Welcome to Genshin Impact, a game that is, in my opinion, all work, no play.

Genshin Impact's primary setting is the world and continent of Teyvat, a continent made up of seven nations governed by seven Archons who all have a unique relationship with their nation. In this game you play as one of two siblings, Aether or Lumine who're ambushed by an Unknown God who splits the two of you apart, starting your journey to find your sibling.

Lemme start by saying that I don't hate this game, I just also don't feel anything particularly special towards it. This game does have things going for it, such as the characters, their interactions and the amazing artwork that the game has. It is very clear that the developers love this game and are trying to craft something genuinely enjoyable, I just have my own personal gripes with this game.

My main and biggest gripe of all being grinding. This is what I mean by all work no play. When you're not doing the story content and the mostly boring and repetitive events, you're grinding for your characters. Grinding materials to level them up, increase their max level, increase their talents, getting them artifacts to boost their stats and levelling up their weapons. To do so, you'll be doing the same repetitive domains over and over again until you have what you need. When you've fought a boss so much in a short amount of time, any impact that boss had is eventually lost completely.

I remember being amazing when I first discovered the Hypostasis or the Regisvines, but the more you grind, these otherwise cool bosses feel more like roadblocks between you and that Level 90 Wolf's Gravestone you've been working on.

It's because of this that the game starts to feel more like a chore than a game, sometimes logging onto the game JUST to grind. It upsets me because I do have an interest in the world and story, I do like the characters, but I cannot tolerate how tedious building characters in this game feels.

I hope years down the line when the game has an actual conclusion and the devs work on more side content to expand the game that it's made more fun or that grinding becomes less of a problem, but honestly, I don't see that happening.

Meh...
3D models are terrifying, plot is too long and complicated, the game itself is really difficult, very boring, the only good thing are some of the characters, but only a few... Also, literally copied Breath of the Wild and for some reason became more popular...? Everybody talking about this poorly made gacha, when BotW is right there... And don't get me started on the character designs-

On the other side, the map is really big and wonderful. It would be great to explore it if only the graphics and 3D models were decent enough. If only. I still play it sometimes to see my favourite places or characters- even though I close it right after.

I remember having a lot of fun with this game when it first came out. The environments and world design are legitimately well-designed and are fun to look at and explore. Even though it does copy BOTW in many areas, I still enjoyed this take on it. I love the idea of each land being based on a different element. The towns are genuinely so cute and comforting too, like the castle area in Mondstadt is such a vibe. It's so nice and comforting.

The characters aren't bad either. I enjoyed the design for most of them, and I think they're very well detailed. Their personalities and dialogue are solid as well. I feel like I'm the only person who actually liked Paimon (I like that they had her do the Q&A sessions as well).

The combat is pretty fun as well. Combining different characters' attacks to create these elemental combos is a neat mechanic and makes the combat fairly enjoyable. There is a nice level of detail to their abilities as well. The only one I can remember is Kaeya being able to freeze water and walk across it, but I always thought that was cool.

The lore is intriguing, but I remember that there wasn't too much emphasis on it, so I've forgotten most of it by now.

However, there are a few things that are holding this game back.

First of all, the gacha system. I admit that I have enjoyed gacha games in the past (I was hooked on Dokkan battle for like 2 years) but having a gacha system for a console game just rubs me the wrong way. I've met people who have spent HUNDREDS of dollars on this game, and I don't feel like this game warrants that kind of commitment. Additionally, once you reach a certain point, the game just becomes a grind fest, which in my opinion does this game a disservice, because there is a lot of potential here. I'm happy that I stopped playing before I reached that point.

Also, I don't remember much of the specifics, but the adventure rank system also rubbed me the wrong way. You have to reach like level 10 or 20 before you can truly unlock everything, which again I feel hinders this game. There are some side quests that are apparently locked behind certain adventure ranks and again, I don't like that. I run into all these characters so often and they talk like they're going to give me a quest and then I can't do it? And there's no way the quests are worth grinding out a ton of levels for, just give me the content before I get bored. The characters are kind of interesting too, but if I have to wait until I'm a certain level to do stuff with them I'm probably going to forget.

The skill trees and other upgrades are pretty wild too. Artistically though, I do like the concept of the whole constellation thing. However, it perpetuates the grind. It's very difficult to upgrade these skill trees and I feel like the game isn't fun enough to warrant all this red tape. LET ME GET TO THE GOOD PART, or at least throw me a bone every now and then so that I don't feel hopeless.

This game is primarily a level-based, gacha grindfest instead of an immersive, freedom-based open world adventure, which is what I feel the game should be and is much better suited for. Take for example the characters. There are a lot of these sample dialogues that you can have with them where they talk about their life, or what they're doing, and sometimes even propose activities with you. Like, Amber asks you if you want to go for a jog or Ningguang asks you if you want to accompany her for some tea. Like, these all sound really fun and the game does not allow you to do any of them. I think this game would be a lot more fun if it were more character focused. I get that there are conversations and cutscenes with certain characters, which I do appreciate, but while I was playing I couldn't shake the feeling that I was playing a game that wanted to be something else, and I really wished it was. Like, you're going to put so much effort into creating these interesting and kind of charming characters, and then lock like 85% of that away in menus and soulless dialogue chains? LET ME HAVE FUN WITH THESE CHARACTERS. I just want to hang out with everyone :(

Also, I saw so many cute cats AND I COULDNT PET THEM. Idk if they've fixed that since. If they have, I'll consider giving this game an extra half star.

I genuinely think this game has the potential to be amazing but it's just the wrong kind of game. However, I will say that I quit before I really got into the gacha grindfest part of it, so I'm kind of happy where I left off, because all things considered I had pretty good memories of it.

Even though the game is probably cooked at this point, there is still hope for Genshin. They announced that it was getting an anime a couple years ago, and I'm pretty optimistic about it. Like I said, I enjoyed the world and the characters, so I think the anime could be pretty good. It's also being animated by ufotable so that's awesome. Looking forward to when that comes out though.