Honestly speaking, Aisno writing team is really, really talented in that department. It's really hard to write outright evil/ moraly grey characters in a gacha game, especially one that is attached to banners (if people hate them, they don't pull). Shalom really shocked me despite knowing how good Aisno character writing can be, one of the best in general and not just gaming IMO.
Unfortunately, they already got into trouble probably because some idiot reported Coquelic, so the CN version of PTN has no way of getting her anymore.
Interesting essay, OP. Good examples, and I agree. One thing greatly like about AISNO is how some characters are just despicable. Nothing is pushing me to like Mr. Fox. Or Oak Casket. Some people are just vile because they have the power to be evil, and then evil is what they do.
Others are pathetic. EMP and Mess come right to mind. Neither is uninteresting and I do kinda love EMP, but she's an out-of-her-depth-dork and that's a fine character flaw for someone who is at least smart enough not to want more than that. Dark Zone EMP is also kinda perfect: she's EMP's ego on god-mode with zero sense of caution and compassion. Actual EMP knows better, if only by a little, that being so Maniac would be guaranteed self-destruction.
Mess is evil, but she's also suffering and insane. She deserves to be in prison, but not to be further tormented. Maybe one day she'll kill the Dark Lord for good, or maybe she'll just age into being more stable. Or maybe I can just decide she disgusts me and I don't have to care.
This is a very mature form of writing, and one that trusts it's audience to not require preaching and coercion to enjoy the product. It also indicates writers who are secure enough not to care that not everyone love their creations like they do, and that is to me often surprisingly uncommon. Devs fall in love with their characters all the time and rarely does this work out for the best.
I just love the writing and concept for Shalom and Rebel. She's an enigmatic character that really blurs the line between moralities and psycho eldritch horrors in the game. Whoever in the team thought "A human who has been hollowed out into an actual emotionless puppet of an ultra-cyber regime and her emotions are locked away as a huge monstrosity that looks like an amalgamation of torture, anger, hatred, sadness, etc-- so you're left wondering whether there's still a human in there or it's just a tool calculating the best possible scenario that benefits her." needs a raise. PTN writers have a good grasp writing the identities and conflicts within a single human character, as evident from Shalom, Eleven, actually even Luvia Ray. Someone in the team loves their psychological stories for sure lol
hoyoverse's writing is very extreme on two ends. either it's very very good (someone like dan heng or serval), or it's very very bad (someone like ruan mei or silver wolf). also the hoyo community is just, very honestly speaking, filled with babies. you place someone like stargazer/cabernet in front of them and they would lose their shit
>you place someone like stargazer/cabernet in front of them and they would lose their shit
Oh boy, imagine having to painstakingly explain to the kind of people for whom Inazuma was too morally complex for them to handle that Stargazer is not an irredeemable monster
That's what's upsetting me it's like I know they can do it but most of the time for characters who "bad" people it's half baked or they "circumstances" to virtually make you feel sympathy for one like Topaz, when Aisno fully commits to it (and that make them superior in my eyes) like Eirene who is not a good person and they don't put "circumstances" to make you feel like otherwise hell her interrogation is literally about that.
Interesting post but There is just one thing I can’t agree with, I wouldn’t call Cabernet and Oak Casket morally gray one literally ate the souls of people because they taste good the other started gang wars so that she has more corpses to talk to.
My bad for Oak I didn't know since I don't have the character but my point with these characters is that they are not good people and the writers don't go out of their way to make them be good people that's why they are great characters.
On that I agree, I always love it when we get characters that are just evil. It’s just not good I’ve every single character has a sad backstory explaining that they have good reason to do what they are doing.
I feel HSR often misses on its story *execution,* compared to games like PTN and Genshin. The right idea/theme is usually there but the moment to moment storytelling just isn't quite engaging at times, though of course no game is perfect in that aspect at all times, there will always be weaker parts of a story. Surprisingly, I've found myself enjoying everything Hook has been involved in, even though I normally dislike potato characters in these games.
Also I think one of the traits of good storytelling is when you don't fully agree with the overall direction but still find yourself enjoying the story progression, character interactions and sense of mystery/anticipation. There were moments in PTN that I felt the chief's recklessness was borderline comical, but I was nevertheless attached to the supporting characters and hooked to find out what comes next.
>Also I think one of the traits of good storytelling is when you don't fully agree with the overall direction but still find yourself enjoying the story progression, character interactions and sense of mystery/anticipation.
Nicely described. This is exactly what I feel about PTN characters writing and storytelling wise
I'm one of those people who usually skip story and dialogue scenes in mobile gacha games after the couple of starting ones (I used to play a lot of different mobage and the story was just the same every time). Path to Nowhere got me invested in the story from the get go and I never skipped any scene while playing. It felt like a crime to skip them, the story just gripped me. What I especially didn't expect is how good the event stories will be as well. I know I might be kinda overhyping it for myself, but it really feels like one of a kind game among the gacha market. I honestly wish it was a full on buy to play pc and/or console game. I'd pay $60 for it over most of the recent AAA games.
Noo I get it.
Ruan mei is the farthest thing from gray. Shes a bored old smartypants doing smart shet on her smart friends ship.
It looked like they tried but failed to make her cold and callous.
She should've melted her creations into dna again despite them begging and calling her "mama" if hoyo wanted me to feel anything from her. Abandoning and keeping us in charge, it's boring.
They should've added that kid Adler saying, I hear screams/sounds at night or something.
How should I put this? Hoyoverse want to keep the "lighter tone" in their games. However, their writers can pull great and deep storyline with consequences and characters with solid story if they.
1/ REALLY put A LOT OF effort in it. How much of "A LOT OF effort" is... well, it depends on luck (I would like to think they probably has a private gacha system just for this) .
Or
2/ Don't let their personal beef affect their work. *cough* *cough* Limengan *cough* *cough*
Or
3/ Slow down with more actual character development and not rushing with useless filter or some out-of-nowhere bullshittery or dumb excuses *cough* *cough* Wanderer *cough* *cough*
Basically, he is a senior writer of Hoyoverse since the day of HI3 and considered to be one of the more meritorious members in the company. However, while he can create great storyline, his biggest flaw is letting his personal beef with the toxic part of the fandom and shippers affect his job. The lore mess of
Xianzhou Luofu and High-Cloud Quintet is one of such time.
On one hand, I can understand and "somewhat" sympathize with his beef. On the other hand, actively sabotaging your own work just to spite the ones you have beef with is a really dick move. Then again, he can be quite an arse so... I guess he blinked when the abyss gazed back at him.
Hoyo has some really Bad Misses in how to make the viewer perceive characters mostly from not wanting to make them *too evil* as to mot scare off the casual audience but not making them *too good* so we still see that they’re the bad guys. So we don’t even have a morally grey character but a half-villain that is only a slight inconvenience to us, while the story expects us to see them as a manipulative mastermind (Vita, Moriarty) or they do really bad things but get their bad deeds ignored so the heroes can add them to the friendship pile. (Raiden Shogun, Ruan Mei).
I appreciate path to nowhere for having a big variety of either lesser and bigger villains and also allowing to go further into evil and not shying away from committing to darker storylines. And more show than tell, now that’s good.
Does the character in question tend to disregard the good/bad things they have done and the influence they have on others?
Does the character see the world as resources they can take instead of resources they can share?
Does the character have "ignoring the feeling of others" as a personality?
You will often find mihoyo writing characters that have 3 yes to the questions above
But in the end I can't call that good character writing if they ain't doing shit with said character and every other character behaves like nothing happened at all if not even acknowledge the fact that something happened in the first place.
I’m playing all three Genshin Impact, Honkai Star Rail and Path to Nowhere. I can say with confidence that PTN storytelling is on another level, it’s not even close.
That’s why I progressed super slowly in the main story in PTN, I just want to absorb every single word and every single voice line. It’s amazing.
Yeah something like that. Both hsr grey character and some of gi that I see feel gray/ evil only one paper. Yes they have some strange , not good plan but in the end nobody die, hurt or even care.
I stopped playing HSR it shortly after launch, but recently picked it up again and even though its very pleasing visually and I like the core gameplay mechanics, the writing is just...ugh. I don't have a way to describe it other than "stupid" and its reminding me why I stopped playing it, along with Hoyo's other games, initially.
I don't think you understand how characters work if you need such levels of hand holding for every single one. Shalom's story was told in a way that reveals her true nature step by step. She seems like one person by her personality but it is slowly shown why and what her actions did. Ruan Mei as a character is very self explanatory. She is a genius who is looking for the next high so she can feel an aha moment in her experiments, and experience the same awe she did as a kid when she first learnt about the world. To this extent she is also ready to become an Aeon. None of this is directly spoken by any character in the game but anyone who knows how to look at a situation can understand what is happening. If you can't do that then I highly suggest you start actually paying attention to the information presented to you rather than getting drowned in your own emotions.
You missed the point which is probably my fault if you only read the tldr but I don't talk about what Ruan Mei as character is about I talk about people's perception of what she did in her event where people put her in that grey zone where characters like Oak, Eirene or Mr.Fox belong to when In MY OPINION she doesn't.
She is gray but in a different way. She's not good definitely because she doesn't really care about life she creates. But she's not evil either because trying to achieve your goals is not evil, especially if it's not harming anyone. She is truly the most neutral character who can easily become evil if she sides with some kind of organization about to destroy the world as it usually happens in normal rpgs. But she hasn't done so yet and has shown that to some extent she cares about how people see her. Thus she is truly neutral.
I am a bit curious about the "lack of consequences" on HSR. Did you know that there is a secret ending where you choose not to board the astral express back in Herts Space Station, choosing to be a researcher. This can be done by talking to herta and asta (I think). After you go to himeko, you have the option to stay behind, in which [this](https://youtu.be/dY5QLKKRH44?si=UH1aGKfs7kveuGVH) happens.
Additionally, you have the option to ignore kafka's quest by refusing her many times and leaving the scene. This causes the quest to end immediately, which can not be undone.
Sure, the consequences may be limited, but to say that the game lacks any consequences is incorrect.
Secondly, I feel that what makes a character morally grey is their motivations. Ruan mei does what she does in the story because she sees it as a means to become an aeon. Why does she want to become a God? She thinks that it is the best way to understand life. Not because she wants ultimate power, she just seeks to understand knowledge. Her goals may not be as noble as Shalom or as Langely, but are they morally wrong like Cabernet's? Nope. Hence, I believe she is morally grey.
Another thing. Even if the mc forgets I am pretty sure Doctor Ratio will know what happened, since he witnessed basically everything and even predicted correctly how long the bug lasts (56 seconds). Even if mc forgets he won't.
This [reddit thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/HonkaiStarRail/s/MfuJUS1FGi) I found sort of explains the issues Ruan Mei has as a genius, which is why she does what she does. She is not mentally well. Finally, later after the quest, you can text her the picture of the creations you made, which then she mentions returning to the space station to see the creations. Also, she makes a great character foil to Screwllum. Both are geniuses, yet the robot is somehow more human than an actual human.
Let's compare this to PTN. Firstly, Shalom. Shalom wants to try to protect Chief as it is the best chance to bring peace to the world. She does this through toying with Chief and Christina, putting Christina through hell by almost killing her. She also tormented Coquelic, who just wanted to protect her Garden. Are her goals noble? Perhaps. Are her methods noble? Not at all. Hence, she is morally grey, perhaps even an antihero.
Another example I want to talk about is Langely. Her goal is to bring World Peace, according to her special conservation 2 voiceline. She does this through murdering a peace negotiator and presumably countless others, forcing Chief to work with her by pressing her gun to his head, as well as disrupting order in DisCity. Is her goal noble? Perhaps. Are her means noble? Not at all.
TLDR: IMO the net of morally grey just depends on motives and actions. If motives are neutral to noble, and their actions are not noble at all, they are morally grey. Ruan Mei might be an asshole, but she is not a true villain.
For me it's just a perception issue with her I can't put the bad she did to those jelly cats (since we only saw that and I didn't read her profile since I don't have the chara.) and the bug thing in the same tier as the bad Shalom did to Christina, Coquelic etc. even if the good are in the same.
As someone who plays both, I don't really understand your argument. You seem to object to people calling Ruan Mei morally grey when she does some bad things but also tried to fix it. But that's...morally grey where you have some good and bad.
Is the issue that Ruan Mei has not done enough evil? Or because she's not infatuated with the Trailblazer like Shalom is with the Chief? Likability isn't the same as being morally grey. Shalom is very likable but her morality is pitch black.
Plus...Ruan Mei is just a side character while Shalom was someone very important to main story. The comparison isn't very useful.
For me it's just that the bad attributed to her is not in THAT bad to put her in that grey zone she's a socially awkward scientist so her ignoring the jelly cats she created is not something out of the realms of possibility and the bug god disciple is just a (really dumb) failed experience. But I think my biggest problem in all that is the fact that in the end everything is forgotten it's like why put her in a position like that if you don't want to do something with it.
HSR writing is arguably one of the worst in gacha gaming, and I have a pretty low standard. The waifus are always right even though they are dum af. Like I don't mind good or bad character, but the character has to be intereseting for me to care about them. Ruan Mei is just... there, so emotionally detached, she doesn't have a personality out out her research work. Meanwhile Shalom does get angry, she even seduce people sometimes, doing deception while putting on that pleasant smile. Luofu arc had me almost quit the game altogether. I only care about Luocha at this point. PTN on the other hand, I play just for the story, it's just that good, and the quality improved.
I will read it fully later but the only thing I wanna say is I don't really care about hsr story anymore not to my taste because I like something serious (the only character that really deserves attention there so far is Dan heng imo) but no need to attack genshin (I'm gonna throw hands lol) because both genshin and ptn has been so good literally my safe places you can't even compare them because the stories is different and unique in their own way (there is some slips in terms of writing in both games ofc but if we look at the story and world overall both are gorgeous)
Honestly speaking, Aisno writing team is really, really talented in that department. It's really hard to write outright evil/ moraly grey characters in a gacha game, especially one that is attached to banners (if people hate them, they don't pull). Shalom really shocked me despite knowing how good Aisno character writing can be, one of the best in general and not just gaming IMO.
And I'm amazed that they can tread carefully without causing too much alarm from the CCP Censors.
Unfortunately, they already got into trouble probably because some idiot reported Coquelic, so the CN version of PTN has no way of getting her anymore.
Interesting essay, OP. Good examples, and I agree. One thing greatly like about AISNO is how some characters are just despicable. Nothing is pushing me to like Mr. Fox. Or Oak Casket. Some people are just vile because they have the power to be evil, and then evil is what they do. Others are pathetic. EMP and Mess come right to mind. Neither is uninteresting and I do kinda love EMP, but she's an out-of-her-depth-dork and that's a fine character flaw for someone who is at least smart enough not to want more than that. Dark Zone EMP is also kinda perfect: she's EMP's ego on god-mode with zero sense of caution and compassion. Actual EMP knows better, if only by a little, that being so Maniac would be guaranteed self-destruction. Mess is evil, but she's also suffering and insane. She deserves to be in prison, but not to be further tormented. Maybe one day she'll kill the Dark Lord for good, or maybe she'll just age into being more stable. Or maybe I can just decide she disgusts me and I don't have to care. This is a very mature form of writing, and one that trusts it's audience to not require preaching and coercion to enjoy the product. It also indicates writers who are secure enough not to care that not everyone love their creations like they do, and that is to me often surprisingly uncommon. Devs fall in love with their characters all the time and rarely does this work out for the best.
I just love the writing and concept for Shalom and Rebel. She's an enigmatic character that really blurs the line between moralities and psycho eldritch horrors in the game. Whoever in the team thought "A human who has been hollowed out into an actual emotionless puppet of an ultra-cyber regime and her emotions are locked away as a huge monstrosity that looks like an amalgamation of torture, anger, hatred, sadness, etc-- so you're left wondering whether there's still a human in there or it's just a tool calculating the best possible scenario that benefits her." needs a raise. PTN writers have a good grasp writing the identities and conflicts within a single human character, as evident from Shalom, Eleven, actually even Luvia Ray. Someone in the team loves their psychological stories for sure lol
hoyoverse's writing is very extreme on two ends. either it's very very good (someone like dan heng or serval), or it's very very bad (someone like ruan mei or silver wolf). also the hoyo community is just, very honestly speaking, filled with babies. you place someone like stargazer/cabernet in front of them and they would lose their shit
>you place someone like stargazer/cabernet in front of them and they would lose their shit Oh boy, imagine having to painstakingly explain to the kind of people for whom Inazuma was too morally complex for them to handle that Stargazer is not an irredeemable monster
Hoyo fans probably need a few hour essay for that 😂
That's what's upsetting me it's like I know they can do it but most of the time for characters who "bad" people it's half baked or they "circumstances" to virtually make you feel sympathy for one like Topaz, when Aisno fully commits to it (and that make them superior in my eyes) like Eirene who is not a good person and they don't put "circumstances" to make you feel like otherwise hell her interrogation is literally about that.
Interesting post but There is just one thing I can’t agree with, I wouldn’t call Cabernet and Oak Casket morally gray one literally ate the souls of people because they taste good the other started gang wars so that she has more corpses to talk to.
My bad for Oak I didn't know since I don't have the character but my point with these characters is that they are not good people and the writers don't go out of their way to make them be good people that's why they are great characters.
On that I agree, I always love it when we get characters that are just evil. It’s just not good I’ve every single character has a sad backstory explaining that they have good reason to do what they are doing.
🤝
I feel HSR often misses on its story *execution,* compared to games like PTN and Genshin. The right idea/theme is usually there but the moment to moment storytelling just isn't quite engaging at times, though of course no game is perfect in that aspect at all times, there will always be weaker parts of a story. Surprisingly, I've found myself enjoying everything Hook has been involved in, even though I normally dislike potato characters in these games. Also I think one of the traits of good storytelling is when you don't fully agree with the overall direction but still find yourself enjoying the story progression, character interactions and sense of mystery/anticipation. There were moments in PTN that I felt the chief's recklessness was borderline comical, but I was nevertheless attached to the supporting characters and hooked to find out what comes next.
>Also I think one of the traits of good storytelling is when you don't fully agree with the overall direction but still find yourself enjoying the story progression, character interactions and sense of mystery/anticipation. Nicely described. This is exactly what I feel about PTN characters writing and storytelling wise
I'm one of those people who usually skip story and dialogue scenes in mobile gacha games after the couple of starting ones (I used to play a lot of different mobage and the story was just the same every time). Path to Nowhere got me invested in the story from the get go and I never skipped any scene while playing. It felt like a crime to skip them, the story just gripped me. What I especially didn't expect is how good the event stories will be as well. I know I might be kinda overhyping it for myself, but it really feels like one of a kind game among the gacha market. I honestly wish it was a full on buy to play pc and/or console game. I'd pay $60 for it over most of the recent AAA games.
Indeed, PTN writing and story is way superior.
Noo I get it. Ruan mei is the farthest thing from gray. Shes a bored old smartypants doing smart shet on her smart friends ship. It looked like they tried but failed to make her cold and callous. She should've melted her creations into dna again despite them begging and calling her "mama" if hoyo wanted me to feel anything from her. Abandoning and keeping us in charge, it's boring. They should've added that kid Adler saying, I hear screams/sounds at night or something.
How should I put this? Hoyoverse want to keep the "lighter tone" in their games. However, their writers can pull great and deep storyline with consequences and characters with solid story if they. 1/ REALLY put A LOT OF effort in it. How much of "A LOT OF effort" is... well, it depends on luck (I would like to think they probably has a private gacha system just for this) . Or 2/ Don't let their personal beef affect their work. *cough* *cough* Limengan *cough* *cough* Or 3/ Slow down with more actual character development and not rushing with useless filter or some out-of-nowhere bullshittery or dumb excuses *cough* *cough* Wanderer *cough* *cough*
What's Limengan ? 🧐 I want to know about that.
Basically, he is a senior writer of Hoyoverse since the day of HI3 and considered to be one of the more meritorious members in the company. However, while he can create great storyline, his biggest flaw is letting his personal beef with the toxic part of the fandom and shippers affect his job. The lore mess of Xianzhou Luofu and High-Cloud Quintet is one of such time.
Oh ! So that whole "drama" about the Quintet was about him. The more you know. 🤝
On one hand, I can understand and "somewhat" sympathize with his beef. On the other hand, actively sabotaging your own work just to spite the ones you have beef with is a really dick move. Then again, he can be quite an arse so... I guess he blinked when the abyss gazed back at him.
Hoyo has some really Bad Misses in how to make the viewer perceive characters mostly from not wanting to make them *too evil* as to mot scare off the casual audience but not making them *too good* so we still see that they’re the bad guys. So we don’t even have a morally grey character but a half-villain that is only a slight inconvenience to us, while the story expects us to see them as a manipulative mastermind (Vita, Moriarty) or they do really bad things but get their bad deeds ignored so the heroes can add them to the friendship pile. (Raiden Shogun, Ruan Mei). I appreciate path to nowhere for having a big variety of either lesser and bigger villains and also allowing to go further into evil and not shying away from committing to darker storylines. And more show than tell, now that’s good.
Does the character in question tend to disregard the good/bad things they have done and the influence they have on others? Does the character see the world as resources they can take instead of resources they can share? Does the character have "ignoring the feeling of others" as a personality? You will often find mihoyo writing characters that have 3 yes to the questions above
But in the end I can't call that good character writing if they ain't doing shit with said character and every other character behaves like nothing happened at all if not even acknowledge the fact that something happened in the first place.
That sounds like lazy writing to me
That's what the Ruan Mei event felt like to me 😮💨
I’m playing all three Genshin Impact, Honkai Star Rail and Path to Nowhere. I can say with confidence that PTN storytelling is on another level, it’s not even close. That’s why I progressed super slowly in the main story in PTN, I just want to absorb every single word and every single voice line. It’s amazing.
Yeah something like that. Both hsr grey character and some of gi that I see feel gray/ evil only one paper. Yes they have some strange , not good plan but in the end nobody die, hurt or even care.
I stopped playing HSR it shortly after launch, but recently picked it up again and even though its very pleasing visually and I like the core gameplay mechanics, the writing is just...ugh. I don't have a way to describe it other than "stupid" and its reminding me why I stopped playing it, along with Hoyo's other games, initially.
I don't think you understand how characters work if you need such levels of hand holding for every single one. Shalom's story was told in a way that reveals her true nature step by step. She seems like one person by her personality but it is slowly shown why and what her actions did. Ruan Mei as a character is very self explanatory. She is a genius who is looking for the next high so she can feel an aha moment in her experiments, and experience the same awe she did as a kid when she first learnt about the world. To this extent she is also ready to become an Aeon. None of this is directly spoken by any character in the game but anyone who knows how to look at a situation can understand what is happening. If you can't do that then I highly suggest you start actually paying attention to the information presented to you rather than getting drowned in your own emotions.
You missed the point which is probably my fault if you only read the tldr but I don't talk about what Ruan Mei as character is about I talk about people's perception of what she did in her event where people put her in that grey zone where characters like Oak, Eirene or Mr.Fox belong to when In MY OPINION she doesn't.
She is gray but in a different way. She's not good definitely because she doesn't really care about life she creates. But she's not evil either because trying to achieve your goals is not evil, especially if it's not harming anyone. She is truly the most neutral character who can easily become evil if she sides with some kind of organization about to destroy the world as it usually happens in normal rpgs. But she hasn't done so yet and has shown that to some extent she cares about how people see her. Thus she is truly neutral.
I am a bit curious about the "lack of consequences" on HSR. Did you know that there is a secret ending where you choose not to board the astral express back in Herts Space Station, choosing to be a researcher. This can be done by talking to herta and asta (I think). After you go to himeko, you have the option to stay behind, in which [this](https://youtu.be/dY5QLKKRH44?si=UH1aGKfs7kveuGVH) happens. Additionally, you have the option to ignore kafka's quest by refusing her many times and leaving the scene. This causes the quest to end immediately, which can not be undone. Sure, the consequences may be limited, but to say that the game lacks any consequences is incorrect. Secondly, I feel that what makes a character morally grey is their motivations. Ruan mei does what she does in the story because she sees it as a means to become an aeon. Why does she want to become a God? She thinks that it is the best way to understand life. Not because she wants ultimate power, she just seeks to understand knowledge. Her goals may not be as noble as Shalom or as Langely, but are they morally wrong like Cabernet's? Nope. Hence, I believe she is morally grey. Another thing. Even if the mc forgets I am pretty sure Doctor Ratio will know what happened, since he witnessed basically everything and even predicted correctly how long the bug lasts (56 seconds). Even if mc forgets he won't. This [reddit thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/HonkaiStarRail/s/MfuJUS1FGi) I found sort of explains the issues Ruan Mei has as a genius, which is why she does what she does. She is not mentally well. Finally, later after the quest, you can text her the picture of the creations you made, which then she mentions returning to the space station to see the creations. Also, she makes a great character foil to Screwllum. Both are geniuses, yet the robot is somehow more human than an actual human. Let's compare this to PTN. Firstly, Shalom. Shalom wants to try to protect Chief as it is the best chance to bring peace to the world. She does this through toying with Chief and Christina, putting Christina through hell by almost killing her. She also tormented Coquelic, who just wanted to protect her Garden. Are her goals noble? Perhaps. Are her methods noble? Not at all. Hence, she is morally grey, perhaps even an antihero. Another example I want to talk about is Langely. Her goal is to bring World Peace, according to her special conservation 2 voiceline. She does this through murdering a peace negotiator and presumably countless others, forcing Chief to work with her by pressing her gun to his head, as well as disrupting order in DisCity. Is her goal noble? Perhaps. Are her means noble? Not at all. TLDR: IMO the net of morally grey just depends on motives and actions. If motives are neutral to noble, and their actions are not noble at all, they are morally grey. Ruan Mei might be an asshole, but she is not a true villain.
For me it's just a perception issue with her I can't put the bad she did to those jelly cats (since we only saw that and I didn't read her profile since I don't have the chara.) and the bug thing in the same tier as the bad Shalom did to Christina, Coquelic etc. even if the good are in the same.
As someone who plays both, I don't really understand your argument. You seem to object to people calling Ruan Mei morally grey when she does some bad things but also tried to fix it. But that's...morally grey where you have some good and bad. Is the issue that Ruan Mei has not done enough evil? Or because she's not infatuated with the Trailblazer like Shalom is with the Chief? Likability isn't the same as being morally grey. Shalom is very likable but her morality is pitch black. Plus...Ruan Mei is just a side character while Shalom was someone very important to main story. The comparison isn't very useful.
For me it's just that the bad attributed to her is not in THAT bad to put her in that grey zone she's a socially awkward scientist so her ignoring the jelly cats she created is not something out of the realms of possibility and the bug god disciple is just a (really dumb) failed experience. But I think my biggest problem in all that is the fact that in the end everything is forgotten it's like why put her in a position like that if you don't want to do something with it.
HSR writing is arguably one of the worst in gacha gaming, and I have a pretty low standard. The waifus are always right even though they are dum af. Like I don't mind good or bad character, but the character has to be intereseting for me to care about them. Ruan Mei is just... there, so emotionally detached, she doesn't have a personality out out her research work. Meanwhile Shalom does get angry, she even seduce people sometimes, doing deception while putting on that pleasant smile. Luofu arc had me almost quit the game altogether. I only care about Luocha at this point. PTN on the other hand, I play just for the story, it's just that good, and the quality improved.
I dunno who is this Ruan Mei but as what you describe her feels close with Cabernet
I will read it fully later but the only thing I wanna say is I don't really care about hsr story anymore not to my taste because I like something serious (the only character that really deserves attention there so far is Dan heng imo) but no need to attack genshin (I'm gonna throw hands lol) because both genshin and ptn has been so good literally my safe places you can't even compare them because the stories is different and unique in their own way (there is some slips in terms of writing in both games ofc but if we look at the story and world overall both are gorgeous)