Genshin Impact, a free-to-play multiplayer RPG that’s drawn a lot of comparisons to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, is available now. It’s the biggest project to date from developer miHoYo, which was previously best known for mobile games like the popular Honkai Impact 3rd.
While Genshin Impact isn’t an MMORPG, it’s gotten a lot of attention from fans of the genre for blending action game mechanics with a free-to-play online model. It features daily challenges and multiplayer activities much like an MMO, and it requires an internet connection to play. Genshin Impact is playable as a single-player game, but it also allows players to team up to take on greater challenges together. True to miHoYo’s mobile roots, Genshin Impact also relies on gacha mechanics, rewarding players will random drops to encourage them to keep playing.
Now, players intrigued by its genre mashup pitch can try Genshin Impact for themselves on PlayStation 4, PC, Android, and iOS, as miHoYo announced with a tweet and a new gameplay trailer. Genshin Impact features cross-play and cross-saves, so players can try it out on any of its platforms without losing anything if they decide to switch later. A Nintendo Switch version of Genshin Impact is planned for release at a later date, but miHoYo hasn’t yet said when that might be.
Genshin Impact’s similarities to Breath of the Wild seem to have both helped and hindered it while it was in development and beta testing. The initial reveal of Genshin Impact was met with some criticism over those similarities, as early looks showed not only graphics that look remarkably similar to BOTW, but also gameplay features like elemental arrows, spreading fire, and hang gliding that seem to be copied straight from Nintendo’s latest epic. Some Zelda fans said that they would boycott Genshin Impact because of the similarities, with one player even smashing his PS4 in protest at an event where Genshin Impact was shown. MiHoYo has said that the game’s creators have a lot of respect for BOTW and that it’s an obvious inspiration, but add that Genshin Impact is aiming to be a very different title.
It may be hard for some to get over just how similar Genshin Impact looks to BOTW, but for others, that may actually be a benefit. There’s a reason that BOTW has become such an iconic game just a few years after its release, and it makes sense that other games are now putting their own twists on its innovative formula. From the looks of it, Genshin Impact could bring some of the best parts of Breath of the Wild to life in a whole new way.
Genshin Impact is available now on PlayStation 4, PC, iOS, and Android, and a Nintendo Switch release is planned for a later date.
Source: GenshinImpact/Twitter