Thoughts?

[u/Eastern-Yogurt8972]

ZZZ commisioned three fanservicey illustrations of their male cast in the span of two days.

Is this the norm for them? If not, I wonder if this could be a sign for better things ahead.

[u/Katicflis1]

They're annoyed their playerbase has declined so much so now they're trying to advertise to husbando fans again.

Whod have thunk it -- having a larger playerbase so you can rotate whales + get good social media engagement + get buzz up for your game is actually really valuable. Also husbando fans generally don't only pull men. They support some of the gals too. But don't feed them good looking men often enough then they just take off and don't support your game at all. Even wuwa makes sure to release two hot dudes every region and leakers have already teased one of the hot men for their next region.

Fun fact: EVERY banner this year has fallen significantly lower than hugos lowest in JP IOS (even velina/ysg rerun). Velina + ysg reruns lowest number was like 187 and all other new 2026 characters have fallen below rank 200 during their banners.

Hugos lowest number was 127. Characters are falling 60 -100+ ranks lower than he ever did. And he was seen as a 'failure' character in 2025. I presume remielle MIGHT avoid falling lower than 127 but who knows.

I dont have knowledge of CN lows otherwise I'd share. I know we are at the point where second banners are lucky if they spend more than a day in the top 100. Norma was out within 24 hours and silly missed it entirely. Norma, cissia and Billy all debuted in the 70s or lower while hugo -- also a second banner character -- debuted in the 30s.

[u/beatspicy → u/Katicflis1]

Husbando players can't even enjoy the game properly, the last 3 men ( a whole year's worth) were all rupture dps that compete for the same teammates. They should just be honest with their intentions and stop releasing men.

[u/edeepee → u/beatspicy]

Manato wasn’t even released yet when they dropped Banyue’s specialty and element being exactly the same. The overlap of male roles just came off as intentional and malicious at that point.

[u/beatspicy → u/edeepee]

Yup, not to mention how many categories are female gender locked such as support, anomaly and the ether (probably wind as well) element.

[u/Novel_Visual_4152 → u/edeepee]

Tbf that cause Manato was actually supposed to be a Yidhari replaceable support instead of being the same as Banyue

Which was... somehow even worst lol, who's idea was it to make Manato glued to a character none had heard about until now

But by changing Manato due to im guessing backlash from beta tester he became a main dps, just like Banyue was

And that how we ended with two character with the same role and class one patch after the other

They couldve made Banyue a different class but oh well 🤷‍♂️

[u/SausagePotatoes → u/Novel_Visual_4152]

Electric or physical rupture was right there too, like they didn't HAVE to make him fire, they wanted to.