It’s in regards to this Twitch event.
This is on top of the rewards drama that happened leading into their first anniversary, or the weird Twitter campaign they tried to do where the objective was to try to get Elon Musk to stream Genshin Impact. There are other examples I don’t care to waste time digging up.
I’m not going to even mince words here. The point is miHoYo has some real idiots running their marketing and PR; IDIOTS THAT NEED TO BE FIRED.
Sure, the objective of this whole thing is to try and help content creators on Twitch (the ones they selected). The issue is that folks like myself, have chosen NOT to use the site. I do have an account there but have long abandoned using it or watching streams (because I no longer care to do that). So I’m not going to be forced to subscribe (tier 1) for two months to content creators that I have no intention of watching.
It’s not about the money; I’d have no problems just paying for that glider from the in-game shop. It’s not about the content creators (I’m sure they are talented and entertaining). Twitch is just not something that is entertaining to me. And it’s the principle of it; sure, if I really wanted that glider (which I actually don’t), I could just randomly sub to one of those content creators, and be done with it (not watching them). But how is that an ORGANIC subscription? All this does is juice those content creators numbers for a short period (more so if they are smaller one trying to grow). This is not how you want to naturally grow a channel.
Additionally, details of the contract that a content creator needed to sign with miHoYo, was leaked. It comes with all the usual stuff like being non-disparaging about the game. What has many in an uproar is the 2 week exclusivity (where those selected streamers can only stream Genshin Impact for the two week period the event runs). This is miHoYo at it again with seeing what they can get away with by trying to get away CHEAP with promoting Genshin Impact. These gifted subs are how these selected content creators are being compensated. miHoYo isn’t paying them, nor are they having to pay for actual advertising and promotion. Yes, a smaller streamer can rake in potentially several thousand over that period (more than what they would normally see). For miHoYo, it’s a win because it’s their player community (who wants those items) paying for this. This is a company that raked in over a billion dollars in revenue over the last year the game has been live. This translates into pure greed by continually trying to abuse their player community to do the promotion for them, rather than paying for it themselves.
Is it surprising? No. This is the usual corporate greed at play. miHoYo however takes it to another level with how tone deaf their marketing and PR is with being futilely out of touch with the Genshin Impact community who are already ticked off at them from prior gaffs. I cut them slack for the anniversary rewards complaints because I’m one who doesn’t even count seeing such rewards to begin with (that is how cynical I am when it comes to actual corporate generosity). The cluelessness of those in charge is astounding for a company that pulls in the sort of money that they did over the past year. This is indicative of leadership who now feel invincible where they can be arrogant and make idiotic hubris filled decisions (most of the hubris is reserved for the domestic market when it comes to the amount of money spent on display props at events).
Once upon a time, Blizzard Entertainment was exactly like this (BlizzCon) with the people at the top being totally out of touch. But look how that house of cards has come tumbling down where 2/3 of the founders were part of the reality distortion field of being this inclusive family oriented community (when the reality is they were a major part of the dysfunctional aspects of the entire video gaming industry). miHoYo is operating in a similar sort of bubble given the sheer success of Genshin Impact. What goes up, eventually comes down (and the bigger they are, the harder they fall). This company is one of the fastest to lose my respect where I’m about done spending any money with them (this final twenty-something days left of Blessing, and the soon ending battle pass are likely my last) as I believe I’ll have enough Primogems to get Ganyu on her re-run for my main account. Sure, this is irrelevant from their perspective because it’s not whale/leviathan type of spending. But it’s about sending a message that if you keep making stupid decisions, some of us aren’t going to continue supporting this nonsense.
