The Problem With Genshin Impact's Characters 

I. Hate. You. Alex. YOU JUST HAAAAAD TO USE ASTOLFO HUH?

If anything, the fact that we're able to recognize the characters just by their silhouettes proves that they *don't* all look alike, despite sharing just 5 base models.

You forgot a third category: the fun one a perfect example of this is Sayu, She is easily the weakest anemo character but a lot of people enjoy rolling around with her.

One of my biggest worries is Imagine starting genshin in 2023 or so when like Natlan is fresh and new And outline a Natlan character while your still doing the 4 winds temples with the Amber Kaeya and Lisa. A character from a far off region you can't access, that requires those materials to ascend and make useful. It'd be annoying, I would know, I started during Ayaka's banner and pulled Yomiya before I even started the Liyue Archon quest. Thankfully the test run gives enough mats for the first ascension, so I wasn't too put back. But imagine that with late game nations, it'd be infuriating for newer players, basically getting shafted and unable to use their cool fun units because they haven't made it to the end of the story.

I try not to be meta hungry with this game so there are two things that mainly determine wether or not I get a character: 1. If I like the design 2. If the character looks fun to play

I think a good powercreep is when a character is a sidegrade to an existing character. A good example of this is Kazuha and Sucrose. In terms of em buff, Sucrose is actually better but Kazuha is so much more comfortable and smooth to play and does double swirl. We can say Kazuha is better but there are teamcomps in which Kazuha cannot replace Sucrose. In a taser team comp, the best variant of it is sucrose being the on-field driver if you replace her with Kazuha it would not be as consistent as he only swirls with e and q while sucrose can swirl with normal attacks.

If they added a third ability for the new 100th level cap and maybe add a new development team to exclusively change up old characters passives or balance the abilities of new characters so old characters can still compete, this game will remain popular for double whatever is expected

10:00 The wonderful thing about a game like this is that you can throw in random characters pretty frequently without breaking the whole continuity. Rosaria is a prime example of this. While Rosaria was featured in a quest beforehand, she didn’t really.. do anything. You could replace her with any OC your mind can conjure up, and nothing changes. Slap Pallad in her place in that story, and it still works the same way. Give them a cameo in another story quest (not even an archon quest!) to establish that they exist, and then release them later. Itto kind of did the same thing with the notice boards. We didn’t know what he looks like, but he definitely existed before his reveal. Let’s skip ahead a few years to the (presumed) release of Varka. Varka took all the other knights with him on this big mission. MiHoYo could make literally every character that was gone playable at some point with NO ISSUE. As many characters as the company wants! There are ten(?) captains, but who knows how many others were with them. If people are sick of knights, maybe a medic they picked up along the way, a lost adventurer that became a guide, a prisoner they rescued, etc. Add some more characters from the church, who knows how many there are. Liyue has close to the same amount of potential. We don’t know how many adepti there are. We don’t know what goes on in that tearoom. Maybe there’s an elite squad of milileth soldiers that consist of five playable characters! The fact is, *as long as there are things we don’t know in these original regions, MHY can add as many new characters as they want.* If they don’t give us numbers, we can’t disprove the existence of another five knights or ten other adepti that we’ve never seen. MHY can milk those OG regions for a LOOONG time with no issue whatsoever.

@1:05 "I'm aware everyone looks the same" Anyone else except me able to easily identify every silhouette because the characters actually don't look the same and have their own distinguished features?

I totally agree. Despite being a PVE, the lack of resources forces you to build the naturally good characters (meta team comps). Yes, you can level up and build everyone. But not all players will painstakingly grind to level up Amber or Xinyan. If the resin system is better or the artifacts rng is better, I think we will see more diversified playstyles and teams. Heck, you hoard all your fragiles until AR 45/50 just because they are so scarce. That speaks volumes about the game's resources.

I think Gouro and Itto are their attempts in adding more diversity to the cast. I wonder if they will split the character utilities by region? Because right now Inazuma characters seem to be more focused as supports: Baal, Kazuha, Kokomi, Sayu, Thoma, Gorou, Sara. (that's 7) with only 3 DPS scattered in it: Yoimiya, Yayaka & Itto. Whereas Liyue is the opposite. It's DPS heavy, there's 9 Hutao, Ganyu, Xiao, Yanfei, Chongyun, Xiangling, Keqing, Ningguang, and Maybe XinYan ( 10 if you count Childe as a Liyue man) And Support only 4: Zhongli, Qiqi, Xingqiu, Beidou (I will not count Shenhe and YunJin in here because they haven't been launched) (Also I know Xiangling and Beido can be used as both support and DPS so I just put 1 in each) Mondstadt seems like a hybrid because it's the place you start at. I assume Dendro will be more of an amplifying roster like Bennett. And Cryo region will be more about debuffs. Kinda went off topic but, as for new characters, there's still none I'm 100% attached to. I need them to have the character model like, be the element I want, use the weapon I like, and have an engaging play style. So before that comes out, they have a lot of combinations to go through, and I think that alone will keep me hanging in the game. That could just be me tho. As there are way more Waifu's to chose from (28) compared to husbandos (only 13 launched as of now). So I'm kinda forced to wait. :/

Gorou and Itto actually give me a lot of hope for the future of Genshin’s character design, because they open up a new viable playstyle. Mono-Geo teams centered around defense scaling with Gorou as a support look like they’re going to be meta team comps, and new Geo characters that fit into that will be relevant. I think this is the right direction for Mihoyo to take- creating supports and main dps’s that enable/require new playstyles and types of team compa rather than just being stronger replacements for older characters. I also think Dendro could help a lot with this if it has strong reactions!

10:00 Well it seems Mihoyo thought of that which is probably why Grandmaster Varka and the rest of the knight captains ( we know there are 10 from Kaeya's voice lines ) are away on an expedition so they could be released later ( 7-8 new characters depending on if Jean is a captain or not ) . As for Lyue they can make the rest of the Adpti playable in human form since we know they can shapeshift .

I think a big problem is mihoyo released too many op characters in the first few updates (like Ganyu and Hu Tao), and they're trying to remedy that and avoid powercreeps by making more balanced units. The problem is that a kind of opposite powercreep happens. Why pull for Yoimiya when Hu Tao can basically do the same thing, but better? Why use Thoma and Sara, supports with very specific niches, when you can use benny, who will heal, give an atk buff, and deal good amounts of dmg. I'm glad the newer characters feel more balanced, but compared to the older characters balanced feels underwhelming. And looking at Shenhe's leaks, it look like this trend is continuing

Recent characters show there's not even remotely an issue (yet) of characters having to play the same but their kits are sometimes to niche or just plain weak to want to use them. Yoimiya would be much better if she didn't have ICD issues on her e.skill and honestly she is quite unique. In fact, none of the skipped characters have issues of being too similar to someone else, just too weak.

Being stronger isn't the only way to make new characters with appeal. Recently, Genshin has been taking steps into niche building. Evident in 5 star banners that have corresponding 4 stars that work great with them. Like: Raiden + Sara, Hu Tao + Thoma, Itto + Gorou. It's another way of power modelling that decreases the likelihood of "power creep" since people would like to play general-use characters or their favorite characters in the overworld while using niche-specific characters in specific-character needing content like the abyss. There may come content in the future like 100000 years from now that needs a Physical DPS, you have Eula (Razor, Jean, Xinyan, etc), content that needs you to spam bursts, you have Raiden, content that needs a Geo DPS, Itto (noelle, nigguang, etc), content that you need tons of healing like corrosion, Kokomi (Barbara, Jean, Qiqi, etc.). In a sense, characters will technically never be power crept as long as content will be dynamic and character-specific which needs niche-specific characters.

Regarding new mondstadt characters, there's still Varka, Alice etc. and I think they will release them if the story will go back to mondstadt orrr just make a new plot then insert it to the overarching story then introduce new characters. Games like this are easy to insert a plot or a story in, much like this upcoming Yun Jin and Shenhe. For the reason that, they were never mentioned by anyone in the first place, then out of the blue they updated voicelines of existing characters mentioning these upcoming ones. I wouldn't even be surprised if they introduce or instert a new plot and characters in the existing regions in the future (more like a filler episode in series or animes).

I just gotta say, I got kokomi on my alt as a meme and she is surprisingly fun, and since i use my alt to play physical jean instead of healer, she is actually useful, so I believe there will always be a community that will love even the most underwhelming of characters.

I think the reason so many later characters got skipped is cause leaks got out of the next banners - because of this players thought it would be better to save up for the seemingly better character but often by the time the banner rolls around the character no longer seems as appealing (Course this is just my opinion as a F2P player)

I suspect they will simply give us either expanded or specialized versions of existing characters for which we also have to gacha (maybe like in Honkai Impact). For example, Noelle when she becomes an official Knight, Albedo after he looses control, Lisa when she stops being reluctant about being way stronger according to lore than she's letting on. They're also pretty much confirmed to be adding new weapon types. Dendro might not even be the only upcoming new element type.

Feels like more of a reverse Power crept situation honestly, there are some characters that are basically irreplacable like Bennett.

Honestly the biggest problem I have with characters is the lack in diversity of body types. I just wanna see a bit more creativity going into a new character rather than just the normal 5 different body types they have. Also they should reduce the weapon banner pity to like 50 or something.

8:02 this is one of the things that has bothered me the most. I've always been an alt happy person and Genshin is very restrictive when it comes to that. I had a lot of fun equally leveling many characters to try things out at 1st. But that did stretch resources very thin and as my WL continued to rise fairly quickly. Difficulty spiked and I had to start to focus on a few units. I'm fine enough now, but I had to leave quite a few units behind or just untouched. Wish there was more wiggle room with resources. The urge to pull for new characters has diminished for me personally because of it.

I think the new charas feel more and more skipable because Mihoyo actually kept their word. If I recall correctly they said that the big 3 will be as far as powercreep goes and for now they did not lie.

for me, the supports will more future-proof than damage dealers. I haven't played FGO for a quite while now but when I was still actively playing, it's always the supports that dominates the meta (Merlin, Waver, Skadi). I think for Kazuha, Bennett, and Zhongli (probably also with Xingqiu and Raiden) they will still be relevant in the future. Probably, the healers will also rise. But regarding mhy's reverse power creep thing. I think it's their lack of attention to character balancing. I am also wondering why is it that there are characters who have icd and there are some who don't? Why does melt and vape able to utilize stats other than EM while other reactions can't? Sure, the reactions are out of the box but istg it's so unbalanced. I won't be suprised if the next "overpowered" character have high multipliers and no icd. Also, once dendro will be up, I think it will make or break the game.

I get the feeling that Mihoyo is too afraid of creating another Bennett, Xingqiu, or Xianling.

Element "Theme" definitely exists but I don't think it's a bad thing. There isn't an Electro character with a heal, even in constellations, YET. By not having any Electro healers yet, that niche is still free for a future character to fill, so it ultimately helps them craft new units. They get to hold their cards basically by introducing creativity limiters. There's also been theories and leaks relating to a new weapon type. Weapon type ends up being a huge difference for characters. Take Shenhe for instance, who won't have access to Sacrificial set bonus where other similar characters will by not being polearm users. The only real issue in my opinion is the lack of resources which prevents a player from building as many characters as they'd like to. Compare Genshin to a game like Warframe for example where you can relatively easily level every Warframe. That simply won't be possible in genshin unless they add farmable content. As for region power creep, Mihoyo already showed us how that's likely going to work. Eula is probaby the last "new" Mondstat character (outside of characters like Alice who we haven't met), but there may be variants like in Honkai. Characters like Lisa and Kaeya will likely get 5-star variants later on. This doesn't break immersion because we know those characters are powerful in lore, they're just hiding their abilities.

I don’t necessarily think some of the points you brought up are actually that concerning. I think miHoYo is very conscientious of the risk of power creeping and I’m pretty sure they’re aware that they kind of screwed themselves over in terms of balance with the big Liyue 3 (Ganyu, Hu Tao, and Xiao) and the 3 “broken” support units (Bennett, Xingqiu, and Xiangling) ever since Inazuma dropped mhy has definitely pulled back a little on the power levels of most of the characters and because have “the next Bennett” would actually be pretty bad since Bennett is already so universally OP. That’s where I think miHoYo is trying to open up niches for new characters like Gorou with DEF scaling geo characters, Sara with electro characters, Thoma with his refreshing shield (which should be buffed imo). So far, miHoYo has actually mostly done a good job at making all the characters unique. People where saying Yoimiya was “the next Amber” but their play styles are so vastly different that you really can’t compare the two. I think Kokomi and Barbara can be seen as the exception to this but even still, while they have similar kits they both feel different to play whether it’s as a support/healer or a dps. Similarly on the point of the characters fitting their element too much I wouldn’t necessarily agree. Each element has its own unique function but I feel like there’s enough variety that that’s not really a problem. Anemo is all about crowd control but Xiao or Sayu essentially have none of that. Hydro kind of focuses on healing but Mona, Xingqiu, and Childe really don’t focus on that at all. Geo mostly focuses on shields but Ningquang, Albedo, Gorou, Geo MC, and Itto don’t have reliable means of getting a shield. Electro is kind of a mixed bag but I think mhy is trying to go for a focus on energy recharge but Razor, Beidou, Fischl, Keqing don’t focus that much if at all on ER. Not sure exactly what cryo is about but there’s a wide array with Ganyu being a DPS with support options, Diona as a healer and shielder even though they’re both cryo now users. Not to mention they’re in the process of introducing a new element Dendro along with elemental reactions that aren’t currently in the game and we really don’t know exactly yet what Dendro will specialize in. Sorry but I would also have to disagree on the point of visual design to some extent because on that part miHoYo has so far done a good job at making each character feel distinct and unique in terms of visual design and personality. However there is a pretty common trend with all the characters feeling a little lukewarm and subdued as like a “default friendly” but Arataki Itto seems to be shaping up to be a refreshing breath of fresh air with him having a little wild and aggressive personality. Shenhe and Yunjin however do concern me a little though… Shenhe looks like she could very well be another strong but elegant “waifu” character with a unique quirk to her personality (I hope she’s well written though). Yunjin looks interesting enough and doesn’t obviously scream Geo but it looks like she could have a similarly dramatic quirky theatrical personality as Fischl (maybe not as whimsical though). But we still don’t know that much about them so it’s a little too early to say. One thing though that I think mhy could definitely do more of is having more body model variety (looking at you Arataki Itto) They have npc models that aren’t used for playable characters which I think they should really start using but that’s just me. I do think Genshin does have the risk of power creeping but I think they’re very well aware and taking precautions to avoid that. Personally I don’t think that currently (as of 2.3) that they’re at a risk of character design plateauing but that’s just what I’m seeing. I think character design is one of the things that Genshin Impact excels at (at least compared to other similar games).

I disagree with Thoma's concept as a defense Pyro character being the reason he isn't picked. The main issue is that he's outclassed in his role as a Pyro support and a shield support. Pyro supports are pretty great as they provide energy particles, resonance, and application for VV shred for Pyro DPS's. For other DPS's, they can provide Pyro to set up Melt or Vape. Thoma can do all of the above and also provides survivability through his shield, but so does Bennett in the form of healing *and* an enormous attack buff. Since Bennett does everything you would need Thoma for but better,, the only situation where you'd want to slot Thoma in instead of Bennett is with Hu Tao or if you don't have Bennett. As a pure shielder, he's outclassed by Diona who can heal and Zhongli who has the best shield in the game and other benefits. He's better than every other shielder arguably, but that's not saying much. If Bennett didn't exist, Thoma would probably see much more usage. But, as a Pyro support he's outclassed significantly by Bennett, and as a shield support he's outclassed by Diona and Zhongli.

Great video! One thing I wanted to add is that Genshin needs more permanent challenging content other than spiral abyss. This is already a problem because a lot of people have OP teams and nowhere to really put them to full use other than the abyss every 2 weeks :/ I feel like this is going to be a big downfall of the game and a lot of players will leave if they do not address the endgame problem soon. They will always be attracting new players, but this is definitely in their best interest to add a permanent event/game mode that offers some form of challenge to keep players around and keep players spending money. Just FFS no PVP....unless it is like the windtrace event (party games and such)

instead of just powercreeped bennett, i want them to release units that do his job better, but only in specific situations. he'd still be a great universal support, but in certain comps you'd prefer someone else.

I personally find something that keeps genshin interesting is building new units and team comps, that and events, Its a non issue, people will pull for new designs and playstyles. I think a lot of people are easily swayed by meta until they realize its more fun to pull whoever they want. i imagine as the game continues people will seek more unique playstyles and kits will become more niche. because genshin's gameplay is repetitive to the point you sometimes have to find your own fun by doing things differently.

I see what you're saying, but I am more optimistic. The characters we've seen so far were all designed a long time ago, so now that they have all this sales data and player feedback, miHoYo may now be working on more creative designs than they were before. We'll just have to wait and see.

I don’t quite believe that your first point about design overlap is going to be a problem in genshin because of exactly the example you stated about Kazuha and Sucrose’s similarity. Yes they share design overlap but there are nuances that make you want to choose one over the other, Kazuha’s CC generates from the center while Sucrose triggers swirl with her NA. Kazuha’s burst infusion is incredibly reliable while Sucrose’s burst has a stronger pull. Kazuha strictly buffs Elemental damage, a welcome addition for Freeze and mono elements while Sucrose is a better buffer for elemental reactions, making strong elements even stronger. And even then, it’s not even a bad decision to roll for Kazuha because spiral abyss needs two teams, if sucrose is that good then why not have two sucroses? It’s why I don’t quite perceive the design overlap as inherently bad because there is already proof that similar design philosophy can shine differently because of little differences across the board not just in genshin but also in other games.

When he mentioned powercreep, i think its a good point to mention that genshin handles this concept far better than so many other titles ive seen with this issue

10:25 well yes, mondstadt is the first region where the bosses would be slightly easier since new players are learning how to play the game. When you get to inazuma (which you have to be a higher AR), you should already know how to play the game and build your characters. If the late game bosses are as easy as divalin and whatnot, it would probably be boring af

Well i can assure you that mihoyo doesn't do pump and dump, their first popular game "honkai gakuen/gun girls Z" was supported for well over 10yr even tho global release was discontinued last year, CN is still playable even tho the story is done 3-4 yr ago

I mean, if they want they can just lean toward a mono team, like the upcoming update with two new geo characters that look like will work best in a mono geo team

Edit: Adding in that even if I had not played the game and didn't know any of these characters, I would be able to tell all of these characters are completely different characters based just on their silhouettes. I showed my mother the silhouettes and she knows fuck all about this game and even she could tell them apart. Get outta here with this lame ass "you can only tell because you know/play the game" that is not how this works bro. If the silhouettes were bad, even if I played the game I probably wouldn't be able to tell them apart that well, or it would be harder to tell who each character was lol The image of the character silhouettes actually show how good the character design is because I can tell which character is which based only on their silhouette. I could name every single one of them and have zero issues distinguishing them from each other, and being able to do that just from a characters silhouette is a mark of good character design.

I don't think the characters are that visually similar. I was able to identify all of the characters when you showed their silhouettes.

Imo, the recent new characters seems like it was made for older player in mind. I’ve played since xiao’s banner but i have to say that i genuinely enjoy the new characters because they don’t exactly follow the previous characters mold. It gives me new experience on playing with different teamcomps that’s not the ‘best’ in terms of meta but is still very good. The only ‘meta’ that everyone has to follow is building the 4* support units (bennet-xq-xl-sucrose-diona) and then you can basically pull for whoever you like.

This topic is not that interesting to me, but I think GI will follow a path similar if not the same as Honkai. In Honkai you have two attacks too, but they made the building (what would be artifacts and weapons) more complex, that made it go from relative simple, kinda like genshin, to yugi oh levels. I think that will be their route. The other thing, I think they will "re launch" old charas. Hokai has a compact roster of charas, they are released in new costumes and with new abilities, so you have Kiana, Kiana of chap 4, Kiana that is hos, Kiana of the last chapter. I think they will re release new units and updating them according to story progression.

Actually, there are currently 2 additional Talents that some characters have. An Alternate Sprint and a Passive. No, not the 2 Ascension Passives and the Utility Passive, the Passive named Passive, the only one of which is Kokomi's Flawless Strategy. So they're evidently experimenting with adding in more stuff into character kits.

I'm gonna be honest I've literally never heard someone say the characters look the same? like the silhouettes shown were really easy to distinguish. but aside from that really cool video!!

I would say that right now they are on the last characters and ideas that were designed using the Alfa and Beta builds as blue prints and they are now moving to the experimental phases on all elements, character design and team building. Kokomi is the first odd stat character, Toma its a focused defensive pyro and Goro its the first in the line of the mono element teams. So i wont be surprised if in the future we see a healer/shield electro, a full field DPS hydro (Childe doesnt count because of the super CD he gets the longer he fights he is a kick swap character) or mono anemo teams... but before that they must get to work on the Hydro issue on the: Number of units and the garbage resonance (seriously that is the only resonance that no one is using) But the first big changes that might or not kick start the power creep will come when Dendro its introduced which will shake the gameplay a lot, for better or worse. We need to see how they pull it off. After that its a Hail Mary on how things will go... but if i have to make a wild guess... there might be a 4 man mono element resonance and hybrid element characters.

I think another big thing to look at is, "How will new player experiences change as the game reaches the end?" At this point, Spiral Abyss is the definitive DPS check and end game. We've hit Inazuma and our max level cap is at 90. There's nothing that'll show we'll go beyond those ascension, and using a crown feels pretty finalized for stat increases. How would this be addressed? More world level increases? Raid (8+ member) co-op domains? Extra artifact slots like earrings? Maybe even start adding a huge cosmetics library too Look at a game like Maplestory that effectively reached "The End" and we can see there's so much more that can be implemented and revamped. With as little as we know now, there's no telling how it'll go. Good video!

Can we talk about how scary and uncanny Klee's, Diona's, Qiqi's and Sayu's silhouettes look like scaled up to an average model's size...💀🤕

One thing that I felt when I was still playing that could contribute to the repetitiveness of character designs was the number of weapon types. I having one or 2 more types would improve greatly the possibilities. Gauntlets/gloves , dual daggers, sword and shield, even guns (there were some Fatui that used guns no?)

Yeah, I have to disagree with your assessment, here. I think you are being unnecessarily pessimistic about the game's future. First, powercreep is not inevitable. One of the games you mentioned, Magic: the Gathering, has done a fine job avoiding it. In fact, I think it can be easily argued that the most broken cards in the game came from the earliest days of the game. The fact is, game balance is always most tenuous at the beginning, because the dev team lacks experience designng for the game. As the game matures, and the devs get more practice, they can tighten-up their designs and reign-in some of the variance in power levels. Obviously, mistakes will be made, but the idea that power must always continue to rise is false. There are plenty of reasons to pull for new characters besides power level, especially since Genshin is not a hard game, and the devs have explicitly stated it is intended to be a casual experience. They want people to pull for waifus/husbandos, not to clear content, and thus they do not intend to make characters stronger just to make them more appealing. The devs have given every indication that they intend Genshin to be a long-term investment, and every game dev knows that powercreep is toxic to a game's longevity. They have already reached critical mass of popularity and sales, they'd need to intentionally sabotage their own game to kill it at this point. They could never release another update, and they could still keep enough players to stay in the black until they choose to unplug the servers, that's just the nature of live service games. You can be certain that they have no intention of poisoning their cash cow, especially not through such an obvious, amateur mistake as powercreep. I also think you severely underestimate the scope of unexplored design space available for Genshin character design. Again, collectible card games are a perfect example of this concept at work. Most individual cards are fairly simple, with even the most complex having to fit their text legibly into a limited space at a human-readable font size. Even so, games like Magic have only continued to grow in popularity and sales, with libraries of 20,000+ cards, many of which literally do the same things, but in subtly different ways. Those subtleties can make a huge difference in application, and the nuance of team design will only become more important as the roster expands, and future content generates new niches and unique playstyles. We are currently seeing the game at its most simple--complexity will only grow along side our options. Just look at how optimal strategies have shifted and evolved in games like Fate/Grand Order over it's years of updates. Characters that were once considered outrageously overpowered are now mostly unimpressive as new dominant strategies have arisen with the introduction of new mechanics. Just look at Venti, as an example. He was once the most broken character in the game (and I would argue, remains such, from an overall design standpoint) but newer content has been designed specifically to counter his abilities, making him far less dominant than he once was. Sure, he's still utterly irreplaceable in his specialty, but the challenges the game offers have expanded such that such a specialty isn't as game-warping as it once seemed. Top-tier characters don't always remain top-tier forever, and their exalted status doesn't necessitate designing new characters to directly compete with them. Especially since every new 5-star is limited, so they have complete control over when and if those characters are available in the game. I mean, I have Ganyu, but I am still excited to roll on new ranged DPS characters, just for the novelty. Most people don't buy new characters just to fill party roles, there are plenty of other ways to make a product desirable besides marginal utility. Just look at any waifu tier list, most purchasing decisions in gacha games are not strictly rational. Overall, the gameplay of Genshin is still in its infancy, and it's easy to assume that the game will get stale if nothing significant changes. But no developer worth their paycheck would allow such a successful project to stagnate such, and miHoYo has proven many times that they are more than happy to experiment with new game modes, mechanics, narrative styles, and just about everything else. The days when the only fulfilling execution challenge is Abyss 12 are not going to last forever, and there will most certainly be countless new subsystems, such as player housing, fishing, hang-out events, roguelikes, tag-team tournaments, and such added to the game to provide new use-cases to design characters around.

New units are not really more skip now than before. Klee was always at least as bad as recent "skips" if not worse. Xiao is about as much of a must have as Qiqi given how specific his good teams are and how little they do that other teams don't. I think there's still design space to last a while but I think some characters, mainly Bennett and Xingqiu do so many things so well that its physically impossible to ever make a sidegrade to them without power creeping them. The day 1 op characters are a bigger problem for genshin future than the limited amount of abilities.

I've been watching you since I started playing ROTMG back in the day, and now that I'm a month-old genshin player, I really appreciate that you're making genshin content for us to enjoy

10:00 the main reason we are mostly getting inazuma characters instead of mondstat is because Mihoyo is trying to even the character pull. Similar to the xiangling being the only polearm from launch.so i dont think they erase mondstat from either possible New characters or lore. The second part i want to discuss is the characters following their elements too faithfully part. Each element are connected to their archon. Although there are some outliers, in the end they still fit very well. Mihoyo may be the embodiment of a box of problems, at least they make really good character designs. Powercreep is a common issue that most games have, and that includes genshin. However, theres nothing stoppin Mihoyo from changing or adding New things without nerfing strong characters. RAZOR GANG RISE UP XD

My theory for future gameplay: In the future characters will gain either a second vision or a secondary weapon. The vision theory is based on Kazuha using an electro vision. The secondary weapon is based on Childe using a bow when he knows how to handle other weapons. I could be wrong but this would help reducing the amount of characters and make old ones relevant again.

Mostly agreed. The only thing i disagree with is that Thoma and xinyan aren't picked not because they're more defensive, but because they're straight up sh*tty. Thoma's shield and ult scaling is horrendously low and xinyan's shield doesn't work as intended either. They could be good units, mihoyo just doesn't give them okay stats/doesn't fix them.

Pleasantly surprised when I ran into your channel! TY and keep up the good work!!! :D

it’s funny you mention powercreep, seeing as mobile players are currently experiencing storagecreep.

Mihoyo has been doing a fine job expanding power horizontally by creating more niche characters (ei. Gorou and Sara) that open new teambuilding options for veterans, they're just perceived as unpopular because newer players need a stronger balanced roster while approaching end game content. Of course a lot of the problems in these niche kits come from their constellations but that's a new issue with how hard Inazuman character damage spikes with their later cons. Judging on how they're releasing skins for current characters (instead of summer alt versions of them) I'll assume they'll continue to provide support for the early roster in the form of specialized weapons/artifacts like with Albedo's Cinnabar Spindle weapon and Kokomi's Ocean-Hued Clam artifact set, especially if they time it with their rerun banners.

Honestly, I fell in love with genshin a year ago because of how incredibly unique the gameplay is, with reactions and how varied the bursts and skills felt. It’s so exciting to think of all the weapon types with each element and how even the same combos could play completely differently because the normal attacks are all unique. But inazuma has been a ton of reused ideas. Another pyro polearm, who’s also a pyro shield, another pyro bow that had issues, another gel claymore, did I mention that there’s way too much pyro yet?? Cause there is. It’s so infuriating cause they have the money and they have the ideas set up, but here we are

Okay, so the sword of Damocles was actually this story: there was a Ruler named Dionysius, who had the luxury of being the ruling class, so he had a lot of food/prestige/etc. One day, Damocles tried to call him out saying he was resting on his hind quarters in a life of luxury with no troubles, so Dionysius decided to say fine and demonstrated how his life was. He gave the guy a bunch of food/women or whatever, but there was always a sword dangling above his head by a single hair from a horse's tail, and Damocles eventually stepped down due to the ever-worrying threat of the sword falling and killing him

Some great points are mentioned in the video! Powercreep is even expected nowadays (e.g. rumored Itto > Noelle C6). However I think the actual design problem is that there is still no endgame content. Stronger characters are coming out, yes, but endgame has become so easy that there is no real point in getting said stronger characters. I know this mostly applies to high AR players, but pls hear out my example. (My pov is a welkin player.) Albedo is considered one of the less poplar characters in terms of damage (meta). I pulled him at the start of his re-run and dumped 15 fragile resin into the new domain. The drops were terrible (45%< Cr + 80%< Cd), his new sword was R3 and I could still clear abyss 36 with him as sub dps just three days later. Ofc I'm using other characters I've built over the year, but this just shows that endgame really is easy if you've been playing for a while. After Abyss, there are no challenges left. Endgame is not sustainable. Of course I'm speaking from a meta perspective - this is definitely still a "pull for waifu/husbando" game. I just wish that it could be more, because it has the potential to be more. Aside from not implementing some mmorpg elements (like guilds), I don't understand why they can't even keep a minigame like Windtrace in the game. Right now, if you ask any players who have stuck around since launch what the biggest issue is in Genshin, I'd bet 90% of them would say "no content".

I really don't agree with some of the points you raised in this video. Your first point about each character only having two buttons is a fair point, but I don't think it's that big of an issue since the design space can be expanded. They can release characters/content that cares about other things like having shields, multihits, or something else. And technically, characters do have more than two buttons if you count their normal/charged attacks, though that's less relevant for some characters. On your point about elemental themes, it's really more about genshin content being solely focused on offense. Thoma isn't used not because he's a defensive pyro character, but because he's a defensive character. The defensive characters that do see play usually does so because they provide other utilities in a team (Diona sees play because she can battery other cryo units like Eula, Ayaka, or Ganyu. Thoma actually sees niche play in Hutao teams because he fills the role of both shielder and pyro applier in one team slot). You even mentioned Barbara in the segment but neglected to mention that people don't actually play barb for difficult content except for very specific scenarios. (Edit: Though thinking about it again, I can see some concerns about design space and characters feeling similar when looking at the pyro dps roster, they're mostly the same, vape based with xingqiu, with some difference in their gameplay) Then on your point about overpowered regions, you mentioned that the game will powercreep to the point where old region units won't be as strong as new region units, but you then countered that point by listing the characters they've released and mentioning that the inazuma units are very skippable. I actually don't understand what point you're trying to make here. My thoughts on power creep in genshin is that it's inevitable, especially after seeing Honkai's power creep, but so far I actually think Genshin's power creep is managed fairly well. The strongest dps in the game so far is still Liyue units like Ganyu, Xiangling, and Hutao. I actually kinda worry that with the recent nationalization(?) of Mihoyo, I half jokingly think that they won't powercreep Liyue units because they somewhat represent China.

I'm feeling more of the reverse power creep in character power level generally - Yoimiya, Klee, Diluc, etc I woulf argue to all be about the same 'value' on an account. Kokomi is situationally strong, but it's just due to the lack of access to Hydro characters (off-field characters are incredibly valuable). Sayu is nice for overworld travel and getting crystalflies. Thoma is just on the weak end. Raiden is strong but has clear weaknesses (which is what most DPS kits have been geared towards over time)

I just found your channel and its all I ever needed in my life. Your voice is so amazing too!

4:12 there are still more options from the controls, although we may go into 2D fighting game territory - Directional input or lack thereof before activating the ability (like standing, moving, and aerial attacks) - Childe already has a bit, but essentially stance characters that change almost completely if you hold a button down; a character could use held normals to change stance if you don’t want to take up the skill slot for it - Similar to the diving attack, you could add some action if you press the skill or burst button while sprinting

What I was shocked about was the elements that genshin took into account to change, there doesn't seem to be a foreseeable limit on character skill and gameplay. The fact each character has it's individual style of hit combo, shows a lot of variability. Whether the character is going to be meta, depends on what the community likes and how usable the character is. There are a lot of things mihoyo can improve tho

Addressing specifically the point about bossed becoming tougher, that actually makes sense from a game development POV. A lot of power comes from artifacts and at the start no one really had good artifacts. With time people got better gear and naturally bosses also became tougher and more interesting. It seems natural.

Excellent piece. Food for thought: your perspective was heavily based on meta game play, but within the million of players Genshin has and billions of dollars it makes, how much is hardcore meta and how much is waifu seeking casuals? To tell the truth, I'm a little bit of both, but leaning more towards the latter. If Genshin introduces a character that has 1) respectable game play 2) great design and 3) a good background/story/personality, I'll pull for it, no matter if its place (team building wise) is already filled by others. Do you think this could be enough to keep the game going?

There are characters from explored regions (i.e mondstadt) that have not been introduce yet like Varka, Jean's and Barbara's father, the Adepti's human form or their apprentice like Shenhe. As for region mob balancing well they could easily say that the abyss experimented on the hilichurls or abyssal monsters popping out. I totally agree for the third active skill at level 100 to add variety to existing characters and change team comps.

Honestly I’ve been worrying about this for a while It feels as if some characters will become completely irrelevant when a few more regions come out based on how the game is

Just started the video and regarding the character design-imo a good character design is when you show a silhouette of a character’s splash art and you’d be able to identify them. Their splash art still has so e variety in their proportion compared to in game model since mobile players (like myself) is already struggling in loading up genshin lol. Imagine if they decided to add more body types 😂

About what you mention at 8:10 - I'm so sad to see so many of my characters being left with unleveled artifacts and still below level 50 because of lack of resources to level them up. If I could I would love to play them all and switch up the gameplay and figure out new team comps, but it's not worth the few resources. So many of my first 4* are amazing but simply because I only had a few characters in the beginning to play and focus on and I would level them up and figure out their playstyle and strengths along the way and just enjoy the development of the gameplay. Now it's all about farming for the next 5*... If Genshin could somehow provide us with more resin in-game through idk domains/weekly quests (like bounties, requests or even a domain like the abyss that gives resin instead of primos) I would definitely focus more on incorporating different characters into my team - no matter what tier they supposedly are.

Fantastic video, thank you very much! :) I sadly am very concerned for the game's future as its ambitions seem to be too big to last a few years.

Watching videos like this as a long-time gacha player is weirdly comforting. It's nice to see new videos keeping everyone educated about the inevitability of powercreep and staleness. Genshin is my 5th gacha game in about 7 years, I think? None of the previous ones I've played have yet gone down, but they've all succumbed to the usual. The best ones, however, added content that thwarted the powercreep: modes just for fun, tournaments with set teams/stats, incentivising using outdated units, etc.

They should introduce something like rank up quest like in fgo or speciality change from epic seven

I also thought of this but you made it explain very well!

Well looking at Shenhe I don't think Genshin will suffer from power creep. More like reverse power creep where the new characters are hyper niche and even then average. They also kinda stopped buffing characters in the beta. Look at Yoimiya, Komomi, Sara, Thoma and Sayu.

Hopefully the rumors about a new weapon type coming could bring up more gameplay options

The game suffers from reverse powercreep, new units tend to always be weaker than past units (like every shield character past big dong zhong, or support after Bennet)

I like how you assessed this. I can use this when creating my OC.

I'm glad you talked about the actual complexity of each character's kits and how engaging gameplay is within them. Most people discuss how meta or cute a character is, but my number 1 priority is how enjoyable a character's gameplay is. More and more we have characters like Hu Tao, Childe, Yoimiya, and more that give up one of their two ability slots just to buff their autos. This basically means that they are missing an entire ability, as those buffs offer no engaging gameplay on their own. I really hope to see more characters like Keqing and Eula who use their autos, skills, and bursts in a very fluid and dynamic way, giving you multiple options moment to moment and most importantly forcing you to make decisions! These are the kinds of kits we need to make an invidual character's kit more engaging, and I don't feel like the new characters have reflected this.

For a follow up video idea, I would love to see “ways mihoyo could prevent genshin from staling” or something along that line

and yet I see people complaining about certain characters being "too niche" like do you want powercreep?? I personally love "niche" characters I think it's interesting and they have to have some variety somehow

Yeah I agree with pretty much all that you said. As much as I enjoy exploring the regions we have, waiting years to get to another region is going to probably grate my nerves and it would be cooler if perhaps we could start exploring new regions sooner or having some more interaction with them but who knows what they have planned to counter that-- but having concept art sneak peeks will only go so far lol. And I hope they slow down with the new character releases so people have more time to breathe with leveling up who they already have/exploring options they already have but never had the opportunity to try out? I never really go for damage but more so personality/lore of the character but even I want more diversity with the characters mostly in terms of models

I'm sure there will be something of an Awakening system for old units later down the line.

I understand that this wasn't the point of the video but I kinda felt the comparison between Sucrose and Kazuha wasn't very fair. Even though they are both anemo characters with field control abilities that group enemies into a tight cluster their kits have undeniable variation from one another due to their difference in focus. Sucrose's burst first sucks weaker opponents towards the epicenter and then deals anemo/swirl damage while knocking said opponents into the air without further drawing them towards the center. In contrast Kazuha's burst deals damage + additional damage if it swirls and leaves behind a field that deals continuous anemo damage with no additional field control effects. Sucrose's kit is more focused on field control and buffing allies by triggering swirl reactions while Kazuha's kit is more focused on sub dps with a bit of field control mixed into it.

While I generally agree with most everything said, I don't think it's a bad thing for some characters to overlap roles. Many people will always follow the meta and certain characters will always do a better job than others. But if every character was a must pull, then the game would be frustrating for those who can't pull every banner or didn't start day one. Like for me, I missed Zhongli's banner(s) so whenever I see a tier list or a guide that puts him in a team with other characters I own I get a little sad but I know that I can use other characters to replace him. (Don't get me wrong, I know he's best in slot and will pull on his next rerun) so I don't mind if we get a variety of characters that fill the same role. But MiHoYo really should try and diversify their character models. It's not a deal breaker for me, but I would like some effort put in. (And is it too much to ask for a male electro friend for Raxor?)

I started Genshin on release but quit then re-started multiple times but never stuck to it. 2 months ago i started for good and the only 5* i had was Ayaka. I was stuck with a lvl 20 Ayaka as my main char until i Inazuma.. my first 5* from pity was Kequeen and she actually does work very well with Ayaka and is actually way more fun. Now 2 months later i'm nearly 100% on the map, few days away from AR 50 and still the only 5* i have are Ayaka , Keqing and now Mona (for which im happy because she fits my team + shes a top waifu). I've explored the world with the same few chars that i had from the start and even if i get new chars that i do want i will barely have any reason to play them. What they could do is - they could release a 2nd permanent banner which requires different wishes (that maybe can be a choice between standard wishes and new type wishes) and the new banner can have every single 5* released up to date at the same time. I think the reason they dont want to add existing chars to standard banner is in case people have hoarded a lot of wishes for a potential scenario like this but the 'proposition' i have here goes over this. I think genshin would be a better game if chars were more accessible

Yeah regarding the element and character difference over time I actually think they will do double elements eventually and new weapons. They also maybe could make other elements like maybe light and dark when the game progresses in the story more, this probably won’t happen but it would be cool. Oh and one more thing, they totally could do higher ascensions for older characters to keep them relevant. For example when you get them to maybe like level 100 they could do another ascension thing and get a skin as well as a new passive possibly upgrading their element skill or burst. It’s kind of like another constellation but you don’t need to spend money and it’s cooler.

I use Thoma all the time, at C6 it's almost a 100% uptime on his shield and buff. I wish people gave him more of a chance

The only 5* I use is my C6 Ayaka. I skipped Kazuha and most others, and have no regrets. My goal is to have one C6 5* DPS for every element, and that makes it much easier to save up and keep skipping. Itto is also a skip for me. Players are sweating over this *casual* game far too hard. Just go farm Artifacts, get your mats and upgrade your character for them to be good.

I feel the need to point out Sucrose focuses more.on crowd control where as Kazuha focuses more on actually swirling for damage.

the editing and the way you spoke kinda remind me of Exil. i love it.

The character design is the biggest reason for me playing Genshin. I'm a husbando collector and I don't mind them being similar body type because that's exactly why I love anime. Diverse character design is an illusion these days so I'm sick and tired of people critcising the game in that regard. The biggest issue for me is still not enough lore and worldbuilding in terms of characters' relationship. There are so many amazing characters(which are the biggest factor for most players to play the game) and the fact that we can enjoy them so sparingly is just sad. It would be great if we could see them in their natural surroundings just like in the teapot. Just imagine seeing Jean in Knights headquarters and Razor strolling around in Wolvendom. Also the fact that most interactions occur with traveler only is incredibly frustrating. I know that they are the focal point of the story but Mihoyo did not give them an ounce of personality whatsoever. It's hard to care for the twins and their journey when they've become very unlikeable in recent updates and I have more than enough of 'Paimon loves food too much' jokes. I wish there were more cutscenes between all of the character cast like it happened in Albedo and Archipelago one.

Unless spiral abyss is a priority, most of the game can be completed with every character. Yes some aren't as good but they're good enough and i think the whole purpose of a gacha game is to play the characters you like. Despite most people skipping itto I really like his design and gameplay (as far as we know) so I'm going to invest in him :) edit: I am now an accomplished Itto main

I love how you use nier automata wretcehed weaponary ost medium as background music for your video. I love that you pointed out the reliance of weapons and the region power creep,the possibility for this to happen is high.I think players who are more experienced in the game wouldn't just pull for new characters but examin their skills.Howver,newer players to the game with the less experience might just grab for anything they choose

we still have to get at least to more lvl on each talent(if you read third and fifth cons it says the max lvl will be 15) so who knows maybe they add more talents with more variety

Vars:All characters look the same Also Vars:Shows image with clear and discernable silhouettes

Honestly, it felt to me as if Mihoyo is trying to purposefully make new characters a little more underwhelming than current ones. Kokomi, Thoma, and to some extent Raiden are not as game breaking as past releases like Ganyu or Zhongli. Maybe I'm unfairly comparing them, but from what I've seen of Shenhe, it really feels like it.

yooo the thing about the level cap to 100 and getting another skill is actually really nice. idk how and if they implement it, but it sounds really good.

i heard a new weapon type is in the works so maybe we can expect a diversification of content and characters, also considering the fact that dendro hasnt been used yet