If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then Hoyoverse's Genshin Impact is about as flattering as games come. In 2019, Genshin Impact made a splash in the video game world with the unveiling of an open-world action-RPG that was heavily inspired by Nintendo’s The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. That's not to say it’s a mere knockoff, however. Genshin Impact features numerous unique gameplay systems and charming story beats that set it apart from Zelda and other genre titles. It also features a mountainous amount of content, to say nothing of the special events that are introduced every month. That said, the free-to-play PC game requires serious grinding (or spending serious dough) to unlock high-powered warriors, and artifact farming awaits end-game players looking for ideal gear. Flaws aside, Genshin Impact offers a genuinely massive, highly polished, and ever-expanding game for you to enjoy without spending a dime, earning it our Editors' Choice award.
Adventure Calls
Genshin Impact follows twins cast into an unknown world after a conflict with a super-powered goddess. You select a hero to begin the adventure, and after some story shenanigans, you become separated from your sibling. You spend the rest of the game in the unfamiliar world of Teyvat, as you search for your sibling and meet other heroes throughout the journey.
There’s no denying the visual similarities between Genshin Impact and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Both games feature open-world environments to explore that are jam-packed with treasures to find, walls to scale, and whimsical monsters to battle. Genshin Impact's archery and swordplay look extremely similar to Nintendo’s offering at first glance, and the colorful cel-shaded anime-inspired visual style is reminiscent of Zelda's look.
That said, Genshin Impact's party system immediately sets it apart from Zelda and other open-world RPGs. You actively recruit new playable characters into your group as you progress through the story, and each member possesses unique attack styles and abilities. There is some overlap; for example, sword-wielding heroes have unique attack animations, but they all feature the same combat inputs and are functionally similar.
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You can have up to four characters in the active party. Only one can be out on the field at any given time, but you can swap between party members on the fly, leading to an eye-catching explosion of combo attacks and particle effects.
More Than Meets the Eye
Genshin Impact features an expansive and nuanced elemental system that is tied to the game's party system. Each character has a designated elemental affinity, be it air, earth, fire, water, lightning, or ice. In addition to their standard melee combo and heavy attack, each character has a special, element-specific attack bound to a short cool-down gauge. These specials include auto-deflecting energy shields, potent counter-stances, spiraling sword formations, simple magical blasts, and area of effect attacks. It's important to effectively use these elemental attacks, as most enemies have their own affinity attacks and weaknesses that make them tough to deal with if you solely use melee attacks.
Not only does Genshin Impact incorporate elemental magic into its combat, but the game marries status effects to those systems. The result is a surprising well of depth that adds to the challenge. Every elemental attack afflicts its target with a status effect, as well as the base damage from the attack itself. Fire attacks, for example, leave victims burning for several seconds after the initial attack. Ice attacks slow opponents' movements.
Once a status has been placed on the target, the foe becomes susceptible to additional elemental attacks that cause a chain reaction. This is what makes Genshin Impact’s combat genuinely interesting. A target that has been drenched freezes solid when hit with an ice attack. An enemy chilled by an ice attack becomes superconductive when struck by lightning, crippling its defense to further physical attacks. There are many combinations to discover as you play, and the large character list means you can experiment to your heart's content as you explore the world.
The introduction of the Dendro element alongside the release of the Sumeru region adds even more complexity and richness to the gameplay. Dendro represents flora/plants, which reacts with fire, water and electric elements to produce a whole new range of reactions and effects. There is a lot to learn and master, so check out our Genshin Impact tips guide if you need a few pointers.
Explore the World
Naturally, an adventure is only as good as the world you explore. Genshin Impact features a sprawling world that's packed with enemies to fight, treasures to find, dungeons to raid, and heights to climb. Like Breath of the Wild, Genshin Impact's climbing is surprisingly open-ended, so you can scale most surfaces if you have the stamina to complete the ascent. As in Breath of the Wild, Genshin Impact gives you a glider to slow your descent speed, only in the form of wings, in this case. You use the wings to ride air currents, reach distant platforms, complete mini-games, and solve puzzles. The gliding wings consume stamina during use, so there is a limit to how far or long you can glide before you tumble out of the air. But thanks to both the free climbing and accessible gliding, Genshin Impact affords a fantastic sense of verticality; I found myself climbing any building, monument, and tree the game would let me for no reason other than because I could.
Genshin Impact incentivizes you to explore as much as you can. The world map is full of secrets and treasures to find. For example, you can extend the limits of your stamina by finding and donating magical teardrops to divine statues. These relics are hidden across the map, often in elevated spots that require you to ride air currents or solve a puzzle. Ghostly sprites hover over landmarks and encourage you to chase them across the field they inhabit for treasure chest rewards. Of course, dungeons are strewn throughout the world, and they're filled with monsters to slay, puzzles to solve, and gear to amass. Genshin Impact's cooking system lets you combine food items based on recipes you acquire to create meals that heal or temporarily boost attack and defense stats.
Genshin Impact has packed its world with interesting enemies, too. Spinning lizards, flower monsters, spectral wolves, ghostly knights, mushroom raptors, and so much more haunt Teyvat, which makes exploring interesting and engaging. Each expansion also introduces new world bosses, such as golems, plant fiends, giant samurai, dragons, and mechanized serpents. This is on top of the major, story-related bosses you can fight on a weekly basis.
Once you reach Adventure Rank 16, you can explore and dungeon raid in co-op, multiplayer action with up to four players. The host reaps most of the benefits from co-op sessions in the open world, but raiding dungeons and tackling bosses is lucrative for everyone. Genshin Impact also has cross-platform play with console and mobile, making it cinch to find other players.
The game is much more story-heavy than the Zelda-esque aesthetic would lead you to believe. While you are free to explore the world between narrative beats, there are limits to where you can go right at the start. At first, you are restricted to the regions surrounding Mondstadt, the game's first major region. However, the world opens as you clear story quests, discover landmarks, and solve puzzles. I appreciate Genshin Impact’s open-world design; you can explore and quest without a looming sense of being railroaded by the story, and without feeling too overwhelmed by the size of the full map.
Make a Wish
Hoyoverse has introduced more than 50 characters, a number that swells with each new region and story expansion. You get a handful of free characters to use once the story starts rolling, and they each possess a specific attack niche and elemental affinity. Amber, for example, is an archer who is almost always in my party, because her fire-arrows are a valuable puzzle-solving utility. Other characters, like the water-based healer, Barbara, or the fiery lancer, Xiangling, are unlocked by performing particular feats. Barbara is free to everyone who reaches Adventure Rank 20, and Xiangling is unlocked by getting halfway through the grueling Spiral Abyss gauntlet. Collei, a new Dendro archer, can also be unlocked for free via the Spiral Abyss if you missed her during the recent Sumeru launch event.
Beyond the freebies, the only other way to acquire new party members in this free PC game is through Primogems, a premium currency. These are sparingly awarded whenever you open chests, complete quests, participate in seasonal events, and undertake daily missions. You also earn Primogems upon completing game log achievements. As a premium currency, you can purchase Primogems via Genshin Impact’s cash shop. You can convert Genesis crystals, which can be bought in bundles of 300 for about five bucks, into Primogems at a 1:1 rate.
Unlocking new characters is not as simple as selecting the one you like and making a purchase, unfortunately. Characters are doled out randomly through the game's Wish system. For 160 Primogems, you can try your luck and make a Wish, which summons a random weapon or character from an expansive pool. The rates for pulling characters is pitifully low on average, for several reasons. Heroes are ranked as either four or five stars (depending on the character), while weapons range from three to five stars. As Wishes pull from both weapon and character pools, you're far more likely to get a rubbish three-star weapon than a new character.
There are a few caveats, however, that make the Wish system more palatable (we've even highlighted a few Genshin Impact tips for frugal adventurers in a separate guide). Essentially, every 10 Wishes you make guarantees that you get at least one four-star character or weapon. Low-rank weapons still muddy your roll, but at least three-star weapons are eliminated once every ten attempts. Five-star characters and weapons are decidedly rarer, and are only guaranteed every 90 attempts. It's daunting stuff, especially if you’re rolling for characters using real cash.
Even though the system is costly, diligent players can earn roughly one free roll per day by completing daily tasks and in-game events. Earning Primogems through gameplay is wholly more satisfying, and is more in line with how Genshin Impact pushes gameplay to the forefront. Of course, nothing is stopping you from whaling right from jump if you have the cash to do so.
A Musical Triumph
Your adventures across Teyvat are accented by a truly outstanding video game soundtrack. Produced by Hoyoverse’s in-house studio, Hoyo-Mix, Genshin Impact features one of the most engrossing and eclectic video game soundtracks I have ever had the pleasure to experience. Better still, the soundtrack only gets more impressive with each new region.
Enkanomiya's abyssal, floating islands feature somber, deeply atmospheric piano, string, and vocal tunes that match the zone's evanescent tragedy. The newly introduced Sumeru nation adds a host of new Indian and Middle Eastern-themed tracks, highlighting the region's unique sounds and instruments, such as the sitar, bansuri, and percussive tabla.
Flaws in the Canvas
Genshin Impact's earliest dungeons, called domains, are short, combat-heavy affairs. They aren’t particularly cerebral, so when you’re not fighting, you’re platforming, activating switches, or avoiding hazards. Unfortunately, this is one aspect of the game that hasn't changed much since launch. The recent summer event, Summertime Odyssey, introduced excellent and comprehensive Zelda-like domains, but this was a seasonal event that is no longer available. The bulk of Genshin Impact's domains are nowhere near as complex, which is a real shame, as dungeon crawling, especially puzzle-heavy ones, would be a great compliment to the game's elemental system.
Domains are serviceable, but are the least impressive part of the game, by far. They are mechanically sound, but players with a modicum of wanderlust can easily break out of the developer’s intended boundaries and fall out of the map or through floors. In one side dungeon, for example, I rode a wind current to the upper levels of the labyrinth and noticed a gap in the stonework in the previous chamber that led to a seemingly optional room. I cleverly rode the wind back down into said opening, only to find that the detail was cosmetic only, and fell through the floor and back to the entrance. Domains tend to look much larger and more impressive than they are.
Domain Grinding Tedium
One of Genshin Impact's biggest negatives is the incredibly arbitrary, artifact-collecting system. Artifacts are essentially your armor, and there are five pieces to collect: flower, plume, timepiece, goblet, and circlet. Each comes with randomized values for specific stats, such as defense, attack, critical rate, health, and elemental damage. Each Artifact set also has bonus parameters when you equip two, and four, pieces within said set. For example, the Gladiator’s Finale set grants you an 18% attack bonus when two pieces are equipped on a character. With four pieces equipped, you get an additional 35% melee attack buff.
The issue is that every facet of artifact-collecting is randomized. To get artifacts you want, you need to clear the domains that award them. Generally, domains award two entirely different sets, so there is no guarantee that you even get a piece from the set you want. Assuming you do, you then have a one-in-five chance to get the specific piece you want (flower, plume, timepiece, goblet, and circlet). If you’ve gotten lucky so far, then consider that the stats on said artifact are randomized. If you’re building an attack-focused character, for example, you want attack and critical-focused stats on your artifact. However, there is no guarantee that you get one with the stats you want.
Even if, after all this randomness, you get a viable piece to use, you still need to level it up. Through the leveling process, stats increase in value randomly, and only at specific breakpoints (levels 4, 8, 12, 16, and 20). There is no guarantee that a viable artifact you farmed for increases the value of the stats you want. Attack and critical-oriented stats are notoriously unlikely to increase compared to less optimal stats, such as defense or HP. So it’s common, even likely, that after all that farming, leveling, and luck, you still end up with a trash artifact.
There is no way to influence the system to give you what you want. Grinding and luck are the only way to get good artifacts, and this farming process is the crux of Genshin Impact’s endgame. Admittedly, there are many hours of gameplay and story to get through before farming for gear becomes relevant for new players. But the grind is an utter chore for long-time players who have been enjoying the game since launch.
Can Your PC Run Genshin Impact?
To run Genshin Impact, your gaming PC needs at least an Intel Core i5 or equivalent CPU, a Nvidia GeForce GT 1030 or higher graphics card, 8GB of RAM, and at least 30GB of storage space. In addition, the computer must run the 64-bit Windows 7 (or later) operating system. On a gaming desktop, with an AMD Ryzen 5 3600 processor, Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080, and 16GB of RAM, Genshin Impact runs at a smooth 60 frames per second at 1440p.
My only genuine gripe is the lack of key bind customization. Genshin Impact plays intuitively on keyboard and mouse, but I dislike being forced to use my mouse wheel. In Genshin Impact, the mouse wheel is used for its detection system, which functions similarly to the Witcher vision in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. The detection system isn't used very often outside of a few key quests, but it was annoying to switch to a gamepad to get it to work correctly. I would have loved to bind that function to another key instead.
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A Winning Recipe
It’s easy to ding Genshin Impact for its gacha pricing model. The artifact-grind is also a tremendous, tedious chore for everyone. But it’s worth noting that the game is entirely free. Sure, you need to gamble for cool new characters and weapons, but neither of these are at all necessary to enjoy the delightful world, story, and sounds that Genshin Impact offers. You get a base character roster that covers all elemental alignments for free, you can clear the story and optional content with gear you find in-game, and Hoyoverse frequently introduces events with new, free gear. To date, Genshin Impact lacks money-gated elements, which is more than many other gacha games, and even some full-priced titles, can claim. If you want an open world with hours of relaxing exploration and content to enjoy, be it alone or with friends, Genshin Impact has that in spades, and at a price that you literally cannot beat, earning our Editors' Choice award.
For more recommendations, take a look at our selection of The Best PC Games. If battling across Teyvat has put you in a fighting mood, check out our picks for Best PC Action Games. And for rich video game talk, swing by PCMag’s Pop-Off YouTube Channel.
Despite its superficial similarities to a certain popular Nintendo property, Genshin Impact has grown into a phenomenal, free-to-play action-RPG that offers creative combat and an engrossing world to explore.
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