Genshin Impact is an action roleplaying game set in the open world of Tevyat with anime stylisation. it was released in 2020 by Mihoyo, a game company based in Shanghai, China. In the game you fight monsters, play through several story quests, collect characters and weapons, farm for materials for your characters, explore the open world and its puzzles, and not to mention, the patch-exclusive events to name a few things. The main takeaway of the game’s appeal is the nice graphics and animation, and of course, all the characters that you can collect. it’s free to play but you can spend money for more in-game currency like many games have. This article will highlight a few of the communities’ moments where it really came together in a “unique” way.
One of the game’s earliest controversies, the Zhongli incident, occurred around Zhongli’s date in December, around two months after the game’s initial release date of September 28th. At the time, there was only one archon released, Venti, the god of Mondstadt (a region inspired by fantasy Germany) that has wind powers (Anemo). He was the first character that ever had a banner back in version 1.0, and extremely powerful at the time (and still is) Naturally people’s expectations were quite high for the next archon of Liyue, a Chinese-inspired region that is associated with rock powers(Geo).
A week after his release, Mihoyo posted a letter that basically stated that fans were misinterpreting his design and that he was working as intended. They only fixed a bug that was something to do with his constellations which are something usually difficult for free-to-play players to obtain anyways. There were several takes going on around the internet at the time. Some people called it a false advertisement due to what they had shown in his demo, some were saying he was weak for an archon, and for a five-star, that the geo element, in general, had been weak since release, that Mihoyo “broke a promise” that he would be a strong badass archon due to his lore, people actually analysing his kit and pointing out how it doesn’t make sense, and lastly, the take that, “he is a representation of China and the fact that Mihoyo made Venti, a western god stronger that the Chinese god made Mihoyo traitors and “western bootlickers.”
Because of the uproar in the community, Zhongli was the only character in the history of the game to receive a major buff after release in version 1.3, two months and patches after he debuted. He was already a decent support in some people’s opinions, but after the buff, he was deemed “broken.” to this day Zhongli is a very popular and well-loved character.
Take a look at little Qiqi. Isn’t she just a regular adorable zombie child? She is inspired by a type of reanimated corpse in Chinese legends and folklore. Qiqi was picking herbs one day when she was a human and got caught in between the crossfire of some deities that were fighting. Some members of a group of illuminated beasts and gods called the Adepti saved her life by donating a bit of their power to her and she became a zombie. Now that you know a tiny bit about Qiqi, just close your eyes and put yourself in her shoes. You’re just an innocent little zombie girl that likes coconut milk, playing with birds, and picking herbs for the pharmacy where the doctor who takes care of you works and has memory loss so you write in your little diary to remember things. Just an innocent child right? Well, imagine somewhere down the line the player base of the game you happen to be in paints you as someone else…
So, what happened to Qiqi’s reputation? Well… Qiqi is part of the standard banner. Currently, there are seven five-stars on it along with all the four-star characters and a few weapons. You can get these characters on any banner all the time, even the limited-character banners. For example, let’s say you’re trying to get a limited character like Zhongli but you get Qiqi instead, which means you lost the 50/50. It definitely is painful losing the 50/50, especially for free-to-play players. However, any of these seven characters are there to make you lose the 50/50, but somehow Qiqi gets the most hate. It might be because of the fact that she is a healer and a small child (difficult to navigate), but some people say her kit is bad too. Lots of people, including myself, certainly don’t agree with this since we adore her, but she’s definitely become a well-known symbol for losing the 50/50.
Unfortunately, Qiqi’s story doesn’t end here. Now for the main controversy of this section.
As Genshin’s first anniversary approached, many fans speculated what the rewards would be. Some looked to Mihoyo’s other games and thought of a few things. There were ideas of free five-star characters, several in-game items, and plenty of free fates (an item used to pull on banners.) They said the company would go BIG and all out for their very first anniversary. In contrast, some people said not to get your hopes up and that Mihoyo would just give us three fowl and call it a day. When the real rewards were revealed, people started to panic. Ten Intertwined Fates, which will only get you a 4-star item unless you’re close to the set number of pulls required to get a 5-star. The funniest part is the top-up reset, basically, the paid first-time top-up bonus that disappeared after you bought a bundle has now reset.
After seeing this, people were really freaking out and couldn’t believe their eyes. Some coped and said that maybe they were hiding something as a surprise, but when they didn’t, things became worse.
People started rioting and “boycotting” if you could call it that. Any thread talking about the anniversary on Reddit was immediately removed and the posts had to be pre-approved. The subreddit was on lockdown. If you complained about it anywhere else you would get banned. On Google Play, people started review-bombing the game and its rating dropped to an all-time low. It didn’t stop there, some crazy fans started to review bomb other apps as well. This included apps like Mihoyo’s games, other gacha games, Roblox, Cookie Run, and most infamously, Google Classroom.
Now for Qiqi’s return. On Discord, people began spamming the Qiqi Fallen (the above image) emote everywhere on the official servers until it eventually got banned from there. Once again, little old Qiqi got dragged into more drama. And it still doesn’t end here. After all this drama and controversy, Mihoyo quickly dished out more rewards to the hungry player base through the game’s mail system. With each day a new mail came out, people added more and more onto the Qiqi fallen until the last day when she could finally rest…
That is the story of how Qiqi became the symbol of sorrow and heartbreak…
( sources.✷ )
Genshin Impact. Mihoyo, 2020
Genshin Impact Wiki, March 2020, https://genshin-impact.fandom.com/wiki/Genshin_Impact_Wiki. Accessed February 2023.
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