Hoyoverse is repeating history by once again censoring Genshin Impact players for asking for better rewards.
On Friday, May 8, the Special Program livestream for Genshin Impact’s Version “Luna VII” took place, outlining all new additions to the game, along with events, rewards, and other details, and ending with a short Snezhnaya teaser.
While things seemed normal at first, on Sunday, May 10, reports started coming in of players getting banned on the official Genshin Impact Discord server for simply saying, “Rewards aren’t good.”
>Genshin discord mods are banning people who are asking for better rewards.
— Inferno (Frover heels) (@Inferno_s_s) May 10, 2026
>Not only that, Play Store is also removing all the negative reviews and it's rating is back to 4.5.
This is how people are treated when asked for improvements from Hoyoverse. "Toxic positivity"...?? pic.twitter.com/m2MFiA9pwM
Behind the veil of “everything is good and fine,” there were players unhappy with how Genshin Impact has been lacking in rewards, changes, and improvements to end-game mode, as well as basic QoL features like a Skip button.
The disconnect between the community and Hoyoverse has long existed. While companies like Kuro Games, Hotta Studio, and many others pay more attention to feedback, Hoyoverse focuses more on censoring issues than on addressing them.
Now, what seemed like an isolated event, we are talking about the ban, which was not. Since May 10, many players have come forward to say they were banned for simply mentioning rewards.
In fact, some in the community also labeled it as “Dictatorship Mode” as “Players report that Discord mods are silencing any criticism. Plus, the Play Store rating ‘magically’ jumped to 4.5 stars after a massive purge of negative reviews.”
EMPEZO LA PURGA
— AnimeTrends (@animetrends) May 10, 2026
HoYoverse activo el modo dictadura: estan baneando masivamente a los jugadores de Genshin Impact que se quejan de las recompensas, y la comunidad acaba de revivir su tactica de guerra mas legendaria.
Jugadores reportan que los mods de Discord estan silenciando... pic.twitter.com/A2I6Rvbkp3
This is not the first time Hoyoverse has censored players or reviews, as the same thing happened back in 2021, when, despite the game making around $2b+ in revenue in just one year after launch, the first anniversary rewards were abysmal.
Once again, after being banned on Discord, players moved to the Google Play Store to show their discontent, review-bombing the game and bringing it down to around 3.0 stars in many regions.
Jogadores de Genshin Impact estao fazendo Review Bomb no jogo devido a frustacao com seu estado atual:
— ofurro (@tiofurro___) May 9, 2026
* Falta de mudancas de qualidade de vida.
* Poucos pulls F2P (64) em um patch com 3 personagens novos.
* Conteudo de exploracao diminuindo.
* Conteudo sabotado (armas... pic.twitter.com/DQUuKdu31F
But soon, the reviews started disappearing, and the game reverted to a 4.5-star rating, with many bot reviews. That, too, didn’t stop players from reviewing bombing Google Classroom reviews. But soon, the terms “Genshin“ and “Reward“ were re-censored.
Lastly, a frustrated player created a petition titled ‘Stop Killing Genshin Impact’ that outlined issues with the game and Hoyoverse, with 330-plus verified signatures at the time of writing.
Genshin Impact's sixth anniversary falls on September 11, aligning with the version 7.1 update. And if Hoyoverse is unable to address the community before then, we may see even greater backlash.
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