u/C6smin_2th — reddlx

From what I've gathered, a lot of the people here are disappointed in the new character designs, and maybe the new area we're going to see in 3.0 in general. At first I fully agreed, but there's another thought forming in my head. Maybe I made up my mind too fast. So I began to rewatch the teaser and this is what I think after analyzing it more carefully:

The New Area - Does it look like the vague "medieval europe but with modern tech" other gachas base themselves in? I wouldn't say so. Are there similarities? Yes, but that I feel like is more because of the characters in the trailer, which I'll address later down. Other than that, it looks a lot like a different spin on what we've had so far in New Eridu: there's graffiti on the walls, there's a statue (lamppost?) resembling abstract art, we get a specific shot of bangboo recharging stations... I think the people saying the next update looks like something out of Genshin or another game are judging this too quickly, at least in reference to the world itself
Pyrois - I feel like people aren't talking about him in regards to this, but perhaps it is just me being late to the party. I like what his purpose is, I just don't like how he looks. I don't know how to explain it, he seems otherworldly
Norma - I kinda liked her since I first saw her in-game. Now I like her even more, having this tiny engineer in the cast feels right, and she reminds me of working alongside Belobog crew. Her outfit reminds me of the train conductor in HSR, and seeing as she is supposedly a weapons manufacturer, I think it fits
Velina - she's one of the few I'm less excited about. She's Norma's coworker, yet her design doesn't feel that related to hers, except for the color scheme. It was mentioned in the story that she deals more in the management side, and for that her outfit does make some sense... perhaps this one is more about personal taste
Claret - The (I think) owner of "Flint Workshop", one I'm kind of mixed about. I like how she looks for the most part, I think she needs to show just a bit less skin. In the teaser, she's standing in front of a shop named "True Blue", which at least from the name, is unlikely to be her actual store. If it isn't, the name "Flint Workshop" together with that look heavily implies to me a blacksmith store, and I don't think this would fit at all in ZZZ's setting. If they decide to go in that direction, I hope they go for a more fitting idea, perhaps a place to repair intelligent constructs
Roxy - I simply love her design. She seems to be Claret's employee, so we'll likely get their stories together in the game. She reminds me of Corin, having a gravestone for a necklace, together with a scar on her shoulder and the pale green hair. Just based of off that, I think she belongs in this game
Sigrid - She is my main issue with the coming update, along with the knights she's helping train here. I like her shoes with no heels, but other than that, it just feels like she was taken out of another game. The whole "futuristic knights" concept is something I didn't expect from them, and now that it's here I'm surprised in the worst way. I can now only hope that her part of the story will be something unique, otherwise I fully expect this to be just a different take on something I already played 5 years ago when first meeting the knights of favonious
The Storyteller - again, she reminds me of something that was already done not long ago (Columbina), maybe simply because of the fact she is possibly blind. We didn't get the best look of her clothes, but from what I did see, I liked her spear-like shoes and the entire "spiky mercury" aesthetic
Phoenix - Not many things to say here honestly. I like the glowing spikes she has on her back, they remind me of V1's wings from Ultrakill. Her mostly white clothes also make me think back to Seed Jr.'s design. I can only hope it'll have a better execution in-game than Seed did
Severian - I think we've already gotten a decent look at how he looks so far, so there won't be much new to add from the teaser. A lynx thiren wearing a full black business suit with golden accessories and black fingerless gloves. It fits in the game, but perhaps not much so with the rest of NEPS
Ramielle - As opposed to the Ramiel dressed in black leather we saw in the story so far, this one is dressed in a softer, white material. I think I need to see more before I can rightly judge this one
Sunbringer - Possibly the most controversial one here. We don't know if the one we saw in this trailer is the same person we saw in the lore teaser from 2 years ago. Compared to the other characters, I think the issue here is more the way they chose to redesign her rather than how it fits it the game. Her horns are smaller, her hair was redone, her eyes were changed to look less special and her coat was either given the typical hoyoverse style of "hanging from the shoulders down the back like a cape" or removed entirely. I can think of reasoning for some of those changes: her old hair was in bad need of a redesign, her horns could've been reduced in size for gameplay reasons, and perhaps her eye change was done to reflect a more human face instead of the demi-god like look she had in the old trailer, but the removal of the coat was a change for the worse. Maybe it was also done to make animation easier, but I think there were better methods rather than removing her coat and putting her chest out. It wouldn't be a first for Hoyo to make one of their high in-lore status characters have revealing outfits, but it might be the first they added it where there wasn't one before