Genshin Impact Gacha-of-the-Wild All

garion333 wrote:

Where can we have a discussion about the game censoring the words "Taiwan" and "Hong Kong"?

Should we play games from China? I'm truly conflicted.

That depends. Is the game good? If so, think of all the developers who worked hard on the game. Punishing them for the politics/assholery/whatever of their employer seems counter-productive.

If the game is bad clearly we need to take a moral stand.

billt721 wrote:
garion333 wrote:

Where can we have a discussion about the game censoring the words "Taiwan" and "Hong Kong"?

Should we play games from China? I'm truly conflicted.

That depends. Is the game good? If so, think of all the developers who worked hard on the game. Punishing them for the politics/assholery/whatever of their employer seems counter-productive.

If the game is bad clearly we need to take a moral stand.

Is this the Cyberpunk thread?

billt721 wrote:
garion333 wrote:

Where can we have a discussion about the game censoring the words "Taiwan" and "Hong Kong"?

Should we play games from China? I'm truly conflicted.

That depends. Is the game good? If so, think of all the developers who worked hard on the game. Punishing them for the politics/assholery/whatever of their employer seems counter-productive.

If the game is bad clearly we need to take a moral stand.

I'm not sure how I see whether it's a good game or not factor into this.

Is supporting a Chinese game that cowtows to the Chinese government (admittedly, what all games have to do to be released) tacit approval of Chinese governmental policies?

I'm all for supporting devs and whatnot, but what's the take on Chinese-made games?

garion333 wrote:

Where can we have a discussion about the game censoring the words "Taiwan" and "Hong Kong"?

Should we play games from China? I'm truly conflicted.

I think for me to avoid it entirely it would have to be promoting propaganda or unthinkingly participating in propaganda. Like, for instance, almost any entry from the Call of Duty, Rainbow Six, or The Division games. As it is, this means that while I'm probably not going to drop it, I'm also probably not going to spend any money on it. And if I enjoy a ftp game, I usually throw at least the cost of a full price game at it.

As for stuff from China in general--I just don't know. (note, the following section is not directed at anyone here, but more about what I've noticed in online gamer discourse) Focusing on games as being the problem strikes me not so much as worrying about the horse after the barn door is open, but like standing in the kitchen and going, "Oh my god, what if there was a horse in here!" China is a nation actively engaged in genocide against its Uigyr population. Given the chance, it would absolutely invade and subjugate Taiwan without so much as a discussion. The only thing remotely saving Hong Kong right now is that the ruling class of China is laundering all their money through that island, and goes shopping there. Even by the admittedly low standards of nations like the United States, it's not a good place. And we're worried about Tik Tok and Tencent. Bro, 99% of our endpoint communications are manufactured there. All of your consoles are made there. Most of your computer equipment. If you really wanted to send a message China, you would stop playing video games entirely.

Hell, maybe that's what I should do. In my mountain biking hobby, all the frames are made in Taiwan. For once, mountain biking is revolutionary protest.

garion333 wrote:
billt721 wrote:
garion333 wrote:

Where can we have a discussion about the game censoring the words "Taiwan" and "Hong Kong"?

Should we play games from China? I'm truly conflicted.

That depends. Is the game good? If so, think of all the developers who worked hard on the game. Punishing them for the politics/assholery/whatever of their employer seems counter-productive.

If the game is bad clearly we need to take a moral stand.

I'm not sure how I see whether it's a good game or not factor into this.

Is supporting a Chinese game that cowtows to the Chinese government (admittedly, what all games have to do to be released) tacit approval of Chinese governmental policies?

I'm all for supporting devs and whatnot, but what's the take on Chinese-made games?

It was sarcasm.

I don't have a take on Chinese games. I was just pointing out that the general gamer reaction to sh*tty people/companies is entirely dependent on the quality of the game in question. Take a look at the differing reactions to any company that treats their employees poorly (Rockstar, EA famously) and Stardock games, for example. In the former case, we hear all about how boycotting the games doesn't actually do anything, which is probably correct, and in the latter nobody has a problem avoiding Stardock games.

ClockworkHouse wrote:

Is this the Cyberpunk thread?

Actually, this is an even better example of something more comparable to Stardock games. Rockstar/EA haven't (to the best of my knowledge, though I wouldn't be shocked to find something in Rockstar's case) made any gross comments or anything about differing groups of people, but CDPR has had numerous issues come up during the Cyberpunk development, and my guess is that the game will be pretty good and sell plenty of copies.

Unless the company is an arm of the Chinese government I don't think that attacking or boycotting the devs over making decisions to prevent them from getting banned or shutdown is remotely fair.

There's a growing undercurrent of anti-Chinese racism in a lot of discourse and it's concerning. Chinese companies work in China and need to adapt to local conditions.

Do we boycott Marvel for doing the same thing?

MrDeVil909 wrote:

There's a growing undercurrent of anti-Chinese racism in a lot of discourse and it's concerning. Chinese companies work in China and need to adapt to local conditions.

Oh, no doubt. Tencent as a meme is basically mildly veiled xenophobia.

(Marvel cow towing to Chinese censors is definitely something I've seen discussed with little traction, but have seen it mentioned before.)

billt721 wrote:

It was sarcasm.

That I can clearly see now that I've had a full night's rest.

Stardock is an interesting point because a lot of us have had personal run ins with Brad Wardell, myself included. It wasn't until I too got trampled under his rampaging ego that I took a hard line stance.

Thanks for the responses all, I'm curious where we're to draw a line. My personal opinion is that voting with your wallet on the small end doesn't work, it takes a movement to work. I feel that not playing Chinese made games, while playing nob-Chinese games on Chinese-manufactured hardware is ironic, though the flipside is it's impossible to play on a non-Chinese manufactured console or pc. Some, if not all, of the parts will come from there.

I've hit the point in the game where I need to do small quests and explore to get my adventurer rank up enough to pursue the main story again. There's lots to do anyway, but I could see this (I was 16 and need to be 18 to carry on) as the point where some folks fall off. It's also when I started itching for some new characters and blew through all my free points trying to 'win' some. All I got were items and the cook lady you unlock at 20 adventurer rank anyway.

I did drop $7 on some funny money and got two characters out of it, both claymore users which is what I wanted. Now we'll see if I feel satisfied or get thirsty for more. These devs are sneaky and subtle with their carrot and stick routine.

Certis wrote:

It's also when I started itching for some new characters and blew through all my free points trying to 'win' some. All I got were items and the cook lady you unlock at 20 adventurer rank anyway.

That's just, really bad luck. By rank 20 I had received 7 new characters from those 10-wish packs.

AcidCat wrote:
Certis wrote:

It's also when I started itching for some new characters and blew through all my free points trying to 'win' some. All I got were items and the cook lady you unlock at 20 adventurer rank anyway.

That's just, really bad luck. By rank 20 I had received 7 new characters from those 10-wish packs.

Yeah, I thought my luck bad when I only got a handful of 3 stars out of my initial pulls

Very rough luck. I got Venti and some 4* fire lady out of a 10 wish pull.

Paul Tassi at Forbes seems to have basically been on the Genshin Impact beat since launch and it's quite interesting and funny to see his arc with the game. He's now of the opinion he's basically 'done' with the game as progress has now gotten really slow.

I'm planning on keeping it as my daily 'wind down from Apex Legends' game so I'll probably be picking away at it for months.

garion333 wrote:

Thanks for the responses all, I'm curious where we're to draw a line. My personal opinion is that voting with your wallet on the small end doesn't work, it takes a movement to work. I feel that not playing Chinese made games, while playing nob-Chinese games on Chinese-manufactured hardware is ironic, though the flipside is it's impossible to play on a non-Chinese manufactured console or pc. Some, if not all, of the parts will come from there.

I think it's a very personal choice, but I'm quite close to this perspective. I watch a microphone reviewer who now calls out when something is made in China. But he works on a Macbook made by Foxconn, and we've all seen their anti-suicide nets, right?

It's not just a meme that there's no ethical consumption under capitalism, and China is capitalist, but I think we need to pick our battles. And for me ignoring a game because it's made in China and the developers comply with edicts of the Chinese government isn't the right battle to fight.

Eh. Any game needs to comply with the laws of the places you're trying to sell it in. I don't see how you can lay that blame at the feet of a developer.

For instance - Is anyone mad that German versions of games have Nazi symbology removed?

Jonman wrote:

For instance - Is anyone mad that German versions of games have Nazi symbology removed?

Is that still true? I thought was an older thing no longer enforced or whatever.

garion333 wrote:
Jonman wrote:

For instance - Is anyone mad that German versions of games have Nazi symbology removed?

Is that still true? I thought was an older thing no longer enforced or whatever.

The rule was repealed in 2018 in large part because of the Wolfenstein series. German game releases still are required to censor gore to various degrees, as I understand it.

There's also the issue of Japanese games being altered for release in the US by having female characters aged up and covered up. That is either no big deal or oppressive censorship depending on which forums you frequent.

Jonman wrote:

Eh. Any game needs to comply with the laws of the places you're trying to sell it in. I don't see how you can lay that blame at the feet of a developer.

For instance - Is anyone mad that German versions of games have Nazi symbology removed?

Not really, but that's a fairly innocuous example. Let's say the Polish government told CDPR that none of their games could acknowledge non-heterosexual relationships, which--as I understand it--would not be wholly out of character for the current Polish government. I suspect you would see some tempers raised in that case.

kazooka wrote:
Jonman wrote:

Eh. Any game needs to comply with the laws of the places you're trying to sell it in. I don't see how you can lay that blame at the feet of a developer.

For instance - Is anyone mad that German versions of games have Nazi symbology removed?

Not really, but that's a fairly innocuous example. Let's say the Polish government told CDPR that none of their games could acknowledge non-heterosexual relationships, which--as I understand it--would not be wholly out of character for the current Polish government. I suspect you would see some tempers raised in that case.

Yes, but we'd be stupid to be pissed at CDPR for that.

I hit AR 20 last night which apparently opens the Spiral Abyss and the Battle Pass feature/functions.

I'm still enjoying the game, interface kludginess (PS4) aside. It's pretty, tons of content / areas to explore, etc. I'm not great at the combat, but so far I can keep leveling items to keep power levels at parity or better than the mobs I'm fighting.

The random nature of pulls can leave you elemental type starved a bit (I still haven't pulled any other fire user than the free one you get as part of the story), but in general I'm pretty satisfied with my experience (particularly for free).

AR 20 last night for me as well. I think I've got the elements covered except, just not with a good weapon type mix. Yeah, random is not a good look when you want to attempt to get a good mix and match of 2 aspects.

Decided to give this a try and so far I am having fun. I need to get a better grip on the different elements, especially when you encounter the mage type guys who have an elemental shield you need to take down. Found a challenge that gives you 60 seconds to first take down a fire mage guy then it spawns a water mage and an ice mage. Was able to take the fire guy out in about 20 seconds with my water character (Barbara, she isn't super offensive) but then was stuck trying to figure out the last two. Amber wasn't really making a dent in either.

This game is real pretty. Going to be taking a lot of screenshots, I think.

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/IYIKnis.jpg)

Someone commented that this game's unofficial name is Breath of the Waifu...

[...thinking face...]

I've continued to plunk along and make progress. I can see the wall looming in the distance, though. Early levels come quickly, but the xp required to keep growing definitely scales up. Still, daily commission quests and other exploration rewards (as well as quests and random events) can keep things interesting.

I did finally get another fire user from a pull, so that might shift my layout a bit. Amber's fire attack makes timed column activation difficult in some situations.

Installed it.

Don't know if I should somehow reset to pull again...it is beautiful for a mobile title. But it makes my Pixel 4 heat up like a miniature sun! Also, not sure how much I'll play, I was harvesting mushrooms and bird eggs for a long time just because I like to stock up on things LOL

I tried this on PS4 just looking for a game to mess around in. It seems ok but the combat felt slow and not precise, but that could just be me on PS4. I could see this being fun if I was in the mood for a game like this.

Trying this out a bit on PC using a controller, and the button mappings are all running opposed to muscle memory of other games in the same style. Which wouldn't be a problem except that apparently controller remapping in-game isn't a supported thing at this time.

Otherwise, it's interesting so far.

Farscry wrote:

Trying this out a bit on PC using a controller, and the button mappings are all running opposed to muscle memory of other games in the same style. Which wouldn't be a problem except that apparently controller remapping in-game isn't a supported thing at this time.

Otherwise, it's interesting so far.

I’ve been playing a cross-save account between iOS and PC and a second account on PS4 and the lack of control customization is really my biggest - if not only - complaint. I personally find the game feels the best with a controller and as a flight sim aficionado, I was happy to find the PS4 version at least lets you invert the y-axis, but all the button mapping are just... WRONG. I’m also not a huge fan of the FOV setting and again, the lack of ability to change it; when I’m playing on PS4, I’m using a 63” 4K tv and the game makes the screen look as cramped as a first generation smartphone.

Yeah, the backwards controls are an issue. I'd normally play with a controller, but rather sticking with M&K.

I couldn't even get a 360 pad to work on PC. If I selected the option all inputs except mouse movement would stop and nothing short of force stopping would get me back. This was the first 2 at launch of the game, though. I've actually been using mouse and a Razer Tartarus, which is a bit shy of having enough keys, so occasionally I have to reach for my real keyboard for stuff like "G" for the tutorials. Glad they have the alt key for pointer mode, though.

I hit Adventure Rank 25 last night, and have barely begun to explore Liyue.

I'm still playing. Made AR 26 yesterday, and explored more of the southern region. It's interesting to stumble across little quest lines scattered in the middle of nowhere.

Did 2 more pulls and got nothing of value. The XP requirements for leveling are starting to feel a little steep, particularly since I still don't really have a complete lineup.

One thing I've hit a couple of times is a anemoculus or geoculus that is higher than I can reach. This seems to happen when there are no nearby higher elevations to glide down from, which makes me think I am missing some mechanic that would allow me to jump higher or climb. None of the characters I've pulled seem to have any abilities like that, tho.

As I mentioned a few days ago, I'm right there with you guys about the control customization. Apparently the dev team has posted an update that customization is coming, although it's unclear if that will include the ability to swap the confirm and cancel buttons, which is the real problem.

As for myself, I'm just using software to swap the A and B buttons outside the game (ReWASD is the tool I use, if you're curious), and that's worked fine for me -- swapping jump and primary attack seemed like a fine change anyway.

vypre wrote:

I’m also not a huge fan of the FOV setting and again, the lack of ability to change it; when I’m playing on PS4, I’m using a 63” 4K tv and the game makes the screen look as cramped as a first generation smartphone.

Yeah, I'd love to have a bit more control there too, although it's just far enough back that playing on an ultrawide monitor feels pretty good. But, even a small bit of the somewhat limited camera placement controls found in the photo mode would be very welcome.

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/EN0arT3.jpg)
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/1xtBMt1.jpg)
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/wUxpLMi.jpg)

But yeah, another update or two and I bet all that will be sorted out pretty well.


That said, as much as I am VERY much loving the game, I do have one other nit I would pick, as empty a fight as it might be -- that is, the gacha design. I mean, I know, it doesn't hide what kind of game it from the start, and fair play there, but without the predatory monetization scheme this would be a game that would be so, so easy easy to recommend. It still is I suppose, and you can bet your ass this will make my list at the end of the year, but it's always going to have a HUGE asterisk next to it.

Heck, even if they hadn't gone with a full cosmetics only model (with light resource boosts maybe), even just having more than the initial handful of characters (ie, Amber, Lisa, and Kaeya) available from quests and achievements would be a huge boost. I mean, after a few days of enjoying the hell out of the game I happily paid them what I would normally pay for a traditional single player game, and I got enough fun characters from that to be satisfied, but it is a bit of a bummer to know that I may never get to play with some major story characters because they are locked as rare drops in a very expensive slot machine.

Hopefully at the very least they will surprise us and keep adding events like the thing for unlocking Xiangling -- ie, gameplay based, not time locked methods of unlocking characters. I actually rolled her already, but I'm so glad that if I hadn't I would have the chance to get her regardless, because she's great to play as and her story quest was a fun, wonderful surprise.

Spoiler:

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/FNV7os4.jpg)
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/iRlqu3P.jpg)
IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/Tud7Let.jpg)

Tyrian wrote:

One thing I've hit a couple of times is a anemoculus or geoculus that is higher than I can reach. This seems to happen when there are no nearby higher elevations to glide down from, which makes me think I am missing some mechanic that would allow me to jump higher or climb. None of the characters I've pulled seem to have any abilities like that, tho.

So, have you encountered the world puzzle type where you collect a few little wind bugs and then they create updrafts? Every time I've found something I couldn't climb, glide, or otherwise reach, there has been a nearby puzzle to unlock access in some form or another, but the easiest to miss for sure have been those little wind bugs since they are small and almost look like ambient decoration until you run into them and pick them up.

That said, I've also been able to just cheat on a few using Venti's air gust, but you need to have had silly good gacha luck to have that option.

Also,

(mechanics spoiler)

Spoiler:

if you're already collecting geoculus items and are at AR 25 I'm guessing you've tried the earth attuned version of the Traveller, right? Not that I've found a ton of places where it would be required, but I'm assuming there will be puzzles that expect you to use the platform creation ability you get as your main elemental attack in earth form.