HoYoverse (formerly known as MiHoYo) is an experienced video game developer of hack n' slash open-world games due to the successes of Honkai Impact 3rd and Genshin Impact.
These games offer unique gameplay that is similar in some areas. While both are hack n' slash games, Genshin Impact is more about exploration and elemental synergy, while Honkai Impact 3rd is about reflexes to get the bonus damage granted by Active Evasion or other forms of avoiding enemy attacks and setting up the perfect opportunity to unleash special attacks from all team members.
However, HoYoverse, being innovators, combined what makes its two popular games great and added a turn-based twist to differentiate it from them.
The result is Honkai: Star Rail.
Honkai: Star Rail Background
Honkai Star Rail is a turn-based action-adventure strategy game similar to fellow mobile games Fate/Grand Order and Darkest Dungeon.
The game follows a group called the Trailblazers, who travel to worlds in search of and to seal Stellarons, a type of lifeform that causes great calamities for the worlds that host them. The main character, the Trailblazer (whose gender you can shortly select after the game starts), becomes a member of the Trailblazers despite hosting a Stellaron in them.
Any gamer familiar with both HoYoverse games would see how similar Star Rail is with the two previously mentioned games. Star Rail combines the RPG and exploration elements from Genshin Impact and the open-world mechanics elements and linear gameplay from Honkai Impact 3rd.
Honkai: Star Rail Base Gameplay
Star Rail's combat mechanics are similar to Darkest Dungeon to some degree. You create a team comprising four members that come with their own unique kit and specialties.
Some characters fight with the power of a particular element, while some rely on old-fashioned physical damage to hurt enemies. Regardless, using the correct one will break an enemy's shield, opening them up for more damage.
Having a character attack an enemy that isn't weak to their element doesn't deplete their shield; they damage their actual health instead. However, how much damage they would inflict depends on several factors.
Players would use the team they formed to explore the game's maps; some have Safe Zones populated with NPCs that can give you quests or provide you with items to heal or augment your characters.
On the other hand, some parts of the map are dangerous - populated with stationary or roaming enemies, while some maps are exclusively hostile to players. These enemies will start investigating, entering an alert status, and attack you if you get too close.
Though stealth and avoiding unnecessary combat are viable in the game, doing so will deprive you of much-needed resources easily obtained by defeating them.
Attacking before the enemy could see you approach is always the best move, as you could use some of your characters' techniques to make the opening move and grant you bonuses for the first few turns of the fight or not. On the other hand, having an enemy engage you will give these bonuses to them instead.
The game's maps also have destructible objects that grant you credits (in-game currency) and a few materials. They also have set amounts of treasure chests for you to open, making map exploration worth doing.
Combat
As previously mentioned, Star Rail is a turn-based strategy game. You and the computer will take turns dealing damage to the characters on the field until you are either victorious or defeated. Much like Darkest Dungeon, Star Rail uses characters' speed ratings to determine who gets to go first, second, third, and so on.
During one of your characters' turns, you will be asked to choose between one of two ways to attack the enemy of your choice. Basic attacks target and damage only one opponent.
While basic attacks are the weakest, they are also the main source of ability points, which are consumable when attacking enemies using a character's Skill - more powerful attacks that could target two or more enemies depending on the its mechanics.
Not all Skills deal damage, though. Some heal or buff allied characters instead of dealing damage to opponents; having characters with such skills on your team ensures that they can take damge as much as they can give and more.
Just like in Honkai Impact 3rd and Genshin Impact, Star Rail's characters have an Ultimate they can only use when they have accumulated enough energy. Much like their skills, they could target and deal damage to one or multiple opponents at the same time or either heal or buff the entire team.
Characters can gain energy by attacking enemies and being attacked by them and using skills. Once a character accumulates enough energy, you can trigger them even when it's not your character's turn. Unfortunately, there is no way to back out of using an Ultimate if you accidentally press or tap the corresponding button to use them.
HoYoverse may have an update that introduces a way to back out of using an Ultimate in the future, but prevention is better than a cure; just be careful around the Ultimate buttons while playing the game.
Character Enhancements
Much like in Honkai Impact 3rd and Genshin Impact, Star Rail utilizes light cores, relics, and traces to enhance a character's stats. These items are the equivalents of a character's weapon, artifacts/stigmata, and skills from other HoYoverse games, respectively.
These items have benefits that could synergize with your character's kit, so choose how you wish to build them wisely. A character can only use one light core at a time, so players must be careful about how they want to equip their character.
Meanwhile, relics function similarly to artifacts/stigmata; instead of having three or five equipable artifacts, you can only use four for the base game.
The characters in the game come with Traces that you can level up after unlocking them when ascending characters. They consist of active abilities, such as a character's basic attack, active skill, ultimate, technique, talent, and a sprinkling of passive skills.
Leveling them up will improve your characters in the long run if you have the materials and credits. Another way of enhancing them is through acquiring a duplicate of them in the gacha, allowing you to unlock one of their eidolons (Star Rail's constellations.)
Much like in Genshin Impact, characters can buy and create consumables to heal or buff characters, though there is no cooking minigame this time.
Farming And Extra Modes
Star Rail, much like its predecessors, also comes with ways for players to spend more time in-game and reward them for doing so. The game has HoYoverse signature domains, called a Calyx, that provide relics and items to raise your characters' experience, light cone, traces, and relic level.
They also provide items to ascend their characters, light cones, and relics. Of course, you have to beat their challenges to get these items for yourself.
Aside from Calyx, the game also offers a Simulated Universe (equivalent to Genshin Impact's Spiral Abyss) and other modes reminiscent of Honkai Impact 3rd's challenges that offer you significant amounts of Stellar Jade and other items when players meet certain objectives.
Differences With Other HoYoverse Games
Unlike Honkai Impact 3rd and Genshin Impact, Star Rail has Quality-of-Life improvements - solutions probably inspired by the problems of other HoYoverse games - that make the game more navigable. For instance, changing your team members no longer requires you to go to the main menu first, a la Genshin Impact.
Another thing to be thankful for is the game's high energy count, allowing you to grind for items more. Last but not least, the game has many extra modes that provide you with lots of Stellar Jade (the game's premium currency) to exchange for Star Rail passes for the gacha.
Star Rail, thanks to its turn-based gameplay, doesn't feature multiplayer modes like Honkai Impact 3rd and Genshin Impact. However, it allows you to "summon" other players' support characters for you to use on the battlefield, a la Fate Grand Order.
This support character will be your team's fourth member until you are victorious or defeated. You can send a friend request to players whose characters you want to permanently retain for battle, provided they accept it first.
When you reach a certain level in the game's Nameless Honor Battlepass, the game will provide you with a Self-modeling resin that allows you to change the main stat of a relic to your desired one. Genshin Impact players have been asking HoYoverse to add an item similar to this for a while; it can cut grinding by a considerable amount since you can now modify a relic with good sub-stats but a bad main stat, making them viable again.
Unfortunately, players could only acquire this item in the battle pass; here's hoping HoYoverse provides players with other ways to get them.
Bugs
Star Rail is probably one of the games containing little to no game-breaking bugs at release from our experience. However, it does have the occasional glitch; when we tried teleporting to the Ecliptic Express, the game's base of operations, the screen instead showed our character standing in orbit of a planet than the usual carriage.
Having our character randomly floating in space is a situation worth taking pictures of, but it does feel terrifying the first time since it never happened before. Thankfully, nothing adverse happened when the glitch occurred.
Verdict
HoYoverse paid meticulous attention to what it got wrong with Honkai Impact 3rd and Genshin Impact and it shows. Star Rail is easier and more enjoyable to play because of the QoL improvements HoYoverse put into it - they're a breath of fresh air to those who found HoYoverse's other games inefficient.
If you're a fan of turn-based strategy games with a taste of RPG, you'll definitely want to play this game.
Related Article: 5 Must-Have Characters for Your Honkai: Star Rail Teams
