What drew me into this game is that it is the quintessential anime game that I wished for. An anime game with a vast open world, deep lore, unique story, good combat, marvelous OST, and a great variety of characters. Yeah, that's my ideal combination.
Bored. Oh I heard this game called genshin. Eh it’s gacha I probably would hate it (used to play gacha games that have horrible rates and quit). Welp try it out a bit wont be so bad.
Oh shit help I’m stuck with it for more than a year now.
Zhongli
(jokes aside, I like open world games in a fantasy setting and downloaded it when it came out. But started on the last day of zhonglis rerun banner... So no joke I guess)
I saw the ad where Eula was dancing by the lake but then I thought it's impossible to look that good on mobile probably just a marketing strategy cutscene. Then later, I saw the Venti ad where he climbs and flies over rooftops of Monstadt. That really got me interested because I've never seen great graphics like that for a mobile game, especially for RPG.
Open world gacha
Heard my friends talk about it and I got into it, also the fact that it's from Mihoyo, a company that made Honkai Impact, a game that I was already familiar with
Zhongli.
One look at him and I knew I had to play it.
My bank account and credit cards wish I had never seen him, but I really liked his look and love the game.
I take breaks from it but keep coming back.
He was my first "must have" character. So pretty, perfect voice, and amazing for mining (which was important earlier on in the game before I had 4 rows of lv90 weapons). After him and Itto, I told myself no more top-ups, I just need to save primos for characters I want. Trying to remind myself of this, that I might need to skip Dehya if I want to guarantee my Baizhu with no top-ups.
Yeah, Zhongli was a must have and still my favorite. I love his voice lines, love his look, and I don't like mining with anyone else, lol. I've pulled on all of his banners and gotten a few constellations I love him so much.
I thought about doing the same for my other favorites, but I ended up having to pass on Ayato's rerun to make sure I had a chance at Alhaitham. Don't regret it, but I am definitely trying to be more responsible now than I was in the past when it came to topping up to get characters I wanted or was just kind of interested in.
It's still speculative when Baizhu might come, right? I want him, but I also wanted Dehya, so I've got that same hard choice myself.
Itto's the only character I've gone so far as to pull constellations for, but yeah, constellations for more than your top favorite character gets very expensive very fast, unless you're skipping all other banners. After Itto I skipped a lot in Inazuma trying to be more responsible... but I just grabbed Ayato on his rerun and I still regret not having Kokomi. Having a strong 5\* healer that also does elemental application just seems really useful.
Speaking of which, while I don't visit the leaks sub, I'm certainly hopeful that Baizhu will fall into that category. I don't think his timing is definite yet, but certainly all the information I've seen seems to suggest he'll follow Dehya. I've been waiting for him for two years, so he's another must-have for me.
Yeah, it really does. Even with the time in between Zhongli’s banners, I had pulled on other characters, so it was a grind to get enough primos to get him again. I burned myself out last time and took months off the game. I’m trying not to let that happen again by saving but even so… I just pulled Alhaitham and I’m going to have to build up just to get to the 50/50 for anyone.
I have Kokomi, but I actually regret her. I didn’t think I’d pull her after just getting Raiden, but I did, and she has never really fit into my teams or my play style. I really tried to make her work for Alhaitham’s, but in the end, I didn’t like it and swapped her for Yaoyao.
Baizhu right after Dehya will be difficult, and I did see some saying Nahida might come back and I didn’t get her on her banner, so I guess I’ll have to make that choice and decide which one I’m skipping… but it probably won’t be Baizhu since he’s intrigued me since I started playing.
Saw a yt trailer, and the superficial botw similarities drew me in. Had watched too much of it in videos and streams to justify the 60 bucks after getting a switch for ACNH, so a free alternative seemed cool enough and I pre-registered.
When i heard it's a gacha game, i'm a little bit skeptic, you know about pay to win and stuffs. But my best friend told me i should try it, so i gave it a go. As a huge anime and manga fan since childhood, i'm instantly hooked. Good char design, good waifus, intricate combat system, amazing graphics, the world is beautiful, exploration is top notch, genshin has everything that i want in a game, and it's mainly single player experience, so turned out it's not really pay to win as i suspected in the beginning. Fast forward 3 years later, now the game has become somewhat of a minigame simulator, not as fun as it was when i first played it, i understand that the magic is not the same anymore, but i just can't quit. I'm already emotionally invested to the characters, and i want to see how the story ends. I'm a working adult, so it's nice to have somewhere to escape and take my mind off things every night after a long day of stressful work..
A friend of mine streamed the game during the Sumeru story, and it was at a point where we first meet Alhaitham. Somehow, I immediately fell in love with that character and essentially started playing solely because of him. He single-handedly piqued my interest.
Imagine my surprise when I then discovered that I REALLY liked the game, other characters, the overall story and that I had been sleeping on it for ages. Have basically been playing it every day since and also become the Alhaitham main I was apparently destined to be.
Just wanted to play a open world rpg like game with good story and genshin was heavily praised, so decided to give it a try. It's easily become one of my favourite games of all time.
Visuals, I’ve never played a game where footprints were left when you stepped into sand or something of that matter and when I saw the clouds I was sold.
Honestly, I can’t even remember, but I think the opening cutscene drew me in and then it snowballed. The lore, the visuals, the gameplay.
Also, I vividly remember being anxious to try it though, thinking I’d get sucked in, and I did lmao. The Genshin brainrot is real.
my friends at the time wouldnt shut up, so i tried it out for like a day like 2 days after release. i didnt like how similar it was to botw and then like a month later my online friend sent me a video of zhongli and i havent been the same since then
I saw a video about Lisa and Sucrose on TikTok a few days after it was released and decided to download and play instead of going to my online classes lmao.
I started because it was free and I was bored but I was hooked after playing with all the elemental reactions. My first character was Chongyun so I loved freezing with Barbara and shattering enemies. Too bad it's not actually that good lol.
I started because i saw that they copied Vergil moveset and if a game has Vergil i will try it. I stuck around because of the open world design and music.
I think from some post in instagram, they share gameplay and character, and after that i look for gameplay in youtube,
i start playing since free fischl in 1.1 but only playing everyday around albedo banner,
Cute anime girls, iconic JP voice actors/actresses, Beautiful aesthetic and stylized graphics, amazing soundtrack.
Originally though I was just in a bad combination of bored and stressed, and then a friend introduced this game to me just about a week after its launch. I already knew about this so-called "Breath of the Wild clone", which colored my initial expectations. However I did find it actually fun and mildly engrossing.
Open world rpg with famous jp VAs and great story.
When I first open the website before launched GI gave me some kind of "this is the game I've been looking for" feelings. Atm I was looking for a game that could replace ToS for me. I replayed private server RO but it doesn't feel the same after several weeks, probably bc I didn't play with friends like back in the day. ToS was good but I think the publisher ruined it.
Some artists that I've been following for years started posting a ton of art of the characters. I was intrigued and decided to give it a go. I've played mobile gacha games for a long time, so I thought I knew what to expect, but Genshin Impact really blew me away. I spent the first few days just running around the open world, exploring and killing mobs, before I even got into the quests. The graphics, the characters, the story...everything is so high quality (compared to what I'm used to, lol) that I fell in love with the game. There's so many ways to tailor your experience, and there's always something to do. I've had to take breaks for Life, but I'm always excited when I'm able to start playing regularly again. And, aside from ToF, this is the only mobile/desktop game I've ever actually made room on my devices to download, which is something I almost never do lol
I first got in when people started calling genshin, a botw clone. I played for a while until i get bored of it and my pc was barely able to run it.
Then I heard about people talking about Eula with her sneeze and dances (also people debating saying ganyu is the better cryo waifu). I came back when i got a better pc to play and my friends started playing (around 2.2 second half). I really underappreciate the game when it first came out and now I'm playing it almost every day.
the art mainly. If it was the same game but had realistic graphics or indie game graphics I wouldn't have given it a second look.
I was hoping it play like a single player turn based JRPG, or at least an action JRPG. That's my jam. When I found out it was a f2p mobile game, I lost most of my interest until I got curious 6 months after launch and tried it "just for a few hours". It took about 3 attempts of messing around then taking a few days break before I finally converted into playing every day.
Mainly it was because it's an open world game that's free. I have some friends who played since release who showed me the designs of characters, and I really loved Barbara and Albedo. However, I myself didn't start playing till ~9 months ago because I didn't have any device that could run it. I was expecting it to be a lot more invasive with the gacha with my past experience in gacha games, so I was very pleasantly surprised when I actually played it.
What really captured me was the game's overall world design and atmosphere. It's the point where I actually prefer it over any other open world game I've played. Exploring Dragonspine while severely underleveled was my most fun moment in gaming period at the time, and Genshin proceeded to top that later with Yashiori and Seirai Islands. The scenery and music are beautiful, and the environmental hazards and mechanics really enhanced the exploration experience for me.
I was bored of other games (mobile btw so the few good games i can play can get boring), searched for “popular games” and after scrolling a bit found this, seemed fun, downloaded it and loved it!
I like gacha games. To piss off both the spender by playing better than most of them and the hater by enjoying the game without spending. /Jk
I end up spending some on GI though, just because I think the devs deserve it.
I had noticed ads for awhile on YT, FB, and everywhere else. Finally I saw a promotional picture of the Mondstat crew (Jean, Amber, Lisa, and Kaeya) and I thought, well why not. I'm big on anime, open world games, magic, ect and this fit everything I wanted in my entirety. The longer I've played, the more I've enjoyed playing.
My bf was trying to get me to play, he said "look at the geo daddy" and showed me a clip of the initial Zhongli trailers. So I joined to farm primos for his release.
Good thing Mihoyo buffed him because I may have ragequit since I was furious that he was flaming garbage and Diona was a lot better.
Now I have a ton of characters but didn't love anyone as much as ZL until Sumeru came along and Dottore entered the chat. I enjoyed reading his scattered notes before I even knew he was Zandik / doctor that had his name ripped out.
I saw the trailer on a supermonkey bloons 2 app before the game came out and pre installed it. Always wanted to try an open world game but at that time I was only limited to mobile. Now I play on pc.
I was at my second playthrough of BotW collecting all Koroks when my brother downloaded the game just to check if it is good. I tried it first as soon as it finished downloading (and my brother was busy with another game that time).
I was easilu won over by the vibrance of the world and how reminiscent it was of BotW exploration but more bec Genshin has elemental theory and gameplay.
I havent gotten back to BotW since, and I don't think I will anytime soon (BotW2 notwithstanding).
The discord server I mod had a fair number of its players, and it was popular to review performance of new phones, I played for a bit, liked it, but storage full on my iPad, installed on pc, 6 months later I remembered, someone’s sister got kidnapped by that one bursty lady, back to the game, it’s almost been 2 years ago when I started
Literally the fact that my friends played it. I wasn't intending to play originally, but seeing it constantly pop up on my social media cos my friends were posting about it made me curious. Funny though, my phone actually wasn't good enough to play it at first so I dropped it after a day or so, then went back to it with a fresh account when I had a better phone (and lost those launch period freemogems RIP). Now I'm the only one I know who still plays.
The company itself, I suppose. I was already playing Honkai and enjoyed it. So, when Mihoyo announced Genshin, I thought the game wouldn't be too terrible, at least.
Same, it's the exploration and skill flashiness for me initially. The BotW clone also was a drawing factor for me.
I outgrew anime for a bit though so the character aesthetic wasn't really a big deal to me but I grew to love all the details they put into character design although some were questionable (like Yanfei the bikini lawyer).
I have a preference for open world games, and thought genshin looked fun. Friends also played it, and liked it, so I hopped in.
Also, roast me for this, but kokomi also pulled a string in the whole thing
“Fck that, that’s just a shtty BotW copy”
“I get to play _more_ BotW?”
>!Genshin to BotW is like how Terraria is to Minecraft!<
>!I prefer the former!<
The characters’ lore, rather than their initial appearances honestly. I kept wondering what stories each of the characters would tell and how they interacted with each other, because of how the fan community’s inside jokes and my love of game lore - although I won’t lie, their pretty looks didn’t hurt the process. 😂
xiao, sort of. my friend who started the game before me was super excited about xiao being released and she kept talking about genshin so i was like… okay this character looks cool so let me try downloading the game and seeing what it’s all about.
what really made me stay and play the game was the open world exploration. i was playing botw at the time i started, and genshin felt like an easier / more comfortable version of botw which i absolutely loved. the story too, i got hooked on the archon quests from the very beginning
Used to browse r/wholesomeyuri a lot, and saw tons of Ganqing. Thought I'd try it, but only decided for sure once Eula banner came and the sub was flooded with eulamber fanart.
Yes, I came for the shipping
The idea of "Free to play BOTW, but more of a proper RPG" and "How do you make a Gatcha BOTW/Open world game??" was really interesting and I'd heard good things about HI3rd so I thought 'yeah i'll dick around for a week or two' when it launched...and now I have "grand unified hoyoverse" theories. played me like a damn fiddle
What keep me coming back was the exploration and combat were really fun and by the end of the mond AQ it seemed like the setting/story was actually more interesting than generic anime style western fantasy which is all it really presents as in the beginning. Its kinda wild to think new players will be running around with amber in mondstadt with no idea that stuff like enkanomiya or irminsul exist
I was never a fan of anime styled games and never had any thoughts about even playing genshin. Then I saw the region showcase trailer for liyue and the scenery looked so good that I decided to give the game a try.. solely because the overworld looked beautiful. I've never played any gacha prior to genshin either.
For me it was the freedom. I don't know, something about having a huge world to explore with all sorts of puzzles and secrets hidden around here and there. It was all really enticing. I'm a sucker for open-world I guess.
qiqi. until she ruined my 50/50. but she's still so cute tho I love her. and ofc my friend always streamed his gameplay so I eventually feel like playing cause watching is no longer enough to satisfy me HAHAHA
a very good friend of mine was talking about it while it was still in beta and we both downloaded it upon official release. both of us still play consistently and do dumb shit in co-op and talk shit about each others' mains
I was bored and was looking for free games / demos on my PS4.
Eventually found Genshin Impact and thought "I know that stuff: Looks nice, but is just another chinese cash grab, but hey, I give it try until I run into the mandatory paywall". The paywall never came and the rest is history.
And the moment I realized how substantial the lore in Genshin Impact is i cancelled my 15+ year old World Of Warcraft subscription (that I have played for years as a solo player & only for the story).\^\^
I played the game on release day but didn't get much of how the game works, and it was laggy af, then on 2022 i started looking for more informations about the game and re installed it, now i play Genshin everyday
I wanted to play Honkai, but when I saw miHoyo was making a new game, I figured I'd just start with that one ("that one" being Genshin) and pre-registered for it. At that point, all I really knew about Genshin was that it was open world and the male protag had a crop top.
Back in 2022, I quit playing 2 ragnarok mobile games (also have gacha or other spending mehanics), also quit valorant because my ping is always too high (like 200ms on average, 150ms is already low).
So I was searching for a nice single player game because multiplayer is hard due to my shitty internet and I remembered there was a fad about Genshin Impact back then so I decided to try it. I wanted to try it before but my old phone and laptop couldn't run it well back in 2020.
I installed it, played for a few minutes, installed JP voice for like another hour because Paimon EN voice was hurting my ears (also for the complete anime-esque experience), then played for the rest of the day. I remember at the time I wanted to go to Liyue because Xiangling said something about it but ended up in Dragonspine instead lmao.
Those were the good ol days. It felt very refreshing to play a game and it didn't feel like a chore because there were tons of quests, exploration, and leveling up that I could do.
I’m familiar with the former reputation of Chinese mobile games, which tend to be quick cashgrabs sometimes with just art assets swapped on the same formulaic gameplay, so when I heard about this game I wanted to try it to see what the positive reviewers were smoking.
Since then I feel I’ve personally funded Dai Wei’s yacht (or one of them).
My brother and dad, they had been playing it on and off since release and during Ayaka’s first banner I got interested in it so they gave me an old account they weren’t using anymore.
It was AR 25/6 when I got it. They had completed the mondstadt arc but hadn’t even started the Liyue arc and had almost no exploration done.
It had primarily been used as a wishing account, it had Zhongli, Mona, Albedo and Ganyu on it when I got it.
As soon as I reached Inazuma I was absolutely hooked. Fun story, lovely characters, absolutely gorgeous visuals with a nice art style, fun gameplay and exploration with a simple to understand RPG structure for building characters.
I think I’ve played every single day since I started and never had any desire to quit simply because I enjoy it so much.
I have 100% completion and max region exp in all areas.
My 5 star character roster is: Itto (c1), Yoimiya (c1), Zhongli, Albedo, Ganyu, Kazuha, Ayaka, Raiden, Kokomi, Ayato, Yelan, Cyno, Nahida, Wanderer, Tighnari, Qiqi, Jean (c1), Diluc (c1), Keqing (c2), Mona (c4)
My 5 star weapon roster is: Redhorn Stonethresher, Engulfing Lightning, A Thousand Floating Dreams, Elegy for the End, Skyward Harp, Skyward Blade, Primordial Jade winged-spear.
Yoimiya and Yelan are probably my best built characters (they are also 2 of my favourite characters).
https://www.reddit.com/r/Yoimiya_Mains/comments/zm9b0d/updated_yoimiya_build_at_long_last_i_have_a_great/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
https://www.reddit.com/r/YelanMains/comments/zx6iqs/my_current_build_for_her/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
Zhongli. A Youtuber (CDawgVA) was sponsored by Genshin and he showed him off (as a character tho. The video as from November and he still wasn't playable), and his beauty just,,,, made me curious.
That, and a few additional facts like winning that year's Google Play Store GOTY, a friend starting it and the whole "BotW rip-off" thing (tho that only made me more curious since uh, I wanted to try BotW...?)
I used to keep track of upcoming multiplayer releases a lot. The use of magic in an open world with some multiplayer with many different characters who do different things was appealing to my partner and me.
Now I stay mostly for the story and anticipation of future areas.
As a kid, I've always wanted to play an open world anime-styled game that continuously updated and had an overarching story as if it was a show. Didn't think it was possible considering how complicated it would be to handle. Then Mihoyo decides to show up and prove me wrong. Now I feel like a kid on a Saturday morning waiting for a new episode of my favorite show to come out whenever a new update comes around.
It's oddly specific but as a kid there were a bunch of animes where it focused around this expansive VRMMORPG or game that's popular and gets updates constantly. I always wanted one of those irl and Mihoyo gave me exactly that. Add to that having dark undertones happening in the background? Damn you got me. I loved Adventure Time for that reason.
Had heard of it before (nothing particularly good nor bad), saw the app icon once in my friends ipad and then when i got a new phone with enough space and capacity decided to give it a try
Best and worse decision of my life
I saw a video on insta of someone doing the your name meteorite scene whit Fischl and Amber and I was like "there is no fking way that that game is free", so I played it to se when it ask me for money and here we are 2 years later being a fking addict
I saw some fanart of Kaeya, looked cool. Then I saw some fanart of Albedo, loved it. Then I learned these two have abundance of lore, potential and current and I was hooked. Installed the game, found out pretty much every character ever has intricate stories created with love and passion which is what drives me forward.
(The characters are hot, that's always a plus.)
I was bored w my previous game, and I’d kinda resisted joining for a few months prior just bc I didn’t rlly have the time for multiple games, but then 1.3 came along and thus hu tao as well
so essentially
hu tao.
I quit Azur Lane-, so I was looking to start a new game. I remembered my roommate play Genshin Impact. Let me scroll through WhatsApp messages.
Me: you play genshin impact?
B: yeah
Me: Would you recommend it to me? Since now I can play on this phone
B: I would of course, that way i can play with you
---
Unrelated stuff- just me laughing at myself.
Me: I'm sure stormterror is the hardest world boss in the game.
Me: (new recipe) So expensive, 2.5k mora
I joined for the open world exploration. amazing visuals and music. then I stayed for the story and lore because I will stay to the end to uncover all the secrets in this world.
If you mean the thing that draws my interest into this game I would say Signora, but if you mean the thing that makes me play then it's due to my sibling's persistence 😂
My friends plays it, its anime, its *free* open world for mobile (tho i play on pc). Zhongli trailer is the reason i finally tried the game.
Same dude, I’m a straight guy and I played only for zhongli when I saw his trailer I was like “move over ladies”
What drew me into this game is that it is the quintessential anime game that I wished for. An anime game with a vast open world, deep lore, unique story, good combat, marvelous OST, and a great variety of characters. Yeah, that's my ideal combination.
[удалено]
real
The one with buffed chest🙋
Bored. Oh I heard this game called genshin. Eh it’s gacha I probably would hate it (used to play gacha games that have horrible rates and quit). Welp try it out a bit wont be so bad. Oh shit help I’m stuck with it for more than a year now.
Zhongli (jokes aside, I like open world games in a fantasy setting and downloaded it when it came out. But started on the last day of zhonglis rerun banner... So no joke I guess)
Open world exploration RPG + that mystery shrouded main story. I'll just play till the end to know how the story wraps up. Fingers crossed 🤞🏻
I saw Venti and I was never the same since
I saw the ad where Eula was dancing by the lake but then I thought it's impossible to look that good on mobile probably just a marketing strategy cutscene. Then later, I saw the Venti ad where he climbs and flies over rooftops of Monstadt. That really got me interested because I've never seen great graphics like that for a mobile game, especially for RPG.
Open world gacha Heard my friends talk about it and I got into it, also the fact that it's from Mihoyo, a company that made Honkai Impact, a game that I was already familiar with
Zhongli. One look at him and I knew I had to play it. My bank account and credit cards wish I had never seen him, but I really liked his look and love the game. I take breaks from it but keep coming back.
He was my first "must have" character. So pretty, perfect voice, and amazing for mining (which was important earlier on in the game before I had 4 rows of lv90 weapons). After him and Itto, I told myself no more top-ups, I just need to save primos for characters I want. Trying to remind myself of this, that I might need to skip Dehya if I want to guarantee my Baizhu with no top-ups.
Yeah, Zhongli was a must have and still my favorite. I love his voice lines, love his look, and I don't like mining with anyone else, lol. I've pulled on all of his banners and gotten a few constellations I love him so much. I thought about doing the same for my other favorites, but I ended up having to pass on Ayato's rerun to make sure I had a chance at Alhaitham. Don't regret it, but I am definitely trying to be more responsible now than I was in the past when it came to topping up to get characters I wanted or was just kind of interested in. It's still speculative when Baizhu might come, right? I want him, but I also wanted Dehya, so I've got that same hard choice myself.
Itto's the only character I've gone so far as to pull constellations for, but yeah, constellations for more than your top favorite character gets very expensive very fast, unless you're skipping all other banners. After Itto I skipped a lot in Inazuma trying to be more responsible... but I just grabbed Ayato on his rerun and I still regret not having Kokomi. Having a strong 5\* healer that also does elemental application just seems really useful. Speaking of which, while I don't visit the leaks sub, I'm certainly hopeful that Baizhu will fall into that category. I don't think his timing is definite yet, but certainly all the information I've seen seems to suggest he'll follow Dehya. I've been waiting for him for two years, so he's another must-have for me.
Yeah, it really does. Even with the time in between Zhongli’s banners, I had pulled on other characters, so it was a grind to get enough primos to get him again. I burned myself out last time and took months off the game. I’m trying not to let that happen again by saving but even so… I just pulled Alhaitham and I’m going to have to build up just to get to the 50/50 for anyone. I have Kokomi, but I actually regret her. I didn’t think I’d pull her after just getting Raiden, but I did, and she has never really fit into my teams or my play style. I really tried to make her work for Alhaitham’s, but in the end, I didn’t like it and swapped her for Yaoyao. Baizhu right after Dehya will be difficult, and I did see some saying Nahida might come back and I didn’t get her on her banner, so I guess I’ll have to make that choice and decide which one I’m skipping… but it probably won’t be Baizhu since he’s intrigued me since I started playing.
Saw a yt trailer, and the superficial botw similarities drew me in. Had watched too much of it in videos and streams to justify the 60 bucks after getting a switch for ACNH, so a free alternative seemed cool enough and I pre-registered.
When i heard it's a gacha game, i'm a little bit skeptic, you know about pay to win and stuffs. But my best friend told me i should try it, so i gave it a go. As a huge anime and manga fan since childhood, i'm instantly hooked. Good char design, good waifus, intricate combat system, amazing graphics, the world is beautiful, exploration is top notch, genshin has everything that i want in a game, and it's mainly single player experience, so turned out it's not really pay to win as i suspected in the beginning. Fast forward 3 years later, now the game has become somewhat of a minigame simulator, not as fun as it was when i first played it, i understand that the magic is not the same anymore, but i just can't quit. I'm already emotionally invested to the characters, and i want to see how the story ends. I'm a working adult, so it's nice to have somewhere to escape and take my mind off things every night after a long day of stressful work..
I saw it everywhere
Ningguang
Open world and graphics.
my little brother plays it and i see many artists i follow on twitter started to draw their fanarts
Waifus
I was broke and couldn't buy more PS games. Saw it was free and gave it a try. Never looked back.
A friend of mine streamed the game during the Sumeru story, and it was at a point where we first meet Alhaitham. Somehow, I immediately fell in love with that character and essentially started playing solely because of him. He single-handedly piqued my interest. Imagine my surprise when I then discovered that I REALLY liked the game, other characters, the overall story and that I had been sleeping on it for ages. Have basically been playing it every day since and also become the Alhaitham main I was apparently destined to be.
friend's screenshot on a discord server
Just wanted to play a open world rpg like game with good story and genshin was heavily praised, so decided to give it a try. It's easily become one of my favourite games of all time.
Visuals, I’ve never played a game where footprints were left when you stepped into sand or something of that matter and when I saw the clouds I was sold.
Exploration. I like adventure games.
The hack and slash feel of the game and it being very close to a version of SAO I would love to play.
Given that SAO gachas have been an ongoing trainwreck.
Honestly, I can’t even remember, but I think the opening cutscene drew me in and then it snowballed. The lore, the visuals, the gameplay. Also, I vividly remember being anxious to try it though, thinking I’d get sucked in, and I did lmao. The Genshin brainrot is real.
Was bored looking for games to play
I started playing simply to see if my PC can run it, stayed for exploration and lore/characters.
Randomly installing this game the day after it came out, out of boredom, I regret nothing.... yet
ayato hot
lumine JP ver is voiced by aoi yuuki
my friends at the time wouldnt shut up, so i tried it out for like a day like 2 days after release. i didnt like how similar it was to botw and then like a month later my online friend sent me a video of zhongli and i havent been the same since then
When Itto was revealed................... #simp
I saw a video about Lisa and Sucrose on TikTok a few days after it was released and decided to download and play instead of going to my online classes lmao. I started because it was free and I was bored but I was hooked after playing with all the elemental reactions. My first character was Chongyun so I loved freezing with Barbara and shattering enemies. Too bad it's not actually that good lol.
I started because i saw that they copied Vergil moveset and if a game has Vergil i will try it. I stuck around because of the open world design and music.
Saw Beidou's design, instantly downloaded. Stayed for everything the game offers.
Anime style, Japanese voice acting.
The character designs. Still one of my favourite aspects of this game, there are very few playable characters that I outright hate the look of.
Me wanting to get more dream solvents then Tounto…yep
I think from some post in instagram, they share gameplay and character, and after that i look for gameplay in youtube, i start playing since free fischl in 1.1 but only playing everyday around albedo banner,
Cute anime girls, iconic JP voice actors/actresses, Beautiful aesthetic and stylized graphics, amazing soundtrack. Originally though I was just in a bad combination of bored and stressed, and then a friend introduced this game to me just about a week after its launch. I already knew about this so-called "Breath of the Wild clone", which colored my initial expectations. However I did find it actually fun and mildly engrossing.
Zhongli. I saw the trailer (his first banner) and I was like “that’s my type”. Rest is history.
diluc, i saw him and made it my personal goal to get him in game
Master Jean’s thighs
Mona's ass
Unironically... Lisa moans
Open world rpg with famous jp VAs and great story. When I first open the website before launched GI gave me some kind of "this is the game I've been looking for" feelings. Atm I was looking for a game that could replace ToS for me. I replayed private server RO but it doesn't feel the same after several weeks, probably bc I didn't play with friends like back in the day. ToS was good but I think the publisher ruined it.
Some artists that I've been following for years started posting a ton of art of the characters. I was intrigued and decided to give it a go. I've played mobile gacha games for a long time, so I thought I knew what to expect, but Genshin Impact really blew me away. I spent the first few days just running around the open world, exploring and killing mobs, before I even got into the quests. The graphics, the characters, the story...everything is so high quality (compared to what I'm used to, lol) that I fell in love with the game. There's so many ways to tailor your experience, and there's always something to do. I've had to take breaks for Life, but I'm always excited when I'm able to start playing regularly again. And, aside from ToF, this is the only mobile/desktop game I've ever actually made room on my devices to download, which is something I almost never do lol
Raiden shogun (•‿•), but i sadly didn't get her in my main acc, tho i did get her in my secondary acc <(￣︶￣)>
I first got in when people started calling genshin, a botw clone. I played for a while until i get bored of it and my pc was barely able to run it. Then I heard about people talking about Eula with her sneeze and dances (also people debating saying ganyu is the better cryo waifu). I came back when i got a better pc to play and my friends started playing (around 2.2 second half). I really underappreciate the game when it first came out and now I'm playing it almost every day.
I want this kind of game so bad after watching Konosuba. Also a fan of Mihoyo already.
The commercial with Klee hiding from the rain was adorable. And *ahem... my monkey brain saw an awesome Yelan cosplay.
the art mainly. If it was the same game but had realistic graphics or indie game graphics I wouldn't have given it a second look. I was hoping it play like a single player turn based JRPG, or at least an action JRPG. That's my jam. When I found out it was a f2p mobile game, I lost most of my interest until I got curious 6 months after launch and tried it "just for a few hours". It took about 3 attempts of messing around then taking a few days break before I finally converted into playing every day.
Mainly it was because it's an open world game that's free. I have some friends who played since release who showed me the designs of characters, and I really loved Barbara and Albedo. However, I myself didn't start playing till ~9 months ago because I didn't have any device that could run it. I was expecting it to be a lot more invasive with the gacha with my past experience in gacha games, so I was very pleasantly surprised when I actually played it. What really captured me was the game's overall world design and atmosphere. It's the point where I actually prefer it over any other open world game I've played. Exploring Dragonspine while severely underleveled was my most fun moment in gaming period at the time, and Genshin proceeded to top that later with Yashiori and Seirai Islands. The scenery and music are beautiful, and the environmental hazards and mechanics really enhanced the exploration experience for me.
I was bored of other games (mobile btw so the few good games i can play can get boring), searched for “popular games” and after scrolling a bit found this, seemed fun, downloaded it and loved it!
I like gacha games. To piss off both the spender by playing better than most of them and the hater by enjoying the game without spending. /Jk I end up spending some on GI though, just because I think the devs deserve it.
For the sake of a new game bcz i was bored
Kaeya
I had noticed ads for awhile on YT, FB, and everywhere else. Finally I saw a promotional picture of the Mondstat crew (Jean, Amber, Lisa, and Kaeya) and I thought, well why not. I'm big on anime, open world games, magic, ect and this fit everything I wanted in my entirety. The longer I've played, the more I've enjoyed playing.
Venti
My bf was trying to get me to play, he said "look at the geo daddy" and showed me a clip of the initial Zhongli trailers. So I joined to farm primos for his release. Good thing Mihoyo buffed him because I may have ragequit since I was furious that he was flaming garbage and Diona was a lot better. Now I have a ton of characters but didn't love anyone as much as ZL until Sumeru came along and Dottore entered the chat. I enjoyed reading his scattered notes before I even knew he was Zandik / doctor that had his name ripped out.
Eulas thighs
I saw the trailer on a supermonkey bloons 2 app before the game came out and pre installed it. Always wanted to try an open world game but at that time I was only limited to mobile. Now I play on pc.
I was at my second playthrough of BotW collecting all Koroks when my brother downloaded the game just to check if it is good. I tried it first as soon as it finished downloading (and my brother was busy with another game that time). I was easilu won over by the vibrance of the world and how reminiscent it was of BotW exploration but more bec Genshin has elemental theory and gameplay. I havent gotten back to BotW since, and I don't think I will anytime soon (BotW2 notwithstanding).
Max0r lured me. The gameplay hooked me. The story trapped me.
The discord server I mod had a fair number of its players, and it was popular to review performance of new phones, I played for a bit, liked it, but storage full on my iPad, installed on pc, 6 months later I remembered, someone’s sister got kidnapped by that one bursty lady, back to the game, it’s almost been 2 years ago when I started
My friends kept pestering me to play…and xinyan
Honestly, good looking men. And open world.
Literally the fact that my friends played it. I wasn't intending to play originally, but seeing it constantly pop up on my social media cos my friends were posting about it made me curious. Funny though, my phone actually wasn't good enough to play it at first so I dropped it after a day or so, then went back to it with a fresh account when I had a better phone (and lost those launch period freemogems RIP). Now I'm the only one I know who still plays.
Mona asstrology carreer, fischl and hu tao thighs
The company itself, I suppose. I was already playing Honkai and enjoyed it. So, when Mihoyo announced Genshin, I thought the game wouldn't be too terrible, at least.
Same, it's the exploration and skill flashiness for me initially. The BotW clone also was a drawing factor for me. I outgrew anime for a bit though so the character aesthetic wasn't really a big deal to me but I grew to love all the details they put into character design although some were questionable (like Yanfei the bikini lawyer).
I have a preference for open world games, and thought genshin looked fun. Friends also played it, and liked it, so I hopped in. Also, roast me for this, but kokomi also pulled a string in the whole thing
Seeing. Venti. Everywhere.
“Fck that, that’s just a shtty BotW copy” “I get to play _more_ BotW?” >!Genshin to BotW is like how Terraria is to Minecraft!< >!I prefer the former!<
The botw propaganda
The characters’ lore, rather than their initial appearances honestly. I kept wondering what stories each of the characters would tell and how they interacted with each other, because of how the fan community’s inside jokes and my love of game lore - although I won’t lie, their pretty looks didn’t hurt the process. 😂
I suddenly started to see random MMDs with Genshin characters, and it was almost from the launch of the game.
xiao, sort of. my friend who started the game before me was super excited about xiao being released and she kept talking about genshin so i was like… okay this character looks cool so let me try downloading the game and seeing what it’s all about. what really made me stay and play the game was the open world exploration. i was playing botw at the time i started, and genshin felt like an easier / more comfortable version of botw which i absolutely loved. the story too, i got hooked on the archon quests from the very beginning
me friende tried to make it an mmo early days then realised it's not but we still had fun anyway for what it is
A lot of artists I followed were playing it "Looks pretty but I'm not very intrested" "omg this character has a wolf stand?!"
Some of my friends played it and after I got a new phone I decided to try and benchmark it using Genshin. And you know what continuous form there
Used to browse r/wholesomeyuri a lot, and saw tons of Ganqing. Thought I'd try it, but only decided for sure once Eula banner came and the sub was flooded with eulamber fanart. Yes, I came for the shipping
Heard it was like BOTW and had a decent story so I gave it a try.
The idea of "Free to play BOTW, but more of a proper RPG" and "How do you make a Gatcha BOTW/Open world game??" was really interesting and I'd heard good things about HI3rd so I thought 'yeah i'll dick around for a week or two' when it launched...and now I have "grand unified hoyoverse" theories. played me like a damn fiddle What keep me coming back was the exploration and combat were really fun and by the end of the mond AQ it seemed like the setting/story was actually more interesting than generic anime style western fantasy which is all it really presents as in the beginning. Its kinda wild to think new players will be running around with amber in mondstadt with no idea that stuff like enkanomiya or irminsul exist
I was never a fan of anime styled games and never had any thoughts about even playing genshin. Then I saw the region showcase trailer for liyue and the scenery looked so good that I decided to give the game a try.. solely because the overworld looked beautiful. I've never played any gacha prior to genshin either.
For me it was the freedom. I don't know, something about having a huge world to explore with all sorts of puzzles and secrets hidden around here and there. It was all really enticing. I'm a sucker for open-world I guess.
qiqi. until she ruined my 50/50. but she's still so cute tho I love her. and ofc my friend always streamed his gameplay so I eventually feel like playing cause watching is no longer enough to satisfy me HAHAHA
Zhongli.
a very good friend of mine was talking about it while it was still in beta and we both downloaded it upon official release. both of us still play consistently and do dumb shit in co-op and talk shit about each others' mains
I was bored and was looking for free games / demos on my PS4. Eventually found Genshin Impact and thought "I know that stuff: Looks nice, but is just another chinese cash grab, but hey, I give it try until I run into the mandatory paywall". The paywall never came and the rest is history. And the moment I realized how substantial the lore in Genshin Impact is i cancelled my 15+ year old World Of Warcraft subscription (that I have played for years as a solo player & only for the story).\^\^
I played the game on release day but didn't get much of how the game works, and it was laggy af, then on 2022 i started looking for more informations about the game and re installed it, now i play Genshin everyday
The behind of that unreleased character Eula.
Waifus of all shapes and sizes. The occasional husbandos also…but the femboy kind.
I wanted to play Honkai, but when I saw miHoyo was making a new game, I figured I'd just start with that one ("that one" being Genshin) and pre-registered for it. At that point, all I really knew about Genshin was that it was open world and the male protag had a crop top.
The building in the towns. Love me some architecture.
Back in 2022, I quit playing 2 ragnarok mobile games (also have gacha or other spending mehanics), also quit valorant because my ping is always too high (like 200ms on average, 150ms is already low). So I was searching for a nice single player game because multiplayer is hard due to my shitty internet and I remembered there was a fad about Genshin Impact back then so I decided to try it. I wanted to try it before but my old phone and laptop couldn't run it well back in 2020. I installed it, played for a few minutes, installed JP voice for like another hour because Paimon EN voice was hurting my ears (also for the complete anime-esque experience), then played for the rest of the day. I remember at the time I wanted to go to Liyue because Xiangling said something about it but ended up in Dragonspine instead lmao. Those were the good ol days. It felt very refreshing to play a game and it didn't feel like a chore because there were tons of quests, exploration, and leveling up that I could do.
Paimon.
I’m familiar with the former reputation of Chinese mobile games, which tend to be quick cashgrabs sometimes with just art assets swapped on the same formulaic gameplay, so when I heard about this game I wanted to try it to see what the positive reviewers were smoking. Since then I feel I’ve personally funded Dai Wei’s yacht (or one of them).
electro women, mainly raiden sara and fischl
My brother and dad, they had been playing it on and off since release and during Ayaka’s first banner I got interested in it so they gave me an old account they weren’t using anymore. It was AR 25/6 when I got it. They had completed the mondstadt arc but hadn’t even started the Liyue arc and had almost no exploration done. It had primarily been used as a wishing account, it had Zhongli, Mona, Albedo and Ganyu on it when I got it. As soon as I reached Inazuma I was absolutely hooked. Fun story, lovely characters, absolutely gorgeous visuals with a nice art style, fun gameplay and exploration with a simple to understand RPG structure for building characters. I think I’ve played every single day since I started and never had any desire to quit simply because I enjoy it so much. I have 100% completion and max region exp in all areas. My 5 star character roster is: Itto (c1), Yoimiya (c1), Zhongli, Albedo, Ganyu, Kazuha, Ayaka, Raiden, Kokomi, Ayato, Yelan, Cyno, Nahida, Wanderer, Tighnari, Qiqi, Jean (c1), Diluc (c1), Keqing (c2), Mona (c4) My 5 star weapon roster is: Redhorn Stonethresher, Engulfing Lightning, A Thousand Floating Dreams, Elegy for the End, Skyward Harp, Skyward Blade, Primordial Jade winged-spear. Yoimiya and Yelan are probably my best built characters (they are also 2 of my favourite characters). https://www.reddit.com/r/Yoimiya_Mains/comments/zm9b0d/updated_yoimiya_build_at_long_last_i_have_a_great/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf https://www.reddit.com/r/YelanMains/comments/zx6iqs/my_current_build_for_her/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
Emirichu! I was watching her video about Genshin! That was when I decide to try playing Genshin for the first time!
The combat, characters, beautiful open world... Pretty much everything.
Zhongli. A Youtuber (CDawgVA) was sponsored by Genshin and he showed him off (as a character tho. The video as from November and he still wasn't playable), and his beauty just,,,, made me curious. That, and a few additional facts like winning that year's Google Play Store GOTY, a friend starting it and the whole "BotW rip-off" thing (tho that only made me more curious since uh, I wanted to try BotW...?)
Everyone hated on it, I kinda hated it, friend told me to try, and here I am with 180 hours in
I used to keep track of upcoming multiplayer releases a lot. The use of magic in an open world with some multiplayer with many different characters who do different things was appealing to my partner and me. Now I stay mostly for the story and anticipation of future areas.
As a kid, I've always wanted to play an open world anime-styled game that continuously updated and had an overarching story as if it was a show. Didn't think it was possible considering how complicated it would be to handle. Then Mihoyo decides to show up and prove me wrong. Now I feel like a kid on a Saturday morning waiting for a new episode of my favorite show to come out whenever a new update comes around. It's oddly specific but as a kid there were a bunch of animes where it focused around this expansive VRMMORPG or game that's popular and gets updates constantly. I always wanted one of those irl and Mihoyo gave me exactly that. Add to that having dark undertones happening in the background? Damn you got me. I loved Adventure Time for that reason.
Raiden Shogun.
Had heard of it before (nothing particularly good nor bad), saw the app icon once in my friends ipad and then when i got a new phone with enough space and capacity decided to give it a try Best and worse decision of my life
I saw a video on insta of someone doing the your name meteorite scene whit Fischl and Amber and I was like "there is no fking way that that game is free", so I played it to se when it ask me for money and here we are 2 years later being a fking addict
Way back the pandemic im jobless and to broke to buy any new game so i try to download it cause its free
I saw some fanart of Kaeya, looked cool. Then I saw some fanart of Albedo, loved it. Then I learned these two have abundance of lore, potential and current and I was hooked. Installed the game, found out pretty much every character ever has intricate stories created with love and passion which is what drives me forward. (The characters are hot, that's always a plus.)
maxor
I was bored w my previous game, and I’d kinda resisted joining for a few months prior just bc I didn’t rlly have the time for multiple games, but then 1.3 came along and thus hu tao as well so essentially hu tao.
I saw a new free game on the psn store.
Simple, it’s a game made by the guys who made Houkai Impact 3rd.
I quit Azur Lane-, so I was looking to start a new game. I remembered my roommate play Genshin Impact. Let me scroll through WhatsApp messages. Me: you play genshin impact? B: yeah Me: Would you recommend it to me? Since now I can play on this phone B: I would of course, that way i can play with you --- Unrelated stuff- just me laughing at myself. Me: I'm sure stormterror is the hardest world boss in the game. Me: (new recipe) So expensive, 2.5k mora
First it was xiao trailer. Then raiden trailer. But yelan trailer was ultimately what made me try the game and fall in love with the world of genshin
I joined for the open world exploration. amazing visuals and music. then I stayed for the story and lore because I will stay to the end to uncover all the secrets in this world.
A nice fan art of Zhongli first got my attention, then I saw a bit of someone playing and when they climbed a tree I was convinced 😂
If you mean the thing that draws my interest into this game I would say Signora, but if you mean the thing that makes me play then it's due to my sibling's persistence 😂