If I made crazy money I would but naw I'm good with just C0 R0 for now.
After blowing reserves on Arle I was wiped
Ive been putting singles into the scam banner not expecting to get the weapon
Against all odds, getting close to pity, I got Arle's weapon
My next goal is another Con for Furina
I have no expectations of making it and if I cant Ill probably gun for Navia, who I skipped
If Xiphos Moonlight ever shows up again Im cancelling all plans and pulling for as many as I can
Ive been putting singles into the scam banner not expecting to get the weapon
Against all odds, getting close to pity, I got Arle's weapon
My next goal is another Con for Furina
I have no expectations of making it and if I cant Ill probably gun for Navia, who I skipped
If Xiphos Moonlight ever shows up again Im cancelling all plans and pulling for as many as I can
If I were to hate one thing about Arlecchino is that she's totally power crept my Yoimiya (who's C1 with TP)
OP
OP
Hmm... Now I do wanna know what that "visual upgrade" will be...
It must be something significant if every platform below PS5 and PC will take a hit in resolution and object detail for it.
I wonder what they would upgrade after the different upgrades that they have already introduced (soft shadows, global illumination, volumetric clouds and mist, tesselation on character models...). All those were just additions on PS5 and PC that did not affect other platforms' versions.
I've read that some expect raytracing. I doubt that's the case. I'm not sure that kind of reflections, lighting, shadowing etc. would even fit Genshin's anime style. It's also not doable on PS4 and mobiles, and those will obviously make use of the visual upgrades too. Otherwise they wouldn't see downgrades in resolution and object detail for it.
Some other ideas that come to mind:
- new cloud system
They've experimented with volumetric clouds, fog and mist, and in Fontaine they introduced completely different looking clouds than in the rest of the world. When watching Wuthering Waves and Azur Promilia footage I noticed how much nicer the clouds look in those games than in Genshin.
- improved water shaders
I noticed those look nicer in newer games like the ones mentioned above too. Before Genshin released it actually had some really beautiful specular sun reflection effects on water, which were removed in the final game version. Maybe something like that returns?
- improved grass
Grass blades look a bit too big and crude. If they were finer, they would probably look much nicer and closer to the painted anime backgrounds Genshin tries to emulate.
Games that looked so much nicer just alone with upgraded grass blades were Horizon Forbidden West (compared to Zero Dawn) and The Witcher 3 Next Gen (compared to the last gen version).
- general polygon upgrade or tesselation of the environments
The characters already saw a polygon boost, maybe the environments are next. Especially Mondstadt and early Liyue areas have some really low polygon environment meshes. There are so many angular rocks, trees, tables, mugs, plates... You can tell those asstes were made for mobile phones from before 2020.
Environment assets have already much improved in newer areas, but maybe they want to take it up another notch, and hopefully Liyue and Mondstadt would see an upgrade too. Maybe this is the environment detail upgrade we've been longing for in Mondstadt?
They want Mondstadt to look nice, right? It's the very first nation where new players are dropped off. I assume Hoyoverse wants it to look just as good as newer areas those players would only reach later, and from the get go just as good as games like Wuthering Waves and Azur Promilia.
There's more that comes to mind, but I'd be writing all those down forever. So I'll keep it at those. ;)
What do you think these visual upgrades could realistically be?
Hey, I've got another idea:
Maybe they upgrade their version of Unity. Or maybe...no, they wouldn't/couldn't possibly switch to another engine entirely. O:
It must be something significant if every platform below PS5 and PC will take a hit in resolution and object detail for it.
I wonder what they would upgrade after the different upgrades that they have already introduced (soft shadows, global illumination, volumetric clouds and mist, tesselation on character models...). All those were just additions on PS5 and PC that did not affect other platforms' versions.
I've read that some expect raytracing. I doubt that's the case. I'm not sure that kind of reflections, lighting, shadowing etc. would even fit Genshin's anime style. It's also not doable on PS4 and mobiles, and those will obviously make use of the visual upgrades too. Otherwise they wouldn't see downgrades in resolution and object detail for it.
Some other ideas that come to mind:
- new cloud system
They've experimented with volumetric clouds, fog and mist, and in Fontaine they introduced completely different looking clouds than in the rest of the world. When watching Wuthering Waves and Azur Promilia footage I noticed how much nicer the clouds look in those games than in Genshin.
- improved water shaders
I noticed those look nicer in newer games like the ones mentioned above too. Before Genshin released it actually had some really beautiful specular sun reflection effects on water, which were removed in the final game version. Maybe something like that returns?
- improved grass
Grass blades look a bit too big and crude. If they were finer, they would probably look much nicer and closer to the painted anime backgrounds Genshin tries to emulate.
Games that looked so much nicer just alone with upgraded grass blades were Horizon Forbidden West (compared to Zero Dawn) and The Witcher 3 Next Gen (compared to the last gen version).
- general polygon upgrade or tesselation of the environments
The characters already saw a polygon boost, maybe the environments are next. Especially Mondstadt and early Liyue areas have some really low polygon environment meshes. There are so many angular rocks, trees, tables, mugs, plates... You can tell those asstes were made for mobile phones from before 2020.
Environment assets have already much improved in newer areas, but maybe they want to take it up another notch, and hopefully Liyue and Mondstadt would see an upgrade too. Maybe this is the environment detail upgrade we've been longing for in Mondstadt?
They want Mondstadt to look nice, right? It's the very first nation where new players are dropped off. I assume Hoyoverse wants it to look just as good as newer areas those players would only reach later, and from the get go just as good as games like Wuthering Waves and Azur Promilia.
There's more that comes to mind, but I'd be writing all those down forever. So I'll keep it at those. ;)
What do you think these visual upgrades could realistically be?
Hey, I've got another idea:
Maybe they upgrade their version of Unity. Or maybe...no, they wouldn't/couldn't possibly switch to another engine entirely. O:
Last edited:
OP
OP
I could totally see that happen. I fear Hoyoverse doesn't care much about stable framerates in general.
I also worry that upgrading the overall graphics would lead to new bugs and errors arising, especially on Playstation, and there they tend to leave those kind of bugs unaddressed for years or even indefinitely.
At this point I am more worried than excited.
Another thing I worry about with every new patch on PS5 is them removing the option to supersample the 4K image. They did at one point remove the option in the PS4 Pro version, and they had it missing in Honkai Star Rail from the beginning on in the PS5 version.
It doesn't seem that unlikely that they also remove the option after a bigger graphical update in Genshin's PS5 version. :(
Last edited:
Clorinde is a skip, I have C3 Raiden!
View: https://youtu.be/UF-0O0Nv-z0?si=bNHItZ8WKnA_j39w
Chevreuse is C1 here.
Yeah, it's like a Neuvilette situation lol.
View: https://youtu.be/UF-0O0Nv-z0?si=bNHItZ8WKnA_j39w
Chevreuse is C1 here.
Yeah, it's like a Neuvilette situation lol.
This is a cruel thing to do to a man who would probably consider water from Natlan to be spicy
$1100 on Xianyun C6R1
$300 for C2R1 Furina
$1000 for Zhongli C6
$1200 for Raiden C6R5
$2000 over two banners for Yelan C6R5
$300 for Kazuha C3
$0 for Nahida C2R1
$0 Hu Tao C3R1
$0 Albedo C1
These are the 8 main units I use in Abyss, have been using them for years now. Albedo is somtimes substituted by Xingqiu, depends on how I'm feeling. Before Furina, Xianyun and Nahida I was using Bennett + Kazuha + Sara (or Fischl) stuff with Raiden (and at the very beginning it was Diluc and Sucrose).
$100 Ganyu C1 (honestly the only one I felt was wasted)
Don't think I spent money on any other characters, at least, not that I can remember.
For Honkai, I was spending about $300 every month or every other month for a while to get all their gear and S0 (sometimes more if I wanted to get the unit to SS or S2). I dropped it after the end of the Main Story (basically before the Mars arc began - last character I spent money on was Herrscher of Rebirth).
$1100 on Nikke (dropped)
$6000 on Last Cloudia (also dropped)
$500 on Astra Knights of Veda (dropped)
$400 on Guardian Tales (dropped)
$1000 on Arknights (still playing)
$200 AFK Arena (dropped)
$200 Neural Cloud (dropped)
$50 Path to Nowhere (dropped)
$500 Limbus Company (still playing)
There's probably others but I can't recall.
Last edited:
I'm afraid. That's... a lot of cash.
I'm petrified. That's a whole-ass house.
Last edited:
I set aside money every month for different things. Some for investment, some for games, some for travel, food, etc. I give myself carte blanche to spend that money in the way I assign it. Oftentimes the gaming budget will go largely unused or spill over, but I just let each one grow rather than trying to move things around. Sometimes that money goes to gacha games, other times it goes to regular games, other times it just sits there. Even now I still have a lot of my gaming budget unused.
Maybe for a point of reference. I also paid off $300,000 of student loans over these past 5 years.
I took a trip to Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, and went to multiple game and anime expos across the US.
I was making about $25k a year teaching in college, and after graduating I went into the private sector and made... well, a lot more, as you can tell. Even when I was only making $25k I was still fine and still traveled pretty regularly. That said, my spending was more restricted, and I spent money much more cautiously, but I still used the same basic principles and got on alright.
Also, single and living with two roommates, so a lot less cost on that end as well. We collectively own a house.
I apologize if I worried you Beyond Finality but I promise you I'm doing just fine.
Last edited:
Paying your six figure student loans off in 5 years is impressive, more so while you travel across the globe in the mean time.
It is really freeing to pay those loans off. I still find it insane that the government was willing to loan me so much money with so little actual information or oversight (especially to an eighteen year old!). I'm more angry at them than just about any other institution.
If there's something I'd like to change in this country, it would first be our healthcare system, and then student loans would be a close second.
Anyway... I apologize, I didn't mean to stir all this up. I guess this is why it's best not to talk about it. I'm also not trying to pretend it's not a lot of money, it absolutely is. Even as a person who has spent that amount, I'd still always tell people to never spend (for whatever that's worth coming from a whale). I don't recommend gacha games to anyone because even I see them as predatory, but I also don't regret what I do spend, because I allot myself a budget and stick to it.
Last edited:
…of gold? :p
Glad you shared what you spent. It's refreshing to get a perspective from a "whale". Don't feel like you derailed anything.
People will react when they see thousands being spend on a video game that they may spend only 5-15 a month on or maybe a couple hundred here and there.
It's all relative, and as you've stated, you're being responsible with your finances, so you shouldn't feel any shame cuz you have some mora disposable income than most. It's just they way the capitalistic world works.
I just finished the event story and wow I loved it so much!
Paimon and Ito's rock battle was awesome, I laughed so hard. And the conversation between Gorou and Kokomi was so interesting. And last of all, I did not expect to see Ei and Yae Miko at the end. It's the first time I have seen them outside Ei's story quests, I loved it!
I find Ei really interesting, I HATED her during the story quest and thought she was an evil villain and her story quests, her gameplay and voice lines and now actually this instance of her insisting her subjects should never be made to suffer again really shows a lot of character growth, I love it.
Paimon and Ito's rock battle was awesome, I laughed so hard. And the conversation between Gorou and Kokomi was so interesting. And last of all, I did not expect to see Ei and Yae Miko at the end. It's the first time I have seen them outside Ei's story quests, I loved it!
I find Ei really interesting, I HATED her during the story quest and thought she was an evil villain and her story quests, her gameplay and voice lines and now actually this instance of her insisting her subjects should never be made to suffer again really shows a lot of character growth, I love it.
View: https://youtu.be/l1oieaaI1sc?t=332
Inazuma Shines Eternal if normal opponent dares to beat Ei lol.
Thanks for posting that! I never play the card game so I was not aware that the competitions had so much story in it, damn. I will need to start playing it I guess and will watch the old tournament cutscenes on Youtube.
OP
OP
I've proven to be a worthy Worthy Wolf! :D
I achieved 3825 points on hard with Duke Rizzleton's theme. You might think this isn't very impressive at all...well, it is if you've seen how absolutely terrible I've been in earlier themes, lol.
I achieved 3825 points on hard with Duke Rizzleton's theme. You might think this isn't very impressive at all...well, it is if you've seen how absolutely terrible I've been in earlier themes, lol.
The Card game is fairly fun now that the speed up version is an option. Make sure to enable it in the card game settings menu to speed up battles a bit.
I have every character released so far, and their Dynamic Skin, so it'll take a long time to do that if you only play it 2-4 times a week. Another "mini game" aspect is getting each character card to "Level 10" to get their Talent Card to unlock the Dynamic version. It's not necessary, but doing it gives you a long form crash course on how each card works and how each character works so that you can ultimately settle on a team or two or three that are your go-to's when you want to get the matches over quickly.
Or, just keep skipping it to avoid the rabbit hole. :p
When I was between jobs last year, I played Genius Invokation TCG a lot on my phone besides doing the dailies lol. That was before the speed up settings and oh boy each AI rounds takes very long.
Did this with keyboard on PC. Missed one note sobs.
Did this with keyboard on PC. Missed one note sobs.
One thing I hope is real is the bigger focus on story - with the rumours suggesting they're going to pivot more heavily into that, perhaps at the expense of exploration.
I like the exploration but I do feel rather than adding more and more of it, they can probably leverage some areas they've already got a little better (hopefully giving older characters time to shine).
I'd sacrifice some new landmass to get new, meaty AQs in Mondstadt and Inazuma.
I like the exploration but I do feel rather than adding more and more of it, they can probably leverage some areas they've already got a little better (hopefully giving older characters time to shine).
I'd sacrifice some new landmass to get new, meaty AQs in Mondstadt and Inazuma.
OP
OP
I'm not sure I want that, depending on what that is supposed to actually mean. Exploration is what I love most about Genshin.
I did however enjoy how they brought together a cinematic kind of story telling with exploration in the recent Remuria quest. If that's what they'll be going more for then I'd welcome that. I thought Remuria was very enjoyable in both exploration, story and presentation...it was just a little short and the environments a little small. But it was "just" a sidequest, so...
my fingers will just not cooperate when im on my pc. probably because i never play them and just using my thumbs on mobile is easier for meWhen I was between jobs last year, I played Genius Invokation TCG a lot on my phone besides doing the dailies lol. That was before the speed up settings and oh boy each AI rounds takes very long.
Did this with keyboard on PC. Missed one note sobs.
I thought getting Arle would make me park Hu Tao, but I'm actually enjoying this team:
View: https://streamable.com/ab67br
View: https://streamable.com/ab67br
I still think Hu Tao has an awesome design, glad to see you are enjoying her. She does amazing damage. If I get her in the future I would probably play her with Xianyun though since I suck at dash cancelling. xD
C3 Raiden continues to put out jaw-dropping damage, good job! :D
Yeah I think this is it. Though less she forgot and more so that she doesn't need her anymore.
Are you newer to the thread? We did a "how much have you spent? And the rationale behind it" run a few OTs back and many people, especially the big spenders, were very honest about it. It was interesting to get their insight.
It's very interesting to read how you manage your money and where you're at in life. Thanks for sharing.
Fr. I haven't even paid of my £20k student loan yet lmao. Though student loans and university fees seem to work very differently here in the UK compared to the US. I could literally pay off the whole thing today, but it's actually more beneficial for me not to because the interest is so low.
oh damn. I will give this a try later today and report back!
I get it. I'm just more interested in that leak/rumour because it says data shows people want more story over exploration, or enough for them to weigh up reorienting the game at the least.
I think if you like exploration, you've been well serviced for years so I'd be intrigued to see what a slightly different approach would bring.
OP
OP
What data?
Great! Have fun! :3
Failure is not an option though. °____°
OP
OP
99.40%?
Hmm let me try again.
We might have to make you an Honorary Worthy Wolf!
I only bought three Welkin last year, and still feel bad about it lol.
About the new leak, I just hope exploration doesn't take a hit. Traversing a varied and interesting open world is part of Genshin's gameplay quality and more than half of the reason I'm still on board despite this game's monetization being everything I always avoided in games, good story is a bonus.
About the new leak, I just hope exploration doesn't take a hit. Traversing a varied and interesting open world is part of Genshin's gameplay quality and more than half of the reason I'm still on board despite this game's monetization being everything I always avoided in games, good story is a bonus.
OP
OP
This.
Genshin is the next best alternative to the gorgeous AAA open world JRPG that I always dreamed of. The gacha I begrudgingly bear because of that, because of the vast world and exploration that I don't get like that anywhere else in JRPGs at the moment.
I don't trust that leak much anyway. It sounds a lot like the usual very vague guesswork (that is also hard to prove wrong in the end) of leakers that have run out of content to leak, but still have the community breathing down their neck, wanting more and more info, particularly of Natlan.
It's hilarious how some of them seem to imply that they have access to concept arts of future content, but since last year they don't ever go beyond vagueposting like this.
Either they are being monitored 24/7, or they're full of BS. I'm inclined to think the latter is more likely.
View: https://twitter.com/Minty_Chu/status/1789635719633265017?t=0nB7_Ijzr1qwI0s3ewF9Dw&s=19
And yeah still no Garcia
Last edited:
Exploration is Genshin's strongest point - imo. If they do away with it, I'll probably clock out. I really don't care about the story in this game, in fact, not being able to skip them wall-o-text dialog boxes still hurts me to this day.
Pivoting from exploration to story would be horrible for me.
Pivoting from exploration to story would be horrible for me.
Last edited:
I like the story, and I'm glad they're getting better and better at it. But ultimately, I just like spending hours in a giant 3D theme park with things to collect, puzzles to solve and camps of enemies to fight.
I don't think story and exploration are antonyms. They can both coexist in the game. You can have quests opening up new areas and expanding the already gargantuan maps, just as they've been doing since Sumeru – which has been unfairly maligned imo. The Great Red Sand exploration with Jeht's quests is still peak Genshin for me, and I'll die on this hill.
I don't think story and exploration are antonyms. They can both coexist in the game. You can have quests opening up new areas and expanding the already gargantuan maps, just as they've been doing since Sumeru – which has been unfairly maligned imo. The Great Red Sand exploration with Jeht's quests is still peak Genshin for me, and I'll die on this hill.