#its the witching hour rn i wrote this while desperately needing to go to sleep

[demdems]

sorry for being a little hater while watching the new natlan trailer and coughing up blood everywhere, that was a bit dramatic of me

mind the blood tho, we're still talking

a very not cohesive list of grievences i have with natlan [and genshin], I'm writing as i go so if its too long the rest is under read more

I mean truth be told i opened youtube, saw the trailer first thing, noticed the thumbnail, and kinda just immediately knew it was joever

we can start w the archon i guess [I'm assuming the red haired lady is the archon by using context clues] uh ive seen people argue that its fine/makes sense that she's white since the assumption that's been made is that she's based on himeko from hi3 but uh like, himeko murata is japanese, she's not white, if the name didn't make that obvious [this is similarly why i don't like the argument that nahida being white is fine due to her being based on theresa hi3, theresa is a clone of a white german woman im not sure why mhy based the archon of a nation based on swana cultures on her but i digress] i think its at least good that she beat the conquistador allegations, left a bad taste in my mouth when that was being speculated

The confirmation of names means people have been honing in on the cultures natlan is taking inspiration from, ive seen a lot. i made my best guess when talking with a friend but i believe theres polynesian, west african, indigenous american [mexico and central america? specifically based on the name citlali] [[feel free to correct me on anything]] honestly wasn't expecting much based on sumeru

Tbh i have like zero energy to hate on the natlan debut cast cuz i already did it w a friend but I'll do it anyways, its a lifestyle

the argument of, why look for dark skin rep in a game made by a company who's colorist [either by choice or due to pressure from the government since genshin has incredibly insane cultural impact in China], is legit since its like me looking for clothes at the soup store and getting upset

But genuinely even if mhy had a vision with genshin and wanted to show a diverse world in its game, its kinda weak to be almost so blatantly colorist outside their playable characters. I don't think that making npcs dark skinned and playable characters light skinned is a good look, especially when it's the second time that that the human enemies of the region for the most part are darker skinned than the characters used to fight them

And i don't like how parts of the community jumps on people who critique genshin for this. Like, if its a non issue to you why get upset with people yk. Plus never speaking up on stuff is bad like fine, the multi billion dollar company won't listen to you, but id like to think that other people would learn from this to some degree and understand why people get upset. And idk maybe its overstepping and silly but id like to thing that outrage reaches people who can see that yea maybe there's people who Will listen to the stories you wanna tell but idk

I just don't like that people are making it okay to just be racist and colorist like, that's just gonna eventually bounce back and then great everyones seeing how mad ur getting over someone wanting a character w a skin tone darker than #FFFFFF, i cant vocalize my thoughts right tho but you get me ig

aeugh anyways on the characters specifically, the darkest skinned character in the trailer looks almost gray thats not great, and then the girls w darker skin tones [there's so few men in genshin lately] are dressed very much not at all which is a reoccurrence, sumeru dressed its darker skinned characters in not a lot clothing which like if you've ever been to a country that's hot and sunny, people don't dress in swimwear they dress in pants and sleeved shirts because hi sun damage exists and too much exposure is unhealthy and people tend to get used to the climate

Also a lot of animal themed characters this time, do correct me if I'm wrong but i kinda see an overuse in the women of color in genshin being animal themed but if im looking too much into it then uh idk maybe genshin should release a catboy

The modern theming in the outfits isn't egregious but i think too much streetwear might bog down the overall look, like latin america cultures just by themselves have amazing fashion and god id kill to see something like a dancer based on mexico's traditional dances since those are the prettiest dresses, like modernizing is fine [i believe i saw somewhere that chongyun's outfit is based on chinese streetwear and i think it fits great in with the more traditional outfits in liyue] but stuff like the hoodies around the waist and the weird half shorts half pants of one of the characters kinda weakens the overall vision [but I'm not well versed in fashion so I'm not sure what direction wouldve been best for natlan to take to both respect the fashion of the cultures inspo is taken from and also fit in with genshins vibes overall]

Natlan the region itself is the best thing of the trailer tbh, it's very nice looking and yea there isn't a yellow orange filter over it like this were american tv or something, and the music is great i think the one part of the team who does good is the music

Personal expectations, i just hope the characters are good, like i hope good personality saves these guys and my soul while i play the natlan quest getting flashbanged everywhere i look

wegh, drip marketing Monday, and 5.0 in like 7 weeks, let's get this bread gamers