loss changing you as a person. Bronya's first arc was literally the myth of Orpheus descending into the underworld to bring someone back, only to realise that there was a price to pay. And even though she succeeded, it didn't leave her static or bring her back to the good old times - Seele became the catalyst for Bronya's further development because Seele herself had also changed; she wasn't the same as when Bronya'd lost her. The tw- three of them had to accept that no matter what, there was no way back to the past, but also that it's okay to move on, because one can create an even better future, even if it leads though heartbreak, anxiety and further challenges along the way. The story of HI3 can execute all of these different arcs so well because it *embraces change*. All these arcs, and more besides, were only possible to tell so well and so relatably, because the writers didn't treat the characters like holy cows who can do no wrong or who don't need to learn and grow further. It doesn't introduce its characters as coming into the world fully grown with a massive sad backstory you can read but not interact with. Which... is what pretty much all the HSR characters are. Many of the characters in newer HoYo games are immune to death, immune to consequences, immune even to character development, because they were written from the start to be those... instantly iconic self-contained static packages that can be sold as such. Designed so that the average player would fall in love at first sight and impulse-pull... and then that's it. They can't sell the same love at first sight again, so the factory churns out another one, and another one, and another one... Characters don't develop in HSR because that accursed conveyor belt has to keep moving at the rate of the shortest attention span in the audience. I still have some hope that the two models can be reconciled, that the Express crew and the Stellaron hunters will at least provide a persistent stable of characters who can experience HI3's style of growth but.. that potential may also never be tapped into if they continue to mass-produce those one-off characters and prioritise first impressions over long-term attachment.

*saw the title* "Factual statement...let's read the toxic comments" *reads the comments* "...well I'm pleasantly surprised"

It's definitely the lack of consequences in our actions or rather the lack of any actions at all. Most of the time we were there to witness the story unfold, we don't have any real impact (pun intended) on it other than the final boss moment.

crying again seeing these scenes. It has been some time since I played these parts of the HI3rd story but yeah, it is stil the best story.

This is why I love Zenless way to tell parts of the story, manga based. The facial emotions are there.

While I get what you mean with characters should die more, I disagree on characters should die as a means of having stakes. I think what makes deaths in honkai impact and Cocolia death in belobog impactful is less so the actual death but the aftermath of it and how do the characters move on afterwards. Belobog and everything that happens from here on out is solely due to Cocolia sacrifice and the new found motivations and bonds bronya made from it. Whereas let’s say penacony firefly could die 20 million times but that ultimately will mean nothing because she neither has enough connections to the world or cast for her death to truly have a lasting impact hell her relationship with the trailblazer is rushed to the point that anything they’d try to do should they perma kill firefly in penacony afterwards would really just feel cheap. Every action star rail has taken has felt so incredibly unearned after belobog and with the way they handled planets ultimately would make characters dying feel meaningless because said death won’t impact the story since we’re just gonna move on and replace that cast

Coughing baby vs Nuclear bomb

Tbh the reason why the story is not as good as hi3 cuz they dont have the main villain yet, most of tragedy that happening in hi3rd part 1 is connected to otto

I'm biased, I agree!

ohh yeah buddy I can't wait for your honkai impact videos again

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The problem with Genshin and Honkai Star Rail is that their protagonist is more like a camera, gradually moved by some things, but still in a "traveler-mode", witnessing, but not a main part of it. A subtle sense of alienation. Remember in Genshin, Paimon doesn't even know the traveler's real name(chapter1 arc4)

The problem of all gachs is the absence of the main character. You don't have a person on whose behalf you can look at the world of the game. There is no main character through the prism of whose feelings you can perceive this world, feel that it is alive. I want to observe a person who LIVES in this world, that situations affect him positively or negatively, that he changes throughout history. And passing through this huge, amazing and wonderful world, he projects his choices, moods and beliefs onto you, the player. He has a position and his own beliefs. You can agree with him, or you can disagree with him. That's what makes the plot good. There is no main character in Genshin and HSR, there is only a doll that goes from scene *A* to scene *B*, and then to scene *C*. There is no personal attitude to something. There is no growth throughout the plot. They just exist for convention. Playing these 2 games and going through the plot, you are simply transferred according to estimates that you don't care about. It's like you're watching a play, a movie, some kind of scene with the feeling that it doesn't concern you. The main character has no personal opinion, he is not alive, and therefore there is no plot as such. He does not let his emotions pass through himself into you, does not let you understand that this world is changing, that people around (like himself) are alive. Lol, they don't even have dialogues voiced, the voice is the first indicator of emotions, the mood of the character. In this, no gacha will surpass HI3, because there is a wonderful protagonist who goes through all the difficulties of the world, absorbing its terrible and beautiful sides; changes under his pressure or defends his views; makes choices that affect the whole world. The plot is multi-stage, the universe is huge. That's what a plot means, not a kindergarten. Even the Elysium arch is better than the whole HSR plot, and even more so than in Genshin. Although the plot of Penaconia turned out to be quite good, because it was handled by the department that wrote the plot of Elysium. HI3 there is no white and black morality, each character sees his ideal world, which can only be saved by his methods.

part 2 seems promising , since they got rid of the self insert mc , RIP male dream seeker , nobody wanted to play as you lol. and they pivot back to character building again , the dreamseeker seems to be more integral part of the story rather than just a self insert like genshin's mc. the first few chapters of part 2 , i really thought that the MC wasn't really needed and the story should have focused on the new trio. but i guess they did thought the same but instead they temporarily remove sena and the new trio would be DS , helia and hammer girl. haven't touched wuwa yet , but i did played PGR , the story wasn't good in the early chapters but it had a pretty cool world building , i wanted to explore the other factions like the this one faction is basically a kingdom ran by merchants and their whole kingdom is on a train , how cool was that then we learned that it became like that because their home was destroyed and basically they became nomads , experts in machinery and everyone needs to work basically communistic ideology you don't get to eat if you aren't useful , we see the darkside of that ideology , a lot of people who are hurt or unable to work due to physical injuries or can't work as much like the healthier adults , young kids are malnourished and starving , once you get to the 21's story up to the moonbase it's all great story telling , i just don't like the gameplay is too much leaning on touch screen design , it's very hard to play it on PC because of the nature of it's RNG combat mechanic. hopefully we get to explore pgr's world through wuwa since they are basically in set in the same universe don't know if it's another continent or a different timeline. seeing that wuwa characters aren't machines.

I don’t understand why people who have never played Past 2 say that it’s terrible. They criticize it just by looking at the cover. These people are really pathetic. The only reason they think the Past 2 storyline is bad is that they think the characters from Past 1 will be cut out, which is really dumb. Real Hi3 players know what the Past 2 story is like and how many plot twists there are.

Most of the original cast that aren't expy do not feel fleshed out enough yet. There is a lot going on in HSR, but a lot of it isn't bridged together yet, its like different carnival attractions at a theme park with many different flavors. The big bads of the Path of Destruction need to get their pieces moving and at least start laying out more hints at what is building in the background, because we know the universe is under some sort of threat Elio is trying to counteract, but the crumbs are not giving the audience a proper grasp on whatever impending doom is awaiting us. So far the most incredible things that have happened all seem to be in the past. Glammoth, Acheron's world swallowed up, some incredible Multiversal Hacker, the original journey of the Nameless. Our current story feels like a book drawn in crayons compared to HSR's past lore. We need something to happen in the present that shakes everything to its core and lets us know we are stepping into the next big event that will be flavor text for an Artifact grind in Honkai Star Rail Part 2.

Yea agree, but the most dogshit story line for me out of all their games is probably Genshin, we've been trying to find our sister for 4 f*cking years now, and we're still trying. At least with star rail we don't have such a shitty goal like finding something, we just vibe and enjoy the journey. (And wait for someone to attack himeko...) I've quit genshin now cause it's such a slow story, it's too slow I'm probably gonna die of old age before we get to reunite with the sister, and to top it off every f*king Archron quest is at leat 3 - 8 hours as we progress through the story. And what do we f*king get half the story?? NPC interaction... And Archons that don't provide informations... (except nahida that actually tried) Disappointing. At least HSR actually makes you interact with the playable and upcoming characters there are some NPC interactions, but not too much. And we actually don't even have an end point unless we meet the Aeon of Destruction and fight him. But other than that we can just save planets from Stellarons, unless something big's gonna happen. Even zzz's story is better than this. And I'm 100% sure their gonna do what HI3 did with their story, chill at the start but when you get to know most of the characters they'll hit you with that chapter 7 - 9 feels. (Opinion) My rating for every hoyo games base on story quest is probably like this. Honkai Impact Zenless Zone Zero Honkai Star Rail Genshin Impact

11:00 the one thing I loved about WuWa in the short time I played it was the animations during dialogue, I only played up to Act 4 in 1.0 and I feel like HSR was too puppet like despite having good lipsync, like you can easily tell how every animation is just the same without small variation, like just the same. It's been a while since I stopped playing WuWa so I could just be making shit up

true that star rail misses many opportunities to kill a character off. i suppose it made some sense that someone like aventurine lived bc it goes with his whole “gamble” trope, but a lot of other chances were missed. and not even a death scare for himeko or welt is kinda crazy. i can’t explain but it feels like black swan will be given a chance to be killed off at some point, i wonder if hoyo would take an opportunity like that

i agree with you 100% and thats the issue i have with hi3 atm tbh...i love world building in part 2 but there is so much just fcking standing and yappin about same stuff over and over...i heard they cut that shit down on latest part but i didnt have time to catch up on it yet because THERE IS TO MUCH TEXT xD i get that its introduction to part 2 (need to familiarize with characters and basics of stuff) but damn it can be cut down 50% and we wouldnt loose anything worthwhile (still love part 2 in general)

HSR cannot compete with HI3. I know that HI3 had a predecessor (Houkai Gakuen) so it's reasonable to have a solid foundation. That doesn't remove that fact that the HSR Devs had enough time to make Penacony before 1.0 released (I could be wrong here). Story telling in HI3 has more value than HSR. Cutscenes appear in every section of HI3's story. While in HSR, you're running around while dialogue is yapping. I can close my eyes and I would still remember what they said (even in Japanese/Chinese). It's honestly disappointing how much effort they don't put in HSR. I'm not asking for too much when I want a story, not a filler episode. It's easy to say things are bad. Trying to explain it to someone... that's how I feel in Penacony lol. We could've saved the Acheron storyline as another companion mission. To be honest, Aventurine could've been another companion mission as well. Even Jade's quest could've been one too. If these characters get a companion mission down the line, it's probably because we meet them during our travels. I don't expect anything from the newest Xianzhou questline because Xueyi didn't die so I've lost interest in it's story. It's honestly disappointing to see HSR become a yap session. I want to fight to defend, not yap to defend. Did anyone notice Hanya's voice changing in Japanese? Her voice cracked and it happened when we found Xueyi's dead body. It's either me or it's a bug/mistake in the game.

YUPPEE more HI3rd content, I was losing hope LMAO

Agree with you 150%. I feel like the Genshin and HSR model feels more profit driven (new characters every patch, gotta get the new thing for the new meta). And hey, more power to you: profit = more budget. And HI3 feels like a story wrapped in a game. Like early Valkyries are basically useless meta-wise in HI3, but the game will forever stay in our hearts because of the story, and how deeply we've become invested in the character arc's of a silly little girl who becomes a hero, a stoic warrior who comes to care and share her burden, and Mei who... ... just everything about Mei.

Idk, I'm not interested in comparing stories. Different strokes for different folks. I love slow paced plots and world-building on larger scales with occasional deep walkthroughs into a character's backstory that's part of a deeper faction (ex; adventurine, acheron, firefly). I love Hi3 too, but it almost went too fast that I didn't have time to get super invested into himeko and mei/kiana's friendship because so much of it is outside the main plot or in manga and outside media that it makes it a challenge in itself to fully collect and follow.

Someone said it better: Even tough the title is "Honkai Impact" the story itself is almost never about the Honkai or just Heroes against the Honkai, but instead, it is about how each character struggle to survive in Honkai infected world, and how each of them make big decision and clash their ideas each other.

Small teams make better stories. Small companies have to prove themselves. Hoyo has become bloated with streamlined business tactics and huge marketing budgets. Minimizing effort and maxing profits. The "good enough" approach to player retention and workflow efficiency that most large corporations fall into. Also the HI3 writers and animation team are super talented "artist's artists", and the JP and CN voice actors go above and beyond. (these types exist in the other games but they get compromised by corporate priorities) Dawei himself, told the HI3 writers to do what they wanted. That kind of thing is rare in large companies. You can feel the care these smaller teams had. They were all on the same page. As opposed to a corporate machine where not everyone knows each other; Jumping from game to game fulfilling job assignments. HI3 was lightning in a bottle and every other game owes to its success.

As someone who had played HI3 since the beginning, I agree that the main story beats are better than the whole of star rails story, but giving HI3 a pass for its in game storytelling is looking at it with rose colored glasses. HI3 had always operated like genshin, where every update was 90% limited events, and 10% story. The pace of real story updates was always hilariously slow and janky. 90% of missions besides the intro and outro were pure filler. You'd only get a big finale mission and cutscene every 6 months to advance the plot forward. So, per year, you'd get 5-10 min of cutscenes and maybe 20 min of actual story.

Honkai Impact 3rd Cocolia is still alive though... She's just in Jail for Life... Bronya visits her around the time of Part 1.5 if I remember right...

Just one small correction, technically at least one death happens in penacony, that being Misha. But yeah Hi3rd's story is overall better. The biggest advantage that HI3rd has over every single other hoyo game, and over most other games in general, even wuwa, are the recurring characters. Villians, side characters, the MCs, etc. And even if they don't have to, killing them off makes it all the more effective. Hi3rd Himeko was a completely fleshed out character and that makes it all the more heart wrenching. Genshin, and to a lesser degree, star rail, keep pushing out brand new characters for every patch and that leaves less time to actually flesh em out. Not to mention having anragonists that only last 1 planet/ country. But at least in HSR, the mc is clearly gaining power to do sth, whereas in genshin i got no clue what the mc is doing outside of being an errand boy/ girl.

While I agree completely that Honkai Impact has a better story, and likely always will, I severely disagree with the reasoning of it being because people die. You do not need death to have a good story, Honkai Impact does not rely on death for it's story telling, it's not what makes it good. Yes, it makes good use of character death, but it isn't why the story is good. Honkai Impact is good because we watch the main characters grow. You don't need character death for character growth. Star Rail does not need character death to be good. It just needs better character growth. And it can do that without killing people, plenty of shows and games have done so. You say Firefly should have died, but that would have been a shallow death at best. We don't know her well enough for it to have impact, she doesn't have the same development and characterization as himeko did when she died. It's not comparable. In short, you're right on Honkai Impact being a better story, but your reasoning is flawed.

I think a lot of the comparison falls a tad flat. To be clear, I agree with you on most everything here, so let me explain. Its hard to compare the two games mostly for one big reason. Age. HI3rd and its story telling has had many years to mature and come into its own, while HSR is still in its early days. As an example, you cant tell me that first few chapters of HI3rd were amazing storytelling. It took them a while to lay groundwork, experiment and develop what worked for that game. They went threw a lot of scuff and very weak moments at the start, especially when it came to understanding everything they were talking about. I'm sure that many fans, yourself included, can attest that Chapters 1-4 went by with only really being able to absorb a handful of meaningful topics. It wasn't until they developed things more and added onto it that it really came into its own. You see a lot of this same thing occurring in HSR. They talk often about subjects and topics where you arent really meant to full understand what theyre talking about until they elaborate onto it later. Take the Herta Space station arc as a great example. Stelleron Hunters, Aeons, Eminators, all of the different path names and their meanings. It took a while for them to really explain any of it, but they continued talking about it like it was common knowledge. I don't hate this approach, I actually love it. Because, to them, it is common knowledge, and we are the ones out of the loop. You didn't really have that excuse in HI3rd either. Even in Hi3rd we had many moments where we spent time together with characters and connected with them, only to be completely elsewhere with a whole new cast in the next chapter. Even Kiana herself we lost contact with for several long and meaningful chapters after HOV took over. Again, I'm not saying I disagree with anything mentioned here, but it all also has to take in the consideration of age. HSR still needs time to develop to be given the chance to rise to the occasion. That's why I'm saying comparing them doesn't do much Justice. From what we see so far, HSR is still in the phases of building its foundational layers, even with Penacony. As far as the Trailblazer being fairly insignificant to the story compared to Kiana, You do have a point, but I think this also needs more time to bear fruit. We have seen that they do have a past and a story of their own to tell that is their own, but it has yet to really come up in any real way. I, for one, look forward eager to that moment.

Man, I´m with you, I have low expectations with HSR story, if it get good thats awesome if not... well, who is the next expy and when it drops. like srly, I got much more excited for the expy and things like that than the story LOL Who, know maybe HSR Otto finally do Otto things and everything go to shit and finally the story get good...

The Story in Star rail feels more and more like genshin shit way of telling Story

TBH it's just because hoyo is now a behemoth in gacha genre and became conservative about story plots. Writing important characters dead is indeed an effective approach to character building, story pushing, but also extremely risky in a live service gacha game. It just delivers strong emotional impact to the audience, which are potential or existing consumers of hoyogames. Back in honkai days, hoyo is just a medium size anime game company, and that's when their inspirations truly sparkle. But after genshin's success, they experienced huge expansion on revenue, company size, and of course, fan base. Since they can just grab money by only do children's story telling, then why bother doing risky things? In fact, if firefly was really dead in last patch, those hoyo fans would literally go crazy and shit everywhere in the community. And that's exactly what hoyo doesn't want to see cause the "instability of consumer base" influence their profit potential. TLDR, storytelling gives way to commerciality. Hoyo just don't have balls to write those stories now.

We need higher stakes and more darker motives. I still hold hope that when we come to our next destination things might stir up. Besides in lore it's been only *a couple of months* (which is crazy when you think about it) so it's too early for massive change imho. How long has it take for Hi3 to get to those moments(I think we still have time when we compare 2 games)? Yeah they're dragging main plot. Take for example XIangzou for us it's been a year, and only in patch 2.4 main plot with Ambrosial Arbor seems to shift a bit. I remain hopeful. I'm 100% sure we will see more of Stellaron Hunters, Luocha and Jinliu. One things I agree with you on is they need to work on MC more Stelle/Caleus make them something more than trashcan racoon. I love Stelle as my MC and short moment when they let her talk I appreciate, but I really need more. There is so much untapped potential with our companions. I don't know what I prefer more devs concentrating on main cast during story or what they implemented recently POV change. Both are good and I'm conflicted. Star Rail has to stop printing new chars and concentrate on developing current ones. It's quite sad that chars like Boothill or Argenti feel like filler chars. Luckily they remembered Argenti recently it seems.

I'm really worried about the plot of HSR 3.X, even though Penacony wasn't anything super cool, I enjoyed it. BUT... I'm well aware that it's thanks to Shaoji. I don't know who is working on 3.X story, but I hope it will be cool About Hi3rd part 2 story - saddest thing is that part 2 is unlikely to be as good as part 1, everything in part 2 tries to be like HSR and GI. First arc reminds me of a lecture you listen, listen, listen and the only thing you like is the ending. About technical side - Hi3rd is like an experimental field right now, they still haven't completely changed the UI to the new one and it looks awful, like I'm playing a beta version that should have been developed for another year or two. Locations look weird, the engine can't handle shadows on rocks, trees look like I'm playing Minecraft, their texture is PS2 console level, clouds are the same, rocks too. I don't quite understand what they were trying to achieve when they decided to do it all on an engine which code they themselves complained about and said it was terrible to work with. I wouldn't have a complaint if everything was at the same level of quality as it was in part 1 locations, but in part 2 it looks like the buildings look so much better than the other parts The best quality thing there is Oxia (hub of part 2).

go continue Kiana Final Arc

I got to Elysian Realm Chapter 3 before I stopped playing HI3rd but that scene with Kiana and Mei still gave me feels. I remember saying PLEASE STOP FIGHTING :( while watching that. Star Rail has cool characters for sure, but nothing has hit me hard yet. I think Penacony's pacing was bad towards the end for me because I wasn't caring about what they were talking about while they were in yap mode. It does seem like they're playing it safe on the story part for HSR at least since they're just letting some characters just die off screen. Either way I'll just play till I get bored but at least I don't feel like I wasted my time like with Genshin. Ironic that ZZZ pushed you towards HI3rd again but it's pushing me towards trying PGR lol. I don't even hate ZZZ, but I'm just not in the mood for anything that isn't the combat for that game.

W video

Oh this for sure gonna be controversial. Off the title alone, I can tell. I don’t play either game, HSR didn’t quite capture me and I’ve never given hi3 a chance.

I was gonna say it was unfair for you to compare a finished story to a ongoing story that barely scratched the surface of it yet. But then you made me realize HSR is already 2yo and i didn't even noticed how we barely got to any relevant part of the overall plot of the game, while in Hi3 they already had crazy stuff like the himeko scene. Are we going to keep jumping from one planet to another on these mini story arcs for how long? When will it all connect? Before this vid i was still of the mind that HSR is still too "new or early" to get anything serious. I guess it's because i'm a day 1 player and really didn't notice how long it has been, haha. I wish i could get into Hi3, but all the 3 times i tried the game i never got past chapter 2 because of how mobile-like it feels.

Bro hi3rd story is take 8 year development 💀

Don't forget that the team that wrote the prominent stories in HI3 went to write stories for HSR since Penacony patch, so it can be said that this patch has succeeded under the shadow of HI3, such as the person who played Elysian Realm's Stroy, the player has been with this chapter for a years, making player very commitment with all 13 flame chaser, compared to Penaconi who hasn't been with the player for very long And there is an attempt to make it reminiscent to elysian realm in many contexts.

HSR doesn't have Otto Apocalypse that's why and no Loucha doesn't count.

It's so sad that most of the people will never give HI3 a chance because of the things they've heard from the haters. It will forever remain our hidden little gem.

Another thing you left out is that HI3 has arguably the best songs for their cutscenes, from Befall to De Capo. To this day, I still can’t listen to Nightglow without crying, o7 Himeko, you are missed

...Just want to correct 1 thing. Cocolia is still alive in Honkai Impact 3rd. Just thought you would like to know XD Also good job at choosing to play Honkai Impact 3rd on your own time, gonna wait patientlly for those videos

Star rail suffer from what all newer Hoyo games suffer; the "we need to sell mores chars" syndrome. HI3rd had a story so good because not only the mc was really a mc but all new things to get in the gacha was new versions of already existing characters (mostly), and these new versions was representing the evolution that those chars had in the previous (sometimes actual) chapter. Too much chars means less importance to each char.

BASED. TRUE AND REAL 👏

key difference i guess is that HSR or even GI are more focused on whats happening on every world. Every time the astral express visits a planet, they are NOT the center of the story. They are side characters and the MC are the character who heavily involved in the ARC. While in HI3 there's no left overs. Every time theres a new arc, those lesson learned, experience and events in the past are being carried over to the next one which what makes even the 4 tier side character have character development. Unlike in HSR, Bronya Rand might be the center of the story in belobog, but will no longer relevant in the next planet. Even if they go back in Xianzhou, Midyuan and the gang are back yet they are less relevant bcoz Hoyo need to showcase the new characters for their marketing purposes.

I want Mara and Sky people to actually show up in HSR and annihilate a couple of civilizations, maybe even attack IPC or X-something fleet

Cocolia doesnt die in HI3. She is imprisoned

I agree, I like the game but don't feel nearly the same sense of connection. I feel like out of HI3/Genshin/Star Rail, Star Rail is the one that feels the most episodic, and doesn't currently really have much of a sense of destination yet. I guess part of it is the space setting being so unlimited, which is both a pro and a con. You already covered a lot on HI3 already already, but even with Genshin, the seven nations of Teyvat were revealed since the beginning with that trailer showing a tease of each, so there's a sense with each new country the traveler goes to, they're getting closer to confront the Tsaritsa and discovering the truth behind her actions, Celestia, your Abyssal twin, etc. With Star Rail, the writer is free to just make up whatever the next destination is (they even teased a bunch of new places at the end you never even heard of before). There's so much freedom with the writing that one one hand, they could do all kinds of cool niche places like Penacony, but on the other hand it doesn't really feel like you're one major step closer to something critical. I guess there's discovering the truth to the Trailblazer and March but they're so memey and nonchant that it's hard to take things seriously. Now it's not necessarily a bad thing, and is charming in its own right, but it's kind of like a comfort show like the Simpsons where I just drop in and see what's going down this week and laugh at silly memes (or episodic intrigue like the mystery in Penacony), rather than a tightly written thrilling saga I can't wait to see the culmination of the development built up over years.

Having a strong main character and a supporting cast makes a huge difference, and MHY knows this. Even now in Part 2, when they fooled us all into thinking it was going to be something *completely* fresh, recent developments have shown us that it's all still indirectly connected to Kiana and the Honkai. Another issue Star Rail's story has in comparison is that the story lacks lasting consequences or developments that stay relevant in future arcs. Like, nothing that happened in Jarilo-VI comes into play in Xianzhou, nothing that happens in Xianzhou had any relevance in Penacony, etc... I don't know if Star Rail will ever start connecting its story arcs better, but HI3 keeps doing it, delivering, and surprising us.

16:36 Yeah when I was doing the story and saw Xueyi get absolutely destroyed I was surprised for a good 5 seconds until I remembered she’s a robot and Hanya says she regularly gets destroyed

Yeah I think its fair to say HI3rd's writing is better than HSR's writing. Not saying HSR's story is bad, its still good imo, but HI3d knew how to flesh out their characters which HSR is on track to doing but not really there yet. Anyway cool video might go back to watch the rest of your HI3rd playthroughs to touch up on my HI3rd story or something

Just watched. 100% agree with everything you said. The lack of real character development and stakes/consequences, alongside very little connection between story plots amongst worlds, really does impact on the story quality in HSR. I’m getting a little annoyed at HSR when they keep hinting at deaths in trailers yet we all know it will not happen. I’m not saying deaths are necessary for a good story, but stakes and consequences are.

Hi3 is one of my favorite games of all time. The story is one of the best I've seen in FICTION IN GENERAL, but it does fall off at a point. You can tell the drop in quality, and this might just be me, but I blame Genshin and its success. Honkai 3rd up until ch 25 was the best thing ever when it came to story, but then from the Kolosten arc forward, it seemed to try to emulate genshin. It became more focused on open world and stationary yap sessions (telling rather than showing). After closing the door on Otto, they didn't embrace the same type of storytelling that got them where they were. They started pumping out more characters for the sake of characters rather than the stories the individual battlesuits used to tell. Genshin molded the modern gacha story style, and now people just don't know what we used to have. Part 2 seems to be falling into the same hole, but I really hope they turn it around.

I agree that HI3rd has the best narrative core out of all the top 3 Hoyo games with Genshin being the weakest, Star Rail sits in the middle IMO. Removing all semblance of bias towards HI3rd, Star Rail is pretty mid, not too great nor terrible. WuWa may have some issues of its own but it's visual storytelling is on another level. My TLDR take on this is that I need to temper my expectations with regards to how many gacha game story writing differs in terms of quality, it's subjective. And I agree, the severe lack of stakes really soured the experience.

Im not gonna even watch the video, the thumbnail is enough for me, this is %100 correct, Star rail's story by no means was bad but it was not good either

hope you reach hi3 part 2 first arc last battle, it's pretty good oh and maybe part of the reason the sales didn't get higher is because the arc 1 of part 2 is very complicated and too much information for new players. it's like explaining quantum physics to a preschool child

As someone who played HSR and HI3rd I dare say HI3rd story telling is STILL better than HSR but again that could change in the future so we’ll see lol

Hot take Otto is the reason why the main cast can beat HOD. Thats why he is the goat

Absolutely agree so much. I think hsr and hi3 has one very important difference, a world driven story vs. a characters driven story. Yes hi3 has a lot of lore (sometimes a bit too much even) but at its core, the story moves through its characters and we follow kianas journey. They move the story, but hsr is driven through its world and the astral express crew and the train stops, because of its static main character. It can make for some really cool moments but the overarching story can never be as personal as a character driven story is. And i also think this… static main character is also a hindrance to some of the writers. The honkai impact writers are trying to take over the story but have no idea how to utilize the main character. Imo, i think the self insert mcs in hoyo games have overstayed their welcome. Especially part 2 hi3. Ah i dont wanna get started on it since this is not about it but it also has the world driven problem. Thats all im gonna say. Self insert mcs being static make it so that the story can never become as personal as hi3 part 1 did. Even if characters die, they will have no or little effect on a static mc and thus their death will also not impact the audience, and it will be easily forgotten as it brought no emotional consequence. Like signora in genshin. Im not over that, such a useless death that added nothing.

You are so right! Like when I saw that my friend started playing Honkai Star Rail (I watched her play through most of the game at the time which was like a year ago) I was literally shocked be how there was basically no emotion, I could feel no connection to the characters and because of that I just told her about Honkai Impact 3rd and said she should check it out for the story (I don't think she ever did though). And then this year I thought maybe Honkai Star Rail became better in terms of the story, so I decided to try playing it myself but it was not (much) better then a year ago I think personally. If I made any mistake grammatically or such, please tell me English isn’t my first language!

When I'm listening the songs from hi3 .... I still can't stop crying. HSR not really so bad, but! HI3 better. STORY!

Oh yes finally someone has the balls to talk about star rail story! I will be honest I wouldn’t care about star rail story without the HI3rd references, the direction it has gone in is more genshin story like than HI3rd unfortunately. But ya very happy to hear you will be getting back on HI3rd after a well deserved break!

I do agree with you. HI3 story much better. Hope you can finish the finality chapter and can start part 2 story soon. Part 2 story also quite good but i do feel a bit upset where still no short anime with vocal songs just like we always see in part 1. I really hope they can bring back the short anime with vocal songs.

This Video speaks out of my Soul. I finished with Star Rail around 1 Week of 2.3 left, because it was just so boring. Penacony was for me Sumeru 2.0: 90% boring, 10% interesting, only that Penacony had a actual cool Endboss with a GREAT Soundtrack. But before this cool Endboss you needed to go trough around 1 Hour of Robin and Sunday talking about their definition of Harmony or what it was. After like 2 or 3 Minits I just grabed a Energy Drink and spammed left Mouse Key, to not fall asleep and this Quest was for many the BEST Story ever just because they had a cool Endboss with a great Soundtrack. If this is for many the "New Standard" of what a Super God Story has to offer, then i feel realy sorry for them. As I said under a previus Video from you: Star Rail is just Genshin 2.0 but slightly better. But I just don't want a soft-spoken and easily digestible standard story for the general public. For that we have Genshin. I feel realy sorry for Honkai Impact 3rd, because the Name Honkai is now associated with Star Rail and so basicly Genshin 2.0, which is a Insult for every HI 3rd player. I gave Star Rail a fair Chance (Kafka release until End of 2.3) but when the Space Station (basicly the Tutorial with a little bit of "Endgame) was basicly the best Story, after 3 other big Story Areas and the 1 cool and interesting Aeon (The Black Hole) not appering until probably 6.0 or later its just a waste of time for me playing this Game.

too much text alert dude... i've got more attached to cocona in penacony than the other chars... and she is a FUCKING OPTIONAL MISSION yeah i know acheron being a mei expy carries a lot on her shoulders but either way the only reason penacony was good is because she is an expy same goes to belobog and penacony was not even close to belobog story... i thought aventurine died or at least he will die fighting IX but nah... no one died in penacony... boothill came and vanished... gallagher came and vanished... clock-boy is a pain in the ass imo yeah last battle against sunday was good "power of friendship" but still is not even compared with the battle of kiana becoming the HoFl or Ellie killing the herrscher of corruption now we are in the loufu again... bad doggy is out killing everyone and maybe we can hope at least jing yuan could die or maybe jingliu could appear again... shit even luocha dissapeared hi3rd is not for the braindead even if it is full of fan-service and anime style that could make a lot of people dont want to play the lore is too heavy hsr on the other side got carried by mei (penacony) and bronya (belobog) because we know the background of the chars loufu will be good when hua appears (marshall hua) i still play hsr but i dont even care playing it fully like i play hi3rd because the story of hi3rd still has a lot to offer to me (and the new chapter confirmed something that i thought it was scrapped away by mihoyo and is not a good thing) while hsr story is DECENT with a lot of effort and swimming up trying to breath ps: the two reasons im still playing hsr are 1) welt: he is the only connection to hi3rd and with a lot of creativeness hoyo can pull out a massive PLOT using him hsr + apho3 (or maybe apho4) 2) himeko: i know she will not die in hsr because this will mean "more of just the same" and the only people that could be sad are the ones who played hi3rd because hsr community considers she is a "B tier unit" and "OMG I LOST MY 50/50 TO HIMEKO NOOH!" so yeah pulling a "himeko" is not even worth it

Hi3 will forever be a hidden masterpiece of hoyoverse. Only newgen not knowing hi3 exist 😂

PGR, HI3 and others following the same formula where often a new character is an updated version of an old one will always surpass the Genshin/HSR formula that has distinct regions with it's own cast of characters that are forgotten a year later (sometimes even sooner). I am afraid WuWa will follow the same path. I hope it won't.

I totally agree with u on alot of this but to me i think the main difference between the two is how the story is told with HSR going more the Genshin route, with alot of world lore and focus on regions(planets in this case) and the characters that come from there while HI3 is like a singleplayer game story, focused on a 1 cast for the main story and for events they created the Captainverse to fill the content and it works! I do agree the game definitely could use some more darkness but considering they seem to cater it to a more broad audience it won't ever get like HI3 in my opinion. Its probably also the reason i'm really beginning to lose my motivation to play the game beyond the story stuff, just to grindy and one sided.

I keep saying that Honkai impact 3rd story is uncomparably good to star rail or genshin story and almost everybody just laughs at me and says that star rail story is just too good. The only good parts in HSR story are when Sparkle talks.

For me, the part of Penacony is interesting because there is some connection between Welt and Mei (Acheron), and it's because of Honkai Impact 3. But yeah, I completely agree with you that HSR needs to pace up their story and shouldn't be afraid to follow the HI3 story. Heck, I even want gigachad Welt to sacrifice himself and die or something if possible so our Stelle/Celus and the crew can have character development. I want to see what Otto's clone (void archives) is planning, and I want to see what Luocha is cooking rn...

Well, you're deffinetly wright. Compared to HI3rd all others are to childish e t.c. In HI3rd there were consequences, motivations... Well almost like in real life with real people. In HSR there are not only star rails, but also plot rails. And chars just go on them 'cause it has to be so.

HSR is HI3 lite in terms of storytelling. However, I enjoy it HSR's story, but I love HI3's story. Too add on, HI3 enemies are threatening. I dont feel that in HSR. Herrschers felt like "this could get really bad" and sometimes they would do very bad or scary things. In HSR it's "their power level is over 9000" and you win and its over. Sometimes I feel like HSR trailers are more exciting than the story itself.

Im just happy that legend of heroes was mention in the video.

Glad to see ur coming back to HI3rd. If ur just starting pt 2, just be aware that it takes a while to build up, similar to part 1. The first couple of chapters is a lot of explanations and chara introductions

Yay! \o/ can't wait for your new HI3 content! Oh! Watched for views and duration! #redrosesburnmyeyes

Bruh i thought back then was like someone is gonna die in penecony, it's not himeko(cause that's a lot of people thought who would die) but someone else( i don't want to say anything of who it is cause i don't want to spoil legion if he hasn't read it yet).

2:20 it's the same as genshin The spark of hi3 is long lost due to the fact that babying and marketing your characters as cool figures than properly part of the world There are lots of cool moments in Hsr but it's always too safe Instead of the Mc witnessing the characters we are part of the world and characters revolve around us in Hsr same as genshin which muddles the purpose of caring about anyone beyond a new region They're still cool but they can be much more and more involved, idk if it's just trying to ship out as much as possible without proper developments or callbacks but I'm just not as interested in the story because of it When they try it's cool when they don't it's whatever and that's my reaction, a lot of the new hsr fans don't have to play hi3 to understand anything and I think that is a heavy disservice to building upon an already established foundation Its part of a supposed multiverse but that's lame

16:06 And most importantly if you consider play time in the story then getting to penacony takes much longer than getting to amazing parts of HI3rd.

My dream about AMPHOREUS told me that it will be even more PEAK than Penacony, even the filler arc in Xianzhou right now is better than the main arc, that's when you know they are cooking hard towards something

Nikke W

I will always say that the main problem is that the MC is a typical "Self-insert" character, it saves time to the developers give the MC a proper personality and instead choose to let the players give them the personality they want, it's easier to "empathize" with him/her but at the same time is very difficult to give him/her a character development mainly because of that lack of personality. Stelle and Caelus somehow did manage to fix some problems that Aether and Lumine have (that they are literally walls, with no expressions and personality) but it's still not enough. Even Dreamseaker (MC from HI3RD part 2) is better despite being a "self-insert" character, and that's precisely because the protagonist has voice all the times, there are few moments where you can choose an option of dialogue and they do have a defined personality.

The main difference with self-insert MC and Kiana is their perspective where as HI3rd main focus is Kiana and then spread out toward the cast and the world of HI3, and in Star rail and Genshin the focus is spread out the entire world of the respective games and the Writers have done not so great of the job executing the new story telling medium. They need to better balance between MC building and World building

Finally A REASON WHY I SHOULD ALWAYS SUPPORT YOU BROTHER ♥️♥️♥️😭😭 ( I felt heart broken not seeing you post any hi3 content related )

Your Right Honkai Impact 3rd is better, BUT your wrong about Star Rail. Penacony and the Luofo do have stakes, Sunday was about to trap the Entire Asdana Star System in the Orders Dream and Phantylia would have destroyed the Luofu. The main crew may not be directly involved directly with any planets story but HSR is building up characters from planet to planet like Oda has with One Piece from Island to Island. Elio has the stelaton hunter getting us connected with Xianzhou and others. the HSR team could fail but so far they are doing a fine job and i trust them to Cook something atleast close to HI3rd.

Every chapter HSR has SO MUCH FILLER. Good lord the waste of time that is the first half of every trailblazer quest. But then don't worry, you can go play with clockie or be a cartoon owl whatever for 10 hours...

Did you ever play Honkai Impact Part 2 by chance? People been sleeping on it because Kiana currently not in it but I been really loving current plot. But it has a MC similar to MC in ZZZ now but I believe she has way more dialogue than Trailblazer

Just want to point out DEATH is not the only way to build stakes. But stakes imply a huge change needs to happen. Good example is ironically from HI3rd: Fu Hua story section. Yes big win overal but the events of that arc changed status of a lot of story pieces. Lament is a better exampe but wanted to use something else. I still really like Star Rail's story but I'm a sucker for contemplating what an abstract idea (Aeon) even means. Characters do change a bit through the story but there's nothing drastic yet. Oh and you don't like Star Rail yapping good luck with Impact part 2

Agree with that. I think the Astral Express for example has a lot of potential for more development just like the main cast in hi3.

I thought you will use the example of the elysian realm, where they decide to change the main character to Mei and introduce 13 new characters (14 if you include hoc) and they give them personality and you were able to care about them. (for me the best part of hi3) I think that elysian realm is the proof that HI3 is not only Kiana and the story without her is still peak

12:45 bro, the funniest thing about this is that in the trailers versions they spoil almost all of these 5 seconds of cutscene 😅

Props for mentioning NIKKE. Playing it right now and halfway through the story. It's a treat.

i agreed with you i want more HSR characters died or sacrifice for something like 3rd that so many ppl died in entire history the past and the future in main story, and the last I want villain like otto apocalypse lol

HI3 has the benefit of actually having a main character like the Tuna and her friends, while HSR has the Trash-Panda Express who, often, are just spectators in the story. Granted, HSR's story has just begun. We might see a tighter and more focused story rather than the episodic tale we've had so far. P.S. HI3 Part 2, I feel, is weaker than HSR. A bit too convulated, too quickly for my tastes. 😅

U rite

The funny thing about near the end of Penacony, or rather, all dealing with Sunday. Spoilers for Persona 5 Royal: My brain literally was like: "Dude. This is just a weaker Maruki" Not to discredit Sunday, I like this ideal and concept in general, but the way P5 Royal handled it was just way better. And it was literally because these are all characters you were focused and went on a journey with. It wasn't a constant switch of characters by any means.