On October 7th, 2021, Hoyoverse announced their next title in the Honkai franchise: Honkai: Star Rail, a turn-based RPG with some open-world elements, and the successor to the popular Honkai Impact 3. The latest beta testing session closed on June 15th of 2022, and now, as the (unconfirmed) release date grows closer, players can now pre-register in larger groups than before to try it out.
Star Rail will take place along the path of an interstellar train, called the Astral Express, and will follow the adventure of returning character Welt Yang. If this is all gobbledygook to you, don’t worry, I’m right there with youāI had no idea the developers behind Genshin Impact made a free-to-play, single-player game, either! But essentially, this game revolves around a group of gun-totin’, fast-fightin’ anime characters fighting against the evil Houkai (“Decay”). The way that this particular installment has been described thus far makes it sound like an anime version of Mass Effect, but with a much faster sense of pace. Sounds fun!
How to pre-register
While the third session has not yet opened yet, players can go to their home website (link here) and register ahead of time to get notified when the time comes. However, if they don’t plan to try out the game on desktop, they’ll have to wait until it becomes available on app stores.
All other details are sparse, but if you’re excited all the same, I recommend registering early to get all the hottest news right as it drops. And in the meantime, there’s no shame in continuing to play Genshin Impact or Honkai Impact 3, or even giving the newly-released Tower of Fantasy a spin.
(Featured Image: miHoYo)
