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Comment by ThrowawayR2 | Hacker News Reader

> "5* unit you want after 180 pulls"

A casual search says "The minimum you can spend for a single Wish roll is $2.97" from https://www.gamespot.com/articles/genshin-impact-microtransa... so that's $534.60 to get a single character you want? Even if it were 1/10th that much with the pity system, that's still outrageous since new characters are released frequently.

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Oh yeah, the prices to buy premium currency are absolutely outrageous and I won’t even try to disagree with that. However, that really only matters if you want to collect every single character and/or get multiple copies of characters for their constellation buffs. The game is pretty generous with premium currency with most patches (the game releases updates on a 6 week schedule) giving enough currency for around 45-50 pulls. You can also pay $5 for the monthly subscription that gives you enough currency for 18.75 more pulls over 30 days. This is really the only way of buying extra premium currency that isn’t outrageously overpriced. My main point was that you don’t have to buy extra premium currency to have fun with the game or beat it.

The article you linked to does note that the currency for rolls is handed out as you play as well, in what it claims is fairly generous amount, so you don't have to spend extra. (But yes, actually spending money on this sort of game gets ridiculously expensive quickly.)

It can't be all that generous: "In just six months since release, Genshin Impact has reportedly crossed over $1 billion in revenue..." from https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2021/03/24/genshin-im...

It's generous enough if you aren't aiming for every premium character. If you play all the story content and events, and are doing the daily quests, you'll pretty much earn enough for a guaranteed 5* (80-90 pulls) in about 6 weeks (the length of one version update).

So if you're a free player, you can save up for a character you really want, or just pull and be content with whoever you get.

Mobile game economics are funny like that.

There are people who spend thousands of dollars every single month on mobile games in general, and Genshin is no exception. They are called "whales".

Something that hasn't been mentioned is that a lot of people tend to obsess over some characters, independently of their gameplay value. That's usually how gacha games make a lot of their money.

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