What's going on guys it's Mario and Sonic gamer and today we're going to be talking about the 3 Hoyo games Honkai Impact 3rd, Genshin Impact, and Honkai Star Rail once again. For those of you who don know I've already made a chapter a while back called why Honkai Impact 3rd is better than Genshin Impact and Honkai Star Rail which you can find in the table of context but essentially I'm going to be remaking that chapter except this time I'm going to try to go over as much more detail as possible as I feel like that's not what I did last time and there are just some things I didn't add. So I'm splitting this remake into 3 parts: characters, story, and gameplay. This first part is going to go over the characters side of things which is main protagonist, side characters, and villains. I'm be making 3 points for this I got inspiration from this YouTuber I watch named Filmento when he makes 3 points in his videos. Now lastly I just have to say that this is all purely just my opinion and I like all 3 games so I just wanna let you know I'm making this why I think one does better than the other 2. So with that out of the way let's get started.

A developed and expressive protagonist

The first thing that Honkai does better than Genshin and Star Rail in terms or characters is that they actually have a real actual main protagonist in the form of Kiana Kaslana. When we compare her to Traveler and Trailblazer it's clearly no contest on who's superior. The issue I have with Traveler and Trailblazer is that they are just plain self inserts of the player that can only be established based on the player rather it be choosing genders Aether (male) or Lumine (female) for Traveler or Stelle (femele) or Caelus (male) for Trailblazer but the thing is that despite having already established names the player can just choose what name to give them and change their names at anytime on top of that they never speak or I should say they don't have any speaking dialogue and only have that on VERY rare occasions because most of the time they are only limited to dialogue choices by the player which makes Traveler and Trailblazer look emotionless and almost less personality. That was not the case with Kiana, her name and gender are already established and the same goes with her personality and is never limited by dialogue choices and actually has something to say at all times whenever she's on screen. Most importantly Kiana actually has character development, in the beginning when we are first introduced Kiana is a cocky, arrogant, upbeat, loud and always in over head and has a bit of ego when she's introduced like not paying attention in school, getting easily triggered when literally anyone other than herself gets anywhere near Mei or does anything with Mei and acts like she can handle everything when in reality she can't which is why she's failing in classes. Overall Kiana is just a loud mouth arrogant, and egotistic asshole albeit she is kind, caring, selfless, and always happy and smiling but she can be a bit in the top over the head that was our first introduction to Kiana in the first 2 arcs but then we get third arc where everything changes. As we all know Kiana was kidnapped by Otto who awakened the Herrscher of the Void, Sirin inside of her. Sirin would go on to start the Fourth Honkai Eruption killing anyone in her way until Himeko sacrificed herself to save Kiana from Sirin's influence in Final Lesson. But after Kiana turns back to normal you would notice there is a drastic change in her character. The once cocky, and arrogant girl that thinks she knows everything. Gone. The girl that always is confident, loud, and upbeat. Gone. The girl that gets easily triggered if anyone even so much as steps towards Mei. Gone. And the smile and laughs that said girl gives. Gone. It is clear that the Kiana that we were first introduced at the beginning of the series is gone forever and in her place stood a girl who is so depressed and traumatized that she feels like a different person entirely, Kiana went from happy and confident to sad and miserable, however that was part of her character development because in the later parts of the series she grows and learns that even though the world is not sunshine and rainbows, even though everything is not easy she will continue to fight with her friends by her side. I think the moment where Kiana truly grew was in the Herrscher of Dominance arc when she awakened the Herrscher of Flamescion, now we see that she's no longer cocky, arrogant, loud, upbeat, egotistical, confident or depressed, sad, traumatized, confused, and even suicidal but a intelligent, determined, observant, and mature person. Kiana has comes so far as a character that is why she became one of my favorite video game protagonists of all time right up there with Mario, Sonic, Mega Man, Kirby, and Sora because she earned it through her character development. But all the great things I described for Kiana are not the case with Traveler and Trailblazer we never know what their personalities are like, we never get to see them express emotions, and we never see any signs of actual character development. Like you would think that someone who separated from their sibling after being attacked by a god or being created and wake up at a space station with no memories or what their past is would have some form of expressing emotions or character development but that's not the case here. Traveler and Trailblazer's emotions are only limited to on dialogue choices of the player, they could be either just as happy or upbeat as Kiana or they could just be calm and intelligent and takes the situation seriously or they could just have anger issues and huge temper tantrums and even then they don't express any emotions at all which makes them come off as bland as Hell the only time Traveler and Trailblazer ever get serious is during serious situations but those are mostly rare cases other than that they are just bland and emotionless I'll give credit to Traveler for being slightly more expressive than Trailblazer but that's just me being generous. As for character development they don't show any signs of that. Sure we have this moment where Traveler is reunited with their sibling only for said to become a villain for whatever reason we never actually saw Traveler change we never actually saw them develop some determination to bring their sibling back to the light side we never saw how it changed them unlike with Kiana when she witnessed Mei become a villain and after losing to Mei, Kiana vows to bring her back and as for Trailblazer they too haven't shown any signs of character development sure we do have the moment where Trailblazer has a shocking conversation with Kafka but we never actually saw them wanting more answers about their past, even in the Kafka side quest where we learn from Blade that Trailblazer at one point once followed Kafka on a mission but we never actually see a single moment when Trailblazer is desperate about wanting to know more about their past or finding Kafka since she literally created them in first place, unlike with Kiana who after the events surrounding the Fourth Eruption wants answers for why she is the way she is. This is why I have a problem with self inserts especially in Hoyoverse, to be fair having self inserts is fine but that's no excuse for not giving them character development like for example in games such as Sonic Forces where the Avatar is basically a self insert and they don't have much dialogue but at least they express emotions, emotions such as when they are scared of Infinite after he killed their allies and was told to flee, and then showing signs of bravery when fighting against Infinite and Eggman's forces in the final battle Hell even in Honkai Impact 3rd in Captainverse which is an alternate timeline and universe from the main one with the same cosmology and establishments has moments of character development despite being the self insert and the same can also be said for Adam the main protagonist of A Post Honkai Odyssey which takes place 8 years after the events of the first part of Honkai in the mainverse two has moments of character development. Even if your character is a self insert you have to give them personalities of their own rather than just mostly limit them to players choices and make sure they actually express real emotions and have actual dialogue and I hope that Dreamseeker in Honkai Part 2 is an actual developed character like Kiana because that's what Kiana makes Kiana so great as a character despite having a tragic past of being a clone and starting off as carefree and cocky she grows to become a mature hero and an inspiration to us all something that is unfortunately not the case with Traveler and Trailblazer.

A well balanced supporting cast

The second thing that Honkai does better apart from having a better protagonist is they have a balanced supporting cast and a well written support cast. Let's start things off with Honkai for a bit with Honkai outside of Kiana we also have characters like her two BFFS Raiden Mei and Bronya Zaychik, the deuteragonist and the tritagonist of the series, after the first few chapters I was immediately invested in this trio they are who the audience follow let's look at Mei she started off as just a normal A student at the top her class, she is the second most important character in the story besides Kiana and she comes off as sort of shy mainly because she used to be a rich kid and an heiress until her father got arrested and she awakened the Herrscher of Thunder within her and she acted like the older sister to her friends cooking food for them especially Kiana now at the beginning it does appear that Mei doesn't have any feelings for Kiana mostly because Kiana would often express her live for Mei and thinks that Mei feels the same way, Mei doesn't really mind what Kiana is doing as long as Kiana mostly keep it to herself which makes sense because Kiana was the first person who ever showed Mei true friendship, defended her from bullies, and was the one who saved her life. However in the Fourth Eruption much like with Kiana we see a drastic in Mei's character as despite doing well in classes, Mei started to feel inferior as more and more people around her all started sacrificing themselves for her, Bronya fell into a coma, Himeko died defeating Sirin, Fu Hua sacrificed the last of her sentience, and even Kiana sacrificed herself for Mei. No matter how hard she tries Mei was a damsel who needed to be save and was powerless to return the favor as Sirin stole her Herrscher core it got even worse when she was unable to save Kiana from being kidnapped again by Durandal and worst of all she found out Kiana had 2 months left to live. At that point Mei felt powerless and it became clear that Mei did have romantic feelings for Kiana as she was desperate to save her so when Kevin Kaslana gave her an offer that would ensure Kiana's survival Mei did not hesitate to take it even though this means that from that point forward she would have to be a villain she did not care for too long all she did was sit back while everyone else saves her and is unable to do anything she will save Kiana no matter what it takes even if she has to beat her in the same fashion as Sasuke did with Naruto, she did not care she was more than to become a criminal participating in terrorist activities to ensure Kiana's safety. Kiana was a girl who would sacrifice herself for the world and Mei was a girl who would sacrifice the world for Kiana that's how deep Mei's character is as it's showing that nothing and nobody is stopping her from her goals, either Mei sacrifices the world just to save Kiana or she dies trying one or the other. But later on she realizes that what she's doing is hurting Kiana that she doesn't realize that what she was doing is really selfish as Mei is essentially forcing Kiana to be in a cage and not do anything she eventually learns that she cannot stop Kiana from sacrificing herself no matter how hard she tries, Mei eventually accepts this and decides from her on out she would respect Kiana's decisions and makes sure she is there to give her support which is what makes her and Kiana's reunion and reconciliation all the more meaningful as it shows that Mei has finally decided to stop being selfish and continues to be at Kiana's side. As for Bronya when I first saw her I immediately disliked her intensely on sight because she was just this emotionless child who acts like some kind of edgelord but like with Kiana and Mei I eventually grew to love Bronya as deep within that emotionless shell is a tragic character from birth Bronya was a young orphan who spent her entire life being groomed by a gang and forced into going on assassination missions until one day she was adopted by Cocolia after a failed attempt to assassinate her and was brought to an orphanage where she met Seele and the two became close unfortunately she lost Seele who was her first friend ever since she arrived at Cocolia's orphanage when Seele took her place as a test that went wrong and she was in the Sea of Quanta and was willing to do everything in her power to bring Seele back however after meeting Kiana and Mei, Bronya had a change of heart she realizes that going down a dark path that Cocolia did and as such she sacrificed herself to ensure the safety of Kiana and Mei but I do think her character moment really came into action was when she became the Herrscher of Reason. Bronya became more than just an emotionless child who likes video games and that's what I really love about her character. As for Genshin and Star Rail what I described for Mei and Bronya is almost the exact opposite here let's take a look at Paimon I will admit she is really really cute but aside from being adorable what is so special about her character? We never know anything about her backstory so we don't know if she's tragic or not, we never actually saw her progress through character development all we know is that she was saved by the Traveler and since then she basically just became Hoyo's version of Navi from The Legend of Zelda sure we have some emotional moments here and there but they aren't enough for us to be emotionally invested in Paimon unlike with Mei and Bronya, especially since Paimon is the deuteragonist in the Genshin series. As for Star Rail we do have characters like Dan Heng and March 7th. Too be fair on Star Rail's part they did do a good job at least getting us interested in their characters. Dan Heng is the latest incarnation of the Imbibitor Lunae who was branded a traitor of the Xianzhou Luofu after his previous incarnation Dan Feng committed an unforgivable sin and was exiled as a result long ago, and March is a girl who was trapped in a special type of ice and was found by the Astral Express but she has no memories of her past or even her real name much like the Trailblazer. All of those sound good but this is where the issue comes in for Dan Heng this leads to some questions: Why is he being branded as a criminal for a crime his reincarnation committed? Why is he still considered a traitor in present day even though he literally did nothing wrong? What crime did his past incarceration committed that was so unforgivable? Why does Dan Heng have to bare the sins of his past incarceration even though he did absolutely nothing wrong? That's like me getting arrested for something that my ancestor did 200 years ago. Furthermore my problem is that we never actually saw Dan Heng express remorse or regret for what his past incarnation did, we never actually saw this change and mold him as a person with a desire to atone for the sins of Dan Feng and restore the Imbibitor Lune name we never saw any of that unlike with Mei who had a desire to protect Kiana and later be there for her side and support her decisions after being selfish for so long. As for March well she never really stood out for me sure the concept of her mystery backstory is interesting the problem is that outside of her side quest we never actually have some form of desire to find out more about her past nor did we see her develop as a person since March was told not see her past and you would something like that would spark a character development but that's not the case here. Apart form the second and third most important characters we also have some side characters in Honkai we have Himeko, Theresa, Fu Hua, Seele, Durandal, Rita, Welt, Einstein, Tesla, Veliona, and Herrscher of Sentience characters I've managed to get emotionally invested in. We have characters like Seele who I didn't like at first but as time goes on I started to love her especially after she saves Bronya in the Sea of Quanta speaking of which she was trapped there for 3 years after she gave herself to take Bronya's place in the experiment she also struggles with her dark personality who fans call Veliona but the two eventually learned to get along like twin sisters, we have Himeko who lost her father at a young age and lost her mentor and since then she's making sure that stuff like that never happens again, Durandal was someone who despite being hot as Hell was someone we didn't really like at first but then we find out she's not truly evil but she's just doing her job it gets even more deep when we found out she was the real Kiana Kaslana who lost her mother during the Second Eruption was kidnapped by Otto who cloned her and ultimately separated by her father after a failed attempt to saved said clone and Otto wiped her memories before she got them back later on and would go on to be an older sister figure to Kiana, and for Rita much like Durandal she too was not evil and is simply doing her job and just wants to be there for Durandal we also find out in the Durandal visual novel that she was a rich girl who lost her family in a Honkai attack, we have Welt, Einstein, and Tesla having real fleshed out backstories with their relationship with Welt Joyce, we Theresa who was created by Otto with the intention of being a clone to Kallen, and we have Fu Hua the most tragic character in the entire series she went through over 50,000 years of Hell ever since the Honkai arrived losing her family and friends and even after becoming an immortal soldier she still continued to face loss and betrayal which was too much for her it wasn't until she had friends like Kiana where she finally found the light and was finally never alone. Hell even Veliona and Senti had character developments, both of them are dark doppelgängers to Seele and Fu Hua and have opposite personalities as them, both of them were introduced as antagonists and are bosses but they would end up being defeated, both of them have sassy and arrogant personalities, and both of them clam that they care about themselves and not Seele and Fu Hua when in reality that's not true as deep down they care about Seele and Fu Hua as they're are very instances where they are shown thinking about them, worrying about them, and even outright helping them showing that they truly do care about them. Hell even Olenyeva twins Rozaliya and Liliya are very interesting especially the moment where Liliya sacrifices herself to save Rozaliya and Rozaliya rescues Liliya later not to mention they both make me laugh. Honkai has shown to have a big cast that is pretty consistent in keeping us emotionally invested whereas Genshin and Star Rail's supporting cast are just all over the place and many characters are either meh, okay, or just outright forgotten. Let me tell you what I mean by that, Genshin and Star Rail have this similar gameplay style of open world where you can travel between country or planet and meet a vast number of characters and already that presents a bigger issue most of the side characters backstories are too cliche and feels something you would see out of a Disney movie and while there are several characters with emotional backstory like Ei, Neuvillette, and a few others they aren't enough to get invested with them emotionally invested in them the same goes with Star Rail but there is an even bigger issue, we have characters like Bronya, Seele, Himeko, and Welt all characters that are in Impact 3rd pulled into Star Rail though in Welt's case he traveled to the Star Rail universe as shown in the Alien Space manga and the only reason why they are immediately likeable is because they remind you of them in Honkai which is fine for people who've heard of the game but for the people who've never played nor even heard Honkai Impact 3rd that's the exact opposite. Like imagine Star Rail being the first Hoyo game you ever and you see Bronya, Seele, Himeko, Natasha, and Welt you would not understand what the hype is about because you're never emotionally invested in them. To be fair the Star Rail versions of Bronya and Seele have definitely moments of character development the problem is that outside of side quests we never actually see them again, unlike their Honkai counterparts, we never actually see them have any effect on the other all plot, we never actually see anything almost unique about them the same goes with almost any character in both Genshin and Star Rail as outside of quests we never see any of these characters again because we just go onto the next planet. When you have several side characters you have to give them stories that gets us emotional invested in their journey and make are they are balanced as well something that Honkai managed to do because despite have a much larger cast of characters Genshin and Star Rail aren't able to gather the twos Honkai did to get us emotionally invested with the characters.

Incredible formidable villains

Finally the one thing that Honkai has over Genshin and Star Rail is it's roster of villains especially the 3 big bads, Sirin, Otto Apocalypse, and Kevin Kaslana. Now weather or not these guys deserve to be the best video game villains of all time is up for you to decide but for me they are definitely up there among the greatest especially Kevin being up there with the likes of Bowser, Eggman, Xehanort, and more. Now we have to explain what makes Honkai's villains worthy antagonists comes down to two factors: Formidable and understandable. When it comes to Sirin her determination is very clear, we see her blowing up entire entire buildings, creating massive earthquakes, destroying Schicksal and Anti-Entropy's troops with breaking so much as a sweat we see her clear determination of wanting to destroy humanity after being traumatized by losing her friends and family as a result of being experimented on. As for Otto while up until Chapters 26-28 we never really see him do much it's clear that he too has proven have the biggest impact on the entire series he kidnap a little girl to use her DNA to create for clones, he experimented on children, he shot Fu Hua in the head and created the Herrscher of Sentience, and attempted to erase the world's time by 500 years, it is clear that he did all of this just so he can revive the woman he loves: Kallen Kaslana and will do what takes to see her again, and finally we have Kevin while some of you may argue that he does mostly nothing throughout the entire series I would argue that in a way he does something as shown that he is very clear on dead set on activating Project Stigma to save the world from Honkai he's more than willing to battle his former friends Su and Fu Hua, he one shot Bronya who has just recently awaken Herrscher of Reason, he even made Welt shit himself, he manipulated Mei into join World Serpent so much so that he orchestrated the events that surrounds Kiana and Mei's fight, battled Durandal, defeated multiple Herrschers, and even defeated the Will of Stigmata it's clear that despite sitting on his throne the entire time Kevin still manages to be just as formidable which makes sense because he goes on to be the final boss of the first Part of the series. This unfortunately is a problem with Genshin and Star Rail as the villains are nowhere near as formidable as Kevin, Otto, and Sirin. There's this Unknown God who shows up to battle Aether and Lumine then separates them and is never seen or heard from again, there's the Traveler's Sibling who turned to the dark side who became the leader of the Abyss Order and wants to destroy Teyvat for whatever reason and why I'm criticizing this is because they aren't even formidable enough Unknown God just shows up until she's not there any more, Traveler's Sibling shows up to reveal they are the villain which by extension should have a massive impact until you remember that Traveler's Sibling just shows up and then leaves not even bothering fighting Traveler to show how formidable they are. That was not the case with Honkai when Mei becomes a villain in Chapter 17 she doesn't just show up state her intentions to Kiana and just leaves no Mei battles Kiana in a desperate attempt to stop Kiana from sacrificing herself and eventually defeats her to show how formidable Mei is which definitely makes it much more impactful had the Traveler's Sibling battled Traveler and win it would've showed just how formidable Traveler's Sibling is and it would've made it much more impactful. As for Star Rail well the villains are hardly worth a nickel which is a shame because I love Kafka especially her English voice actress Cheryl Texiera but the problem is Kafka doesn't show near as much formidable as Honkai's villains she battles the heroes and gets caught though that was part of the plan so she can speak with Trailblazer before escaping all of that sounds cool but that's not enough to show how formidable she is which was not the case with Kevin because after escaping the Sea of Quanta he boxes Durandal, defeats Fu Hua, obliterates Theresa, manipulates Mei and Seele, just to name a few. We have Blade who wants revenge on Dan Heng for something his past incarnation but outside of the trailers we never actually saw him perform any form of determination for vengeance which was not the case with Sirin, and Silver Wolf she's cool but she literally throws a temper tantrum when Herta destroyed her 70 alternative accounts and we never saw even a hing of determination of her wanting her accounts back. The issues with Genshin and Star Rail is that they never show any signs of formidability to show how threatening they are unlike with Honkai. Now let's move on to the understandable aspect which is where I think Honkai truly shines here. Sirin has this backstory of living a normal happy life considering everyone around her to be her friend until her mom died due to Honkai radiation on top of that she along with several friends other kids were taken by Schicksal and is subjective to experiment under Otto's orders in hopes of find one who can awaken a Herrscher to revive Kallen which Sirin did but she ended up wanting revenge against humanity for forcing her to watch her friends die right in front of her. Sirin's experiences as a inhumane experiments makes you think that she is justified in destroying the human race even though there are lots of people who did nothing wrong but not like that matters anyway, going deep in Sirin's past it's very clear that deep within the monster created by the scum of humanity was a little girl who wanted to live a normal and happy life which is why it cuts so deep when Cecilia rushed to Sirin's side and died alongside her, though Cecilia failed to save Sirin her attempts to save her truly did touch Sirin's heart as shown in the manga when Sirin says she misses Cecilia she wants to feel her comfort and warmth and love and the magic words Ich liebe dich which is German for I love you. It was clear that Sirin was deeply effected by Cecilia so much so that I would argue that if it weren't for the nukes Sirin would've been saved because Cecilia was the first person to show her comfort since her friends and her mother, then when she comes back in Kiana's body and after losing to her we finally see Sirin show her respect as she sees that she got a second chance through Kiana and can finally rest easy now it's so bitter sweet. Next up we have the one and only Otto Apocalypse as stated earlier he had the biggest impact in the entire series but all of this happened because he lost the love of his life Kallen Kaslana. Unlike most people in Otto's life, Kallen was the first person to actually give him support and courage and it's that one person who Otto sees as an only pillar of support in his life and was not willing to let that go now it is worth noting that Kallen never returned any romantic for Otto because she's already in love with Yae Sakura but nonetheless Otto still cared about her so much so that even when he tried to convince Kallen to marry him despite the fact that the marriage isn't really sincere and real and is only there because Otto's father said that marriage is the only way for Kallen to be spared from execution even if he knew the marriage isn't real even if he knew Kallen doesn't love him the way he loves her, Otto still cares about Kallen and doesn't want Kallen to die which doing so he would lose that one pillar of support the one person who always supported him the one person who was always there for him even if nobody else doesn't we see just how much Otto cares for Kallen and is willing to go to every lengths to keep her alive, to keep that pillar of support she gave him standing even if it means sending out Honkai on the day of her execution so Kallen can escape. Unfortunately for Otto, Kallen did not escape and instead chose to sacrifice herself to save a child at the cost of her life. When Kallen died it cut deep in Otto perhaps more deeper than anything he's experienced. The first and only person in his life whoever believed in him. Gone. The person who always supported him through and through. Gone. The light that shined through his darkness. All of the sudden the pillar of hope that Kallen gave to Otto completely crashed and fell apart when she died and as a result he went mad as he could never live with the lose of Kallen which give birth to his plan of him spending 500 years to bring her back he doesn't care how many times he has to clone Kallen, he doesn't care how many children he has to experiment, and he especially doesn't care how many lives have to be lost as a result of his own actions like shooting Fu Hua or just casually let Himeko die or the fact that he doesn't care about Sirin snapping at humanity due to his own actions of inhumane experiments that got her friends and causing the Second Eruption, I mean he doesn't even care about fighting the Honkai anymore they only thing he does care about is bringing back the love of his life, his only real pillar of support, the person that only ever supported him when literally the rest of the world didn't. That's what makes Otto such a compelling character because of his determination to bring back Kallen even if he's a death's door he still found a way to bring her back by using the powers of a god to create alternate timelines where Kallen is alive. Going much further Otto in some way is kinda like Darth Vader and Obito Uchiha, all of them have women they love as their only pillars of support but that's lost when Padme, Rin, and Kallen died. He may have been hated but deep within the monstrous mad scientist was a man who simply wanted to be acknowledged and nobody but Kallen would do that, despite her not being in love with him, Kallen was everything to Otto and losing her makes him look like a tragic hero. Speaking of tragic heroes let's move on to the best villain of the entire series and one of the best video game villains, Kevin Kaslana. What separates Kevin from the other two is that unlike Sirin who want to seek revenge on humanity for the experiments she experienced as well as loss of her friends and unlike Otto was willing to literally anything rather it's cloning or sacrifice the entire human race to bring back Kallen, Kevin's goals involve making sure that humanity never has to experience what he went through. Much like with Fu Hua, Kevin was once a happy normal teenager living a happy life unfortunately life made him go down an unexpected turn when the Honkai showed up, he lost many friends and family in the process and as a result this gave him his goal with his infamous quote: "No matter what it takes, Humanity shall defeat the Honkai." But despite that the losses never stopped as he grew for thousands of years he continued to lose much of his comrades despite his victories against dozens upon dozens against Herrschers and the more people he lost the more depressed he got it got even worse when he's unable to defeat the Final Herrscher otherwise none as the Herrscher of the End which lead to humanity's near extinction, it got even worse when the love of his life MEI lost her life it was already bad enough for Kevin as he's never able to make physical contact with MEI due to being a MANTIS which means he can't have a child with her through sexual means so her dying just add more insult to injury which ultimately gave birth to his Project Stigma plan a plan that forces Honkai energy to a small percentage of people to develop Stigmata and place humanity into a dream-like state through the powers of Hare and the Herrscher of Finality much like Madara Uchiha's Infinite Tsukuyomi plan thus replacing them with realised physical Stigmata while humans merge into a Spiritual Adam, however in the process 99% of humanity will die. Despite the nature of the plan Kevin was more than willing to go through with it, despite people saying he's a hero and not a villain realistically speaking his actions speak otherwise Kevin attempted to nuke a city never mind that fact that millions of lives will be lost, he battled his former friends Su and Fu Hua, he manipulated Mei and Seele in such an incredible way that Kiana and Bronya are forced to fight them especially in Mei's case since Kevin and Otto conveniently set up the events for Mei to reawaken the Herrscher of Thunder and join World Serpent. But again this shows how far Kevin is willing to fall in order to save humanity from the Honkai as like Sirin, Kevin lost his friends and lived a life of pain and misery and like Otto, Kevin lost pillar of support in the form of his lover MEI, but unlike Sirin, he doesn't want people to suffer the same pain he bad experienced especially when it comes to losing friends out of revenge, and unlike Otto, he actually accepts that his pillar of support MEI is gone and isn't trying to revive her but rather he's fighting to make sure that nobody else loses their pillars of supports the way he did. His actions and methods may have been monstrous but deep down within is a war hero who has lost so much and was trying so desperately to ensure that never happens again but all that war he went through was too much for his heart which led to darkness and just like Madara Uchiha, that darkness corrupted Kevin and ultimately became the very worldly threat he swore to defeat. That's what makes him the best villain in the entire series as well as one of the best video game villains in general, may Kevin finally rest in peace. As you guys can see Honkai does a great job at making the 3 big bads understandable but in Genshin and Star Rail that's the exact opposite. We know that this Unknown God is responsible for separating the Traveler twins but we never actually have a full understandable reason for why she is this way other than to end their journey, while I can by the possibility that maybe the Traveler's Sibling was bore witness to the true nature of the world and decided to destroy the gods of Celestia, as well as the nations of Teyvat that were under their purview and that's perfectly fine and is understandable the problem is that we never actually saw how Traveler's Sibling turned out this way and therefore we can't fully understand them which was not the case with Sirin we saw what she went through we saw why it turned her to an absolute monster which is why we find them understandable. Star Rail is no different Kafka's reasons for why she is the way she other than to basically act like a mother for the Trailblazer is basically almost nonexistent we have some details on how she used to come from a planet that has no fear but that's just basic as Hell, Silver Wolf other than she's pissed at Herta for taking her accounts away and just to be a gamer we have no exact reason on why she's the way she is or whatever, as for Blade I can find how he wants revenge and to find his own funeral because immortality is completely miserable which I can understand the problem is that we never actually saw what made him be this way so we truly can't find him understandable which was not the case with Kevin as we saw what immortality is doing to him that's why according to Fu Hua once everything is all said in done Kevin wants to die and commit suicide because at that point there's nothing else for him to live anymore. Honkai does such a good job at making the 3 main villains so formidable and understandable. Hell Honkai does such a good job developing that minor characters like Raven and Cocolia just as formidable and understandable as the main villains. Both of them appeared to be heartless and mercilessly antagonists based on their actions weather it'd be bombing a city in Raven's case or being partially responsible for the Third Eruption in Cocolia's case but then it turns out that they only did this stuff all for the sake of protecting their respective orphanages that they founded and in Cocolia's case to bring Seele back this lead to both women making mistakes that they regretted, and we have a few more well developed villains like the Herrscher of Dominance as well as Hare which is not the case with Genshin and Star Rail. Staring with Star Rail outside of maybe Cocolia Rand who as basically brainwashed by the Stellaron most of the Star Raik antagonists are bland as Hell we have Jingliu who like Blade wants to die due to her immorality and wanting to be free from the pain she bas been causing as a result of getting mars struck but the problem is that we never even saw her have a glimpse of her feeling pain and sorrow or how immortality effected her which is once again an issue that Kevin doesn't have Hell even Fu Hua doesn't have that issue, and as for Genshin the minor villains aside from maybe Shogun aren't as understandable or formidable either and even then with Shogun she's just pretty meh. Overall when making your villains formidable and understandable you have to make sure you show us how understandable they can be rather than just tell us through words because if Kevin, Otto, and Sirin can do that you really have no excuse.

And that's going to be it for the chapter like I said this all purely opinion and as of right now Genshin and Star Rail still need some proper improvement if they want to be as good as Honkai, nonetheless this is the conclusion of Part 1 where I talk about the characters the next part I will take about the story but until then let me know in the comments below what you think and I will see you all next time. Peace.