So I like Genshin.
That's it. That's the bit.
No but fr I wouldn't really describe myself as a gamer, I played with my dad, brothers and friends A LOT growing up and I do adore and buy new releases of like 5 or 6 franchises every time they come out but I don't just buy new games anymore really if i dont have that already connection. There was a time in uni id buy story ones to just complete and dissociate to. 
that time has passed.
But like I ended up playing genshin for a bit during covid and just fell in love.
I thought I'd hate it cos I'd seen how horny and gross the fanbase could be and some of the outfits and jiggle physics ๐๐๐ i mean all the outfits are beautiful and I'd absolutely wear them but like omg who's fighting gods in heels with no support RAIDEN?!
but like what I think what hooked me was the fact that outside of their aesthetic design, all of the women were written great.
Not like feminist icons to stand out (lmao they absolutely do cos the blatantly male lead staff have a bias towards the female characters) but just how they are written as people.
I can't quite put it to words in how it's different from a jrpg but like when I've played jrpgs in the past I feel both ashamed of my body and an object as the opposite/foil to all the usually positive traits male protagonists get given.
In genshin I just feel bad about my body!! Yey!!! ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ
I'm not making sense maybe. Genshin women feel like people. In terms of their characterisation they are people with motivations, not women with motivations if that makes sense?
When Jrpgs do it they get close but then BAMN the writers could not make some sexist reference or comment or characterisation. And it reduces us back to "women" vs a person who is a woman.
Actually that said there's like a few character that fancy the MC. What's funny is because I'm playing as Lumine, for me Genshin characters (ayaka who you dancing for girl? I fell for childe like an entire chapter ago, im locked up) who have flirted with me now makes my teyvat wholy sapphic and I love that.
So yeah it's not feminist by any stretch but it's also not sexist (relative to comparable games) in how it depicts women. It's genuinely been a pleasure to play the story as it's just powerful female character after powerful female character AND it feels like I'm just playing a life bite anime sometimes and that's so fun.
I dunno nobody feels like they are written as an object for men either or as a women to just push the male characters along. Instead women are written as real characters and that's so refreshing.
And then like furina, the whole ptsd plot hit hard. She's my favourite and nobody else is allowed to like her now (as well as siegwinne, mualani and citlali. Sorry not sorry)
I dunno, feels like in the west and Japan even when writers try to write strong women or just not be sexist they end up condescending us somehow. Here's genshin that I seriously doubt set out to do anything for women and did a way better job by accident.
If we ignore the aesthetic design and jiggle physics, WHICH I CANT AAAAAAAAAAAA THEY ARE SO BAD SOMETIMES.
But like yeah I dunno, it's weird that I'm seeing better written female characters in a gooner gacha mill and outside of a few romantically leaning scenes (childe ๐) when I'm playing everyone's just a person. Not a man or woman but just a person and imo I think that's why I personally got so attached to all of the characters and their little stories and motivations.
Also melusines, the melusines are the best bit and they are so cute and precious and I love them and my bf says I like them because I'm similar in my manorisms but that's stupid because they are so adorable and I'm not so narcissistic (I hope) and they have this big back story about how they were discriminated against and they get they're rights eventually and become beloved by the fontanian citizens and it is a legal decree to use she/her pronouns for them instead of it and that's super cute and I feel so happy for them and aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa snxkdkfmelcnskwmdmekxjenxnend3mdms
Can we have some melusine emojii gif things please ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ
Edit: tbh childe is just the meme, it's all about our sensitive soft boy neuvillette and bad boy wriothsley ๐
I don't think it was "by accident". Maybe Mihoyo staff were not principled "feminists" by western standards but GI was always meant to be a much more mainstream and casual game.
At the time HI3rd was already going towards this grand scale melodrama route too, though I never played that, HI3rd's world building and plot is far from hentai slop or whatever you may think given the game.
Even in 1.0 there is absolutely nothing risque about it. The moral outrage over Klee is just absolutely dumb in reality when you actualy go to all conventions back in the day and you see children and adults cosplaying her. The most controversial part of 1.x is maybe that one Barbara fan guy who gives JP idol otaku stalker vibe. Hoyo definitely didn't realize people wouldn't get the "joke" there.
As someone that been playing since mid 1.X wrt to the writing. Enjoyment of the writing is somewhat related with how invested you are in the world building and the lore. I've seen people describe Genshin as an "archeology" type game and its quite apt.
A lot of information is not given to you unless you actively seek out e.g all the artifact descriptions, the huge book library, many key world quests etc.
They do a good job on the main quest for casuals, but its gotten to a point now the lore bombs are kind of reliant on that extra information. This matters a lot for characterization sometimes e.g Nahida's characterization depends a lot on her story quest while the final parts of Fontaine AQ give you most of what Furina's character is all about.
I hope not to spoil much but Furina's characterization is far more meaningful given Egeria's plot, its not just about her, but a "woman" in a position of power effectively made a grand master plan to subvert Heaven.
Likewise Nahida is like more than half about Rukkhadevata's sacrifice.
If you're lazy you don't need to necessarily do all this search yourself though, I really recommend Ashikai's videos to understand what the writers are going for. Sometimes its not even that easy or obvious even with the context given some of the creative writing and unreliable narrators.
Anyway point being I don't think it is by coincidence, I'm sure you played the Freminet event? Thelxie's Fantastic Adventures They don't go out of their way to write a story like that without being competent and knowing what they're doing realy. Some events are remarkable yet forgotten e.g Fischl's summer castle event. Her entire character is a huge magnet for conspiracies and giga brain theories and its great.
I wont talk about literaly everyone but I don't think there is any character realy done dirty but the writers at all. Maybe Kokomi is the worst failed potential, some of the old cast is forgotten or stereotypes(Kuki, Amber, Barbara etc). I'd almost excuse it given the team needs to keep looking forward to new characters so there is pressure getting it right on the first impression. I think ultimately this is their biggest flaw. The infinitely expanding lore and cast makes it impossible to give everyone equal attention.
I'm all up to date with furina , focalors, egeria etc she my favourite after all durrrrrrr and the backstory with egeria and the sea of bygone eras was sooooo good I love it so much!!
What did you think for the lore that got added with Ochkanatlan? I love reading the lore and watching it all together. Especially now we are getting mention of the shining shades of the heavenly principles in the main plot and it's like aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
I watch minslief mostly but ill give them a look!
I replied back to this more fully but it didn't send and I cannot be typing out all that again lmao.
I'm behind I only done up to 5.1 I'm procrastinating until the end of the patch to touch the new areas due to the other games ZZZ 1.4 soon. Ashikai does a lot of theory stuff and she streams sometimes so I love long form content like that, its crazy to notice how much real world history stuff they reference etc. Its a bit sad the vast majority don't get it except through the AQ though.
Yeah I was remembering Fontaine's AQ and its wild one of the best moments was the oceanid "girls" telling Vasher or whatever his name to go fuck himself lol. I think a lot of similar anime/male oriented media would not have gone that way lol probably it would have been "awww so cute the serial killer loves us so much, we have no choice but to become his harem!" nope.
I'm on 100% map completion across natlan so far ๐ช easier than redoing areas (I'm sorry liyue your chests are so hard to find ๐ญ๐ญ)
Just means you get to binge the AQ interlude and wrap up!
I'll have to give them a listen as they seem to so way more stuff to listen to which is what I want vs shorter minsleif stuff.
Aaaaaa miyabi I'm so excited!!! I got my boy Lighter and I just adore him. Such a goofy guy but also just so cool ๐
What's your team? My main team is Jane (who's my fav character aaaa i want to be her), Lighter or Qingyi and Burnice with the Baddieboo cos he's so cute.
Mmmmm!!
Omg one of the all round best moments of the plot, I was kinda disgusted to hear him doing that and then trying to spin a sob story so when he just got ripped to pieces by the oceanids it was like "holy shit fontiane keeping winning" it's sooo fucking cool. More writing like that in media please. Fr if it had been anywhere in the west it would have been a sympathy call to empathise with a dude who just slaughtered women as objects for his own desires and it's like erghhhhh.
Amber.