A Girl's Journey Has Only Learned the Bare Basics / miHoYo: We Have Our Competitors to Thank

Seeing this, Fallen was genuinely blown away.

The music paired with those visuals was just insanely cool, wasn't it?

He took a moment to glance at the Danmaku. At this point, the entire screen was filled with: Fu Hua! Husband!

He nodded in wholehearted agreement. This girl was unbelievably badass; calling her husband wasn't excessive at all.

What the screen was showing now was actual combat footage of Fu Hua's Azure Empyrea Battlesuit.

Every punch and kick carried a strong Dragon Country Style flair.

"Damn... this character is seriously cool!" he blurted out instinctively. "I get it now. This was probably supposed to be Honkai Impact 3rd's version promo video."

"This arrangement is pretty good. You can see the main updated content as soon as you log in, and—this promo video is genuinely exciting to watch. It doesn't feel boring enough to skip at all."

Before the video had even ended, the game's music changed again as Fallen was giving his review.

Want me to avenge you?~

Please, my other self~

Seeing the "two" adorable girls on the screen, Fallen couldn't help pausing the video.

According to the text introduction in the video, this girl was called Seele.

"Stygian Nymph? Two souls in one body?" Only then did Fallen understand. "I get it. This girl has two personalities."

"From the voices just now, one should be an innocent personality, while the other is the obsessive type, right?"

While explaining, he glanced at the Danmaku and found it filled with comments like, Seele... huff huff, so cute, MiHoYo understands me...

Fallen: "..."

"Fine, I like this girl too."

Next came Seele's combat demonstration.

"Whoa~ She actually has two combat forms? And they didn't split them into two characters to sell separately? MiHoYo really doesn't know how to make money..."

The moment Fallen said that, the Danmaku exploded.

You suck more blood than Tencent.

That's some textbook capitalist talk, 666.

"Haha... just kidding. The two combat forms should be this character's main selling point."

"The video's over. I like both of these characters, so next up is gacha time. Let's see what MiHoYo's pull rates are like."

"Maiden Voyage" Only Learned the Basics

I updated too. Why didn't I see this PV?

The guy above, MiHoYo directly added two chapters of story, but there are several PVs. Every time you log in, one PV will be randomly shown to you. If you want to see them all, just log in a few more times.

True. I watched the Herrscher of Reason and Valkyrie Ranger PVs. Sob sob... Teacher Himeko's backstory was in there too.

Watching the stream while pushing the main story, life is good.

Herrscher of Reason is already fully built. Duck Duck's motorcycle is so cool.

Cool? Seele's skills are the cool part, okay? And the animation effects—MiHoYo is seriously too good at this...

After Fallen finished watching the promotional PV, the Danmaku in the livestream became incredibly lively.

There was barely any discussion left about "Maiden Voyage."

"Bros, let's start with two 648 packs and see how many characters we can pull."

Not wanting to waste time, Fallen quickly topped up two 648 packs.

"Even though I don't play this game, that PV really stunned me. And after trying it for over ten minutes, I personally think this game is very good."

"Putting aside the gameplay and visuals, just based on MiHoYo's attitude toward this game, these two 648 packs were absolutely worth it."

"Have you ever seen a game that releases an animated short and a theme song every version? I sure haven't~"

Hearing Fallen say that, the Danmaku was filled with agreement.

Games in this world didn't even need to be judged by their music or short films. Their stories were already garbage—calling them completely storyless wouldn't be an exaggeration.

Once you logged in, it was just killing monsters, leveling up, PvP, monthly cards, and gift packs all in one package.

If you didn't spend money, you couldn't even beat monsters, let alone compete in PvP.

Some players even spent money only to be crushed and mocked by players with deeper pockets.

The worse ones would even send a shill to dance around in front of you every day, deliberately taunting and provoking you to make you whale so you could beat him up...

"Time to pull!"

As he spoke, Fallen wasted no time and rapidly tapped through several ten-pulls.

"Whoa~ Every ten-pull guarantees an A-Rank Valkyrie? That should be better than my three starting B-Ranks, right?"

When he reached his fortieth pull, S-Rank Seele appeared.

"Whoa~ What a coincidence. The two 648 packs were just enough to use it all up!"

At this point, the Danmaku kept telling him to claim the crystals in his mail.

But Fallen waved his hand. "I'll pull again after the stream. Let me try out the new characters first, then I'll show everyone Tencent's new game, 'Maiden Voyage.'"

As he spoke, Fallen opened the stages, selected a few Valkyries he thought looked good, and started playing.

"So many characters... it's so hard to choose..."

After struggling over it for a while, Fallen still chose Seele, Rita, and Fu Hua.

Once the game began, Fallen continued evaluating its strengths and weaknesses from the perspective of an ordinary player.

But... almost everything that came out of his mouth was praise...

"Sorry... I really want to find some flaws... but... I honestly can't find anything wrong with this game..."

"I swear, MiHoYo has absolutely never paid me."

"You don't believe me? Fuck, even Eden is speaking up for this game. With a superstar like Eden around, MiHoYo wouldn't need to hire a small streamer like me to advertise for them, right?"

"Alright, let's go check out Tencent's 'Maiden Voyage.'"

As he opened the newly downloaded "Maiden Voyage," Fallen continued talking. "Honestly, after experiencing Honkai Impact 3rd for over ten minutes, I was really drawn in."

"I've played so many single-player games, and this game's current scale isn't any smaller than some single-player titles."

"And from what you guys said, this game's true essence lies in its story... damn... honestly, I'm starting to regret getting into it so late."

"The main thing is... I've always looked down on mobile games a little... Don't get mad, okay? That's a perfectly normal hierarchy of disdain in gaming circles."

"After all, in most people's eyes, mobile games are only so big. Their playability definitely can't compare to PC games or major single-player titles."

"After all, if you can make a highly playable mobile game, why not just make a PC game or a big single-player title instead? Right?"

"Alright, alright, let's drop the Honkai Impact 3rd topic here and take a look at Tencent's new game."

As he spoke, he quickly created an account.

"If a small Studio can make a polished game like 'Honkai Impact 3rd,' then a product from a company as huge as Tencent should at least be no worse than Honkai Impact 3rd, right?"

While the login screen loaded, the viewers could see the anticipation overflowing from Fallen's eyes.

The game finally loaded.

To his surprise, Tencent's game also opened with an animated short.

"Whoa~ The visuals are on par with MiHoYo's! Looks like Tencent got serious too!"

In the short, a red-haired mature woman and a white-haired little girl wielded heavy machine guns as they weaved through the battlefield.

The animation was exceptionally smooth, and the scenes were intense as well.

But for some reason, Fallen simply didn't feel the same shock that Honkai Impact 3rd's short had given him.

The short ended quickly, and the game immediately entered a combat scene.

After skipping some of the beginner tutorial, Fallen moved the camera around and examined the red-haired mature woman he was controlling.

However...

When he zoomed the camera in, he was so startled that his scalp went numb.

"Fuck!! What the hell is this?! This red-haired lady looks way too different from how she looked in the short!!"

He hadn't noticed from behind, but once he saw her face, the art style was simply bizarre.

The Danmaku was likewise shocked by that devilish face.

It wasn't that the red-haired woman looked especially horrifying. Rather, the art style... looked incredibly strange.

The red-haired woman's facial shape was actually quite attractive: a typical oval face with big eyes, paired with fiery red lips.

But... the more you looked at her, the more awkward she seemed.

If he had to explain it, she looked like a real person who had gotten a Barbie doll face.

As a veteran gamer, Fallen quickly discovered the key issue.

"I get it!! It should be a problem with the game engine... or the visual rendering."

"As everyone knows, for this kind of anime-style game, Honkai Impact 3rd could be considered a pioneer. Previous games all leaned more toward realistic art styles."

"So I'm guessing Honkai Impact 3rd's game engine, or its rendering technology, must be different too."

"And Tencent's game uses an anime art style, but... its game engine and rendering style still use the old methods."

"Don't get it?"

"Let me explain it this way. Everyone watches anime, right? Anime comes in several different art styles."

"There's purely 2D animation, purely 3D animation, and 2D-plus-3D animation."

"And different rendering methods can make the same animation produce different results."

"So Tencent may have only copied Honkai Impact 3rd's art style, but not its rendering methods. That's why the visuals feel a little... mismatched."

"I'm not saying Tencent is incapable. After all, a company this large should have no problem researching a game engine."

"The main issue is that they haven't had experience making this kind of 3D anime-style game before..."

"This is just my guess, okay? I'm only some lousy gamer with no game development experience. If I'm wrong..."

"Then just assume I'm talking out of my ass, hehe~"

In truth, Tencent couldn't really be blamed based on the visuals alone.

Even if other game developers had been tasked with it, they still couldn't have achieved Honkai Impact 3rd's level of naturalness in just half a month.

After all, game development in this world lagged far behind Earth's. Nearly every game in the world used the same game engine and the same rendering methods.

On Earth, meanwhile, there were several game engines alone to choose from.

Rendering technology was the same.

That was why Honkai Impact 3rd had brought such an enormous shock to the people of this world when it debuted.

On Earth, Honkai Impact 3rd might not have amounted to much.

But in this world, it truly felt like a dimensionality-reduction strike.

The major game companies around the world were actually all quietly learning from Honkai Impact 3rd.

Whether it was the gameplay or the operating model...

It could only be said that Tencent had been a little too eager for quick success.

They had merely copied Honkai Impact 3rd's gameplay and operating model.

But they had not thoroughly researched Honkai Impact 3rd's 3D anime rendering technology at all.

MiHoYo: It's All Thanks to the Competition