And this is why I refuse to play HoYo games. They might have good mechanics, but they also have gacha and that ruins everything.
DumShork
Jul 30, 2024 5:42AM
^ Amen. Gacha - not even once.
Hylarn
Jul 30, 2024 10:11AM
Hoyo games in specific have a very strong pity system, which means that with a bit of planning you can reliably get the characters you want. There's other problem that the live service model brings, but the gacha's really not a huge issue if you have a bit of self-control
Ironhide
Jul 30, 2024 3:02PM
Honestly I take pride in making low tiers viables , if this is what its referring to , is Eleven low tier ?
Moedred
Jul 30, 2024 3:56PM
*Not really, she isn't top, but usually rank A not S. It's just that she is standard banner character and Ellen is both S tier and limited character.
thechampionmike95
Aug 1, 2024 9:35AM
@Omega Deuse hopefully you never touch FGO. That has one of the worst drop rates of all gacha games.
jaggyd
Apr 8, 2025 10:36AM
Eh, Hoyo's gacha isn't as bad as others. You can easily get pull mats from just playing the game. It gives the opportunity to use characters even if you don't have them. The pull rates are pretty decent, plus they have a pity system (like mentioned before).
Hell, in nearly ever pull I get at least one A tier. And my most recent I pulled 2x Pulchra (A) and a Rina (S), without spending a cent.
Omega Deuse
Apr 8, 2025 5:00PM
Genshin is actually the game that convinced me that true gacha games (as opposed to single player games that just mimic some of their mechanics or aesthetics) can't be done well. It's not just a matter of drop rates, but also how it distorts things like progression and narrative while decoupling play progress with character growth.
A big example of this, in both FGO and Genshin is the way accessing new skills and effects, rather than just certain numerical bonuses, is largely dependent on pulling duplicates. This can result in, relatively, stagnant gameplay because your access to new abilities doesn't expand the way it's supposed to as you progress through the game, so clearing the first dungeon can look a lot like clearing the 10th, just with slightly different enemies and bigger numbers. It can also result in an opposite problem, where you gain access to a particularly strong character or mechanic early on, due to luck or monetary investment, and that trivializes things.
Overall, good drop rates or not, I'd rather just pay for a game up front and, possibly, the occasional expansion and get an experience with more intentional pacing and fewer perverse incentives for the devs.
FluffyCow
Apr 8, 2025 5:30PM
^FGO isn't largely about pulling duplicates though, unless you want a damage boost for your main DPS. Main thing with FGO also is that free characters for events are often really powerful and the bread and butter for free players. Also that supports are strong and a 1 copy support will often carry you through the game, especially with another friend support.
There's a ton of problems I have with FGO, including the token system that was added later and how dupes interact with it, and that caused one of the biggest controversies even for the JP side of the game. However in general you really don't need the dupes. Plus resources in FGO once you get going, especially with how all the extra additions now, make it really easy to skill up and level characters in my opinion.
Genshin more so locks quality of life features behind character dupes, and that's more of a problem in my opinion and experience.
I know none of what I'm saying matters because regardless you it sounds like you think all gacha games are terrible and you hate them, and I don't see that changing. Where as I think there's a lot of really great things about gacha games, and I enjoy playing them in general. I just wanted to give my take on it as a long time player of FGO, and someone that played a good amount of Genshin.
Omega Deuse
Apr 8, 2025 5:54PM
FGO isn't largely about pulling duplicates though, unless you want a damage boost for your main DPS. Main thing with FGO also is that free characters for events are often really powerful and the bread and butter for free players. Also that supports are strong and a 1 copy support will often carry you through the game, especially with another friend support.
Huh. I could have sworn you needed a duplicate to ascend a servant and get access to additional skills, but that doesn't seem to be the case. To be fair, it's been a VERY long time since I've played.
I know none of what I'm saying matters because regardless you it sounds like you think all gacha games are terrible and you hate them, and I don't see that changing. Where as I think there's a lot of really great things about gacha games, and I enjoy playing them in general. I just wanted to give my take on it as a long time player of FGO, and someone that played a good amount of Genshin.
I think most good free to play gacha games would be better as traditional games, because the requirements of making them free to play gacha games (that have a chance at actually turning a profit) are measurably reduce the quality of the gameplay experience and the only thing they add is a stream of cash for the developers (which can create its own problems). I wouldn't mind being proven wrong about that, because HoYo's games look like they do a lot of things right, when it comes to character design, animation, and general storytelling. I just wish I could pay up front for a version with a traditional unlock structure and pacing.
FluffyCow
Apr 8, 2025 6:05PM
^That's fair, I understand not enjoying gacha games and the way they're set up to make money, it's definitely not for everyone. The one time pay experience is usually a good way to go for a games because you get everything you need for a complete experience, I don't disagree there. For me though a lot of single player / single purchase games are expensive, along with the means to play them such as PC and consoles, and the price is only growing. So playing gachas as a free player often provides a lot of content, and while I have my frustrations with gachas there's a lot I do love about them as well, plus the whales basically fund long term experience with the games for everyone else. Plus they fund other media projects, such as adaptions, and single purchase games even. So I think overall gacha games can be great for long term enjoyment in varied regards. I do what I can in game to get by as a free player, and then invest my money into official physical merch. That works for me is all I can say lol
Zesc
Apr 9, 2025 6:23AM
Whee, more long posts!
Now I've never properly played gachas outside of PGR and the discontinued SMC, and I despise defending the genre in general, but to expand upon FluffyCow:
Next time you're on the bus or train, look at what people do on their phones. If it isn't antidemocratic brainrot asocial media, it's games, and yikes are those horrendous. Everything's full of ads, multiple psych PhDs worth of manipulation and both P2W AND P2P mechanics at once.
Now compare this with popular gachas. You get to play 99% of the game for free, have a continuos stream of new content, side-activities/minigames and story. Do you really mind that there are skins 60 chips each? That in order to be in the top 100 global leaderboard (which is just bragging rights) you need to spend the price of a car? Ever more so since so-called "triple-A" games just do the same thing but with a 100 chips fee up-front. They've normalized lootboxes in SP games for crying out loud!
Most of the big-name gachas allow you to drag along just fine F2P with daylies/weeklies (=habit forming), and lacking the chance to play proper games (which nowadays means the better indies), which many people do, it's the next best alternative. Especially since I believe that the supermajority of gacha players doesn't engage with their, err... idiosyncratic communities at all.
Moedred
Apr 9, 2025 12:16PM
^ Calling these dens of scum and villainy "idiosyncratic communities" is a very "politically correct" way to call them :p
last edited at Apr 9, 2025 12:16PM
juanelric
Apr 9, 2025 1:38PM
^^In a perfect timeline, gacha, lootboxes, battle passes and the like would all have been outlawed. But we live in a timeline where big companies have more power over the law than their customers.
But yeah, a F2P gacha where you can just choose to not pay for anything is definitely better than a game you have to pay for AND THEN has the guts to charge for lootboxes.
last edited at Apr 9, 2025 1:39PM
FluffyCow
Apr 9, 2025 1:53PM
Yeah indy games are usually what I can afford and usually have the tech to run. It doesn't help that a lot of triple a games tend to not only need better hardware, but they're also often poorly optimized further increasing the need for more powerful hardware. So I enjoy some indy games, and then dip into the free waters of gacha. Plus I watch some streamers play through games I can't run, which has always worked for me dating back to old days of youtube lets play videos, since console exclusives and so fourth have always limited my ability to play various games I might take an interest in. I digress though, I'm really getting off topic of the art now lol
Zesc
Apr 9, 2025 3:37PM
^ Calling essentially any modern game (or software at all) "poorly optimized" is like calling a forest on fire "too dry for optimal tree growth": not technically wrong, but really over-focused on a singular issue to overplay that the entire industry has been recursive clusterfuck at least since two decades.
This goes for gacha too. How many GB is Genshin on mobile again? 35 GB? So more than double the size of Tears of the Kingdom, which was made long after Nintendo lost its ways of actual technical competence?
Okay, sorry, rant over. Why are we debatting under a year-old spanking pic again?
Moedred
Apr 9, 2025 3:49PM
^It's 23.06GB on my phone, not sure if it's updated. It started around 8GB but map is way bigger so not surprising.
Two SYTOkun artworks have been uploaded in latest batch so we get back here to debate. Honestly Twitter going to shit further and further so people comes to better site for debate ;p
BTW. FGO is 18.3GB, Arknight 12.55GB, Honkai 3rd 30.58GB, Star Rail 18.72GB and Zenless is 29.63GB. BIIIG.
last edited at Apr 9, 2025 3:50PM
FluffyCow
Apr 9, 2025 4:08PM
All I can say is that I can't play a lot of triple a games because they're not optimized in a way that runs well on a PC I can afford. I'm not really here to debate more on that subject matter myself at least lol
Also if a gacha is less then 20 GB and runs smooth on my phone it's fine, and I always have lower end phones. When I played Genshin it ran fine on my low end PC, though I didn't care for it on mobile.
juanelric
Apr 9, 2025 5:00PM
^I stopped playing Genshin because it keeps getting harder to grind and taking up more and more space (and I don't have THAT much space), but it ran like dogshit on my PC before I started upgrading it.
Omega Deuse Jul 30, 2024 1:42AM
And this is why I refuse to play HoYo games. They might have good mechanics, but they also have gacha and that ruins everything.
DumShork Jul 30, 2024 5:42AM
^ Amen. Gacha - not even once.
Hylarn Jul 30, 2024 10:11AM
Hoyo games in specific have a very strong pity system, which means that with a bit of planning you can reliably get the characters you want. There's other problem that the live service model brings, but the gacha's really not a huge issue if you have a bit of self-control
Ironhide Jul 30, 2024 3:02PM
Honestly I take pride in making low tiers viables , if this is what its referring to , is Eleven low tier ?
Moedred Jul 30, 2024 3:56PM
*Not really, she isn't top, but usually rank A not S. It's just that she is standard banner character and Ellen is both S tier and limited character.
thechampionmike95 Aug 1, 2024 9:35AM
@Omega Deuse hopefully you never touch FGO. That has one of the worst drop rates of all gacha games.
jaggyd Apr 8, 2025 10:36AM
Eh, Hoyo's gacha isn't as bad as others. You can easily get pull mats from just playing the game. It gives the opportunity to use characters even if you don't have them. The pull rates are pretty decent, plus they have a pity system (like mentioned before).
Hell, in nearly ever pull I get at least one A tier. And my most recent I pulled 2x Pulchra (A) and a Rina (S), without spending a cent.
Omega Deuse Apr 8, 2025 5:00PM
Genshin is actually the game that convinced me that true gacha games (as opposed to single player games that just mimic some of their mechanics or aesthetics) can't be done well. It's not just a matter of drop rates, but also how it distorts things like progression and narrative while decoupling play progress with character growth.
A big example of this, in both FGO and Genshin is the way accessing new skills and effects, rather than just certain numerical bonuses, is largely dependent on pulling duplicates. This can result in, relatively, stagnant gameplay because your access to new abilities doesn't expand the way it's supposed to as you progress through the game, so clearing the first dungeon can look a lot like clearing the 10th, just with slightly different enemies and bigger numbers. It can also result in an opposite problem, where you gain access to a particularly strong character or mechanic early on, due to luck or monetary investment, and that trivializes things.
Overall, good drop rates or not, I'd rather just pay for a game up front and, possibly, the occasional expansion and get an experience with more intentional pacing and fewer perverse incentives for the devs.
FluffyCow Apr 8, 2025 5:30PM
^FGO isn't largely about pulling duplicates though, unless you want a damage boost for your main DPS. Main thing with FGO also is that free characters for events are often really powerful and the bread and butter for free players. Also that supports are strong and a 1 copy support will often carry you through the game, especially with another friend support.
There's a ton of problems I have with FGO, including the token system that was added later and how dupes interact with it, and that caused one of the biggest controversies even for the JP side of the game. However in general you really don't need the dupes. Plus resources in FGO once you get going, especially with how all the extra additions now, make it really easy to skill up and level characters in my opinion.
Genshin more so locks quality of life features behind character dupes, and that's more of a problem in my opinion and experience.
I know none of what I'm saying matters because regardless you it sounds like you think all gacha games are terrible and you hate them, and I don't see that changing. Where as I think there's a lot of really great things about gacha games, and I enjoy playing them in general. I just wanted to give my take on it as a long time player of FGO, and someone that played a good amount of Genshin.
Omega Deuse Apr 8, 2025 5:54PM
Huh. I could have sworn you needed a duplicate to ascend a servant and get access to additional skills, but that doesn't seem to be the case. To be fair, it's been a VERY long time since I've played.
I think most good free to play gacha games would be better as traditional games, because the requirements of making them free to play gacha games (that have a chance at actually turning a profit) are measurably reduce the quality of the gameplay experience and the only thing they add is a stream of cash for the developers (which can create its own problems). I wouldn't mind being proven wrong about that, because HoYo's games look like they do a lot of things right, when it comes to character design, animation, and general storytelling. I just wish I could pay up front for a version with a traditional unlock structure and pacing.
FluffyCow Apr 8, 2025 6:05PM
^That's fair, I understand not enjoying gacha games and the way they're set up to make money, it's definitely not for everyone. The one time pay experience is usually a good way to go for a games because you get everything you need for a complete experience, I don't disagree there. For me though a lot of single player / single purchase games are expensive, along with the means to play them such as PC and consoles, and the price is only growing. So playing gachas as a free player often provides a lot of content, and while I have my frustrations with gachas there's a lot I do love about them as well, plus the whales basically fund long term experience with the games for everyone else. Plus they fund other media projects, such as adaptions, and single purchase games even. So I think overall gacha games can be great for long term enjoyment in varied regards. I do what I can in game to get by as a free player, and then invest my money into official physical merch. That works for me is all I can say lol
Zesc Apr 9, 2025 6:23AM
Whee, more long posts!
Now I've never properly played gachas outside of PGR and the discontinued SMC, and I despise defending the genre in general, but to expand upon FluffyCow:
Next time you're on the bus or train, look at what people do on their phones. If it isn't antidemocratic brainrot asocial media, it's games, and yikes are those horrendous. Everything's full of ads, multiple psych PhDs worth of manipulation and both P2W AND P2P mechanics at once.
Now compare this with popular gachas. You get to play 99% of the game for free, have a continuos stream of new content, side-activities/minigames and story. Do you really mind that there are skins 60 chips each? That in order to be in the top 100 global leaderboard (which is just bragging rights) you need to spend the price of a car? Ever more so since so-called "triple-A" games just do the same thing but with a 100 chips fee up-front. They've normalized lootboxes in SP games for crying out loud!
Most of the big-name gachas allow you to drag along just fine F2P with daylies/weeklies (=habit forming), and lacking the chance to play proper games (which nowadays means the better indies), which many people do, it's the next best alternative. Especially since I believe that the supermajority of gacha players doesn't engage with their, err... idiosyncratic communities at all.
Moedred Apr 9, 2025 12:16PM
^ Calling these dens of scum and villainy "idiosyncratic communities" is a very "politically correct" way to call them :p
last edited at Apr 9, 2025 12:16PM
juanelric Apr 9, 2025 1:38PM
^^In a perfect timeline, gacha, lootboxes, battle passes and the like would all have been outlawed. But we live in a timeline where big companies have more power over the law than their customers.
But yeah, a F2P gacha where you can just choose to not pay for anything is definitely better than a game you have to pay for AND THEN has the guts to charge for lootboxes.
last edited at Apr 9, 2025 1:39PM
FluffyCow Apr 9, 2025 1:53PM
Yeah indy games are usually what I can afford and usually have the tech to run. It doesn't help that a lot of triple a games tend to not only need better hardware, but they're also often poorly optimized further increasing the need for more powerful hardware. So I enjoy some indy games, and then dip into the free waters of gacha. Plus I watch some streamers play through games I can't run, which has always worked for me dating back to old days of youtube lets play videos, since console exclusives and so fourth have always limited my ability to play various games I might take an interest in. I digress though, I'm really getting off topic of the art now lol
Zesc Apr 9, 2025 3:37PM
^ Calling essentially any modern game (or software at all) "poorly optimized" is like calling a forest on fire "too dry for optimal tree growth": not technically wrong, but really over-focused on a singular issue to overplay that the entire industry has been recursive clusterfuck at least since two decades.
This goes for gacha too. How many GB is Genshin on mobile again? 35 GB? So more than double the size of Tears of the Kingdom, which was made long after Nintendo lost its ways of actual technical competence?
Okay, sorry, rant over. Why are we debatting under a year-old spanking pic again?
Moedred Apr 9, 2025 3:49PM
^It's 23.06GB on my phone, not sure if it's updated. It started around 8GB but map is way bigger so not surprising.
Two SYTOkun artworks have been uploaded in latest batch so we get back here to debate. Honestly Twitter going to shit further and further so people comes to better site for debate ;p
BTW. FGO is 18.3GB, Arknight 12.55GB, Honkai 3rd 30.58GB, Star Rail 18.72GB and Zenless is 29.63GB. BIIIG.
last edited at Apr 9, 2025 3:50PM
FluffyCow Apr 9, 2025 4:08PM
All I can say is that I can't play a lot of triple a games because they're not optimized in a way that runs well on a PC I can afford. I'm not really here to debate more on that subject matter myself at least lol
Also if a gacha is less then 20 GB and runs smooth on my phone it's fine, and I always have lower end phones. When I played Genshin it ran fine on my low end PC, though I didn't care for it on mobile.
juanelric Apr 9, 2025 5:00PM
^I stopped playing Genshin because it keeps getting harder to grind and taking up more and more space (and I don't have THAT much space), but it ran like dogshit on my PC before I started upgrading it.