MAKING AN IMPACT

Genshin Impact’s developers open up to Oscar Taylor-Kent about PS5, charting new horizons, and bringing Teyvat to life

- Oscar Taylor-Kent

Adding a huge slice of map with Inazuma, Version 2.0 of Genshin Impact and its recent updates have made what was already a generous game even better. It’s felt distinctly powered-up on PlayStation, not least of all with the addition of Aloy, its first crossover character. Her prescence was spurred in part by the fact that many of the team are fans of Horizon Zero Dawn.

“Paying homage to Aloy’s original look from her own game while also giving her the Genshin Impact treatment was the most important, and difficult part of the process,” the team tell us. “Horizon Zero Dawn has a more grounded, realistic aesthetic, compared to the anime-esque art style of Genshin Impact. In order to preserve Aloy’s strong personality and image as a Nora huntress, we made sure to retain most of her original costume design and facial features while adding expressive and cute features that are more in line with Genshin Impact’s anime style.”

Needless to say, Guerrilla Games had plenty of input on how Aloy turned out. While there are no plans for further crossover characters they can talk about yet, the process has been a learning experience. Every character will be someone’s favourite, and all are mechanically dense to create. These aren’t skins, but whole characters with individual backgrounds, with attacks and abilities that need to work alongside those that already exist.