Genshin Impact (TV series)

***Genshin Impact*** is a British-Japanese Shonen anime television series based on miHoYo's action-roleplaying video game of the same name. It was produced by J-Animations and was directed by Jay Stevenson. The series aired from January 2021 until August 2031 in a variety of regions, notably TV Tokyo in Japan, and digitally on Netflix in North America and Europe. The series spans 290 episodes, with each season airing episodes weekly on Wednesdays. The series has been collected into 29 Blu-Ray volumes, becoming the first J-Animations production to not receive a DVD release.

The series' story initially follows the plot of the game, whereby the protagonist, Aether, is separated from his twin sibling Lumine after the pair land in Teyvat and fight Asmoday, a god who watches over the world. The anime follows Aether as he travels through the different countries of Teyvat in an attempt to find his sister and return home, meeting different characters along the way. Whilst originally being a faithful adaptation of the game in the first season, the show soon began altering characters and plot points, eventually breaking off from the main plot and producing its own original story by the 5th season.

Development of the anime was rumoured in 2018, alongside production of the game. miHoYo divulged all relevant character information, plot details and settings to the studio in order to ensure the series would release at a similar time to the game. A series of legal disputes arose between miHoYo and J-Animations following alterations made by the animation studio to the game's story, with J-Animations claiming many details surrounding the 4th season of the show were withheld by miHoYo, forcing the studio to create their own plot. This ended in an undisclosed sum being paid to miHoYo in return for full liberty in regards to the adaptation of the product, which ceased following the storyline of the game after the series' 4th season. The series' soundtrack was composed by HOYO-MIX, including songs from Yu-Peng Chen, as well as from external composers such as Shiro Sagisu.

Johnny Yong Bosch plays Xiao in the second season, but the rest of the voice cast from the game transfer to the anime in multiple languages, such as English, Japanese and Mandarin. Voice actors include Erika Harlacher, Keith Silverstein, Anne Yacto and Kimberley Anne Campbell.

The series garnered immense press attention prior to release as the first new Shonen series by J-Animations since *Elixir* first aired in 2004. The series has received positive reviews for its animation and art direction, soundtrack and characters. The alterations made to the plot of the game have been highly controversial, but most have been met with praise. The series' original storyline has also received acclaim, although has been criticised for feeling too dissimilar to the source material. Performances of the voice cast have received acclaim for adapting their acting styles to a different type of media.

The series has been popular throughout its run, becoming one of Netflix's most streamed Asian programmes and helping to promote the game, although this created complications later into the show's run when the storyline between the anime and video game split. Despite this, the series has been able to stand on its own and won the Anime of the Year Award in 2022 at the International Anime Awards.

## Seasons

* Season 1 (2020)
* Season 2 (2021)
* Season 3 (2022)
* Season 4 (2023)
* Season 5 (2025)
* Season 6 (2027)
* Season 7 (2029-2030)
* Season 8 (2031)