Genshin Impact has done well for itself over the last five months, considering it is a mobile gacha game expanded to work on home consoles. The mobile version of Genshin Impact made over 400 million dollars in just two months, and millions of players have downloaded the game across its various platforms since it released in September 2020.
However, Genshin Impact has yet to have a substantial collaboration with another IP, as is common for many popular gacha games based out of Asia. Now, a leak seems to confirm that KFC will be the first brand that has a major collaboration with Genshin Impact, in which Chinese restaurants will offer special meals and the chance to earn in-game cosmetics.
The leak comes by way of Genshin Impact content creator Zeniet on Twitter. Zeniet tweeted a picture of the KFC collaboration featuring what looks to be a special meal featuring Genshin Impact's fiery Diluc as the mascot. The image also shows Noelle without her armor, as well as what looks to be a KFC-themed pair of glider wings. Though the text for the image is written in Chinese, it seems this collaboration will only last for a limited time, making the meal and the cosmetics limited as well.
It is certainly an odd collaboration, especially seeing as it appears to be one of Genshin Impact's first high-profile events. That said, KFC is no stranger to the video game industry, especially within the last year. Many will have likely heard about the KFC-themed dating simulator game that made waves in 2019. Thanks in-part to the sheer randomness of the product, as well as the oddity of the game as a whole, the dating sim was popular among streamers and content creators for a brief period of time.
Additionally, KFC recently made headlines in the gaming industry thanks to the surprise announcement of a dedicated gaming console with a chicken warmer. Even more surprising were the alleged specs of the console, which housed an Intel NUC 9 to put it on par with many high-end gaming laptops. Still, this collaboration seems more believable than some of KFC's previous video game marketing stunts, especially as it appears the collaboration will be centered around the Chinese market.
Genshin Impact is still relatively new as far as gacha games go, so miHoYo has plenty of opportunities to incorporate more exciting collaborations in the future. Genshin Impact's playerbase has been hard at work speculating about potential collabs and creating fan art of various crossovers. For example, a Genshin Impact and Persona 5 fan video showed what All-Out attacks could look like in Genshin Impact, and it's hard to argue the collaboration wouldn't be fitting. Hopefully the game will see more collaborations worldwide in the future.
Genshin Impact is available now on Mobile, PC, and PS4, and is in development for Switch and PS5.