I know saying it doesn’t matter how you play a game is kind of a funny stance to take, given that a good portion of my job is playing a game to an efficient death in the name of optimizing it and writing guides to teach you how to do it too. But nothing frustrates me more than someone telling me how I’m supposed to play a game.
Maybe it’s because I grew up playing simulation games that give you a lot of direction at the start before letting you go wild, or maybe it’s because I’ve been dealing with tryhard guys doubting my gamer cred as a woman my whole post-pubescent life, but no matter what it is, it grinds my gears to be told how to enjoy something, and that goes doubly so for gacha games like Genshin Impact and Infinity Nikki.
I’ve written before about how I feel about getting into Genshin Impact years after its launch: both blessed and scared by how much there is for me to catch up on. After three months of playing daily, I’ve got 29 characters unlocked, all the Statues activated, and I’m hanging out at Adventure Rank 50 until my main four are a little stronger.
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Among said main four is Diluc – there’s something about a lanky pessimist with a biting wit that always does it for me, so I, like Donna, fell in love quickly when I met him in Mondstat. I was prepared to wait a while to pull him, but on only my second banner, I lost my 50/50 and got Diluc instead of Wriothesley. That night, my voice was hoarse for a while after how loudly and suddenly I let out a scream of elation when my favorite redheaded claymore-user popped up on screen. I’m sure people seeking to increase the constellation of one of the meta cryo users of the moment would have been livid to pull Diluc there, and I’d have been pretty sad if I lost to anyone but him, but I have him now and he almost immediately became the strongest character on my team.
Plenty of my friends have pointed out that while it’s nice I have my man, there are pyro users superior to him stat-wise who have been gathering dust on my character screen already. I pulled Arlecchino with less than 20 pity when I first started playing, and Dehya came not long later, but with Petrichor and Sumeru so far out at the time, they got shelved in favor of Amber whose ascension materials were much easier to get. And now that I have Diluc, as well as Gaming whose fiery sass and plunge attack I also adore, I don’t see myself prioritizing the pyro characters in Genshin for the moment.
I even have Chevreuse’s constellation completed with how many times I’ve pulled her, but she’s almost never in the party – I’m too tired of seeing her come up on my banner screens to see her every day adventuring, too.
My In-Game Currencies Are Mine To Spend
The other gacha I’m hooked on is Infinity Nikki, and I’ve been playing since the closed beta back in October 2024. I still love it, mega-buggy updates and all, but having been in Miraland for so long, I’ve finished every single quest already. My Mira Level is 78, my outfit compendium is stacked, and I just log in for a few minutes to do my dailies between big updates while I have coffee before work.
To keep things interesting between new content in updates, I started working on a complete Eureka compendium, a project I started before we earned extra Diamonds for logging color sets. I’ve always been a completionist; I have a living Pokedex, and the only reason my Persona playtimes are so absurd is due to the hours I spend in the Velvet Room making every Persona, so while it sounds tedious, it’s satisfying to me.
Part of getting into multiple gacha games is that the gacha in Nikki seems a little flimsier to me now, and less worth it. When I spend my premium currencies in Genshin Impact, I can get a whole new character with talents, weapons, artifacts, lore, and tons of interactivity around the world of Teyvat, but when I spend in Nikki, sometimes I might only get a rare dress I can’t find a practical use for. Getting an iridescent Eureka feels more like the gambler’s rush of pulling a five-star character than pulling a five-star outfit piece does.
As such, I’ve been using my Diamonds on Vital Energy every day, quick-finishing trials from which I still need to make iridescent Eurekas. Any of my Nikki friends I tell about this project are downright aghast that I would blow my Diamonds on anything but pulling for outfits, but I’ve kind of realized I never cared much about using them ‘correctly.’ I mean, I blew them on Vital Energy at the beginning of the game while trying to make the Wishful Aurosa outfit a little faster by leveling up my skills with the Fufus, and then I did the same thing again when the Silvergale Aria outfit came out.
I’m not an efficient player, and that’s okay because I’m not trying to be. I think I might just not care about that aspect of the game anymore, but guess what? I’m still logging in every day, having a blast, working toward my own things, and having fun in my own way.
Play Your Games The Way You Want
There’s merit in optimizing your playtime. Hell, it’s why I’ve got a job writing game guides in the first place. But at the end of the day, these are games. I’ve always been a creative kid and I think that’s why I got so into sandbox games so early, but while it’s nice to have a goal in bulky, open-world, endlessly expanding games like Genshin Impact and Infinity Nikki, I don’t think it detracts from the fun to have a different goal.
I always appreciate well-meaning advice, and I love my job in giving it, too. But I’m not here to judge your favorite things or ways of playing, so leave me, my Diluc preference, and my iridescent Eureka collection alone – we’re pretty, we’re making our own fun, and we’re having a damn good time doing it.
Genshin Impact
- Released
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September 28, 2020
- ESRB
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T for Teen – Fantasy Violence, Alcohol Reference
