Genshin Impact x Aniplus Cafe
Have you been to a Genshin Impact Cafe? This is a little recap of my visit to my first ever Genshin Impact themed cafe and how I started playing the game.
The Genshin Impact collaboration with Aniplus Cafe ran from 3 December to 16 December 2021.
Ad Astra Abyssosque, travelers! Today I’ll be doing a brief recap of my fun visit to the Genshin Impact cafe way back in December 2021! The Genshin Impact Aniplus Cafe was actually part of the bigger Hoyo Fest Collaboration where we saw themed cafes with 3 of Mihoyo Games across different cities in Southeast Asia.
The Genshin Impact Cafe was a somewhat special experience to me because if it wasn’t for the cafe collaboration… I probably wouldn’t have gone down the rabbit hole started playing the game.
And at adventure rank level 55 (as of November 2022), let’s just say Genshin Impact is no longer a stranger to me ^ ^
I honestly had a lot of fun at the Genshin Impact Cafe and this is one collaboration that I hope to see a sequel to!
Update October 2022: Hoyo Fest 2022 has came and gone! ^ ^ Which means I went to another Genshin Impact themed cafe in 2022! Yay~ Do note that HoYoFest 2022 collaborated with a different cafe, Flippers.
Seems like Hoyofest is going to be an annual affair and I, for one, am looking forward to 2023’s HoyoFest! ^ ^
Page Contents
What is Genshin Impact?
Genshin Impact is an open-world action role playing game developed by miHoyo (米哈游), where players essentially take on the role of the “Traveler”, who traverses the lands of Teyvat, in search of their missing twin. Teyvat itself consists of seven nations, each associated with an element and ruled by a different ‘God’. The Traveler inevitably gets involved in the affairs of the different nations.
As with most JRPG inspired games, there are plenty of side quests, character backstories and story quests to propel the game forward. It uses a gaacha game system to monetize and acquire new characters and weapons. As of September 2022, 4 “nations” have been released. Players can choose to go at it solo, or ‘team-up’ with others to complete quests and achievement goals.
For a freemium mobile game ( free-to-play with in-game purchases), the graphics and game play are astonishingly good. Character designs are lovely and I have to say the English Voice Actors are pretty good too. It probably also helped that I only joined the game after many of the initial complaints have been addressed. There is also a thriving Genshin Impact community, fueled by a community app (Hoyo Lab)
For more information, please visit their official website: https://genshin.hoyoverse.com/en/home
Genshin Impact Cafe x Aniplus
So back in December 2021, I went for my very first Genshin Impact themed cafe. ^ ^ I mean how could I not, when it was held in the country I was at ^ ^ especially after 2 years of not going for any anime cafes in Japan!
Fun Fact: I only started playing Genshin Impact a week leading up to my reservation date. I had wanted to at least know the basics before going for the cafe. And like so many others, I just fell into the Genshin rabbit hole and never left lol.
As part of the Hoyofest SEA 2021, Aniplus Cafe had a collaboration tie-up with miHoyo where it would feature collaboration campaigns with 3 of miHoYo’s games: Tears of Themis; Genshin Impact and Honkai Impact 3rd!
I managed to snag reservations for Tears of Themis and Genshin Impact.
Having been to so many anime/game themed cafes over the years, I have to say that getting these reservations were such a painful process. It was obvious that they underestimated the sheer fan response to the event and were not adequately prepared for the interest. However, I’m happy to share that Aniplus Cafe has improved greatly since and the reservation process for its other anime/game collaborations are relatively smooth now.
To find out more about Aniplus Cafe, please check out their official website here; and their official facebook page here
Note: HoyoFest 2022 was not held at Aniplus Cafe but instead had a collaboration with Flippers in Singapore instead. Check out my visit here (coming soon!)
At the cafe
I was pleasantly surprised to see the entire exterior of Aniplus cafe decorated with decals of Genshin Impact Characters! Totally gave me my anime cafe vibes.
So far it all looks really promising! Who’s in your starting team?
Look! It’s Lisa and Kaeya welcoming you to the cafe! Honestly, having these two sweet talkers charming members of the Knights of Favonius welcoming you to the cafe is a wonderful sight.
Kaeya was one of my first pull characters so he holds a very special place in my Genshin Impact heart. 🙂
Next up are the decals of our favourite Astrologist, Mona Megistus, and the one and only Prinzessin der Verurteilung, Fischl! (Where’s Oz though?)
Update: Happy to share that I finally pulled Mona in November 2022. Fischl is a very important member of my starting team.
I really love how many decals there were for the Genshin Impact collaboration. Aniplus Cafe really went all out for this collaboration. (For their other anime collaborations, there weren’t as many decals/standees like there was for Genshin Impact.) Happy to share that I pulled these two too!
And yes, I have both Sucrose and Razor in my party now as well. ^ ^
Food & Drinks
As in every recap post I’ve done for my anime cafe escapades, the star attraction is usually the themed food and drinks, so without further ado, I present… our meals of the day:
I had the “Travelers Skewer Ricebowl“, Everlasting Boulder Parfait and the Violet Flora Ade. The Ricebowl was surprisingly tasty and is still one of the better dishes I’ve tried so far at Aniplus Cafe (as of Nov 2022). The Violet Flora Ade was not bad and was rather refreshing.
However, I was pretty much disappointed by the Parfait.
I mean, the parfait is definitely pretty and checked off all the visual boxes for a themed dessert. But OMG! There was no ice-cream in it >< just loads and loads of cream.
To be fair, the disappointment was due to me assuming that all parfait is ice-cream based, i.e. there’s ice-cream in it. LOL I now realized that a parfait, traditionally, is (whipped) cream or custard based, so there’s actually no ice-cream in it. Having a scoop of ice-cream would have helped break up the cloying of the cream. So if you are like me, please always check with the staff what the dessert consists of before ordering.
Putting aside the Parfait, there was one other thing that caught me by surprise… which was the food that we had earlier pre-ordered was out-of-stock.
We had actually pre-ordered and paid for a ‘Meat Sandwich’ at the point of reservatio but to our astonishment, we were told that the ‘Meat Sandwich’ had run out. Sold out?? How could a pre-ordered item be sold out? Shouldn’t they prepare, at the very least, the minimum quantity that was ordered?
In all my anime cafe escapades, this has never happened so I was really taken aback by the experience. Nevertheless, they did replaced it with the ‘Travelers’ Skewers Bowl’ which was pretty tasty.
What I appreciated for this collaboration was that they included coasters as novelty items if your orders reached the minimum cost indicated! Perhaps I was too used to my anime cafe escapades in Japan (e.g. Animate Cafe), I’ve come to prefer coasters as the novelty items for my cafe experiences. Most of the time these menu novelty coasters are made of paper but occasionally, Aniplus surprises us with acrylic coasters! The Case of Tof Vanitas ( Vanitas no Carte ) collab had nice arylic coasters for its menu novelty items!
Note: If you are interested to find out about the key differences between Aniplus Cafe (Singapore) and Animate Cafe (Japan), do check out our my Attack on Titan x Aniplus Cafe post where I did a slight comparison. Having been to both AOT cafes collab in Animate Cafe and Aniplus Cafe, there were indeed some interesting differences.
Inside the Cafe:
As with most anime cafes, we see paper table-mats and standees adorning every table. Do note that not all collaborations have a paper mat that you can take home.
Update: I’ve only very recently gotten Mona (after close to a year of playing!). Yeah! Lisa was one of my early pulls.
More standees. And no Klee and Eula yet for my party. Hopefully soon!
There’s a section where fans are invited to share thoughts, drawings and messages on post-its. ^^
Genshin Impact Cafe Merchandise
As with most themed collaboration cafes, exclusive themed merchandises are one of the highlights.
I wish I could show you what I bought but I couldn’t because almost everything was sold out when I went for the cafe. >< Ahh well, at least my wallet is happy that I wasn’t buying goods LOL
In Conclusion
I have to say, Aniplus Cafe really did an awesome job with their miHoyo Fest collaboration, and in particular the Genshin Impact Cafe. Putting aside the whole reservation fiasco (which has greatly improved since), the entire experience was fun and a pretty good experience for many.
It was clear that they were not very prepared for the sheer fan response to the event and were caught off-guard. But having a collab cafe is still better than not having any, and seeing how Aniplus Cafe was still relatively new to the cafe collaboration scene at that time, these can be over-looked.
Thankfully, having been to many more collabs at Aniplus Cafe after, I am happy to say that Aniplus Cafe management of these events has improved by leaps and bounds. There are still some areas for improvement but they have generally done a pretty good job so far, so I do still recommend a visit if the opportunity arises.
Fun Fact: My very first experience with Aniplus Cafe themed collaborations really started with Tears of Themis (another miHoyo game) and Genshin Impact. Since then, I’ve visited a few more anime/novel themed collaborations with Aniplus Cafe: Attack on Titan (AOT) x Aniplus Cafe , Heaven’s Blessing ( 天宫赐福）, The Case Study of Vanitas ( Vanitas no Carte ) and Jujutsu Kaisen. ^ ^ And yes, there will be recap visits posts for all of them, so do watch this space!
Have you been to the Aniplus Cafe in Singapore? Let me know which collaboration you went for and what your experience is in the comment below!
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