Genshin Impact’s Gacha System is Sneaky and Misleading
How you view the game’s gacha system depends in part on whether or not you view loot boxes as gambling
Twitch streamer Lacari hung his head in dismay as he continued to spend dollar after dollar trying his luck at Genshin Impact’s gacha system. Here, they’re known as Wishes and are used to attempt a small chance at getting rare characters and items. The main draw that Chinese developer MiHoYo is going for in its newest free-to-play title is for players to open up their wallets for a chance at four and five-star characters that they won’t otherwise have access to.
Genshin Impact is the newest free-to-play open-world action RPG reminiscent of Breath of the Wild. So much so, in fact, that upon its initial announcement, players actually broke their PS4s in response. Like any game, Genshin has its own perks and quirks, but which of those two categories the gacha system falls under really depends on if you are one the 74% of gamers that consider loot boxes gambling.
In the case of Lacari, he ended up spending over $2,000 taking risks on one character. His friends in chat reminded him that the chances of getting a five-star character are less than 1%, even if the banner presents this information in a different, misleading way. To his credit, Lacari eventually got his hands on Keqing, a rare five-star wielder of Electro, but as his friends reminded him in horror, he still had several more characters to go before getting the entire roster.
This is the gamble of the gacha system. At the time of writing, MiHoYo has earned over $100 million from it alone.
Despite getting Amber time and time again and spending wish after wish, Lacari continuously said “just another hundred,” during another stream after a strange mix of excited and horrified screams. Again, after putting enough money down, he was able to get the rare character he’s been after for hours, but only after dedicating another $1,500 towards the cause.
“…his friends reminded him that the chances of getting a five-star character are less than 1%, even if the banner presents this information in a different, misleading way.”
I was asked by a friend not to refer to this experience as a “gambling addiction” as that’s a serious, medically diagnosable condition and I shouldn’t label an obscure Twitch streamer as such. While it’s not my intention to imply that Lacari falls under this umbrella, we can’t deny the addictive quality that gambling has, and by trying your luck with hard-earned cash at an unforgiving in-game loot box system, you are, by definition, gambling.
The catch is that developers are aware of its toxic, addictive quality, and exploiting it is how MiHoYo (and many other developers of the uber-popular gacha-style games) make money with free-to-play games like Genshin Impact.
In recent years, gaming has seen a rise in the exploitation of loot boxes and microtransactions. This mechanic really found itself in the eye of criticism back in 2017 with Star Wars Battlefront 2’s loot box controversy. This led to the argument that some randomized loot-box reward systems and gacha games are a type of online gambling, but with gaming, individuals are perhaps more vulnerable because it can prey on minors. Battlefront 2’s main offense was forcing players to spend $60 on the upfront purchase, followed by paid loot boxes to create a pay-to-win system, because these prizes often contained rare, powerful characters, such as Darth Vader, and would give their owners an edge over those who couldn’t afford to play the gamble. As a result, some online gambling laws pertaining to loot boxes were introduced.
Though Genshin Impact isn’t an offender of the same crime since it’s free-to-play upfront, and the gacha system is the essence of how the developer can earn money, it still features that same gambling experience. There’s a sense of pride that comes with having a rare, high-quality character that few others own. It also means that you might have access to areas of the game that are otherwise unattainable. In Battlefront 2’s case, it also meant an advantage over other players who couldn’t afford to pledge hundreds of dollars to try their luck. In Genshin Impact, there’s only a 0.6% chance of getting that rare pull.
Along with that pride element, the predatory practice of the gacha system relies on the impulsive nature of people and their brain’s need to trigger dopamine release. So while it isn’t my intention to name any Twitch streamer as a problem gambler, this reaction is very natural, and it’s exactly what the developer relies on to earn its money back.
The problem with observing Genshin Impact in comparison to Battlefront 2 is that the former’s gambling mechanic is far more subtle, and some would even argue that it’s quintessential to free-to-play titles, and therefore, expected and necessary. There’s no paywall and no notifications repetitively nagging the player to spend money towards premium in-game currently.
“In Genshin Impact, there’s only a 0.6% chance of getting that rare pull essential to late-game content.”
And in this specific case, it’s sneaky because there are actually many ways to acquire Primogems by simply playing the game, and though I’ve already spent dozens of hours playing and enjoying Genshin Impact, I’m only now discovering some of these methods by doing research for this article. But this is done intentionally. It’s supposed to be hidden so that you will attempt to take the most “convenient” route possible: spending Wishes. It all boils down to the impulsive human nature of consumers.
Despite it being unaggressive, it still forces the players to perceive gambling as the norm in order to get the best experience out of the game. Genshin Impact markets the five-star characters as crucial for the strongest party and therefore would seem like it directly correlates with player experience in the way Battlefront 2 did, but it’s unclear whether or not this is actually the case.
On one hand, many online gamers are showing off the best builds for each character and the best party combinations to help others be as successful as possible without spending anything. Currently, it would seem that players are basically getting an open-world action RPG completely for free while others are emptying their bank accounts.
“…it’s sneaky because there are actually many ways to acquire Primogen by simply playing the game, and though I’ve already spent dozens of hours playing and enjoying Genshin Impact, I’m only now discovering some of these methods by doing research for this article.”
The dilemma is if the game will continue to be basically entirely F2P, or if it will cater to spending money further down the line after the “honeymoon phase” ends. MiHoYo has stated that its initial full release was only the first step of many free expansions and enhancements to come, so the big question is whether or not those expansions will require players to strive for the most powerful characters to continue playing, and thus, desperately give in to the gacha system as Genshin Impact becomes more difficult.
