“We hope for Honkai: Star Rail to be easily accessible to new players”: Hoyoverse on their newest entry in the Honkai series

Hoyoverse is known worldwide for its two biggest gacha titles in the current market, Genshin Impact and Honkai Impact 3rd. Each game introduces a unique set of characters and gameplay mechanics to the players, attracting millions of fans over the course of two to three years.

While Genshin Impact became immensely popular due to its vast open-world, Honkai Impact 3rd pulled in players for its fast-paced combat and heartbreaking story. With the recently announced project, Zenless Zone Zero, Hoyoverse have shifted gears while they work on two of their most ambitious projects to date.

Honkai: Star Rail, being based on the popular Honkai franchise, takes a totally different approach from anything Hoyoverse has done in the past. It implements turn-based combat while keeping an open world and gacha. Despite being a Honkai game, Hoyoverse intends to keep a fresh experience for both long-time fans and newcomers.

In an exclusive conversation with Sportskeeda Esports’ Soumyadeep Banerjee, Hoyoverse spoke about their recent entry in the Honkai series and some of the challenges they faced during development.

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Hoyoverse talks about their approach to turn-based and other features for Honkai: Star Rail

Q. For starters, can you describe to our readers what Honkai Star Rail is all about?

Hoyoverse: Honkai: Star Rail is an important product of HoYoverse that will be released soon. As a turn-based strategy game, it embodies our hope to continue to improve players' experience and choices.

We've accumulated and consolidated the tech, project development, and content creation experiences from the previous titles. These valuable experiences have played a major role in the project's development.

In terms of the design, Honkai: Star Rail will have its own independent gameplay and story to improve accessibility for players but will also have extensions of the Honkai series to inherit its spiritual core.

We are looking forward to hearing the feedback of players from around the world in the upcoming Closed Beta. Your feedback will help us in improving the game experience and content to meet players’ expectations.

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Q. Genshin Impact and Honkai Impact 3rd are known worldwide for their fast-paced combat, with Honkai having quick time events between party members. Walk us through the thought process that led Honkai: Star Rail having turn-based combat.

Hoyoverse: There are two main reasons why Honkai: Star Rail adopts a turn-based strategy genre this time: First, we hope to continue to develop products of different varieties to improve the player's experience and choice, and attract more people to try HoYoverse games, and the turn-based strategy genre is one of the areas we wanted to explore; second, we believe that turn-based strategy is still a very engaging game genre.

Whether it is real-time action or turn-based strategy, it is just how we shape the style and immersion of the game. We also hope to organically combine the turn-based gameplay with the worldview and narrative of Honkai: Star Rail. In the upcoming Closed Beta, we believe players will be able to have a more comprehensive experience.

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Q. Honkai: Star Rail is the first game from Hoyoverse to have turn-based combat. What are some of the challenges you faced while implementing entirely new combat mechanics?

Hoyoverse: Unlike the on-hit feedback of real-time action games, turn-based strategy games have their own unique charm. Their excitement comes from careful planning, thinking, and defeating the enemy. Despite being easy to get started, it allows for diverse and flexible playstyles and strategies.

Therefore, we have carefully balanced the game's overall setup so that it's both novice-friendly and challenging for experienced players. We will also adjust the game's difficulty accordingly so that all players are able to enjoy the thrilling experience that the game has to offer.

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Q. We see many characters from Honkai Impact making their appearances in Star Rail. From Himeko, Welt, Bronya, and Selee, how much will Star Rail be linked with Honkai Impact in terms of story?

Hoyoverse: Honkai: Star Rail is the newest title of the Honkai series after Honkai Impact 3rd. Honkai: Star Rail will continue to incorporate the consistent spiritual core of the Honkai series, showing the symbiosis and confrontation between human beings and destiny.

Some of the characters of the Honkai series will even appear in Star Rail, giving some surprises to the old players of this series. For example, in the Closed Beta, Himeko and Seele will appear in new identities.

At the same time, the gameplay and story of Honkai: Star Rail are independent of the other titles from the Honkai series. We hope for Honkai: Star Rail to be a title that is easily accessible to new players, so they too can experience the beauty of the Honkai Universe. We'd also like Honkai: Star Rail to be the beginning of a new series. That is why this title is not numerical to the series.

As a whole, the continuation of this spiritual core of the Honkai series and the independence of the game itself allows all players to develop this magnificent galactic adventure together and enjoy the fun of a brand-new game.

It will not be necessary for new players to have played the previous Honkai series prior, and old players of the series will share a moment of nostalgia when they reunite with their "old friends" in the game.

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Q. Given the difficulty and thought process that goes into turn-based gameplay, many seem to shy away due to its slower pace. However, can players expect anything extra while fighting different enemies in combat?

Hoyoverse: Although this is a turn-based strategy game, we've also consolidated our experiences with developing action RPG games and produced an organic combination between it and a turn-based combat system.

We've also put forth a lot of effort in creating dynamic experiences in the maze exploration and puzzle-solving features. Players can use path planning, enemy encounters, sight avoidance, and other actions to gain the upper hand. For instance, players will notice that each character has been given a different Technique in this Closed Beta.

Different Techniques will have different exploration or combat effects. Players will need to switch the controlled character accordingly for maximum effect. This allows for players to freely cultivate their own best strategies prior to each fight.

At this moment, Honkai: Star Rail is still in its Beta testing, and we hope to collect players' suggestions and opinions on the core gameplay mechanics of the game to help us further optimize the core content of the game.

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Q. Given that Genshin Impact has been out for almost two years now, how much did all the feedback help create new mechanics and the world of Honkai Star Rail?

Hoyoverse: We have built an independent team of more than 400 people for Honkai: Star Rail, dedicated to presenting an excellent game that still incorporates the spiritual core of the Honkai franchise while exploring turn-based core gameplay that we have never tried before. These factors have brought different challenges to the production team.

At the same time, the development experience of many previous products, including the production and management of platform resources, and the rational use of the hardware characteristics of each platform for optimization, all have been very helpful for us in developing Honkai: Star Rail.

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Q. The Honkai series has some of the most memorable characters that have impacted both the story and gameplay. Could you tell us more about the creative process behind each character?

Hoyoverse: Character creation has always been an important way to enhance the game experience and immersion for HoYoverse, and this Honkai: Star Rail is no exception. When the game is released and players have a deeper understanding of the characters, we will share with you the story behind the character-shaping of this game.

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Q. After the conclusion of the first closed beta, how has the community feedback been, and what are the changes that everyone can expect from the first beta to the second?

Hoyoverse: The majority of users received this game well during the first Closed Beta, and they have provided a lot of valuable advice for novice guidance and strategy tutorials. Hence, we will be focusing on optimizing the early-game experience, hopefully, to improve the players' goals at the start of the game, which in turn allows them to understand the game better.

The second Closed Beta will focus on the display of turn-based strategies, and we will further optimize the game based on the players' feedback.

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Q. Before we wrap things up, care to tell our readers what can they expect from HoYoverse this year?

Hoyoverse: We hope to further listen to the suggestions of the majority of players through the Closed Beta for Honkai: Star Rail, so as to help us further optimize the gameplay experience. This is the core principle in developing this game.

Of course, other HoYoverse titles will also continue to launch new content to improve everyone's choice and experience. Please keep us in your mind.