Honkai Star Rail
This space fantasy RPG has absolutely captivated my heart
When Genshin Impact was first released, I tried it on both the PS4 and mobile. I tried getting into it for around four times before dropping it during the tutorial. I can’t explain why I couldn’t get into the game. The world was praised for being super beautiful, but even if it was beautiful, I just couldn’t keep going for some reason. Even so, Genshin was always on my radar but truth to be told, I didn’t even know Hoyoverse was going to be making a new game. I didn’t have any expectations from it.
I guess it’s because I went into the game with no expectations at all that I became addicted to the game.
Visuals
First of all, the visuals are incredible. Such a good use of environment and character design. Rich and vibrant colors, various environmental assets, cool enemy designs…
The designs for the main characters were also amazing. I chose Stelle, and absolutely loved her design. I usually find Hoyoverse’s female character designs kind of… bland, to be honest. They are detailed and nice, but redundant. However, I found Stelle’s design to be top-notch. She's pretty enough, yeah, but more than that, she's unique. She's taller than most of the other female characters, her dead stare fits so well with her dry humor and she wields a damn bat! I really enjoy playing as her and try to have her in my team whenever possible.
“Rules are made to be broken.”
What I really like about the game is that it is FUNNY. Let’s see some examples:
Stelle is immediately established as a trash racoon with a snarky personality. I enjoyed making Stelle rummage through all the trash cans in Belabog and the ensuing dialogue and banter was worth the effort.
When Simulated Universe is first established, Herta thinks on naming it “Metaverse”, only to have Stelle immediately dunking on it. That’s when I knew I was in for a ride.
Dan Heng comments that the object finder robot, Findie, who has the catchphrase “beep, beep, beep” is an antiquity. Findie’s response (in a cheerful voice): “Beep, beep, beep. Your mom’s an antiquity!”
This trailer.
Serval has an electric guitar as a weapon whereas her brother, Gepard… wields a guitar case. This guy is the captain of the Silvermane Guards.
You can see Pela and Gepard’s incredible drawings of the main cast throughout Jarilo-IV. The difference between the drawings is hysterical. See for yourself:
Luocha's companion quest where March 7th speculates about his movements had me cackling with laughter. The voice acting needs to be praised as well. Contrary to the general consensus, I think Welt’s voice actor could have been better, he pauses a bit too much when he speaks. However, when he was doing that silly voice during the “flashback” sequences, he absolutely charmed me.
Any reference to my favorite series of all time, Ace Attorney, is a gold star in my book:
Before you say that this is just a Japanese attorney’s badge, the last sentence of the description is the reference.
The chemistry between the main trio is impeccable. They function as the Freudian Trio of the game:
March 7th as the Id: Excitable, bubbly personality, impulsive and playful.
Dan Heng as the Superego: Calm, calculated, logical and book-smart.
Stelle as the Ego: Empathetic but prone to being sarcastic, provides a good balance between the other two.
This is a common trope in fiction. However, it starts being really funny when you play Stelle as an absolute goblin and March has to be the one to bring Stelle to her senses and play the Ego role. With Dan Heng occasionally joining in their antics in his deadpan snarker way, their interactions become a joy to watch. I’m hoping that they don’t break up the main trio in the future because what we have is too good.
Simulated Universe
I’m a Hades player, it’s one of my favorite games of all time. Playtime-wise, it sits comfortably at the 2nd place on my Steam library, only beaten by Left 4 Dead 2, which I used to play a ton because it was the only game I owned in high school.
So imagine my shock when they introduced Simulated Universe to me. A Hades-like roguelike? In my mobile game? It’s more likely than you think. It was really easy for me to get into it, and I absolutely love that every run is different. Just like the prophecies in Hades, the Index is forcing me to choose a different blessing each time and wildly changes the run I’m in. Whoever thought of putting the Simulated Universe in the game, I must give you my kudos.
Turn-based Combat
I think one of the reasons why I got more into Star Rail than Genshin is because of the combat. I like to strategize during battles, and with Star Rail, the combat is more chill and calculative whereas Genshin seems more chaotic. Of course, there are butt-clenching moments during Star Rail battles as well, but at least you can accept defeat before you are actually defeated.
Maybe it’s because of my background in JRPGs, but I find Star Rail’s combat super fun. Triggering follow-up attacks and breaking the opponents’ weaknesses is satisfying, trying to strategize with your characters before you get into the battle is great. The game motivates you to have different classes in your team depending on the opponent, so you have to think before blindly charging into battle.
Gacha elements
Maybe it’s because it launched very recently, but I don’t think the gacha elements are too bad yet. I have completed the main missions so far, and I haven’t had the need to pull from the Special Banner. I do have some standard 5 star characters which have been a great help.
Hoyoverse is incredibly smart in putting Blade, Kafka and Imbibitor Lunae back to back in the Special Banners, knowing that people will be dying to get them. In that way, it is a money trap if you want to get them all. But for me, I’m not easily swayed by these gambling elements in games, so I have been patiently saving for Imbibitor Lunae.
I just know that I’ll be eating these words when I don’t pull him when he’s available though. Oh well.
I must lastly point out that the story of the game is also very intriguing, but the lore does feel a bit bloated. It’s hard to keep up with the amount of texts you gather, so I end up skipping them. But I do appreciate them, as it makes the world feel more real and less one-dimensional.
I honestly can’t wait to see what else is in the store for this game. As someone who hates money-grab games with a passion, Star Rail surprised me in the best way. I do think this might change in the future, but for now I’ll enjoy it. I’m very curious to see where they will take us with the way they left things in the latest 1.2 update, and I also expect some banger music from them as well (Wildfire and Samudartha are just incredible).
Until next time!