Some characters in Genshin Impact are being really adored by part of the community. “This is intentional,” believes MeinMMO author Irina Moritz. She explains which mechanisms are at play here to help players find the right “Waifu.”
Hardly was the co-op RPG Genshin Impact released, when various posts and videos appeared on Reddit, social media, and YouTube claiming that the game is full of “Waifus” and “Husbandos.”
For the readers among you who are less versed in “Otaku-talk”: “Waifu” is the Japanese pronunciation of the English word “Wife.” It is usually used for fictional female characters from anime or video games that one finds sexy or cute. The male equivalent is “Husbando.”
Update October 13: In the meantime, one of the heads of the developer miHoYo has commented on the topic. He confirms that the sexualization is intentional.
Tier List by Strength vs. Tier List by Waifu Level
This is the situation: Normally, in hero-collection games like Genshin Impact, which features numerous playable characters, there is a more or less clear ranking list.
This list sorts the characters by strength and usefulness: a so-called Tier List. People who aim to build the objectively best team refer to these lists.
But there is also another type of “Tier List” where the characters are sorted by their Waifu and Husbando level. That is, how sexy, cool, or cute the characters are. They are, in contrast to the strength lists, very subjective since one swoons for the characters they personally find attractive.
These preferences lead to players ignoring the strength of the characters and instead creating a group of their favorites. Some even spend large amounts of money to obtain their favorite character. Like a YouTuber who spent $2,000.
In my opinion, this is no coincidence. The developer behind Genshin Impact is the Chinese company miHoYo. They have several years of experience in creating and operating anime gacha games and know their audience very well.
There’s something for everyone
Examples from Genshin Impact: Genshin Impact, like many other gacha games, is bursting with Waifus and Husbandos. The colorful mix of characters in the game can be categorized by various personality types. This is what makes a proper RPG. It needs an interesting and diverse cast of NPCs.
But it can also be divided into different Waifu and Husbando types. For example, we have:
- Lisa as a sexy sorceress who flirts with the player
- Jean is the cool, elegant swordswoman in a high leadership position
- Barbara is the cute healer
- Kaeya serves as the charming playboy
- Diluc is the cool, aloof swordsman
And the list can go on and on. Fans can thus find the character that appeals to them the most within the roster.
Their preferences for specific characters are expressed by fans in the best way they can: through fan art and memes.
Fan art (some of it not exactly suitable for children) and swooning over characters are plentiful on Reddit and social media. Often, there’s talk of hoping to pull that one favorite character or to assemble a team of desired characters.
Even new characters that are not yet playable and partly do not even appear in the game are already declared Waifus and Husbandos:
On YouTube, players create tier lists for the best Waifus in Genshin and suggest that the game should be renamed to “Waifu Impact” or “Genshin Impact: Breath of the Waifu”.
The one character you absolutely want
Genshin Impact is not alone in this. Many gacha games rely on the sex appeal of their playable characters in addition to the gameplay, which you can draw from the pool. Among them are popular titles like Fate/Grand Order or Granblue Fantasy.
The developers at miHoyYo apparently know that a successful gacha game also requires a range of characters that are not only strong but also attractive.
The characters do not necessarily have to be overly sexy or show a lot of skin, even if the character Lisa, with her many moans, fits well into this category:
It’s enough for characters to be perceived as merely attractive, cool, or cute. When looking at the character roster of Genshin Impact, one can see that the various types of characters are present at all levels of the tier list which sorts them by strength and usefulness.
This has two effects:
- If a player has bad luck pulling 5-star characters but doesn’t want to spend money, they can still have cool or sexy characters in their group, even if they are weaker.
- Players who are completely indifferent to min-maxing and strength still want the 5-star characters because there might be one among them that has particularly high Waifu or Husbando level for them.
This gives players an additional reason to keep playing, and it seems to work.
However, many in the Genshin Impact community have to admire their favorite Waifus and Husbandos from afar. Because the chances of pulling a 5-star character are slim and become even slimmer if it is one or several specific characters.
Counter Question: Is Genshin Impact also popular because it is not overly sexualized?
Even though there are sexy characters in Genshin Impact and “Jiggle Physics,” which give female breasts more movement, it holds back compared to some other anime games.
- The characters generally show little skin
- Young characters are not sexualized, but are rather cute
- Not only female characters are portrayed as sexy, but also male ones, which creates a balance
This moderate amount of “fan service” is perceived by some players as pleasant and not too intrusive.
I actually find it to be at a pleasant level.
The noticeably younger characters are less about being sexy, but rather cute, while the older characters tend to focus a bit more on revealing clothing. But it doesn’t go overboard; it stays quite true to anime series.
Namma on MeinMMO
And so, Genshin Impact keeps us hooked. Even if one has finished the story and is not particularly eager to grind for materials, some of us still keep playing. You want that one dream character badly to continue playing with him or her once the next chapter of the story and new content arrives.
It could be that they are particularly strong, have a cool story, or simply are top tier Waifu or Husbando material.
Have you already spent money on Genshin Impact to get a desired character?
