The reason I’m still playing after four years, Archon quest is peak. I’ve grown attached to the story of Teyvat.
Commentaires
Sentinel102026-01-14 20:14
Despite some nations doing less for me than others, Teyvat has genuinely become of my favorite settings in fiction.
Pabu_Redpanda2026-01-14 20:14
Very good. Nod krai has been great as a returning player who took a break during part of Fontaine after main story and during all of natlan.
It feels like they.really worked on the flaws they had in story writing from previous story arcs in the game.
Grouchy_Gap452026-01-14 20:20
Disagree, especially if you can the fatui treatment in nod krai "working on the storytelling flaws '". Before fontaine fatui were an actual interesting group of pretty charismatic antagonist, done fairy well. Now they are just a bunch of clowns with an horrendous treatment in the story. And we still have to talk about that "potential man" called varka and his NOT SO NUMEROUS feats
PandaBlueDance2026-01-14 21:51
Could you share just some brief thoughts on why you feel Fatui was more interesting before Fontaine, and less so now?
I think some want them to act more antagonistically, rather than MC chumming it up with half the harbingers.
Grouchy_Gap452026-01-14 22:32
I mean you literally took words out of my mouth. Harbingers before fontaine were full of charismatic antagonist or at least morally grey characters challenging the MC ideals while trying to pursuit theirs. Before fontaine, the majority of the game fatui were impactful with some being antagonist with trafic backstory (signora), very well developed character (scaramouche) or confronting deuteragonist with moral ambiguity (childe). We even got dottore being an absolute scumbag. But now look at what we have:
-Tsundrone: seriously I think she is the best written nod krai fatui, but her execution was just as lackluster as capitano. She stopped being an opposition force just in at act 1 only to become a hero immediately after. A character that once found the believing in other foolish and only focusing on research should have opposed lauma for example, for much much longer in order to changer her view and make us understand why she sided with us, out of respect for our ideals or out of récognition that her ideals was flawed. But instead, she became gentle because she made friends...yay. Dont get me wrong, among the nod krai cast I genuinely think she is pretty well written, she simply should have opposed us more
-Offscreen arlechinno, queen of exposition. What was shaping up to be an interesting character with motivations, grief, some madness and a will to protect, became just an exposition machine, once again siding with us for seemingly no reason, and being treated by paimon like a "trusthworthy ally" when she was described as a wolf in sheep clothing
-Poor capitano whose death is his only feat.
-Even charismatic antagonist like dottore got so much shafted by the power of friendship bullshit (it's not even my words but bina's one), without having accomplished anything. The guy just vanished like that... No big reveal, no confronting with the true master of this world (shades), not even varka or Alice bothering to show themselves to stop him, nothing but an anticlimatic end for a man that wanted to challenge the gods, but failed because friendship is magic isnt it... For a man that got rejected by everyone for being heretic including is own colleagues and who got drown in loneliness, grief and pure folly for his ideal, throwing aside his very humanity for the changing the world, at least make him see his goal for himself and realise wether or not it was worth it before killing him like that man...
PandaBlueDance2026-01-14 22:43
On Dottore some don't believe we've seen the last of him. He did show us what his world looks like (human experimentation for example, which has been one of his favorite pastimes). Showing him confronting the shades might be giving too much away at this stage, in an AQ that's already full of lorebombs.
I think the lack of an effective and well-characterized antagonist has been a long time narrative criticism held by some. Dottore is probably the best try yet. On the other hand, Wanderer being a perpetual fan favorite especially in Asia kinda tells them redeemable evil rather than unrepentantly evil is more popular with fans I suppose.
Grouchy_Gap452026-01-14 23:03
Maybe. But honestly I remember being so pissed when dottore said "why are you satisfied with your fate", only for bina to straight up say STFU with your fate, the story is about friendship and family, basically dottore is a lost child who messed up on his game location. Instead of answering him with something like "fate cannot be bend so easily by one's will" or "fate directed by you have no good future, and we'll see for our own fates" , they straight up cancelled him by saying stop yapping, you're in the wrong story. So ridiculous and literally off topic
And it made me actually worried, because Tsaritsa too want to overcome her fate, you're telling me that they will use the same bullshit type of reasoning, by telling me that friends and magic can overcome 500 hundred of years of revenge, the creation of the most dangerous criminal organisation, a hatred for the divine order of this world... just because the plot says it? Really, so this is the story the "archon of love who doesn't love her people" will go through. Please no, anything but that
Fabulous_Ground_19832026-01-14 20:41
I say this every single year, but damn this was actually amazing
From Dottore to the 3 Moon goddesses, feels like we are reaching some of the payoff set up so many years ago
kuhaku15102026-01-14 22:46
Flame me all you want, downvote me to hell—I don’t care. I don't know what other media or novels youve been reading but this is mid as hell to me.
I’ve read novels that made me cry, played games that made me question my life, and watched anime that genuinely changed how I see things. I’m not asking Genshin to reach those heights—but at the very least, don’t bore me to death for hours just to justify a few cutscene payoffs.
The cutscenes themselves are genuinely 10/10—but the presentation and pacing needed to get there are disgustingly bad. When those cutscenes hit, people call it “peak,” but that praise ignores the hours of dull, bloated storytelling it took to reach that moment.
slayer589x2026-01-14 23:55
If people only liked it because of the cutscenes then they'd instead say that only the boss fight was good and the rest were bad because all of the cutscenes were in the boss fight . Yet I hear more about the lore , the character dynamics and their development more than the boss fight itself.
kuhaku15102026-01-15 05:38
Welcome to learning about what a echo chamber is. I knew this ages ago but it is what it is.
cjcduck172026-01-15 02:00
The Traveler themselves has also admitted they’ve become attached, referring to Teyvat as their home now (also cause the sibling probably has no plans to leave with how they’re acting)
paolostyle2026-01-15 02:19
100% agreed, Natlan storyline wasn't _that_ great but Nod-Krai has been peak and especially this patch's story was amazing
Fabulous_Ground_19832026-01-15 04:08
Natlan was primarily plot driven, but honestly just as enjoyable tbh as someone who does love a good amount of shounen anime. This latest AQ was incredible for having such well rounded villains. Had both Rerir as the sympathetic and Dottore as the logically evil.
No_Letter_13262026-01-15 03:24
absolutely agreed but some people only play the game to satisfy there, gambling addiction
Jimi785yt2026-01-15 04:30
People fighting over the characters ignoring the beautiful story teyvat has to offer
_DestroyerX2026-01-15 04:36
Same here. Now I’m genuinely curious how things will move on from Teyvat. Like the Traveller said, it’s basically our home here.
Commentaires
It feels like they.really worked on the flaws they had in story writing from previous story arcs in the game.
I think some want them to act more antagonistically, rather than MC chumming it up with half the harbingers.
-Columbina, moon goddess aether waifu, enough said...
-Tsundrone: seriously I think she is the best written nod krai fatui, but her execution was just as lackluster as capitano. She stopped being an opposition force just in at act 1 only to become a hero immediately after. A character that once found the believing in other foolish and only focusing on research should have opposed lauma for example, for much much longer in order to changer her view and make us understand why she sided with us, out of respect for our ideals or out of récognition that her ideals was flawed. But instead, she became gentle because she made friends...yay. Dont get me wrong, among the nod krai cast I genuinely think she is pretty well written, she simply should have opposed us more
-Offscreen arlechinno, queen of exposition. What was shaping up to be an interesting character with motivations, grief, some madness and a will to protect, became just an exposition machine, once again siding with us for seemingly no reason, and being treated by paimon like a "trusthworthy ally" when she was described as a wolf in sheep clothing
-Poor capitano whose death is his only feat.
-Even charismatic antagonist like dottore got so much shafted by the power of friendship bullshit (it's not even my words but bina's one), without having accomplished anything. The guy just vanished like that... No big reveal, no confronting with the true master of this world (shades), not even varka or Alice bothering to show themselves to stop him, nothing but an anticlimatic end for a man that wanted to challenge the gods, but failed because friendship is magic isnt it... For a man that got rejected by everyone for being heretic including is own colleagues and who got drown in loneliness, grief and pure folly for his ideal, throwing aside his very humanity for the changing the world, at least make him see his goal for himself and realise wether or not it was worth it before killing him like that man...
I think the lack of an effective and well-characterized antagonist has been a long time narrative criticism held by some. Dottore is probably the best try yet. On the other hand, Wanderer being a perpetual fan favorite especially in Asia kinda tells them redeemable evil rather than unrepentantly evil is more popular with fans I suppose.
And it made me actually worried, because Tsaritsa too want to overcome her fate, you're telling me that they will use the same bullshit type of reasoning, by telling me that friends and magic can overcome 500 hundred of years of revenge, the creation of the most dangerous criminal organisation, a hatred for the divine order of this world... just because the plot says it? Really, so this is the story the "archon of love who doesn't love her people" will go through. Please no, anything but that
From Dottore to the 3 Moon goddesses, feels like we are reaching some of the payoff set up so many years ago
I’ve read novels that made me cry, played games that made me question my life, and watched anime that genuinely changed how I see things. I’m not asking Genshin to reach those heights—but at the very least, don’t bore me to death for hours just to justify a few cutscene payoffs.
The cutscenes themselves are genuinely 10/10—but the presentation and pacing needed to get there are disgustingly bad. When those cutscenes hit, people call it “peak,” but that praise ignores the hours of dull, bloated storytelling it took to reach that moment.