Genshin Impact Ayato birthday art controversy: Accusations and drama explained
A recent controversy involving Ayato's birthday art in Genshin Impact erupted recently, where accusations of tracing were thrown against the artist. The accused is 花邑まい (translated from Japanese as Mai Hanamura). It is worth noting that people have brought up the artist's past history of tracing, yet that isn't the full story.
The person who started the accusations of birthday art being traced has since deleted their Tweets on the matter. They did not apologize for the damaging claims. This article will cover the controversy regarding Ayato's birthday art and why it garnered so much attention online.
Explaining Ayato birthday art controversy within Genshin Impact community
Although the original accusations were deleted, there are other Tweets where the sentiment is still shared. The above example shows the most commonly cited "proof" for the claims of tracing. Another anime character (Bedivere) overlaps Ayato's official birthday art and starts to fade in.
Some might notice highly similar jawlines, ear curves, and placements. This particular video had over 3.3 million views and over 6.4K likes at the time of writing this article.
The above video also covers some other aspects of the Genshin Impact drama. Important developments include:
- Twitter user @b_spectacledbun states that the artist has a reputation for tracing
- A past example from 2020 is cited as a reason why people shouldn't "support art thieves"
- There is no definitive proof of the Ayato birthday art being traced over
- @b_spectacledbun states there is no evidence that the artwork wasn't plagiarized
It is worth noting that the current news indicates that there was no tracing, yet some Genshin Impact players are not convinced.
Some Twitter users even assumed that the birthday art was chimera traced (the act of copying multiple different artworks rather than a single one). That sort of plagiarism would be impossible to prove since various works could have been used rather than a single one.
Nonetheless, this isn't a one-sided episode. Some of the following Tweets are examples of fans defending the artist against the recent controversial claims.
Counterarguments to tracing allegations
Ayato's birthday art for 2023 appears to be similar to Fate's Bedivere, often cited as being traced over. The two could share similarities, yet that doesn't prove the accusations.
The above English Tweet references how the original claim was deleted. However, the embedded Japanese Twitter thread covers the following topics:
- There is barely any overlap between the two images
- Accusations of tracing have already spread worldwide
- There were some past allegations, but some of them were unreasonably false.
It is worth noting that it's impossible to verify whether the artwork was copied or entirely original. The Genshin Impact community is divided on the matter, with some being adamant about their current stances.
Some think that male anime characters look similar, which doesn't prove any tracing. Others deny that and say that it could have been chimera-traced instead.
What do you think? The Genshin Impact controversy has been a hot topic lately, so there are bound to be more interesting discussions on the matter.
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Dinesh Renthlei