Honkai Impact 3rd

Honkai Impact 3rd (CN: 崩坏3; pinyin: Bēng Huài 3), also called Houkai 3rd in Japan and Honkai Impact 3 in Southeast Asia, is a 2016 Chinese free-to-play 3D Action RPG by miHoYo Co., Ltd. for mobile and Windows. It is a Spiritual Successor to the same company's Houkai Gakuen 2, also known as Guns Girl Z, and reimagines several characters and concepts from the earlier title in a new setting.

On an alternate Earth, humanity has been plagued since time immemorial by "Honkai", a phenomenon with an apparently malevolent will that can zombify people, create monsters, and turn selected targets into godlike "Herrschers" to advance its apocalyptic goals, but can also be harnessed as energy. In the present day, a variety of organisations exist to either combat or exploit the Honkai; the most prominent of these are Schicksal, a Europe-founded group that uses superpowered warriors called "Valkyries" to combat the Honkai, Anti-Entropy, the former North American branch of Schicksal that relies on robots instead, and the mysterious Ancient Conspiracy World Serpent.

The game initially follows Valkyrie-in-training Kiana Kaslana (CN: Dian Tao; JP: Rie Kugimiya) as she battles alongside classmates Mei Raiden (CN: Jiang Jingju; JP: Miyuki Sawashiro) and Bronya Zaychik (CN: Hanser; JP: Kana Asumi) to stop the hostile flying battleship Selene attacking the city of Nagazora. They return to their education at the Extranormal Institute St. Freya Academy under Shicksal's Far East branch afterwards, but secrets about themselves, those around them and the world soon come to light, and they quickly find themselves very far from home.

The player takes the role of the Captain of the flying battleship Hyperion, managing a stable of Valkyries, whose ranks are grown by pulling on Gacha banners, equipping them with weapons and the Power Tattoos called "Stigmata", and deploying them. Gameplay primarily involves teams of up to three Valkyries engaging in Hack and Slash in short, linear missions, where one character is on the field usually but can be tagged out at will. A semi-Wide Open Sandbox mode called "Open World" that has its own story content also exists, as do a variety of minigames in other genres; the latter are used mainly for gathering resources.

In addition to the game proper, a number of supplementary animations and comics exist, expanding on the backstory and the setting.

Warning: Honkai Impact 3rd is full of Reveals, twists and Wham! Episodes, and the official website and social media are not shy at all about advertising Late Arrival Spoilers. Read on at your own risk.


 * Actor Allusion: Mei's Haunted Dusk outfit bears a suspicious resemblance in colour scheme to Twilight Sparkle from My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. Both Mei and Twilight are voiced in Japanese by Miyuki Sawashiro.
 * Alternate Self: Some of the battlesuits actually are bubble universe versions of the characters rather than the main universe's version.
 * Alternate Universe: Apart from the Alternate History nature of the main story, there are also "bubble universes" in the Sea of Quanta. Some are mostly similar to the main universe except For Want of a Nail to varying degrees, while others diverge much more wildly, sometimes to the point of characters and concepts being In Name Only from the main one. For example, the Neon Genesis Evangelion collaboration event takes place in a bubble universe where Anti-Entropy takes NERV's place and various Honkai characters slot into the places of the Evangelion ones.
 * Anti-Frustration Features:
 * Most missions that cost stamina to start will only deduct stamina once you reach the victory screen, so you won't be penalised for failure or quitting or restarting halfway.
 * Similarly, missions that give limited times to play them only deduct the counter on victory or defeat, so you can try again without penalty if you restart before it's too late.
 * Most gacha banners have a pity system where you will automatically pull the featured Valkyrie or equipment after a certain number of failed pulls.
 * EXP chips can be used to quickly level Valkyries, so you don't need to drag around a low-level deadweight just to get her to the point where she won't crumble at the slightest touch from a high-leveled mook.
 * After completing a mission, all drops will be automatically collected, so you don't need to worry about missing any that haven't been manually collected or needing to go back to pick them all up.
 * It is impossible to fail certain storyline bosses; the game will either freeze your HP at nonzero or grant a free heal should you take fatal damage.
 * SSS versions of Memorial Arena bosses come with an optional "buff mode" that grants health and damage buffs to the valkyries every certain amount of time in exchange for a score penalty, allowing players who don't have good gear yet to still be able to get some of the rewards.
 * Elysian Realm:
 * It is possible to give up in the middle of an Elysian Realm stage and start from it again, allowing you to try another time if you fail a timer without needing to replay all the way back from the start. Similarly, 5.4 adds the ability to restart a boss level instead of ending a run for failure, which helps if you were close to victory and could possibly have made it with a bit more skillful play.
 * Kallen as a boss is normally completely immune to elemental damage. This would be a big problem the times she appears as a miniboss in Threshold Breach and Elysian Realm while you're using an elemental damage Valkyrie. In order to not be unwinnable, what instead spawns is a "Breach" version that, while no easier, at least doesn't have the immunity so she can be beaten by elemental damage Valkyries.
 * As of 5.7, there is a new floor of Felis Store right before the final bosses so that you don't go into them with unused Shiny Silver.
 * As of 5.8, it is possible to reroll the choice of Signets in Felis Store. At cost after the first, of course, but better a chance to come up with the one you want than none at all.
 * Open World:
 * The game will seek confirmation if you try to refresh away task choices that offer Crystals, such that you won't accidentally lose a chance to gain that premium currency.
 * In the A Post-Honkai Odyssey subset, there are a few places, like on bridges, where your character or enemies can fall to their deaths. Your character, though, will just be brought back up to the nearest safe spot with some HP loss instead of dying outright.
 * Also in A Post-Honkai Odyssey, triggering a Chase or Treasure Chest Hunt quest will temporarily make all (other) enemies disappear so that you don't need to waste time contending with them on this Timed Mission.
 * In the Empyrean Legends event, bringing a full team of Level Capped characters to an EX stage will unlock a secret weapon in case you've been having so much difficulty beating the boss that you ended up maxing out the levels.
 * The Ark: One of the plans the Previous Era had for surviving the Honkai-induced apocalypse was Project Ark, the sending out of a spaceship to find a inhabitable world to evacuate to. It was never heard from again.
 * Assimilation Plot:
 * Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever:
 * At the end of A Post-Honkai Odyssey 2,
 * summons such a titan to fight the main trio in an obvious homage to Devil May Cry 4's Savior.
 * Authority Equals Asskicking: The leaders of the three main anti-Honkai organisations conform to this. Anti-Entropy's Sovereign Welt Yang is the Herrscher of Reason, able to conjure legions of war machines from thin air, create and survive near a black hole, and hold his own against the Herrscher of the Void. Schicksal Overseer Otto Apocalypse has replicas of some powerful Lost Technology weapons. World Serpent Sire
 * Batman Can Breathe in Space: Herrschers, MANTISes and Stigma Awakened can move around in vacuum without petty little details like oxygen.
 * Beef Gate: As you slowly unlock the story content in Elysian Realm, everything starts pointing towards a character who is repeatedly raised but hasn't shown up in person yet: Mobius. Go far enough and you will be taken to meet her, but first you will need to fight . Until you beat this boss, the story won't progress. Progress further still and you will need to fight Mobius as well to keep the story moving.
 * Beethoven Was an Alien Spy: According to the Second Key comic,
 * Bittersweet Ending: "The Day You Vanished With The Stars" event has this.
 * Black and Gray Morality: The Honkai is undeniably malevolent and seeks to destroy humanity, but some of those it turns into Herrschers have legitimate grievances that one can understand why they want to get vengeance on their tormentors even if it doesn't excuse the collateral damage. Among the groups opposing it are those who carry out unethical human experimentation, though, and
 * Boobs of Steel: Zig-zagged. Many of the strongest S-rank Valkyries like Durandal, Rita and the late Cecilia are well-endowed, while Long-Range Fighter Support Party Member Bronya is flat. However, Bare-Fisted Monk Carole is only of modest size while Fu Hua is flat, and what makes the inversion of the last one even more significant is that
 * Bragging Rights Reward: Beating the Elysian Realm on the second-highest difficulty gets you the third and best of a set of Emblems that increase HP and damage while in the Realm. If you managed to get that far without it, though, all it'll do is make reruns slightly easier; while a higher difficulty does exist, completing that offers no reward but the acknowledgment of having done so, and thus is of no importance.
 * Bribing Your Way to Victory: While no gameplay content is outright locked out to truly free players, the best Valkyries and equipment are only available through gacha that use the "crystal" premium currency. Crystals can be gained in small quantities through gameplay, or their acquisition can be sped up with real cash. Better types of Battle Passes and other resource-granting bundles can also be acquired using a different kind of premium currency called "B-Chips".
 * The Bus Came Back: Chapter 37 sees the return of Owl/Chen and the "Arc: Light Bound" event's bubble universe that Haxxor Bunny came from.
 * Canon Welding: Several events are revealed late in their course to be part of the Captainverse.
 * Casting Gag: Nana Mizuki and Yukari Tamura previously acted together in Lyrical Nanoha, where Mizuki played They acted together again here, where
 * Clock Roaches: In "The Day You Vanished With The Stars" event,
 * Clothes Make the Superman: While Valkyries are already superhuman, the battlesuit used affects and enhances how that power is expressed and can change both the type and element. Taking Fu Hua as an example, Azure Empyrea and Phoenix are Psychic Fire, Night Squire and are Biologic Physical, Shadow Knight is Mecha Lightning, and Valkyrie Accipiter is Psychic Lightning.
 * Combat Breakdown: After trading fire with all kinds of superhuman powers, the final fight between Kiana and Kevin devolves to a Batter Up duel.
 * Combined Energy Attack: The third phase of has way too many layers of shields, more than every previous boss combined, and the main trio despair that he looks to be beyond them despite how far they've come. Then  bringing the shields down and leaving the boss vulnerable.
 * Conspiracy Redemption: It is eventually revealed that
 * Contractual Boss Immunity: In A Post-Honkai Odyssey mode, quest targets will not be insta-killed by Back Stabs. Doing one will still inflict more damage than any standard hit, though, so it's still a good idea to open with one.
 * Death by Irony:
 * Death or Glory Attack: The Elysian Realm mode has the Signets of Decimation, which grant bonuses based on HP loss. The less HP your Valkyrie has, the bigger the bonus. Thus, running around with low HP will get the most out of them. However, this also means that there is much less room for error.
 * Difficult but Awesome:
 * The Elysian Realm mode has the Signets of Vicissitude, which build up to 40 stacks of buffs over time but lose 10 stacks every time you get hit. The buffs are big, though, like extra 1.0% total damage per stack for a whopping 40% when maxed out, and its Enhanced Signets can raise the buffs even further. Anything else that comes close has another Necessary Drawback like only lasting for a short period of time. Good players who can avoid getting hit ride on those big buffs to do well; poor players who get hit often suffer and would have done better choosing Signet sets that aren't so skill-demanding.
 * The Elysian Realm also has the Signets of Infinity, at least before getting nerfed in 5.4. In addition to Magikarp Power, getting them to the Purposefully Overpowered heights they can achieve that surpass even the Signets of Vicissitude requires the player to carefully manage the cooldowns of summoned units on top of everything else already demanded by normal gameplay.
 * Dramatic Irony: In the Elysian Realm, Mei asks Those who have played the story mode up to the latest chapter at the time of the Elysian Realm's release in version 5.0 will know that exactly the opposite happened;
 * The Ending Changes Everything: The "Estival Seaside Amusement Park" event starts out cutely as the Captain and Seele go around catching Honkai beasts Pokémon-style for a competition. Strange things start happening along the way, but it isn't until the end that the truth is revealed:
 * Everyone Has Standards:
 * In the Elysian Realm, would not have crossed.
 * Also in the Elysian Realm, Kalpas - The Berserker and Blood Knight par excellence - expresses disgust over a past incident where a young child was killed in an attempt to thwart a Herrscher.
 * Faustian Rebellion: A number of Herrschers chose to fight for humanity rather than fall in line with the Honkai.
 * Four Is Death: The Fourth Herrscher,, is the first character to die, and this happens in the fourth chapter.
 * From Nobody to Nightmare: Kevin was previously just an Ordinary High School Student interested in basketball and his crush, while Otto was physically weakly and not the designated heir to his family.
 * Full Set Bonus:
 * Most Stigmata come in three-piece sets. Putting two together grants a bonus and having all three on the same Valkyrie grants a second one. These bonuses are powerful enough that, outside of a few specific cases, equipping a Valkyrie with a complete set is recommended.
 * In the Elysian Realm mode, getting three or more Signets from the same set will grant a powerful Core Signet that is almost always necessary for the set to come online, as well as unlocking for selection more powerful Enhanced Signets.
 * Gameplay and Story Segregation: The characters in the Elysian Realm mode will always act as though Mei is the one they're interacting with regardless of who the player is actually using.
 * Giant Space Flea From Nowhere: Chapter 4 has "Dark" versions of Mei and Kiana as bosses. No foreshadowing is given, no after-the-fact explanation either, and no one comments on it.
 * Grand Theft Me: The real purpose of the Elysian Realm is to find a suitable host for to transfer herself to so as to escape it and return to the real world.
 * The Guards Must Be Crazy: Mooks in Stealth-Based Missions have only a roughly 90-degree field of view, take a few seconds to investigate your presence and a few more to be properly alerted, and are deaf to their comrades dying to Back Stabs even if done right next to them. In all fairness, "don't be seen" is almost the only avenue for stealth.
 * He Who Fights Monsters: Whatever just cause Sirin might have had in seeking vengeance on those who experimented on her, she lost any claim to the moral high ground the moment she stopped restricting herself to her tormentors and started indiscriminately bombarding civilians.
 * History Repeats:
 * Humans Are Their Own Precursors: There was a Previous Era of humanity 50,000 years ago that also had to fight the Honkai. They had Lost Technology the likes of which the Current Era either cannot replicate or can only do so imperfectly, such as the Divine Keys and MANTIS Super Soldiers, but failed to defeat Honkai in their time. Whether they had any more Previous Eras of their own is unknown.
 * Hypocritical Humor: One of Pardofelis's possible lines if you get a Signet from her has her ask if you took anything from her shop. Bit rich considering that most if not all of her stock was acquired by Five-Finger Discount.
 * Immune to Flinching: There is a hidden "Ignore Interrupt" stat that determines how easily something gets disrupted by getting hit. The extreme of this is the Iron Body buff, which grants total immunity.
 * Interface Spoiler:
 * A player can see all the player characters even if they haven't been unlocked for use yet. This includes those who are Walking Spoilers.
 * "The Day You Vanished With The Stars" event seems to end happily after the Captain and Kongming successfully negotiate peace between the kingdoms and the two of them can celebrate at a festival. Then the player notes that there are still more missions to complete...
 * Late Arrival Spoiler: The official website and social media has no qualms whatsoever with advertising new content that only exists because of spoilers.
 * Leaning on the Fourth Wall:
 * In "The Day You Vanished With The Stars" event, the Captain wonders if there are observers watching him and commenting on his actions. Tesla - Zero has similar thoughts later on, and her telling the Captain that it's okay to cry could also be interpreted as directed at the player.
 * In Chapter 26, when Nagamitsu explains Otto's plot to use the Imaginary Tree, she draws an analogy between altering the world from said higher reality and a gamer loading different save data.
 * Loads and Loads of Characters: As of August 2021, there are 15 playable characters in the main mode, almost all of whom have multiple battlesuits to equip. Add in NPCs of varying importance and the count grows even larger.
 * Luck-Based Mission: Success in the Elysian Realm mode, especially on higher difficulties, largely comes down to random factors even when you have a maxed-out character with the best gear - which Signet set portals spawn (with only three resets per run), which Signets you actually get to choose from out of the selected set, which Signets can be purchased or upgraded each time the shop can be visited, which enemies spawn and where in the level with which buffs, whether they use That One Attack that grants time-wasting invincibility (and/or how often)...
 * Magikarp Power: In the Elysian Realm mode, the Signets of Infinity are potentially the most powerful type of Signet, or at least they were before getting nerfed in 5.4. However, many of said Signets are individually weak and most of the set must be collected before it develops synergy and becomes viable, whereas almost every other Signet sets only needs three to unlock the set's Core before it becomes viable.
 * Masquerade: Most of humanity is kept in the dark about the true extent of the war against the Honkai. This is made especially clear in Chapter 23 where Welt and Bronya investigate an exhibition of Honkai beast statues and none of the visiting civilians express the kind of alarm or disgust one might expect from encountering replications of the monsters terrorising them.
 * Mysterious Past: Durandal's past is a blank. Officially, she is an amnesiac orphaned by the Second Eruption. Unofficially, her sheer strength and a number of curious coincidences have invited much speculation both in-universe and out as to who or what she really is. Later reveals show those coincidences were not coincidences after all.
 * Name Order Confusion: The official localization has East Asian characters with family name first, so Mei is officially "Raiden Mei". However, everyone else goes with family name last. It gets confusing with, among others, a pair of characters named Welt Joyce and Welt Yang who it's hard to tell at first glance what the name order actually is.
 * Necromantic: plots, which have caused much harm and killed or hurt many people, are driven by his desire to resurrect The Lost Lenore.
 * Never Trust a Trailer:
 * The Pre-Revelation trailer made it seem that Mei and Durandal would have a rematch. It never happened.
 * The Preview of Honkai Impact 3rd Part 1 Finale Opening made it seem like Kiana, Mei and Bronya would have to navigate a complicated environment in fighting Come the actual game, they fight in an open crater and
 * Not a Game: In Chapter 32, it is surprisingly normally-easygoing Kiana of all people who says this.
 * Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: Despite the fancy name, the Flame-Chasers could only be called a team in the most charitable sense.
 * Regenerating Shield, Static Health: Unfortunately not for the player characters, but for Elite Mooks and certain bosses; they have shields that can be drained and will regenerate after some time, while the health underneath doesn't. Shields don't completely negate damage to health, though, which makes things less nightmarish than they could have been.
 * Remember the New Guy?: In A Post-Honkai Odyssey 2, newcomer Lyle speaks very familiarly with the Protagonist and the two are supposed to have both come from Schicksal cadet prep school. As is the case with this trope, the new guy's existence was never brought up in the previous APHO.
 * Restart At Level One: Despite A Post-Honkai Odyssey 2 taking place not long at all after the end of the first one, the Protagonist somehow has lost everything he's learnt previously.
 * Rollerblade Good: In A-Post Honkai Odyssey 2, Timido is An Ice Person who moves and fights using ice skates.
 * Sacrificial Lion:, whose death at the end of Chapter Nine is a major turning point that deeply affects most of the cast.
 * Scunthorpe Problem: The chat filter has caused problems with, for example, a boss called Jizo Mitama.
 * She's All Grown Up: Bronya's return in A Post-Honkai Odyssey 2, set 8 years after the main story mode, has her noticeably taller and bustier than her younger self.
 * Someone to Remember Him By: A gender-flipped take from the supplementary comics:
 * Sorting Algorithm of Evil: The Honkai may seek the destruction of humanity but it has a twisted sense of fair play. It clearly has room to escalate, as seen from how more strong Honkai beasts appeared after the Previous Era survivors tried introducing their technology to the Current Era, but reduced the potency of the attacks when the survivors stopped doing so instead of continuing to attack at full force.
 * Stealth-Based Mission: Some missions require you to avoid being detected. In addition, the Open World maps and some other missions have the option to sneak around mooks and Back Stab them.
 * Tactical Rock-Paper-Scissors: There are five types that battlesuits and most enemies fall under. Mecha beats Biologic beats Psychic which circles back to beat Mecha. Quantum and Imaginary deal extra damage to themselves and less to each other, and have no bonus or malus against the main three.
 * Tom the Dark Lord: Two of the most dangerous and influential people are named Kevin and Otto.
 * Tomato in the Mirror:
 * Tragic Keepsake: The aptly-named "Burden" item is a piece of flame-frozen flame from first use of the Flaming Sword Judgment of Shamash, which destroyed all the Honkai beasts it was used on but also the city and people they were attacking. Notwithstanding that the city wouldn't have made it anyway if he hadn't, he still holds onto it as a reminder of the price of failure.
 * Turns Red:
 * At low enough health, Anti-Entropy Mecha-Mooks literally glow red and gain Iron Body.
 * Aesir Heimdall literally turns red and activates a Super Mode if damaged too much within a short period of time, becoming faster, stronger and gaining several new attacks.
 * Several other bosses gain improvements when damaged enough.
 * Unexpected Gameplay Change:
 * Some of the levels in Chapter 6 are side-scrolling platformers.
 * Chapter 7 suddenly becomes a Shoot'Em Up.
 * The Un-Reveal: In Chapter 31,
 * Villain Shoes: Chapter 31 has a Player Punch sequence where But Thou Must control
 * Virtual Ghost: The Elysian Realm stores sims of the Flame-Chasers, 13 legendary Super Soldiers from the Previous Era.
 * Wham! Line: In Chapter 32, a character unexpectedly hits Mei with the claim that what the latter's about to do is in line of something the Herrscher of - a thought-dead character - would.
 * Wham! Shot: In Chapter 36-10, The Reveal of the villain's identity, who has just impaled a character In the Back -
 * The Worf Effect: The Flame-Chasers were far stronger than anyone in the Current Era; an imperfect copy of their World's Strongest Man with just 1% of the original's power stalemated the Current Era's best Valkyrie. The Herrscher of the End/Finality was so much stronger than them in turn that of the eight remaining sent to fight her, two were dead within five minutes of battle start, and said strongest using all his power was only able to temporarily immobilise her for 12 hours.
 * World of Action Girls: Almost all playable characters are female. The in-universe justification is that women are more likely to be resistant to Honkai than men and there are thus more female Valkyries.
 * You Are Too Late: At the end of A Post-Honkai Odyssey 2,
 * Zero Effort Boss: The final Batter Up duel between Kiana and Kevin doesn't have a health bar for the former, so the player can completely abandon finesse and not worry about losing at this point.