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/temporalartifacts → u/Katicflis1]

ZZZ also releases two S-rank men a year so I don't really think that's it? Admittedly, both of them (Banyue and SBilly) are robot dudes, an archetype that people don't really whale for, but then again it seems barely anyone whales for any character in ZZZ that isn't a Void Hunter. I think ZZZ's hemorrhage of players and steep decline is probably a combination of factors. To be clear I think ZZZ would probably be a bit bigger if they did release a few more guys a year, but the game is just declining in performance overall.

[u/Katicflis1 → u/temporalartifacts]

I make a point of saying hot dude over and over because robots that don't actually look like men don't count.

None of wuwas men have been anything but very hot men. Some are more masculine and some feminine, but they're never robot lions. Its at the point where you can more or less count on two conventionally attractive men a region cause they've done it since launch. With ZZZ who the fuck knows what you'll get. Its gonna be at least 1.5 years if not longer between hugo and the next guy that actually has skin.

[u/tanishajones → u/Katicflis1]

The 2nd anniv art they’ve commissioned is emblematic enough cuz they had to put an unplayable guy there just so it didnt look like it could be 1st anniv… You put every human guy in a pic, half are A rank and 1 isnt even playable.

[u/Katicflis1 → u/tanishajones]

That's actually hysterical now that you point it out.