Gacha video games
Gacha is a game monetization system often likened to gambling and hated by many. In anime-style games, players often use real world money to by tokens that are then spent “pulling a lever” that might or might not yield a cute/sexy character as a reward. Without spending, progressing in the game may become difficult as the characters available for free are often significantly weaker.
In my opinion gacha games can also be done well, in which case it enables the games to keep adding new content for years and years. That can make them very immersive experiences, also for those players who choose to not spend very much (in fact most gacha games are free to play). With buzzing fan discussion around these games, playing one can feel a bit like playing a “single player MMO”.
Now reading this, seems like I figured out the basics on my own:
Due to the nature of Hard pity, it is often a recommended strategy by players to never roll for a character or item unless they are capable of making it to the 100% guarantee by saving enough currency to reach the spark limit, essentially “buying” the character.
You know, the best way to get over a gacha addiction is to play another gacha game?
Recently hooked on Wuthering Waves, I researched other gacha games that I might eventually try out. They need to be on PC, and graphics style is probably the most important factor. Gameplay matters too. It would also be nice if the game is relatively new. These seem most interesting:
- Umamusume: Weird concept, I think earlier I dismissed it only because I had a negative view of gacha, not having tried any.
- Infinity Nikki: I actually originally intended to play this instead of Wuthering Waves but could not get it to run on Linux.
- Reverse 1999: Art maybe isn’t quite good enough, and I suspect this would be too difficult to play in Japanese for me. But the reviews seem pretty good.
- Blue Archive: I think I don’t like 3d chibis, but the 2d art is great. Steam indicates that there is no Japanese interface, although there is voice acting.
- Neverness to Everness: Not released yet.
- ANANTA: Not released yet. Apparently not a gacha but still a similar game if I have understood correctly.
Not good enough ones:
- Honkai Star Rail: Not on Steam, so probably difficult to run on Linux.
- Zenless Zone Zero: I don’t like the art.
- Genshin Impact: All Wuthering Waves players seem to complain how bad this game is in comparison, haha. Would probably have been good to play Genshin Impact a few years earlier.
Weird ones:
- Love and Deepspace: An Otome game with only five male characters. This is like the top 4th grossing gacha game.
- Final Fantasy VII Ever Crisis: Most people including me thought this franchise was odd choice for gacha.
- Girls’ Frontline 2 Exilium: This looks like X-COM, I’m actually a bit intrigued, but the recent reviews for this game are really bad and the graphics are not very good.
(Update) New ones:
* Arknights: Endfield
I’m browsing 4chan /vg/ and they of course have a thread for every gacha game. I checked many of the above, and I have to say posts in the Wuthering Waves one seem the most varied, and I don’t think that’s just because I’m familiar with the game. Genshin Impact is older, and it seems like its threads have “devolved”, full of posts by people who have been playing the game years and years and become a bit crazy in the progress. The Katawa Shoujo threads are perhaps the best example of the phenomenon.
