I bought scratch cards from a dog in Zenless Zone Zero and it made me stop and look around

In Zenless Zone Zero, the free-to-play sequel to Genshin Impact, your character steps out into the city center and announces their daily ritual: going to the scratchcard stand. It’s in keeping with the brand. But, oh no, a nod to the actual game could be interpreted as a transparent acknowledgement of the gacha genre’s psychological claw machine, which is perhaps why the developers decided that the scratchcard stand should have only one employee: a very cute dog.

It’s also indicative of ZZZ’s overall vibe, which is meant to be devoid of any zen in the title, but is actually quite relaxing if you stop to think about its myriad currencies and confusing menus for a moment. The city’s streets are bright, colorful, full of neat details, and very stylish (the whole thing is stylish, which is actually the game’s core design pillar – “looking cool”).

There’s chill lo-fi music, a noodle stand, a cool bench made of skateboard decks. There’s a trash can that makes suspicious noises inside, almost certainly containing a cat or raccoon that I’m eager to meet. The arcade machine that glows on the street advertises an arcade building that promises Snake and other simple mini-games, once I advance far enough to unlock the door (is the game machine called “God Finger” in reference to Capcom’s God Fist or James Bond’s Goldfinger? Maybe neither. I’ll let you decide).

As a developer, it’s not unusual to fill your hub area with details like this. And in my opinion, it’s still far from the best futuristic city block PC game has to offer (Deus Ex Mankind Divided’s Prague, anyone?). The invisible walls and pointless dead ends do nothing to distract from the game’s ultimate goal: to take you into the gacha loop as much as possible. But I still appreciate the color. In some ways, ZenZoZe is the gachification of Persona 5’s memories—the sort of optional dungeon journeys you use to upgrade your stats and farm characters. But at least it also channels some of that JRPG’s wandering during downtime, exploring its city streets.

This is honestly when I prefer video games. When you take the time to stop and appreciate the work or effort on a street bench or in the cluttered shelves of a video store. I will play Zenless Zone Zero more often in order to give it a more complete description. So far, my eyes are wide with its sense of style, even if my brain completely rejects the opaque mechanics of what sometimes looks like a very pretty scratch game.