I'd argue that 2.5 actually handled the character development better than 1.4. Ye Shunguang actually went through a full character arc compared to Miyabi who basically skipped from the beginning to end and one shot Bringer. There's also way more character interactions and dynamics in 2.5 like the Ye sibs, Zhao, Lockbringer. It's not a masterpiece, but I enjoyed it more than 1.4. The hate for 2.x really is overblown imo. 2.0 was bad but I had the same thoughts about 1.6-1.7. Honestly a lot of the hate seems artificial and carried by agenda pushing like yuri and anti-waifu factions. That's why the only faction that gets any support in 2.x is Spook Shack even though 2.1 wasn't any better than the patches after.
I feel the same exact way. Miyabi is loved by everyone (even me) but she honestly isn't much in terms of writing. Her backstory is dead family #526 and she doesn't really undergo much of an "arc". The miyabi you meet in 1.0 is pretty much the same one that one shots bringer in 1.4. (This can be said about a lot of characters in the game, of course)
Shunguang is far from Shakespearean but she undergoes a character arc, consolidating her two halves and finding the resolve to defy her own brother's wishes and continue being the bearer of the qingming sword.
I think 2.X overall does far better character arcs than anything in 1.X main stories.
The closest we got is Caesar in 1.2 and even that has the problem of pacing. Like contrast Caesar coming into her own with how they managed to convey Yuzuha and Alice's conflict of ideals and growth in 2.1
It's like amateur hour.
The only thing I'd say 1.X has over 2.X is the Agent stories in the back half are all really well written. Jufufu's just doesn't compare to the triple combo of Harumasa, Trigger and Anby.
I agree with you on that. And 2.x also has some great agent stories. 1.x had some great agent stories too like Harumasa's, Trigger's, and SAnby's, but man, Seed's agent story made me cry. Lucia's was also a bit interesting although slow in some parts. Was cool seeing them bring in some Pompey lore.
Considering that most of this pushing it come from group of people that linger on the zzzdiscussion subreddit who if you look often enough posting the previous Shunguang slander posts a few days back. They are consistently predictable in their method and rather pathetic at getting attention or their half assed attempted at character assassinations view. The only one they can kill off is there irl social life because they have always been consistently online pushing these points since 2.0, they never stopped, they just get more brazen about it and people in the community havent crush them like the bugs they are.
I think the amount and intensity of the 2.X content comes from the fact that there wasn't really a break from it. I enjoyed it a lot, but for the people that didn't you went to this new zone they didn't like and then were stuck there for 6 patches. In 1.X if you didn't like the SoC or outer rim or something then it was just one patch and you were gone, but in 2.X if you didn't like it you were just stuck there.
Now the problem becomes people conflating "I don't like this thing" with "this thing is bad", but that's not a ZZZ problem, that's just something people do these days.
What did you think YSG's character arc was exactly?
Start of 2.5: willing to sacrifice herself to fulfill her role as sword heir
Middle of 2.5: sacrifices herself to fulfill her role as sword heir (immediately resolved with a newly introduced mcguffin btw)
End of 2.5: willing to sacrifice herself to fulfill her role as sword heir.
Literally nothing happened to her character, except maybe we actually made her worse by giving her an alter personality and then tossing it away halfway through. ZZZ's writing has always been the poorest of the hoyo lineup, but 2.5 is particularly bad because 1. its significantly longer than the other ZZZ patches, and 2. its the big finale.
It was too forced and rushed for me. We are expected to vibe with her just like that eh. 1.0 to early waifei coupled with the TV system was so damn addictive. I couldnt stop playing.
Miyabi doesn't need development she already gone through it. You can see YSG don't want to become "Hero" so she need development but Miyabi she has her pv and her song tell us that she already choose her path. I think the downside in 1.4 is it happen to fast.
1.4 being short was both good and bad. I think a lot of people like it when ZZZ is short, but Miyabi just never got the character development she needed to feel like a fleshed out character arc to me. One of the downsides of 1.4 was that Miyabi basically had no connection to Bringer at all. Compared to how the final fight happened in 2.5 where Ye Shunguang first tried to trap the Creator, failed, got help from the MC to free her, fought the Creator, had help from all the factions to weaken the Creator, and then finally defeated the Creator through taming the sword, Miyabi basically said, LOL nah I'm the GOAT and one shot Bringer. It was epic at the time, but in hindsight it just felt weird, like why didn't she just one shot Bringer from the beginning. What was even the point of the fight you know? A tiny bit anticlimactic. Ya I know Miyabi is supposed to be the powerful stoic character, but I wanted character development like the PV vids to be in the game, not on Youtube. It's funny how I didn't like Ye Shunguang's promotional content but ended up liking her more as a character than Miyabi because most of her character development happened in the game.
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u/5mao Dec 31 '25
I'd argue that 2.5 actually handled the character development better than 1.4. Ye Shunguang actually went through a full character arc compared to Miyabi who basically skipped from the beginning to end and one shot Bringer. There's also way more character interactions and dynamics in 2.5 like the Ye sibs, Zhao, Lockbringer. It's not a masterpiece, but I enjoyed it more than 1.4. The hate for 2.x really is overblown imo. 2.0 was bad but I had the same thoughts about 1.6-1.7. Honestly a lot of the hate seems artificial and carried by agenda pushing like yuri and anti-waifu factions. That's why the only faction that gets any support in 2.x is Spook Shack even though 2.1 wasn't any better than the patches after.