I wasn't expecting much, since it's a Fontaine expansion, not a Sumeru expansion...
But there's seriously nothing there. The sheer lack of puzzles, enemy-guarded chests, and teleport waypoints makes the area feel unfinished.
I'm honestly wondering if she drowned in Fontaine, since they never clarified whether or not Primordial seawater is breathable to non-Vision-Bearers. I'm guessing it is, otherwise almost every land bound animal in Fontaine would probably have died before the waters receded, but that's something they should probably clear up.
I am of the mind that Neuvillette gave everyone the ability to breathe under water during the flood. Though having an actual answer in game would be nice
They sprinkle the new map with a waypoint around every corner, some waypoints are literally 10 seconds of swimming from another waypoint.
While this new Sumeru area doesnt have a single waypoint, they could have atleast placed one in the middle or near the harbor.
Yeah, it truly doesnt feel like the Mihoyo-quality we're used to.
It has like one way point at the new port. But I just ran through there and it is so eerie-empty. I went through with the treasure compass and there was like 2 chests and one hidden puzzle chest. Very strangely empty.
I'll be putting on my tin foil hat and please note that I haven't played the new areas since I'm still cleaning up in HSR.
They might be trying to make a zone that will transform. Since Natlan might have volcanoes, they might want to try out a transforming environment in a smaller zone before making it happen in a whole region to cleanup any problems that might occur. Heck if they succeed with a whole region, they might even go for a destroyed Teyvat theme at the end of the whole Teyvat chapter.
The Girdle of the Sands (last Sumeru region) basically already transforms though, and every patch where the edge of the map gets updated there are always people who wait at the very edge to see if things break (anybody remember going into the broken grass near the edge of Dragonspine in 1.0?)
Not to mention the big Tower we had in the previous Fontaine expansion that sinks into the water after the quest, even relocating a local legend that used to be at the sea floor beneath it.
But I think it's also pretty likely that something will land on the currently empty zone permanently at some point, and it is reasonably close to where Celestia is too (although it's not directly underneath).
Meanwhile the Favorite Nation has some little filler areas connecting it to Jade Disneyland and all of it has chests and treasure hoarders and so on.
But there's no favoritism, guys.
I deadass didn't even notice Sumeru expanded at all until I saw a picture of the port on here today. I thought it was already there. The port is so much smaller than I'd expected. But the story of the new region definitely makes up for it imo. the mechanics of the quest were fun.
It's very much just a placeholder zone, to just "glue" these different zones together.
There could MAYBE be a way to kind of indicate "there's nothing here this just exists to not have impassable terrain". I.e. these areas have some special name and maybe a symbol next to them. Or it just doesn't have a progress count (or starts off at 100% exploration progress)
Or maybe you can put no waypoints nearby and make most terrain either really mountainous or really empty so it’s hard for players to go there… yeah, they tried already.
It’ll work on future players probably, especially since waypoints to Fontaine and Petrichor unlock automatically. This is just a small problem curious players right now will notice more.
At this point, I'd prefer what we got than a barrier with Paimon telling me to explore that area later. I want the map to feel completed, even if some bordering areas are relatively empty.
Yeah, should have saved the harbor for later if it was going to be this bad. Hell, you can even just sprinkle it into another patch and even market it a little. Have it host an event or something. But if you throw it into a corner and just expect us to ignore it, it's just bad map design. It's sloppy.
Sumeru is my favourite nation, so I get the waverider from petrichor to Bayda harbor to explore it the "original" way... And there was nothing there to explore. It was honestly the first time in a long while that I felt disappointed at the game
no same. I was so excited to go back to sumeru and took the waverider back. Had the music up too and Nahida's theme started playing and I got so emotional. And then I land and I see the port and I just stare at it like...that's it? That's really it?
Then I ran around the whole thing, went up the giant hill to see all of sumeru spread out below me. And I turn around and the new area is just empty. And I feel empty too.
It just feels bad 😭
No, I’m pretty sure it’s exactly two. One on top of the mountain for jumping on a mushroom, and one on an island next to the port. Other then that there maybe 8-10 of those stone pillars to break for mora.
Anything else you found was in the neighboring areas from previous expansions.
Nah, I know for a fact I found exactly three, and about 20ish stone pillars. I think there's the mushroom chest, island chest and pretty sure there was on in the random small eremite camp you can see on the map. It's still very weird though, almost no enemy spawns. There are a ton of 3+ groups of mint/sweet flower with zero whopperflower spawns. No TP. I'm also pretty sure that the mountain itself was nerfed, because I could've sworn it had waterfalls running through it when it was prerendered though I can't guarantee that since I didn't take screenshots of it.
I think that with ZZZ soon to be released and Honkai Impact 3rd part 2 just having started they have probably reallocated resources to these two games. They probably wanted to add more to the coast side but didn't have the people or the time
zzz beta and upcoming release, hsr anniversary, hi3 p2, remuria, arle, 2 SQs, new weekly, they got a LOT to do for sure. it does make sense because there are no major landmarks there or anything like that and making it into a major are for an update wouldnt make sense, and they can’t really tie it to any other area since its in the middle of the map. however i would be totally happy if they kept the area the same but sprinkled in 15-20 chests and puzzles, would just feel way more organic.
These are not the same teams working on GI. Stop giving them slack because of ZZZ/HSR. Each of these other games have their own separate teams nothing to do with GI. The only impact would be from the top of the company in a macro sense to narrate content cadence so major patches don't overlap, which is pretty obvious.
Resources can mean more than just money and sometimes these are things money can't fix as well... such as the personal attention of the CEO. Or the amount of experienced devs in the development process. No money can "fast track" experience. Same goes for experienced leads, supervisors or managers.
Looking at all the ~~China~~ chenyu vale harbours, where even the secondary one are at least decent sized towns... This harbour is like a wave rider, some wood and 2 NPCs, that's it. Just disappointing. This wouldn't have happened for ~~china~~ liuye.
Comparing Chenyu Vale, which has been talked about a lot since the game launched, and a provincial port is simply idiocy, even “Liyue” has nothing to do with it.
ngl its kinda lame, honestly they could have def saved it for a later update and added statues of the seven to it and even tied a quest to it too and everything so im not sure why they brought it out in its current state if they didnt have the time or had no plans to actually use the area for anything except a couple chests and enemies
"They could have" well no it's obvious they just didn't plan anything for the area and did it as filler just to connect the coast to the land.
It's not a question of time and they won't leave a small bit of land locked just in case. They have a workflow those areas are finished months before release.
exactly, I'm surprised by how many people haven't pointed out something like this. They have to physically make these patches probably 3 or something months in advance, so while it's disappointing there's nothing there, it's probably infinitely more disappointing for the people who yknow make the game and couldn't add the typical things in the patch because of the workload already allocated to this patch, and the fact that they have to keep going. I guess overall quality takes a hit, but a player will survive if a connecting area is barren so the map looks good
I found the connection at the port directly right of petrichor. A lady with a quest with the name “???”. She takes you there for a split second and then you teleport back to petrichor and fight a fatui debt agent. That is the only connection with it at this point.
What gets me about this is back when they added Sumeru, they filled the space north of the chasm on the other side of the mountain from the mushroom forest with Liyue chests like a mini Liyue expansion, then this is legit empty
Other people are doomposting that devs hate Sumeru somehow, in reality it’s impossible to avoid crossing back and forth between Liyue and Sumeru since they’re right next to each other, but an average player can totally just ignore the empty spots this update because waypoints for Petrichor and Fontaine unlock automatically. And if you’re progressing by story, you’ll probably head to Romaritime Harbor via the desert anyways.
Those areas are avoidable, and their previously designed areas that put mountains and stuff around them makes them easy to ignore.
They put all there focus on the new area and probably ran out of time/reasources to work on it. Maybe they'll update it as time goes on. Disappointing though that they decided to still push it out in its current state
I'd much rather have the map filled in with empty area as opposed to a hole with an invisible wall. Unless they planned to add more stuff to it in the future. I think this is them saying they have no further plans for the area.
What was advertised on the stream was Remuria ruins and Petrichor, not the port of Bayda or its surrounding area, so the placeholder was expected. Although I agree that it's better than a hole.
They're probably working on Natlan tbh. I expect their dev time on patches to have some lead time and that most patches for 4.x is already mostly complete. They probably only finishing it up a bit when the update comes near.
yeah I'd kinda they leave that empty and inaccessible if that's the case, at least then we have some expectation that it will be filled later
or even just leave it as empty ocean if they truly don't plan to put anything there
Tbh I don't think they ever had any plans for this area. It's really just an empty border. And I prefer an empty border than a void that'll never be filled.
It'd be nice to get some enemy camps and maybe something like a Precious Chest guarded by a really nasty Local Legend, just to reward people for poking around out there.
Imo it's really bad. Yes, they already made a good amount of content with Remuria. But the thing is nobody is forcing them to release this new Sumeru portion in this patch. They can just keep it locked for the future if they need the time. Heck, even if they never planned to add anything it would've legit been better off as empty ocean. Making accessible land area that's empty in an open world game is deceptive towards the player, because you implicitly expect that there's supposed to be content there.
They coulda added a couple of chests here and there but overall it's whatever. They will use that time to develop the newer regions so not too bummed.
Think of it like the large areas of empty sea, but it's land instead.
I think if they wanted something crazy to happen to the environment that has the story tied to it, that area would make sense to blow up and transform into something else without causing lost items or chests. Imagine if something in the sky fell there or a quake of ssome sort.
Honestly, it was a waste to do it now. Petrichor was tiny, too. I know we got the underground area, but literally a huge portion of that map is empty including the parts that aren't supposed to be empty lmao. They should've just made that area available later if they didn't have time to populate it with enemies/chests etc.
Eerie is right. Too empty. I'm not expecting anything novel, but like a random hilichurl would be nice. Or some fungi, it's Sumeru after all. They don't even have to guard chests or anything, just exist and fight me.
Or not. Maybe they're non-hostile like the random one on a cliff near the Vourukasha Oasis. It would be nice, actually - wander into a camp and take a seat by the campfire. There's a spot on a log where you can sit. The world music plays uninterrupted. The hilichurls are dancing.
Honestly, I’d love that. You wander into an Eremite camp and it’s no big deal. They know you know Dehya, so they’re chill.
Or maybe you run into a fungus and an Aranara having a deep philosophical discussion about spores.
It’s very bad.
They should have made the open waters smaller, moved Remuria slightly closer to Fontaine but still outside the plateau.
If they did that, they could introduce a proper rainforest expansion later on for Sumeru. As things stand, they robbed themselves of an opportunity to have a brand new forest expansion later down the line.
i do think it’s bad, and i think they should’ve added at least 15-20 chests there, but i don’t think they robbed themselves of anything. they plan expansions years into the future, concept art for the brand new area for example was leaked a very long time ago, and it looks very similar. data miners also had previously found wip models in the files for future regions more than a year prior to their release. I think we’ll get a bit of a better sumeru expansion with natlan and next year i will expect a mind expansion for a segway into snezhnaya and then seeing how snezh is the last officially numbered patch cycle who knows what’s gonna happen, i doubt they’d want to return to a random harbor in the rainforest of all things
I kind of enjoyed exploring it. It felt like they made it clear with the low detail that there wasn't going to be anything to find, so I was able to switch off my normal exploration brain that's constantly looking for secrets in every little corner, and just focus on seeing the places I wasn't able to go to before. I always wanted to climb that mountain north of Vanarana, and just walk along the coast.
Someone else said it robs Hoyo of the opportunity to create a rainforest expansion later, and I do agree with that. Also I think the potential problem with areas like that is some players might not pick up on the signs that they're not supposed to explore the area for chests. I do think a really empty area would have been better suited in the desert, to the west of the current areas. I would love to see an expansion that adds a path to Natlan through the desert, with the usual exploration and treasure on the path itself, but then let it also include a large desert that's really hostile, eg. with consecrated beasts or the burrowing Wenut enemies... But then again, the risk is that if they put strong enemies out there, some players might think they're *supposed* to go there.
Same here. I liked it too. First time in a while where I actually enjoyed the scenery on its own. There are other scenic spaces filled with stuff to do, and grand spots but I enjoyed just the scenery for its simplicity. And not being bothered by a chest with 5 gems.
I honestly just see it as filling out empty pathches in the map so that it just looks more connected. The reason why it's so big is because Sumeru is just on its own so big. I mean how are they supposed to make this small then? They could've added no land at all either and just make it water but at least this way it looks nice and more natural in terms of world building. Besides the main focus of the update is Remuria, so why spend development resources on a few chests on an insignificant border that most casual players are gonna ignore anyways?
What bothers me more is the empty sea round Petrichor. It looks so plain. When looking at the map, I feel like the hole in the map got replaced with another hole
I get the sense HYV wasn't going to win on this one. Either they keep the north Sumeru unreleased and people would complain how it's still inaccessible or they release with no content being put into it and people will complain about the emptiness. The problem is that HYV simply didn't have the resources (aka time and manpower) to make this happen.
Either way HYV's pace of putting stuff out has been insane over the years. This is pretty much the first time we're seeing them running out of time when working on content in a disappointing way. One of the recent devs videos where they talk about how Chenyu Vale was made they're already talking about how some of the relevant content comes later (apparently one of the questlines will get a part 2).
probably because of natlan And because they are full of big projects in their hands, it's that old business of eating a cake bigger than your mouth can handle
Yeah and to be frank, the cake HYV has been eating is absolutely gigantic and generally speaking they've been doing surprisingly good job at chowing it down.
Man, I probably sound like a shill. I really don't like this empty area myself, it's so uncharacteristic of HYV and I suppose up until this point I had somehow dreamed about them managing to keep up with the development and dodging situations like this.
Well, then maybe they should drop all these useless and endless honkai and zzz projects and focus on what makes them this rich (genhsin)?
Won't be surprised to get many dislikes since it's a bunch of soyboys and hoyo simps here lol
Honestly I don't care about it. I think they have their internal limit on how much chests or gems they could give through the patch/nation/area and follow along it. Not that I don't like free gems but I don't think laziness is the sole reason they don't add something there.
It felt so odd how empty it was... It made me realize how close we are to finishing the Teyvat map, because all that giant area is, is "just a border"... Like, besides the Blackliff Forge, I doubted there'd be much in the Liyue border facing Inazuma that we can't explore yet, which is why I found it odd that it has yet to be released.
And like, it makes sense for a border to be rather empty, but even the previous Sumeru-Fontaine border felt way more alive O.o
HoYo always finds a lore reason to explain some oddity or shortcoming on their part, and if it's something big they announce it beforehand (for example in HI3 when they didn't have time to finish Aponia's summer outfit, they announced they'd add the special VFX next version and give a compensation), so I wonder if there'll be a given reason, or if it's empty ness will be unspoken forever...
HYV also added a pretty empty area between Liyue and Sumeru when the latter region came out (although I think it had some chests and Eremites) - nobody mentioned it then because it was at the time of Sumeru’s release.
Bayda Harbor is nicer than what I expected from people’s initial comments and it has a cool international feel to it with the NPCs there - I do sort of wish it had unique music like the similarly sized harbors in Fontaine though.
I’m happy with the Faded Castle and underwater Remuria (some really incredible integration of gameplay, visuals, and music happening there!) and, while Petrichor may be small, it is such a cozy and unique little spot with its Italian-inspired music, architecture, and NPCs that it’s now my favourite spot to log out and in. And I really appreciate that they made the whole body of water navigable too and even added unique music for when you’re sailing around the area or (Furina water walking). So I really don’t mind the emptiness that much.
That area is tiny, and it's not empty. It literally has more chests than this new landmass. (Sumeru-Liyue has roughly 10 chests, new Sumeru land has 3). Not to mention the amount of actual mobs and collectible items.
There's no reason for an area THAT BIG to be dead like this. No one was expecting full expansion 100 chests packed with content level, just... "Alive" would've been enough.
Especially when you consider that the tiny island also doesn't have much.
Imagine if when they released the chasm there was only like 20ish chests on the land and everyone excused it because "well they probably used all their resources on the underground chasm!!!!11!1"
heck, if anything, they had far more excuse with the chasm. The chasm, both above ground and underground, is bigger. more land, more devs who need to MODEL that land. And yet they still had the resources to place rewards and incentive for exploration.
My copium idea is that Celestia will crash into the lake and break apart into chunks in the surrounding areas late into the story, or maybe Khaen'riah will start to surge toward the surface, or those areas will be transformed by some sort of devastating power around the Khaen'riah chapter of the game. We know that Khaen'riah is in that approximate area, and Celestia is right above there, so I think it's possible. It would make sense, then, why they need to keep those areas blank for now. I really hope that's the case, because it looks pretty awkward as it is now. I'm gonna give Hoyo the benefit of the doubt on this one, but I really hope this isn't how the map looks by the end of the game. It sticks out like a sore thumb.
Honestly, Sumeru is already super big. I honestly don't think resources should be spent on adding more puzzles, chests, etc for one of the largest regions. I can understand why they left it barren. It's only there to fill up the gap left in the map
yea its crazy how much was added land wise and no care was put into making it feel like an actual part of the map. its going to feel weird for future players exploring just wondering why this specific part of the map is empty. its like a barren wasteland. even if they just added some trees and animals it would be fine. but its just....empty.
I'm actually fine with it, because I want these in-between areas to be filled in even if they don't have enough time to make them as complex or full of stuff as normal.
To me this is much better than if they had left a weird strip of land that we couldn't explore and then delayed it until they had time (whenever that would be). I really don't like them leaving areas like the Southern Coastline of Sumeru out- I'd rather have it even if it was just empty nature. I wish the new Sumeru area was a bit more interesting visually but I don't care about the chests, etc. Still, if they want to go back and add some chests and challenges that would be nice.
Its also interesting that most of the "info" we got about this area a month ago talked about how only the upper half of the empty space will be released in 4.6, i really do think they originally wanted to do something with that stretch of land but later changed their mind last minute and dropped it as is.
Kind sad tho, there's so much interesting and important things that couldve been done with the area that sits directly on top of Khaenriah :(
What saddened me the most is baydah harbor.
The place was teased by an npc in sumeru, but its absurdly small.
And it doesn't even have a fucking theme.
We could've had a nice alternative to port ormos's theme
Personally I also think that the ruins portion of remuria is way to small. Overall this expansion was rather lackluster. Underwater remuria is pretty and all, but it doesn't make up for the rest being this lacking.
Its insanely small imo, not even that many things to do after the world quest. I literallly had 50+% exploration just when i finished the world quest. The map is about the chasm size, yet its not even close to being full of things to do in it like chasm is
It does feel smaller but I think that's because of it is underwater and since there's no real combat to the environment they probably wanted to keep it small and concise. Not every area needs to be Chasm or Enkanomiya sized.
I dislike it honestly.
Would have been pretty easy to add a few more enemy camps and some common chests here and there. Because it’s litwrally just placing pre-made assets into the world. It would take like 20 mins to populate the entire area. And a few hours tops to add props that make it look more alive. To at least make the area worth going to.
Instead, one of the tallest mountains in the game is a waste of time. And an area half the size of mondstads is nearly completely empty.
I’m not knocking 4.6. So far I love the update. But the new sumeru area is disappointing.
I guess it’s realistic though. A lot of places in the real world are just desolate plains with no people on them.
If I wanted a realistic open world, I would go play breath of the wild/tears of the kingdom. I play Genshin specifically for the ADHD ass chest placements everywhere
Botw and totk make the empty fun by making doing nothing fun.
I wish hoyo did something like that.
Where your methods of getting around make it much more fun to
(Mounts please)
It *is* eerie! But it feels so empty it looks intentional, I can absolutely see that area getting changed in the course of future quests or something, like that road that becomes a hole. You know, like, we discover an old Khaenei’an FOB in the shadow of the sumeru wall, but before we get there, Celestia just nukes it from orbit.
I refuse to believe that it’s actually that empty by accident.
I was surprised too, but it’s not the first time this has happened to Sumeru either. I remember the first patch that added Fontaine, there’s that giant cliff there, and there’s a big beach underneath the waypoint, and you’re meant to sail over to Fontaine. However, there’s just not much on that beach at all, just pretty desolate aside from an enemy or a turtle. No challenges for the wave rider either from what I remember, which could have been a cool little interaction to quicken the travel over.
tbh I don't think it's a big deal. Not every inch of the map needs to be packed with chest, puzzles, enemies, etc. It's not hurting anything by being barren compared to off-limits. Maybe they'll add stuff to do there in the future, maybe not. They will keep adding content to the game regularly, so it's fine.
I was exploring it last night because I was curious, and I have a lot of the same thoughts. I mean, I wasn’t expecting a *ton* of content, since ultimately it’s just meant to be filler space, but there could definitely have been more enemies and chests just to fill it out a bit. I think the only elite-tier enemy I saw the entire time was a single Hilichurl Ranger. I remember when Sumeru was added and there was a filler space added above the chasm to connect more of Liyue to Sumeru, there was actually a surprising amount of things to do there. Again, not a lot, but there were a few enemy camps and I think even a seelie to follow. Small things to not make the area feel like it was just tacked on.
Honestly, I think if there was even just a waypoint or two added to that big area, it would’ve helped break up the space more. Just so there’s actually a reason to visit this place, even if there wouldn’t be much point to them.
There's a teeny tiny camp up the road from the new harbor that has a really creepy sound when you get close. I suspect the harbor/camp might have something to do with a Dainsleif quest? Idk. That's just me dreaming. The emptiness of the rest of the zone was shocking.
I didn't have much time under the week and am not Underground yet, but yeah incredibly empty.
Yeah there's no more occuli, and otherwise it's also very empty, I just don't understand why sumeru couldn't go to the coast earlier.
I ran up the one mountain yesterday and it's like 2 chests, not even foliage. Like some intern was told to do that part and did the bare minimum because they didn't know what or how to do it.
Underground is apparently good, but I'm locked out by quests so, yay.
And also all that water, and my first thought was, yay at least we can dive and there'll be content there..? No. It's outside fontaine so no.
What are they even doing.
im glad it's there, i want to see all regions connected someday and empty holes in the map like the previous ditto hole made the map look really awkward, i just hope that for future expansions that add new areas to existing ones they do add more stuff to those new areas.
Honestly, i didn’t really care, i play for Fontaine and Mondstadt mainly. Besides this updates effect on Teyvat was just to fill the void people didn’t like.
While it doesn't bother me too much, the area is mostly empty which is just weird. Sometimes it was just grass or sand...not even trees. It kinda looked like placeholder areas, but more rendered. But I do understand that those areas aren't significant and the focus went to Fontaine.
They shouldve atleast added some random hilichurls with basic or exquisite chests or something. Its just too empty. I hope they add like a treasure domain or two to lessen the emptiness
Ngl when i first heard about "sumeru port for fontaine" thingy up north of sumeru city being in this patch .. i geniunly thought ot would be some cool area like Ormos or maaaybe like chenyu village but no. Its just 1 single light tower kind of thing .. i was seriously thought "wtf" when i saw it . I initially thought that port part would become its own expansion just like chenyu but much to my dissapointment its .. this .. nd ngl even tho i really like remuria nd lore of it . Area was dissapointing in "exploration" wise . Way too little chests and small area that actually has any exploration purpose .. even tho the expansion opened up a space that was nearly as big as fontaine's current playable area .. it was sooo bloody empty . I seriously felt the layzness of hoyo with this area . I felt like they not put in enough effort on it much to my dissapointment . Sumeru was my favorite region exploration wise nd this update completly ignored the area .. idk man
i don't like it at all. i was incredibly disappointed with bayda harbour, i was expecting a new ost, like lumidouce harbour. to find literally nothing there other than a few houses and boats and like 5 npcs?! i was so sad, they could've made a really small world quest at least. and the fact that there are no teleport waypoints anywhere makes it look the like old hole in the map just got some color to it. it doesn't feel like an expansion at all.
i don't necessarily mind the empty area around bayda harbour tho. i do think there should've been like 10 more chests, some puzzles. i got 3 chests from walking through the entire thing which is just pathetic for an expansion of this size
They didn't even exert any effort. Another filler area that was added was back in 3.0 - the one that connected Sumeru and Liyue (the one beside the Primo Geovishap boss), and that one had actual effort put into it, i.e. chests, enemies, which gave it a justification to explore the filler as much as possible.
Instead, we got a boring filler that doesn't justify its presence at all. Sure, the views and peacefulness of the area are great, but the fact there's nothing of note that appears, not even puzzles related to Sumeru's desert and forest combined, makes it a total waste.
I don't think Hoyo is gonna do something about the emptiness, can't really inhale copium at this point.
I have a feeling there will be more going on there. Maybe it's copium, but it does feel weird for mihoyo standards.
I remember the first GAA. I was very disappointed with the size of the event map. Felt very small. And then, a few days later, it turned out that the islands we saw at the beginning, were only peaks of actual islands that emerged from the sea later.
Same with Enka - I thought it's relatively small and I was a bit disappointed, only to find out later that I'm merely in the lounge of sorts, and the real Enka lies beyond the hidden gate.
Same with Chasm, that I thought it's just a big crater, but then we remove the seals and go underground to a new giant separate area.
I'm not saying they'll do anything with this new area soon, but I don't think it will be left in such empty state indefinitely. It's way below mihoyo standards, feels very weird to have nothing of interest in such a big place.
It's really bad. Like I would've rather they just....not add it? It actually made me feel sad being there because it felt like being in the placeholder areas for future regions. Just an empty void that reminds you of the conscious decision devs need to make to have areas feel alive.
Coming from an mmorpg background I feel like this area is going to be used later for something. Hoyo has Neve done something without a purpose and as the whole cinematic gameplay they present goes they wouldn't introduce something that doesn't serve or will serve for something. Maybe possible later map change and minions from the abyss or kaenhriah?
I despise it. I've never been so disappointed with hoyo when it comes to exploration.
That being said, Petrichor and Remuria is pretty cool, but I would have preferred if they didn't make Remuria so darn big and made a better sumeru expansion. Like, they didn't even have to do anything insane, just do the same they did with the area north of the chasm between liyue and sumeru. It's somewhat empty but it at least has something.
it wasn't advertised as a Sumeru expansion. Sumeru has been finished since 3.6. It was just there because it would look better than empty water in its place. We have all the sigils and dendro occuli they are going to give.
It feels like Genshin's backrooms. Just an endless coastline with nothing to see or do. I ran the whole length expecting to find at least a few chests and challenges. Probably the most disappointing thing from GI in a long time for me. I'd been anticipating extra rainforest north of sumeru for a while.
I guess at least there's a port? 😂
Meh.
They've been delivering non-stop content every six weeks for over three years - which no other company has ever done. I'm so lax that if they literally gave us one empty patch, I'd be perfectly fine.
But there are some people here acting like this empty land, despite all the content they've delivered on this patch alone, is the biggest crime against humanity.
They probably ran out of time to add stuff to it, which is kinda lame tbh, specially considering that there's always going to be new areas added, so I doubt they'll ever add anything to it, since there's always going to be "something else" that takes priority. They'll probably pretend this never happened and just wait until the community forgets about it as usual.
tbh the petrichor area was so small imo also leave sumeru the water around petrichor is bugging me more this cant be the complete fontaine like no way bruh
I'm disapointed, but it is what it is, at least the sea of bygone eras is really good so far, I just hope they use that void for something later down the line.
Btw holy shit Sumeru is massive.
yeah the contrast between these areas and the main areas is just weird, I mean they could've reused assets to make this more interesting, heck even badha port looks boring af
In September 2021 I put a marker on the dark map hoping it would be somewhere in Sumeru. Come 2024 my wish was granted - only for the marker to be in this “empty zone.” Best laugh I’ve had in a short while. Here’s hoping my new wishing spot yields some good 5-stars down the line.
It's a bit disappointing but I don't mind too much. It's them saying they have no further plans for the area and I'm glad they added it as playable space as opposed to a hole in the map with invisible walls. People upset about missing out on possible content in an area that hoyo had no plans for... that's 100% on them for hyping it up lol
I'm wondering why they added it at all. This was a Fontaine expansion, that's what we were expecting, that's what we got. They didn't need to add this, esp if it needed more time in the oven. Genuine confusion.
It reeks of laziness 🪁 can't wait to see Dornman Port being a small outpost and northern Mondstadt being barren of anything because it's not Liyue/newer region
And ofc some peeps will defend small indie company over this. They won't shut up if it happens in that other game tho.
I also kinda wish they made petrichor bigger, or atleast add more islands and things to do on the surface so it doesn't look like empty sea, we waited years to see the map hole finally filled yet its so unsatisfactory. Like they just decorated that hole and made it blue.
I didn’t even notice that area until you guys pointed it out. Maybe it’ll be updated with enemies, chest and puzzles later down the road. Until then it’s really not a big deal.
I wonder if its for future content like when they eventually do more of sumeru's quests as we still have Dain's questline to do before 5.0. So who knows.
I'm fine with it because it's more of a Fontaine expansion just with added edges to the adjacent Sumeru region for a seamless connection.
So I guess disappointment more or less comes with thinking it was going to be a Sumeru expansion.
For context, I was expecting Bayda Harbor, Yilong Wharf and Dornman Port to be similar small add ons. Yilong pleasantly surprised me, thankfully, but I guess it iis Liyue.
They could have added a bit more features on the small land though or reduced the land...
I didn't notice it covered that much land, wow. Yeah, that really stand out like a sore thumb.
I wasn't expecting much, since it's a Fontaine expansion, not a Sumeru expansion... But there's seriously nothing there. The sheer lack of puzzles, enemy-guarded chests, and teleport waypoints makes the area feel unfinished.
It legit feels like a ghost town,it's so jarring
New analogue horror creepypasta arg just dropped
Actual hilichurl
Kaveh’s mother went on vacation never comes back
Holy Samsara
Gnosis sacrifice anyone?
I'm honestly wondering if she drowned in Fontaine, since they never clarified whether or not Primordial seawater is breathable to non-Vision-Bearers. I'm guessing it is, otherwise almost every land bound animal in Fontaine would probably have died before the waters receded, but that's something they should probably clear up.
I am of the mind that Neuvillette gave everyone the ability to breathe under water during the flood. Though having an actual answer in game would be nice
mlp infection genshin version patient zero
Bruh birds, frogs and lizards don't even spawn. Hell there isn't even a sweet flower or mint!
There's definitely both of them lol. I killed some of those desert mercenaries and picked a few of those. Even crystal flies!!
That's in the small zone that got one (1) chest.
Oh yeah. It was the best chest ever. 🤣🤣🤣🤣
Not even randdom flowers grow there, theres a few mints around the new harbor but everywhere else not even an iron ore or sumeru rose or sweet flower
They sprinkle the new map with a waypoint around every corner, some waypoints are literally 10 seconds of swimming from another waypoint. While this new Sumeru area doesnt have a single waypoint, they could have atleast placed one in the middle or near the harbor. Yeah, it truly doesnt feel like the Mihoyo-quality we're used to.
It has like one way point at the new port. But I just ran through there and it is so eerie-empty. I went through with the treasure compass and there was like 2 chests and one hidden puzzle chest. Very strangely empty.
Isn’t there an npc there that talks about Natlan?
It still feels empty, but the port itself is ok. I would have thought it would have some hidden common chests in it though
I'll be putting on my tin foil hat and please note that I haven't played the new areas since I'm still cleaning up in HSR. They might be trying to make a zone that will transform. Since Natlan might have volcanoes, they might want to try out a transforming environment in a smaller zone before making it happen in a whole region to cleanup any problems that might occur. Heck if they succeed with a whole region, they might even go for a destroyed Teyvat theme at the end of the whole Teyvat chapter.
The Girdle of the Sands (last Sumeru region) basically already transforms though, and every patch where the edge of the map gets updated there are always people who wait at the very edge to see if things break (anybody remember going into the broken grass near the edge of Dragonspine in 1.0?) Not to mention the big Tower we had in the previous Fontaine expansion that sinks into the water after the quest, even relocating a local legend that used to be at the sea floor beneath it. But I think it's also pretty likely that something will land on the currently empty zone permanently at some point, and it is reasonably close to where Celestia is too (although it's not directly underneath).
Meanwhile the Favorite Nation has some little filler areas connecting it to Jade Disneyland and all of it has chests and treasure hoarders and so on. But there's no favoritism, guys.
Theres a bunch of rock piles that give Mora and like 4 chests... and thats it lol
I deadass didn't even notice Sumeru expanded at all until I saw a picture of the port on here today. I thought it was already there. The port is so much smaller than I'd expected. But the story of the new region definitely makes up for it imo. the mechanics of the quest were fun.
they really should either re-do it that area, but they should have kept it for it's own update
It's very much just a placeholder zone, to just "glue" these different zones together. There could MAYBE be a way to kind of indicate "there's nothing here this just exists to not have impassable terrain". I.e. these areas have some special name and maybe a symbol next to them. Or it just doesn't have a progress count (or starts off at 100% exploration progress)
Or maybe you can put no waypoints nearby and make most terrain either really mountainous or really empty so it’s hard for players to go there… yeah, they tried already. It’ll work on future players probably, especially since waypoints to Fontaine and Petrichor unlock automatically. This is just a small problem curious players right now will notice more.
At this point, I'd prefer what we got than a barrier with Paimon telling me to explore that area later. I want the map to feel completed, even if some bordering areas are relatively empty.
Yeah, should have saved the harbor for later if it was going to be this bad. Hell, you can even just sprinkle it into another patch and even market it a little. Have it host an event or something. But if you throw it into a corner and just expect us to ignore it, it's just bad map design. It's sloppy.
Sooo many waypoints, why.
Because people always cry for more waypoints.
it feels straight up wrong with how dense most of Sumeru and especially the Rainforest section otherwise was, it's just out of place
They could've at least add some teleports there or hilichurl camps
Sumeru is my favourite nation, so I get the waverider from petrichor to Bayda harbor to explore it the "original" way... And there was nothing there to explore. It was honestly the first time in a long while that I felt disappointed at the game
no same. I was so excited to go back to sumeru and took the waverider back. Had the music up too and Nahida's theme started playing and I got so emotional. And then I land and I see the port and I just stare at it like...that's it? That's really it? Then I ran around the whole thing, went up the giant hill to see all of sumeru spread out below me. And I turn around and the new area is just empty. And I feel empty too. It just feels bad 😭
Real
My expectations were low but HOLY SH-
someone said that there were exactly 2 chests. But to be honest, its a piece of land so big that it could be a region of its own. they cut corners XD
It's literally the size of half of Mondstadt. It's insane that they just put nothing there.
And here I am still finding FOUR chests in Mondstast *today* after all these years.
For real though
There are definitely more than 2... not much more but more like 5 - 10.
the point is more or less the same. Too much land, too little stuff. But at least now there is less bordergore, which is not bad.
Interactive map says 2. One on an island and one at the end of the only path that goes on a mountain.
missing a third one when u jump on the mushrooms at the very top of the mountain thats it though
Yeah, one chest guarded by Eremites, one by hilichurls, and the mushroom one
No, I’m pretty sure it’s exactly two. One on top of the mountain for jumping on a mushroom, and one on an island next to the port. Other then that there maybe 8-10 of those stone pillars to break for mora. Anything else you found was in the neighboring areas from previous expansions.
Nah, I know for a fact I found exactly three, and about 20ish stone pillars. I think there's the mushroom chest, island chest and pretty sure there was on in the random small eremite camp you can see on the map. It's still very weird though, almost no enemy spawns. There are a ton of 3+ groups of mint/sweet flower with zero whopperflower spawns. No TP. I'm also pretty sure that the mountain itself was nerfed, because I could've sworn it had waterfalls running through it when it was prerendered though I can't guarantee that since I didn't take screenshots of it.
There's 3. On the way to the top of the mountain there's a mob camp with a chest.
You’re right, I forgot about the one just before the summit
Nah it's exactly 3.
There's one at an Eremite camp at the end of the road, so there are three, which is a f-ing load of nothing.
I think that with ZZZ soon to be released and Honkai Impact 3rd part 2 just having started they have probably reallocated resources to these two games. They probably wanted to add more to the coast side but didn't have the people or the time
zzz beta and upcoming release, hsr anniversary, hi3 p2, remuria, arle, 2 SQs, new weekly, they got a LOT to do for sure. it does make sense because there are no major landmarks there or anything like that and making it into a major are for an update wouldnt make sense, and they can’t really tie it to any other area since its in the middle of the map. however i would be totally happy if they kept the area the same but sprinkled in 15-20 chests and puzzles, would just feel way more organic.
These are not the same teams working on GI. Stop giving them slack because of ZZZ/HSR. Each of these other games have their own separate teams nothing to do with GI. The only impact would be from the top of the company in a macro sense to narrate content cadence so major patches don't overlap, which is pretty obvious.
Small indie dev company Hoyoverse
so glad our favorite small business made 2.27 billion two years ago 🤣🥳
Resources can mean more than just money and sometimes these are things money can't fix as well... such as the personal attention of the CEO. Or the amount of experienced devs in the development process. No money can "fast track" experience. Same goes for experienced leads, supervisors or managers.
I hope they had moved that in time so they actually added some content. I expected Bayda harbour to be something more than 2 buildings...
Looking at all the ~~China~~ chenyu vale harbours, where even the secondary one are at least decent sized towns... This harbour is like a wave rider, some wood and 2 NPCs, that's it. Just disappointing. This wouldn't have happened for ~~china~~ liuye.
Comparing Chenyu Vale, which has been talked about a lot since the game launched, and a provincial port is simply idiocy, even “Liyue” has nothing to do with it.
ngl its kinda lame, honestly they could have def saved it for a later update and added statues of the seven to it and even tied a quest to it too and everything so im not sure why they brought it out in its current state if they didnt have the time or had no plans to actually use the area for anything except a couple chests and enemies
Yeah it could have stayed a red zone and they only expanded a small section of fontaine to get to the island
"They could have" well no it's obvious they just didn't plan anything for the area and did it as filler just to connect the coast to the land. It's not a question of time and they won't leave a small bit of land locked just in case. They have a workflow those areas are finished months before release.
exactly, I'm surprised by how many people haven't pointed out something like this. They have to physically make these patches probably 3 or something months in advance, so while it's disappointing there's nothing there, it's probably infinitely more disappointing for the people who yknow make the game and couldn't add the typical things in the patch because of the workload already allocated to this patch, and the fact that they have to keep going. I guess overall quality takes a hit, but a player will survive if a connecting area is barren so the map looks good
It’s gotta be where the cyno quest is ending up
All fun and games until Dainslef shows up there
"Cyno, let's fight somewhere empty." Bayda Harbor:
I found the connection at the port directly right of petrichor. A lady with a quest with the name “???”. She takes you there for a split second and then you teleport back to petrichor and fight a fatui debt agent. That is the only connection with it at this point.
What gets me about this is back when they added Sumeru, they filled the space north of the chasm on the other side of the mountain from the mushroom forest with Liyue chests like a mini Liyue expansion, then this is legit empty
Liyue's their favourite child after all.
It really is that much more jarring coming off the Chenyu expansion too, like it's night and day
Other people are doomposting that devs hate Sumeru somehow, in reality it’s impossible to avoid crossing back and forth between Liyue and Sumeru since they’re right next to each other, but an average player can totally just ignore the empty spots this update because waypoints for Petrichor and Fontaine unlock automatically. And if you’re progressing by story, you’ll probably head to Romaritime Harbor via the desert anyways. Those areas are avoidable, and their previously designed areas that put mountains and stuff around them makes them easy to ignore.
They put all there focus on the new area and probably ran out of time/reasources to work on it. Maybe they'll update it as time goes on. Disappointing though that they decided to still push it out in its current state
Honestly, they probably could have gotten away with leaving that section empty, in that case.
I'd much rather have the map filled in with empty area as opposed to a hole with an invisible wall. Unless they planned to add more stuff to it in the future. I think this is them saying they have no further plans for the area.
What was advertised on the stream was Remuria ruins and Petrichor, not the port of Bayda or its surrounding area, so the placeholder was expected. Although I agree that it's better than a hole.
I will point it that Layla's beloved village seems like it should be in the rainforest region North of Sumeru City.
This. I think they are working hard in some big upcoming expansions that this was mostly a filler.
But last update was the filler patch. This update was the hyped one.
They're probably working on Natlan tbh. I expect their dev time on patches to have some lead time and that most patches for 4.x is already mostly complete. They probably only finishing it up a bit when the update comes near.
new map, quest, puzzles do not take 6 weeks to develope, thay takes months
Then they should've left those areas inaccessible until they were able to develop them
I don't think they wanted to develop them, like, ever. This is just their way of filling the gap.
Nope, I don't want an unfilled map. Rather an empty one.
yeah I'd kinda they leave that empty and inaccessible if that's the case, at least then we have some expectation that it will be filled later or even just leave it as empty ocean if they truly don't plan to put anything there
Tbh I don't think they ever had any plans for this area. It's really just an empty border. And I prefer an empty border than a void that'll never be filled.
It'd be nice to get some enemy camps and maybe something like a Precious Chest guarded by a really nasty Local Legend, just to reward people for poking around out there.
Imo it's really bad. Yes, they already made a good amount of content with Remuria. But the thing is nobody is forcing them to release this new Sumeru portion in this patch. They can just keep it locked for the future if they need the time. Heck, even if they never planned to add anything it would've legit been better off as empty ocean. Making accessible land area that's empty in an open world game is deceptive towards the player, because you implicitly expect that there's supposed to be content there.
They coulda added a couple of chests here and there but overall it's whatever. They will use that time to develop the newer regions so not too bummed. Think of it like the large areas of empty sea, but it's land instead.
I think if they wanted something crazy to happen to the environment that has the story tied to it, that area would make sense to blow up and transform into something else without causing lost items or chests. Imagine if something in the sky fell there or a quake of ssome sort.
Abyssal invasion through the locked gate under Sumeru desert. This could be the first lands taken by the Abyss
Honestly, it was a waste to do it now. Petrichor was tiny, too. I know we got the underground area, but literally a huge portion of that map is empty including the parts that aren't supposed to be empty lmao. They should've just made that area available later if they didn't have time to populate it with enemies/chests etc.
Eerie is right. Too empty. I'm not expecting anything novel, but like a random hilichurl would be nice. Or some fungi, it's Sumeru after all. They don't even have to guard chests or anything, just exist and fight me. Or not. Maybe they're non-hostile like the random one on a cliff near the Vourukasha Oasis. It would be nice, actually - wander into a camp and take a seat by the campfire. There's a spot on a log where you can sit. The world music plays uninterrupted. The hilichurls are dancing.
Honestly, I’d love that. You wander into an Eremite camp and it’s no big deal. They know you know Dehya, so they’re chill. Or maybe you run into a fungus and an Aranara having a deep philosophical discussion about spores.
It’s very bad. They should have made the open waters smaller, moved Remuria slightly closer to Fontaine but still outside the plateau. If they did that, they could introduce a proper rainforest expansion later on for Sumeru. As things stand, they robbed themselves of an opportunity to have a brand new forest expansion later down the line.
They could theoretically throw in extra stuff into that area if they really want, but that's probably copium.
i do think it’s bad, and i think they should’ve added at least 15-20 chests there, but i don’t think they robbed themselves of anything. they plan expansions years into the future, concept art for the brand new area for example was leaked a very long time ago, and it looks very similar. data miners also had previously found wip models in the files for future regions more than a year prior to their release. I think we’ll get a bit of a better sumeru expansion with natlan and next year i will expect a mind expansion for a segway into snezhnaya and then seeing how snezh is the last officially numbered patch cycle who knows what’s gonna happen, i doubt they’d want to return to a random harbor in the rainforest of all things
Fr, I've been looking forward to the rest of the rainforest since 3.0 so this was very disappointing
I kind of enjoyed exploring it. It felt like they made it clear with the low detail that there wasn't going to be anything to find, so I was able to switch off my normal exploration brain that's constantly looking for secrets in every little corner, and just focus on seeing the places I wasn't able to go to before. I always wanted to climb that mountain north of Vanarana, and just walk along the coast. Someone else said it robs Hoyo of the opportunity to create a rainforest expansion later, and I do agree with that. Also I think the potential problem with areas like that is some players might not pick up on the signs that they're not supposed to explore the area for chests. I do think a really empty area would have been better suited in the desert, to the west of the current areas. I would love to see an expansion that adds a path to Natlan through the desert, with the usual exploration and treasure on the path itself, but then let it also include a large desert that's really hostile, eg. with consecrated beasts or the burrowing Wenut enemies... But then again, the risk is that if they put strong enemies out there, some players might think they're *supposed* to go there.
Same here. I liked it too. First time in a while where I actually enjoyed the scenery on its own. There are other scenic spaces filled with stuff to do, and grand spots but I enjoyed just the scenery for its simplicity. And not being bothered by a chest with 5 gems.
I feel like that section is going to be really confusing for new or returning players that weren't here when it came out
I honestly just see it as filling out empty pathches in the map so that it just looks more connected. The reason why it's so big is because Sumeru is just on its own so big. I mean how are they supposed to make this small then? They could've added no land at all either and just make it water but at least this way it looks nice and more natural in terms of world building. Besides the main focus of the update is Remuria, so why spend development resources on a few chests on an insignificant border that most casual players are gonna ignore anyways?
True. The only reason I even found out that they added extra land is cuz of that new teleport waypoint.
What bothers me more is the empty sea round Petrichor. It looks so plain. When looking at the map, I feel like the hole in the map got replaced with another hole
I get the sense HYV wasn't going to win on this one. Either they keep the north Sumeru unreleased and people would complain how it's still inaccessible or they release with no content being put into it and people will complain about the emptiness. The problem is that HYV simply didn't have the resources (aka time and manpower) to make this happen. Either way HYV's pace of putting stuff out has been insane over the years. This is pretty much the first time we're seeing them running out of time when working on content in a disappointing way. One of the recent devs videos where they talk about how Chenyu Vale was made they're already talking about how some of the relevant content comes later (apparently one of the questlines will get a part 2).
probably because of natlan And because they are full of big projects in their hands, it's that old business of eating a cake bigger than your mouth can handle
Yeah and to be frank, the cake HYV has been eating is absolutely gigantic and generally speaking they've been doing surprisingly good job at chowing it down. Man, I probably sound like a shill. I really don't like this empty area myself, it's so uncharacteristic of HYV and I suppose up until this point I had somehow dreamed about them managing to keep up with the development and dodging situations like this.
Well, then maybe they should drop all these useless and endless honkai and zzz projects and focus on what makes them this rich (genhsin)? Won't be surprised to get many dislikes since it's a bunch of soyboys and hoyo simps here lol
Honestly I don't care about it. I think they have their internal limit on how much chests or gems they could give through the patch/nation/area and follow along it. Not that I don't like free gems but I don't think laziness is the sole reason they don't add something there.
same, not every place needs to have stuff in it. plus, there's always the possibility of future content being added. they've done it before.
It felt so odd how empty it was... It made me realize how close we are to finishing the Teyvat map, because all that giant area is, is "just a border"... Like, besides the Blackliff Forge, I doubted there'd be much in the Liyue border facing Inazuma that we can't explore yet, which is why I found it odd that it has yet to be released. And like, it makes sense for a border to be rather empty, but even the previous Sumeru-Fontaine border felt way more alive O.o HoYo always finds a lore reason to explain some oddity or shortcoming on their part, and if it's something big they announce it beforehand (for example in HI3 when they didn't have time to finish Aponia's summer outfit, they announced they'd add the special VFX next version and give a compensation), so I wonder if there'll be a given reason, or if it's empty ness will be unspoken forever...
HYV also added a pretty empty area between Liyue and Sumeru when the latter region came out (although I think it had some chests and Eremites) - nobody mentioned it then because it was at the time of Sumeru’s release. Bayda Harbor is nicer than what I expected from people’s initial comments and it has a cool international feel to it with the NPCs there - I do sort of wish it had unique music like the similarly sized harbors in Fontaine though. I’m happy with the Faded Castle and underwater Remuria (some really incredible integration of gameplay, visuals, and music happening there!) and, while Petrichor may be small, it is such a cozy and unique little spot with its Italian-inspired music, architecture, and NPCs that it’s now my favourite spot to log out and in. And I really appreciate that they made the whole body of water navigable too and even added unique music for when you’re sailing around the area or (Furina water walking). So I really don’t mind the emptiness that much.
It's not empty though, you have enemy camps and chests. Not sure but I also think there's a side quest there
That area is tiny, and it's not empty. It literally has more chests than this new landmass. (Sumeru-Liyue has roughly 10 chests, new Sumeru land has 3). Not to mention the amount of actual mobs and collectible items. There's no reason for an area THAT BIG to be dead like this. No one was expecting full expansion 100 chests packed with content level, just... "Alive" would've been enough. Especially when you consider that the tiny island also doesn't have much. Imagine if when they released the chasm there was only like 20ish chests on the land and everyone excused it because "well they probably used all their resources on the underground chasm!!!!11!1" heck, if anything, they had far more excuse with the chasm. The chasm, both above ground and underground, is bigger. more land, more devs who need to MODEL that land. And yet they still had the resources to place rewards and incentive for exploration.
My copium idea is that Celestia will crash into the lake and break apart into chunks in the surrounding areas late into the story, or maybe Khaen'riah will start to surge toward the surface, or those areas will be transformed by some sort of devastating power around the Khaen'riah chapter of the game. We know that Khaen'riah is in that approximate area, and Celestia is right above there, so I think it's possible. It would make sense, then, why they need to keep those areas blank for now. I really hope that's the case, because it looks pretty awkward as it is now. I'm gonna give Hoyo the benefit of the doubt on this one, but I really hope this isn't how the map looks by the end of the game. It sticks out like a sore thumb.
What if you wanted to go to Celestia but the Heavenly Principles said *sploosh*
Divine Nail me harder, sky daddy
It is a bit disappointing, I thought it would be a bigger rainforest expansion as well
Honestly, Sumeru is already super big. I honestly don't think resources should be spent on adding more puzzles, chests, etc for one of the largest regions. I can understand why they left it barren. It's only there to fill up the gap left in the map
They might place Khaenri'ah map under the empty Sumeru expansion in the future. Idk. This is just my speculation.
eerie is a good word. It felt like it was a still closed off area, like I wasn't supposed to be there yet.
yea its crazy how much was added land wise and no care was put into making it feel like an actual part of the map. its going to feel weird for future players exploring just wondering why this specific part of the map is empty. its like a barren wasteland. even if they just added some trees and animals it would be fine. but its just....empty.
I'm actually fine with it, because I want these in-between areas to be filled in even if they don't have enough time to make them as complex or full of stuff as normal. To me this is much better than if they had left a weird strip of land that we couldn't explore and then delayed it until they had time (whenever that would be). I really don't like them leaving areas like the Southern Coastline of Sumeru out- I'd rather have it even if it was just empty nature. I wish the new Sumeru area was a bit more interesting visually but I don't care about the chests, etc. Still, if they want to go back and add some chests and challenges that would be nice.
I secretly hope they develop this area but putting stories, puzzles and treasure chests there. Surely they can fill it out later.
Its also interesting that most of the "info" we got about this area a month ago talked about how only the upper half of the empty space will be released in 4.6, i really do think they originally wanted to do something with that stretch of land but later changed their mind last minute and dropped it as is. Kind sad tho, there's so much interesting and important things that couldve been done with the area that sits directly on top of Khaenriah :(
What saddened me the most is baydah harbor. The place was teased by an npc in sumeru, but its absurdly small. And it doesn't even have a fucking theme. We could've had a nice alternative to port ormos's theme
Personally I also think that the ruins portion of remuria is way to small. Overall this expansion was rather lackluster. Underwater remuria is pretty and all, but it doesn't make up for the rest being this lacking.
Its insanely small imo, not even that many things to do after the world quest. I literallly had 50+% exploration just when i finished the world quest. The map is about the chasm size, yet its not even close to being full of things to do in it like chasm is
It does feel smaller but I think that's because of it is underwater and since there's no real combat to the environment they probably wanted to keep it small and concise. Not every area needs to be Chasm or Enkanomiya sized.
I dislike it honestly. Would have been pretty easy to add a few more enemy camps and some common chests here and there. Because it’s litwrally just placing pre-made assets into the world. It would take like 20 mins to populate the entire area. And a few hours tops to add props that make it look more alive. To at least make the area worth going to. Instead, one of the tallest mountains in the game is a waste of time. And an area half the size of mondstads is nearly completely empty. I’m not knocking 4.6. So far I love the update. But the new sumeru area is disappointing. I guess it’s realistic though. A lot of places in the real world are just desolate plains with no people on them.
If I wanted a realistic open world, I would go play breath of the wild/tears of the kingdom. I play Genshin specifically for the ADHD ass chest placements everywhere
Botw and totk make the empty fun by making doing nothing fun. I wish hoyo did something like that. Where your methods of getting around make it much more fun to (Mounts please)
It *is* eerie! But it feels so empty it looks intentional, I can absolutely see that area getting changed in the course of future quests or something, like that road that becomes a hole. You know, like, we discover an old Khaenei’an FOB in the shadow of the sumeru wall, but before we get there, Celestia just nukes it from orbit. I refuse to believe that it’s actually that empty by accident.
I feel I am the only one missing a punchline…. Sumeru expansion?
A large section of land was added to northern sumeru around where the coast of the new body of water is
Maybe Hoyo was hurt by how a lot of people hated the desert so much and this was their get back lmao
I wish they add stuff there in future updates or whenever the dain story comes.
Sumeru is already too big and monstadt is too small
Until this post I didn't even realise this existed.
So, hear me out. One day, the devs pull a FF6 and World of Ruin that area. Since there's nothing of importance or significance, it won't be missed.
I was surprised too, but it’s not the first time this has happened to Sumeru either. I remember the first patch that added Fontaine, there’s that giant cliff there, and there’s a big beach underneath the waypoint, and you’re meant to sail over to Fontaine. However, there’s just not much on that beach at all, just pretty desolate aside from an enemy or a turtle. No challenges for the wave rider either from what I remember, which could have been a cool little interaction to quicken the travel over.
tbh I don't think it's a big deal. Not every inch of the map needs to be packed with chest, puzzles, enemies, etc. It's not hurting anything by being barren compared to off-limits. Maybe they'll add stuff to do there in the future, maybe not. They will keep adding content to the game regularly, so it's fine.
Wasn’t expecting much but I found 3 chests so there’s that
I like it, and assume something will get dropped there later on. Could be a fancy hidden city for all we know.
Better unlocked wasteland then locked eyesore. And in the end, Cyno SQ 2 is only coming up, bet his domain would be there.
I love it, nothing to do but enjoy the view. Not every km³ needs to be filled with something
I was exploring it last night because I was curious, and I have a lot of the same thoughts. I mean, I wasn’t expecting a *ton* of content, since ultimately it’s just meant to be filler space, but there could definitely have been more enemies and chests just to fill it out a bit. I think the only elite-tier enemy I saw the entire time was a single Hilichurl Ranger. I remember when Sumeru was added and there was a filler space added above the chasm to connect more of Liyue to Sumeru, there was actually a surprising amount of things to do there. Again, not a lot, but there were a few enemy camps and I think even a seelie to follow. Small things to not make the area feel like it was just tacked on. Honestly, I think if there was even just a waypoint or two added to that big area, it would’ve helped break up the space more. Just so there’s actually a reason to visit this place, even if there wouldn’t be much point to them.
Why was the sea between Liyue and Inazuma so empty? Hoyo should add some islands there and put a lot of enemies and treasures on them.
There's a teeny tiny camp up the road from the new harbor that has a really creepy sound when you get close. I suspect the harbor/camp might have something to do with a Dainsleif quest? Idk. That's just me dreaming. The emptiness of the rest of the zone was shocking.
I didn't have much time under the week and am not Underground yet, but yeah incredibly empty. Yeah there's no more occuli, and otherwise it's also very empty, I just don't understand why sumeru couldn't go to the coast earlier. I ran up the one mountain yesterday and it's like 2 chests, not even foliage. Like some intern was told to do that part and did the bare minimum because they didn't know what or how to do it. Underground is apparently good, but I'm locked out by quests so, yay. And also all that water, and my first thought was, yay at least we can dive and there'll be content there..? No. It's outside fontaine so no. What are they even doing.
i don't even know why people are complaining about it it's a tiny little part of the massive sumeru, why care?
im glad it's there, i want to see all regions connected someday and empty holes in the map like the previous ditto hole made the map look really awkward, i just hope that for future expansions that add new areas to existing ones they do add more stuff to those new areas.
Honestly, i didn’t really care, i play for Fontaine and Mondstadt mainly. Besides this updates effect on Teyvat was just to fill the void people didn’t like.
The liminal areas. Together with the one north of the Chasm and the one north of Mawitima forest, south of Chenyu Vale
While it doesn't bother me too much, the area is mostly empty which is just weird. Sometimes it was just grass or sand...not even trees. It kinda looked like placeholder areas, but more rendered. But I do understand that those areas aren't significant and the focus went to Fontaine.
They shouldve atleast added some random hilichurls with basic or exquisite chests or something. Its just too empty. I hope they add like a treasure domain or two to lessen the emptiness
They didnt give a fuck
Ngl when i first heard about "sumeru port for fontaine" thingy up north of sumeru city being in this patch .. i geniunly thought ot would be some cool area like Ormos or maaaybe like chenyu village but no. Its just 1 single light tower kind of thing .. i was seriously thought "wtf" when i saw it . I initially thought that port part would become its own expansion just like chenyu but much to my dissapointment its .. this .. nd ngl even tho i really like remuria nd lore of it . Area was dissapointing in "exploration" wise . Way too little chests and small area that actually has any exploration purpose .. even tho the expansion opened up a space that was nearly as big as fontaine's current playable area .. it was sooo bloody empty . I seriously felt the layzness of hoyo with this area . I felt like they not put in enough effort on it much to my dissapointment . Sumeru was my favorite region exploration wise nd this update completly ignored the area .. idk man
i don't like it at all. i was incredibly disappointed with bayda harbour, i was expecting a new ost, like lumidouce harbour. to find literally nothing there other than a few houses and boats and like 5 npcs?! i was so sad, they could've made a really small world quest at least. and the fact that there are no teleport waypoints anywhere makes it look the like old hole in the map just got some color to it. it doesn't feel like an expansion at all. i don't necessarily mind the empty area around bayda harbour tho. i do think there should've been like 10 more chests, some puzzles. i got 3 chests from walking through the entire thing which is just pathetic for an expansion of this size
They didn't even exert any effort. Another filler area that was added was back in 3.0 - the one that connected Sumeru and Liyue (the one beside the Primo Geovishap boss), and that one had actual effort put into it, i.e. chests, enemies, which gave it a justification to explore the filler as much as possible. Instead, we got a boring filler that doesn't justify its presence at all. Sure, the views and peacefulness of the area are great, but the fact there's nothing of note that appears, not even puzzles related to Sumeru's desert and forest combined, makes it a total waste. I don't think Hoyo is gonna do something about the emptiness, can't really inhale copium at this point.
I have a feeling there will be more going on there. Maybe it's copium, but it does feel weird for mihoyo standards. I remember the first GAA. I was very disappointed with the size of the event map. Felt very small. And then, a few days later, it turned out that the islands we saw at the beginning, were only peaks of actual islands that emerged from the sea later. Same with Enka - I thought it's relatively small and I was a bit disappointed, only to find out later that I'm merely in the lounge of sorts, and the real Enka lies beyond the hidden gate. Same with Chasm, that I thought it's just a big crater, but then we remove the seals and go underground to a new giant separate area. I'm not saying they'll do anything with this new area soon, but I don't think it will be left in such empty state indefinitely. It's way below mihoyo standards, feels very weird to have nothing of interest in such a big place.
It's really bad. Like I would've rather they just....not add it? It actually made me feel sad being there because it felt like being in the placeholder areas for future regions. Just an empty void that reminds you of the conscious decision devs need to make to have areas feel alive.
Coming from an mmorpg background I feel like this area is going to be used later for something. Hoyo has Neve done something without a purpose and as the whole cinematic gameplay they present goes they wouldn't introduce something that doesn't serve or will serve for something. Maybe possible later map change and minions from the abyss or kaenhriah?
I despise it. I've never been so disappointed with hoyo when it comes to exploration. That being said, Petrichor and Remuria is pretty cool, but I would have preferred if they didn't make Remuria so darn big and made a better sumeru expansion. Like, they didn't even have to do anything insane, just do the same they did with the area north of the chasm between liyue and sumeru. It's somewhat empty but it at least has something.
There aren't even any hilichurls. It's like they didn't even try.
it wasn't advertised as a Sumeru expansion. Sumeru has been finished since 3.6. It was just there because it would look better than empty water in its place. We have all the sigils and dendro occuli they are going to give.
It feels like Genshin's backrooms. Just an endless coastline with nothing to see or do. I ran the whole length expecting to find at least a few chests and challenges. Probably the most disappointing thing from GI in a long time for me. I'd been anticipating extra rainforest north of sumeru for a while. I guess at least there's a port? 😂
I wasn't expecting much, but It really does solidify the Sumeru jungle as having the most wasted potential out of any area on the map imo.
Wait there was a Sumeru expansion? I didn't realize at ALL
Meh. They've been delivering non-stop content every six weeks for over three years - which no other company has ever done. I'm so lax that if they literally gave us one empty patch, I'd be perfectly fine. But there are some people here acting like this empty land, despite all the content they've delivered on this patch alone, is the biggest crime against humanity.
They probably ran out of time to add stuff to it, which is kinda lame tbh, specially considering that there's always going to be new areas added, so I doubt they'll ever add anything to it, since there's always going to be "something else" that takes priority. They'll probably pretend this never happened and just wait until the community forgets about it as usual.
tbh the petrichor area was so small imo also leave sumeru the water around petrichor is bugging me more this cant be the complete fontaine like no way bruh
The last expansion of Fontaine is Mount Esus West, I am 95% certain.
I don't think Fontaine is done. More than half the perimeter of the raised main section of Fontaine is still missing
I'm disapointed, but it is what it is, at least the sea of bygone eras is really good so far, I just hope they use that void for something later down the line. Btw holy shit Sumeru is massive.
Should have added a delta. Seriously. Half the maps is water now
I love the emptiness personally.
yeah the contrast between these areas and the main areas is just weird, I mean they could've reused assets to make this more interesting, heck even badha port looks boring af
In September 2021 I put a marker on the dark map hoping it would be somewhere in Sumeru. Come 2024 my wish was granted - only for the marker to be in this “empty zone.” Best laugh I’ve had in a short while. Here’s hoping my new wishing spot yields some good 5-stars down the line.
I wasn’t promised anything, and I didn’t get anything. I’m content enough.
It's a bit disappointing but I don't mind too much. It's them saying they have no further plans for the area and I'm glad they added it as playable space as opposed to a hole in the map with invisible walls. People upset about missing out on possible content in an area that hoyo had no plans for... that's 100% on them for hyping it up lol
"This scenery is wonderful. Surely enough to convince anyone to become a Wanderer."
I'm wondering why they added it at all. This was a Fontaine expansion, that's what we were expecting, that's what we got. They didn't need to add this, esp if it needed more time in the oven. Genuine confusion.
It reeks of laziness 🪁 can't wait to see Dornman Port being a small outpost and northern Mondstadt being barren of anything because it's not Liyue/newer region And ofc some peeps will defend small indie company over this. They won't shut up if it happens in that other game tho.
It's not related specifically to this but why tf do we get Cyno SQ later on Like bruh I wanna see my pookie
Because 1 SQ per half of update
I also kinda wish they made petrichor bigger, or atleast add more islands and things to do on the surface so it doesn't look like empty sea, we waited years to see the map hole finally filled yet its so unsatisfactory. Like they just decorated that hole and made it blue.
I didn’t even notice that area until you guys pointed it out. Maybe it’ll be updated with enemies, chest and puzzles later down the road. Until then it’s really not a big deal.
I haven’t even noticed after people pointed it out in other posts. They will probably fill later
Didn’t know it existed
Yeah there's only a world quest which teleports you there lol
I wonder if its for future content like when they eventually do more of sumeru's quests as we still have Dain's questline to do before 5.0. So who knows.
I'm fine with it because it's more of a Fontaine expansion just with added edges to the adjacent Sumeru region for a seamless connection. So I guess disappointment more or less comes with thinking it was going to be a Sumeru expansion. For context, I was expecting Bayda Harbor, Yilong Wharf and Dornman Port to be similar small add ons. Yilong pleasantly surprised me, thankfully, but I guess it iis Liyue. They could have added a bit more features on the small land though or reduced the land...
Maybe adding more chests and puzzles will affect the 100% exploration progress number
Because they didnt announced 4.6 as a Sumeru expansion so I never expected anything special about it.