is the raiden shogun the WORST archon? (in terms of writing) | genshin impact character analysis

is the Raiden Shogun a bad character no she's not if we're talking meta wise you would have to be insane to think that she's bad unless you're one of those poor souls who don't post that are on launch and somehow refuse to acknowledge that she is probably one of the most powerful units in the game right now but whether or not she was a good character in the story was something that was always up for debate the right and Shogun or a if you will is an extremely polarizing character in terms of writing people either love her or they hate her even to this day Not only was she the first female waifu arkhan introduced to us but she was also the first archon who wanted us dead she was also actively harming the citizens of Inazuma in her pursuit of sen eternity at least that was what was happening when we got to Inazuma while the fatou did play a major role in destabilizing Inazuma it is also later revealed that a willingly turned Blind Eye towards almost the entire thing and after the whole Civil War that caused the deaths of countless innazumans we didn't really get to see a being held accountable for her actions and I feel like the whole mess that was 2.1 spacing gave a the reputation of a badly written character that wasn't held accountable because she's a waifu but I actually don't think this is true but before we get into that let's get into why people think a at least when compared to the other three archons that we know is terrible the badly paced Inazuma are Conquest as a day one player and massive weep I was looking forward to Inazuma a lot the game had already left us multiple hints that the inazuman archon ball wasn't going to be as friendly as venti or zhongli and is currently doing questionable things to her people and when we got to Inazuma we got to see that the things were indeed pretty bad the sakoku decree was in place which if you don't remember what that means is that the borders of inezuma is essentially closed say for the fatoui and several snesh Nayan Merchants who can travel freely due to their diplomatic ties the only other way to get out of Frito as a foreigner is to get yourself a travel permit and as you can probably imagine this harms inazuma's economy greatly and on top of that through ayaka and Toma we got to see firsthand how the vision Hunter degree was affecting division holders in Inazuma despite Vision holders being a very very small percentage of the Inazuma population the game made it clear that a lot of people were suffering from division hunt decree the sakoku decree and just how bad the state of Inazuma was when we got there not long after we get to the resistance and we get to see up close what the civil war was like in yashiori island and let's not forget that that's an entire Island that's inhabitable because of the War caused by division Hunter Creek we got to see the horrors of war and how innocent people were getting caught in the crossfire of War losing their homes and family as they often do in real life and by the end of the second act it was crystal clear that the Shogun was causing harm to her people say what you want about the Inazuma arkon Quest but the first two Acts were good they were actually really good the build up for both the Shogun the 10 real commission the resistance was executed really really well only for it to implode in the very last act not only did the third act Force the fatui was behind everything plot without any proper build up other than one mention of Senora in Rito and then making kokomi seem incompetent in the process they also tried to make me care about an NPC in the span of 20 minutes I think that pay is a terribly written NPC you can come for me for this but his death literally made me feel nothing I mean I felt bad for the guy but I barely knew him and at that point I realized the writers were trying to do too much all at once by shoving all of these different story lines in one act and mind you the third Act of inezuma only lasted two and a half hours compare that to sumeru's last act which is act 5 which took almost like double that amount almost four hours and after meetings Kara Bush fatui bad and a brief training Arc with yai Miko which I can't even call an arc because it was one training session it's less than a day we made our move to infiltrate tenshukaku where we immediately faced off against neura saw her get obliterated within seconds and then we fight a and through the power of not come on we managed to defeat her and change her mind okay maybe I'm undermining the story a lot here but that was what I felt when I first played through it in the 2.1 update there were genuinely intriguing moments that stood out to me immediately too like when we learned how the Shogun is actually a puppet and how there are two archons in Inazuma and how deep the corruption was in Nina Zuma and an idea of the political landscape of Inazuma as we follow around gujosara kazua deflecting the musono hitotachi was also an amazing payoff to his and his dead friends storyline it remains one of my favorite moments in the game to this day and finally confronting a herself everything was so hype I was so ready to confront a only to learn that she was well aware of what the show good puppet was doing the entire time at least she had an idea what the puppet was doing to her people and she didn't care or she just didn't care enough to interfere unless it directly correlates to Eternity she basically said that if it's not about eternity then I don't want to hear it making sure everything stayed in stasis was A's way to ensure that she didn't have to go through any more losses like she did 500 years ago during the cataclysm it was in a way her own way to cope with her intense grief of losing her friends and sister at that point it was revealed in her character trailer that she lost two of her best friends essentially at the same time mikoshi Chio and Kitsune saigu and then around the same time she also lost Makoto which is why she did what she did right after but at the time the game didn't really touch on it too much they briefly mentioned how a is suffering from loss in a cutscene and I think that's it but then through the power of ambition like Collective ambition we managed to change your mind at least about the Vision Hunt decree not about everything else yet and we conclude that Inazuma are Conquest with a saying that she needs time to think on which direction she will take Inazuma going forward which brings us to her story Quest the first one what I and probably a lot of other people expected was to see how a would grow as a character and how she would take accountability for her actions in the archon quest after all we did manage to change her mind about division hunt decree and she did say that she was contemplating a lot of stuff regarding eternity so her story Quest seemed like the right time to do this to explore this but what we got was a quest that felt out of place is the best way I could put it her story Quest the first one is essentially us acting way too friendly to someone who just tried to kill us no less than two days ago and see her slightly changing her mind about her ideology regarding eternity something that she has not considered in the past 500 years through jungle milk photos and light novels instead of well the Damage Done by the war that she let happen and the fatoui that she let run amok in her nation and I admit it was actually important for her character development a needed to learn that change even in the little things the simple things can be good and I genuinely think that her first story Quest isn't as bad as people make it to be it's not even bad in my opinion it has good moments if you think about it near the end with Kujo kamaji and the conflict within the tendrio commission we got to see her at like a leader for the first time and showing Mercy towards him despite what the Kujo Clan did it humanizes her and it showed us that she indeed have what it takes to be a good leader when she's not isolated for 500 years in hindsight given what we know now about her development later on I think her first story Quest is just misplaced if anything I feel like the writers couldn't have picked a worse timing to put her story Quest right after ending the Inazuma arkon Quest the way they did her story Quest just didn't provide the closure that a lot of people playing back then was looking for including myself for those who don't know the only available content right after the third Act of the inezuma are Conquest was Ryden shogun's first story Quest so for a lot of people it was the only story content we had going and technically the story quests available right before her was I which definitely had fan service and what some people would call a date quest which probably contributed to people seeing a taking a stroll with the traveler as essentially another date Quest like similar to ayaka's I feel like it might be possible for people who started the game after 2.1 like a lot later to have a completely different perception of ryden's first story Quest given that they aren't technically forced to play her story quests right after the third Act of the main quest just because there's just so much content available now but I guess to a lot of people back then including myself it just felt out of place and it's almost insulting to the players who were expecting closure to the story no one wanted to go on a stroll with a through the city right after witnessing what she did and what she let happen and seeing how inezuma has quite literally got on to because of what she did her first story Quest was essentially hoyo versus way to show us that a is more than her tough Warrior unfeeling puppet exterior she has her unique quirks she can't cook she likes desserts she has all of the qualities that make her a cute waifu who is also strong and fearless all of which would have been good additions to a as a character if not for the fact that we just spent the last few quests seeing the page he caused and then seeing her not taking any repercussions and how she up Inazuma because she couldn't really deal with her grief Scaramouche and comparisons to the other archons on top of everything we just went through we later learned that a is the reason why we even have Scaramouche granted his actions aren't her fault at all like she isn't to blame for the atrocities that Scaramouche did when he was living as konikuzushi and as the valid year but what she did to him was morally questionable no matter how you see it she created a being that she knew was fully sentient but just left him to sleep essentially abandoning him and then never bothered interfering even though he was going on a murderous Rampage in her own country Scaramouche didn't just kill one or two people he ended entire Bloodlines but I guess a just really couldn't bring herself despite discarding Scaramouche after he couldn't fulfill his purpose but you would think someone destroying the ride in gokaden a tradition so important to Inazuma that a would at least bat an eye but the complicated relationship of a and his son is the discussion for another day and since the release of sumero and it's excellent writing a is often compared to nahida who suffered just as much as a and she has been nothing but kind helpful and benevolent to her people whom I knew rejected her kept her in prison and tried to replace her with a robot and nahida is also a newborn archon she and a technically became archons around the same time since also died in the cataclysm after trying to cleanse Airmen soul from Abyssal corruption even Jeong Lee who has made morally questionable decisions as well has led leeway without failure for thousands of years that man was responsible for building leeway from the ground up and cultivating it into the prosperous Nation it is today even though he also suffered extreme grief and loss when he lost guijon someone who he holds very very dear to his heart in the arkhan war even venti monstat's resident alcoholic and absent archon still care there's a lot for his people which we have seen time and time again through his story Quest and also events he has always watched over his people and has their best interests at heart which makes a by comparison just a horrible archon in the eyes of the players So based off the arkon quest story quests and hidden lore a is selfish incompetent childish and overall can be a huge but that's just not true there's so much more to her character than her mistakes in defense of Ryden a here's the thing about a she was never meant to be a leader she was always Makoto's Shadow her body double her character story mentions how Makoto was never the fighter out of the two of them so a is always the one in the front lines before the death of Makoto Ace whole world was war and fighting and killing she was the one who who defeated orobashi when he tried to invade narokami Island so she was always a warrior not a leader her incompetence in running a country shouldn't be at all surprising considering that when Makoto died a instantly freaked out and became terrified of erosion and spent all of her energy making puppets so she can prevent erosion and then lived in isolation for 500 years literally like up until the point we meet her she didn't have time to grow into a great leader it's not like you could learn to lead while staying in stasis she has always chosen to ignore everything happening around her because she was so hyper focused on achieving her goal achieving eternity and and not having to feel grief or loss ever again and this was always her biggest flaw but Curry Nigeria was also in prison and she's a great theater right off the bat well let's not blame a for not being the wisest God in tavad it's not really her fault that nahida is a wise and competent archon almost immediately being wise is quite literally nahida's biggest strength as an archon and even though nahida lived most of her life in isolation she has always tried her best in understanding humans to human heart which is something a has clearly not done until we meet her I don't think it's fair at all to expect a who is a warrior to act the same way as the god of wisdom herself like come on guys give her a break if she's so encountered them then the people of ibazuma shareholder accountable for all of the horrible ships and while I agree with this to some extent it's also the reason why I think the resistance was such wasted that potential in terms of story because they never really did anything despite being the only group of people brave enough to question and even go against the shogun's Army and by default the Shogun herself however the society in Inazuma is based on Japan specifically sengoku era Japan there's this Reddit post explaining A's ideology and actions based on real historical Japan I'll link it below if you're interested it's a really good read so why is this important why is it that just because Inazuma is based on Japan that the people of Inazuma won't take a accountable for everything she did it's mentioned in A's character details if you're an Ina zuman citizen the first thing you learn is about the Shogun and how great she is as a God everything that happens in Inazuma is for the glory of the Shogun and the people of Inazuma has always believed that their archon is both wise and strong they never knew that they had twin archons as far as the people of Inazuma is concerned the writed Shogun is one person Makoto so they never really had any reason to question her leadership for thousands of years like since the archon war and the vision hunteri and everything else only happened in recent years so it was like maybe three years of suffering versus 2 000 years of prosperity so she was never going to be held accountable by her people at least not the majority because they just have so much faith in her both as a leader and a warrior I mean I could see kokomi and the people of watatsumi calling her out for what she did but we all know how badly hoyovers handled kokomi's writing so his friend well technically that's very much false because it was her puppet who killed him and even then kazua's friend is the one who challenged Kujo Sara to a duel Before the Throne and then lost hence why the Shogun puppet executed him I'm kind of sure it wasn't even paying attention to the whole thing because the puppet was just scaring out what she was made to do it's the same reason why the puppet executed Senora immediately after she lost to the traveler kazua's friend literally knew what he was getting into when he went to tenshukaku kazuha himself said that his friend's biggest dream was to witness right in shogun's musono hitotachi so there was no way that he didn't know that was his fate if he lost the battle against kuyosara the puppet as explained by a herself was given instructions to always act in the interest of Eternity no matter what which was brilliantly explored during the Saving Grace that was her second story Quest her story Quest this second one was much better received solely because I think the execution was just a lot better not only did the quest have really interesting and immersive mechanics it also Builds on the things that was previously established in her first story Quest and our Conquest not only did the quest double down on the grief a was feeling because she lost her sister and her best friends it also showed us that she was completely unprepared to lead a nation and she recognizes this a admits for the first time that she has let down her people and Dishonored their memories in the pursuit of Eternity she even says herself that what Inazuma needed wasn't a fierce Warrior but someone more like Makoto whose ideal was transients a was the first archon and Remains the only archon at least as of the writing of this video who questioned and set aside her own ideology for the betterment of her people and right after a has this realization the puppet instantly thinks she was affected by erosion because she was changing her mind and afterwards we got to see a fight her own unshakable ideals in the form of the Shogun puppet she's quite literally fighting in order to overcome her grief and past ideology that stopped her and in turn Inazuma from moving forward at the end of the battle with the Shogun puppet a mentions that she refuses to look at the puppet as a murder tool like she did in the past which we know is very much what she used to do the puppet in turn said that she has indeed changed for good so it's writing a bad no absolutely not he is just as complex as the other archons we've met so far it's just that she has the most obvious flaws to compare venti's most obvious flaw right now is that he's an alcoholic and even then your last brain cell could probably tell that he's hiding a lot behind that facade so that's not his full story and the same thing with zhongli nahida is a victim more than anything else hence it's kind of hard for you to criticize her as an archon or God because she quite literally was never given the chance to even lead her own people and it is crystal clear that she was the main victim in her circumstances but a was the only archon that we got to see go through so much change and development throughout the game we couldn't have seen her growth had she been a fully developed character like like venti or zhongli Ace writing was always about her coming into herself and finding her footing as the leader of Inazuma while accepting that her ideology of Eternity was something that her people didn't need her first and second story Quest was about confronting her past and her past ideals which is the only only way she could move forward as a person which convinced me that she's not a badly written character at all she's only now started her growth and maybe down the line we get to see more of her dealing with her past actions and it would be so interesting to watch because a has changed so much over the past year and it leaves a lot of room for even more growth in the future which is something that I am looking forward to any archon lore is something that I welcome so in conclusion I think Ryden a suffers from a bad first impression which unfortunately is as they say A Lasting Impression so a lot of people are under the misconception that she was just badly written because the Inazuma archon Quest had pacing issues but that would be such a disservice to the thought the writers have put in a and her growth as a character so yeah that's my ride in a video I love gentian slur and I had the idea to make this when I re-watched a second story Quest and she says she no longer views puppets as tools which will change her Dynamic with Scaramouche significantly like I can't help but wonder how he would even react if he knew a is a completely different person now but those are brain worms for another day let me know what you think of writing a do you think she was cooler before we got to know her like as a villain or if you're on the same page as me and you like her development feel free to correct me if I got anything wrong it's 2 am right now and I'm just about ready to pass out thank you for sticking around subscribe if you want see you in the next one bye

Channel: otsuucurry

Views: 96,505

Keywords: genshinimpact, genshinlore, raidenshogun, character analysis

Id: gDbbY-1qC3Y

Length: 24min 46sec (1486 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 12 2023