How did Honkai: Star Rail draw from Genshin Impact to succeed?

Recent revelations have shown that Honkai: Star Rail is a major success for miHoYo, but it has also led many Genshin Impact players to leave the game. The time spent by players in the world of Teyvat has significantly decreased as they are busy traveling through space on Himeko's train.

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The History of miHoYo

Founded in 2011, miHoYo is a game developer with two primary goals. First, they aim to create anime-style games with characters that embody the perfect 'moe' aesthetic, fostering deep emotional connections between players and virtual characters. Second, miHoYo continuously strives for technical advancement, developing increasingly complex games. With Genshin Impact, miHoYo has successfully pursued both objectives.

The first game released by this publisher is Fly Me 2 the Moon, launched in 2011 with simplistic 2D graphics and gameplay that can be experienced with just a single button. Following that are Zombiegal Kawaii and Guns GirlZ, both 2D but with increasingly complex gameplay. In 2016, they introduced Honkai Impact 3rd, a real-time action game with deep gameplay systems, achieving initial success.

, một tựa game hành động thời gian thực sở hữu hệ thống gameplay sâu sắc, giành được những thành công bước đầu.

However, it wasn't until 2020 that miHoYo truly soared. They brought forth Genshin Impact, a game that only today's flagships can maintain at a steady 60 FPS. This continues miHoYo's remarkable journey as they deliver gamers a vast open world with stunning 3D graphics. Genshin Impact even features unique gameplay with depth previously unseen in the gaming world.

With Honkai: Star Rail, miHoYo once again showcases innovation in technology by integrating AI into their game development process. Although miHoYo mentions that AI is used in a limited capacity for 'some NPC behaviors,' resembling more of an experimental step rather than a groundbreaking innovation, at least the company is striving to push its boundaries.

Honkai: Star Rail, a daring step forward

Different from HI3 or Genshin Impact, the latest game by miHoYo is not a real-time action but a turn-based role-playing game. This is a genre the company has never ventured into before, indicating an expansion of their target audience. It's akin to miHoYo's reason for launching the card battle game Tears of Themis in 2021, targeting anime-loving gamers, which has been successful so far.

miHoYo themselves confirmed: 'Honkai: Star Rail is a new game for everyone.' However, as mentioned by Mytour earlier, miHoYo has never made turn-based action games in its history. All their previous games have been real-time combat with heavy action elements. The turn-based genre is also fiercely competitive, with formidable rivals such as Fate/Grand Order, a game consistently topping app store revenue charts.

Perhaps it's for this reason that miHoYo has borrowed extensively from HI3, more so than Genshin Impact. Those who have played miHoYo's first action game can recognize familiar characters appearing in Honkai: Star Rail like Cocolia, Carole, Otto, Kafka, Welt, Sushang, Natasha, Bronya (actually, there are 2 versions: Silverwing and Haxxor Bunny), Himeko, Seele.

This list will expand in the future as characters like (Yae) Sakura, Raiden Mei, and many others are gradually introduced. This move is a kind of insurance for miHoYo, as at the very least, it can attract back players who once enjoyed Honkai: Star Rail to meet their favorite characters.

Up until now, we can confidently say that miHoYo has achieved tremendous success with Honkai: Star Rail. This game has brought them approximately 1 billion USD in just a few months, even reviving the revenue chart of turn-based genre on mobile. On its release day alone, the game was downloaded around 17 million times, an incredibly impressive feat for a turn-based game. Many of these players are undoubtedly Genshin Impact enthusiasts curious about miHoYo's new offering.

And the price to pay

However, the launch of Honkai: Star Rail reveals a 'crack' in miHoYo's business strategy. Despite this developer opting for a completely different game genre (turn-based RPG) instead of action-packed ones like HI3 and Genshin Impact, initial revenue estimates indicate that Honkai: Star Rail is 'siphoning' off Genshin Impact to thrive. Unlike Tears of Themis targeting female gamers less inclined towards action games, Honkai: Star Rail remains a game primarily for males, with a similar anime graphic style, causing a 'wound' to its sibling.

With the arrival of Honkai: Star Rail, the time players spend on Genshin Impact has decreased by approximately 20-34%, according to some estimates. There are also reports that miHoYo's CEO, Dawei, has expressed dissatisfaction as the company's flagship game no longer generates the expected revenue despite the development team expanding to 1,000 members. This can also be attributed to the lack of truly enticing new content in Genshin Impact over the past year for male players, with too few new 5-star female characters and disappointing 4-star characters.

Zenless Zone Zero, miHoYo's upcoming game, is likely to further solidify this trend. Unlike Honkai: Star Rail, which at least avoids the open-world action genre, ZZZ will be an open-world action game set in an urban environment – something that Mytour doesn't think will bring much differentiation. It's highly possible that we'll see a large number of players who have played Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail switch to ZZZ, once again 'siphoning' off their predecessors.

Zenless Zone Zero isn't even the only game miHoYo is developing. According to what Mytour knows, miHoYo Montreal studio is developing a shooter + action + adventure game set in an 'unusual world'. We've also heard various names like Project X, Kochell Frontline popping up in miHoYo-related news, though it's hard to say which games are still existing and which ones have been canceled.

Conclusion

Thus, it can be said that miHoYo's products will 'step on each other's toes' many times in the future. This is inevitable as their games, whether few or many, are quite similar and target anime-manga-loving gamers. Hopefully, this developer will find the best way to bring success to their games and provide gamers with increasingly new joys.