Yesterday, Genshin Impact develops HoYOverlook announced that the latest update to their open world RPG would be delayed, a first for a live service game that has been reliably consistent for the past two years. The official Twitter account said that version 2.7 would be postponed due to “project progress” and that more information about the new date, content adjustments and compensation would eventually be announced.
The studio has managed to meet every official release date in a remarkable stretch, so many fans think the delay speaks to the seriousness of the government-mandated shutdowns in Shanghai, China. More Genshin players responded to the message by linking a tweet about supply chain issues. The relative patience of the community was remarkable due to Genshin players are known for making controversies out of very small perceived little things, such as the low number of anniversary rewards (which led to no less than ten unrelated games get the review bomb by angry Genshin players).
Most of the response on Twitter has been sympathetic. Multiple players replied that they were willing to wait. Genshin streamers expressed concerns for the safety of employees, wished them welland hoped that their relationship would get better. Some players reminded the community that the well-being of developers was more important than banners or compensation currency (HoYoverse has allocated special currency to temporarily close functions in its housing system). Even though infamous delicious just as Lumie (who had to remake their account to avoid official controls) reminded the community that the company “has no control over real-life events.”
Reddit was significantly more concerned how much compensation would result from the delay. Compensation is a common practice in gacha games where companies will distribute free premium currency as an ‘excuse’ for regularly scheduled maintenance or emergency repairs. These are not actual excuses, but currency outages that players anticipate in order to build up their savings. Several players pointed out that content delays meant they had more time to save up for the gacha characters they would pull after. However, some Reddit users were particularly sympathetic one commentator who pointed it out Genshin has one of the fastest update cycles compared to other gacha games. Even those players who want a delay seem to think that HoYoverlook will pretty soon resume its normal schedule.
Like a Reddit user pointed out wisely: “Health before wealth.”