Okay, this post might be controversial, but I hope y'all will listen to my points and give me a chance as I'm not trying to be rude or disrespectful at all. Also, please look out for my comment that I will make under this post as this one is already very long.
I guess I "lurk" in this sub a lot. It's really great to have a gaming space that can call out some of the toxic, gross stuff in the gaming industry. I've felt like, at times, most of this sub could come together and boycott certain games or even whole companies. I know not everyone agrees with this type of sentiment, and sometimes, I find myself feeling conflicted about it. For example, I hear how prevalent "crunching" is in the industry, so I wonder – what's the point of supporting the video game industry at all at this point? Nevertheless, I do try to be careful of what I end up spending my money on. This brings me to my main point, and just to be clear, I am specifically speaking to people in this sub who DO believe in boycotting certain games, companies, etc. – especially if giving money to them would affect real people in real life. As a black woman, I find this sub's response towards games like Genshin Impact and the company that makes them to be… disappointing :(. I would have thought Genshin Impact and MiHoYo's other games would've generated the same amount of controversy as other past examples, but… they haven't really – until maybe the Z game – but that's too little too late :(.
Let me explain. I saw a lot of comments recently that said that Genshin "isn't that bad" comparatively – but it is. I'm going to list the most egregious examples, but make sure to do your own independent looking as well. Hilichurls are the most common enemy in the game, and one can see that they are a prime example of the "tribal" stereotype as they are described and depicted as primitive, savage monsters… that also just "happen" to have dark skin. In the MiHoYo Tour 2020 video, at around 1:30, you can see that the company seemingly gets their "inspiration" from indigenous peoples. It is presumed that these are New Guinean indigenous people, but I haven't been able to confirm that. Next, we have Xinyan's charactization as one of the first brown-skinned women in the game. She is written as a loud, hothead with a fiery personality who constantly scares and/or weirds out others around her. Not to mention, she likes rock n' roll (look up: origin of rock music) – which is not well-liked in the Liyue region. Then, there's the Sumeru region – which seems to be a hodgepodge of different cultures from ancient Egypt, India, Mesopotamia, etc. However, the NPCs in Sumeru City are very white with pretty much no diversity in their skin tones. Yet, the Eremites are stereotypical "desert people" (some are even bandits…) that mostly live outside the city and collectively have darker skin. Some even have "ethnic" hair. They are also "coincidentally" an enemy type (at least at some points in the game). There's even a mission where a racist lamp will assume that Jeht (an Eremite) is a SLAVE, call her a "sand-licking lackey," and believe your fair-skinned player character is her master. Now, in 2024, we have a Natlan preview teaser. Again, this region presumably takes from multiple places like Latin America, Africa, and more… but I still didn't see a single character that resembled me – EXCEPT for a darker-skinned enemy NPC with more "ethnic" hair. This could change in the future, but I have very low expectations even if it does happen.
I've saved something else terrible for last. MiHoYo has another game called Honkai Impact 3rd that was released in 2016. The three images on this post are from that game. I believe Carole Pepper was first introduced in 2020, and despite her having straight hair and her skin tone being similar to Xinyan – she is canonically black. In the game, Carole struggles with her self-image because of the color of her skin. She also states that she has felt insecure because of her mother. This is the turd topping on the crap cake that is MiHoYo. Her mother's name is Lewis, and she is one of the most cruel, unapologetic, stereotypical depictions of a black woman that I have ever seen – from this company. Her masculine name, appearance, and dark skin (the darkest I've seen from MiHoYo) in comparison to her more stereotypically feminine, light-skinned daughter is not a coincidence. The intent is obvious.
Needless to say, Genshin Impact and MiHoYo are severely problematic. This stuff affects real humans as black people and others with darker-skin are horribly discriminated against in China (skip to 6:19 if you aren't going to watch the whole thing). It also negatively contributes to the global perception of my people as we are constantly discriminated against and dehumanized. Therefore, I urge those of you who care about things like this to please stop giving your money to MiHoYo. They are a Chinese company that has proven to us that they don't care about their international audience, and they care even less about BIPOC. Please, just stop giving them your money, or at the very, very, very, VERY least – be F2P – but deleting your accounts and uninstalling the apps would be much better.
I know I obviously can't force anyone to do anything, but even so, I just wanna know what is so different about this game/company in comparison to other controversial and more hated games that have been on this sub? 🙁
Thank you for reading.
Angry black female character who is also hyper masculine looking. Wow, they managed to check nearly every box on the ‘black female stereotype’ checklist. Guess they didn’t have time to add the huge nose and afro. 😒
I’ve never downloaded any of MiHoYo’s games, and now I’m even more prompted not to. I saw the designs for the Natlan characters and it’s laughably ridiculous that they couldn’t make a single one of them dark skinned. It’s like they’re self-inserting in someone else’s culture. The way that they portray black and brown characters sounds disgustingly racist. Designing the only black woman like a Jojo character amongst the butter-faced teens and making her daughter self-conscious about her skin is incredibly messed up, and it’s practically obvious that the company had malicious intent behind it. I can’t believe that I only just found out about their blatant racism through your post. MiHoYo has to face backlash for their bs.
great post! thank you for sharing and putting in all the work. a really important read to be a more thoughtful consumer
I’ve stated in another post about that ZZZ loli crap, but its such a huge relief in dropping genshin. while the story is rich and i ship some characters in the peripheral, the bad is too bitter a pill to swallow for me.
>Barbara
girl now why do i see her paired with whole ass adults? mhyo fandom, calm down perhaps
>Xinyan
something that bothered me: i dropped out at Liyue but is she the only one with that imo obnoxious accent? like why only her?
I’m sorry I couldn’t make my original post shorter; I tried my best. This is why I’m making a separate comment. As always, make sure to conduct your own independent search as well.
As I stated before, I know that people don’t view Genshin Impact as “bad” as something like the Z game. However, the sexualization in Genshin is still rampant and terrible – even if the other game manages to be worse. To understand, please read at least some of these sources first. Real children are being affected by the culture that is cultivated in anime and the societies that participate in it. I know that these articles are primarily about Japan, but this culture also exists in other Asian countries like China and Korea as well. **I couldn’t include all the links I wanted to for fear of some of the things I’m sharing being classified as not safe. I’m pretty sure my links are okay, but please be cautious anyways when looking at upsetting and disturbing things like this. Protect your own mental health.**
Sources:
Normalization happening in Japan
•https://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/article/57eaaf23-0cef-48c8-961f-41f2563b38aa
•See: “enjo kōsai” (compensated dating) and **also** “chikan” (groping/sexual harassment) as these events involve minors as well
•https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enjo_k%C5%8Dsai
•https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chikan_(body_contact)
•https://www.everand.com/article/379486255/Japanese-High-School-Girls-Wear-Badges-Warning-Would-Be-Train-Gropers-I-m-Not-Going-To-Take-It
•https://www.asahi.com/sp/ajw/articles/14643843
Wikipedia Lolicon Article
•https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lolicon
(Just look at the example picture they use. Anime characters DO NOT have to be naked to be explicitly sexualized. The BBC article mentions this and uses the specific word.)
Gravure idols
•https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Model_(person)&diffonly=true#Gravure_idols
•**There’s a great informational article by Sabukaru Online that I wanted to link, but I’m afraid it might be not safe.**
(This is also an egregious example of explicit sexualization that doesn’t involve nudity but DOES involve real people – and minors at that. **Remember**, “idol culture” like this doesn’t just exist in Japan.)
Perspective from a Japanese-American women
•https://newuniversity.org/2022/11/03/animes-hypersexualization-of-japanese-women-is-coming-to-america-from-a-japanese-womans-perspective/
I use all these links to say that anime contributes to these problems in Japanese society at the same time that anime springs forth from what is already present within the society. It’s a perpetual cycle that takes place in other countries as well.
When it comes to Genshin, women and girls (whether “ambiguously” aged or not) are repeatedly sexualized and/or preyed upon. Lumine, the female player character who looks like a child, literally has Lisa – an implied ADULT – constantly call them “sweetie” and flirt with them. Additionally, the way Lisa herself is sexualized and objectified as a character is very blatant. I know that the sexualization of grown women (in this game) doesn’t seem to be “as big of a deal” – but it still is an issue as MiHoYo knows EXACTLY who they are marketing this sort of stuff towards. **However**, characters that are implied to be minors – like Fischl, Noelle, and Barbara – are also sexualized in various ways. Fischl has very revealing mesh on her outfit and looks, talks, and acts like a very young girl. This [pose](https://www.reddit.com/r/Genshin_Impact/comments/13sxejk/happy_birthday_fischl/) is from official art 🤮. Noelle is a maid, and if you don’t know already, maids are heavily sexualized within anime culture. She is very intentionally designed. Barbara is an “idol” and fulfills the stereotypical “innocent, but can be made erotic” category in anime (similar – but not exactly the same – to Noelle). She even wears sailor/school-girl inspired attire for her [Summer outfit.](https://genshin-impact.fandom.com/wiki/Summertime_Sparkle) Again, if you didn’t know, school-girls are very heavily sexualized within anime – and even around the world (like in America). The way a lot of the fanbase potrays her is evidence of what MiHoYo was going for. To make matters worse, if you know anything about idol culture in Japan, you’ll see how this is not a coincidence. Needless to say: Genshin Impact AND MiHoYo as a whole are gross. If you prescribe to “voting with your wallet” – please stop supporting this company.
Thank you for reading.
**EDIT:** Hello, everyone, I’m getting a lot of comments about how Lumine doesn’t look like a child/isn’t a child, how the sexualization in the game doesn’t really exist/isn’t that bad, that I haven’t really played the game, that I’m attacking anime culture, etc.
I can’t reply to everyone, so I’ll just try to edit my post here. About Lumine, the age that someone “looks” is obviously a subjective subject, so we will often see people differently. However, I also think that – a lot of the times – people might not realize how young anime characters are actually portrayed. Lumine has quite a “baby-face” with how huge her eyes are – comparable to Klee. This is a trait used in anime for “cuteness” and/or “child-likeness.” Next, by “child,” I mean a minor – because teenagers are still children. To me, Lumine looks like a young, teen girl.
About the sexualization, I understand that not all characters can be “innocent” or that the sexualization and objectification in Genshin can seem like it’s not that bad or that it “doesn’t exist” in comparison to other works. I can’t force anyone to change their mind, and I believe I stated most of my argument already, so I’ll just say this. It is less about simply “flirty” characters and more about what medium these characters exist in. That is why the stuff in Genshin is still bad even though it may be more tolerable for you to play in comparison to other gacha games. The fact that MiHoYo created something like the Z game makes it obvious where their intentions lie. There’s a reason why there aren’t any “shota” (young boy) main character models in Genshin.
Finally, I actually used to enjoy playing Genshin, but stopped a while ago – even before Sumeru came out. I don’t think all anime is bad, but it would be incorrect to say that a very, very large chunk of anime culture isn’t inherently problematic – especially when you look at it from the lens of it’s country of origin.
These games are racist and have always been. Sometimes people just don’t like to be confronted with the facts when it actually impacts them. They think “it’s not that bad” because it’s just a video game and because they aren’t the ones being discriminated against. When you actually ask them to make a minor change like give up a game… Well good luck with that. Most people are all talk. I’m never surprised to see a stereotype of black people, or even of other dark skinned Asians in Asian media because racism and colorism are super prevelant culturally and we love to make excuses for it.
The sexualizing minors thing… Absolutely. I had to give up almost all anime because it’s so bad. Characters are depicted in ways that are obviously intended to mirror a child in both looks and mannerisms and people will bend over backwards saying they aren’t a real kid, or just a petite adult, etc. I see a ton of this kind of content coming from these games as well. I see a lot of defense of this as not being harmful because Japan supposedly has low rates of child abuse. But as someone who has family that lives there, there is also a massive culture of not reporting and not documenting crimes because they take a lot of pride in being safe and want to keep those parts hidden from outsiders. I wish more effort was being put in to study the harm the industry does by sexualizing children. But I think it’s also a hugely profitable industry and that’s why it hasn’t happened.
This is a really informative post, thank you for writing this out!
While I’ve never played Genshin or the like, I have enjoyed other controversial titles (namely the Persona series), ultimately making me question what my stance is on games that I enjoy but also feel are wrong on so many levels. You absolutely have every right to feel this way, and the fact that you are expressing this here no doubt means that there are so many others who are negatively impacted by these types of games as well. You deserve to feel safe and represented when playing games in the same way that literally everyone else does, and I’m sorry that you’ve felt so terribly misrepresented by certain companies in particular.
While I’ve never boycotted a company, I have seen how our community has been able to make positive impacts in the gaming space. So I know it’s not much but personally, if I ever had any intention of playing these games in the future, I’ll probably avoid it now.
Having lived in South Korea for a large portion of my life, although I’m not a POC, I know how, well, racist the community can still absolutely be. I’m so sorry you have to feel this way over something that you should be able to *enjoy* and I hope this trend changes quickly.
I can’t really comment on gention impact as I’ve never played it. It’s not really my cup of tea and with some of the controversies that I’ve heard including this one I don’t think it’s ever going to be.
I can’t give you an example from The boulders Gate 3 community that really disappointed me with the character Wyll. There are lots of really undertoned racism when talking about his character in BG3.
I believe there was even a mod to change his race 😩 and it was sad to kind of see the silence or the small amount of people who talked about the racism in the baldur’s Gate community when it came to his character but unfortunately I am not surprised. I should also mention I am a person of color and unfortunately I just don’t have high expectations sometimes when it comes to people noticing stuff like this. I will definitely point it out but if it doesn’t get as big as it should be it doesn’t surprise me just kind of disappoints me at this point.
as a girl that in fact played genshin for 2 years daily after release, i absolutely agree with you. some of the comments im reading here make me disappointed too. i can tell you that the plotline does not sexualize women or put them down (the story and dialogue is a lot like a pokemon game–really pg) but their designs definitely do, and i cant believe so many people are jumping to defend it because the girls have power and the story doesnt “focus on the objectification of women” and other games are worse like that now removes the sexualization. mihoyo doesnt give a shit about about giving women power and agency, they care about money. it’s a waifu gacha with jiggle physics. i assume you havent played it, but im surprised you didnt mention all the playable female child characters that literally everyone knows is pandering to lolicons. there are 7 little girl characters and not a single boy😭it’s just classic anime shit.
you should absolutely be represented accurately and with respect. i think mihoyo doesnt give characters darker skin tones because it isnt profitable for them, not because of some cute ignorance. the way some people cant disagree with you about the racism but excuse it right away because “thats just how it is over there sorry 🙁 and the game is fun :(” is gross! people really drop an issue the moment it doesnt affect them. this is my first and probably last time interacting with this sub, lmao
Lumine doesn’t look like a child? Very confused by that part, but….
I agree with your criticism on their handling of skin tones (though I have slightly differing thoughts about the hilichurls). I don’t in any way agree with your “rampant sexualization” critique of genshin, though. Cause it doesn’t do that. I have only been put off very few times by their portrayal of a woman in that game. It’s leagues above almost every other gacha game in that front, and it’s miles better than most regular games too. There’s no ambiguous ages in genshin, everything is set in stone in game. If not exact age, a very good idea is given.
I want to reiterate, just in case this was lost, I do agree with everything you’ve said about the ethnicities treatment forefront.
OP, I just wanted to thank you for writing this up.
Since Genshin Impact and other games like it don’t really vibe with me, I’ve never bought any of their games. I am, however, still over here boycotting Hogwarts Legacy (and all other Rowling-related stuff – folks please don’t comment to argue about this, I will not engage).
The examples you’re pointing out are decidedly ones I don’t think anyone could ignore while still claiming to argue in good faith.
Especially the consistent “hot-bloodedness” of dark-skinned characters is something I’ve been side-eyeing for a long time. Even creators who ~~seem~~ claim to be “over it” with the overly racist stereotypes seem to consistently fall back into the trap of “passionate woman = dark skin” (just like the “meek, pale, soft-spoken asian woman” – *every* damn time…)
It’s not right and I’m sorry if not everyone’s as invested in noticing these things and fighting them as they should be.
I’ve never interacted with Genshin or the company, I had no idea it was so bad!
I agree with your points and most of what needs to be said has been said by you or other commenters.
However, I’m relatively certain Carole was concerned about becoming super muscly like her mom not her skin color. The insecurities and cosmetics were because she wanted to appear “girly’ and cute and she complains about gaining visible muscle too easily all of which is its own problem since there aren’t any examples of female characters that aren’t/are perfectly fine with being muscly (aside from her mom).
Speaking of her mom… she has almost zero presence in the story so the only thing I can say is I got the impression of overprotective mama bear which is its own stereotype I suppose. As for her appearance, I mean, she is a Valkyrie but so is almost every other female character and none of them have muscles like that, not even Durandal who is just as, if not more, well known for her intense workout routine. But Durandal’s white sooooooooooo.
I guess the only positive I can say about Lewis’s depiction is she led Schicksal’s forces during the second Honkai Erupation and seemed to be a calm and competent leader.
The following is major spoilers for Genshin and doesn’t at all excuse their actual depiction in-game but the >!hilichurls are the cursed people of the fallen civilization of Khaenri’ah which all human characters (or former human forms of characters) from there so far have been white. Why their “primitive” form is reminiscent of native American tribes though… /sigh. Though, thinking about it it’s also quite the missed opportunity to have a more “unique” primitive race by using ancient European civilizations as its inspiration unlike so, so many other games that make their primitive race native American “inspired”. !<
As for the Eremites. Yeah no I got… well almost nothing. Personally, I got the impression that they were part of a great civilization that Sumeru ruined and has continued to discriminate against ever since but I’m really not that up to date on my Genshin lore as I stopped playing some time before Fontaine. I just mean to say that I think they were trying to depict the terrible effects of racism but seem to have done so in such a watered down, easily missable, and even ignorant way it pretty much does the opposite (See: That racist lamp you mentioned) which is just as inexcusable.
Anyway, I’ll admit I really enjoyed my time with both Honkai Impact (Honkai Impact still holds my favorite character in all of fiction) and Genshin but that doesn’t mean they, or Mihoyo, don’t have problems (I haven’t even mentioned all the pedophilic $#!T so many characters feed into.) I don’t play either anymore and don’t really intend to try ZZZ and while I can’t honestly say I wouldn’t recommend any of their games (I genuinely think their stories are mostly quite well written) I would urge people to not spend any money on them; and definitely avoid if you have addictive tendencies though the latter applies to all gacha games.
I decided I’m going to answer your question. I wasn’t going to because I think I’ll be downvoted, but I’m going to take a leap of faith and believe that you posted this wanting an honest answer, and so I hope the others in this sub aren’t too harsh to me.
TL;DR — My own personal happiness, peace of mind, comfort, and mental stability come first. That’s first above *everything else*.
I’ll try to keep this as short as I can. Here are the main reasons I play games even if the companies suck:
1 – I’m almost 40, and in my experience boycotting does nothing. There are far too many people who are into any particular thing for it to matter whether I partake in it or not.
2 – I’ve stopped reading up on politics and various drama. (So I did not know most of what you shared.) This is to preserve my own mental peace. There is largely nothing I can do about most situations, so it’s best to ignore them in order to not be a 24/7 ball of stress/anxiety/depression. (I do what I can when I can, like vote.)
3 – Genshin Impact is a free-to-play game. It also came out during the Covid shutdown. So people had the time to spare to play it, and it required no money upfront to try it out. This made it a very easy game for many people to try.
4 – Genshin is the only free-to-play game like it that I know of. So anyone looking to try out a free RPG really has no other options.
5 – I find the aesthetics amazing. The world feels like I’m walking through a painting. The music is gorgeous. Collecting things is relaxing. Hearing character voicelines is fun. I enjoy quite a bit about the game.
6 – Almost all of my current gaming library has various awful real world things attached to them. I’m not sure if I’m unlucky in terms of interests or what, but that’s how it is. So if I want to continue playing games I like, I’m stuck.
7 – Me getting some enjoyment out of a game is *important*. We are all struggling to live in this current hellscape of a world. Anything that makes it easier and makes me feel it’s worth it to keep going another day is a good enough reason for me to continue engaging with it.
8 – A bunch of my gaming friends play it, and so it’s easy to jump in with them. It’s nice to stay up-to-date with the news of new characters and events so we can discuss them.
I think that mostly sums it up, at least for me. I’m not really looking to discuss this or debate it, as I’ve made my peace with the conflict between “there is no ethical consumption under capitalism” and “I’m alive and need to do things” long ago. That being said, I do hope my input helps answer your question. 😊
Edit: I play on PS4! I was specifically referring to no free RPGs on the PSN store. Sorry for the confusion! ❤️
Ive never bought any of their games, but now that you brought this to my attention I never will! I don’t know about other people on this sub, but I had never heard of any of these controversies or horrendously racist shit they do until now. Thank you, OP for making me aware of this. I agree with you, a company that does this doesn’t deserve our attention or money.
To be honest: I dont like Genshin Impact and so I dont care to play it. As with all free to play games.
So me boycotting the game is not going to be any different because I don’t play either way.
As for all free to play games: if you play the game normally (dont spend money or little money), you’re not their target audience. Their income comes from their “whale” fanbase: people who spend thousands upon thousands on the game.
They’re addicted: so they’re also not the audience who is going to care. And to be honest if I have to list one reason why I don’t play free to play: it is going to be the “whale hunting one” rather than any problem with representation .
Well, I’m glad I never played this game. But the racism/colorism (or lack of diverse characters) in East Asian made games isn’t even surprising anymore.
This is terrible! Thank you for sharing.
I’ve never played Genshin Impact and now I never will. Thanks for speaking up.
i don’t play genshin, so can’t really comment from a position of authority. but when i read about these issues they seem really blown out of proportion compared to the median game dev.
i’m 34 years old and a lesbian. growing up, i almost never had representation as a woman; and outside of incredibly tiny (and gross) sections of the game space never had representation as a lesbian either. yet i still played games; my love of the media transcended the lack of personal representation.
today, i have lots more representation as a woman (not so much as a lesbian). in fact, i have lots of representation _from hoyoverse games_. so the situation is very different now, and of course i still love games (even more).
i am all for people wanting this representation for themselves, and i do what i reasonably can to support it. but, to put it very bluntly, lack of _my own_ representation couldn’t stop me from playing games. lack of _other people_ being represented can’t possibly either, if that didn’t.
not to mention, as a 34 year old i’ve seen plenty of boycotts and protests and petitions or whatever. nothing meaningfully changes how massive companies with mass appeal do things other than “oh hey this group would buy more of our stuff if we included them” (that’s why women generally have more representation now). so i’m like, fairly uninterested in depriving myself of media i love (remember, love enough to overcome my own lack of representation) for what i perceive to be no real cause (because my self sacrifice will mean nothing).
I saw this post yesterday while in bed, and read it again today and… Well, I’m going to preface this by saying I’m not a person of color. I’m from Germany, and live in a relatively rural area so I do not have much contact with people of color either. However, I was raised very clearly left and am of the opinion any form of bigotry is an absolute no go. And the more I inform myself / am in online contact with marginalized communities, the less I can respect in particular east asian games. They have a very big issue with racism and sexism, and personally I really dislike things like minors / “lolis” and honestly, ESPECIALLY maids. They’re rarely depicted as an honorable profession, but far too often call the player/MC master while being weirdly sexualized with big boobs or none sense move sets which would NEVER work IRL with their uniforms.
Also the point you made about hilichurls… It kind of clicked to me why I hate the connotation of darkness / black with evil. I know, I know, one could argue that humans are afraid of darkness, but frankly, it’s far too often all those aspects – dark color, tribal, polytheistic – are brought together to create an evil race. Even Zelda isn’t free from that, just look at the Koga I think the ninja-like race is called. I don’t know, I don’t play male characters and as such no Zelda.
Oddly enough, I have a weird view on sexism. I understand it and, as a trans woman, am not immune to it despite my lack of classic feminity. But I would also lie if I said I didn’t like “commonly” considered inappropriate designs. I absolutely love sword and sorcery, the genre that birthed Conan and Red Sonja, but I think it does kind of show what I am “okay” with: The clothing barely plays any role in universe. Sonja is feared as the she-devil, her enemies are deathly afraid of her, and in some iterations she runs around in a chainmail bikini. Conan is nicknamed the destroyer and has the same effect, but up until he is king, he barely wears more than a loincloth. And those clothing “styles” are kind of common in Hyboria (their world). I guess I would say I don’t mind those designs if it is commonplace and equally distributed in universe without being used in universe to demean someone… That being said, I’m well aware it is male gaze that birthed it. I guess I like the Power behind it.
That doesn’t excuse other settings though IMO. To not stray too far off topic, I’m going to refer to Genshin, which I used to play until I got fed up with new characters being consistently child like for a while, or at least it seemed to me like that at the time. I’m specifically thinking of Raiden Shogun and Zhongli, two of the major characters, in equal power standing, or at least similar I guess. Considering their role. Zhongli, a man, is dressed in a fine suit. Raiden, a woman, has a very sexualized Kimono for clothes. I’m not a fan of that. Female characters are also often referred to as pretty in-game and I seem to remember at least one side quest asking to court one of them for a nameless guy. Though that last part could be conflated with another game I stopped around the same time.
In the end, I completely agree. A very well written post, and even though I do not claim to understand one part of the criticism from personal experience, I absolutely agree it is a huge issue and while I don’t want to judge people for playing it (I’m a trans woman and understand why my cis partner plays Hogwarts Legacy), I still think criticism is necessary and flaws need to be recognized. No game or games community is perfect, but there’s something to be said about ignoring issues, obvious or pointed at by someone affected.
I genuinely don’t get how people can ignore so much grossness and nonsense to play these games.
I don’t trust MiHoYo with my data at all. I haven’t touched one of those games basically ever haha. They also REEKED of “you can only win if you’re a whale”, and I’m just not interested in being pressured to spend stupid amounts of money on it.
This is just icing on the nasty cake that is those games. Definitely never going to play them.
As someone who played Genshin daily for ~3 years up until Fontaine and hit the obligatory AR60, HOYO makes a lot of design choices that I’ve been side-eyeing so I’m not really surprised to learn about the racist lamp or that Honkai would design a black woman badly. It’s pretty disappointing. All I can offer is that it’s possible the stereotypes about black women in China might not match the stereotypes in the western world exactly. To be honest, despite being an American, I had to read through the comments to understand why Carole’s mother’s design was concerning. It wasn’t a stereotype that I knew off the top of my head, so I needed a little more context to confirm.
It is pretty sad to see Carole be insecure about her skin color, especially as she’s likely biracial. Asia still has quite the complex about it, and as a kid I was dressed in long sleeves and sunblock as much as possible because my own mother didn’t want me to tan.
I’ve quit Genshin and won’t be picking up more HOYO games. I think HOYO doesn’t catch more flak on here because they haven’t had major scandals, and compared to other waifu gachas, they have much more mainstream appeal. Meaning they’re not as obnoxious about the sexualization as Nikke or Azur Lane. That’s still kind of a race to the bottom, but the oversexualization in other gacha games continue to make Genshin and HOYO games look better by comparison. I personally am not fond of them, especially since it trends against finally getting much better depictions of girls and woman in games like Horizon Zero Dawn and The Last of Us.
I also agree about the general handling of darker-skinned characters by HOYO. In Genshin, it sucks that both the Sumeru and Natlan look to hardly have any such characters. Cyno, Dehya, and Candace are barely more tan than the Mondstadt cast, and having just 3 tanned characters among the collectible cast of the very Egypt-inspired region is a really disappointing design choice by HOYO. Makes sense they’d do the same with Natlan. HOYO really isn’t run by very progressive people, and I doubt they’ll ever be very swayed towards more thoughtfulness in their design choices as long as they make most of their money out of Asia. But at the same time, it’s really difficult to convince people to boycott something unless it’s extremely egregious. It’s easier and maybe more satisfying to support indie companies that are more aligned with your values. Not disagreeing, just lamenting that Genshin / HOYO continues to have a chokehold on many of my friends who still play, so the games regularly come up on conversation.
ive never seen anything from this game so im glad you could bring this to my intention. WOW is that fucked…
I mean. I was boycotting them for being lootboxy cashgrab games. Glad I never caved to the trend.
Control sometimes is on for $4