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The latest game from developers HoYoverse, Honkai: Star Rail, aims to deliver a unique role-playing experience for all players worldwide, based on characters from the Honkai Impact series of gacha games released prior. Honkai: Star Rail is from the parent company that released the beloved free-to-play anime RPG, Genshin Impact.
As such, many similarities are bound to be found as the game shares much of Genshin's DNA in its world-building and gameplay elements.
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Read on to learn more about the two titles' similarities and differences.
Honkai: Star Rail borrows many elements from Genshin Impact while putting in a unique spin of its own
While the games undeniably share many similarities in both the gacha and gameplay sections, Honkai: Star Rail puts in enough changes to keep the formula fresh and unique while also being true to the setting and cast of the Honkai universe.
The significant points of interest (and division) between the two games are explained below:
1) World Design:
Both games feature a completely explorable game world.
While Genshin has a completely explorable open world, Star Rail differentiates itself from the former by being slightly more restrictive - players can still freely explore hubs and sections of the spaceship. Still, the exploration scope is somewhat limited in comparison.
2) Combat:
Perhaps the combat design is the most significant change between the titles.
While Genshin is more of an action-adventure title, Star Rail is wholly turn-based. Players must make strategic decisions based on their character skills and the enemy moves before proceeding with battles.
Both titles feature regular attacks, special skills, and an ultimate that charges up over time. Much like Genshin, Star Rail also features an elemental alignment system (Fire, Ice, Quantum, and Imaginary, much like Honkai Impact 3rd) but with a twist - no element is advantageous against the other, and enemies possess multiple elemental weaknesses to take into account during a battle. No additional damage bonus is gained when exploiting an enemy's weakness.
Additionally, battles do not trigger in Star Rail until you manually approach a foe, unlike in Genshin, where being in the range of the enemy will automatically start the fight.
3) Farming in-game items:
A significant similarity between the two games is the presence of the Resin/Artifact system - known as Energy/Relic in Star Rail. Players use a set portion of their Energy for farming various Relics from domain-like sections of the game known as Cocoons.
Relics have six stat slots (Head, Hand, Body, Feet, Neck, and Article) instead of the five present in Genshin's Artifacts.
Energy can be replenished using in-game materials for farming Relics further and capped at a certain amount. It should also be remembered that the Relic drops and the stats generated on them are completely random.
4) Character Levelling:
Characters in Star Rail also follow a similar ascension system to Genshin.
In short, players need to grind through various Cocoons to obtain both EXP and character ascension materials used to upgrade them further. The ascension limit will also scale to the Trailblazer level, so level up as soon as possible to max out your characters.
5) Weapons and Character Rank Ups:
Constellations and Weapons appear as Eidolons and Light Cones in Honkai: Star Rail.
Like Genshin Impact, Light Cones can be refined to R5 by fusing multiple duplicates of the same, with free-to-play and gacha-only Light Cones being available in the game.
Eidolons also follow the same route, having a maximum of 6 slots with E3 and E5 skills, additionally empowering character skills.
6) Skills and Passives:
Talents and Techniques in Honkai refer to the character's Passive and Skill abilities, as seen in Genshin Impact.
Each character possesses unique Talents and techniques with various in-game effects.
7) Expeditions:
Similar to the Expedition feature of Genshin Impact, Honkai: Star Rail also features the Assign system. The system is used to passively farm EXP materials and credits (more equivalent), among others, while being AFK from the game.
8) Gacha:
The gacha system of both games is completely identical, save for the terminology used. "Warp" refers to a summon in Honkai: Star Rail and requires 160 gems each.
The summons is divided into Limited and Standard banners, equivalent to the Event and Standard banners of Genshin. Suffice it to say that players will wish to summon on the Event banners to obtain the newest units at a boosted rate.
The gacha is also expected to be the same, with a 90-pull 5-star character pity and a 10-pull 4-star pity. Light Cones of 5-star rarity drop within 80 pulls of the Light Cone banner. Rotational changes to the banner with each update are expected as well.
Additionally, players can use Undying Starlight and Undying Embers to purchase more in-game items, including summoning currencies earned while performing the summons
9) In-app purchases:
In-game purchases are identical, with a monthly card (Express Supply Pass) that supplies gems daily and arguably the best value-for-money item in Star Rail.
A Battle Pass has also been confirmed, with free-to-play and paid tiers that gradually unlock via in-game activities.
Players can also buy gems or Oneiric Shards using real-world money directly.
10) Endgame Content:
Finally, both games at present have an endgame mode - known as the Forgotten Hall in Honkai: Star Rail.
Like Genshin, Honkai will also feature a series of escalating challenges in the form of waves of foes that must be defeated to obtain summoning currency. The rotations and rewards are expected to reset at regular intervals as well.
However, if Honkai Impact 3rd is anything to go by, Star Rail will likely feature additional endgame content later in the game's life cycle.
Honkai: Star Rail can be pre-loaded when writing this article, with the game going live on April 26, 2023, for both the PC and mobile markets. A PlayStation port is also planned for the near future.
