Oh, we got a big one today! Two and half years ago or so I started Genshin Impact and wrote a review of that, stating I had had a lot of fun with it, but wasn't sure how long I'd keep playing. Well, it's now one of my most played games of all time, and I have played it every single day since then. So, when the developers of Genshin were releasing a new game, how could I refuse playing it right away? Honkai: Star Rail, has taken a lot of elements from Genshin, but has the big difference of being turn-based. I'm going to be drawing a lot of parallels to Genshin in this review.
Where to even begin. Star Rail is an RPG, so naturally I'll talk about both the story as well as the gameplay. It's also a gacha game, so I'll also describe the monetization and grind elements.
Let's start with the gameplay. Unlike Genshin, Star Rail is played in a number of small maps, with less of a focus on exploration (no swimming, climbing, or even jumping). There's still chests and casual puzzles in the environment, but to a lesser degree than in Genshin. You run around these instances as normal, but upon encountering an enemy, the game shifts to a turn-based battle mode.
I am moderately disappointed in how unimaginative the turn-based system is. Sure, Genshin didn't have anything never-before-seen, but Star Rail just uses the most standard "your lineup vs their lineup, whack each other in turns" system used in most turn-based RPGs out there. At least there's a turn tracker, and every character has a variable speed. Your entire team of 4 shares a pool of skill points. A weak basic attack gives 1 point, while a skill costs 1 point. Each character also has energy, accumulated by attacking and getting hit, and once full, allows them to cast their ultimate. The ultimate system is unique because you're allowed to cast ultimates in real-time, outside the normal turn order, but with how fast turns sometimes go past (there is only a split second between gaining energy from your or an enemy's action, and the next turn), it can be easy to miss the right moment. I think it's a huge mistake to put real-time elements in any turn-based system, and this is no exception. I have often been frustrated at losing a battle because I missed the 0.2s window for casting my ult.
The 7 Elements from Genshin are also present (though some have changed), but instead of reactions, each enemy has 2-3 weaknesses, and attacking with the right Element does 25% more damage, as well as depletes their toughness bar, which, upon breaking, slightly delays their turn and deals a large burst of damage. I think the lack of elemental reactions is a big loss in terms of team building variety and simply matching your team to the enemies' weaknesses is boring. It kind of just amounts to a 25-50% increase in damage. Aside from the 7 Elements, there also 7 Paths, which don't "do" anything, but describe what type the character is. (DPS, healer, buffer, tank, etc.)
Not to diverge into a strategy guide, but given the rules above, certain team compositions are somewhat mandated. Unlike Genshin, where there's a distinction between on- and off-fielders, Star Rail gives every character their time in the limelight, and provides no invulnerability dodge button, which means every character must be defended or healed, and every character's output matters. While good for fans of the characters, I believe this, too, hurts the team variance in the game. See, the skill point system basically means that you will ideally delegate two characters to be dummies and only generate skill points with basic attacks, and fire off the occasional ultimate, while the other two are actually the meat of the team. You will need 1 healer (of which there are 2 at the moment). This healer uses up one skill user slot, leaving you with just a single slot for another skill user. Putting a buffer / debuffer there is pointless, as your dummy basic attackers deal no damage, so the only option is to use a DPS there. This leaves a massive pool of characters with no role in any team, because they need to use their skill to function. To the developers' credit, they have put roughly 6 characters in the game, who can be useful with just special basic attacks and/or ultimates, or whose skills don't consume any or almost any points. But out of 23 characters, you're currently limited to 1 of 2 healers, 2 of 6 dummies, and can only pick 1 of the remaining 15 cool characters, some of whom aren't even DPS characters. This is a massive flaw in terms of team building, but something future patches can fix.
To segue into the topic of story, I believe the emphasis was not on combat for Star Rail. Two more examples of this. Every character's ultimate has a long, unskippable animation. Genshin was somewhat limited by its action combat still running, but Star Rail takes their sweet time, and because of how often ultimates can be cast, almost half the combat can be spent watching the animations. Due to this, everyone I know plays at 2x speed, which sadly makes the animations look a bit goofily sped up, and reduces variety in voice lines. The game should have been built for a faster pace. Worst of all, Star Rail has auto-battle as an option. I adamantly believe that no game should ever give you an option to not play it. Auto-battle screams "the gameplay is bad, and we know it", and I'm afraid that this is the ultimate truth for Star Rail. To any gameplay-oriented readers, this can be the end of this already long review, but I want to keep writing.
Now, the story. If we exclude games which are basically only story, Genshin has one of my favorite stories in games. Its lore being the best part, while the moment-to-moment storytelling / writing being a bit weak. Star Rail has massively stepped up the writing quality, to the point where dialogue is usually genuinely fun to listen to. Losing a Paimon-like character is clearly the biggest contributor, giving the main character more agenda, as well as giving more time to the various side characters. The story so far has a much more comedic tone, especially when it comes to the various ways you can interact with the environment. Many NPCs or environmental items also have new dialogue as you repeatedly talk to them, and there's overall more dialogue options in conversations, really allowing you to drill into the story as deep as you want to. For fans of story, there is so much more reading, and significantly higher quality everything. There is also more focus put into the characters, which clearly shows from how long we have to look at them in combat.
I have but one nagging issue with the story, which is ultimately a very important one for me, personally. There is no long-term hook. Sure, the general long-term premise is the same as Genshin - we go from place to place, learning about the place and solving its problems, but Genshin gave us a promise at the start. "Gather the 7 Elements", "We will be reunited at this journey's end", "Then you will understand". Genshin holds a promise that the story will not just spin endlessly until the game stops being profitable, and gives us something to look forward to. Star Rail has nothing pressing. No reason to want to move forward, except for if you love the writing itself. I find Star Rail's overarching lore a bit weaker overall, and that matters to me a lot, while I think most would consider Star Rail's story superior. Up to you, I guess.
Finally, the gacha and the grinds. If you're already familiar with Genshin, there is next to nothing new here. Exact same rules for gacha, though they do give their first Standard 5* at 40 pulls, and a Standard 5* of your choice at 300 pulls. Same as Genshin, there's enough currency to go around to make the teams you want even as free-to-play, so I've no complaints here. Weapons are now called Light Cones, lack a secondary stat, and are now restricted by Path instead, meaning only 1/7 instead of 1/5 weapons fit your character, and they're a bit more boring. Aside from the Basic, Skill, and Ult, every character now also has a levelable Passive, which is a cool addition, and instead of an Ascension stat, there are various stat increase nodes you can pick up as you level. Artifact grind has gotten even worse, as there's now 6 artifacts instead of 5, meaning ideally no off-piece, and there's more possible substats, making it even harder to get that perfect artifact.
For end-game, not that I got there yet, there's the Spiral Abyss equivalent dungeon, where defeating the enemies in a low amount of turns matters. There is also a really cool dungeon mode, which gives you a new buff from a large selection after every combat, along with upgrades to those buffs, and possible small events. These roguelike elements make it by far the most enjoyable content in the game so far, as you actually want to go for another run, just to see what build you can put together from the buffs this time. I fear that it, too, will become boring over time, as player strength eclipses any semblance of challenge, but maybe that's just my pessimism.
I put a good 50+ hours into Star Rail over a week, and I really enjoyed it. Reading it back to myself, my review may come across as overly critical, but I think Star Rail is still a pretty good game, compared to other games out there. It's just that, there are too many similarities to Genshin, and with the pace of updates, I don't have the time for another Genshin. I don't enjoy Star Rail as much, as explained by the faults above, and I believe it to be a lot more oriented toward the casual crowd, which gives me less hope about its future. Between the two, I would choose Genshin without a doubt, but if you have time to play both, care more about story than gameplay, want something that you can actually play on mobile, or simply want something that's like Genshin, but not Genshin, Star Rail can still be a game worth playing. So, a partial recommendation from me, but I will not be continuing my journey in Star Rail.
To also make a prediction for the future, because this matters in live-service games, I think Star Rail will settle to maybe 1/2 to 1/4 the popularity of Genshin. Still, considering how Genshin makes on a magnitude of 10x more money than it costs, I don't think Star Rail players will have to worry about it being abandoned for a long time, as it will be able to earn its share.
