Genshin Impact, a globally popular Chinese online game known for its immersive gameplay and vibrant community, faces a crisis as it grapples with the mass departure of over one million users at home. Players are unceremoniously bidding farewell to the game’s social media spaces, spurred by a collective sense of dissatisfaction with the meager New Years’ gifts offered by the Genshin Impact’s developers.

On January 19th, Genshin Impact unveiled its Version 4.4 Special Program, aligning with the Chinese New Year. In the announcement, the game revealed plans to gift users a mere 3 “Intertwined Fates” as a token of appreciation for their support over the past year. However, players found this gesture to be lackluster, considering that acquiring a quality in-game character typically demands 70 “Intertwined Fates.”

While the size of the gift itself was seen as too stingy, the combination of a few other factors left players feeling even more unappreciated and disenchanted. Firstly, three “Intertwined Fates” have traditionally always been granted to players each New Year, so the poor communication strategy of presenting them as a special gift left the gamers displeased. Secondly, Honkai Impact 3rd, another game from developers miHoYo, recently gave away a rare character to players for free. Together, these two factors sparked dissatisfied players to unsubscribe from the game’s social media accounts and launch review bombing campaigns.

Highlighting the massive exodus of fans on social media, Weibo user Shuma Xiaoqiao posted screenshots of Genshin Impact’s social media account followers before and after the release of the official gift announcement video.

In response to the backlash, Genshin Impact has committed to enhancing communication with its player community, reassessing rewards, and offering increased compensation. Whether these efforts will successfully pacify the discontent among its dedicated player base remains to be seen. Interestingly, the incident points to a gap between the game’s players in China and overseas, with English language gaming websites attempting to explain the affair to foreign fans.

Banner image via HoYoverse.