r/gachagaming

Feels like every gacha community has been fighting about rewards lately.

WuWa had a lot of people saying the anniversary didn’t even feel that big. R1999 got even messier in CN fan community because it stopped being just about pulls and turned into people arguing about the game's whole direction. HSR felt more like people shrugging and saying it was fine while farming the Elation jokes. Then NIKKE came along and a lot of reactions were basically "yeah okay, this actually looks like an anniversary." And with NTE, people seem pretty positive mostly because the launch rewards immediately make you feel like you can actually plan your pulls.

At this point I'm less interested in the exact numbers and more curious about what actually gives people that feeling of okay they really showed up for this one.

I'm curious where that line is for you, because lately it feels like every fandom has a completely different definition of what counts as generous, what counts as bare minimum, and what actually feels like a real anniversary.

Last year, I reached a point where logging in daily just felt like a chore. It not only robbed me of my time but also negatively affected my attitude towards these games. It wasn't even about how much time the dailies actually took, the perceived obligation of the login itself was the main problem. Because of this, I took a break last year that lasted roughly from November to March of this year. Originally, wrapped up in the negativity I felt at that moment, I thought I would never touch these games again. But somehow, after that negativity gradually faded, I remembered how much fun I used to have with them. I thought about what actually made me play these games in the first place and realized it was always the stories and the characters. The daily grind had just corrupted that fun.

So, I decided to try an experiment: I deliberately stopped logging in every day. At first, I felt a lot of internal resistance. I told myself I was leaving too much currency on the table, and that I wouldn't get all the endgame rewards if I didn't make it my goal to improve my characters every single day. But after a while, I started questioning if that was actually true, or if these games had just pulled me into a hamster wheel for minimal rewards, designed to make me addicted to something that isn't proportionate to the time I invest. The two games I play (hsr and wuwa) give daily login rewards in amounts that would take ages to save up for anything relevant, yet it's just enough to make players dependent and give them the feeling of missing out if they don't collect them every day.

So what I did was this.. I now only log in to spend my stamina when it is completely capped. And by that, I don't just mean the regular 24 hour cap, but I actively use the overflow systems that kick in when regular stamina is full. In Wuwa, that takes about 5 days to fill up, and in hsr about a month. So technically, I am still grinding, but the frequency has dropped drastically. This has had a very positive impact on how I feel about these games. Nowadays, I only log in when there's a new story available, an event I'm actually interested in, for the weekly runs, or endgame modes. And I even ignore the weeklies if I don't feel like doing them. I only play endgame or events as long as I enjoy them, and I stop the exact moment the fun ends, even if it means leaving rewards behind.

You could say I treat these games much more like "real" singleplayer games now compared to all the years prior. Because of this, my enjoyment hasn't just returned, it's stronger than ever before.

In case anyone is wondering about the currency: since March, I have still managed to save up about 120 pulls in Wuwa and about 190 in hsr.

Only available for Vietnam, Indonesia, Thailand, Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore, but you can still register even if you aren't from these countries since the game will be available in English. It's possible that you'll need a VPN to play when it launches.

Rewards are 6x Initial Wish, 3x Adoring Heart, 2k Aurora Coins and an exclusive avatar frame.

^(Iirc those first 2 items are just EXP items to level up cards)

Is a gacha game hypothetically able to gradually phase out gacha mechanics over time while still being able to maintain itself? If so, which alternative do you think is the best (skin aesthetics? one-off payment? others?), and how would you design this phasing-out process?

For example, Genshin is turning 6 years old soon, and while it still has a massive fanbase up until now, it may be approaching an ending with the release of Snezhnaya this year, and nobody knows what is going to happen after. It may as well continue the way it is indefinitely, but it may be possible that it would no longer receive updates at some point, and becomes a "complete" game. In that case, it would be necessary to consider a new monetization model.

Personally, I think Genshin will certainly have a story ending and will not go on forever. I was discussing this with my friends a while ago, and I thought it's an interesting thing to consider, i.e. whether it would be practicable, legal or beneficial, though I'm not sure if there are gacha games other than Genshin that may need to consider this problem at this moment. What do you think? I'd love to hear about your opinion!