On December 26, the voice performances for Genshin ImpactThe newest playable characters from ware shown for the first time. These included Yun Jin, the young director of a Chinese opera company. The reaction from the genshin The community was mixed, but the moment also became an opportunity for people to experience an underappreciated aspect of Chinese culture that they probably hadn’t seen before.
I come from a little-known city called Beijing, which most Americans associate with state repression and abuse. The other thing we’re known for is Peking Opera, the most popular regional variant of Chinese opera. I’m generalizing here by and large, but performers generally sing it in a very high voice. The outfits and makeup are extremely over the top, and the dance moves include a lot of pauses. Ours is the most famous in China and is on the UNESCO List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
These aspects of Chinese opera have come to the fore in recent years Genshin Impact speech performances. some fans enjoyed Yun Jin sings while others reacted negatively singing “Oh, Maestro” in a high pitched voice (including a popular genshin Stromer, who later had to make one apology video). Some fans pointed out that laughing at a traditional Asian art form is one way crappy at best and racist at worst, especially for a game that has made a point of including non-Western cultural touchstones in all of its updates. But that’s not really what I want to talk about. On January 13 the official Genshin Impact YouTube account posted a video about Yun Jin, who made it clear that the developers created the character with a genuine love for opera as an art form.
Growing up, every time I heard my grandmother’s operas on TV, I hoped my American friends would never find out about it. Contrasting with other Chinese cultural exports such as food and fashion, making the shrill sounds of opera palatable to American audiences seemed impossible. When I first saw Yun Jin’s video, I was among the viewers who reacted negatively. My shoulders tensed and I gritted my teeth. I just wanted the song to end. You see, even at home, the cultural significance of opera was in question. Chinese opera was almost decimated during the Cultural Revolution. Nowadays even Chinese teenagers are more interested in it Marvel Movies. I was confident that opera would never become one of our cultural exports.
Well, millions of Americans discovered it from a number of genshin Fan. And you know what? It wasn’t the end of the world. After the initial shock of hearing something unfamiliar, Yun Jin was received more positively Twitter. The YouTuber changed his original mind of their song, and I’ve seen players mention that they wanted to learn more about Chinese opera. This was overwhelming for me: a single gacha character was able to change the public perception of something I’ve struggled with my entire life. Before Yun Jin, my own feelings about Chinese opera were still stuck in the previous decade. Some people move faster than the culture. I call these people artists. In the case of genshin Community, culture moves faster than people.
As a video game critic, I expect most major video companies will be chasing trends. Fourteen days is one of the most egregious examples of how gaming content tends to follow in the footsteps of what is already popular. The developers of genshin, but have sparked worldwide interest in an art form that has struggled even with government efforts to promote it domestically. Popular video games should try to define the mainstream instead of staying committed to it.
And the developers were very careful about the handling genshinthe cultural power. According to Xiao Luohao, a developer of the genshin writing team:
It is difficult to sustain the profound accumulation of Chinese opera arts over thousands of years. But if there is a way to use it Genshin Impact, a form of entertainment easily accepted by others…to introduce people to the artistic crystallization of traditional Chinese opera, and even arouse interest in the art itself…to get in touch with the essence of genuine operatic culture to come…we felt that if the game could serve as a simple introduction, then our effort would be worth it.
Yun Jin incorporated Chinese opera into almost every aspect of her design. One animator explained that her fluid attack animations relied on how performers would pose on stage and then pause. She was conceived as a supporting character because the opera relied on multiple performers.
Her character design was also inspired by the opera, like the pompoms, feather plumes, and a cloud collar. The developers planned to release them since Liyue was conceived, but Yun Jin’s design caused a difficult development problem. Her large headdress had caused camera distortion, but the staff decided not to take the easy route by compromising her design. Instead, they built custom tools to enhance their looks. With a mischievous smile, character designer TT joked that his only concern was that their playtesters might confront him after work.
When the writer Dou explained that she had been going to opera since she was a child, it struck me that the developers wThey also reveal something deeply vulnerable within themselves. I couldn’t help but feel enchanted. They were brave enough to present something they loved to the whole world, regardless of whether its image was “cool” or not. That is what art should strive for. Art is not defined by the production value or the well-known artists associated with it. Art should fearlessly and confidently present the hearts of its creators.
A few weeks ago I streamed the main quest with Yun Jin. At the very end, She gave a full performance a story she was working on. I started watching quite anxiously, but gradually got used to the song. the genshin The community had already moved away from “their music is weird.”
With every YouTube replay I would also be transformed.
.
