Copy-pasted from somewhere else I posted this: As someone who has been playing since 1.3 and Natlan was my most hyped region since I started, I was severely disappointed. Right from the get-go Natlan started off with questionable character designs and blatant colorism, so that didn't set up the expectations well. Sorry if this analysis/discussion ends up all over the place. 3 out of 5 acts focused on getting the Traveler an Ancient Name just for it to not have mattered in the end anyways; the Ode of Resurrection never took place. There's a blatant retcon in which Xilonen was supposed to die while crafting it which never came again either. The entire point of an archon quest is to focus around the titular archon and we got the boringest one to date. The entirety of Natlan felt like watching a season of My Hero Academia without any of the decent character building they do. Other than perhaps Ororon and Chasca, I don't feel like any of the characters actually ended up changing throughout the course of the story, and this is especially true with Mavuika. She knows all, sees all, and does all. How does a nation with a tribe specifically set up for delivering information and goods to and forth not know how to dispose of extra supplies obtained for a party? Everyone simply agrees with Mavuika because she's too good; she simply knows how to tackle every situation. And she's not an unfeeling archon either which isn't the problem; she has emotions and doubts they touch on but elaborate so little on they basically shouldn't exist. It was incredibly obvious from the start that Mavuika wasn't going to die, and that essentially makes the stakes non-existent; you know everything's going to be alright at the end anyways. The pacing on Act 5 was horrible. There was another freaking party for some reason and a casual lore drop about Capitano's name that no one acknowledges. The souls part was somewhat interesting but it went on for too long and felt like it was elongating the story on purpose. After that, the actual Night Kingdom sequence was good, but I'll touch on that later. Following that is the worst Traveler glazing scene to date. Yeah everyone loves the Traveler, I don't really mind it, but jeez the parade lasted almost half as long as the battle itself. Capitano still hasn't showed up yet and Mavuika has gone off to possibly die, why are we taking so long to party? And of course there was the horrible pacing at the end. Capitano has all of 5 mins of screentime then just straight up dies which is ridiculous. I really want Capitano to be playable but I don't let that bias get in the way of saying his death made sense; they just handled it horribly. The pacing of it should've gone throughout the entire act, not the last 10 minutes. No one has still discussed the fake sky either by the way. The weekly boss is the least significant weekly boss thus far. The whale was going to drown all of Fontaine and Scara-mech was going to ascend into an archon. To be honest I'm still not entirely sure what the King of Primal Flame was supposed to be. I thought it was the original Pyro Sovereign Xiuhcoatl but every time the subtitles show up he has a different name, including Xbalanque. And then it just kind of dies with the power of friendship and then, yay? It felt insignificant. We also had all that hype for Pyro Traveler and I don't understand from a lore perspective what gaining the power of Pyro accomplished. More than what, they never explained why we ever got blocked from obtaining in the first place. We just conveniently get it in the end and defeat the big bad. We still haven't found out what secret Dainsleif was speaking about in the Travail trailer. On that note, as a tangent, not playing the Natlan theme in the Travail teaser anywhere during the Natlan quests is an absolute travesty. However, as I like to be fair, I will give what I like about the Natlan archon quest as well. Act 4 was fantastic; the entire war arc of the nation of war felt incredibly enjoyable, go figure. The whole thing with Chuychu was genuinely enjoyable for an NPC. The one part of Act 5 I thoroughly enjoyed was the sequence in the Night Kingdom. It felt like a good rush and the one thing it did better than every other archon quest was implementing the character story quests and world quests into the archon quest; I had the dumbest smile on my face when I saw characters like Bona, Och-kan, our Little Companion, Nepecha, and those other characters show up. The pacing between all acts was definitely the most solid; I liked Meropide but I know most people hated how long it lasted. The acts flowed between each other smoothly and I think that deserves some merit. I do appreciate the dynamic between us and Mavuika. It feels nice that for once our relationship with the archon is present throughout the entire quest and she is the focal point of the story. Overall Natlan has been a massive disappointment for me and it sucks that this is the region I was most excited for (if only it was Fontaine lol). Some of it was good but the ending is what soured most of it more me; it didn't tie up any loose ends, feel exciting, have stakes, answer any questions, change the characters, and it killed off a character most people were extremely excited for. And I haven't even gotten into my thoughts about the archons kit, how half of the character stories were lackluster, or the characters physical designs, but that's not why we're here. I'd rate every Archon quest over Natlan except for Inazuma (which was obvious) because of how foul the ending was, no matter how good it was in the middle (and as a side note I enjoyed Acts 1 and 2 as well, but they aren't anything incredibly outstanding unlike the Samsara cycle from Sumeru or the trials from Fontaine). I probably missed some points I wanted to talk about but I think I got the main stuff. If anyone wants to discuss in the comments I'm open. :)
IVE BEEN SAYING THIS imo natlan peaked at act 4 act 4 in my opinion was basically PERFECT the writing the pacing the plot the “power of friendship” felt a lot less forced then act 5 but like act 5 the pacing was soo confusing it felt like several plots going on at once I think the act 4 fight would’ve been a much better finale fight then act 5 as it hammers down the theme of “nobody fights alone” much better as we saw what happens when you did fight alone you die so when all the warriors of natlan come together they were finally able to defeat the abyass. Now I’ll give act 5 this the immersiveness is most definitely like top tier in Genshin the world quest charecters coming into tact making the world of natlan feel so much more alive then other nations Now then the charecter writing it’s wonky… kachina and mualani i think are very well written charecters so are ororon and Citlali and a certain someone everybody else is…wonky specifically mavuika i think shes overall more well written then just bland but like a lot of her depth is in official videos instead of the actual story i compare mavuika to another recently released charecter in a hoyoverse game Miyabi Their both op figures in their world and have some heavy backstory’s the difference is Miyabis is shown and said in the game and we see her charecter development and gain more depth from said backstory compare this to mavuika who has her backstory yet that’s it I’m gonna assume her second story quest will pull a raiden soo ima just leave that their but so far that’s just it for mavuika a backstory. Now then capitano his death itself is good I don’t mind it it’s just too soon and could’ve been a much more sastifying death if they waited for later on so we could get more of his charecter. Overall I think act 5 could’ve been done better but it definitely isn’t bad I think they could’ve done a better job fleshing out charecters like they did in act 1-4 but oh well as a while I give natlan a 7/10. My main PROBELM though is that the story doesn’t feel complete which it probably isn’t but that’s the PROBELM Fontaine and sumeru were able to complete their story in their 5 acts without adding anymore content adding content isnt bad but considering how Genshin decided to spoil like every nations archon quest being only 5 chapters I feel disappointed that they didn’t wrap up natlan in Thoose 5 chapters
yah, i always prefer that character writing and development is focused on in the archon quests/story quests, i.e. in the actual game without having to rely on outside media like animated shorts. even with mavuika's animated short, it's still difficult to really know who mavuika is as a human besides being a leader since the media hasn't shown her reacting to things. Don't just recap events -- react to events. with capitano, at least they didn't write themselves into a corner with his character. but they definitely could've done more to give a more satisfying solution to his current state.
@ I completely agree ironically Genshin did the same thing yet exact opposite with arlechinno they released her trailer yet recounted the backstory again in her story quest For capitano. I wished he had died somewhere around celestia or better yet right before they head to celestia idk it could be a sacrifice maybe as soon as the tsarista gets the gnosis the shades attack her and capitano sacrifices himself to save her burdening her with his wishes of revenge against them it’d be a ironic death yet also a heavier motivator for the tsarista to overturn celestia as just like (probably) sometime in the past she might have lost something or someone to the heavenly principles
It doesnt work. Simple as that. Natlan was hyped up to be war torn with constant friction between tribes and what do we get? The most colorful region by *far* The thing I'm most pissed about is the ONE thing I liked and it's because it had potential, Capitano. Capitano had the potential to be the PEAK of character writing and everything- And they dropped the ball so hard, iirc he has 23 dialogues total. His ending felt good but was underwhelming and insanely rushed which lead to 100% the worst ending of an AQ climax, ever. The fight was plain boring. Nothing happens. The region as a whole breaks itself- There is no reason for it to have technology on the levels of fontaine and there is no reason to any of its culture. Now, the absolute BIGGEST fault of the Archon Quest, the Archon. Mavuika is a Mary Sue and has 0 flaws that are obvious and absolutely 0 stakes. She is papier mache for a character. Mavuika is the good old "Im strong because im strong and perfect and good at everything so you should like me!" Not to mention, Natlan just feels unserious compared to literally every other archon quest. Mondstadt? It was a bit more on the chill, silly side but stakes were there, problems happened and got solved, THERE WERE CONSEQUENCES. Liyue? All of the harbour risked getting destroyed and Childe was out causing trouble, again, there were consequences and stakes. Inazuma? Definetely one of the worse regions but the archon quest, if badly written at best and dogwater at worst, still felt like a story, it made sense for the region to be as it is. Sumeru? The dendro archon was on her last legs and all of the ruling body was corrupt, again, stakes and consequences. Fontaine? Do I even need to talk on this one? The whole hydro throne got killed, the one thing I can say its bad is the disregard for the "contaminated beyond belief waters" which just seems like something they wanted to do but threw away due it not making enough sense, and even then it did not take away from the region. Natlan? Uh... I am not trying to hate but I genuinely can't think fo anything. The war sequence was good but it felt... empty? Natlan as a whole seems like it was rewritten for the money which ended uo hurting it a LOT. It destroyed its own foundations by existing.
Great analysis as always. TBH I really didn’t like how the first part with the party and then later Citlali and Xilonen reaaaaaly dragged on. The whole time I was like come oooooooon. Let’s get to the good stuff. Capitano’s death was quite sudden and he could have been more involved in the quest somehow, but overall I like the ending he got. I don’t think it’s impossible for him to still become playable, but for now, it feels like a satisfying conclusion for him. Let the old man have his nap lol Overall I liked the Natlan AQ, but Fontaine still reigns supreme in my mind, especially the ending. (I’m also soooooo excited for Snezhnaya as someone from a slavic country, I just hope it isn’t all harbingers when it comes to characters.)
@@emion7834 yup too much partying when war is a thing coming up! capitano can be brought back later in the story whenever they want ($$$), but his situation is very thematic and fitting just rushed. i wonder if he can even sleep now? since he’s still tied to the souls but maybe he’s in influx snezhnaya will be fun. connects all the dots together. definitely will have other citizens other than harbingers for playable chars. maybe some rebels similar to watstsumi who disagree with tsaritsa
The other disappointing thing was that we barely got any important lore drops from the final archon conversation. What about the secret mauvika was going to share with us? Honestly hoping there’s an interlude chapter at this point. Thought we would end with a bang, but instead it’s just awkward cheering XD
Natlan really ruined genshins aesthetic like bruh flying revolver and bike 🫠 the story was also rushed and goofy really disappointed gona quite Genshin for a while
LUL i have skipped every natlan character except mavuika mainly because archon tho i do love motorcycles so i'm happy to have a motorcycle character let's hope snezhnaya cooks. tsaritsa has all the ingredients for a compelling character
Copy-pasted from somewhere else I posted this:
As someone who has been playing since 1.3 and Natlan was my most hyped region since I started, I was severely disappointed. Right from the get-go Natlan started off with questionable character designs and blatant colorism, so that didn't set up the expectations well. Sorry if this analysis/discussion ends up all over the place.
3 out of 5 acts focused on getting the Traveler an Ancient Name just for it to not have mattered in the end anyways; the Ode of Resurrection never took place. There's a blatant retcon in which Xilonen was supposed to die while crafting it which never came again either.
The entire point of an archon quest is to focus around the titular archon and we got the boringest one to date. The entirety of Natlan felt like watching a season of My Hero Academia without any of the decent character building they do. Other than perhaps Ororon and Chasca, I don't feel like any of the characters actually ended up changing throughout the course of the story, and this is especially true with Mavuika. She knows all, sees all, and does all. How does a nation with a tribe specifically set up for delivering information and goods to and forth not know how to dispose of extra supplies obtained for a party?
Everyone simply agrees with Mavuika because she's too good; she simply knows how to tackle every situation. And she's not an unfeeling archon either which isn't the problem; she has emotions and doubts they touch on but elaborate so little on they basically shouldn't exist.
It was incredibly obvious from the start that Mavuika wasn't going to die, and that essentially makes the stakes non-existent; you know everything's going to be alright at the end anyways.
The pacing on Act 5 was horrible. There was another freaking party for some reason and a casual lore drop about Capitano's name that no one acknowledges. The souls part was somewhat interesting but it went on for too long and felt like it was elongating the story on purpose. After that, the actual Night Kingdom sequence was good, but I'll touch on that later.
Following that is the worst Traveler glazing scene to date. Yeah everyone loves the Traveler, I don't really mind it, but jeez the parade lasted almost half as long as the battle itself. Capitano still hasn't showed up yet and Mavuika has gone off to possibly die, why are we taking so long to party?
And of course there was the horrible pacing at the end. Capitano has all of 5 mins of screentime then just straight up dies which is ridiculous. I really want Capitano to be playable but I don't let that bias get in the way of saying his death made sense; they just handled it horribly. The pacing of it should've gone throughout the entire act, not the last 10 minutes. No one has still discussed the fake sky either by the way.
The weekly boss is the least significant weekly boss thus far. The whale was going to drown all of Fontaine and Scara-mech was going to ascend into an archon. To be honest I'm still not entirely sure what the King of Primal Flame was supposed to be. I thought it was the original Pyro Sovereign Xiuhcoatl but every time the subtitles show up he has a different name, including Xbalanque. And then it just kind of dies with the power of friendship and then, yay? It felt insignificant.
We also had all that hype for Pyro Traveler and I don't understand from a lore perspective what gaining the power of Pyro accomplished. More than what, they never explained why we ever got blocked from obtaining in the first place. We just conveniently get it in the end and defeat the big bad.
We still haven't found out what secret Dainsleif was speaking about in the Travail trailer. On that note, as a tangent, not playing the Natlan theme in the Travail teaser anywhere during the Natlan quests is an absolute travesty.
However, as I like to be fair, I will give what I like about the Natlan archon quest as well.
Act 4 was fantastic; the entire war arc of the nation of war felt incredibly enjoyable, go figure. The whole thing with Chuychu was genuinely enjoyable for an NPC.
The one part of Act 5 I thoroughly enjoyed was the sequence in the Night Kingdom. It felt like a good rush and the one thing it did better than every other archon quest was implementing the character story quests and world quests into the archon quest; I had the dumbest smile on my face when I saw characters like Bona, Och-kan, our Little Companion, Nepecha, and those other characters show up.
The pacing between all acts was definitely the most solid; I liked Meropide but I know most people hated how long it lasted. The acts flowed between each other smoothly and I think that deserves some merit.
I do appreciate the dynamic between us and Mavuika. It feels nice that for once our relationship with the archon is present throughout the entire quest and she is the focal point of the story.
Overall Natlan has been a massive disappointment for me and it sucks that this is the region I was most excited for (if only it was Fontaine lol). Some of it was good but the ending is what soured most of it more me; it didn't tie up any loose ends, feel exciting, have stakes, answer any questions, change the characters, and it killed off a character most people were extremely excited for. And I haven't even gotten into my thoughts about the archons kit, how half of the character stories were lackluster, or the characters physical designs, but that's not why we're here.
I'd rate every Archon quest over Natlan except for Inazuma (which was obvious) because of how foul the ending was, no matter how good it was in the middle (and as a side note I enjoyed Acts 1 and 2 as well, but they aren't anything incredibly outstanding unlike the Samsara cycle from Sumeru or the trials from Fontaine).
I probably missed some points I wanted to talk about but I think I got the main stuff. If anyone wants to discuss in the comments I'm open. :)
IVE BEEN SAYING THIS imo natlan peaked at act 4 act 4 in my opinion was basically PERFECT the writing the pacing the plot the “power of friendship” felt a lot less forced then act 5 but like act 5 the pacing was soo confusing it felt like several plots going on at once
I think the act 4 fight would’ve been a much better finale fight then act 5 as it hammers down the theme of “nobody fights alone” much better as we saw what happens when you did fight alone you die so when all the warriors of natlan come together they were finally able to defeat the abyass.
Now I’ll give act 5 this the immersiveness is most definitely like top tier in Genshin the world quest charecters coming into tact making the world of natlan feel so much more alive then other nations
Now then the charecter writing it’s wonky… kachina and mualani i think are very well written charecters so are ororon and Citlali and a certain someone everybody else is…wonky specifically mavuika i think shes overall more well written then just bland but like a lot of her depth is in official videos instead of the actual story i compare mavuika to another recently released charecter in a hoyoverse game Miyabi
Their both op figures in their world and have some heavy backstory’s the difference is Miyabis is shown and said in the game and we see her charecter development and gain more depth from said backstory compare this to mavuika who has her backstory yet that’s it I’m gonna assume her second story quest will pull a raiden soo ima just leave that their but so far that’s just it for mavuika a backstory.
Now then capitano his death itself is good I don’t mind it it’s just too soon and could’ve been a much more sastifying death if they waited for later on so we could get more of his charecter.
Overall I think act 5 could’ve been done better but it definitely isn’t bad I think they could’ve done a better job fleshing out charecters like they did in act 1-4 but oh well as a while I give natlan a 7/10. My main PROBELM though is that the story doesn’t feel complete which it probably isn’t but that’s the PROBELM Fontaine and sumeru were able to complete their story in their 5 acts without adding anymore content adding content isnt bad but considering how Genshin decided to spoil like every nations archon quest being only 5 chapters I feel disappointed that they didn’t wrap up natlan in Thoose 5 chapters
yah, i always prefer that character writing and development is focused on in the archon quests/story quests, i.e. in the actual game without having to rely on outside media like animated shorts.
even with mavuika's animated short, it's still difficult to really know who mavuika is as a human besides being a leader since the media hasn't shown her reacting to things.
Don't just recap events -- react to events.
with capitano, at least they didn't write themselves into a corner with his character. but they definitely could've done more to give a more satisfying solution to his current state.
@ I completely agree ironically Genshin did the same thing yet exact opposite with arlechinno they released her trailer yet recounted the backstory again in her story quest
For capitano. I wished he had died somewhere around celestia or better yet right before they head to celestia idk it could be a sacrifice maybe as soon as the tsarista gets the gnosis the shades attack her and capitano sacrifices himself to save her burdening her with his wishes of revenge against them it’d be a ironic death yet also a heavier motivator for the tsarista to overturn celestia as just like (probably) sometime in the past she might have lost something or someone to the heavenly principles
@arminkir9389 thatd be a fun path for tsaritsa, could turn into a tragic character
@ yeah 👍
It doesnt work.
Simple as that.
Natlan was hyped up to be war torn with constant friction between tribes and what do we get?
The most colorful region by *far*
The thing I'm most pissed about is the ONE thing I liked and it's because it had potential, Capitano.
Capitano had the potential to be the PEAK of character writing and everything- And they dropped the ball so hard, iirc he has 23 dialogues total.
His ending felt good but was underwhelming and insanely rushed which lead to 100% the worst ending of an AQ climax, ever.
The fight was plain boring. Nothing happens.
The region as a whole breaks itself- There is no reason for it to have technology on the levels of fontaine and there is no reason to any of its culture.
Now, the absolute BIGGEST fault of the Archon Quest, the Archon.
Mavuika is a Mary Sue and has 0 flaws that are obvious and absolutely 0 stakes.
She is papier mache for a character. Mavuika is the good old "Im strong because im strong and perfect and good at everything so you should like me!"
Not to mention, Natlan just feels unserious compared to literally every other archon quest.
Mondstadt? It was a bit more on the chill, silly side but stakes were there, problems happened and got solved, THERE WERE CONSEQUENCES.
Liyue? All of the harbour risked getting destroyed and Childe was out causing trouble, again, there were consequences and stakes.
Inazuma? Definetely one of the worse regions but the archon quest, if badly written at best and dogwater at worst, still felt like a story, it made sense for the region to be as it is.
Sumeru? The dendro archon was on her last legs and all of the ruling body was corrupt, again, stakes and consequences.
Fontaine? Do I even need to talk on this one? The whole hydro throne got killed, the one thing I can say its bad is the disregard for the "contaminated beyond belief waters" which just seems like something they wanted to do but threw away due it not making enough sense, and even then it did not take away from the region.
Natlan? Uh... I am not trying to hate but I genuinely can't think fo anything. The war sequence was good but it felt... empty?
Natlan as a whole seems like it was rewritten for the money which ended uo hurting it a LOT.
It destroyed its own foundations by existing.
Great analysis as always. TBH I really didn’t like how the first part with the party and then later Citlali and Xilonen reaaaaaly dragged on. The whole time I was like come oooooooon. Let’s get to the good stuff. Capitano’s death was quite sudden and he could have been more involved in the quest somehow, but overall I like the ending he got. I don’t think it’s impossible for him to still become playable, but for now, it feels like a satisfying conclusion for him. Let the old man have his nap lol
Overall I liked the Natlan AQ, but Fontaine still reigns supreme in my mind, especially the ending.
(I’m also soooooo excited for Snezhnaya as someone from a slavic country, I just hope it isn’t all harbingers when it comes to characters.)
@@emion7834 yup too much partying when war is a thing coming up!
capitano can be brought back later in the story whenever they want ($$$), but his situation is very thematic and fitting just rushed.
i wonder if he can even sleep now? since he’s still tied to the souls but maybe he’s in influx
snezhnaya will be fun. connects all the dots together. definitely will have other citizens other than harbingers for playable chars. maybe some rebels similar to watstsumi who disagree with tsaritsa
The other disappointing thing was that we barely got any important lore drops from the final archon conversation. What about the secret mauvika was going to share with us?
Honestly hoping there’s an interlude chapter at this point. Thought we would end with a bang, but instead it’s just awkward cheering XD
YUP lmao they definitely reworked the writing
Natlan really ruined genshins aesthetic like bruh flying revolver and bike 🫠 the story was also rushed and goofy really disappointed gona quite Genshin for a while
LUL i have skipped every natlan character except mavuika mainly because archon
tho i do love motorcycles so i'm happy to have a motorcycle character
let's hope snezhnaya cooks. tsaritsa has all the ingredients for a compelling character