(Full disclosure, the furthest I’ve played in the story is Fontaine Act I and I don’t see myself returning for the foreseeable future.)
It’s been a couple of months since I’ve fully moved on from Genshin, and ever since then, I began reflecting on what exactly went wrong. I previously wrote a now deleted review on this site about how Genshin had the potential to be a proper masterpiece, so what exactly happened for my opinion to sour so much?
The culprit couldn’t be the environments and music, those are still top notch and I do kinda miss them. I would say the gameplay got tiresome, and while I do find it annoyingly stiff, I don’t think it was enough to turn me off on the whole game.
It really all came down to one element: the writing. I don’t nessecarily think the story is outright bad, but it does not flow well at all due to its overly long diatribes and pitstops that never fail to overstay their welcome. The story beats are decent, but they would be much cooler if it wasn’t for the main thing that really pisses me off with this game.
Genshin’s character cast might just be one of the most fraudulent casts in any piece of media ever. The characterization is just “This character does this job really well” or “Hey, did you hear about the time they did this?” and its so annoying everytime it happens. I look at the cast and all I see is personality mush. I couldn’t even come up with a proper favorite character because they all feel the exact same to me, even if they aren’t. None of this is helped by the fact that I straight up dislike most of the character designs.
Because of this, a story that I’d usually see as a little flaud but incredibly enjoyable just comes off as mediocre because I fail to really get excited when the characters start actually doing things. Funny thing is that I actually noticed this back when I first started playing, but since this was the first gacha game I ever really got invested in, I thought this was just a symptom of the amount if characters there were and simply expected things to get better. As soon as I started playing Blue Archive, that delusion was shattered instantly. The fact that I like Ako more than any Genshin character really says it all.
I have heard that the story got better the moment I left with the rest of the Fontaine, but I think that even if it is better, it still won’t be in a way that I personally find enjoyable. The game obviously puts a lot of investment into the world building, but sacrificing character quality for that was not a great decision, especially when the world building is so taxing. I play gachas for the story and characters after all, and if I’m rolling for characters for just gameplay reasons rather than actual attachment to them, then what’s even the point.
It’s been a couple of months since I’ve fully moved on from Genshin, and ever since then, I began reflecting on what exactly went wrong. I previously wrote a now deleted review on this site about how Genshin had the potential to be a proper masterpiece, so what exactly happened for my opinion to sour so much?
The culprit couldn’t be the environments and music, those are still top notch and I do kinda miss them. I would say the gameplay got tiresome, and while I do find it annoyingly stiff, I don’t think it was enough to turn me off on the whole game.
It really all came down to one element: the writing. I don’t nessecarily think the story is outright bad, but it does not flow well at all due to its overly long diatribes and pitstops that never fail to overstay their welcome. The story beats are decent, but they would be much cooler if it wasn’t for the main thing that really pisses me off with this game.
Genshin’s character cast might just be one of the most fraudulent casts in any piece of media ever. The characterization is just “This character does this job really well” or “Hey, did you hear about the time they did this?” and its so annoying everytime it happens. I look at the cast and all I see is personality mush. I couldn’t even come up with a proper favorite character because they all feel the exact same to me, even if they aren’t. None of this is helped by the fact that I straight up dislike most of the character designs.
Because of this, a story that I’d usually see as a little flaud but incredibly enjoyable just comes off as mediocre because I fail to really get excited when the characters start actually doing things. Funny thing is that I actually noticed this back when I first started playing, but since this was the first gacha game I ever really got invested in, I thought this was just a symptom of the amount if characters there were and simply expected things to get better. As soon as I started playing Blue Archive, that delusion was shattered instantly. The fact that I like Ako more than any Genshin character really says it all.
I have heard that the story got better the moment I left with the rest of the Fontaine, but I think that even if it is better, it still won’t be in a way that I personally find enjoyable. The game obviously puts a lot of investment into the world building, but sacrificing character quality for that was not a great decision, especially when the world building is so taxing. I play gachas for the story and characters after all, and if I’m rolling for characters for just gameplay reasons rather than actual attachment to them, then what’s even the point.