I Want To Keep Playing Genshin Impact, But Its Barren End Game Makes It Difficult

For a long-running game, what do you think is most important to keep it fresh and engaging? I think it is the presence of meaningful end-game content. In the early stages of your progress, you have plenty to do like story chapters, side quests, exploration objectives (if open world), challenges, etc. But once you hit end-game, you need proper end-game content that serves to challenge your characters, build, and game knowledge.

On the contrary, you’ll be burned out pretty quickly if you have nothing concrete to do, and that could be fatal for a long-running game. Thus, I believe the existence of end-game content is integral, even more so if the game is pretty great otherwise. Notice anything that comes in this category? For me, it’s Genshin Impact. It is a brilliant adventure through and through that makes more effort every patch, but the timeframe between pre-determined content is pretty barren.

I’ve Seen Genshin Impact Grow Into The Splendid Adventure It Is Today

I still remember seeing the trailer for this game and being excited for an anime-style open-world RPG, and the rest was history. Playing this game since Day 1, I’ve spent more than 3500 hours in it and witnessed firsthand how it changed and improved over the years. At the time of its release and even a long time later, it was always compared to BOTW, and for very valid reasons. Other than its character and combat, Genshin Impact on release was very much a Breath of the Wild clone.

It stayed in BOTW’s shadow for a long time but continued to try and bring some innovations, as minor as they may be. Gradually, the game introduced new regions with distinct landscapes, improved and more creative puzzles, and an overall world design that gave it a distinct identity. It continues to improve, with the new Fontaine region introducing proper underwater exploration and traversal, the game’s best world design choice to date.

Underwater exploration is honestly mesmerizing!
byu/neverplatonic inGenshin_Impact

All in all, with vastly improved world design and environments, new character kits and combat styles, some fun events in between, and an impactful story, Genshin’s growth from its launch days is gigantic. All this contributed to how it became a global sensation and continues to go strong. I’m positive many of the players didn’t even know what Gacha was before Genshin Impact, now it has become so well-known many others are trying to create proper big-budget Gacha games.

Even I Admit Genshin Critically Needs Better End-Game Content

From all that, you must’ve got an idea of how much I enjoy Genshin Impact. Thus, take it from a hardcore fan, the game is in dire need of better end-game content. This isn’t as much of a problem for new players, but veterans who have completed a majority of the game’s content have essentially nothing to do in the interval between periodic content. The game has such detailed character-building and growth mechanics, but very few things to test them on.

This game desperately needs some real end game content already
byu/TurtleIslander inGenshin_Impact

The only permanent end-game content available to Genshin Impact players is the Spiral Abyss. In this mode, you have to fight waves of enemies with two teams of four characters each, and you get better rewards for clearing faster. The enemies are of higher difficulty, but the actual challenge is meeting the time limit. You can select some buffs in between subsequent floors to gain an advantage. This is the only mode you can test your end-game builds on.

Spiral Abyss is a pretty interesting concept, but the problem is that it is far from enough. Let me break down Genshin’s content cycle a little. A new patch arrives every 41 days, and it does not always pack new locations and areas, but it has some new events. These events arrive with an interval, but generally, for standard events the content within is pretty short. This creates a lot of gap days with nothing to do, and even the abyss takes 15 days to reset. See the problem?

Players who have reached “end game”, what do you do?
byu/gelamarionne inGenshinImpact

What’s With The “Not Wanting To Give The Players Anxiety”?

Yes, this is the reason the developers gave back in 2022 in response to why Genshin Impact doesn’t have better end-game content. End-game content will increase the difficulty level and it would be troublesome so the game is avoiding it. To this day I disagree with this thinking, and firmly believe better content will be nothing but beneficial in the long run. I’d rather have something difficult to do that motivates me to get better instead of having nothing at all.

Also, we’re forgetting one key factor; Permanent end-game content in any game is entirely optional. It is the hardest content the game has to offer and serves as a challenge to test your mettle against. By design, it is not to be attempted until you’re at “end-game” and you can always opt out of doing it if your teams or characters are not strong enough yet. This also gives you the motivation that this is the level I have to reach to call myself proficient in this game.

Swarm Disaster showed me how bad my main team is and how bad I am in this game
byu/alonedead inHonkaiStarRail

What will you do with your monstrous end-game builds anyway? Genshin’s open-world is child’s play even with average builds let alone OP ones, and with enough effort, Spiral Abyss is not insurmountable either. I’m saying all this with experience, I have nothing to throw my characters at in between events. Not having anything to do gives me even more anxiety than a difficult challenge. A fair challenge is more motivating than stressful.

The “Less Than A Year Old” Honkai: Star Rail Has A Better Endgame Than Genshin Impact

Okay, I’ll be honest, if Mihoyo (the present Hoyoverse) followed this philosophy in all of its games, I would have accepted this as a flaw and moved on, but that is not the case. Take a look at Honkai Impact 3rd for example. The game has been running for more than 7 years now, and it has consistently performed more and more experiments with challenging endgame content. Do those players not feel any anxiety due to difficult content?

You might say that is a fairly old game, so let me give a recent example. Following Genshin Impact’s overwhelming popularity, Honkai: Star Rail followed it to appeal to the turn-based audience, thus keeping it distinct. Even on its release, Star Rail had better rewards and endgame content than the present Genshin. What’s more, in a timespan that is a quarter of Genshin’s lifetime, the newer entry has released more endgame content upgrades than the predecessor ever did.

Star Rail started with two endgame modes: Simulated Universe and Forgotten Hall, in comparison to Genshin’s only one. In addition, it has expanded the Simulated Universe mode twice now, added another permanent mode to Forgotten Hall, and even introduced a new, more brutal but enjoyable Swarm Disaster mode. If all this can work in Honkai, why can’t the same be done for Genshin? I feel motivation and excitement playing these game modes in Honkai, while Genshin is still stuck with only Spiral Abyss.

Simulated Universe Is The Best Gacha Game Mode Ever
by inHonkaiStarRail

We Can Get A Testing Ground As Well As Better Rewards, It’s A Win-Win

If all of the above discussion didn’t make it clear, let me say it again, there are no drawbacks to better endgame content in Genshin Impact, it only has merits. An argument can be made that difficult endgame content will make the game even more pay to win, and thus harmful for F2P players. To this, I reply that take a look at the other two games and you’ll realize that all of these game modes can be done with completely F2P teams and proper thinking.

I believe this will be more beneficial to F2P players than the pay-to-win ones. That’s because the presence of more endgame modes means you’ll have more sources to farm the gacha currency, and thus have a higher amount of pulls you can get without spending money. Present the possibility of free rolls and there won’t be a single player to reject this. In addition, this will give pay-to-win players the motivation to create even stronger teams and thus will spend more.

And still no End Game Content…
byu/EMaylic inGenshin_Memepact

No matter how you see it, it’s a win-win for everyone, including the developers. With better endgame content, players will have more difficult encounters to test their teams on, and they’ll be more motivated to put extra effort into building characters. After having completed everything Genshin has to offer so far, it will give players like me a chance to test and further improve our characters, as well as those delicious rewards to sate the gacha addiction.