The Chinese gacha game: Genshin Impact has been such a success that it has generated over four billion dollars in two years!

The Redmond-based tech company wants to cater to Chinese gamers, which is reportedly why Microsoft wants to have a game on Xbox similar to Shanghai-based miHoYo Studio’s Genshin Impact. Reuters reported it: the action-RPG game is something Microsoft would like to copy. Genshin Impact is an anime-style (and strongly similar in visuals to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild…), open-world game with a strong gacha mechanism monetization. Players pay to acquire special characters and continue fighting by controlling them.

“Chinese game developers are trying to standardize their development tools, create advanced production processes, and invest in large-scale teams. Ultimately, that helps give them the competitive edge to reach a broad audience in terms of the geography and platforms,” Niko Partners senior analyst Daniel Ahmad told Reuters. Reuters, citing its sources, said Microsoft is looking at the Chinese market to find new developers to add to its Xbox Game Studios roster (which already includes Bethesda via acquiring ZeniMax Media and could even have Activision Blizzard King if the nearly $70 billion deal is approved by competition authorities worldwide).

Sony does have some involvement with Genshin Impact. They don’t own the IP, but they teamed up with miHoYo early in development, and the company helped the Chinese team bring the game to market. As a result, the console version is available exclusively on PlayStation, where Genshin Impact is almost constantly at the top of the free-to-play games charts. Still, it makes much more money on mobile (iOS, Android)…

According to Reuters sources, Microsoft “regretted” not paying attention to Genshin Impact and briefly talked to miHoYo during development. Still, negotiations broke down, and Sony made a lot of money from it…

Source: VGC