The Aeons of Honkai Star Rail have always been far beyond ordinary mortals. They are conceptual deities whose actions have the potential to reshape entire galaxies–so putting one into a player’s four-person team was always going to be a huge design challenge for the HoYoverse team.
Ahead of the game’s Version 4.7 update, we spoke to lead game designer Chengan An about why Aha, The Aeon of Elation, was chosen as the game’s first playable Aeon. According to Chengan, the decision to bring Aha into the fold came down to their uniquely human disposition, as well as the development team’s unwillingness to break the game’s battle rules. Aha is meant to focus on collaborative synergy rather than racking up extreme damage numbers.
Chengan also noted that Aha’s personality is what makes them the most logical Aeon to bring to the battlefield at this point in the game’s life cycle. “The game’s system is based on the concept of Paths. For Aeons, they are quite abstract concepts for most of the people in the world, but Aha is the most human-like one.”
Chengan continued: “I think our [game’s] battle is way too tiny for Aeons to initiate a war. For Aha, we picked some of the most important factors to bring into the combat design. We certainly don’t want them to destroy the battle with the power of an Aeon, and that kind of design does not fit Aha’s personality as an Aeon of Elation.”
HoYoverse viewed the Path of Elation as a foundation for Aha, one that’s been built up over months of prior updates.
“For the Path of Elation, we do not intend to simply bring a character with super-strong skills to overcome all the existing characters when we have already designed so many previous Paths. We aim to bring the Aeon of Elation to interact with our other characters, and that’s why we have already presented so many characters that can interact with Aha. We think this kind of design can bring a fresh experience to our players when they see such an Aeon,” Chengan explained.
Chengan confirmed that Aha was never envisioned as an offensive carry, and that the decision to make them a supportive unit rather than a damage dealer was an easy one. “We’ve always designed Aha that way,” he said. “Aha is closely connected to other characters, and from Aha’s instance you can see lots of performances. The Path of Elation is about bringing happiness and all these emotions. Aha is more suitable to be a supportive character than a damage-carrying one.”
Playing alongside Aha is supposed to mirror stepping onto a grand stage together, reframing the battlefield into an immersive performance. “All the characters together with Aha perform on the cosmic stage, and different characters have their own moments on that stage.” Chengan said.
By keeping Aha in a supportive role, HoYoverse avoids rendering previous characters obsolete. Instead of ending the fight single-handedly with absurd damage output, the Aeon of Elation works alongside every squad member, giving them a chance to show their strengths.
This is the best choice HoYoverse could have made when introducing a playable Aeon. Investing years of play time into a game only to have your hard work nullified by introducing an overpowered character that’s capable of wiping the floor with any opponent would have put many players, myself included, off the game. However, if this is the approach the team is taking with Aha, I don’t foresee any possible ways to add more playable Aeons in the future, unless they exclusively take on support roles, and that could be a missed opportunity.
It remains to be seen whether there are any tricks up HoYoverse’s sleeve to get around the limitations they’ve created for themselves, but for now I’m looking forward to bringing Aha into my team and feeling what it’s like to play as an actual deity.
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