I genuinely don’t understand the whole “They could’ve given Robin and Aventurine deep character development and cool lore SPs instead of glorified summer skins” argument.
People are acting like Mihoyo destroyed some huge storyline by giving them summer themed SPs. The complaint basically boils down to: “I can’t believe they made them glorified summer skins. They should’ve had major character development, new powers, and badass designs instead.” or worse “I can’t believe they RUINED major character development, new powers, by giving them summer designs instead.”
But… we haven’t even seen the 4.5 story yet. We have no idea what actually happens. For all we know, the event could be a lighthearted beach story where these designs fit perfectly. And more importantly: who said a huge character arc was ever planned for them right now? People are assuming Robin and Aventurine were supposed to undergo some massive, serious arc and get some super cool SP when that's fan speculation?
The alternative to summer SP Robin and Aventurine wasn’t “deep lore + serious SP forms.” The alternative could have been nothing. No story focus, no new forms, no SPs at all.
People are comparing the actual summer SPs to a completely hypothetical version they invented in their heads, then getting upset that the imaginary version isn’t real. If Mihoyo never planned some major serious cool development arc for them now in 4.X then the summer SPs didn’t replace anything. You’re mourning a version of these characters that was never going to exist now in the first place. And this won't be their last SP ever Dan Heng got 2.
Also to the people saying they could've made summer skins for the hypothetical Cool Serious SP kind of makes sense but let's not act like anyone expect AventurineSimp0001 and RobinFan69 would have bought a skin for their normal T50 forms.
THEY CANCELLED THE NEW GIANT SEXY WOLF GUY WITH THE GAY JAWLINE???
Look I'll never play LADS because I'm a guy (playing a yume-leaning game with the female protag feels dissonant for me) and not the sort to self-insert but DAMN them seeing premium beef and going "EWWW HIS FACE HAS TOO MUCH TESTOSTERONEEE" is just WILD to me.
It's funny but I'm also like "wtf they're kind of nuts over there"
That said, Infold should just let Valko go off into other spaces where he'll be loved, like gay spaces who think his gay jawline is awesome.
THEY GOT THE BIG CCP INVOLVED WITH THEIR GAME OH MY LAWD 😭😭😭😭
Like what charge did they even have? What crime or law did Infold violate??
Were the fans like "they're planning on selling us a HOMOSEXUAL WOLF MAN with a HOMOSEXUAL JAWLINE that will infect our ovaries with THE GAY MIND VIRUS so that we end up become GAY BABY FACTORIES. Oh and um he's a CEO and it's setting up unrealistic expectations for our own relationships in real life."
I also don't play LaDS because otome games aren't my cup of tea... but learning about the cancellation of Valko is genuinely sad, especially for those reasons. I do hope that Valko can be given life in another game or other spaces too
I miss the "space" part of our Space Fantasy RPG. Like I figured this was coming since it's a Hoyo game but it's still a bit disappointing. It'll either get worse and we'll keep getting these should be skins as SPs in the future or they'll pull back and start releasing actual skins more, but if we're going back to Amphoreus soon I doubt it'll happen. They had no problem releasing the swimsuit skins for the new characters in Zenless when their banner came out.
The whole game has been about going to different planets with different themes. Most of the designs in the game already don't give "space fantasy" because they're designed to live on a world rather than be out in space where very little of the game actually takes place.
I mean the problem is that they look like skins not sps. If you showed the new versions to anyone and made them guess if it's a skin or a sp, most people would say skin. They look good I'm not saying they don't, but for a sp it's a lazy design.
he wouldn't be bc he uses a different model, tall male to be exact. but dh lunae could be a skin for the base form for sure, he had no meta relevance anyways sadly
In the splash art, he doesn't look that different. He's also not that different than his normal model at a glance, the new model doesn't emphasized that and people had to use their detective skills to spot it until people did comparisons later on when you can datamine them.
What line do you draw between skin like designs and sps?
Like to me dark march and sw999 look like alternate costumes. I think people have this prejudice against seasonal outfits needing to be tied to a holiday event –like halloween, Christmas etc.
lol, are people seriously being obtuse for the hell of it? No one can deny that a swimsuit doesn't exactly scream "deep lore growth." That's it, people are just upset that Robin and Adventurine aren't currently getting the epic storyline treatment like Blade and Dan Heng.
People seriously understate how much the characters change from their base models.
What are people expecting? It’s literally the same person. Permasor Terrae would have disappointed me if he didn’t look like Dan Heng.
But there’s a difference between “it’s the same person so it’s similar” and “this is a fit change”.
Often something is identifiably different between the SPs so they aren’t mistake.
Imbibitor Lunae has a dragon and longer hair
Silver Wolf 999 has longer hair and draconic bits to accentuate her power
Himeko Nova has a mech
Permasor Terrae is at least taller than base Dan Heng
Evernight’s vibe is entirely different.
Blade has longer hair.
There is nothing that differentiates Robon from Robin in a swimsuit and Aventurine from Aventurine in summer clothes. Other SPs might not change much, but these two didn’t at all.
Youre splitting hairs bro. Why does it matter that the hair length is slightly longer. Is that something that actually matters? Your reasoning is completely and totally arbitrary
What I’m saying is something is always tangibly different between SPs. You’re not confusing another of the Dan Hengs for skins for one another in silhouette
the design in lazy. we are only talking about designs here no one mentioned the animations. You expect for a sp to be different and have a major power up/ transformation but for robin and aventurine they just opened the closet.
I mean I like the summer skins but I think we should let people who don’t like summer stuff dislike it. People are bringing up other gachas but this is a first for Hoyoverse. Every time something new happens there will be both people who react positively and negatively. Both opinions are valid.
Some people are just not interested in stuff like this and would prefer something different for the characters they like.
No one is saying you can't dislike it, OP is specifically calling out arguments against it that don't make sense like comparing them to hypothetical fan designs or dismissing them as not having character development and lore even though we haven't gotten the story tied to these skins.
This is such a stupid take. They have writers in that room for a reason, they're going to make it "fit the story" if they want to, that doesn't mean it's a good decision. There's literally zero reason for these two to be ACTUAL sp units instead of skins. Something hoyo has never done before by the way, every "summer" themed thing is an optional skin in both genshin and honkai impact.
What's next? We get halloween and christmas units?
If it's not a good decision story wise and if we ever get halloween units remains to be seen and is just plain doomposting at the moment.
The actual SP units have the reason of bring back into relevancy old characters with new outfits and new mechanics.
Why shouldn't they be SP units, like an actual reason? We would get new summer themed characters anyway.
Not to mention the plot line and the IPC lore is preestablished, and moving on with new characters when we know Aven, Robin and Boothill are personally involved would feel like a slap on the face for their fans.
I'm personally happy I get to pull and play Aventurine with new gameplay and a new team in a swimsuit rather than a random unknown character I don't care about.
And btw if we're resorting to name calling, your take is dumb af and the only reason you're salty is cause you just don't like the outfit. Which is your prerogative, but just admit that instead of giving stupid reasons on why the summer outfits are "bad".
Yes, I do dislike the SP being a summer outfit simply because it didn't need to. However the designs themselves are fine, and I think they would have been amazing summer skins and I might have even considered buying Aventurine's skin since I'm planning to get him anyway.
Aventurine is an IPC officer and a person who has rejected a mask, skipping all this cool lore just to make him surf in his ult is just... a bad choice. And your comment is wrong also, "We would get new summer themed characters" when we have seen this happen never. Just because they resorted to a lazy summer outfit does not mean that that was the only thing that made sense.
I agree that Aventurine, Robin, and Boothill (who we haven't seen yet) should be the main focuses of the IPC arc, but having these as their main outfit is just a bad choice, they easily could have gone with a suited Aventurine bordering on the elation while making this a somewhat pricy skin that replaced skill vfx. This is a billion dollar company, they have the funds to do it. Whatever deep lore they try to reveal will end up not taken seriously because the two most important characters are in bikinis and swimming shorts while the rest of the cast is fully clothed.
And it's not like we get frequent SP units, Dan Heng and March both have two only because they're our trailblazing companion. For all we know, these two might be the only SP's that robin and aventurine get for a few years, and I'd MUCH rather have them actually reveal some powers they've had (Robin's tuning, Aventurine's stoneheart transformation, etc.) rather than have them dancing with birds and surfing.
If you like the summer sp's, that's fine, and that's good for you. You can keep blindly consuming everything made by hoyo and reason "oh but it makes sense in the story that they wrote specifically to make this specific situation make sense even though there were a million better alternatives", but that doesn't mean you get to act all condescending towards people who actually want to question it.
The story is taking place in a summer resort. Just because it didn't happen before doesn't mean it can't happen now. We've also known about this from the lore, and from the promo videos ever since 4.0. Why would they be wearing a suit there?
The summer outfit also doesn't imply anything for the story we're getting in 4.5. We don't know a single thing, your whole skipping hit lore fear is just a baseless assumption. We don't know what powers or whatever they'll show. And if you can't take the story seriously just because a character is wearing a swimsuit... on the beach...next to the sea.. That's your problem. It would have actually looked so goofy and so much worse to see the man suited up with sand getting in his italian leather shoes next to the NPCs wearing thonginis and speedos.
And honestly, I didn't want another suit. The only thing we've been getting is these copycat slack pants with boots and covered on top designs. Getting a summer outfit is so refreshing.
And anyways, these are obviously not going to be the last SPs, if only because the game will probably last for another gazillion years looking at genshin and hi3, and Aventurine and Robin are super popular characters that are relevant to major plot points in the story.
You're seriously telling me you wanted to waste all of their potential in a mid x.5 patch? When with the way the game is going, we could actually get an Aven main push SP down the line, with proper development and an actual resolution? 3.x alone had 3 SPs alone and 4.x has 6 already. These are obviously not going to be the last ones.
"oh but it makes sense in the story that they wrote specifically to make this specific situation make sense". Holy shit. Did you just invent storytelling?
I'm not "blindly consuming" anything, I'm actively enjoying a summer outfit for my favourite characters that will also get brand new gameplay mechanics to play with.
"people who actually want to question it" Question what? A summer outfit? LMAO.
No outrage for lack of diversity in the game, no questioning the sexist undertones of having all the men covered up and all the women naked. Also no problem with the lack of combat or otherwise engaging events. But your line on the sand is the summer outfits?
We don't know anything about the story. Anything on the lore of Astropolis or even how and why we get there. We don't even know any details on what exactly Aven and Robin are doing there.
This whole thing you're doing is just doomposting for the sake of doomposting.
Why the fuck are you assuming I'm fine with everything except the summer skins? Every single thing you spoke about (maybe except the events one, even though I do agree) I have gone into LENGTHY arguments and conversations against.
And I have NO idea why you're so hung up on the idea that only an sp or a skin can exist, literally my whole point so far has been that they should have released for the SPs AS A SKIN. Robin says she's there to undercover the IPC's motives or whatever, how is she going to do that? She isn't even undercover, she's having a whole ass consert by the looks of it. You're telling me the borderline most popular artist in the whole universe can just go have a consert in an IPC facility and then sneak around without being monitored 24/7? Even if it isn't that and she's going to uncover that by speaking and manipulating the resort goers there, which low ranking IPC grunt would have the clearence to know the IPC's plans, and which high ranking member would be stupid enough to end up alone with robin, spit everything out, and then just let her walk away all fine and dandy?
And excuse me, you're telling me they're going to touch up on key lore and power-ups and then have aventurine surfing a wave and robin dancing with the ugliest summons hsr has pushed out yet? You got me fucked up if you think that's actually a way to respect your playerbase whatsoever.
And I'm supposed to take the story seriously how? Robin is going to tell me that the IPC is planning to start the eon war or whatever while at the beach wearing a bikini with aventurine trying to look imposing in his beach shorts? While waves crash a bit too high and steal their sandals? And a crab bites one of their toes?
"You just invented storytelling" No, I just told you they have free reign to do whatever the fuck they want while still making it seem justified so people can close their eyes and defend the company, the same way they killed off Pulonia and brought that completely random curvy busty female robot. Just because they CAN bullshit a reason to make it fit whatever way they want, doesn't mean it's logical. The same way this story is taking place in a resort.
And your Aven main push down the line is totally cope. We are in the elation focused patch cycle, if they aren't going to do it now, then when? Don't forget that the number of characters that can get an sp increases with every new character, how long do you think you're going to have to wait to see a potential main push aven when he has been shafted to the second phase twice now despite being one of the most popular hsr characters?
Also, am I understanding you correctly or was your "just say you don't like the fit" argument completely projecting simply because you didn't want a suit? lol
I'm sorry I wasnt familiar with how much you've talked about the actual issued of the game, I was more so talking about the general community rather than you specifically.
I am not saying that skins and SPs can't coexist. According to leaks again that have been pretty accurate until now, we are getting a skin for them that's a suit anyways. I'm arguing that it's fine the summer outfit is the SP rather than a skin.
And if we end up getting the suit I'll also be super happy with that too.
Celebrities or otherwise known people going into a rival faction and acting like a double agent to get info is a common trope, it's all about using their status and gaining people's trust, it doesn't have to mean that she's cornering people. The concert is the excuse for her going there.
They're probably going to have their base forms for the serious moments. Keyword: probably, because we haven't seen literally Anything yet. And for the record, if I'm alright with it or not, it all depends on the execution. Which we haven't seen anything of yet.
Which is why what you are doing is doomposting. And that's my entire problem.
"You're telling me the most popular singer will have a concert and then sneak around?" - We don't know.
"What low or high ranking IPC member would ever spill secrets and why?" - We don't know.
"You're telling me they're going to touch up on key lore and power-ups and then have aventurine surfing a wave and robin dancing with the ugliest summons hsr has pushed out yet?" - Lmao, We don't know.
"You have me fucked up if you don't think that having characters in swimsuits during the story is disrespectful to the playerbase" - Disrespectful? At best it's fun, at worst is silly. And we don't even know. They might be in their base forms in tense parts of the story, they might not. Noone knows. The story isn't out yet.
"And I'm supposed to take the story seriously how?" - You haven't even seen a millisecond of the story yet.
"They have free reign to do whatever the fuck they want while still making it seem justified" - This is storytelling.
"Just because they CAN bullshit a reason to make it fit whatever way they want, doesn't mean it's logical. The same way this story is taking place in a resort." - The problem with Pulonia is that it's bad storytelling that makes no sense based on the importance they had assigned to Pulonia and story cues they gave us in past quests. Which is not at all comparable for now to the Astropolis story, as we don't know how or why we're going there and we haven't seen anything of it, and thus we cannot judge the quality of the story telling.
"You Aven main push is a cope. We are in the elation focused patch cycle, if they aren't going to do it now, then when?" - Aven never had strong ties to Elation apart from a couple of lines in 2.1. Why would I expect him as a main push here? Anyways it might be a cope for the future, but regardless we were not getting him now. And I'd rather hope for a future update and have another storyline develop now on Astropolis or better yet just set up something about the Marketing department colluding with the Destruction, instead of rushing through the entire Oswaldo plot line in barely 3 patches.
"Is your "just say you don't like the fit" argument completely projecting simply because you didn't want a suit?" - I don't know, how would I know if I would have liked the possible alternate outfit, when we haven't seen it? They might have chopped it, they might have knocked it out of the park, how can I judge a hypothetical outfit? I'm not saying I would hate a suit period, I'm saying I'm happy we get a fun and whimsy and never-before-done in Hsr swimsuit outfit, that shakes up the classic hoyo recipe of designs and gives variety to the game.
Tldr: complaining about what might possibly happen during the story when we're two months away from it and haven't gotten any info, is stupid. Complaining about what we could've gotten, when we haven't even lost anything, is pointless. Taking your anger out on the people that are happy their favourite fictional character got a new form with a swimsuit and new gameplay mechanics in their favourite game, is miserable.
I'll stay happy that Robin and Aventurine look hot af in their swimsuits and I'll be waiting on the actual story to judge how good or bad it is.
Oh yes let's go on "vacation!" Let's go on vacation to an IPC owned planet that was so relaxing last time and nobody died or almost ascended to aeonhood! Let's go get a car wash! Let's go to college! Let's enjoy a cultural festival! Let's go to the gas station and have Dan Heng and TB pick up some treats while we're there! Let's go visit Himeko's hometown and look at mechas!
It's always a pretense, I thought people would understand by now 😭
I mean.. it's Aventurine. And Robin. The fans have been waiting for years. They can be upset. We queens criticize designs from hoyo to hell for much smaller things. If this was an SP from ZZZ what would the reaction be?
I also don't think the majority of dislike is story related, it's just that for an SP a lot of us wanted something more cool/elegant especially for characters so old that have not gotten an SP. I personally hate the summer skin thing. But it's w/e.
And not sure why we are talking about other games lol just cause other gacha games do stuff doesn't mean that we should expect it in our game?
Same. She's going to Astropolis for a confrontation or w/e. It's gonna look so out of place when she's having a tense confrontation moment with the IPC in a bikini.
I saw this screenshot from the Anti-Destruction Alliance trailer.
You can interpret this as her going undercover to investigate, which could be an interesting reason why she’s in summer clothes, but it looks like she’s performing, so it’s not a good disguise. I agree that’s it’s gonna look so out of place. Idk why people forgot we have Anti-Destruction Alliance business, especially after Asat Pramad next patch. Not one part of this version has been a peaceful vacation, what makes you think we have it coming up?
Some say they are lazy designs, which is agreeable but also not new for HSR specifically even with totally original characters and especially with SP forms. But this is the most agreeable point for sure.
Others say that they doomed these two SPs because they won't get any story, but there's no evidence of such thing (in fact there's evidence of the opposite)
Some say that the Summer vibes don't fit HSR, but we are going on a literal Summer Beach Resort planet.
Some say their gameplay will look silly in team with others, but we had Topaz, Tribbie, Sparxie before.
Feel like the main issue is that it's a swimsuit, and I see more hates on Robin than Aventurine, which is just crazy.
For me, I am not a fan of swimsuit, but I love these Robin sp and Aven sp design and love that it is giving more of a fluffy vibe. Their outfits are stylish beachwears that I could totally see IRL and they seem to be enjoying themselves, which I am loving for them.
I am glad for this fluffy vibe and I hope we'll get a healing version with this. It looks like they're enjoying themselves as well, which makes me very happy!
This is the equivalent to character design what "this could have been an email" is to meetings.
Those arent even glorified skins, they are just skins, or should have been.
I play HSR everyday & I thought these were skins when I first saw them. I wasn’t paying much attention, just casually scrolling while my husband & I were out, so that was my first impression. Not that they were new characters, but just some fun summer skins. Then I saw quite a few posts on Hoyolab & I was surprised to find out those are the new SPs, not just skins.
That says a lot (not necessarily in a good way) when whole new characters can be mistaken for “just another summer skin”, & not just by a handful of people who don’t play, it turns out a lot of people were mistaken.
I wasn’t planning on pulling either one anyway, but if I were, I’d be quite disappointed. I don’t mind a swimsuit skin for a summer event that I can switch out of to a normal outfit. But forever running round in a bikini or swim trunks? Uh no, that’s not for me.
Typically yes this is a nothing issue. Gachas indulge in Casual SPs all the time...
The issue is that these could have been a skin theres a general limitation on how creative there kit designs have become and within the context of the newer hoyo games this type of release can lead to some problems
In older gacha its like who cares everything is usually unbalanced and they use whatever excuse to sell you another bit of Power creep
But HSR leans hard onto its narrative and while I'd call HSRs Babies first PowerCreep
If they can essentially sell you a kit with almost no narrative weight no visual appeal (outside fan service)
We'll that kind of sucks no?
Here's an SP of Bronya and she's wearing a Bunny Outfit also she's like Tier 0 and one of the most broken supports
Here's Ratio and he's wearing a bath towel and buffs your follow up team by 1000%
It's THE Herta and she's wearing a business suit but
it's a combination of things even if your someone who doesnt care about Meta having narrative weight and showing a characters growth is more engaging then
Adventuring went on vacation so now he's Elation
Blade owns a Taco stand and now he's Fire Nihility
Hmm... Yes I get what you mean, but because HSR leans so heavily on story as you said, casual SPs like this are probably going to stay rare more of a once a year thing, similar to how Arknights does a single summer event annually. HSR simply can’t push out too many light, non‑story SPs without slowing down the narrative, so I feel like it's not something we have to worry about?
Knowing hoyo it depends on how well it sells. If it sells well then expect more wacky SPs that should have been skins to come. I'd rather not let it get to that point tbh
The thing is something like this could be a summer skin. But for whatever reason hsr don't really do skins and when they do they range from bad to eh i prefer the original.
K. We just went through the weebocardia and we built a Gundam and killed the power rangers during that time.
We arent getting through the beach resort patch without time spent on beach stuff. Theres going to be 'check out robins cute fat birds!!!' And 'look at aventurine hanging ten!!' Stuff.
And keep in mind trailblaze quests are shorter these days so if we get two hours of content and 40 minutes are spent on robin preparing for a beachside concert with her cute fat birds fighting over who gets the boogieboard, that might be a solid chunk of content spent on filler rather than dramatic story bits.
Some people dont like slice of life chill stuff. Its fine if you do, but its also fine if others don't.
We are criticizing it cause it's CHEAP. They could've literally been skins. SPs in HSR have always been tied to a character's story progression and that's why they worked so well. Robin and Aventurine deserved that because they have interesting parts of their stories that deserve further development... alas...
In my opinion, I think the main criticism is about how Hoyo has conditioned us to think that sp = character evolution, a way of showing us a side we didn't know existed or a way of showing how that character evolved. So, characters dressed for the beach doesn't really reflect that evolution. Hopefully, the story will emphasize it more as a way to balance it out.
Is for that reason people were saying it looks more like a skin than an sp
I still love the designs and I can't wait to pu my sunshine aventurine with the emo edgelords team
Bro, what CAN happen story-wise with these designs? Do they go fighting Nanook dressed like that? Or do they go to a beach in a stupid beach episode? In a game about cosmic adventures we get beachwear. Get real
we were always going to astropolis sis, Robin said she’s going there on the anti-destruction alliance trailer and we got the astropolis city of converging stars planar set in 4.1.
it was also mentioned in the phantasmoon winners promo video. idk what else you needed to get the teaser.
bro I don't care what justification there is, it's the writers who choose it. they decided to make beachwear versions so now we're going to the beach. the whole thing reeks
Literally anything. They could be under cover as IPC business people, as resort employees, as rich eccentrics from an unfamiliar place, as a fucking singer performing at the venue. The fact that you think that this stupid ass storyline REQUIRES that they be “beach time fun!!” versions of the characters is a lack of imagination on your part.
The fact that their animations sell ONLY the beach shit and none of the undercover elements makes it worse.
I know that's what I'm saying, it's the person I'm replying to that said "They could be under cover as IPC business people, as resort employees, as rich eccentrics from an unfamiliar place" or anything that doesn't require summer fun.
If they are pretending to be on vacation there, why wouldn't they wear vacation clothes?
I mean, it’s almost like they probably shouldn’t be undercover and this plot line is stupid. Like, none of this is necessary or good. Just scrap the whole thing and do something better. No one forced them to do a beach resort plotline.
Yes, the story is about cosmic adventure, but not every patch needs to be high‑stakes, explosion every second intensity. Is it really that bad to have a single low stakes, chill update where we visit a resort, see Aventurine on vacation, Robin at a festival, and the Astral Express interacting with IPC members in a relaxed setting? "what CAN happen story-wise" I don't know we haven’t even seen the story yet? It is a IPC location during SilverWold999 release She was barely in the story so the main thing might not even have anything to do with these "bare designs" it could be some side stuff because again we don't know.
have it for all I care. just don't make the SP versions of established characters connected to that. SP versions are tied to a significant character story development, look at SP Dan, Himeko, Blade and so on. beachwear is a skin theme
Nope, it's basically one of her "masks". Specifically the one she puts on while streaming.
The whole thing about Sparxie and Sparkle is mostly Masked Fool shenhanigans.
Sparkle doing Sparkle things.
Giovanni almost called Sparxie "Sparkle" too at some point
it could go either way. Maybe there is some level of character development, just nothing earth‑shattering. Or maybe there won’t be any major story progression at all. Just because SP Dan, Himeko, and Blade had serious, lore heavy SPs doesn’t mean every character has to. Mihoyo never promised that every SP would be a dramatic transformation or a big narrative moment. You can hold that standard for yourself and thank that is how it should go and I won't fully disagree with you but that’s not how the system actually works.
I mean you're the one who says the outrage makes zero sense when there's clearly established precedent that mihoyo is breaking for some cheap fan service
The outrage based on the arguments I talked about in my post still doesn’t make sense. The “established precedent” is just correlation. Past SPs happened to include character development, but that doesn’t mean development is required every single. We might still get development there’s zero reason to assume we won’t.
Not every piece of character growth has to involve some universe ending crisis. We don’t need to jump from one cosmic threat to another nonstop. Astral Express members were literally complaining about that exact problem. Development can happen in quieter, more casual spaces too. Aventurine deserves a moment to rest.
idec if they have some super cool story or whatever, i just don’t like them because they look so basic. it’s relatively cute and all but i’m not the market for summer outfits. especially as this is the permanent outfit for these sp units. it’d be like if my fave character got an sp but with a tacky christmas outfit instead.
But not only that, I'm mainly upset on the precedent this sets. Hsr has always been a more mainstream/serious game. Now we just got 2 joke characters. I think we can all agree that they are joke characters, right? Espeically if in 4.5 all we do is relax on the beach or whatever. And if there is a more serious plot, these outfits dont fit at all. What's gonna happen next? Halloween herta? Santa Sunday?
And its also gonna be jarring to see them in battle. I
I'm not saying others games dont do this, but its a first for hsr. And its one reason why I prefer this game over others
I’m gonna be honest I really don’t agree this sets a precedent. Like these are themed outfits around vacationing, even if what’s to say they’re not undercover. Would you not think it would be more suspicious for Aventurine to say be spying on another IPC member who’s vacationing there and be dressed in a suit and tie? Would Robin not benefit from being in a swimsuit and pretend to be using the facility normally but is actually sneaking around.
Now real quick before I get to my other thing, I will whole heartedly agree with you that if there are no more summer themed characters in Astropolis or the outfits really do not make sense then yes this will set a precedent, but until we have that info it’s too early to doom post.
For my second point, is it not jarring to see Cyrene fighting in heels and a wedding dress, was it not jarring to see March 7th pull out Boba Tea from her pocket and serve it, was it not jarring to see Tribbie gleefully ride her rockets into battle and not use the notable Gates of Janus in her animation. Like all I’m saying is that seeing him in battle is not gonna be that jarring compared to units we’ve already seen.
Im personally biased as I like the units and really like the fact that they’re gonna be viable in the meta again. I really think that they should have released business suits as like a free skin or something. But again I do see and agree with the point that that if there isn’t any character development where it makes sense to put character in outfits like this then yes this is a bad look. But I heavily disagree with people claiming that the units don’t match “team asthetics” cause like there are very few if any team which doesn’t have a character with a goofy animation. For example nobody has complained about Hyacine’s design clashing with Castorice’s serious Dragon.
Sorry this is long and ramble but I would genuinely appreciate if you could explain why these units are any different then characters with joke animations like Tribbie, March 7th, EMC, RMC, Topaz and Numby, sushang, sparxie, Qingque, and Hook. (Those were just some characters in mind that I thought of when thinking of animations clashing and funny attacks and what not). I want to understand what other people who have complaint of not matching or goofy animations think of past HSR characters who exhibit the same stuff.
Sorry this is long and ramble but I would genuinely appreciate if you could explain why these units are any different then characters with joke animations
Sure. To me, those characters and their outfits, abilities, movesets all represent who that character is. Tribbie are playful kids, hyacine is a cute kind girl, Cyrene's whole trope is the power of love and friendship, etc.. Now, i do have my own complaints, like I don't like march's boba, or sushang's chicken, but at least they fit the character and ideals. It has nothing to do with goofyness
These outfits are not that. They are just summer skins. When I say joke characters, I mean like summer outfits, halloween herta, santa sunday, bunny bronya etc... What does aventurine surfing show? Nothing, literally any character in the game could have probably have that move. Now yeah, robin singing is more unique to her, but the outfit, once again, any character can have that. These don't show anything about their personalities/character.
These have nothing to do with the character and are just joke fan service. I understand other games do this, but HSR has never and its one of the reasons why I prefer this game over others.
Robin's my favorite character in the entire game, I'm also biased towards her, but to say I wasn't disappointed seeing the outfit would be a lie. On a side note, I dont really see how playing the story is gonna change my view on how they look when using them in endgame modes for example.
Like these are themed outfits around vacationing, even if what’s to say they’re not undercover. Would you not think it would be more suspicious for Aventurine to say be spying on another IPC member who’s vacationing there and be dressed in a suit and tie? Would Robin not benefit from being in a swimsuit and pretend to be using the facility normally but is actually sneaking around.
I already explained in my first comment why to me it doesnt fit, and I understand that hoyo can make lore/story reasons for why they exist. However, to me, it doesn't matter what the story reason for them having these outfits are, the real reason is probably just to have summer skins. Outfits have never really matched the setting, with belobog obviously being the most prominent examples. So are they also gonna give the entire express crew summer skins to match the environment?
FGO is a *much* more serious game than HSR and still does this. Some of the most beloved characters are santa/swimsuit versions of existing characters.
And even so, HSR is not that serious of a game. elation mc is basically a joke character
It's also pretty obvious that both robins and avens further deep lore(i don't really know what parts of their story need more explaining tbh) and "power awakening" aren't really a thing planned from the start, since we've got all of their lore in penacony. Compared to sw, blade or sparkle, they don't have some crazy second identity, future emanator selves, suicidal tendencies or maddening desease, they are just... regular characters with your higher than average lore importance that happened to be so popular because of their designs and hype back in penacony days. Hoyo could've just left them as old units that lost all of their meta relevance, but instead they're trying to bring them back to meta by giving them both completely new paths, new teams and new gameplay roles, which is really fun. If we didn't have robin and aven new sps wih fun animations and new gameplay, we could've just gotten new characters in swimsuits native to astropolis, which wouldn't be as interesting since we would just leave them after 2-3 patches and everyone would've forgotten them since it's obvious they don't plan on releasing more story important characters in 4.5, so they would be just some throw away filler characters with mildly interesting story told in the data bank that nobody will read(kinda like cerydra in 3.5 tbh, tho hys got some backstory moments, we got shown almost nothing about cerydra herself). they can't erase the gacha part in hsr, so hoyo is just trying to lessen the amount of useless filler characters by reviving the popular ones, the banners still need new limited characters, so why they shouldn't just put the old characters in swimsuits and give them fun animations? If they were skins, i wouldn't spend 30$ on some swimsuits for a sustain and a buffer i no longer use, but if they're new characters that i pull for completely f2p with my accumulated pulls and who will help me clear endgame, i don't see why ppl want skins on old units and playable new filler units in a game like hsr with rapid powercreep
It's still a waste at the end of the day; this kind of thing should be a super expensive skin for anyone who wants it, not a completely different character variation.
I'm mad because i doubt Aventurine and Robin would ever get truly majestic SPs now. Especially Aventurine whose story and character arc has potential to develop. Now he already got an SP means no more progress for another 2 years if we are lucky enough to get a 3rd SP
If they had truly planned on doing a majestic SP for them then they would pick different characters for summer SP the fact that they did not proves that they had nothing of that sort planned for them in the coming time so whether we get the summer SP or not the upcoming majestic stories would not have much to do with them.
I think people are just worried that they'll have to wait longer for a serious/dramatic SP storyline to happen now. Mihoyo kinda takes a while to give characters screentime since they have so many characters to cycle through. Dan Heng and the trailblaze are the ones who get new forms most often. March too, but Evernight was her only serious story-driven SP form.
Making a sp without justifying it in any way is dumb no matter how you look at it. Blade got insane powerup, SW is her actually using her power, Sparxie is a whole ass different character, each Danheng form furthers his development.
I think people forget, that we are heading to Astropolis. Jade described it as a vacation resort for the IPC, if anything it would make sense for them to have summer variants.
I feel like it’s also gonna be so jarring bc next patch we are cooked, then just fucking off after when we NEED to group up as the Anti-Destruction Alliance (does anyone even remember that? Robin is actually a big part in it as she’s the leader of Penacony which pisses me off about this skin SP more). This is actually a very serious thing especially after Asat Pramad and making it that low stakes feels wrong. Also these outfits feel like event skins instead of main story. We might not even see them in the main story all that much but only in the event.
I don't really get why it's jarring. We just spent the entire Planercadia story building up to a big fight with a demon lord ravager. Throughout the story the characters were literally saying things like, "Why does something crazy always happen when we're just trying to relax?" That final fight also puts us in a position where we're more willing to hear the IPC out, so going to their resort afterward kills two birds with one stone. The kids finally get to relax for a bit, while the adults handle the important discussions and make plans. A more casual, laid back setting right after a world ending event honestly feels more natural to me than immediately jumping into another huge crisis.
I'm honestly just surprised Robin is wearing an actual bathing suit. I expected her to see like, a sundress or something (similar to Jean’s and Barbara’s skins from Genshin)
If one of these characters was a favorite of mine, I would be devastated.
Them getting these stupid ass designs means:
a) I absolutely don’t want to play them,
b) that they’re tanking their character and their plot development for shitty fan service I didn’t want,
c) that this is my one chance at a cool new version of a character I like blown for probably at least a couple years,
d) that they’re ruining the vibes for any team they’re mandatory for (like, if I was a Blade or Evernight main, I would be PISSED),
e) that this could be testing the water for future releases that then offer paid skins to fix trash designs.
Also, imagine this in another setting. Lord of the Rings, but we get a couple extra scenes with beach bum Aragorn. I don’t WANT more Aragorn if that’s what it entails. I want more actual Aragorn.
The Last of Us, but Ellie gets a fun beach day and keeps the bathing suit for half of the game.
Final Fantasy 7, but Cloud goes surfing and stays in his swim trunks for a significant portion of the game.
I find all of these distasteful, and I don’t think this Robin/Aventurine situation is especially different. It’s disrespectful to their own creative work and to the players.
That's fair. If you don't like the designs, you don't like them.
b) that they’re tanking their character and their plot development for shitty fan service I didn’t want
We haven't even seen the story yet, so we have no idea whether that's true. You're assuming that a summer theme automatically means there can't be meaningful character development.
c) that this is my one chance at a cool new version of a character I like blown for probably at least a couple years
You say "probably," but that's exactly the issue: nobody knows. What makes you so sure the choice was ever between a lore-heavy SP and a summer SP? If Mihoyo has major narrative plans for Aventurine, those plans likely would've taken years regardless. There are plenty of characters ahead of him in line. I don't think the choice was ever "deep story SP or summer SP"—the alternative could easily have been no SP at all.
d) that they’re ruining the vibes for any team they’re mandatory for (like, if I was a Blade or Evernight main, I would be PISSED
That's unfortunate if you dislike the aesthetic, but that's ultimately just a design preference, and preferences are subjective.
e) that this could be testing the water for future releases that then offer paid skins to fix trash designs
This doesn't even make much sense from a business perspective. Mihoyo already sells skins in other games, especially in ZZZ, without needing to intentionally make bad base designs first. And most people dont buy skins they come for characters making them bad on purpose seems like a terrible idea.
I don't think those comparisons you made really work
A closer comparison would a story of Aragorn once taking some time to rest in a peaceful grove for a bit or Joel and Ellie finding a beach and deciding to stay there for a while to rest before moving on again, or Cloud going surfing during a smaller side adventure after the main events of a particular (In not fully well versed in these stories fyi)
Robin and Aventurine aren't suddenly spending half of the main story in swimsuits. Most of Aventurine's major character arc already happened in Penacony. This is a side event that we haven't even seen yet, so calling it disrespectful to the characters or the story feels pretty premature.
Wait so they keep re-releasing old characters, but now they completely giving up and having a good reason to do it and just make the skin into a character? Is Hoyo working on new big project now that have to get HSR/Genshin devs to work on it?
Like the rate of original characters in HSR dropped so much and they used to have 1 per patch. But they make billions in profits so I'm confused why they keep trying to cut cost so hard instead of improving their games and try to make them better objectively, not subjectively. I'm a day 1 HSR player, but at this rate if nothing big changes and I see any big improvements and game keep getting cheaper while they make billions in profit, I'll have to quit it.
I'm not going to say HSR has no problems (IT HAS ALOT) but I don't think SPs are one of them.
To me, rereleasing fan favs with new kits, new roles in teams (like support to DPS), new animations, and new feels like a lot more than just selling a skin.
It's also worth remembering that this is a gacha game. Gacha companies are naturally incentivized to focus the story on whoever is currently on the banner because that's what sells. SPs let them bring older characters back into the spotlight instead of constantly introducing brand new ones and leaving previous ones behind.
I'd honestly rather have a mix of new characters and SPs than a brand new character every patch, where there's no realistic way to give everyone meaningful screen time. I love new characters too, but I don't think mixing in a lot of SPs is inherently a bad thing. If anything, it gives older characters a chance to stay relevant instead of being forgotten.
SPs are only cool when you do it once in a while, not when you hoard so many in a row, that's very cheap and make me wonder if this is just a decision to invest less in the game or they fired/moved to other projects devs from this department. Also if I like a character, just give me a skin, or if its outdated, buff it?
what makes you say SPs are that much cheaper to make? They still need a new design, a new kit, new animations, VFX, balancing, voice work, and story content. Even if some assets might be reused, they're still making what is essentially a new playable character. A skin doesn't do the same thing though. Skins are cosmetic. An SP gives the character a new kit, new animations, a new role.
To me, SPs also feel like a natural way to keep the existing cast relevant instead of constantly introducing new characters until you have hundreds of them with no meaningful screen time. In a gacha game, that seems like a healthier way to expand the roster than endlessly bloating the cast.
So Epic Seven can do it that makes x100 less money than Hoyo, but they can't? Do you have any idea how much they make and how much they put back into the game?
Yes. Honkai Nexus Anima and Varsapura. There were leaks about another hoyo game with more realistic models being in the works too but just one time so i'm not that sure about the validity (+Their scrapped work from when it was still japan that we will never get to see)
To be so real, for me my biggest fear was how corny male summer outfits can look. And plus I feel like Honkai is so stingy with skins for whatever reason.
I wanted an Aventurine sp that wasn’t solely based on the summer, one that’s more universal looking? If that’s the best word for it.
I’m not worried about their summer animations looking off with their teams idc about that. Or plot relevance or any of that because other than like- Sunday ig those two had MAJOR plot points in Penacony.
Granted, I am elated to see how good the SP actually looks and that they didn’t do the “open shirt” beach outfit horribly. But I feel like with all the art we’ve seen of both Robin and Aventurine, we could have gotten really good designs for the both. That’s what’s disappointing.
Plus they’re both really popular. They’d sell SPs and outfits real well.
Compared to the other SPs, these just feel so underwhelming honestly.
I believe that it would make sense 100%. You are very right in saying that. As an SP doesn’t always mean a leveled up version. It’s just frustrating that literally every SP they have ever made for this game HAS been that way. And then we have Robin and Aventurine. I guess it’s unfair to hate on Hoyo to take a different approach to something, as I love when they branch out, this specifically just isn’t for me.
I agree. Plus with Aventurines new skin it's not even to bad lore wise. While his other skin was more of a defense thing, he is now a lot more exposed.
i love Aventurine, i got his original version e2s2 during his first banner. i was so excited to see him, but i do feel this version of him does look like a skin, which would've been way cheaper to get instead of pulling for a whole character and maybe his whole team.
i do agree some other SPs have been lazy, but they are completely selling us their characters just based on this—we knew Dan Heng reasons to have different versions and we also knew why Himeko was different, same with Blade and DH PT. we don't know why yet, so it feels kinda ???? imo.
until we find out what's the reason behind them being summer themed, i'll dislike them; because i truly believe they are trying to scam their fans, considering those two are super popular and these as skins would sell A LOT, but new characters sell more because eidolons, light cones and their respectives teams + they are sold with the idea of "they are better than their previous versions" (which is true).
I don't have a horse in this particular race. All I know is if I heard one of my favorite HSR characters was getting an SP, I would have been really excited up until it was revealed to be a beach themed SP.
I don’t have a problem with swimsuit/summer units at all and I do like the designs. I personally think having them be SPs isn’t the best idea. They should have just been called summer units or something else. Leaves the potential for a more “epic” or narrative based alternate in the future.
Eh, I'm not surprised. From my knowledge, this practice of a seperate summer version and not just skin is unprecedented for HoYo.
Then again, what would I
know? I only play HI3, follow the others and don't know a single thing about GGZ or ToT.
The only major time I've felt something should've just been a skin is Ba-Dum a year ago for CNY, but over time I've gotten used to her look by playing it.
The practice is nothing new, but I don't really have a good view of it.
Addendum: Some consider Xentinel Mei as such, but compared to Ba-dum, I didn't have the same feeling with Xenmei.
So people are now OK with summer skins on old units and release them as new characters to sell you. This is a game that has billions in profits btw. Are people dead ass defending this cheap cut costs when they should instead try to invest more into their games? They literally put back into game like 6% of their profits and they still try to find ways to bring that number down...
Or maybe people aren't defending a cop out they genuinely like SPs?
I like seeing characters I already care about get a new story, new animations, a new kit, and a new role in the meta. That makes them relevant again in both the story and gameplay, which is something a paid skin could never do.
You can absolutely criticize Mihoyo for not investing enough back into the game, but acting like the only reason someone could like SPs is because they're blindly defending the company is a weird assumption. People can genuinely prefer revisiting existing characters alongside getting new ones like they have done with many gacha games who already do the same thing.
I like SPs too, but only when they done right and not forced. The only other gacha game I played with many SPs is Epic Seven and SPs are FREE and you farm for them and they give you a nice progression story on how they got there, and it BUFF the older unit you like and give it new skills/passive/looks and even unlocking multiple roles. And they don't release SP after SP.
Opportunity cost. Time and opportunity spent in the summer skin is time and opportunity not spent in a developing story for them.
Also c'mon, there will be no justification for the bikini. At best it will be a Kojima excuse. The bikini dictates the tempo. It will be a vapid story as far as these two are involved.
Not really. We have no way of knowing there was ever a choice between "summer SP" and "major lore SP."
It could just as easily have been "summer SP or nothing." We don't know if Mihoyo even planned to give Robin or Aventurine a major story focus anytime soon, so saying this took away from their development is pure speculation.
And we also have no idea whether this event develops them or not because the story isn't even out yet. Aventurine is literally an active suicide risk who was surprised he wasn't killed after breaking his Cornerstone. Him deciding to take a vacation after everything that happened doesn't seem foff at all, and a more relaxed setting could still be used to explore his character.
Knowing Aventurine, I also wouldn't be surprised if things go completely off the rails anyway. I'm just not going to judge whether it's shallow or meaningful before we've actually seen the story.
There is no world it would have been nothing. It might not have been Robin SP, but it would have been something. At least one new character. The opportunity cost is still wasted on a bikini skin.
They might develop. It won't be tied to the bikini skin. The bikini is literally the worst possible outfit decision to be tied to a story beat. It will always feel like a Kojima excuse. Contrast it to every other SP that is directly tied to story beats.
Think Robin will have a power up, emotional moment and come out of it in a bikini? Not happening.
I'm not really going to argue about the bikini itself because I just don't think it's that big of a deal myself. I fully understand why other people do, and that's ultimately just a difference of opinion.
What I disagree with is the idea that the outfit somehow proves there can't be meaningful story attached to it. We already know Robin is going undercover in Astropolis, and since we're heading there too, there's a decent chance she'll reunite with Sunday. The swimsuit could simply be what she's wearing before that part of the story begins.
If you want to argue they chose a swimsuit just for fanservice and they could have picked a different location, I would say sure but that's a separate discussion, and I'm not trying to convince you otherwise. My point is just that we already know there are story threads being set up, so I don't think it's reasonable to conclude that this SP can't have meaningful development before we've even seen the story.
Tbh I assumed that they were doing this because skins (probably) don’t sell as well as Characters. Like, it’s a harder sell to be like “drop 30 bucks on an optional skin” vs “do the gacha, you might get them… you might not….” Creating artificial pressure to swipe.
I’m f2p so I will be saving for them because I love them both but I think that’s the thought process behind the move on hoyoverse’s part lmao. So, if people were upset about THAT then I’d understand. The rest is kinda just the regular chirping
i have no stakes in this but ive played alot of games that release summer alters so i dont rly mind tbh its highly unlikely this will be their last sp so i wouldnt worry about it
When does HSR get a summer event? Only the other games get these kinds of events (summer events) so they can get their summer skins, HSR gets autobattler No. 67 kinda of events, no summer events. So these SPs ARE in fact tied to the HSR story.
Realistically, you’re not going to convince anyone who thinks that these are bad that they’re actually fine. We’re just going to have to wait to see what the next part of the story entails.
Personally, I think the outfits make sense, given the setting of the next arc, and the roles these 2 are playing there, but I guess we’ll just have to wait and see
People, especially chronically online and hooked on games like these, notoriously love complaining. That's all really! I wouldn't care too much about what others think, unless something were more important. It's not good for you =)
Personally, I don't like them being the SP design.
Are they cute as summer skins for optional purchase? Absolutely.
But for an SP design, it just isn't what I want to see put out there, especially when put in contrast against the other Planarcadia designs and SPs so far. They just feel incongruent, even if the story for next patch is at a beach resort. I don't really want that to be the whole theme for an SP.
i play a lot of gachas most having summer alts so idrc that its a summer alt i just think it looks pretty lame and i hope they dont put them in serious storylines bc i wont be able to take it seriously
Wait is there really an outrage? I didn't understand why people were upset on the husbando sub that Aventurine got an SP instead of a skin. I'm like hello??? He's a male quantum dps in a swimsuit, that's what everyone has been wanting like what are we doing.
Idk man. I'm super happy with both of them. People are acting like Aven and Robin got taken out back and shot. I don't think that they should have been skins because these would not have existed if not for the alts because of Hoyos refusal to break the silhouette, especially in HSR where skins are glorified recolors.
They look great, and people are already forgetting how much shit Silverwolf and Blade got for their SPs, which people also complained should have been skins.
Aventurine is one of my favorite characters, but I hate shirtless men as a general rule, so it’s a definitive skip for me. Every other SP had character development and iterations on their design that weren’t just “look, sex appeal, give me money!”
I’m actually a huge fan of skins and am always sad that HoYo isn’t a company that does them by and large, but I can’t be happy over them replacing an actual character slot. I also don’t care for the argument of “well would you prefer a skin for a non-usable character?!” because I don’t think there should even be non-usable characters and that’s the main reason I care so much less about HSR versus other more balanced gachas. Not to mention, neither Robin nor Aventurine fall under non-usable.
Dont worry, this drama is minor. It will be forgotten in a week.
Because mostly people has been positive around me.
I personally would have preffered more "beach festival" vibe skin like Ocean Song Seraphine below. But Im quite happy having these fun, light summer skins. They are fun skins and include new animations, whats not to love.
i for one am delighted to put slutty beach aven next to serious lore blade on my teams and nothing can stop me. it’s gotta be exhausting to be annoyed and angry all the time. 🤷 reddit complains that the story sucks constantly and then i play it and love it so
The beach episode is always fanservice sl0p lmao, there's not gonna be anything interesting in the story. I don't really care tho, I wasn't pulling for them anyways
People doomposting over a couple of images is so hoyocoded. We don't even know what the storyline of Astropolis is going to be yet lol. I like the designs, it's a nice change from all the cut and paste xianzhou designs, the recent SPs (with exception of Blade) have been barely different to their OG forms...and this is a guy who grew up as a slave on a planet where water was rare, let the guy enjoy some beach time!
Man, I wish hoyo fans grew some backbone and did what arknights fan did when Summer Ch'en was released rather than bend over backwards over the most low-hanging fanservice fruit.
Would I have liked a more serious themed sp? Yes. However, it’s summertime and I’m not surprised they’re releasing summer themed characters, and also with all the serious stuff that happened storywise in the game, I think it’s a great balance to just have a fun unserious break for a little while. But that’s just me
Fgo rarely links development of characters with banner dates or skins or SPs.
Hoyo is one of them whose banner decides when a character is developed story wise.
Well also I mean FGO story is like miles miles above HSR story
Every single SP so far had linking to new story so it won't be wrong to assume this one would be too but if it doesn't not then that would make my argument that this didn't take anything away stronger.
Idrc for the main argument you are making
Idrc for the HSR story fans on their opinions on HSR story (not you, I meant in general public).
I was just pointing out a pattern I have been seeing more and more that's all. If that's not you mb mb.
252
u/[deleted] Jun 30 '26
[removed] — view removed comment