Wanderer’s Birthday in China — 13 Buildings, Thousands of Ads, Drone Show, and GenshinFES

Among the past three years of Wanderer’s birthdays—and even among all Genshin Impact characters—this year’s birthday campaign is by far the largest ever.

- Entire buildings are fully wrapped for his birthday in 13 cities, including Beijing Station.
- Advertisements are running across 2,000 cities.
- 17,000 screens in the Beijing subway are showing Wanderer ads.
- City-wide advertising using thousands of buses.
- Ads displayed in 1,850 movie theaters.
- Multiple massive 3D billboard screens, plus large screens in 27 shopping malls.
- Drone shows held at night.
- Advertisements displayed on all Genshin players in e-commerce apps.
- Animated displays shown on Ferris wheels.
- Fan cafes opened in four cities, including cat cafes

At the same time, Genshin FES, an official miHoYo event, is currently being held in mainland China, and miHoYo is running an enormous amount of Wanderer advertising as part of it.

There were several Wanderer exhibitions in the venue, and today Dawei(mihoyo CEO) and LuYin(Wanderer Chinese VA) celebrated his birthday.

P.S. Every year, the topic of Incel comes up in posts like this, so I'll write the answer first. Wanderer is the most popular character in China. He was the only one to rank in Genshin Impact, and won 3rd place after the romance game and Vtuber.
A small number of incells made a false report to cancel the event, but the event went smoothly.
The situation is not that bad, so please don't reply to this post with "Incell".

Voir le contenu lié

Commentaires

unchinko2026-01-03 15:03

For reference, here is last year's (my post on the previous account)

[On January 3, China will be flooded with Wanderer fan advertisements.](https://www.reddit.com/r/Genshin_Impact/comments/1hkrgiw/on_january_3_china_will_be_flooded_with_wanderer/)

unchinko2026-01-03 15:31

It was an advertisement of 20,000, not 2000. They have put it out in more than 30 cities.

marshmochifauxie2026-01-03 15:34

BROOOOOOOO WHATTTTT

ArkassEX2026-01-03 15:43

But remember, the best birthday present for Wanderer is if we get to totally murder Dottore next patch.

Pitiful_Feedback_7562026-01-03 16:03

so true

piichan142026-01-03 21:38

We cut up Dottore, wrap up the pieces and gift it to him. Will most probably the best thing he'll get in life.

unchinko2026-01-04 03:53

He wants to do it by himself

MrCovell2026-01-03 15:50

This shit must be so annoying to clean up lol.

Magpie_03092026-01-03 16:00

Is he that popular in china??

unchinko2026-01-03 16:44

Weibo (China's Twitter) conducts popularity polls every year, and Wanderer has been in the top 3 every year since 2023. Not only the Genshin, among all male characters.

Ayges2026-01-03 17:21

Amongst male gacha characters these polls are usually the boys from LADs and Wanderer on top although this year Phainon is joining in

Magpie_03092026-01-06 16:35

Wow really? I had no idea he's THAT popular even among other Gacha games.

Ayges2026-01-06 16:38

Yep its even become a meme with LADs fans to draw Wanderer with the LADs boys

Pitiful_Feedback_7562026-01-03 16:08

awww even the ceo celebrated his birthday.Still wont forgive for the lack of animation and chibi art tho..:(

PandaCheese20162026-01-03 16:36

How much does it all cost?! If you try to explain to say a Disney or Hollywood exec that fans are paying for all this out of their own pockets, they'll absolutely think you are insane.

Wanderer far from the only one of course. Popular characters across other games often inspire large scale celebrations. CN fans as usual just take it to a whole other level.

unchinko2026-01-03 16:40

It is supported by donations. Other characters are impressive as well, but Wanderer is on a completely different level, with over 20,000 ads and numerous projects.

mrheosuper2026-01-03 19:33

Impressive. I always thought Furina would be the highest.

siowy2026-01-04 00:52

Male fans are more numerous, but female fans are more rabid. Most of my female friends have high constellations on their favorites.

OneRelief7632026-01-04 05:34

and people still try to deny his popularity, smh my head

hera-fawcett2026-01-04 00:20

>Popular characters across other games often inspire large scale celebrations. CN fans as usual just take it to a whole other level.

the LADS boys for instance. ive seen some *wild* ass shit for their birthdays.

ngl, its gonna sound terrible, but it really makes me wish i was a crazy rich cn girlie

rW0HgFyxoJhYka2026-01-04 04:26

So you can get 5 lookalike LADS male strippers to do the helicopter?

hera-fawcett2026-01-04 19:45

yeah sure, why tf not.

ill throw up archon skin venti into the sky too.

like thats lifechanging amounts of money--- and id love to have it and just enjoy it.

reina_meraki2026-01-03 16:40

scara nation just built different 💙

Whilyam2026-01-03 16:41

Meanwhile Hoyo has quietly stopped making chibi art for character birthdays starting with Wanderer. I'm sure that was SUCH a huge cost to them every year.

alberich212026-01-03 18:08

Just a small indie company ❤️

Whilyam2026-01-03 18:10

Oh yeah and the Collected Miscellanies that have small insights into the character and Dain and actually clearly showed animations before release.

Kardiackon2026-01-04 09:21

let's be real nobody watched those except for the little lore tidbits dain would add at the end which can easily be replaced by actual lore in the story

Ball-Blam-Burglerber2026-01-03 17:01

And he tries *so hard* to be unlikable. Poor guy.

birdsbirdsbird2026-01-03 17:24

Jesus christ

DottoresPet2026-01-03 17:55

[deleted]

masternieva6662026-01-04 04:58

Well he also got insane fans so mihoyo will definitely make him playable just imagine the potential physical merch sales

toucanlost2026-01-03 18:03

The 3D illusion screens and drone show must be so cool to see in person. Fans surely spent more on his birthday than Hoyo, who cut the chibi illustration.

Glittering-Ad-16262026-01-03 18:28

They should just give him a new skin with all that promotion revenue

Silent_Silhouettes2026-01-03 18:48

i really hope they do id buy it no hesitation

Pitiful_Feedback_7562026-01-03 23:56

i'd rather they would release it later, then they would remodel his hair and other things more nicely then

Silent_Silhouettes2026-01-03 23:59

wouldnt they remodel it now if they released it now? Neuvi's new skin model seems to be like the latest models

Pitiful_Feedback_7562026-01-04 00:01

well it's really good because they've improved a lot since then, I'm just saying let them improve more so that we could get even better models in the future so better skin for wanderer

Silent_Silhouettes2026-01-04 00:05

true

AgentOOX2026-01-03 20:58

Can someone please help me understand why he’s so popular in CN community? Is it the design? The outfit? The standoffish personality? I know it’s probably not just any one thing but he doesn’t seem to stand out for me in a way that disproportionately appeal culturally to the CN community.

Interesting-Storm-722026-01-03 21:54

You can just ask people here why they like Wanderer. I'm a huge Wanderer fan but even so I don't think I have the time to explain every reason why I like him. There's just so much, and he's popular in Japan as well. It really just comes down to good story and growth.

KTOpalescent2026-01-04 04:32

Him being a giant Queen reference might be part of it too (it certainly is for me) for Japan, where they've been popular since the 70's. No idea if they're popular in China though.

Electronic-Office7092026-01-04 00:09

Yes, the long wait for his playability, his story is very relatable (easily one of the best in the game, nuanced, with many themes and conflicts), and his sarcastic, distant attitude toward the Traveler, which sets him apart from other Genshin characters. Even though he has clearly grown and softened over time.

unchinko2026-01-04 04:19

A tsundere, sarcastic manner of speaking is something that naturally captivates people. Characters like that are also very popular among heroines in Japanese anime. Because he was once an enemy, the way he gradually opens his heart to the Traveler and to others feels especially precious.

Now, he is trying to stop Dottore, who is committing acts similar to what he himself once did. In the past, he committed sins driven by suffering and anger, but now he has reformed. People naturally want to support someone who chooses to walk the right path.

I understand that there are critical opinions about him. He probably doesn’t care, and that’s exactly one of the things I like about him. Wanderer antis only serve to make Wanderer stand out even more.

Weak_Potato_3632026-01-03 21:29

100% deserved

whitebathingsuit2026-01-03 21:46

I thought chinese players didn't like him much.. thinking of the cat incident

Lolmyusernamewhat2026-01-03 22:52

Thing can be both popular but also hated, just think Justin Bieber at his prime or any top celebrity really

tuxedocat20182026-01-04 03:54

diff demographics exists

his fanbase is female players thats why the male fanbase hate him

unchinko2026-01-04 04:20

It's fake news. It was linked to an unrelated incident by a fake image.

Economy_Pass54522026-01-05 07:04

Do you by chance have any links and sources about this because i remember watching an old video about the cat thing being a lie and everything but the person seems to have deleted their channel when I tried to find it again recently cause a certain someone wouldn't believe me lol and I see people to this day keep spreading more and more misinformation about it and adding onto the lie.

OneRelief7632026-01-04 05:36

his haters are a loud minority. I believe CN speakers said his popularity amongst females is one of the reasons some CN males hate him.

luugburz2026-01-03 21:56

crazy the effect this traumatized puppet twink has on literally hundreds of millions of people

RubyShabranigdu2026-01-03 22:17

But I thought males don’t sell?

unchinko2026-01-04 04:03

This is an issue of combat performance. Wanderer achieved high sales among male characters during his initial banner, but the long-term return was limited. In contrast, Kazuha and Neuvillette did not sell particularly well at first, before people understood their strength; however, once their power became widely recognized, they achieved very high sales. Pulling for a character based solely on appearance only lasts for the first week, so miHoYo should release a new version of Wanderer as a powerful ★5 character. He deserves to be sold.

masternieva6662026-01-04 04:57

Males banners dont sell but their physical merch sell so well that it always out of stack. Females dont do c6 r5 compate to male players .

Sabishi19852026-01-03 22:25

Can't say I'm all that surprised: he's the most interesting character in the game after all. 😏

(just kidding: this is INSANE! In the best way possible. 😄)

Mean-Razzmatazz15542026-01-03 22:48

Isn't he also just the most popular character in china?

hera-fawcett2026-01-04 00:22

just behind some of the LADS boys iirc. def top 5.

OneRelief7632026-01-04 05:43

Atp this point I think ita safe to say hes just straight up the most popular genshin character in CN?

unchinko2026-01-04 05:49

It's been like that for the past 3 years

OneRelief7632026-01-04 05:52

Hopefully Hoyo sees this and gives him direct kit buffs sooner than later!

ibeeeeeechan2026-01-04 06:35

Based x100

inanfurry2026-01-04 08:08

can they campaign for buffs instead of this please god do something

ktaztrofk2026-01-04 09:46

I’m a newish player who hasn’t even done Inazuma (I just met Ayaka), can someone explain to me in as few spoilers as possible what is Wanderer’s main appeal? I like his design and think it’s really cool, but I’m just really impressed with this treatment he’s getting from fans.

unchinko2026-01-04 10:43

His very existence is a spoiler. It's a sarcastic tone, but it's like the so-called "tsundere". Through the story of Inazuma and Sumeru, you can learn about his charm.

ktaztrofk2026-01-05 10:46

I just have to make it through this slog of boring ass quests at the start of Inazuma huh 😭

Pitiful_Feedback_7562026-01-05 00:56

Tell me what you think after you're finished with the inazuma and sumeru quests!

ktaztrofk2026-01-05 10:47

I’m excited! I like his design a lot and would like him on my account even if he isn’t meta

Pitiful_Feedback_7562026-01-05 11:21

Then.... BECOME A MEMBER OF THE SCARANATION WE WILL WELCOME YOU WITH OPEN ARMSS!!! :D

99cent-tea2026-01-04 09:55

As he deserves 👌✨

Powerful_Helicopter92026-01-04 13:20

All this, but no bday animation and chibi art??? My shayla deserves itttt

lazytanaka2026-01-05 06:38

I want the merch of him in different outfits!!