Honkai: Star Rail

Honkai: Star Rail  is a role-playing gacha video game developed and published by miHoYo (with publishing outside mainland China under Cognosphere, d/b/a HoYoverse). It is miHoYo's first turn-based game, featuring the main character, who is referred to as the Trailblazer, travelling across planets through the Astral Express to help and connect the worlds while resolving disasters caused by "Stellarons" and other third-parties. The first closed beta test was launched on October 27, 2021. It was publicly released internationally on April 26, 2023, for Windows and mobile devices. Additionally, the PlayStation 5 port was released on October 11, 2023. The PlayStation 4 version is still yet to be announced, as revealed at the 2023 Summer Game Fest with a trailer. It is the fourth installment in the Honkai series, utilizing some characters from Honkai Impact 3rd and some gameplay elements from miHoYo's previous game, Genshin Impact.

Partially due to the popularity of Genshin Impact, the game had already received widespread expectations before its launch. It was nominated for the Most Wanted Game Award at the Golden Joystick Awards in 2022, won the Best Popularity Award of World Science Fiction Game Annual Awards in 2023, and Best Mobile Game Award in the Game Awards 2023.

Gameplay

Honkai: Star Rail follows the gameplay style of classic Japanese role-playing games: players build up a lineup of characters and control a team of up to four in turn-based combat. In addition to various stats that affect characters' strength, each character has a combat type that affects the kind of damage dealt to targets, a character class referred to as a Path (see Story and Setting § Setting) that defines their combat role, and a set of unique abilities called Traces used in combat. Each character can equip a weapon known as a Light Cone, that has various effects that activate if the Paths of both the character and Light Cone match. Characters can also equip various Relics, similar to Artifacts in Genshin Impact.

Elements of open-world and dungeon exploration are present, with multiple mechanics, including the gacha system, carried over (with slight differences) from Genshin Impact. Both games have gacha mechanics, in which players spend in-game currency that can be earned in-game or purchased with real money to receive new characters and weapons.

Plot

Setting

The game is set in a science-fantasy universe in which humanity and sentient non-human beings follow the Paths of god-like beings known as Aeons. Those who follow Paths are known as Pathstriders. Each Path espouses an ideal: for example, the Abundance is based on the view that immortality is a blessing and that healing and altruism should be valued as a top priority. The Destruction believes that civilization is cancerous to the universe, and seeks to eradicate all of civilization through the spreading of various disasters, such as the Stellaron, an object known as the Cancer of All Worlds, which brings destruction to any planet it is placed on.

Some Paths were led by Aeons who are now deceased, but continue to exist without the influence of their Aeons. The main character of the game known as the Trailblazer, a mysterious amnesiac possessing a Stellaron, follows the Path of Trailblaze, a Path created by the deceased Akivili. Pathstriders of Trailblaze seek to "explore, establish, and connect" among different worlds.

Different Paths are portrayed as antagonistic, protagonistic, or neutral. The primary antagonist of the game is Nanook, who controls the Path of Destruction, along with the Emanators of the Path of Destruction. Other Paths, such as the Path of Abundance, are not necessarily seen as antagonistic, but are involved in rivalries with the Hunt and other Paths, who view the immortality granted by the Path of Abundance as a curse.

Aside from the Path of Destruction, the Stellaron Hunters are a somewhat antagonistic antihero group throughout the game, who search for and collect Stellarons across the universe and claim to be able to see the future. The main characters are often in conflict with the Stellaron Hunters, though they more or less end up aiding each other on their journeys.

Story

Characters

Playable

The following table lists all currently confirmed playable characters in alphabetical order. All playable characters are associated with a specific world or faction, except cosmic characters.

All characters wield one of 7 playable paths: Abundance, Destruction, Erudition, Harmony, the Hunt, Nihility, and Preservation, and one of 7 combat types: Ice, Wind, Fire, Lightning, Physical, Quantum, and Imaginary.

Astral Express

The Astral Express was released in April 2023.

Herta Space Station

Herta Space Station was released in April 2023.

Belobog

Belobog was released in April 2023.

Xianzhou Alliance

The Xianzhou Alliance comprises six flagships: the Yaoqing, the Zhuming, the Yuque, the Fanghu, the Xuling, and the Luofu. The Xianzhou Luofu was released in April 2023.

Penacony

Penacony was released in February 2024.

Stellaron Hunters

The Stellaron Hunters are a mysterious group that collects Stellarons. They are led by Elio, also known as "Destiny's Slave".

Interastral Peace Corporation

The Interastral Peace Corporation (IPC) is a megacorporation that manages the economy across the entire cosmos.

Cosmic

Non-player characters

• Pom-Pom (Voiced by: Jiang Li, Christine Sposato, Miki Nagasawa, Yoon Ah-yeong). The conductor of the Astral Express who is unable to leave the train.
• Cocolia Rand (Voiced by: Mufei, Heather Gonzalez, Misa Katō, Unknown). The eighteenth Supreme Guardian of Belobog and the adoptive mother of Bronya. Later revealed to be the main antagonist of the Belobog chapter, with the Stellaron's influence turning her away from the Path of Preservation.
• Screwllum (Voiced by: Zhao Yang, Steven Kelly, Yūya Uchida, Kim Min-kyu). Member #76 of the Genius Society.
• Duke Inferno (Voiced by: Meng Xianglong, Bob Johnson, Teruyuki Tanzawa, Lee Joo-seung). The leader of the Ever-Flame Mansion, whose true name is Ifrit. He was later assassinated by Acheron.
• Sunday (Voiced by: Xu Xiang, Griffin Puatu, Takeo Ōtsuka, Kang Seong-woo). A Halovian who is Robin's brother and the head of the Oak Family on Penacony. Later revealed to be the main antagonist of the Penacony chapter, hoping to usurp the Charmony Festival to revive Ena, the Aeon of Order, and turn everyone on Penacony into mindless puppets under their power.
• Huaiyan (Voiced by: Li Haojia, J. Michael Tatum, Tadashi Miyazawa, Jo Min-soo). One of the seven Arbiter-Generals and the general of the Zhuming.

Development

Honkai: Star Rail began development in 2019 with the goal of "exploring new directions for the Honkai series". The production team has about 500 people, most of whom are fans of science fiction works and turn-based role-playing games. This project is HoYoverse's first attempt at a turn-based combat mechanism game. The team has stated that this genre is very popular in the game market and can lower the difficulty threshold for players to get started. In previous surveys conducted by HoYoverse, many players expressed that they enjoy this type of game. There were concerns about whether this type of game is too retro, but the production team believes that as long as the quality of the game is enjoyable, it can attract players.

Like other works in the Honkai series, it is in no way "too hard-core science fiction". The setting of Honkai Impact 3rd is Earth, but the plot mentioned that there were other planets in this worldview. Therefore, the production team of Honkai: Star Rail decided to expand on this concept of "a universe". The basic setting revolves around taking a train and traveling around the major planets in the universe. The production of each planet in the game takes around one year. The production sequence is to first determine the worldview and theme of the planet, then create the characters and detailed setting information, and then finally write the plot. The design of the planet "Xianzhou Luofu" is based on East Asian fantasy, and has been described as "silkpunk".

In terms of combat mechanism, producer David Jiang said that this game adopts "command-based combat." He said that Honkai Impact 3rd and Genshin Impact were heavy on the role-playing aspect, but they did not include command-based and turn-based combat. In addition, some players reported that Honkai Impact 3rd was too action-oriented and too difficult to operate. Therefore, Honkai: Star Rail pays more attention to strategy than the player's operational skills. Persona 5 was the team's inspiration when deciding to develop a turn-based role-playing game.

Producer David Jiang hopes that Honkai: Star Rail can achieve the immersive feeling of "as if you are in the world of the work", and create a "playable animated series". In order to enhance player immersion, the production team integrated artificial intelligence technology into the behavior patterns of non-player characters.

Distribution and promotion

The game was revealed in October 2021 at the end of the Honkai Impact 3rd online concert, Starfire Sonorant, then later on the game's official YouTube channel. On October 27, the game launched its first closed test and its second closed beta test on May 25, 2022. On August 15 of the same year, the game received support from the "Special Fund for Cultural Development" issued by the Culture and Tourism Bureau of Xuhui District, Shanghai, where the developer is located. On August 23, 2022, a game story trailer was unveiled on the opening night of Gamescom 2022.

On January 17, 2023, the mobile version of the game received the game version number approved by the National Press and Publication Administration, and the game was approved for distribution in mainland China On February 10, 2023, the game conducted its third closed test On the same day, the Apple App Store page revealed that the official launch date of the game was April 26. In the international market, miHoYo launched more than 2,000 sets of ads on Google Play one month before the public beta of the game. The main advertising channel was Google AdMob and the main advertising areas were Japan, Hong Kong, the United States, Vietnam, and Thailand.

On April 25, miHoYo released the game's opening theme animation "Star Travel". The game was officially launched globally on April 26. On April 28, miHoYo held its first theme exhibition "Galaxy Gathering" in Xujiahui. From April 29 to May 13, miHoYo undertook train advertisements on Xiamen Rail Transit Line 1 and jointly issued NFTs to promote the game. On mid-May, HoYoverse began to put up ads for the game in Japan, which are prominently displayed in Akihabara in Tokyo, as well as collaborating with Chichibu Railway in Saitama Prefecture to launch a special steam train service, which ran for a month. On July 13, miHoYo launched a high-speed train named "Star Dome Railway High-speed Railway Brand Special Train" with an uncertain route, used to promote the game.

Reception

Honkai: Star Rail received "generally favorable reviews" according to review aggregator Metacritic.

Eurogamer recommended the game for its "delightfully goofy humour, charismatic voice cast, and truly magnificent combat", despite the writers' tendency to "give one sentence explanations for important details, yet spend eight paragraphs overexplaining the simplest plot twist". Rock Paper Shotgun called the game "still in its early stages but (...) incredibly good fun to play", comparing it to "Star Ocean, but if everyone was hotter and you could gamble". The reviewer praised the combat system for being deep yet approachable, and noted that, like in Genshin, spending money was not necessary to progress, as all content in the game could be cleared with the characters players receive for free. PC Gamer appreciated Star Rail's "impeccable visual style and strategic depth" and its "elastic tone, which fluctuates from the heroic optimism of a space opera, to the dark comedy of a Nier game, with a lot of Final Fantasy 14's soap opera storytelling mixed in". To the reviewer, the game's main draw was its "sheer creativity" and that it "distills what's most satisfying about turn-based RPGs: tactical, team-based decisions."

However, some people have criticized the character designs, saying that they lack creativity, especially those of female characters, saying the outfits worn by female characters in Genshin Impact had more variety.

Popularity

Before the game's official release, the number of pre-registered players in mainland China reached 22.98 million, with an additional 10 million players outside of mainland China. On April 23, 2023, the day of pre-download, the game topped the free charts on the App Store in over 113 countries and regions, and ranked first overall in mainland China, the United States, Japan, and South Korea. After the game's global launch on April 26, it reached the top spot on the bestseller list of the App Store in mainland China within five hours, and ranked within the top 10 on the bestseller lists in 42 countries and regions. On April 28, miHoYo announced that the game had exceeded 20 million downloads.

GameLook estimated that on the day of its launch, the game's global revenue across all platforms likely exceeded 100 million RMB. According to data from Sensor Tower, within the first 10 days of launch, the mobile version of the game generated over $100 million globally, with 44% of the revenue coming from China, 22% from Japan, and 12% from the United States. Data from DataEye indicated that within 15 days of launch, the iOS version and the Android version downloaded through Google Play had generated at least $65 million, with Japan contributing a total of 120 million RMB. On February 6, 2024, with the launch of version 2.0, the game's download count exceeded 100 million.

Accolades