Genshin Impact

An adventure game that lets you immerse yourself in the exciting events of Teyvat, a fantastical world. Together with a group of brave companions, you’ll explore the ruins of ancient empires, use forbidden spells, test your strength against fantastical creatures, and defeat incredible bosses. This is a hundred-hour journey.

The graphics don’t aim for realism, but they’re a treat for the eyes. Simple, easy-to-read object shapes, high-quality artwork, colorful effects, and real-time rendering create a unique art style. The characters are well animated, move naturally, and react to hits during combat. Lighting and weather change dynamically, bringing the visuals and gameplay to life.

Genshin Impact is a single-player, story-driven, third-person action RPG set in a vast open world. It’s a gacha game focused on collecting characters, building a team based on their abilities, and endlessly leveling them up.

At the same time, it’s a free-to-play grind, a live-service game with a long development cycle. You can mix up your solo play with co-op by inviting one to three friends into your world. Regardless of the mode you choose, the game requires an internet connection to play.

In the first few days, players are showered with resources, rewards, and characters, but after a couple of days the freebies dry up and progression slows down dramatically.

For the game, miHoYo created the medieval world of Teyvat and carefully established its basic rules and laws, the timeline of events, and the current state of affairs in its nations. You can learn more about it by visiting the in-game library and listening to dialogue.

Teyvat is ruled by seven gods, or Archons — Anemo, Geo, Hydro, Pyro, Electro, Dendro, and Cryo — who embody the known elements. The game map is also divided into seven regions, whose inhabitants worship only one deity. Each region has a large city (the capital) and several settlements, farms, and production sites.

Each region has a unique style based on the medieval culture it represents: Japan, China, India, Russia, Ancient Rome, Germany, and France (including their national and climate characteristics). There are also some ideological similarities: some value order, others freedom, and others financial well-being.

The world of Genshin Impact is truly vast and spacious. You can explore it not just from side to side, but also up and down. Teyvat is full of activities: daily and weekly tasks, killing enemies and bosses, opening chests, and solving unusual puzzles.

In the style of an MMO, each region's map is divided into zones with different levels, which determine the available quests and enemies. The greater the difference between a zone's level and your character's level, the harder it is to defeat even a simple enemy.

Genshin Impact borrows its gameplay and controls from mobile games. One button is used for the basic attack—press it several times to perform a combo. Another button is used for elemental attacks. There is also an "ultimate" ability that charges over time.

The basic combat system uses one-handed and two-handed swords, as well as bows with magical arrows. Characters get their abilities from the elements: fire, water, wind, electricity, ice, earth, and plants. In addition to attack spells, there are support and defensive abilities, such as a healing aura or summoning a pet. The environment also reacts to magic—you can freeze water or set grass on fire.

During combat, you control only one character at a time, but you can switch between party members instantly and at any time, letting you use all their weapons, abilities, and ultimate attacks.

You can combine the abilities of different characters . Drench a target with water, then hit it with fire to trigger a "vaporize" reaction. Freeze a target, then hit it with lightning to "shatter" it. Or drench a target with water and hit it with lightning to spread the damage. Earth powers help with defense and crowd control, while wind powers strengthen attacks.

Using combinations can deal much more damage to a target than a basic or magical attack. What's more, some enemies and bosses are immune to physical or magical damage. Movement also includes climbing any walls and ledges, dashing to dodge, and gliding through the air. There is a stamina system.

Putting together a powerful build in Genshin Impact that can destroy everything in its path isn't easy, because each class is tied to specific characters. And those characters are tied to the gacha system. This is a monetization method where players pay a set amount to receive a random set of items. In Genshin Impact, the chance of getting a five-star (ultra-rare) character is 0.6%, and if you want someone specific, such as an earth mage, the chance drops to a fraction of a percent.

Technically, you can complete the game using the free characters you receive in the first few hours. But tackling dungeons or completing co-op quests with them will be tough—you'll need better heroes. You will need to open quite a few loot boxes, which means hours of grinding or spending real money.

The game also has many manipulative mechanics that encourage players to collect characters or even try to get them all. Limited-time heroes are sure to be a welcome surprise. This can be addictive and lead players to spend a lot of money on cute anime waifus.

The story of Genshin Impact is simple and full of clichés. In the prologue, the main character loses their sibling, then does everything they can to get them back and defeat the main villain (who is evil simply because the plot requires it). But the script also includes unusual plot twists and well-developed characters.

Side quests are simple, but their unusual objectives make them enjoyable. You’ll need to use your wits, unlock a certain ability, or save up in-game money for a bribe. The game also has fairly long personal quests for its characters.

As players complete quests and explore the world, they earn several types of experience, raising their character, friendship , or Adventure Rank. The latter is the main measure of progress, unlocking more of the story, difficult dungeon challenges, and various other features.

All the items you collect are used to improve the ones you already have. Players feed unwanted weapons or equipment to the items they want to keep. It works similarly with characters: if you get a duplicate, you have to “apply” it to the character you already own, making them stronger. This greatly improves their stats and unlocks an extra talent.

Upgrading any item is also divided into stages. You can’t just upgrade weapons or characters alone; you need to develop everything in parallel, or your progress will simply stop.

It unlocks at Adventure Rank 16. The mode supports cross-platform play, so your team can include friends playing on any device. Characters are distributed based on the number of players. Co-op offers its own set of quests:

Successful co-op play requires knowing your abilities and how they work with other characters, as well as having good equipment. At launch, Genshin Impact was not planned to have a PvP mode.

In co-op, “Spiral Abyss,” story quests, and side quests are unavailable to the whole team. Only the host receives rewards for challenges, and only they can open chests and collect items.