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Honkai Impact 3rd's Annual Celebration Art Sparked Controversy Over Quality

2K View2022-10-20

The sixth anniversary of Honkai Impact 3rd took place on October 14. One week before that, the official Weibo released a group of "Sixth Anniversary Phone Wallpapers" for this occasion.

However, players were soon furious over the quality of these illustrations, spamming negative comments and putting the illustrator at the center of a controversy.

"Is this the quality of commercial illustrations? It's not even comparable to AI drawing." A fan commented sharply in a game forum.

The main complaints were about the faces with empty eyes, the wrong body structure and proportions, and even the sketch lines that had not been cleaned up properly.

Angry fans even called quits for the illustrator if she couldn't put her heart into this, because the annual celebration art has a crucial meaning for them.

A comparison between the illustrators' work and a poster for Murata Himeko in Honkai Impact 3rd.

Players were using the character Murata Himeko as an example, claiming that the illustrator's art lost the vividity of the character. A fan commented: "For sure, this is not the same person, and what I can say is that they are irrelevant."

Fans also condemned HoYoverse for its flaws in reviewing the works.

After these negative responses, illustrator Shadow Magician responded under Honkai 3's official Weibo account on October 12. She pointed out that initially, the projects were not intended for the sixth anniversary but a concert. Then, she made an apology.

A screenshot of the illustrator's apology for Honkai Impact 3rd

She explained that her works should be considered Fanart, which means the illustrations for various products such as game-themed badges, standing cards, pillows, etc.

In fact, Shadow Magician has a relatively high reputation in the community. She has previously contributed to several well-known 2D mobile games and cooperated with HoYoverse on several projects.

The exact reasons behind her slackness this time remained unclear.

Usually, the payment of commercial projects by game companies is two or three times private orders between individuals. So, fans said that budget should not be the main cause.

In the face of the criticism, on October 17, Shadow Magician released her revised works and stated that she made an application to revise the illustrations and thanked the officials for this opportunity.