On February 23rd, a teaser for the Genshin Impact character Dehya was released. In the video, Dehya, unwilling to let desert children suffer from the wind and sand, brings a bag full of Mora to Sumeru and names the donation "The Wall of Hope."
One hour after the release of the Dehya teaser, something unexpected happened.
A Bilibili content creator posted a video of him donating 648 CNY to Project Hope 1+1, a welfare project that aims to bring schools into poverty-stricken areas. The player stated that he was deeply touched by Dehya's video. He also pledged to donate his subsequent income from the video. At the time, the player didn't know what impact his action would have.
As of February 26th, the video has nearly 400,000 views, and the ripple effect has been huge. Many Genshin Impact players were touched and inspired by the video and the teaser. Travelers began to spontaneously seek out ways to help those in need and share their love.
A Bilibili content creator posted a video of him donating 648 CNY to Project Hope
Screenshots of donation records for Project Hope 1+1
A large number of players began to donate through public welfare platforms and the website of the China Youth Development Foundation, the organization behind Project Hope 1+1. Project Hope focuses on aid for children with various charity drives and projects. Project Hope 1+1 will build schools and pay for tuition and had a goal to raise 5 million CNY. It saw a huge influx of donations, while many other charities also received some from Genshin Impact’s players.
In the donation records, various Genshin Impact avatars appear. Donation amounts such as 30 CNY, 68 CNY, and 648 CNY are also common, which correspond with the prices of in-game items in Genshin Impact.
Regarding donor names, many IDs are related to the character names, such as "Dehya," "The Wall of Hope," "Qiqi," "Keqing," "Xiao," and so on.
In just a few days, these avatars and names with Genshin Impact characteristics have appeared in the donation records, a phenomenon that has even shocked those who do not play Genshin Impact.
Genshin Impact Dehya’s character teaser
For Project Hope 1+1 donations, as of February 23rd, 13,775 people had donated a total of 4,483,687 CNY to the project. On February 26th, just three days later, it had risen to 30,367 people donating 5,000,261 CNY.
As of 8:30 pm on February 26th, the fundraising goal for Project Hope 1+1 had already been met.
One player estimated that based on the assumption that 90% of the new donations were from Genshin Impact players, a total of about 15,000 Genshin Impact players donated, contributing more than 450,000 CNY (65,000 USD). This is just a rough estimate, but many Genshin Impact players have also donated to other public welfare projects.
During the wave of donations, Chen Yu, the voice actor for Dehya, also made a donation to Project Hope 1+1.
Chen Yu, the voice actor for Dehya, also donated to Project Hope.
It is believed that HoYoverse probably did not expect a reaction like this, as they made no suggestions or calls to action in the teaser.
The wave of donations has heartened many players, as one player commented on the game forum NGA: "This is a very, very beautiful thing. First, a small group of players was moved by the character created in the game and put their good intentions into practice. Their kindness infected other players, and more players joined in. The kindness converged into a stream."
Source: NGA