Azur Promilia really isn't off track this time — it's really not bad

Author / SD

Edited by < the Reliable Editorial Desk >

In early September, I got an early hands-on with Manjuu's Blue Star Origin: LüYao "LüJi Test" in Shanghai. After four hours of play, the surprises far outweighed the disappointments. Compared to the April "Hengxu Test," the new build added quite a lot — new characters, new Chibos, and new map content — and the overall experience felt more complete than the previous test.

But what players care about most is the monetization design that Blue Star Origin: LüYao finally revealed this time — clearly defined dual gacha pools for characters and Reiryoku, plus some cosmetics and progression packs for purchase. This standard monetization model is very familiar to everyone, but Manjuu made a decision that won my goodwill: limited characters have a hard pity at 90 pulls, and limited Reiryoku at 80 pulls — no 50/50 losses at all.

A 3D open-world gacha game likely launching this year, being this upfront about the pull cap for getting the character you want, genuinely deserves credit. And looking further at the changes, you'll find Blue Star Origin: LüYao has made plenty of player-friendly trade-offs elsewhere too.

In past gacha games, what did players worry about most during the pulling phase? It was hoarding resources for several versions, going for the character they loved, only to watch, time after time, that animation heralding a gold pull land on a non-limited five-star character.

But in the gacha design of Blue Star Origin: LüYao, I felt a sense of "certainty" that is still rare in the industry.

In this test, limited characters take at most 90 pulls, and the Reiryoku pool at most 80. Even more crucially, the pity counts on the limited character and Reiryoku pools carry over to later banners. For Starfarers just starting out, the game shows plenty of goodwill: the beginner pool guarantees a five-star character within 30 pulls, and once you've made 50 pulls on the standard pool, you can pick any five-star standard character outright. In other words, even pulling only on the standard pool, a new player can secure at least two five-star characters within 80 pulls.

This test opened with 21 characters available, all of decent quality — a very friendly starting experience.

Why do I think no-off-banner design matters so much for a new gacha game? In gacha games, while pulling itself is part of the fun, the overly long distance between liking a character and actually obtaining them directly dampens enthusiasm.

The character art is gorgeous, the animations are beautiful, and the story has won you over — naturally you want to bring her into your team. But once you lose the 50/50, all that excitement and anticipation turns into hesitation: should I keep pulling? For gacha games that treat characters as the core driver, a few losses in a row will cause mid-to-low spenders' motivation to keep playing to drop fast.

Blue Star Origin: LüYao has removed the "loss" problem this time. If your target is the current banner character, you save up to pity and you get her. Your planned pulling budget won't suddenly be derailed by a non-limited character.

This kind of certainty is extremely valuable for a gacha game that relies on characters to attract players. Studying a character's skills, taking her out to explore, slowly learning her story — all of that starts with owning her. Only when the acquisition step involves less frustration can the content afterwards hold on to your anticipation.

A gacha pool that lets us plan our budget in advance and know exactly "how much we need to prepare at most" may be exactly the ideal balance between publishers and players right now. It doesn't promise that everyone can collect every character at low cost, nor does it require calculating the possibility of spending nearly double — it gives players an expectation they can understand and accept. Of course, whether overall progression is expensive still depends on how much free resource each version provides and how much improvement standard-pool characters and Reiryoku offer. Long-term pulling pressure will only be revealed by the post-launch versions.

But I hope that by 2026, high-quality gacha games will consider options like this in their monetization more often. Open-world updates, characters, and story all cost money — of course publishers need to earn. And all players want is a predictable investment they can calculate, on top of a version they're satisfied with.

Making people willing to pay because they love a character, while giving them confidence that they'll actually take that character home — this balance is worth more products trying.

Having covered the most practical part — the "pulling" — let's return to the game itself. The content of Blue Star Origin: LüYao has always been showing players exactly how anime, open worlds, and creature-collecting can be more fun together.

On creature-collecting: the "LüJi Test" features over 200 Chibo species, roughly 70 more than the previous "Hengxu Test." They can fight alongside players, join in exploration, and work around your homestead. These different uses give players reasons to keep hunting for new Chibos — there's always somewhere a collected little companion can be put to use.

This test also introduced "Starshine" Chibos. According to official info, each Chibo species has more than just one or two Starshine variants; they have special changes in appearance and material, and the vast majority of Chibos have corresponding Starshine variants. For players who love collecting, this kind of personalization is very easy to fall for.

When a player encounters a Chibo already in their encyclopedia but notices its appearance is different, they'll still want to catch another one. This kind of partiality is part of the fun of creature-collecting games in the first place. When the game is willing to add more visual variety, players get one more reason to keep an eye on their surroundings while exploring, and can pick companions according to their own taste.

The capture process was also reworked: in this test, "Starbond" no longer stops time — while capturing, players can keep moving and jumping, and wild Chibos will attack. You still have to deal with what's in front of you during the capture; actions and reactions all happen within the same battle, making the whole process feel more seamless and immersive.

There's also an easily overlooked supporting change: the "Chibo Hut" filtering and interface have been adjusted, supporting more convenient browsing and manual sorting. After all, once you've collected hundreds of Chibos, being able to find the one you want is equally part of the collecting experience. The more stuff you have, the less you can skimp on these basic functions.

I still remember during the last test, friends praising the game's art and adorable Chibos while complaining about the tedious systems. So when I set foot on this land again, my biggest question was: "There's more content now — will my daily routine be more tiring?"

The answer is not only no — it's even more relaxed.

Open-world traversal has become much smoother: the addition of wall-jumping, plus the ability to summon your mount directly in mid-air, made the connection between movement and traversal far smoother, saying goodbye to that rigid "jump — land — mount up" rhythm. Chibos essential for newcomers, like the Sprout Chick and Silly Chick, can also be used for short-distance flight. Put together, these changes make using terrain and chaining mounts much more flexible.

At the same time, the game bravely did some subtraction. Character satiety is gone, and so is durability for exploration and gathering tools. This means your exploration won't be interrupted by chores like "finding food" or "repairing tools." Streamlined progression materials and an auto-clear feature for dungeons are also quality-of-life improvements certain players have been asking for.

I quite agree with these trade-offs. Life details in an open world are nice, but when players want to explore, there's no need to be too realistic about preparation. Feeding and tool wear eat up a bit of time here and there, and traversal slows to a crawl — it all adds up until you feel like you've been busy half the day without playing what you actually wanted to play.

Smoother exploration, more fun creature-collecting, blended with the characters' own journey — the world becomes all the more worth lingering in. It gives us more reasons to collect, fewer interruptions along the way, and finally makes the three core pillars — anime, open world, and creature-collecting — work together organically. That is what "no off-course drift" means in terms of experience.

The most core, most emotional part of Blue Star Origin: LüYao is that it retains the essence of being an anime-style game.

In this test, the five-star character "Tushan Xiaoyu" got her exclusive "Flower Festival Bond Promise" event. Players accompany her in training for the fox spirit examination, arranging her daily practice and outings; after three rounds of training, the run branches into four different endings based on the resulting stats. For a character-driven anime game, designing a multi-ending story event around a limited character is both necessary and refreshingly inventive.

Also, in this test, Blue Star Origin: LüYao added customizable idle screens. Character animations, Reiryoku, and story CGs can all be set as backgrounds, with up to five rotating. Like a particular performance? Let it stick around a while longer. Fond of a certain character? Keep her somewhere you'll see often. Seeing these conventions of 2D games carried over into a 3D game, I always feel this is exactly the kind of clever touch Manjuu should be making — and is good at making.

Manjuu made Azur Lane; it has been doing "making great characters" for almost a decade. What makes me happy about Blue Star Origin: LüYao is that it's willing to keep the bond between characters and the player's Starfarer as a continuing highlight. After drawing players in with the art, there's story and gameplay that meet their expectations, letting them feel the core that makes Blue Star Origin: LüYao different from other open-world games.

Rather than empty talk about market trends and competitor cannibalization, after playing it, as a pure player, I'm left with one simple wish: keep this current feeling going. Make the characters even more lovable, make the creature-collecting adventure even more fun, and keep the monetization design considerate of players' expectations. Let the publisher operate for the long haul, so that anime fans like us — obsessed with isekai settings and anime-style art since childhood — can keep having new things to play.

The updates and adjustments in this test seem generous yet modest, but combined, they're already enough to convince me that Blue Star Origin: LüYao is genuinely good. And I hope that when we encounter similar designs in the future, they'll become more and more the norm. When we talk about a gacha game, we can talk less about what we once had to endure, and more about what we got to play today.