Genshin Impact: Kamisato Ayato release date and everything we know so far

A trailer featuring Genshin Impact’s upcoming five-star character Arataki Itto has players clamoring over a new reveal in Kamisato Ayato. At the end of the Itto teaser, Thoma can be seen watching the show. He then speaks to his “Lord”, whom we can only assume to be Ayato. We don’t get a look at his face, but we do hear him speak. Here’s everything we know about Kamisato Ayato so far.

If Kamisato Ayato sounds vaguely familiar, it’s because he’s the older brother of Kamisato Ayaka. It’s kind of like if you named your kids Daniel and Danielle. He may also sound vaguely familiar in voice, as players think Chris Hackney’s behind him.

Does Chris Hackney voice Kamisato Ayato?

We don’t know definitively who voices Ayato yet, so this is all based on speculation. It’s hard for me to tell given the short line, but I’ll take Twitter’s word that it’s Chris Hackney. You may have heard him as Dimitri in Fire Emblem: Three Houses or Ghiaccio in Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure: Golden Wind.

It’s a fun game miHoYo’s playing: fans get to speculate and they drive hype for upcoming content, especially when it involves actors with a huge following.

Given how under-designed the relatives of playable character tend to be, there were a few jokes going around that Ayato was going to be an NPC. With this trailer, it’s safe to assume Ayato is going to be a full-blown event character.

Ayato had been a somewhat enigmatic character before now. In the little lore that’s available, we know that Ayato serves as the head of the Yashiro Commission and the Shuumatsuban (the intelligence operation/ninja squad Sayu’s part of).

His sister Ayaka has a samurai motif and serves as the public face of the clan. Ayato works in the background and is the leader of an intelligence group, so I think it’d be cool to see Ayato as the samurai’s opposite: a ninja.

There’s a few other things that we don’t know about Ayato yet, namely, what Vision he would have. We also don’t know when he’s coming to the game, or even what he’ll look like.

When does Ayato release?

There’s some sleuthing we can do to figure out when Ayato comes to Genshin Impact. As of writing, we’re on update 2.3. MiHoYo has already previewed 2.4’s new characters, namely Shenhe. Shenhe first appeared in the background of the cutscene that played at the end of 2.1’s Moonlight Merriment event. Shortly after, many Liyue characters got new voice lines about Shenhe.

With three updates between Shenhe’s first appearance and her supposed release, this could mean Ayato will come in either 2.5 or 2.6. My money is on 2.5, as there are already voice lines about Ayato in the game.