I think the recent happenings in the Genshin Impact content creator community may warrant a topic on the podcast. Not sure if me or @Victim have anything too interesting to add but it's such a wild development we should put it in anyway for the sake of our dear listeners in the distant year of 2030 binge-listening the show as a historical record.
This is a developing story so this thread will probably have to be updated with time as we lead up to the next recording day.
Anywho - THE PEOPLE IN QUESTION
Tectone
This dude is kind of the center of the drama, as he usually is. This guy is blacklisted by Hoyoverse, criticizes the game alot, and has an abrasive personality. I don't mind him and he has a lot of fans, but his fans get a little too excited when someone tries to attack him because they know he will defend himself. This was articulated really well in a video MTashed did on the subject. I have a soft spot for MTashed because Genshin was his first Gacha game as well, so he explained all the systems in a way only an outsider could, which in the past caused Tectone and others to hate on him because the information he was presenting they were taking for granted. They made up and are friends now, so I would recommend watching MTashed's full video for context, watch it after you finish reading my forum post --> https://youtu.be/z_MA8Au36QM?si=Anjv8JBelTwL_uf4
Additional context: Tectone used to play and make content for Arknights but was driven out of the community for his behavior, and was only recently (THIS year in 2024) vindicated as the Arknights dude that conspired against him recently got outed as a piece of shit. I don't have those details handy though.
TL;DR - I am totally aligned with the Tash man on this, but he's not the subject of the drama
Atsu aka AsianGuyStreams
Similar to Tectone this guy is kind of a dick. He's been friendly with Tectone before and collaborated with him, and they together became sort-of known for shitting on other people. For example, when Zhongli came out these two condemned other content creators that said he needed a buff. He ended up getting one anyway, which elevated him from ok to a must pull (in my opinion anyway, but what do I know I don't even play anymore). Something happened between these two and they are no longer friendly at all.
So what even happend?
Anyway, it's not really clear to me who started it, but Tectone is pretty passionate about defending himself. As far as I can tell, he recently blew up when another content creator - Zylok posted this tweet:
Source: https://x.com/Zy0x_/status/1748395412283630014?s=20
This tweet is actually kinda funny and is totally something I would post. I'm not mad about that. Tectone took it very personally as he usually does and made some videos about it, which riles up his viewers and hate-watchers.
This includes Atsu, who also mentioned this in his streams. Which kinda sucks for us because I ain't watching all of that. You can't screenshot a stream unfortunately and you'll just have to take my word for it that Zy0x posted a funny tweet, that made both Tectone and the other guy in the picture get lots of hate mail. This is profit to Tectone because he gets to respond and handles everything like he's a goddamn Heel in the WWE (great strategy TBH) whereas this other dude may not be up for that kind of flaming. MTashed mentions this in his video, big recommend.
This led to the typical back and forth we see in Genshin drama, and if it ended there I wouldn't be writing this thread.
Unexpected Turn of Events
Braxophone Document
They cycle should have reset like normal and everyone would have moved on, but another content creator, Braxophone posted a Google Doc (source: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1WmF1CKa2cYqvS0KKuw7NgwimBmaX1qSPj2ujKpnTxWs/edit?pli=1 ) though he seems to have recently edited it so some CC coverage may reference the original text.
This document goes into detail about how Braxophone feels stalked and harassed by Atsu, and makes several accusations that Genshin-related career opportunities have been denied to him because of Atsu's influence.
I'm going to paraphrase MTashed's video here just incase you aren't going to watch it - but this is hella suspicious. In MTashed's video he mentions that he has absolutely met Brax in person and it was fine, not weird at all, as well as Atsu and friends who are the targets of this document. Since Atsu is sponsored MTash tries to stay away from them because his status as blacklisted could harm their careers, but they've never treated him like some kind of black sheep like Brax's article is impling they did to him. MTashed also goes on to explain that if Brax's words are to be taken at face value here, then it's possible that Brax absolutely fumbled his first interactions with Atsu and came off as a really awkward guy. Tash man didn't say this but I will - it sounds like the dude went full autism. That seems unlikely and someone in this drama must be exaggerating. MTashed also points out there's several pieces of context missing from Brax's statements, such as not disclosing if he's getting flown out to these Genshin events or paying his own way, which would paint what he's describing here in a very different light based on which scenario it is. Either way, super fishy.
Sekapoko Corroborates Braxophone
In an another unexpected turn, Sekapoko - another Genshin content creator who is not part of this drama at all reads off the beginning of Braxophone's document and comments that he too has experienced this behavior from Atsu, but does not go into any detail. Simply implying that they've met, Atsu didn't like him, and avoids him in the same way Brax describes.
I can't embed tweet video so click this link and watch the short clip:
https://twitter.com/ShadowCressy/status/1753827782813991273
Atsu Response
Much like MTashed, I too really wanted to hear Atsu's side of Brax's claims. Hoping they would help complete the picture since there's so much wrong with Brax's arugments. However what we got was a long wall of text from Atsu that does not inspire any confidence in him.
You can read the wall of text here:
https://twitter.com/AsianGuyStream/status/1753707177728979050
TL;DR - Atsu rejects some of Brax's claims regarding Atsu's friends and ignores some of his other claims.
He re-tells the group photo incident in Brax's doc as Brax inserting himself into a friend group photo that required them to take another, whereas in Brax's document he makes it sound like this is a group photo of Genshin CCs that were sent to the event - which MTashed points out requires context - did he just show up there or did Hoyo fly him out? If Hoyo flew him out he should totally be in the picture. Atsu describes this as a friend group photo.
Atsu also rejects the idea that doing collabs with his friends is soley for the purpose of climbing some social ladder and gaining influence. These are his friends and they can collab all they want. It just happens to be profitable and Brax is not his friend.
Atsu however does not address the allegation that he is actively working to deny Brax career opportunities. I think this tweet sums up why that's a problem really well:
Ironically, at the start of this wall of text he says he just woke up and this is a quick response, and a more detailed response will come soon. Yet bro wrote a wall of text? Also the only reason his response is so long is because he spent a lot of word count on just insulting Braxophone, rather than attacking the rest of his arguments. Most of the replies I've seen thus far have been in support of Brax, and against Atsu. This was a bad reply.
Enviosity Document vs Tectone & Goose Egg Document vs Atsu
Yes, two more google drops dropped this morning. One about Tectone and one about Atsu. They were posted TEN MINUTES APART, so we'll cover Goose Egg vs Atsu first because that one was posted first.
Goose Egg vs Atsu
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-m68U6-LNy0GPLw2U2VvZXjCbHoEnHhMXZCfa0qAXws/preview
https://twitter.com/GooseEggYT/status/1753852136411074600
Goose Egg used to be a content creator that worked closely with Tectone, to the point where they eventually moved in together 2 years ago. Before this however Goose Egg looked up to Atsu, which he mentions in his document. His first interaction with Atsu was a $1 bit donation with a message. I'll quote what he said in the document here:
I told him I really enjoyed watching him and his content and he was kinda an inspiration to me and if he would maybe want to talk more and become closer. He immediately said no and shot it down and that me trying to “buy” his friendship was a terrible move and that I should never do that again.
So he never made any attempts to reach out to Atsu again, and got to know Tectone. They became friends, moved in together, and both grew as creators (obviously Tectone was gonna grow anyway, but this was a benefit for Goose Egg who was along for the ride). This seemed to anger Atsu who made multiple videos calling this man out and saying he was some kind of leech given their one previous interaction. Goose Egg links Atsu's videos he made on the subject if you would like to watch them but Atsu was not nice about this in his videos at all.
In Goose's document he goes on to describe how Atsu's fans would stalk all of his comments and streams, and tell him to either kill himself or say things like "atsu owns you". He claims this took a real tool on his mental health and led to him quitting content creation, which has been the case for 2 years now.
That's pretty damning if you ask me, however Goose doesn't provide any screenshots or other evidence that Atsu's fans did this to him. Having some empathy for him this shouldn't be needed, but these are big claims and I can't help but want to ask for more. Maybe I'm just built different than Goose here but if people ever said shit like that to me I would save it and have it ready for a time like this as evidence, however Goose says he blocked a lot of people who were doing this so it makes sense he isn't holding onto the evidence. Also it's really really not hard to believe Atsu's fans would do this.
Enviosity vs Tectone
Still crazy to me this document was posted JUST 10 minutes after the last one
Instead of a longtweet or googledoc Envy posted a twitter thread that is 15 posts long, starting here -> https://twitter.com/Enviosity/status/1753854364756607390
Unfortunately his tweet thread doesn't have much substance. He starts by outlining how he and Tectone didn't get along at the beginning, and implied that tectone was asking him to not stream at the same time as him because his (Techtone's) viewers would go watch him (Envy). However there's no proof of this, its just words in a tweet, no screenshots. Envy claims that early Genshin for him felt like a competition he didn't sign up for and people kept comparing him to other creators like techtone which stressed him out.
The only other evidence envy provided was actually a stream clip from one of Tectone's subathons where he's in the car with his (now-ex) wife talking about their relationship, describing the clip as inexcusable behavior. The clip itself is an argument between the two about how much effort each puts into their marriage. It's not abuse like some claim but totally inappropriate to discuss on a stream. However what Envy and the other haters using clips like this don't understand is that these two were a couple for over 10 years, and they went on to later have a totally amicable breakup and claim to have remained friends so I don't really agree with the hater's efforts to imply the guy is abusive, the shoe doesn't seem to fit to me. However Envy bringing this up as evidence not to like tectone was in poor taste, and lots of the replies he got to his thread call him out for this.
Envy describes in the first post that these events are trauma and he has PTSD. However all he described was competition? His drive to compete with the likes of Tectone drove him to do more pulls than he wanted to do to get Rossaria on release, which he cites in his thread as a problem caused by Tectone with a short stream clip of him having a breakdown on stream. This is a strange defense to make because it looks self-inflicted to me.
Side note: I really don't understand why Tectone and Envy have such beef. Envy seems like the kind of dude who would be happy to just never mention or think about Tectone again and move on with his life, yet this stuff keeps coming up. Who is starting it? I don't watch either of these creators livestreams so I honestly don't know. If I were to make an assumption it sounds like Tectone is "starting it" but really any single short casual mention of Envy from Tectone is likely being blown out of proportion by Envy. I can't figure out who is to blame here.
Tectone's reply
Link: https://twitter.com/Tectone/status/1753859306766709173
So Tectone wrote a long tweet in reply to the Envy thread, and he also points out what was going through my head about the Fream clip - to paraphrase Tectone said you can't use a single clip to define a 10 year relationship and you can't know what they say/do off the camera. in Tectone's reply he goes on to call out Envy for weaponizing his sensitivity and exaggerating every little thing that happens to him as some kind of attack. Tectone also provides a screenshot of their DMs from 2021 where, when the drama referred was happening, Tectone made multiple attempts to reach out to Envy and was ignored, BUT the screenshot is so zoomed in you can't actually tell if those DM's were sent to Envy. This is probably real because it would be a huge risk to Tectone to fake such a DM since Envy could just leak-back proof that he's lying, so I think they're probably real.
About Evidence
So, modern society kind of demands that people have empathy and we should be more willing to believe people who say they have been wronged.
We also live in the digital age where everything on the internet is forever, even if you try to delete it.
Therefore, we come to a bit of an impasse. While Goose and Envy both didn't really have any evidence about what they are going through, Atsu made videos directly attempting to harass Goose. We don't need Goose to provided that evidence himself it is right there. Meanwhile Envy tries to make it sound like Tectone is just the bane of his existence, but the one clip he did come up with in his thread didn't really amount to anything. We can say the same about Braxophone who only gave us his perspective of events, which sounds pretty fishy, but then Atsu fumbled the reply and made Braxophone sound less crazy as a result.
Some of the parts of this first post, especially the last two documents and Tectone's reply, literally happened within the last hour. This is a developing story!