Genshin Impact — Usability, Accessibility, and Ethics

An open-world role-playing game (RPG) with beautiful graphics and anime-like characters? It’s a no-brainer why many people including myself are addicted to Genshin Impact. The Gacha game was developed by miHoYo and officially launched in September 2020. It hit commercial success and grossed over $1B within six months.

So, what makes Genshin Impact so enjoyable from a user’s standpoint? The answer is simple, it meets all five categories of usability heuristics. Let’s take a deeper look at how the developers achieve this.

Usability

• Learnability. As new players enter the world, they are taken to a brief introduction to the lore and a tutorial. Like other RPGs, players are first placed in the beginner area of the map where the monsters are low in level. This tactic is a method of easing new players into familiarising themselves with the game mechanics with a steady learning curve before diving into its complexity. Players are also guided by a series of quests to move along the storyline. These are always present within the quest bar to track progress for each one as well as indicators on the map to let the player know where to go and what action they need to do.

Learnability — map navigation to guide users through their quests

• Memorability. Due to the game’s complexity, there are a lot of actions a user can take — whether this is to move around the map, to look at their quests bar, to access the inventory, or to add friends. As a result, it would be a lie if I said the game mechanics are easy to remember. With that being said, the user interface never changes so the more time is spent playing the game, the more familiar users become with the UI.
• Efficiency. Once users are familiar with the mechanics, access to the most common tasks can be easily reached on the screen. The most important actions including getting access to the inventory are always present, while less important actions such as friend list are hidden in the menu so it doesn’t get distracting during combat.

Efficiency — quick menu to access a range of actions

• Errors. Now imagine playing hours to get an in-game artifact and whilst you clean up your inventory, you accidentally discarded it. This would be detrimental and so error prevention is crucial to games like Genshin. Luckily, the developers have made it impossible for users to bin items or use their in-game currency to roll on banners without first reading a pop-up message asking if they want to proceed with their action and warning to let them know this action cannot be undone in bold red writing.
• Satisfaction. The game encourages the user to explore the open-world map and to complete series of quests following a storyline. As the user progresses, the more achievements they unlock and the more primogems (in-game currency) they acquire. As more time is spent on the game, users receive more rewards — making the experience of playing an RPG enjoyable and satisfactory. miHoYo regularly asks their user to complete satisfaction surveys but not surprisingly, this is not released to the public.

Accessibility

There’s no doubt that the graphics for Genshin is beautiful. Being so visually stimulating, the game didn’t spare to spend a large amount of their budget on audio either. Every dialogue is accompanied by audio of the specific character talking. This is crucial for those who are visually impaired and have difficulty reading in-game text. Additionally, every dialogue is accompanied by close captions for those who have a hearing impairment.

Graphics Setting

Moreover, players are given the option to customise their UI to suit their personal preferences and needs. This ranges from controls, graphics, audio, and language.

Configure Controls

With that being said, those with fine motor disabilities may find it difficult to play this game due to the complex mechanics of combat. However, it looks like the gaming industry is making a move towards designing and building adaptable controllers for gamers with disabilities (source). With platforms such as PlayStation supporting games like Genshin, this could move us one step closer to improving the accessibility of games.

Ethics

There’s a lot of debate around Gatcha games. A genre of video games that simulate a toy vending machine mechanic. Gacha games encourage players to spend in-game currency to receive a virtual item.

For Genshin, this is to induce users to roll for their favourite in-game character. With limited banners that rotate every 2 weeks, it’s hard to resist the temptation not to continue rolling before the chance to get your favourite character disappears.

An example banner highlighting the characters that can be obtained

However, miHoYo is clear about one thing and that this is a free-to-play game. Although five-star characters have better in-game statistics compared to four-star characters, this is not to say that players cannot complete the game without five-star paid characters. So the choice to spend in-game money for better weapons or a character of choice is purely up to the user. Yes, it can make the gameplay easier but no, it doesn’t mean you have to pay to win.

Key Learnings

When it comes to creating a game, it really boils down to creating a positive user experience. With that being said, a unique storyline or beautiful graphics can only take the game so far. To achieve success, developers and designers have to consider how easily players can learn the game, how to create an experience that accommodates the broadest possible set of user needs, and lastly, how to be transparent and have users enjoy the game without worrying about the hidden dark patterns.