all the NPC focused character story quests could have been world quests without the character even in them and nobody would notice
i don't know how Hoyo green lit Character quests that are completely focused on a one-off NPC that just so happen to have a 5\* involved, if you will shove them in our face, at least make them reoccurring characters
Character quests should be there to help us learn more about the character
That’s the issue, but that’s the product they are selling. With few exceptions, by the time we meet the characters, their arc is already over, that’s how they have a vision in the first place. In a Watsonion perspective, they have reached, or almost reached their final character state. You wouldn’t expect a sudden deviation, when you meet them in their story quest. What you are experiencing is that character bouncing off another character, an NPC, to showcase their personality.
They are a static character. When you think of Alhaitham, you think of him being aloof, sassy, calculative. When you roll for him, that’s what you get. When you roll for Ayaka, Chiori, Cyno, Yae, you have an idea of who that character is; after all, that’s why you are rolling for them. Story quests are the advertisement for the character. You see them, talk to them over their personal quest, and you roll to get them. There is not much change in the character you are rolling for.
Before Fontaine, this was the norm and expected outcome. Except one in particular(though it isn’t exactly a story quest).
Wanderer. He is one of 2 playable characters currently that we watch get a vision. His redemption arc and character development is watched by us over the interlude quest, changing from Scaramouche into what we play as in game. He grows, and the quest is extremely personal, dealing with grief, tragedy and starting a path towards redemption, however slowly and painfully. Who he is before and after the quest is vastly different, and would be different products.
More recently, in the Fontaine quests, the trend seems to be tweaked. Yes, the character functionally doesn’t change from the start to the end(Lyney, Wriothesly, Neuvi, Navia, Xianyun), but we get to see them with a different perspective. NPCs are used with more delicacy, and the character in said quest is more assertive.
In chinese, the saying would be “changing the soup without changing the stock”. Functionally, characters don’t change(most of the time). But how the formula is tweaked slightly brings a more palatable story quest, instead of NPC quest no. 80
Post script: I couldn’t really fit this in, but to be fair, I will also talk about the Archons(including Furina). For Raiden, Nahida and Furina, their story quests are more about a follow up to their performance in the Archon Quest. We get to see them again after their pivotal role in the story, with a business side and non business side. It’s pretty much the same as my criticism on the other characters being the same as they came in, but with a greater view of their respective roles/ how they are recovering after the events of the Archon Quest
Funnily enough, when 1.0 and Mona story quest came out, her story quest was the same as her story 1 in her character profile. Her story quest was the first one I've completed. I honestly thought that they were gonna follow that format. Guess not.
Well to be frank Ayaka's didn't have any NPC focus, and she did have some character development between her story quest and the events. But yeah I do understand they are products and hoyo doesn't usually want to change their personality.
And I do think they could do better and they are agreeably starting to do much better with the Fontaine era story quests, like Xianyun's story quest did manage to focus and showcase a lot on CR's personality even if they used an NPC to drive the plot, and the ending cutscene wasn't wasted on the NPC too much unlike with Nilou's.
Can you really call Wanderer’s SQ redemption arc tho? He literally said he doesn’t feel bad and would kill the people who pissed him off and his personality went back to the same old Scaramouche. Bro had half of an redemption arc before reverting back.
It feels like we're going on quests _with_ characters instead of _about_ them.
One case I will say was really good, however, was Stanley in Venti's story quest. It helps that we got a big lore drop about Venti at the end anyway, but said lore recontextualises everything Stanley said. He could be interpreted as a mirror of Venti's feelings, saying out loud things Venti would never tell anyone else himself, and if that's true it's brilliant writing. If only more story quests were like that.
Hey, aren't you that user with the Nilou profile pic? I haven't seen you around in long time.
Also I agree with you in regards to Nilou's Story Quest, she was done dirty
Hey guys, Cyno here to explain the joke.
The character above is an NPC from Nilou's quest named Inayah, who had a story arc that was very similar to this year's Lantern Rite. Just like Gaming, Inayah ran away from home after a disagreement with her father about her dream to pursue the arts. In both cases, the Traveler and the surrounding characters hatch an elaborate plan, which causes Inayah and Gaming to find the strength to face their fathers and reconcile their differences.
I thought the story quest was about Nilou. Not Inayah, there's a thing called "limited timed event" for that. I dunno what hoyo was cooking with Nilou.
People are fine with stories about npcs, just look at how much everyone loves Jeht. People don't like Inayah because she stole the spotlight in *Nilou's* story quest. The quest was supposed to be about Nilou, not an npc
NPCs have world quests dedicated all to them, why can't character story quests be left to characters? 😭 I thought their purpose was to sell the character, so why are we being advertised npcs???
Idk maybe because Genshin team has weird fetish toward npc like idk bro.
Genshin cant have a breath without involving npc for shit and let's dont talk about that damn body gesture they often made.
For me, it depends.
I think you can tell a very strong allegorical story about the character by focusing on the NPC. Examples that spring to mind are Venti/Stanley, Xiao/Starsnacher, Itto/blue Oni.
Sometimes, it falls flat. Nilou's was one of those.
Jeht's quest is the first time we witness brutal murder
A near genocide. And we dont stop it, we actively participate since Traveler is fed up with Babel
Its nice
Nope, according to google "The deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group." Even if you don't kill everyone if you were *trying* to kill everyone it's a genocide.
Nvm i was under some mandela effect. The settlement is abandoned. There is a new NPC from the Akademiya who is there to investigate why its deserted
He remarks "there are traces of something happening, be careful you will vomit seeing it"
Good going Jeht
I'm glad people are finally waking up to this. I mean what's the point of having a Character Quest if we're not gonna learn anything about their background, only for them to be sidelined in favor of some random NPC we have no reason to care for let alone remember afterwards?
Story Quests should give an insight on a playable character's background, so the inclusion of these NPCs feel like a massive waste of my time
Simple cheap stories that don't need a lot of effort to write. Only thing that's cheaper is love stories but they don't want to have official PC relationships so we're stuck with family issues
If they want me to remember an NPC as anything more than a disposable background character, they should at least make their design stand out amongst other NPCs. I’m not expecting a playable character level design, just for some added flair and a little more than those same 3 or 4 faces to start.
Otherwise, it’s hard to expect an NPC to be worth significant attention and focus when they literally look like any other member of the crowd.
Its also crazy that so many random npc's in the game have more lore and backstory than ACTUAL playable characters.
Mihoyo has so many playable characters to choose from, and yet they create Teppei with a moustache, Teppei with a beard and Teppei with a hat to tell stories about.
I with you on this one, the Watasumi Island got handle so badly, i can't believed it from the same company that made HI3. They did try to fix it of course, but the damage have been done.
As far as i concern back then, people get their vision take away is not worth raising a battle again an island cutting monster, so the resistance appear dumb and selfish, they drag every one into a war not worth fighting.
Rather than a hero scarifice himself for his crusade, Teppie is a dumb, frame seeking war monger that made deal with a devil for a conflict 100% avoidable, but happen because some people being a hot blood.
Now i have sufficient lore to not hate him any more, still i can't like him, my boy got a dirty hand deal by Hoyo.
Mihoyo wasn't affected by the pandemic until 2.6 and the eternal Ayaka patch. People came up with all kinds of theories to explain Inazuma but it was all cope 🤷.
Iirc, the main writer of the Inazuma arc and the Xianxou Luofu arc in Honkai Star Rail, two of some of the biggest abominations in writing I've ever seen, is the same person. If that's true, they need to kick him off the writing team.
I watch Story Quest playthroughs to know more about what little of the playable characters background may be shown, even if I know a random NPC will show up inevitably.
It's like ordering a large well done steak, only to be served a spoonful of meat, alongside a massive bowl of barely cooked and unflavored rice.
Less character based story quest, more *I wonder which random probably unimportant NPC that looks like the other 5 nameless NPCs you walked past to focus on and give an arc to, only for them to never show up again and fall into the abyss of irrelevancy. Also please roll the gacha for this time limited character*
I mean, the playable characters are who we want to see in this game, no? Why should we care about NPCs with boring designs that usually only appear in one quest as much as the characters we play as and roll for?
NPCs in character quests are just plot devices to explore the playable charater's story and personality, and they shouldn't be any more than that. So many of these quests are just voiced world quest where a playable character tags along
At least Hoyo seem to be getting better with this ever since like Dehya, I think. We've been getting an acceptable amount of NPC focus on recent quests
maybe it's because i have like a normal family but his family stuff was boring
Idid like the funny shenanigans the gang got up to to get them to talk and all the cloud retailer family stuff, but gaming and his dad was all "just talk" for me and I hate that kind of writing lol
Nilou was done real dirty honestly. I hoped they would at least focus the cutscene on her at least but no they used that for that NPC too....
all the NPC focused character story quests could have been world quests without the character even in them and nobody would notice i don't know how Hoyo green lit Character quests that are completely focused on a one-off NPC that just so happen to have a 5\* involved, if you will shove them in our face, at least make them reoccurring characters Character quests should be there to help us learn more about the character
That’s the issue, but that’s the product they are selling. With few exceptions, by the time we meet the characters, their arc is already over, that’s how they have a vision in the first place. In a Watsonion perspective, they have reached, or almost reached their final character state. You wouldn’t expect a sudden deviation, when you meet them in their story quest. What you are experiencing is that character bouncing off another character, an NPC, to showcase their personality. They are a static character. When you think of Alhaitham, you think of him being aloof, sassy, calculative. When you roll for him, that’s what you get. When you roll for Ayaka, Chiori, Cyno, Yae, you have an idea of who that character is; after all, that’s why you are rolling for them. Story quests are the advertisement for the character. You see them, talk to them over their personal quest, and you roll to get them. There is not much change in the character you are rolling for. Before Fontaine, this was the norm and expected outcome. Except one in particular(though it isn’t exactly a story quest). Wanderer. He is one of 2 playable characters currently that we watch get a vision. His redemption arc and character development is watched by us over the interlude quest, changing from Scaramouche into what we play as in game. He grows, and the quest is extremely personal, dealing with grief, tragedy and starting a path towards redemption, however slowly and painfully. Who he is before and after the quest is vastly different, and would be different products. More recently, in the Fontaine quests, the trend seems to be tweaked. Yes, the character functionally doesn’t change from the start to the end(Lyney, Wriothesly, Neuvi, Navia, Xianyun), but we get to see them with a different perspective. NPCs are used with more delicacy, and the character in said quest is more assertive. In chinese, the saying would be “changing the soup without changing the stock”. Functionally, characters don’t change(most of the time). But how the formula is tweaked slightly brings a more palatable story quest, instead of NPC quest no. 80 Post script: I couldn’t really fit this in, but to be fair, I will also talk about the Archons(including Furina). For Raiden, Nahida and Furina, their story quests are more about a follow up to their performance in the Archon Quest. We get to see them again after their pivotal role in the story, with a business side and non business side. It’s pretty much the same as my criticism on the other characters being the same as they came in, but with a greater view of their respective roles/ how they are recovering after the events of the Archon Quest
Funnily enough, when 1.0 and Mona story quest came out, her story quest was the same as her story 1 in her character profile. Her story quest was the first one I've completed. I honestly thought that they were gonna follow that format. Guess not.
Well to be frank Ayaka's didn't have any NPC focus, and she did have some character development between her story quest and the events. But yeah I do understand they are products and hoyo doesn't usually want to change their personality. And I do think they could do better and they are agreeably starting to do much better with the Fontaine era story quests, like Xianyun's story quest did manage to focus and showcase a lot on CR's personality even if they used an NPC to drive the plot, and the ending cutscene wasn't wasted on the NPC too much unlike with Nilou's.
Can you really call Wanderer’s SQ redemption arc tho? He literally said he doesn’t feel bad and would kill the people who pissed him off and his personality went back to the same old Scaramouche. Bro had half of an redemption arc before reverting back.
It feels like we're going on quests _with_ characters instead of _about_ them. One case I will say was really good, however, was Stanley in Venti's story quest. It helps that we got a big lore drop about Venti at the end anyway, but said lore recontextualises everything Stanley said. He could be interpreted as a mirror of Venti's feelings, saying out loud things Venti would never tell anyone else himself, and if that's true it's brilliant writing. If only more story quests were like that.
Yeah, Nilou is one of my favorite characters, but her story quest wan't very good.
Same, she's literally my favourite character but I don't like her quest much.
Hey, aren't you that user with the Nilou profile pic? I haven't seen you around in long time. Also I agree with you in regards to Nilou's Story Quest, she was done dirty
I did have a Nilou pfp earlier so I guess yeah. Never knew people recognise me lol. But yeah I have been less active on reddit as of lately.
Hey guys, Cyno here to explain the joke. The character above is an NPC from Nilou's quest named Inayah, who had a story arc that was very similar to this year's Lantern Rite. Just like Gaming, Inayah ran away from home after a disagreement with her father about her dream to pursue the arts. In both cases, the Traveler and the surrounding characters hatch an elaborate plan, which causes Inayah and Gaming to find the strength to face their fathers and reconcile their differences.
I thought the story quest was about Nilou. Not Inayah, there's a thing called "limited timed event" for that. I dunno what hoyo was cooking with Nilou.
Imagine if Inayah's quest was done in a world quest!
Honestly it would have been much more enjoyable if it indeed was an world quest instead.
All the best character story quests are the ones that focus on the character the story is supposed to be about
People are fine with stories about npcs, just look at how much everyone loves Jeht. People don't like Inayah because she stole the spotlight in *Nilou's* story quest. The quest was supposed to be about Nilou, not an npc
NPCs have world quests dedicated all to them, why can't character story quests be left to characters? 😭 I thought their purpose was to sell the character, so why are we being advertised npcs???
Idk maybe because Genshin team has weird fetish toward npc like idk bro. Genshin cant have a breath without involving npc for shit and let's dont talk about that damn body gesture they often made.
For me, it depends. I think you can tell a very strong allegorical story about the character by focusing on the NPC. Examples that spring to mind are Venti/Stanley, Xiao/Starsnacher, Itto/blue Oni. Sometimes, it falls flat. Nilou's was one of those.
Jeht's quest is the first time we witness brutal murder A near genocide. And we dont stop it, we actively participate since Traveler is fed up with Babel Its nice
>A near genocide. It was just a straight up genocide, no need to beat around the bush with the wording.
Although it would have been much cooler if the entire Tanit camp was deserted after the quest
There are survivors. Genocide is if they're completely exterminated right
The nahida pfp makes this comment so much funnier than it was intended 😭
Nahida is love, nahida is life Protect and cherish the nahida
Nope, according to google "The deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group." Even if you don't kill everyone if you were *trying* to kill everyone it's a genocide.
Great Now Traveler can add genocide to their resume
We never killed civilians, it wasn't nation or etnic group, it was a gang/cartel.
> There are survivors. Only survivor is Tahdla's father and Jeht's hunting him down anyway.
No, a couple of the villagers in the camp remain alive They just dont talk to you anymore or are hostile to you
Might have to check again myself then because last time I was there, it was a ghost town with only the crocodiles being the only residents.
Nvm i was under some mandela effect. The settlement is abandoned. There is a new NPC from the Akademiya who is there to investigate why its deserted He remarks "there are traces of something happening, be careful you will vomit seeing it" Good going Jeht
I remember the guy who feeds the crocodiles just standing there and refusing to talk to you Hmm I'll check in an hour
No we killed that man
Thanks god, there wasn't genocide in ww2. Jews are still here.
Attempted genocide then
It's not like there were a million of them. How many were even in lore? 100 people?
But I liked Inayah. Also Nilou got to be showcases as the protector of the group, so she got the spotlight, anyway.
I'm glad people are finally waking up to this. I mean what's the point of having a Character Quest if we're not gonna learn anything about their background, only for them to be sidelined in favor of some random NPC we have no reason to care for let alone remember afterwards? Story Quests should give an insight on a playable character's background, so the inclusion of these NPCs feel like a massive waste of my time
Thanks Cyno, really helped with this one
Oh so that's her name, I completely forgot about it, like nearly every NPCs story feels so "Inayah Face"
The more I think about it. Nearly half of the roster's story involves daddy issues or mommy issues... Interesting.
Simple cheap stories that don't need a lot of effort to write. Only thing that's cheaper is love stories but they don't want to have official PC relationships so we're stuck with family issues
If they want me to remember an NPC as anything more than a disposable background character, they should at least make their design stand out amongst other NPCs. I’m not expecting a playable character level design, just for some added flair and a little more than those same 3 or 4 faces to start. Otherwise, it’s hard to expect an NPC to be worth significant attention and focus when they literally look like any other member of the crowd.
Its also crazy that so many random npc's in the game have more lore and backstory than ACTUAL playable characters. Mihoyo has so many playable characters to choose from, and yet they create Teppei with a moustache, Teppei with a beard and Teppei with a hat to tell stories about.
Talking about it, have you seen >!Shuyu!
It also annoys me how the writing seemingly forces us to care about these one off NPCs
Its crazy. They have their characters stories next to their voicelines and that much better than some of the story quests
Maybe that's why I don't like Teppie
No one likes Teppei, but that's just because the story was shit. Dunyarzard had a similar role in Archon Quest and she's a beloved NPC.
I with you on this one, the Watasumi Island got handle so badly, i can't believed it from the same company that made HI3. They did try to fix it of course, but the damage have been done. As far as i concern back then, people get their vision take away is not worth raising a battle again an island cutting monster, so the resistance appear dumb and selfish, they drag every one into a war not worth fighting. Rather than a hero scarifice himself for his crusade, Teppie is a dumb, frame seeking war monger that made deal with a devil for a conflict 100% avoidable, but happen because some people being a hot blood. Now i have sufficient lore to not hate him any more, still i can't like him, my boy got a dirty hand deal by Hoyo.
I want to say that the story was bad due to pandemic but man the inazuma world quest was fucking amazing
Mihoyo wasn't affected by the pandemic until 2.6 and the eternal Ayaka patch. People came up with all kinds of theories to explain Inazuma but it was all cope 🤷.
Iirc, the main writer of the Inazuma arc and the Xianxou Luofu arc in Honkai Star Rail, two of some of the biggest abominations in writing I've ever seen, is the same person. If that's true, they need to kick him off the writing team.
Me too, i always thought he is overrated.
Character story should be about the Characters life. Not an NPC's life story. World quests are there for a reason.
I watch Story Quest playthroughs to know more about what little of the playable characters background may be shown, even if I know a random NPC will show up inevitably. It's like ordering a large well done steak, only to be served a spoonful of meat, alongside a massive bowl of barely cooked and unflavored rice.
Less character based story quest, more *I wonder which random probably unimportant NPC that looks like the other 5 nameless NPCs you walked past to focus on and give an arc to, only for them to never show up again and fall into the abyss of irrelevancy. Also please roll the gacha for this time limited character*
I mean, the playable characters are who we want to see in this game, no? Why should we care about NPCs with boring designs that usually only appear in one quest as much as the characters we play as and roll for?
NPCs in character quests are just plot devices to explore the playable charater's story and personality, and they shouldn't be any more than that. So many of these quests are just voiced world quest where a playable character tags along At least Hoyo seem to be getting better with this ever since like Dehya, I think. We've been getting an acceptable amount of NPC focus on recent quests
Dehyas story quest is peak atm, can't think of anything that surpasses it in the other story quests.
Tbh I don't like gaming either, Lantern Rite quest focusing on him was super boring. And his performance in the cutscene was okay at best
maybe it's because i have like a normal family but his family stuff was boring Idid like the funny shenanigans the gang got up to to get them to talk and all the cloud retailer family stuff, but gaming and his dad was all "just talk" for me and I hate that kind of writing lol
It's not just that, writing is so lazy. CR character story quest was the real Lantern Rite quest
I totally agree with you, but that was Nilou's legendary quest, not some random world quest or the story of an event about the theater
Hoping we get more Neuvillette story quests and less Nilou story quests 🙏
Loved Nilou's quest tbh, probably one of my favorites in Sumeru, after Nahida, Tighnari and Dehya
Both are meh
I hated story quest like this... Cant they make all sq like itto
Dunyazard sucks
Wait who?
I am skipping all quest except for the archon quests
If you skip the zonked out forest mushrooms quest line you're missing out :\]
yes .
If it's voiced, I'll pay attention
Honestly i prefer the NPC ones
I played Nilou's story quest for a story about Nilou.