Immersed in Genshin Impact: Active Field Control Takes Visitors on a Musical Adventure

For ten days in October 2023, over 1500 people enjoyed the world of the popular role playing game Genshin impact at a special screening event hosted at Yamaha’s Ginza showroom in Tokyo. Takeout Show Genshin featured visuals shown on a three-sided screen, with a Yamaha Active Field Control (AFC) system meaning visitors could fully immerse themselves in the game’s virtual world.

Boasting 65 million players worldwide, the HoYoverse game Genshin is a particularly popular game in eastern Asia. It places the player as a traveller in a mysterious world, meeting friends, creating challenges and going on adventures. Alongside the detailed story, one of the most important aspects is the music, which enhances the animation world and helps to immerse the player.

The style of the music varies, depending on the characteristics, environment and images of the country that the traveller within the game is visiting and is reproduced on a wide range of orchestral and traditional instrumentation from Japan, China, India and other cultures.

The Challenge

The aim of the Takeout Show event was to provide an immersive Genshin experience, with music arranged by four innovative Japanese pianists.

Maki Toyoda of Yamaha’s corporate marketing department, who was in charge of the project, says, “We thought that by bringing together Genshin and Yamaha, fans of the game and music lovers who visit our showroom would be able to enjoy the music of Genshin together.”

Four pianists - Yumi, Harami, Kei-chan and Bento Iven - were commissioned to reinterpret the music of Genshin for piano. Each brought their own musical identity to the project, bringing out the character and appeal of the game’s many different situations and locations in a new and imaginative way.

A special three-sided screen was created by Yamaha's Real Sound Viewing development team, which gave visitors the impression of being within the world of Genshin. The height and width of the screen can be freely adjusted for use in a variety of venues and events. As with this application, it can also be folded to create an immersive experience.

Complementing the screen, a Yamaha AFC Image system was used to achieve realistic localisation of the sound, with three-dimensional reverb helping to deliver an atmosphere which matched the expression of the both performance and the Genshin world on the screens. AFC Enhance was also used to create a more interactive experience by adding resonance to the sounds made by the audience, such as applause.

To make the experience as immersive as possible, it was important that both the visual and audio quality were excellent, with an unobstructed view of the screens. To maintain this and avoid the impression that the sound was coming from the speakers, the AFC system used NEXO ID24 compact loudspeakers, which deliver high quality sound while being visually unobtrusive.

“Not only does the AFC system provide a sense of space, it creates the ultimate acoustic environment for enjoying music. It showcases where the uniqueness of Yamaha's technology really shines,” says Maki Toyoda.

The event was very successful, with over seven million social media impressions and more than over two million related video views. Days when only reserved places were available were fully booked and, even on days when no reservation was required, there was a queue of over an hour.

“The experience was enjoyed by Genshin fans, musicians, content creators and those related to the game developer HoYoverse alike,” Maki continues. “Many said that the immersive experience was so powerful and realistic, it was hard to believe that it was a video. It was like the performer was playing in front of them.

“Importantly, we felt that this experience will lead people to further positive actions. We received comments like 'I want to go to a live concert again' and 'I want to try playing the piano, so I bought some sheet music'.”

Dai Hashimoto of the Yamaha’s professional solution division adds, "It was very rewarding to be involved in this collaborative project with Genshin. AFC has the potential to enhance many types of entertainment and I look forward to musicians and sound designers creators continuing to make AFC an integral part of their content.

“We will continue to make the most of opportunities like this, so creators, audiences and performers alike can benefit from AFC in the widest range of entertainment uses.”