Summary
While new updates forGenshin Impactare normally something to get excited about, plenty of fans are quite upset about phase one of the recent 4.5 update. This is becauseGenshin Impact’s latest Wish Banners have turned out to be quite controversial.
Specifically, both the current Event Wish Banners and the new Chronicle Wish Banner have limited selections of featured characters that players can earn. For the Event Wishes, the majority of featured characters are Geo characters, which the community has been increasingly expressing disinterest in. And regarding the new Chronicle Wish Banner, it is too similar to other existing Banners for its own good.
Genshin Impact’s Event Wish Banners for Phase 1 of 4.5 are Double-Edged Sword
Every Featured Character in Genshin Impact’s 4.5 Phase 1 Event Wish Banners
The good news about the majority of characters in the current Event Wish Banners being Geo is that this Element is at its full potential when players can build afull-Geo team composition inGenshin Impact. This is because many Geo characters often have unique abilities and/or talents that synergize with other Geo characters. Also, equipping multiple characters of any matching Element will allow them to passively generate energy for each other’s Elemental Skills as well. However, the current Event Wish Banners each featuring three Geo characters doesn’t excuse the fact that Geo is arguably the weakest of the seven Elements inGenshin Impact.
Geo characters aren’t inherently bad, because they can all generally be upgraded to the point of being relatively powerful (although, the same can arguably be said for any character). Instead, what makes Geo characters as a whole so lackluster is that Geo has very limited reactions with other Elements, whereas most characters rely onElemental reactions inGenshin Impactto unleash their highest-damage attacks.
Genshin Impact’s New Chronicle Wish Banner Is Off to a Troubling Start
In due time,Genshin Impact’s new Chronicle Wish Bannercould be a great accessibility feature for players to expand their arsenal with. However, the current similarities between the new Chronicle Wish Banner and the existing Banners begs the question of why a new Banner was needed in the first place.Genshin Impact’s 4.5 update could have been a great opportunity to expand and improve upon the Standard and Weapon Wish Banners instead of adding a new Banner, for example.
While the Chronicle Banner uses Event Wishes and the Standard Banner uses Standard Wishes, there’s currently a lot of overlap between the featured characters in both of these banners. Specifically, half of the 5-Star characters currently featured in the new Chronicle Wish Banner are characters that are already featured in the Standard Wish Banner. Unlike the Standard Banner, the featured rewards in the Chronicle Wish Banner are expected to rotate with every new phase and full update forGenshin Impact, but this doesn’t justify the initial overlap between the Chronicle and Standard Banner’s rewards.
Future Genshin Impact Updates Should Learn From the 4.5 Update’s Mistakes
Given the similar yet unrelated controversy surrounding the Event Wish Banners, phase one of the 4.5 Update has put players in a seriously awkward position. Currently, players’ only choice to getnew characters inGenshin Impactis to get infamously underpowered Geo characters or to spend Event Wishes on characters that can already be obtained with Standard Wishes.
This whole ordeal has given a bad reputation toGenshin Impact’s newest update, which is unfortunate considering that this will potentially overshadow the unproblematic features that 4.5 will bring to the game. If there’s anything that these controversies can teach future updates and future Wish Banners, it’s thatGenshin Impact’s Geo Element deserves a reworkand that the separate Wish Banners need to offer more variety.
WHERE TO PLAY
Step into Teyvat, a vast world teeming with life and flowing with elemental energy.You and your sibling arrived here from another world. Separated by an unknown god, stripped of your powers, and cast into a deep slumber, you now awake to a world very different from when you first arrived.Thus begins your journey across Teyvat to seek answers from The Seven — the gods of each element. Along the way, prepare to explore every inch of this wondrous world, join forces with a diverse range of characters, and unravel the countless mysteries that Teyvat holds…
