A clip of the Traveler mowing down Rifthounds with a modern assault rifle, while launcher traps flip them into the air, has been passed around as proof that Genshin Impact’s AI got a dramatic overhaul. It did not. The footage comes from a modded client, and the “AI” in the framing has nothing to do with the enemy behavior on screen or with miHoYo’s separate, very real artificial intelligence spending.
Quick answer: The assault rifle and its elemental bullets are a mod, not a live Genshin Impact feature. Check your own client: the Traveler has no gun weapon type, and no Stronghold mode hands you a firearm. Nothing in the clip is a shipped AI change.
What the Stronghold defense clip shows
The run is a three-wave tower defense encounter. The stronghold starts at 20/20 HP, the wave tracker reads Waves 1/3, and a counter in the corner ticks down the enemies left in the current wave, beginning at Remaining 10/10. Score climbs in fixed chunks as kills land, with a consecutive defeat bonus stacking from +1 upward.
Between waves there is a build phase with a timer running down from roughly three minutes and an Engage Now button to skip it. During that window the player drops Impact Shield traps onto the floor tiles. The trap is filed under the Control category and its description reads: “Knocks opponents entering its AoE in the direction of the arrow.” Blue arrows on each pad show which way anything stepping on it gets thrown.
Clearing a wave pays out a flat reward, shown on screen as “Wave cleared! Earned 500 construction materials.” That currency funds more traps for the next round.
For the second wave the player parks on a raised circular platform, which keeps the Traveler out of melee range while Rifthounds funnel through the trap layout below.
Here is what the interface is tracking during a run.
| On-screen readout | What it tracks |
|---|---|
| Stronghold HP: 20/20 | Health of the objective being defended |
| Waves: 1/3 | Current wave out of three total |
| Remaining 10/10, later 14/14 | Enemies left in the active wave; wave two is larger |
| Total Score and Consecutive Defeat +1 to +5 | Running score plus a stacking bonus for chained kills |
| Countdown with Engage Now | Build phase timer, skippable to start the wave early |
| Elite Opponent Inbound | Warning before the elite enemy spawns in wave three |
| Wave cleared! Earned 500 construction materials | Payout used to place more traps |
Why the assault rifle is a mod, not a Genshin Impact feature
The character is Aether in his default outfit, which is ordinary. The weapon is not. He carries a modern assault rifle in place of a sword, and the control prompt reads “Switch to aiming mode,” a first-person aiming state tied to the modded weapon rather than to any standard combat input.
The rifle fires elemental bullets. Cryo and Hydro shots handle the regular Rifthounds and Riftwhelps, and swapping to Pyro during the elite fight pops Melt and Vaporize in the damage feed. The reactions themselves are normal Genshin Impact rules. The delivery method is what is invented.
Wave three opens with the Elite Opponent Inbound warning and ends with a large Thundercraven Rifthound marked by a red warning dome. The player finishes the round by picking off the last few enemies stranded on the upper bridge. It is a clean run, but it is a clean run in a client that has been altered.
The arena itself is the least unusual part. It is a tower defense layout in the mold of the Theater Mechanicus event format, where you place devices along fixed paths and let waves walk into them.
Enemy behavior AI and generative AI are different things
Rifthounds pathing along a route, reacting to knockback, and charging the stronghold is behavior AI, the kind of scripted decision logic games have used for decades. It has nothing to do with generative models, and a mod that adds a gun does not change it at all.
That distinction matters because the two get collapsed constantly in community arguments. The voice actor strike concerns were about models trained on performers’ voices to replace paid work, which is a separate question from how an enemy decides where to walk.
miHoYo’s actual AI spending and projects
The real AI story sits outside the clip. miHoYo head Liu Wei used a private AI event in Beijing earlier in 2026 to announce a commitment of 100 billion yuan, roughly $14.7 billion, released in stages across three years. The goal is an in-house stack covering GPU clusters, training systems, and applied tooling, with NPC systems and content generation named as early targets for new projects.
Liu framed the risk bluntly rather than promising results.
Even if nothing comes of it and we achieve no result, we’ll come to terms with it. We’ll just consider it as having organized a grand fireworks display.
The company has also posted roles aimed at AI-driven NPC interaction, where a player-written prompt produces a unique response. Co-founder Cai Haoyu, who stepped down as chairman in 2023, has argued publicly that AI-generated content will reshape who makes games, splitting development between tiny elite teams and hobbyists building whatever they feel like. He is attached to the AI content startup Anuttacon.
BSide: Olivia Lin, the AI companion app
The most visible product of that push is BSide: Olivia Lin, an AI desktop companion released into early access in China. Olivia is presented as a Shanghai college student studying piano and psychology who likes vinyl records, classic films, and rainy days. You can listen to her play piano, upload your own music files, and send her letters that she answers.
miHoYo has said the app will be free when it launches properly. There is no confirmed release date for regions outside China.
Note: Modified clients violate Genshin Impact’s terms of service, and running one puts your account at risk. Treat clips like this as what they are, someone’s private build, and not a preview of anything heading to the live game.
So the short version holds up under scrutiny. A creator built a gun into Genshin Impact and ran it through a wave defense arena, the enemies behaved exactly as they always have, and miHoYo’s multibillion-dollar AI program is a separate track whose results have yet to show up in anyone’s game client.
