Stream: Honkai Star Rail
Dive into Honkai Star Rail through my perspective. This page serves as a living journal, updated daily with bite-sized reviews, exclusive video highlights, and curated screenshot galleries from my adventure.
Cosmicon, Roll on! Hook is clearly cheating!
Currently playing the dice game to clear the event and get the rewards and I was like "oh, this event is kind of a borefest" when I started the final battle against Hook (the leader of the Moles) and she put out that obviously ultra cheat card of Castorice with Perforation, Combo, Counter, Forcefield, Unyielding and 99 health. I was like "wait, what? How am I supposed to win here?!". I managed to survive one turn thanks to Unyielding by Phainon, but that was it. Of course it was a scripted defeat before the real match against her, but it was a cute scene to see her proud of being invincible.
Also she isn't repentant either as, apparently, she was just a poor adorable kid being mislead by the "Four Heavenly Kings" that are the next ones we need to fight in the event. The first one we found was Sparxie, but apparently wasn't her the one that teached Hook to use cheat cards. Who is the mysterious culprit?!
Even though it wasn't voiced, it was nice to see the Belobog gang all back to play some random fun. It reminds me of when I started playing this game at launch and I fell in love with Seele, Bronya and the whole setting of Belobog. It was the best part of the release day as I never managed to like Xianzhou Luofu.
Apparently I heard from rumours online that there's going to be a new story part dedicated to Belobog in the future of the game, but don't know the details as of yet. Only some leak by usual unknown sources, but I'm stoked for it.
Yao Guang can't see Stelle's future
Seems like Yao Guang has the power to see the aura of fortune around anyone with a simple look thanks to her power called "Eye of Isvara", but she's completely unable to see anything for Stelle. This seems to be connected that she's the "wild card" that even Destiny's Slave want to keep around to achieve his plan. According to her Stelle's very presence becomes a variable in whatever situation she's into and it's not really a consequence of her witnessing Terminus. More like she was able to witness Terminus BECAUSE she's that variable.
Yao Guang is trying to defy the destiny she calculated (basically the fall of Planarcadia) by adding more and more variables to the "Phantasmoon Games". That's why she put the mask on Sunday (forcing him to participate) and is acting more erratically than she normally would. Her primary objective remains the alliance between IPC and Xianzhou alliance against the Destruction, but she doesn't want other things to impact this plan. (Blade presence seems to be something she is convinced of)
I love how she sees that Fugue has an aura of absolute luck as a rebound of all the misfortune she got up until now. It's sort of a cosmic karma to allow her to have it easy now and I have to say it, she deserves it.
Talking a bit more about Yao Guang, I have to say that her design is outright gorgeous. She's the "femme fatale" design of hoyoverse games, but her face has something that puts her outside of the other beauties we got until now (Ruan Mei, Himeko, etc...). She's more mysterious maybe? It's something to do with her eyes I feel. I usually like cute designs more, but she's definitely near top tier character visually for me.
Tingyun is the legendary assassin?!
Ahahah, seems like Yao Guang is playing bluff with the IPC by saying that the "Xianzhou's Number One Assassin Blade" is on Planarcadia, but it's instead Tingyun under cover investigating into the Synwish Syndicate. Seems like she's pivotal in the calculations that Yao did for her stay in Planarcadia and she's paying her 6 times the normal rate.
Tingyun is a lot more confident here showing that she can easily negotiate and discuss with the general Yao at the same level reaching the point where she states "And Madam Yao, you've passed my test, too" referring to her testing if Yao is the right master to serve going forward.
There is an entire story segment narrated from her point of view infiltrating the criminal group and she really can make the act of being cruel and powerful (Takada Yuuki is the seiyuu for JP). The segment has to be one of the most hilarious we've had in a while, Sunday and Dan Heng appear unexpectedly and she has to invent something so start saying that the "Xianzhou's Number One Assassin" is a brand and there's 300 of them.
Sunday was nicknamed "Winged Deathkneel" ranked 7th in the organization while Dan Heng nicknamed "Jadedragon" ranked 2nd in the organization. She herself is instead the "Whistling Flamefox" ranked 1st.
It's incredible she managed to invent all this on the spot and Sunday/Dan Heng were able to keep up with her and keep the lie going.
It's been a while since we saw Tingyun in the Star Rail main story, but she really grew on me since the reintroduction as Fugue a few years ago and it's nice to see that Hoyoverse is reusing existing characters instead of just adding a bunch of new ones and move on like other games do.
Pearl's position within the Ten Stonehearts
As Himeko mentioned earlier, seems like Pearl has a very different personality compared to the Ten Stonehearts we've met so far. While she's still loyal to the IPC and the Preservation, she seems to be taking a more controlled approach to negotiation compared to the pushy Jade/Topaz or the uncontrollable Aventurine. Himeko and Welt even seem a lot more favorable when it comes to cooperating with her.
The situation of the IPC on Planarcadia is a bit different compared to other planets because seems like Preservation and Elation are, on the surface, at least acting on friendly terms. Both Sparkle and Sparxie doesn't seem to like them and treat them as invaders, but everyone else seems to be fine with them being around and providing technology and such.
Of course it's IPC we're talking about so it's almost certain that they're going to be somewhat antagonistic to the player as they'll always prioritize profit, but I'd like to see them at least once in a more positive light.
Also, as seen from the screenshot below, seems like Jade want to make the Ten Stonehearts collaborate and act as a group, but that just isn't going to happen easily considering how differently they try to achieve their goals. It also reinforces the fact that they're all "equal" and they don't really receive order from anyone except Diamond (who is the original Emanator of Preservation).
Also she looks like to not be fully human? Look at her hands and shoulder, those are clearly "puppet"-like isn't it? Intellitron maybe or some other race we haven't met yet?
Who is Sparxie?
Sparxie just appeared after we had a long discussion with Sparkle about Planarcadia (tutorial basically to explain a bit how the various mechanics of the world work). Sparkle referred to her as "her enemy" and one of the people participating in the "Phantasmoon Games", but they're basically identical visually aside from some different color which brings the question about what exactly Sparxie is.
Sparxie herself refer to Sparkle as "older model" so I wonder if she is one of those "paintings" that they mentioned earlier in the story that become alive and started acting on their own. I feel they have to be separate entities also because of the various things that Sparkle got involved with in the recent past, how could she keep her streaming and presence in Planarcadia ongoing if she was traveling all over the universe?
About the new zone. It's honestly the best in my opinion, I love the modern urban design of the city a lot more compared to what we've been used to in the previous two zones (Penacony was more "noire-style" while Amphoreus was ancient Greece/Rome). There's also lots of new mini games like a 2D pixel platformer to a more complicate 3D puzzle with rotating aspects.
Oh and there's a new card game named Cosmicon Collective in which players choose one card to use (with special skills) and use dices to roll attack/defense values. The damage made is the difference between attack and defense (except special skills that may penetrate defense or similar). Seems like a fun thing to pass time with, plus they give a free 4* after playing the event with it so I'm all for it.
Yae Sakura is a rabbit?
Just started the new Star Rail Patch story (4.0) in order to prepare for the article I'll write later today in the main blog and it's pretty hype to be honest, we're going to Planarcadia which is the home planet of of Himeko that has really strong ties with the Aeon Aha and is the place where the Astral Express fell in the past. The first thing we see before even reaching is a small scene with Yae Sakura, one of the ever recurring expy of this franchise. She looks stunning and she even has the same way of talking of Yae Miko from Genshin Impact. She even has a manga/light novel on her face (seems like related to the Astral Express)!
I'm curious about the ears though, as I mentioned in the title those are clearly rabbit ears, but I don't remember seeing any other unit in the game so far with anything resembling those. Is it a special race or just an accessory?
Seems like IPC is still meddling in order to try and create an anti-destruction alliance and they basically made sure we reached this place. The representative this time is Pearl who looks to be a beautiful lady. Himeko says that she has different appraoch compared to Aventurine, but she's still "cut of the same cloth". Black Swan also left us apparently so we technically have a free slot for someone else joining us in this journey? Hope it's someone that will change the dynamics within the team a bit...
Seems like the planet is currently in a ceremony period called "Phantasmoon Games" in which the winner "becomes an Aeon". It's clearly some sort of joke by Aha isn't it? There has to be a big catch to it...
Sparxie (Hibana) announcement!
They finally announced the new Sparkle (Hanabi) alternate character getting released in patch 4.0. Her new name is Sparxie (Hibana)! Seems like she'll be in the second half of the patch and will be in the Elation path (it's a whole new path that they're adding with the 4.x patches).
The leaks I've seen show that her animations are really high quality (sort of a vtuber vibe). Hopefully they'll keep up this level for the entire patch cycle. I don't want to see too many reused assets like they did in the 3.x patch cycle.
Dahlia release pre-patch thoughts
There are only few hours separating us from the new Star Rail patch with Dahlia. I really can't wait for it!
It seems like this is supposed to be the "real" ending of Penacony, even though I'm not really sure what they mean by that. Does it mean that what we saw in the last patch of the cycle was all fabricated by someone?
I quite like the last patch of Penacony with Sparkle and Firefly aboard the flying ship with the chase to find all the Sparkle bomb dolls and the fireworks at the end so it would be a bummer if it turns out it was all a fabricated lie.
School art for Amphoreus cast!
I just spotted this in the wild on the internet, apparently a new official art from the Star Rail team focused on showing how the Amphoreus characters would look in a traditional romantic comedy setting in Japan.
Damn, now I really want a school spin-off for the characters of Amphoreus in some form. Aglaea and Cypher really look like a yuri couple there (their story was one of the best of the chapter). Plus adult Tribbie is there too, maybe acting as a teacher?
Now we just need Stelle and March to join as a transfer students and then...romcom!
