HoYoVerse uploaded a video detailing how real-life astronomy plays into the worldbuilding of Honkai: Star Rail. Didier Queloz, who is a Swiss astronomer and physics professor at Cambridge, is the guest. He also won a Nobel Prize of Physics in 2019 when he, along with Michel Mayor, discovered the first extrasolar planet 51 Pegasi b.
Queloz stated that he hopes that media can sneak in actual knowledge. This could not only educate its players, but also increase interest in science. In the past, for example, Jurassic Park inspired a paleontology renaissance. Due to the vast number of star systems, he suggests that there is the possibility that planets like the ones in Honkai: Star Rail (and by extension, any piece of sci-fi media) exist in reality.
An example of this lies in the icy Jarilo-VI. This is the first planet that we encounter in Honkai: Star Rail. In Earth’s own history, there was a time when snow and ice covered the entire planet. Such a planet is completely plausible. Temperature, the atmosphere, distance to the star, and the presence of water would all contribute to the planet’s conditions. One could explain Jarilo-VI’s icy environment as the result of a dramatic change in the atmosphere.
The second half of the video mostly focuses on the possibilities of extraterrestrial life, intergalactic travel, and the various conditions that affect a planet’s state or appearance. Intergalactic travel is not possible for us now, but it could be some day in the future. Queloz concluded that as a species, we must cherish the planet now and survive as a whole if we ever wish to travel to the stars in the future.
Honkai: Star Rail is readily available on mobile devices and Windows PCs. PS4 and PS5 versions will come out in the near future.
