Memes / Genshin Impact

Okay, calm down, emergency food.^note For the last time, PAIMON IS NOT EMERGENCY FOOD!

Genshin Impact has attracted a lot of talk and hype from anime fans; quickly becoming one of the most popular and THE most famous of Gacha Games to the point of becoming mainstream on a global scale. As such, expect the game to end up resulting in a metric shit ton of memes.

For "Breath of the Waifu" and other fan nicknames, see this page, although some examples may overlap.

Important Note: Before adding entries, the following below are not allowed under any circumstances. You Have Been Warned.

• Content Leaks of any information not officially revealed yet by HoYoverse.
• Flame Bait topics such as racism (including In-Universe racism), complaints about a character's skin color, etc.
• Fandom drama on any social media platform, as it's considered drama importation.

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Please add entries in the following format if possible:

• The meme. [[labelnote:Explanation]]The explanation behind the meme, if necessary.[[/labelnote]] ^ExplanationLike this.
  • Further mutations and successor memes, if any.

Beware of unmarked spoilers!

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Subpages:

• Playable Characters

NPCs

• Abyss Heralds:
  • "My life for Aiur - I mean, the Abyss" ^ExplanationDue to the Abyss Heralds using twin wrist blades, an obvious comparison was made between them and the Protoss Zealots from Starcraft (especially the Frost Fall where their voices are similar to the latter's version in II).
• Abyss Mages:
  • "Ran Ran Ruu!" ^ExplanationThis is one of the Abyss Mages' most identifiable and iconic sound quips. As such, expect the fans to mimic this warcry whenever posts on the Abyss Mages are brought up.
  • Abyss Mage: *shrieking* ^ExplanationIn Lisa's Story Quests, she electrifies an Abyss Mage into unconsciousness all while the Abyss Mage shrieks loudly in pain. Many fans used the picture of the face-down Abyss Mage as a way to express exasperation or a Cathartic Scream.
• Aranara:
  • Aranara Characters ^ExplanationWhen the Aranaras were introduced, they quickly blew up in popularity because of how cute they were. Many players found their petite fairy design, their funny walking animation and idle dancing animation to be incredibly endearing. So much so that multiple fanart was made turning Genshin characters into Aranaras.
  • Aranara speak ^ExplanationThe way the Aranara speak is unique due to the combination of broken English and adding the nara-suffix at the end of every sentence. Due to how popular the Aranaras are, players have also gotten into roleplaying their speech patterns.
  • Aranakin/I don't like sand ^ExplanationA blatant shoutout to a certain Jedi that hates sand. A lot of Genshin fans took notice especially when Aranakin quoted the very memeable reference. Expect a lot of cross-over memes with the Star Wars community.
  • :] ^ExplanationThe default Aranara facial expression. Players sometimes use their face as an emoji.
  • Arabalika OP ^ExplanationAn Aranara with Arakalari capable of one-shotting a ruin guard with a small wooden stick. Players impressed by his feats frequently joke about bringing Arabalika to the Archon Quests since he is definitely capable of effortlessly fighting Scaramouche and Dottore as well as dishing out proper punishment to the sages.
  • The Sages' True Punishment ^{Explanation(Spoilers!)}Many players like to think the real reason Nahida exiled the sages into the forest was to let them die at the hands of the Aranara, specifically Arabalika. After all, the forest remembers.
• Arnold:
  • Arnold, the Mona Simp ^ExplanationDuring the Summer Fantasia event; in Fischl's quest where the group investigates Fischl's inner psyche, we meet Arnold, one of the many Oz-like living statues inhabiting Fischl's dreams. Arnold immediately took everyone's interest with his not-so-subtle flirting with Mona, making the fans to chastise him as an unapologetic and somewhat-creepy Mona simp.
• Grand Sage Azar:
  • Most Hated NPC ^ExplanationGrand Sage Azar easily tops the list of many players' "most hated Genshin Impact character so far" list, due to his many transgressions, which could take awhile to read (but beware of many spoilers for the Sumeru Archon Quest!). Aside from topping the lists, content that makes reference to Azar (just him, while the other sages who collaborate with him are mostly not included) will involve having the crap beaten out of him or having him brutalized in some form, as many think that Nahida's punishment for him was too lenient, even if it was technically a Fate Worse than Death. There may be notorious Hate Sinks in the series, but Azar is considered the reigning champion and the measuring stick of the trope in Genshin Impact, in which others have to compete with him and mostly falling short.
• Azhdaha:
  • "We mustn't let Phraeganoth be revived!"^ExplanationA raid boss in Dragalia Lost, Phraeganoth, is a giant turtle boss and the quote is said by Celliera on the game's home screen during the "Loyalty's Requiem" event. When Azhdaha was first shown, people made the comparisons.
  • The Archons' Pets ^ExplanationSince the release of Azhdaha as a boss in 1.5, players have been joking about each Archon having a dragon companion (Venti has Dvalin, Zhongli has Azhdaha, and the Raiden Shogun possibly having Mei's Kurikara from Honkai Impact 3rd).
    • Zhongli overfeeds Azhdaha ^Explanation Due to Azhdaha's large belly (that is most noticeable when he roars), many players have joked that Azhdaha went on a rampage because he was angry that Zhongli overfed him.
• Chlothar Alberich:
  • Chlothar pointing ^ExplanationThere exists a popular unofficial site where players can annotate the Genshin map to mark the locations of chests, oculi and other treasures, including adding screenshots to highlight their exact positions in-game. At some point, one particular person started intentionally poorly editing Chlothar into their screenshots, where he would point at valuable items with an exaggeratedly stretched arm. These edits became popular, and Chlothar became known as the guy who points at stuff. Even his EN VA, Andrew Russell, joined in on the jokes.
• Crucabena:
  • Malty/Bitch ^{Explanation (spoilers for The Rising Of The Shield Hero)}Crucabena's red hair, curvy figure, and wicked personality immediately made people compare her to Malty S. Melromarc from The Rising of the Shield Hero. There's even a similarity to how both of them die, as they are both burned to death.
• Dainsleif:
  • National Geographic: Teyvat Edition ^ExplanationInitially, many fans noticed that the English narrator for the Collected Miscellany videos sounds monotone in contrast to the fast-paced gameplay demonstrations, as if he was narrating the characters like they were wild animals running about their natural habitats. As a result, they've come to start making comments reiterating the content of each video in the form of National Geographic-style narration. However, this phrase is usually replaced once viewers noticed how the narrator sounds like Yuri Lowenthal (a.k.a. the English VA of Sasuke Uchiha as detailed below).
    • AoE Pyro Damage ^ExplanationThis term came up constantly in Klee's Collected Miscellany video, causing it to appear with equal frequency in any discussion involving Klee.
    • Sasuke saying "AoE damage" ^ExplanationAs more Collected Miscellany videos got uploaded, some viewers on YouTube thought that the English narrator sounded like Yuri Lowenthal. Since the script for the videos usually mention the phrase "AoE damage" for certain characters' skills, and Yuri Lowenthal is well known in anime communities for voicing Sasuke Uchiha, this became a usual comment. On November 9, 2020, it was confirmed that Yuri Lowenthal indeed voices Dainsleif, the Character Narrator of many Genshin Impact videos.
  • "Jin Kisaragi, is that you?!"/"Why hello, Jin Kisaragi!" ^ExplanationThe announcement of the new character, Dainsleif, has people outright saying either of these since they both look very similar. Right down from the hair style, to the green eyes, the edgy facial expression, and the androgynous look. Needless to say, fans are hyped to get him into their collection.
    • There are also people memeing him for resembling Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd from Fire Emblem: Three Houses after the Time Skip in that game.
  • Dainsleif for emergency food ^{Explanation (spoilers for Dainsleif's world quest!)}Dainsleif's world quest gave heavy implication that he had traveled with the Traveler's sibling in the past before going their separate ways. Cue jokes of players who are asking to trade Paimon for Dainsleif. This little tidbit spawned role-swap "What if's" where Paimon is an elegant adult lady and former traveling companion of the Traveler's sibling while Dainsleif accompanies the Traveler as a small fairy.
  • 500 Moras, 3 questions, meet sibling. ^ExplanationPlayers have noted that no matter how many quests you've done for Teyvat, they contribute very little to no progress towards The Traveler's quest on finding their sibling. Dainsleif, on the other hand, only asks for 500 Moras and three questions to The Traveler, and soon enough, they encounter their sibling. While it still fails to bring them back, players have joked that Dainsleif contributes more towards The Traveler's main quest with just few Moras and questions than the entire Teyvat with their endless quests will ever do.
  • Future new players traversing half the map to level up Dainsleif^ExplanationDain is expected to become a playable character in the future. When that happens, he will likely require Khaenri'ah-specific Ascension Items to level up beyond level 20. Therefore, players who will have just started and pulled him would have to move through the whole map to get those materials and make their character useful.
• Dottore:
  • "I am first and foremost a scholar"^ExplanationA very notably quote from Dottore that is frequently said by players in discussions concerning Dottore's achievements and actions.
• Dvalin:
  • "aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa" ^ExplanationA meme that became popular two years after Genshin's release. The meme is associated with Dvalin's defeat animations during his bossfight, where Dvalin's head is briefly seen with his mouth wide open. This immediately blew up as a popular facial reaction meme.
• Electro Abyss Lector:
  • Khassar de Templari ^ExplanationThe Electro Abyss Lector's attacks, including how one basically puts the player in Stasis during a World Quest in Fontaine, could easily be compared with the Protoss, specifically with High Templars and Arbiters.
• Ellin:
  • "So THAT'S how you do it" ^Explanation Ellin's Daily Commission requires you to demonstrate how to destroy a group of training dummies near-simultaneously. After completing it, Ellin says she'll try the technique you used even if she doesn't have elemental powers or the weapon type you used. Because many players complete the commission using Elemental Bursts or large AOE attacks, this led to jokes about Ellin using Diluc's Dawn, Venti's Wind's Grand Ode, or even Zhongli's Planet Befall.
• The Eremites:
  • Dancing Desert Clearwaters^Explanation One of the Female Enemy Eremite variants, are shown to be dancing for other's entertainment while not being aggroed by players.
  • *Breaks Sitar* Sounds Good To Me!! ^ExplanationThe line from an aggroed Eremite Axe Vanguard as she breaks her Sitar in half to start the fight every single time. The sheer levels of sudden mood swings from playing her (expensive) musical instrument to suddenly breaking it in sheer rage at the mere presence of the Traveler made her a prime meme material for the fanbase.
  • Lord Have Mercy, Daythunder is kinda hot. ^Explanation One of the Male Eremite variants, Daythunder isn't shown wearing a shirt. The Sunfrost, on the other hand Downplays this trope since he wore a shirt unlike the Daythunder leaving his bare-chest open. In fact, their abs are more noticeable than Arataki Itto's in-game model & rival Alhaitham.
  • Being hot is a requirement to become an Eremite.^ExplanationJust about all the Elite Eremite enemies consist of both Ms. Fanservice (Clearwater, Galehunter) and Mr. Fanservice (Daythunder, Stone Enchanter) alike, leading to players joking that being sexy is a requirement to be one of them.
  • Ai-chan^Explanation The in Version 3.4 added Female Eremite Floral Ring-Dancer has similar weapons, attacks and idle animations to Ai Hyperion Λ, a playable character in Honkai Impact, leading to comparision between the two characters.
• Havria :
  • FOR HAVRIA!/SALT FOR THE SALT GOD! ^ExplanationDuring the 2022 Player's Choice awards for the Game Awards, there was a very strong competition between the Genshin and Sonic fanbase on who would win. Suffice to say, the competition turned incredibly toxic, to the point that even neutral Genshin fans jumped on the bandwagon. Usage of Havria, the former Goddess of Salt, became widespread during the event as a way for Genshin fans to enjoy anothers person's 'saltiness' and has now became a phrase beyond that of the 2022 Game Awards event. The chant itself is also a parody of the WH40K DoW: Soulstorm's memetic "BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!"
    • #Genshin Sweep! ^ExplanationRelated to the above meme. But this term became increasingly widespread once the results of the 2022 Game Awards was known and Genshin Impact ended up winning the Player's Choice Awards. This resulted in much gloating by the Genshin fanbase after a week of bitter online feud with Sonic. Given that the whole debacle caught the attention of Genshin's ''ridiculously huge'' Chinese community in addition to the equally huge ''60+ million non-Chinese players, the end result of the feud became very, VERY'' one sided.
• Hilichurl Rogues:
  • "Abyss Toridas." ^ExplanationMuch like how the Abyss Heralds bear some resemblance to the Protoss Zealots from Starcraft, the Hilichurl Rogues bear a resemblance to the Protoss Dark Templars (specifically the Avengers from Legacy of the Void).
• Hushang:
  • "They need to touch more grass, not books."^ExplanationNilou's story quest features this absolutely wonderful line from Hushang when they talk about the Akademiya. This blew up two ways, one because they actually brought up the "touch grass" meme mentioned below, and two because players like to interpret it as Hoyoverse dunking on certain parts of the community.
• Hydro Eidolons:
  • Free Honkai: Star Rail Eidolon Upgrades! ^ExplanationDue to Hydro Eidolons having, well... "Eidolon" in their name, fans who play Star Rail immediately took notice and joked that completing "Secret Summer Paradise" stuff would somehow give players free Eidolons to upgrade their Star Rail characters with as a what-if cross-save bonus. This is because Star Rail's take on Genshin's Constellations are named "Eidolons", despite the word itself being a niche Greek term meaning "to see, to know" and not a specific reference to Star Rail.
• Il Capitano:
  • Yoimiya’s Father ^ExplanationThe instant it was discovered that Capitano has the same English voice actor as Yoimiya’s father, the fandom immediately starting joking that he was secretly a Fatui Harbinger. Even Yoimiya and Capitano’s English voice actors got in on it.
  • GOATHIMtano no diffing the entirety of Fraudlan / "Stand proud, Murata. You're strong." ^ExplanationFollowing the conclusion of the Fontaine Archon Quest, which includes a Sequel Hook dialogue about Natlan and how Il Capitano has joined the wars there, a trend of jokes about the Harbinger obtaining the Pyro Gnosis by defeating the Archon and her nation's entire population (usually all at once) rose in r/fatuiHQ. This meme has since then grown to the point that entire subreddit now makes ridiculous claims about each Harbinger's power level (including Pantalone) and how they easily defeat any opponent from any franchise, usually with large amounts of Lobotomy Kaisen involved.
    • GOATHIMtano and RaidHER ShoGOAT versus Fraudestia ^ExplanationSoon, r/fatuiHQ invaded r/RaidenMains with their GOATHIMtano memes, prompting a meme war between the two subreddits, each hyping up their character's strength to absurd levels and claiming they will defeat the other. While the meme war did see the production of high-quality shitpost art from both communities, it also generated a lot of toxicity, with certain users taking the rivalry too seriously. In order to promote good-faith fun, a truce was declared, launching a new wave of memes about Capitano and Raiden Shogun being chummy, or even in a relationship, while fighting Celestia together.
  • Il Capitano's brown shoes ^ExplanationTowards the end of The Song Burning in the Embers, the Captain appears alongside other harbingers in their signature intricate coat... and a pair of extremely mundane-looking brown shoes peeking underneath. The sight of such a hyped character wearing normal footwear proved to be intrinsically funny. His EN VA, Chris Tergliafera, stated it was because he stands on business.
• Isak:
  • Nahida at home ^{Explanation (Spoilers for Sumeru Archon Quest Act V)}As part of the scheme to draw out all the guards from Akedemiya grounds, a misleading order planted by Alhaitham was issued to them to capture an escaped Lesser Lord Kusanali, and Isak disguised himself as her with a white wig and a similar dress.
• Jafar:
  • Chad Jafar/Best Commission ^ExplanationJafar features in the NPC Commission "Eat and Learn". Most NPC Commissions are usually wordy and long roleplay sessions that can be a waste of time. "Eat and Learn", on the other hand, takes place within Sumeru City, requires just one of Mint, Potato or Raw Meat, and ends with Jafar cooking you a free dish, making it the most efficient NPC Commission in the game.
• Jeht:
  • This girl deserves a Vision ^ExplanationJeht's story across two long World Quest chains, which put her through absolute hell and numerous betrayals, has led many players to agree that she deserves to be given a Vision for getting through it all.
• Katheryne:
  • "Add extra applesauce" ^ExplanationThe Adventurers' Guild receptionist will greet you with the guild motto, "Ad Astra Abyssoque". Since most players don't speak Latin, they prefer to come up with amusing misinterpretations of what she's saying.
    • Katheryne is angry that you are skipping her line/"Ad astra-" *skip* ^ExplanationSince talking to Katheryne is required in order to assign characters on expeditions and collect daily Commission rewards, players frequently skip Katheryne's line, having heard it a lot.
• La Signora:
  • The boss as a playable character: a pile of ashes. / The Crimson Witch of Ashes^{Explanation (spoilers)}From her first appearance in the story, La Signora had garnered a fair share of fans who wanted her to become playable someday. However, Signora's ultimate fate in the story has her be defeated by the Traveler, whom she sorely underestimated, and as a result of her loss, she is executed by the Raiden Shogun in such a brutal manner that she's reduced to ashes. It becomes extra ironic when one of her battle lines is "not even ashes will remain!". This had put a massive wrench in her fans' plans to save for her in the future due to her death, although a few continue to hold on to hope that she may still become playable someday.
  • Roasting Signora Mains ^{Explanation (spoilers)}When La Signora was killed on-screen, there were plenty of jokes on not only Signora's death but also on the immense copium used by Signora mains. This dialed up to eleven when "A Winter Night's Lazzo" trailer was dropped, outright double confirming that Signora is in fact, really dead. Cue an outpouring of memes and shitpost on people dunking on Signora. On a much darker note, the memes have been so overwhelming that it has even infiltrated the Signora Mains subreddit to the point of harassment. This led to the subreddit making itself private to stop the harassment.
    • Playable Signora at home ^ExplanationTCG was released in 3.3, and among the artifact equipment cards, there was a Crimson Witch card depicting Signora dressed in said artifact set. Playable Signora had finally become real... but in TCG. Then, in 4.3, a fully playable Signora character card was released, reviving the meme.
• Lepine-Pauline:
  • Most dramatic NPC ^ExplanationWhen Lepine-Pauline begs Charlotte when the latter explains the former's mistake, Lepine-Pauline starts utterly Chewing the Scenery in the Japanese dub. Players have gone on to joke about how well-paid the voice actor had to have been.
• Liben:
  • Liben Gigachad^ExplanationLiben is an NPC that sporadically appears from time to time in the recurring temporary event Marvelous Merchandise, and is noted for being one of the most helpful non-playable characters in the game. Not only does he trade highy sought-after items for random junk that players have lots of from exploration, but he also drops lore regarding other regions. This has propelled him to Ensemble Dark Horse status, and with his pamapadour and muscular body, image crops of Liben in the gigachad meme format are not uncommon.
• Madame Ping:
  • Madame Ping banner when? ^{Explanation (spoilers!)}As soon as fans learned that a random old lady in Liyue is actually a powerful Adeptus, they half-jokingly suggested she should become a playable unit. Some even made mock-ups of her in a featured banner.
  • "Yas bitch slay!" ^Explanation A fanart made by Twitter user bun depicting Madame Ping and Yanfei in the Yas Bitch Slay meme format has spawned numerous other mutations. The meme pokes fun of playable characters whose attire is awfully impractical and inappropriate for their profession.
• Melusines:
  • Wololo~ ^ExplanationOne particular World Quest has one of the Melusines saying "Wololo"◊, a saying that Age of Empires fans would immediately recognize.
  • Do not the Melusine ^ExplanationIn Fontaine, one of the NPCs mentioned on feeling disgust for thinking of "bad thoughts" on the Melusines. This immediately took off as a meme bonking on any players having "dirty thoughts" on the Melusines.
• Menthe:
  • "Ugh.. the tea heer just keeps gettin moar bitta" ^ExplanationA Melusine in Fontaine laments how the local tea keeps getting more bitter the more time goes on. However, she does so with a very noticeable British accent, leading to people writing out what they hear.
• The Pyro Archon:
  • What have I done?!^{Explanation (spoilers!)}Before it was confirmed that archons didn't choose who to give Visions to, people joked that Murata gave Klee a Pyro Vision for shits and giggles, only to regret it horribly.
  • Seeing Himeko die again ^{Explanation Honkai Impact 3rd spoilers!} Since the Pyro archon is expected to be an Expy of Himeko Murata from Honkai Impact 3rd, it has become a joke that Honkai players would have to see her die again. This also cross-pollinated with Star Rail fans since they also have a Himeko counterpart.
• Oceanid AKA Rhodeia of Loch:
  • Fischl Vs. Oceanid ^ExplanationThe Oceanid is infamous for being the most annoying boss in the game, as well as the most talkative one (it didn't help that she was voiced in 1.4). Many people started joking about how a fight between her and Fischl (another very talkative character) would just be non-stop monologuing.
  • The power of water is its ability to take any shape... ^ExplanationOne of several hammy declarations the Oceanid makes during her boss battle.
• Paimon:
  • "Paimon is Emergency Food." ^ExplanationWhen you meet Amber, she asks who/what Paimon is, and you have the option to snarkily reply that she's "emergency food." Later, when you meet Xiangling, she asks if Paimon is an edible exotic creature, and your second dialog option is "Dig in." No one ever actually tries to eat her, of course, but these Running Gag moments led to a lot of memes related to eating Paimon or literally turning her into food. Even one of the Japanese commercials makes a joke about it!
    • "Emergency Snack" ^ExplanationLeaning on the Fanservice side, this is used whenever a fanartist draws Paimon in a teenager/young adult form. It's also a common reply whenever one makes fanarts of the Unknown God, following a popular fan theory suggesting that the Unknown God and Paimon are the same person.
  • "'Ehe' te nandayo?!"/"What do you mean 'hehe'?!" ^ExplanationThis is Paimon's line when Venti can only answer her inquiry (about stealing the Holy Lyre just to play it in front of drunkards at the tavern) with "hehe". Many fans find this cute, and so it became memetic quickly. Even one of the Japanese commercials made a joke about it too!
  • Giant Paimon^ExplanationIn March 2021, Genshin Impact had a promotion with the Chinese branch of Kentucky Fried Chicken. During the video where a new KFC store opens in Mondstadt, Paimon suddenly grows large enough and drags Aether in line for some chicken.
  • "O kawaii koto"/"How cute..."^ExplanationPaimon's Brief Accent Imitation of Ayaka in the Traveler's Voice line about Ayaka. Paimon's Japanese VA also voices Kaguya Shinomiya who often say that line in Shirogane's Imagine Spot.
  • "In Memory of Paimon" ^ExplanationUpon receiving Albedo's drawing of Paimon as a Serenitea Pot item, players were quick to build her a "funeral" and display the photo there.
    • "Derpy Paimon/Paimona Lisa" ^ExplanationAnother variation of Albedo's drawing is a comparison with the Traveller's depiction of Paimon with a more cartoonish design akin to the Teri Teri/Derpy Theresa meme from sistergame Honkai Impact 3rd. The contrast between the two plus Paimon's Mona Lisa-esque inspired drawing from Albedo created a very popular meme template akin to the Drake Hotline Bling Meme
  • Paimon is a UFO ^ExplanationFurina calls Paimon a "flying object" when she tries to press charges on the Traveler. Given that the game still hasn't revealed just who or what Paimon really is, this makes her an Unidentified Flying Object.
  • "Be nice, Paimon!"/Protect Furina from Paimon^Explanation Out of everyone involved in Furina's trial, Paimon is touted by both her haters and Furina's defenders as the most unsympathetic for her constant insensitivity and rudeness towards her throughout her Story Quest, in contrast to the others who treat the former Archon much more kindly or are at least civil to her, such as Neuvillette financially supporting her or Clorinde visiting her. This continues in the "Roses and Muskets" event quests, where such moments as Paimon questioning Furina's sleep schedule and noting the persistence of her PTSD has fans expressing a lot of chagrin with her, with some even expressing a desire to get rid of her or make good on the "emergency food" memes
    • Blown cover^Explanation Some fans also interpret Paimon's comparative hostility towards Furina as evidence for the theory that she's actually a Celestia sleeper agent, and her insensitive words is her expressing her resentment towards Furina for her and Focalor's deception
• Pyro Abyss Lector:
  • Chad Pyro Lector ^{Explanation (spoilers!)}When the Pyro Lector was first announced, players remarked that his pose resembled that of the Chad from the Virgin vs. Chad meme. Such memes were made with the Lector as the Chad and another enemy as the Virgin. When Enkanomiya's world quest was released and its central character Enjou, a Pyro Abyss Lector, became an Ensemble Dark Horse due to his Affably Evil personality, he was then memed as a chad similar to Scaramouche.
  • "Well I mean I totally did betray them" ^ExplanationEnjou says this line in the 2.5 Three Realms Gateway Offering event when he confesses that he betrayed the vishaps to the Traveler. The casual way in which he says it has since made it become his iconic line in the fan base.
• Pulcinella:
  • "¿Cuantás gnosis tenés?"/"Che" ^ExplanationA meme from the spanish community involving Pulcinella, in which he´s compared to the stereotype of Argentinians due to having a long and pointy nose.
  • "We are gathered here to remember our dear comrade"/A Winter Night's Lazzo script ^ExplanationIt is very common to see comment chains quoting the entirety of the Winter Night's Lazzo trailer's script when all sorts of drama in the community happens. Such threads blew up after one event in particular: the delaying of Version 4.2's livestream due to the death of Chinese politician Li Keqiang, causing "work in China to cease for half a day".
  • Buff Pulcinella ^ExplanationDue to his stature compared to his comrades, and the fact that he's ranked 5th among the Fatui Harbingers, above the likes of Childe, who was able to fend off the All-Devouring Narwhal for over a month, La Signora who became an embodiment of fire, turning her into a Walking Wasteland and Scaramouche, the original host for the Electro Gnosis, created by the Raiden Shogun herself, further amplified by Dottore's experiments, it's lead to some questioning how strong he is to have such a high rank. While it's likely the reason for this status is more due to his role as mayor and the political power that comes with it, given he practically controls Childe through caring for his family, it's lead to memes that he's secretly absolutely ripped under all those cloaks and furs.
  • Airplane Arms ^ExplanationPulcinella's debut in Teyvat Chapter Storyline Preview: Travail all but confirms he's going to be playable in the future. However, as a diminutive man, his model would have to be far smaller than any pre-existing male models. Given miHoYo/Hoyoverse tendency to cut corners regarding these, such as making the Melusine Sigewinne near identical to a human so she could use the Short Female model. This has lead to jokes about how they'll accomplish it, such as the creation of a Short Male model that uses the animations of the Short Female model, including the running animation◊.
• Little Que'er
  • Azar's predecessor ^{Explanation (spoilers!)}While fans declare Azar to be the most hated NPC introduced in Sumeru, he's actually preceded by Little Que'er, a minor NPC in Liyue (Transgressions can be read in the Discussion page, but beware of spoilers!). She only somehow falls short because the comeuppance she gets (being reduced to wreck after her target decides to leave) is considered more satisfying than Azar, who somehow got a Fate Worse than Death considered lenient, and that she's a missable NPC, you can skip her but you cannot skip Azar.
• Rana:
  • "Rana, the Best NPC Waifu/Chad Sumeru NPC" ^{Explanation (spoilers!)} In the world quest series Aranyaka, you can see the NPC Rana fighting back against some fungi & Spinocrocodiles. Something that Mondstadt NPCs like Reckless Pallad & Allan never do. Her Heroic Sacrifice to put her life at danger in The Withering Zone to save one lost child in the cave. In the Epilogue, she eventually received a vision for her heroic deeds.
  • Playable Rana ^ExplanationFollowing up on the joke above, some fans quipped when Rana will become playable, despite that her having a generic NPC model automatically disqualifies her from ever being a playable character.
• Reckless Pallad:
  • Reckless Pallad Ruins Everything ^{Explanation (Spoilers for The Chalk Prince and the Dragon; Act IV: Uninvited Guests)} Reckless Pallad mistook the festering desire sword for a bonfire and he thoughtlessly rushed towards it and pushes Sucrose & The Traveler, causing Resurgent Cryo Regisvine to pop up & attack. Players started to hate this guy for this mess.
  • Reckless Pallad's Time to Shine ^Explanation In Shadow Amidst Snowstorms / Snowy Silhouette Reunion World Quest, Reckless Pallad accidentally met Joserf, father of Joel who was presumed dead in Dragonspine. He was recognized back as a hero by Cyrus though it doesn't stop him having any misfortunes triggering Pallad's Dilemma quest.
    • #Azarsweep ^Explanation Pallad's reputation of being the most hated character award were snubbed by Grand Sage Azar, who is literally a plain Jerk NPC you've met in Sumeru Archon Quest. Because at least Pallad is just reckless and not trying to be actively malicious.
• Greater Lord Rukkhadevata
  • Who's that? ^{Explanation (Big spoilers for Sumeru's Archon Quests!)}Rukkhadevata lets herself be erased by Nahida in order to erase forbidden knowledge and other disasters that plague Sumeru. This erasure removed all memories of her existence from everyone but the Traveler. However, fans jokingly act confused as to why Kusanali is the Lesser Lord when she has been Sumeru's only Archon and question who is Greater Lord Rukkhadevata and why hasn't she been mentioned before.
• Sandrone:
  • The real Sandrone is the robot^ExplanationA semi-serious theory that suggests the true Harbinger is not the girl in the maid outfit but the large robot that carries her around, using a smaller robot as A Form You Are Comfortable With to communicate with people.
  • Sandrone is Guizhong^ExplanationWith the reveal of Guizhong's design in the 2023 Lantern Rite event, players noticed that she shares similarities with Sandrone. Both characters study Ruin Machines (the flavour text of one domain mentions Guizhong trapping Ruin Machines in order to study them) and have similar haircuts. Theories and jokes were made about Sandrone being a reincarnation or puppet of Guizhong.
• Setekh Wenut:
  • "We'' NUT'' in the Hole" ^ExplanationDue to the pretty amusing name of the Setekh Wenut serpent boss, plus the fact that it is located in its own cave and the fact that its face looks somewhat phallic in appearance. Jokes blew up poking fun at the boss' expense.
• Skirk:
  • Yeet the Childe. ^ExplanationSkirk's introduction involves her unceremoniously throwing Childe's unconscious body through a portal, then dusting her hands off with a satisfied nod. This was quickly labeled the funniest moment in an otherwise emotional Archon Quest.
• Tent Tortoise
  • The strongest being in Teyvat^ExplanationStarting in Version 3.6, you can encounter this animal in the Girdle of the Sands region of Sumeru. Many curious players instinctively attack it on sight, only to realize that it is literally immune to all types of damage, making it unkillable; no matter how hard you try, high crit builds do absolutely nothing, elemental reactions are powerless, and it's even immune to drowning. Thus, players joked that they dread of the possibility of this creature showing up in Spiral Abyss to ruin their run.
• Teucer:
  • "Snezhnayan Timmie" ^ExplanationTeucer has shown a great fondness towards Ruin Guards to the extent that he owns a plushie of one that he calls "Mr. Cyclops." Due to this, some fans have joked that Teucer and Timmie may get along well, as Timmie's imaginary friend is also a Ruin Guard.
• Timaeus:
  • Timaeus, Guardian of the Alchemy Table^ExplanationDue to him standing right next to the alchemy crafting bench table in Mondstadt, many players will inevitably wind up talking to him on accident when they're trying to interact with the bench. This has led to many comics and edits where the Traveler will talk to him and then immediately shout at him to shut up, or else portray him as someone trying to defend that poor crafting table from whatever the player is trying to do. The meme was finally laid to rest in the 2.2 update, which added an option for Timaeus to redirect you to the crafting menu if you click on him by mistake.
• Timmie:
  • "Little Timmie's seen some shit" ^ExplanationPlayers entering Mondstadt for the first time will likely notice an NPC child named Timmie hanging out on the bridge into Mondstadt with some pigeons; crossing the bridge (the obvious way to enter Mondstadt) scares the pigeons, and if you speak to Timmie, he'll blame you for scaring the birds. You can point out that they'll come back, and he'll ask what if they don't... "just like daddy." This is such an out-of-nowhere turn for the conversation that it immediately became memetic, with people assuring Timmie that his dad was just out for smokes or trying to assure him that dad would be "back" and also speculating why his dad disappeared (the player can later discover he died in a hunting accident and the people in the know are hiding the truth from Timmie to not break his heart). There is also a quest later on where the player is tasked to feed the ducks by Timmie. If the player so chooses, they can kill them after feeding them (shooting them with arrows or magic, or simply charging up the pond with Electro). If they did do this, Timmie will exclaim that he "saw what you did to those poor ducks!" and you will get another quest later on to apologize to him.
  • Killing Timmie's pigeons^ExplanationTimmie is somewhat disliked by the playerbase for his insistence on throwing a tantrum whenever the player scares off his pigeons—which is inevitable whenever the player crosses the bridge to Mondstadt, the main entrance into the city. This, combined with the fact that Timmie's pigeons are a convenient source of Fowl for cooking, makes Timmie's pigeons a popular target, with players often making up elaborate ways to kill Timmie's pigeons.
  • Timmie's Stand ^ExplanationDuring Venti's Character Quest, the Traveler, Venti and Paimon are able to see the imaginary friends of the children of Mondstadt. When they get to Timmie, they find out that his imaginary friend is a Ruin Guard of all things. Upon realising this, Paimon gets scared and Venti nudges the group to leave. Considering how Ruin Guards can be Demonic Spiders, especially in large groups, the fanbase takes it that Timmie will throw down if you mess with his pigeons.
  • Timmie the Fatui Harbinger ^Explanation In the Web Event "A Thousand Questions with Paimon" in which the player can answer quiz questions about the game to earn Mora, one of the questions is "Who is the 8th Fatui Harbinger". One of the multiple choices is Timmie, resulting in jokes about Timmie showing his true strength and initiating a boss fight if you mess with his pigeons.
  • Sending Timmie to the Shadow Realm ^ExplanationTimmie is one of the NPCs who plays Genius Invokation TCG in the overworld and he has a curfew. If the card game ends at night time, Timmie's character will vanish. Players joked that they have sent Timmie to the Shadow Realm if they won against him in those conditions.
• Treasure Hoarder Potioneers:
  • Test subjects ^ExplanationSome of the potioneers' opening and defeat lines refer to the player characters as test subjects, e.g. "Another test subject!" and "Picked the wrong test subject...". It's memorable as what they are testing for is not clear (the intent is that they're testing their potions on you by attacking you), and you can expect some references to test subjects to appear when the potioneers are mentioned.
  • "Fry!" / "That tingle?" / "Suffocate!" / "Freeze!" ^ExplanationThe potioneers' attack calls when they throw their potions depending on their element. Given their punny nature and brevity, that makes them popular lines to repeat in a proper context with the potioneers.
• Tubby:
  • "Maybe you" ^ExplanationSimilar to Katheryne, players need to talk to Tubby in order to access the Serenitea Pot Menu. Her line is therefore frequently heard and skipped.
• Unknown God:
  • "Arrogation" ^ExplanationIn the opening cutscene, the apparent Big Bad declares that "The arrogation of mankind ends now" as she captures your sibling and traps you in Teyvat. Though it sounds like a made-up version of "arrogant," "arrogate" is a real (if somewhat archaic) word meaning "to claim something you have no right to." Since most people haven't heard this word anywhere else, it shows up frequently in Genshin-related memes, with or without the original line from the intro.

• Vacher:
  • Azar's rival ^ExplanationVacher's many heinous crimes plus his insufficient 'redeeming quality' have made him just as hated, if not moreso, than Azar, who was already a major asshole. However, he's mostly stuck as a runner-up because his comeuppance is seen as satisfying (the amalgamation of his victims killed him at the end of Chapter IV Act II by taking his soul) as opposed to Azar's Fate Worse than Death.
• Varka:
  • "Varka took all the good shit!" ^ExplanationAlthough not seen, only mentioned, Grandmaster Varka plays a significant role in why Mondstadt is the way it is and why Jean is the Acting Grandmaster. Due to the fact that he went on an expedition and somehow took all of Mondstadt's calvary units (Explaining the lack of horses in the game), fans begin to joke and snicker on why Mondstadt feels lacking in content and why the soldiers of Mondstadt suck. The explanation? Because Varka took everything cool, including the actual good soldiers.
  • Please be muscled, please be muscled... ^ExplanationFrom what little's known about him, Varka is a Boisterous Bruiser who serves as an extraordinary knight and The Mentor to several characters. This has caused the Fanon of Varka being a Hunk. Considering the game's Cast Full of Pretty Boys and male characters being limited to two body types (medium and tall, with both being slender builds), some fans are worried that Varka may end up as a skinny Bishōnen instead of the muscle-bound warrior they were expecting. Similar concerns are made of the Manly Facial Hair several people want him to have, when the entire playable adult male roster are clean-shaven.
    • Shota Varka ^ExplanationThe above meme taken to its logical conclusion has the Grand Master of the Knights of Favonius being a child. This is unlikely however, considering Razor describes him as tall and he's implied to be older than many other characters.

General Character Memes

• DA BOYS ^ExplanationAnother meme featuring Alhaitham's Character Demo - "Alhaitham: Think Before You Act". Being the first trailer where all the known playable male Sumeru characters were present, sitting on the table and gossipping. This setup immediately became a meme where the table became the go-to hideout for all the men to bicker, argue, play Invocation TCG and all sorts of shenanigans.
  • The addition of content for this group has led to fans referring to them as 4ggravate, named after the Aggravate reaction.
• OBJECTION! ^ExplanationDuring the 3.4 Lantern Rite: The Exquisite Night Chimes event, a popular image captcha emerged showcasing Venti, Hu Tao and (Sometimes) Xingqiu pointing at each other in the same manner as Ace Attorney.
• Zhongli and Venti Awkward Family Dinner ^ExplanationAnother meme from Lantern Rite: The Exquisite Night Chimes also spawning from the very same place and cutscene as the above meme. This meme stems from the very awkward encounter of Venti giving Zhongli a surprise visit whilst he was in a restaurant with Hu Tao, Xingqiu, Chongyun, Xiangling, Xiao and the Traveler and Paimon. Their very funny interaction on both trying to not accidentally dox each other whilst throwing shade at one another, quickly became a popular image captcha meme. It is not helped by Zhongli's clear uncomfortableness of the situation, Xiao becoming overtly stressed out and Hu Tao playing fun with Venti.
• Genshin Girls with Guns ^ExplanationFor some reason or another, it is very popular to see people cosplaying as one of the Genshin female characters to hold a gun of some sort. Que memes of each girl trying to hunt down one another in order to gain the Traveler’s affection. It became even funnier when characters such as Clorinde, Cheveruse and to a lesser extent Ayaka holds a gun.
• Detached Sleeves^ExplanationDue to detached sleeves being a very recurring character design element in Genshin's female playable and non-playable cast, jokes have been made about the designers' armpit or bare shoulder fetish.
• The Harbinger Pose^Explanation So far, all of the featured Fatui Harbingers (Signora, Tartaglia, Scaramouche, Dottore, and Arlecchino) have at some point made some sort of gesture that involves them holding their arms out to the side or in front of them, almost to the point of Running Gag. The fanbase ended up nicknaming it as such and accusing any character who makes a similar pose of having ties to the Fatui.
• Genshin Pretty Cure ^Explanation Some fans recognized a plethora of Pretty Cure VAs voicing most of the playable characters in Genshin Impact, it became a sign of acknowledgement from both the Genshin and the Pretty Cure fandoms.
• The x.5 curse ^Explanation Fans note that it has become a trend that in every sixth regional patch (which ends in ".5"), the newly released 5★ character in said patch suffers varying degrees of Low-Tier Letdowns: Eula started out strong, but her viability plummeted when physical damage became increasingly less feasible in current endgame content. Yae Miko initially suffered from the awkward clunkiness of her kit, though Dendro reactions introduced in Sumeru improved her personal damage. Dehya is plagued with a below average kit that did not improve much since release, and became a Standard Banner character. While Chiori herself isn't entirely bad like the previous three (though she isn't considered to be too special), she does get Overshadowed by Awesome when it was announced that both Neuvillette and Kazuha are getting re-runs right after her, as well as the announcement of the long-awaited Arlecchino being scheduled for release in the patch after. In addition, x.5 patches tend to be what are known as "filler patches" that introduce no new map expansions or other notable content (though Versions 1.5 and 2.5 did introduce two weekly bosses and 3.5 even implemented Archon Quest Chapter III Act VI with Dainsleif reappearing).
• Electro: Lesbians and dogboys/The lesbian element ^ExplanationGiven the Archon of Electro is a Raiden Mei Expy and the large ratio of female to male characters within the roster (especially given the portrayal of the former in the fandom, such as the likes of Beidou and Yae Miko), it's joked that the requirement to gain an Electro Vision is either to A: be a lesbian or dogboy or B: be a lesbian, with all that Cyno's obtainment of one implies, and Razor simply mistook an Electro Vision for a Wolfhook. The only exception to this rule is Dori, who is only attracted to her grind for Mora. Even Sethos, who possesses no apparent animal features, still has a link to the "dogboy" traits due to being named after the Egyptian god Set.
• Harbingers with marketable plushies ^Explanation"The Song Burning in the Embers" animated short depicts Arlecchino as a rabbit plushie. This has lead to jokes that a Harbinger is made playable if they have some sort of representation as a doll or plushie (Tartaglia has a narwhal plushie, Scaramouche appears as a doll of himself and turns into a marketable cat). This has also given hope to Dottore fans, given his appearance as a Cute Monster in Nahida's fairy tale.

Event Memes

• Top 10 images taken right before disaster ^ExplanationThe event "Five Flushes of Fortune" involves having players travel all around Liyue and Mondstadt to take pictures of a certain item or creature of the day. Items are easy enough, but "creatures" include taking pictures of the monsters and enemies you find out in the wild (animals being the safer option). Cue shenanigans and jokes with players posting in game photo's of themselves getting attacked by the creature they want to take a picture of, and some went as far to take pictures of difficult enemies such as Ruin Guards and Ruin Hunters, and even bosses.
  • National Teyvat ^Explanation Referencing NatGeo's famous nature photoshoots. Extra fun if the picture in question is a photo of a dangerous animal enemy like Boreas or the Primo Geovishap.
• Arknights Crossover ^Explanation The 1.3 event Theatre Mechanicus is a tower defense game mode in which the player can place turrets. Cue jokes about Arknights, a popular gacha tower defense game, especially because this event took place not long after the Hypostasis Sympho- er, Contract event.
• Genshin Fall Guys ^ExplanationThe Peculiar Wonderland event that was part of the Windblume Festival in the first half of version 1.4 featured multiplayer minigames that were immediately compared to Fall Guys, a chaotic 3D-platforming contest game that came out around the same time as Genshin.
• Endora catching Pokémon ^Explanation In the Wishful Drops event and storyline, the player obtains an Endora gadget with which they are tasked to capture Oceanid water mimics in the overworld with water bubbles, not unlike catching Pokémon in Poké Balls. The whole event was also likened to Pokémon GO as well due to this synopsis.
  • Getting revenge on the Hydro Abyss Mages ^ExplanationThe Hydro Abyss Mages are notorious for That One Attack that traps players in bubbles. Endora could capture enemies with similar bubbles during the Wishful Drops event, prompting players to use them on the Abyss Mage.
• Windtrace memes^ExplanationThe Windtrace event was a Hide-And-Seek style minigame where players disguise themselves as objects while someone hunts them down.
  • Windtrace tier lists^ExplanationSome characters perform better than others. Mona can fulfill both roles greatly since she is fast and only seen as a tiny splash of water when sprinting. Qiqi, Klee and Diona are preferred rebels since they are much smaller and are harder to spot, while Kaeya and Razor are better hunters since their expedition talents decreases their sprinting stamina allowing them to cover the map and chase rebels more efficiently.
    • Mona too OP plz nerf^ExplanationBecause of how broken Mona's Illusory Torrent was during the event, which greatly increases her speed and reduces her to a small splash of water, miHoYo/Hoyoverse removes the use of alternate sprints altogether in the next iteration of Windtrace, reducing Mona and Ayaka to regular sprinting.
  • Tree climbing simulator^ExplanationA lot of players cheese the game by climbing up a tree and staying there. The leaves make it really hard to find someone and the height makes it easy to spot an incoming Hunter.
  • Qiqi Hunt^ExplanationHaving Hu Tao as the Hunter and the Rebels as Qiqis has gotten popular due to their backstory.
• 1.6 Midsummer Island Adventure Event
  • Bombs ^ExplanationAt the end of the Midsummer Island Adventure event, players could craft bombs which made it easier to clear out buffed Hilichurl and monster camps. Many players found out these bombs did much more damage than their main party in regular gameplay. Meanwhile, players with high Adventure Ranks found their fully upgraded characters struggling with the monsters in the event area.
  • Unplayable Minigames ^ExplanationThe Midsummer Island Adventure minigames required the Wind-Blessed Harpastum to play, but many players skipped the tutorial on how to use it. This led to scenarios such as attempting to glide through the Hymnal Rings and shooting the Dodo-King painted walls.
• Ending Never-Ending Battle ^Explanation The Never-Ending Battle was a limited-time event. Players who received the P.A.I.M.O.N mail informing them it was ending soon were quick to call out the sheer irony of the event's name. It doesn't help the event battle itself was also timed.
• Fungimon ^Explanation The Fabulous Fungus Frenzy event is basically a Pokémon fight with Fungi.
• Alchemical Ascension
  • "Paimon, we need to cook" ^ExplanationThe event lets you create potions to sell them for profit, fans usually compare this to Breaking Bad of all things where the entire premise is basically making and selling drugs. And thus one of the memes from said series making its way to the event.
  • Atelier Crossover ^ExplanationSince alchemy and potion making is the main focus of this event, players joked about Genshin is having a crossover with the Atelier games (even though the Atelier characters never actually appeared in the game).
    • Atelier Sucrose is real! ^ExplanationRelated to the above, fans rejoiced that Sucrose appeared in an Atelier-esque event, although she's taking the role of the examiner while the Traveler is the actual main character here.
• Feline Fortress Furrdyssey
  • Cats reacting to the event ^ExplanationThe prominence of cats in the event lead to images of owners showing their cats' reactions to the event or attempting to pet them similarly to the event.
  • The REAL endgame content ^Explanation The event involves playing with cats. Given a lot of people like playing with cats, it was joked that it was finally the actual endgame content Genshin players had demanded for so long.
  • Where do I pet this cat? ^ExplanationAs Genshin contains characters with cat features (or in Kirara's case, is just a cat straight up), people joked about petting them as well.

Fan Content Memes

• Everyone dancing to specialist^ExplanationVideos that plug dumped models of the cast into the dumped dance routine for the song "Specialist" from Persona 4: Dancing All Night, often with a version of the Cool Shades the Protagonist can wear in that game added. Versions include everything from playable characters to hilichurls and boars to Amber's Baron Bunny. Whenever a new playable character is revealed, it is now a tradition to immediately have them dance to "Specialist".
• Genderbent Archons ^{Explanation (Spoilers!)}Venti and Zhongli are occasionally drawn by fans as females, though with different reasons: Venti already looks pretty as a boy, while Rex Lapis (and thus, Zhongli) was known for disguising himself with a female form.
• "THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING!" ^ExplanationGenshin content creators on YouTube commonly include this phrase on their thumbnails when hyping an upcoming patch or character. While it's attributed to Genshin player "Mtashed" and was initially limited to YouTube, it also spread into other online platforms.
  • Big PP Damage Numbers/DPS = Damage per Screenshot^ExplanationAnother common thumbnail is a screenshot of a big damage number. Viewers often remark on how the thumbnail is not indicative of the character's actual damage capabilities as the youtuber often uses Bennett, Mona, Sucrose and food buffs to achieve that damage number, calling out the thumbnail as clickbait.
• Old Italian Man ^ExplanationAfter this reddit post in which an "Old Italian Man" commented on how the outfits of the characters seemed impractical and remarked on the lack of trousers, many Reddit users refer to the "Old Italian Man" whenever someone suggests less Fanservice-y outfits and female characters wearing pants.
• Doki Doki Literature Club! edits ^ExplanationAs "hangouts" (basically dating sim quests) were introduced in 1.4, many players started making edits of Barbara, Noelle, Bennett and Chongyun in the interface or menu screen of Doki Doki Literature Club, a well known dating sim game.
• McGenshin ^ExplanationA viral social media trend on April 2021 wherein fans use profile pictures of Genshin characters wearing McDonald's hats.
• I will turn into a convertible! *transforms into convertible* Let's go! ^ExplanationAn utterly hilarious trend of Genshin Impact characters transforming into convertibles in the same vein as the "DaBaby turns into a convertible" memes.
• Least Horny Genshin Player^ExplanationGenshin Impact's wide range of attractive characters and popularity is bound to create a massive fanbase who are only interested in the 'fan art'. Frequent memes often prompt up showcasing the apparent widespread degeneracy, lack of social life, and just blatant smut from the fanbase.
• Resinless behavior^ExplanationA riff off of the "maidenless behavior" meme from Elden Ring, used to refer to players indulging in weird, high-effort in-game behavior. Resin is the Freemium Timer mechanic of the game meant to limit how much people can earn character-upgrading items in a single day, so when people run out of resin, it means there's nothing else to do... so they get bored, and begin inventing highly unusual ways to entertain themselves within the confines of the game. Sometimes this jokingly includes basic things like completing quests and commissions - the actual primary gameplay.
• "Garnt, our Favourite Genshin Streamer" ^ExplanationA crossover meme with famous anituber Gigguk or Garnt which exploded into popularity when he did a surprise return streaming Genshin in 2022. It is to the point that Gigguk's streams on twitch is forever synonymous with Genshin despite originally dropping it in late 2020 and insisting that he was not addicted to it.... only to relapse and admit later on two years later that he is indeed addicted to it.
• The Rawflerverse is canon!^ExplanationThe Youtuber Rawfler's videos have portrayed Yoimiya and Tartaglia as best friends (starting with his "Yoimiya.exe" video). Cue the release of the "Outside the Canvas" event in 3.2, where Yoimiya and Tartaglia are actually shown interacting with each other quite pleasantly. Many fans were in awe, thinking that Rawfler actually predicted their friendship becoming canon.
• Sonic x Lumine^ExplanationThere was tension between players of Genshin and Sonic Frontiers during The Game Awards 2022, due to a lot of badmouthing each other over who deserves to win the "Players' Voice" bracket. Both sides spawned fanart of Sonic being chummy with Genshin Impact characters in order to promote friendship between the two fandoms and end the conflict. Among these was fanart of Lumine embracing Sonic as they kiss each other. The memetic art itself isn't all that risque, but the Crack Pairing had caused both fanbases to feel a mix of shock, disgust, and confusion.
  • "Maybe Lumine wasn't all she's cracked up to be".^Explanation A line of Real Time Fandub Goes to Hell Episode, where Shadow throws away the picture of Gerald & Maria with melancholic tone. Replace Maria with Lumine. Anyone who isn't fond of Lumine x Sonic is predictably reacts with disgust. Coincidentally, in Sonic YT Channel featuring Aoi Yūki, her favorite character is Shadow.
• xinzoruo/心臓弱眞君 Image Captchas ^ExplanationProminent Genshin twitter artist 心臓弱眞君 or xinzoruo is known for their relatively cute and well-drawn comics based on Genshin characters and their percieved day-to-day shenanigans. Some of the images became popular Genshin image captchas as a result.
• Cwack on Crack montages ^ExplanationThe Youtuber Cwack on Crack creates videos with unconventional and joke builds for Genshin characters, often with varying and humorous results seeing characters being played in different ways anyone would have last expected.
  • When the joke build still does more damage than my DPS build ;-; ^ExplanationA common comment on Cwack's videos is a joking lament on how their joke builds somehow still deal more damage than some players' dedicated DPS builds.
  • Eternal Xiao ^ExplanationEveryday, Cwack on Crack holds a poll for which character and build they should do next. It all started when a poll option for Pyro Xiao went unpicked for several days, leading the community to deliberately not vote for Xiao to keep him in the polls for as long as possible, going for weeks before finally being picked. After that, any option involving Xiao now tends to be unpicked for as long as possible.
  • Eternal Trio ^ExplanationThroughout December 2023, Cwack's polls had gotten to the point where three out of the four options, consisted of Bennett with eggs and bacon on his face, Albedo making a ":O" face, and a mustached Ayato with a beret and baguette, remained on the polls for several weeks (the Albedo option remained since the start of November), with fans intentionally picking the fourth poll option to keep the three on the polls for fun's sake. Cwack tried solutions to get people to vote for the trio, such as a blank option and a paper shredder, though it didn't stop them from voting for them anyway, or in the case of Cwack saying "2nd most voted wins", fans will still manipulate the results to favor the fourth option to still be chosen for the next video. By Christmas Eve, in order to put an end to the trio clogging up the queue to make room for more options, Cwack reduced the poll to only the unchosen three, putting the meme to rest.
• Those motherfuckers from Bilibili are at it again!^Explanation Bilibili, a Chinese web video site akin to YouTube is infamous for a vast collection of absolutely bizarre Genshin animations and skits that it has reached notoriety in the wider Genshin fanbase. In fact, some of these animations are so weird, it has reached memetic status.

Gacha Memes

• F2P btw ^ExplanationThis is a borrowed meme from other gacha game communities. Since Genshin is a gacha game, Bribing Your Way to Victory is common, and the amount players choose to spend varies widely. At the opposite end of the spectrum from "whales" who spend thousands of dollars are "free-to-play"-ers who don't spend any real money. And as the adage goes, you'll always know if someone's in the latter category, because they'll tell you—especially when showing off any rare characters/items they've acquired. It crops up often enough that the stereotype of saying "F2P btw" has itself become a meme making fun of this phenomenon.
• "Rate up is a lie!"^ExplanationAnother meme borrowed from several pre-existing gacha game communities (like Fate/Grand Order), this is used to express how unlucky the player is when drawing from the gacha.
• WGS stands for Waster Greatsword ^ExplanationUsually, "WGS" is short for Wolf's Gravestone, a very popular 5-star claymore. Coincidentally, though, there's a one-star claymore called Waster Greatsword, which also abbreviates to WGS. So, people will sometimes pretend this is what the acronym really means and/or that the Waster Greatsword is powerful (it's actually the worst claymore in the game, given to newly-acquired claymore-wielders as a default weapon).
• Finally a character who uses The Bell ^ExplanationThe Bell claymore, which has an HP substat, is known for being the most useless 4* weapon in the game, since the only claymore character who scales off HP is Dori, who prefers energy recharge weapons due to her energy requirements. Wanderer's 5* signature weapon, Tullaytullah's Remembrance, is shaped like a bell. Thus, players refer to it as "The Bell", creating intentional confusion with the notorious claymore.
• "I finally got [x]"/"My [x] looks weird" ^ExplanationUsed by players who didn't get their desired character and used with an image of their roll, edited to look like the character they were aiming for.
• Wish Rituals ^ExplanationA popular meme in the community is to pull for desired characters after performing strange tasks inside and outside of gameplay because it would supposedly increase their luck. The most popular in-game ritual is sitting in the palms of the Barbatos Statue. Optionally, players would make a 'sacrifice' by jumping off and letting a character die by fall damage. Outside gameplay, it is common to (digitally) make magic circles and mandalas featuring pictures of the desired character along with Primogems and Intertwined Fates for added luck.
• "We are not addicts. We are...Investors." ^ExplanationA meme that has been attributed to Gigguk or Garnt as a way for Genshin or Hoyoverse players to sidestep accusations of being addicts by stating that they are merely investing in the Genshin Impact anime adaptation. A pretty tongue-in-cheek meme meant to make the fanbase look more like sophisticated businessmen than the basement dweller stereotype.
• 4★ rarer than 5★^ExplanationPlayers are guaranteed the featured 5★ unit in 180 pulls or less. On the other hand, every banner has three featured 4★ unit, and the only guarantee is to obtain a random one of three in 20 pulls or less. As a result, it is possible to completely fail to obtain a desired featured 4★ unit, needless to say raise them to a critical Constellation, despite hundreds of pulls and multiple 5★ pulls.

Gameplay Memes

• "Melted Phones"/"Nuclear Reactor Phones" ^ExplanationJust like the "Busted Phones" and "Phone-Toasting Ultimates" memes from Honkai Impact 3rd, gamers worry and joke that because Genshin Impact is a graphically-demanding game, it would end up overheating devices and reducing the lifespans of batteries, especially on lower-end phones.
• "Chest-opening simulator 2020" ^ExplanationThe game includes a prodigious quantity of Inexplicable Treasure Chests—at least 400 in Mondstadt alone—and you have to manually pick up the items that fall out when opening one, so you'll spend a lot of time just looting chests. When the game was just freshly-released on 2020, treasure hunting is the most common thing to do in the open world.
• "Lighter, pickaxe, bridge" ^ExplanationHow fans describe Amber, claymore users (but especially Noelle) and Kaeya respectively, due to their utilities in non-combat situations.
• Teyvat has its own "laws".^ExplanationA common loading screen tip. Quoted whenever players come across anything that would break the laws of physics in real life, like screenshots of bugs and glitches and implausible in-story scenarios.
• Baby [x] ^ExplanationNo matter the player's Adventure Rank or their other characters' levels, all new characters will be at level 1, without any artifacts and with a 1-star weapon. Said newly acquired characters are often depicted as babies or small children, with their higher-leveled teammates collecting ascension materials for them, protecting them in battle or outright acting as parents.
• Calling a character "discount [x]" ^Explanation Originally used as a way of putting down four star characters if their abilities are somewhat similar to those of a five star character's, such as Bennett being a "discount Diluc". Usually flipped to mean the opposite these days though, like "Venti is discount Sucrose", but whether or not it's said in earnest depends on the poster.
• Forgetting to use the Parametric Transformer ^ExplanationThe Parametric Transformer was added in 1.3; it lets you spend some unwanted items to get random rewards, but only once per week. Since there's no notification when it's ready, and the timer starts whenever you last used it, it's common to forget about it entirely, and a number of memes have been made about this. That reminds us, have you used your Parametric Transformer this week?
• Bitcoin mining / Bitcoin Impact ^ExplanationThe housing system added in 1.5 generates "realm currency" at a rate depending on the amount of objects placed in your magic-teapot-dimension. The most efficient way to do this turned out to be crafting tons of decorative folding screens (a 4-star item) and cramming them all into one room in your house (because each room has its own placement limit). This was jokingly compared to server farms for mining cryptocurrency.
• Teyvat Deforestation ^ExplanationThe 1.5 housing system lets players craft furniture with wood that can be obtained from attacking trees. Even though the trees do not disappear once the player has collected their wood, players joke that they are destroying Teyvat's ecosystems and beautiful landscapes just to build furniture.
• Inazuma has no chill ^ExplanationInazuma is significantly more dangerous to explore than Mondstadt and Liyue, owing to enemies being a good deal stronger and many of the islands having severe hazards. Kannazuka Island has a big chunk covered in Balethunder that causes constant damage while you're in it, while Yashiori Island has intense thunderstorms all throughout (Both required a specific World Quest to be completed in order to safely explore through those islands). Came to a head in 2.1 when Seirai Island was added, which is almost entirely covered in a field that has both Balethunder and constant lightning strikes that aim directly for you.
  • 6.0 Snezhnaya puzzles ^ExplanationInazuma's puzzles are also noticeably harder than Mondstadt and Liyue puzzles. A common joke is putting calculus problems next to the caption "Snezhnaya puzzles" to show probable exponential growth in the difficulty of puzzles.
• Dubstep Impact ^Explanation The soundtrack to Genshin Impact uses a mixture of Orchestral, Rock, and EDM elements liberally, especially during Boss Fights. After fights like Childe, Signora, and the Raiden Shogun used these musical combinations surprisingly well, fans have dubbed the game "Dubstep Impact" to express enthusiasm, bemusement, or surprise at the combination being so effective.
• Maybe Get Yourself a More Social Hobby... ^ExplanationEnkanomiya has a hidden achievement with this name, obtained when you complete the labyrinth-maker's challenge. An image of the pop-up banner with this achievement on it will often get posted in response to someone doing something that indicates they clearly have too much time on their hands, such as overanalyzing some aspect of the game.
• The real 5*/6* ^ExplanationA title often given to 4* characters who the fans end up loving more than the 5* ones, be it for combat abilities (Bennett), being more unique than the 5* the appear alongside (Sayu), or for their amazing animations (Yun Jin).
• Polearm Impact ^ExplanationA humorous jab at how every new patch always seems to introduce a new polearm-wielding character, starting with Shenhe and Yun Jin (whose patch also notably featured the reruns of Xiao, Zhongli, and Ganyu), and then Cyno and Candace, which were revealed at the same time.
• "gENiuS InVOcaTiOn tCg!" ^ExplanationThe way multiple characters say the card game's name in full has been mocked by some players, due to how long winded it is and how it sounds like a blatant ad read. You'd expect the characters to start shortening it at some point - that being said, starting in 3.7., some characters do start shortening it to "Genius Invokation" or just "Invokation", albeit usually after the full name has been spoken in the scene.
• Gen**i* Ce**ors*** ^ExplanationGenshin Impact is notorious for its comically bad censorship algorithm in its online chat function to the point of hilarity. For example, the word "ass" or "hole" is sometimes censored, but the combined swear word "asshole" is not. Sometimes, the censorship gets to the point where even singular letters (not words, LETTERS) are censored, laying the groundwork for some truly confusing and nonsensical conversations at times.
• Transmog when, Hoyo? ^ExplanationPlayers often have varied opinions on whether a 5-star weapon designed for a character fits them visually (i.e. Mistsplitter Reforged for Kamisato Ayaka). As such, the playerbase has long requested the ability to change weapon skins (a.k.a. Transmog), citing the desire to do things such as making a Freedom Sworn look like a Dull Blade to (at least visually) create a Lethal Joke Weapon. Whenever discussion about weapon designs is brought up, expect someone to ask when a Transmogrification feature is going to be added.
• Useless Trishiraite ^ExplanationIn Version 3.6, this orange rock appears as a Local Specialty in Sumeru. However, it ends up going unused as Kaveh (who debuts in the same version and is the last Sumeru character released during the 3.x patches) uses Mourning Flowers instead. While Local Specialties that aren't used by any of the current playable roster during a given patch is nothing new (especially during the initial patches of a new region), the Trishiraite debuts when the Sumeru series of patches are nearing its end, and with no new Sumeru characters being planned for release at the time. Thus fans joke that the Trishiraite will remain useless until a future Sumeru character is released. Given the reveal of Sethos, who will become playable, people speculate that when he is released he will use Trishiraite

Memes on Promotional Content (and Leaks)

• Passing off Honkai Impact 3rd designs/news as Genshin Impact leaks ^ExplanationAs Genshin Impact shares quite a few concepts and designs with Honkai Impact 3rd, it's not surprising to have future Genshin content be based on Honkai's. Thus, joke/fake "leaks" of Honkai concepts being said as future Genshin contents appeared; some clearly intended to be joking while some others are actively misleading. Quite a number of Genshin players (especially those who don't know or play Honkai) get fooled, with some getting disappointed upon seeing the contents' actual origins; occasionally it may also fool Honkai fans into believing that their specific content may be adapted into Genshin.
• 2.8 Live Stream ^Explanation The English version of the live stream showing off the upcoming Version 2.8 has had numerous technical issues, with the video lagging and buffering an untold number of times, and rewinding itself a few minutes back several times, culminating in the infamous moment of the long-awaited Sumeru preview suddenly being interrupted by the third Redemption Code. After the initial frustration, players started making jokes about the whole ordeal, like saying that Hoyoverse were trolling the playerbase in retaliation for content leaks, or that Istaroth was messing with the video.
• 8.5/10 ^ExplanationBefore they were officially unveiled on July 11 2022, the long wait for Sumeru characters had led some artists to try and draw what characters like Tighnari, Collei and Dori looked like based on leaked descriptions. This led to the leaker's response by usually rating them around 8.5/10. Fans immediately took this by strides and memes based on rating characters and even weapons and artefacts as an '8.5/10' blew up on reddit and twitter.
• If Cryo, why hot? ^ExplanationA recurring joke from fans about how so many Cryo characters (Kaeya, Ganyu, Rosaria, Eula, Shenhe, Ayaka, and (even though her Cryo is merely a Delusion) La Signora) end up being some of the most attractive characters in the game.
• If evil, why hot? ^ExplanationAs "A Winter Night's Lazzo" teaser revealed, the entirety of The Eleven Fatui Harbingers is comprised of attractive people (and Pulcinella). The phrase popped up as a response to both the individual characters' designs and the group shot near the end of the teaser.
• Jenshin Impact ^ExplanationDuring The Game Awards 2021, Genshin Impact won Best Mobile Game but was mistakenly pronounced as Jen-shin rather than Gen-shin by the announcer. It started trending almost instantly, even the official Twitter page joined in.
• miHoYo/Hoyoverse Executing a Leaker ^ExplanationWhenever there is a giant leak for each update, jokes would pour in poking fun on how Da Wei would personally locate and execute the potential leaker. This went double during the Fontaine Leaks which led to numerous jokes on how the leakers are going to get beheaded via a guillotine due to Fontaine being fantasy France.
• miHoYo/Hoyoverse "sECuriTY" ^ExplanationWhenever there is a massive leak flood, fans of the leaker community often mock and make fun of HoYoVerse's questionable security capabilities (Or lack thereof), given that something major always gets leaked... somehow. It got to the point that fans often joke that the leaker is Da Wei himself.
• Delicious WHAT ^ExplanationA tweet revealing a set of standees revealed the theme name as “Delicious Party”. That also happens to be the name of a magical girl series. Cue reactions of that variation
• More aoe/[X] damage than C6 Ayato ^ExplanationAfter a leak from a questionable source said a character would have "more Ao E and damage than C6 Ayato, the oddly specific choice of C6 Ayato had people begin to joke about new potential characters outdoing the head of the Kamisato clan, such as doing more Pyro damage compared to Ayato's output (read: none at all). The memes only increased as the leaker became more unreliable with time.

Location Memes

• Mondstadt = Home ^ExplanationDue to it being literally the first region that has a very chill atmosphere largely devoid of any politicking. A number of players view Mondstadt with a hint of nostalgia and a place to relax. This can be applied to a little extent to Liyue too post-Archon quest. Given the rampant political turmoil and mini-civil wars in both Inazuma and Sumeru, this is not a surprise.
  • Mondstadt sus ^ExplanationOn the flip side, Mondstadt is also known for being very "sus" - despite the peacefulness of the starter region, there are still many loose ends. Two Mondstadt characters have Khaenri'ah ties, Mondstadt used to worship Istaroth alongside Venti, the Abyss Order is most active in this region, and Venti is very suspicious overall and has a connection with the God of Time. Venti is said to know all songs from the past, present and future which becomes especially relevant when it is revealed that fiction bypasses Irminsul erasure. Compare this with all subsequent regions that become all wrapped up when the next region is released.
• Inazuma:
  • Inazuma the Giant Cock ^ExplanationWhen the whole of Inazuma's map was released in the 2.1 update, people believed it looked... rather phallic, to say the least. As such, people joked about it and mocked Ei for ruling over a region that looks like a giant penis, and often draw attention to the fact that the two political leaders of Inazuma are named Kokomi and Baal. Alternately, some joked that the whole of Inazuma was actually the remains of Orobaxi's massively oversized penis on his corpse; the rest of him made up Yashiori.
  • Tsurumi Island, the Giant Uterus ^ExplanationIn the same vein as how Inazuma gets much snickering due to its phallic appearance. It wasn't long before the fandom also realised that Tsurumi Island kind of resembled something heavilly yonic in appearance. Put two and two together and the jokes just writes themselves.
• Sumeru:
  • Sumeru Bollywood ^ExplanationThe cutscenes in Inazuma are noticeably inspired by anime and Japanese television. Because of this, many fans joke and speculate about how cutscenes in Sumeru (a nation themed after the Middle East) will have Bollywood-style editing. The editing of Bollywood movies and Hindi soap operas has become infamous due to the narmtastic overuse of special effects to the point of ruining a scene's tension and mood.
  • 3way Asiska Fake Aladdin Video ^ExplanationWhen Sumeru as released, a shit ton of memes immediately linked Sumeru with 3way Asiska's A Whole New World parody due to the heavy middle-eastern influence of the region.
  • Touch grass ^Explanation Since Sumeru is the land of Dendro, full of lush greenery, players have been joking that with the release of Sumeru they will get to "go outside and touch some grass" without actually exiting the game.
    • The Sages' Punishment: Touching Grass ^{Explanation (spoilers!)}Many players felt that exile to the rainforest was not enough of a punishment for the sages at the end of the Sumeru Archon Quest. Later on, they started joking that the punishment was in fact the worst possible one imaginable: forcing the sages to touch grass.
  • The Weed Nation ^ExplanationWith a nation of the element of Dendro and with the fact that it is populated by highly sentient and hostile mushrooms as shown from the Sumeru Preview Teaser 03: Prelude to Wisdom developer diaries, jokes on how everyone in Sumeru is high just naturally ran itself. When Sumeru came out, some of the daily commissions required the players to jump on mushrooms, causing the fanbase to ask who's high enough to commission and pay the Traveler to jump on mushrooms.
  • Sumeru's Animals ^ExplanationSumeru's animals are known to stand their ground and fight back or even attack the traveller. The sheer aggression from the animals and its tropical environment combine this with Sumeru's reputation as the weed nation, has spawned countless memes of players taking photos with these animals seconds from disaster to players referring the nation as Genshin's Florida Everglades or Amazon Rainforests.
• Fontaine:
  • Guillotine time ^ExplanationWith Fontaine being a Fantasy Counterpart Culture to France, the predictable jokes of its people overthrowing the Archon were made. This becomes Harsher in Hindsight (or Hilarious in Hindsight) since Fontaine's Archon Quest culminates in Furina being put on trial, and Focalors executing herself via a gigantic sword dropping on her, just like a guillotine.
  • 7.8 too much water ^ExplanationSince Fontaine is ruled by the Hydro Archon, many players are expecting a lot of water areas, leading them to reference IGN's infamous review.
  • Baguette claymore ^ExplanationA humorous hypothetical weapon consisting of using France's famous long bread as a beating stick.
  • Detecting multiple leviathan class lifeforms in the region. Are you certain whatever you're doing is worth it?^ExplanationThe sight of a coral reef at the end of the version 3.7 preview (as confirmed by the version 3.8 preview) was an announcement of underwater exploration in Fontaine. While people were excited for the region, they also dreaded the release of underwater monsters reminiscent of the ones in Subnautica. Fortunately, as of 4.0, the most dangerous things in Fontaine's water are a bunch of minibosses.
  • Attack on Fontaine ^ExplanationDue to the sheer amount of JP AoT VAs voicing Fontaine characters as per the introduction of the Overture Teaser: The Final Feast trailer (Lyney, Clorinde, Wriothesley and Neuvillette), this became kind of a meme in the Genshin fanbase.
  • Ace Attorney Comparisons^note Due to Fontaine being the Nation of Justice, and how two different court trials end up happening within the first two acts of Chapter IV, many associations were made regarding Fontaine quests and characters to the Ace Attorney series.
  • Watching the events of Act V from a distance^{Explanation (unmarked spoilers!)}People tend to make images showcasing characters (mostly ones from Sumeru) watching the events of Chapter IV Act V (the flood, the appearance of All-Devouring Narwhal, Wriothesley's flying ship up in the sky) from a distance, and them reacting to it.
  • Farming for Xenochromatic Crystals? You Monster! ^ExplanationObtaining Xenochromatic Crystals and the associated lower-tier materials involves defeating many aquatic creatures in Fontaine, several of which qualify as a Ridiculously Cute Critter. As such, farming the materials is joked about as a horrible act of animal slaughter.
    • I...I killed them. I killed them all. They're dead...every single one of them. And not just the men. But the women...and the children, too. ^ExplanationSome chests in Fontaine are locked behind needing to eliminate some of the aforementioned adorable animals. As such, you'll often see comments quoting Anakin Skywalker's famous line from Attack of the Clones when you check the map markers on the Interactive Map.
  • Nation of Assholes ^ExplanationThe sheer number of Hate Sink villains in so many of Fontaine's quests have led to jokes about the nation being full of jerkasses. While the previous nations have had several despicable characters, Fontaine outdoes them all with sheer quantity and, in some cases, quality as well (though none of them have been considered to have dethroned the reigning champion in Tevyat: Sumeru's Azar).
  • Fontaine, Liyue and Sumeru having a border dispute over Petrichor Island ^ExplanationPetrichor being at the intersection of Fontaine, Liyue and Sumeru, and the fact that it's a small island, which are often the result of heavy border disputes in the real world, lead to players joking about the three countries having a border dispute, just like real life countries. Common jokes include "Liyue's Nine Dash Line" or imagining the archons claiming that the piece of land belonged to their respective nations back during the Archon War.
• Because Snezhnaya is the Genshin Fantasy Counterpart Culture of Russia, the fandom has associated Russian memes with that nation and its citizens:
  • "In Asia, whales roll in the gacha, In Soviet Russia, the Childe throws the whale"^ExplanationPlayers often take the scene of Childe throwing a whale at you as the reference to how rich he is (because people who spend exorbitant sums on gacha games are often called "whales"). The "In Soviet Russia" meme phrase is also commonly used alongside it.
  • A handful of edits referencing gopnik culture ^ExplanationAKA sticking [x] character in an Adidas track suit with a pair of shades and a bottle of cheap booze floated around on Twitter for a while, usually with a caption like "Can't wait for the Snezhnaya update".
• Vandalising Google Maps ^ExplanationBecause the names of certain Genshin locations are based on real-life ones, the fanbase decided it would be funny to find those locations on Google Maps and spam fake Genshin-themed reviews as well as add images with poorly edited Genshin characters of those locations. For example, the reviews of Snezhnaya River mention Childe wanting to fight random tourists, and the reviews of a random drinking fountain in France describe Fontaine.
• The Ditto Hole ^ExplanationAfter the 4.4 update which added Chenyu Vale, there was a hole on the map between Liyue, Fontaine and Sumeru. Players noticed that the hole was shaped like... something. It died in 4.6 with the release of Petrichor, which filled the entire ditto hole and even got rid of the Ditto shape before unlocking the Statue of the Seven there.

Lore Memes

• For those who are into the lore and fan theories, some characters are thought to be suspicious (as detailed in the WMG page) even if the game's story is still at its early parts. This resulted into the "[Character] sus!" phrases (originating first from YouTube Poop and is later popularized by Among Us meme template) being used by the Genshin fandom when these characters are discussed:
  • "Paimon sus!"^{Explanation (spoilers!)}The game presents little to no information on who or what Paimon really is, but a popular fan theory suggests that she may be the Unknown God who fought the Travelers in the prologue. Her name being based on a demon king from the Ars Goetia raised eyebrows as well, especially since the other Archons, Barbatos and Rex Lapis (Morax) also are named from the same book.
  • "Kaeya sus!"^{Explanation (spoilers!)}His character story mentions that Kaeya is an agent from Khaenri'ah "placed in Mondstadt to serve their interests". Whatever that means, he's thought to have a hidden agenda.
  • "Otto sus!"^{Explanation (spoilers!)}A phrase that's quite exclusive to fans of both Genshin Impact and Honkai Impact 3rd. There's a minor Knight of Favonius NPC named "Otto", making HI3 players theorize, suspect, or joke that perhaps, he is Otto Apocalypse, the Big Bad of HI3, in disguise. While he's normally found guarding the church, he's oddly nowhere to be seen when the Fatui attack Venti and the Traveler the moment they leave it.
• Nothing happened in Khaenri'ah/The Archons' War Crimes^{Explanation (Spoilers!)}After 1.4's We Will Be Reunited quest in which Dainsleif states that Khaenri'ah was destroyed by the gods, and 1.5's No Mere Stone in which Zhongli is unable to tell the Traveler about Khaenri'ah, there have been many jokes based on the saying "it's not a war crime if you're the victor" and the "Nothing Happened in Tian'anmen Square" meme.
• You don't want to be a Genshin Child ^ExplanationA surprising amount of children in Genshin Impact have sad stories, some even completely depressing. Many players claim they wouldn't want to be a child living in Teyvat.
• Anemo vision holder curse / An-Emo^Explanation A similarity in the backstories of most Anemo characters (as of Version 3.3) is that they lost someone close to them, such as all the Anemo medium males (Venti, Xiao, Kazuha, Heizou, and Wanderer) witnessing the deaths of their friends, Sayu not knowing what happened to her master, Sucrose gradually losing contact with her friends, and everyone Faruzan knew having died of old age by the time she escaped the ruins she was trapped in. Thus players joke that having a dead friend is a prerequisite for gaining an Anemo vision, and if you're "lucky" enough to receive one, expect your friend to die soon; Jean is especially subject to jokes regarding the last part, as she's the only Anemo vision holder who is not known to have a tragic backstory or experienced any sort of personal loss, as her family and close friends are still alive. Wanderer in particular started out Visionless, was revealed to have lost people dear to him in the past, and then eventually received an Anemo Vision, seemingly further confirming the theory. Coincidentally, both Xiao and the Wanderer, personality wise, fit the definition of being "An-Emo".
• Venti: I solved the problem for my people.
  Zhongli: I let my people handle their own problem.
  Nahida: My people are the problem.
  Raiden: I am the problem.
  ^ExplanationA succinct meme highlighting how the 4 Archons so far differ in role in each arc.
  • Focalors: I am looking for a problem.
    Tsaritsa: I create problems for other nations.
    ^ExplanationAn expansion of the original meme, this time including the two yet-to-be-revealed Archons whose roles in the main story are the most understood based on flavor text and other miscellaneous lore bits.
  • Zhongli: I wish not for dominion but I cannot watch the common folk suffer.
    Venti: I wish not for dominion but I cannot watch the common folk suffer.
    Raiden: I wish not for dominion but I cannot watch the common folk suffer.
    Nahida: I wish not for dominion but I cannot watch the common folk suffer.
    Furina: I wish not for dominion but I cannot watch the common folk suffer.
• Archon Family
  • Scaramouche is Ei's Son^{Explanation (spoilers!)}Due to the fact that Scaramouche was one of the first puppets Ei experimented upon for a mortal shell, a lot of fans joked and depicted Scaramouche's relationship with Ei like mother and son, since she is the one that created him. As Ei saw Scaramouche as a failure when he shed tears with the Gnosis inside of him but decided against destroying him, Ei is either depicted as a strict and demanding Asian mother, holding a slipper or coathanger to discipline him, or a negligent mother who isn't very conscious about his needs (memes featuring either of these depictions, but especially the latter, often involve some Black Comedy). This meme exploded in popularity after it was revealed that Scaramouche actually does canonically perceive Ei as his mother.
  • Ei Chancla^ExplanationSince Ei is more or less Scaramouche's "mother", many, many jokes were made about Ei being an Almighty Mom who could/would discipline Scaramouche with her slipper like the unruly kid he is.
  • Auntie/Therapist Nahida/Nahida is Scaramouche's new mom^{Explanation (Spoilers for Sumeru Archon Quest Act V and Sumeru Archon Quest Interlude!)}After defeating Shouki no Kami, Nahida opts to take the comatose Scaramouche into her custody and reassures the Traveler that she will ensure that he won't commit any more evil. As this is more care than Ei herself had ever given Scaramouche, the fandom immediately latched onto the idea of the newly christened Wanderer declaring that Nahida is his new mom. This sentiment is further strengthened after Sumeru Archon Quest Interlude, where not only is Nahida one of the few people who remembers him and helps him to move on from his past, he also accepts her offer to stay in Sumeru and help her from behind the scenes.
  • Alternatively, Nahida's new pet has an unusually high badness level for his size. ^Explanation Nahida taking in Scaramouche and reforming him earning numerous comparisons to the titular duo of Lilo & Stitch.
  • Mother, Sister, Aunt, Other Aunt, Stepmother^ExplanationA meme describing Scaramouche's Tangled Family Tree. Ei is his mother. The Raiden Shogun, being another of Ei's puppet creations, is his younger sister. Makoto is his late aunt, and Yae Miko is his other aunt. And ultimately, Nahida takes him in, making her his stepmother.
  • Big Sis Ei^Explanation Many fan-artists like to depict Ei as being a Cool Big Sis to Nahida, often doting on and displaying affection towards her. This also includes her having a Big Sister Instinct that'll prompt her to harm anyone who hurts Nahida, including the Sages and Scaramouche (the latter coinciding with Ei Chancla). A piece of official art depicting the four current Archons together, in which Ei is giving Nahida a Lap Pillow, has added fuel to the fire
    • Nahida's the smart one^Explanation In line with Ei's Ditzy Genius nature, fans also tend to give them a Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling dynamic, with Nahida typically being depicted as the latter
  • The Cooler Uncle ^{Explanation (spoilers)} Xiao and Scaramouche have been depicted by the fandom as the sons of Zhongli and Ei respectively, yet both of them received an Anemo Vision - meaning that both boys chose to take after their "uncle" Venti rather than their respective parents.
• Karen Impact/Every resident in Teyvat is a Karen ^Explanation Clients who put bounties in "Bounty Lists" have an accompanying reason for their posts, however the majority of these (bar the Kairagi, a few Eremite bounties, and posts by Melusines) come across as petty, arbitrary, and trivial (i.e. an unemployed person putting a bounty on a mitachurl for being hard-workers) leading to jokes that every resident in Teyvat is secretly a "Karen".
• Genshin fans can't read ^ExplanationDue to the game's very thick dialogue and lack of a skip button, a lot of players try to click through as much dialogue as possible, leading to mistakes and misconceptions when discussing/understanding the story. As a result people joke that Genshin fans don't read or can't read, though sometimes it isn't a joke.
  • THIS IS WHY WE'RE NEVER GETTING RID OF PAIMON ^ExplanationGiven the above, many have lamented that though Paimon can be annoying, she is tragically necessary to explain every detail, and in some cases even underutilized.

HoYoverse

• 'Poor Indie Company' ^ExplanationA sarcastic quoted meme used whenever miHoYo/Hoyoverse is perceived as being too stingy with rewards, especially when it comes to Anniversary rewards. Given the billions of revenue that miHoYo/Hoyoverse makes each month, jokes has often been made on miHoYo/Hoyoverse's financial situation.
• Google Classrooms ^ExplanationDuring the fiasco involving the rewards for Genshin Impact's first anniversary, Genshin players expressed their wrath by review bombing the game alongside several apps related to miHoyo/Hoyoverse like Honkai Impact 3rd and Tears of Themis. But some (which includes trolls) go as far to review bomb apps that have nothing to do with Genshin Impact or miHoYo/Hoyoverse like Google Classroom, Clash of Clans, Cookie Run: Kingdom, and Arknights. It has since become the go-to example for the toxicity in the Genshin fandom.It then happened AGAIN when Honkai: Star Rail revealed Dr Ratio and people began complaining that Star Rail is giving out free 5* characters while Genshin only gives out free 4* with the exception of Aloy, who is a guest character.
• Excessive Anxiety ^ExplanationIn an interview, when asked about the implementation of new endgame content, the devs replied that there will be no endgame content similar to Spiral Abyss because they don't want to cause excessive anxiety in the (mostly casual) playerbase. The wording used has since become memetic.
• miHoYo/Hoyoverse is a music company ^ExplanationDue to the consistent high quality and huge library of soundtracks for the various games produced by the company's in-house music studio Hoyo-Mix, it is a recurring joke that miHoYo/Hoyoverse's true products are the music and the games are just free add-ons.
• They will send out their best Mahamatra/try them in the Courts of Fontaine ^ExplanationAfter the widely-publicized Kaveh hack, the company address to the player base included a firmly-worded intent to take legal action against the hackers. This lead to a lot of jokes about the Genshin characters (mainly Cyno, Neuvillette, and Furina) dealing out justice against them.
• Your feedback will be used to improve Honkai: Star Rail instead ^ExplanationStar Rail seems to have corrected most of Genshin's shortcomings. The Trailblazer has meaningful alternate dialogue options. Trailblaze Power (the Resin equivalent) has a higher cap (240), faster recharge (1 per 6 minutes) and an automatic overcap mechanic (Reserve Trailblaze Power) instead of being wasted if it hits the cap. The free Battle Pass grants an item that guarantees the main stat of a Relic (Artifact equivalents). Simulated Universe provides an alternate endgame mode to the time trial that is Forgotten Hall (Spiral Abyss equivalent), with bosses that are actual challenges. The reward for 300 standard banner pulls is a free standard banner 5★ unit of the player's choice. Celebratory rewards are also far more generous, including a free limited 5★ unit (Dr. Ratio) for all players in celebration of Star Rail winning multiple awards in 2023. While many of these can be attributed to Star Rail being a new game on a clean slate, players wonder why corresponding quality-of-life, endgame and reward improvements don't seem to be coming to Genshin.
  • Genshin could never ^ExplanationA related meme that began spreading like wildfire after the announcement of a free Dr. Ratio during Star Rail's 1.6 special program. Many Star Rail and former Genshin players gloats at how Genshin could never do what Star Rail does better. However, it also depends on who should respond to as it can piss off Genshin players and some Star Rail players who is still playing Genshin of which they are many.
  • Genshin is the stepchild of mihoyo's games ^ExplanationStar Rail having done most of what Genshin had better on top of generous free rewards such as the aforementioned free Dr. Ratio has a section of players making this joke.
• Rigging Artifact/Weapon Rates^ExplanationWhenever the game implements features that mark a player's desired items such as the Weapon Banner Epitomized Path or the Artifact Auto-Lock in 4.3, players joke that it rigs the game so that you'll never get your desired item. This has resulted in joking (or sometimes serious) behavior in which players would instead lock in the item they don't want, and use reverse psychology to get what they really wanted.

• Hoyoverse CEO Da Wei confirms^ExplanationA joke trending among players of Hoyoverse's top three most popular games (Genshin Impact, Honkai Impact 3rd, and Honkai Star Rail) to spread "news" on Twitter of Da Wei confirming headcanons about their favourite characters (such as sexuality, relationship status or developmental disorders).

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