Burnice, a character from the action game Zenless Zone Zero, has infected all my social media feeds.
On Oct. 15, developer Hoyoverse released a new trailer called “A Burnice Special for the Brokenhearted” to tease the new character in Zenless Zone Zero. Instead of showing her fighting, the development team gave Burnice the full pop-star treatment and made her the protagonist of a music video. Since its release, the video has captured the attention of fans online with its mix of absurd choreography and energetic electronic beats.
The music video is unbelievable. Within seconds of the song starting, the bartender Burnice lands a perfect split in a mini skirt and sings, “Mocktails, mixers, ice/The snacks are real nice/Soda, sour-mix, dry/I’m lit, you can’t deny.” Throughout the video, she does the viral dance from “Gangnam Style,” and the camera captures copious shots of her bouncing chest in a tiny bandeau top. At another point, there’s a full dance number where several characters dance in a triangle formation.
The video itself feels like the fever-dream version of a spring break party girl. But the song is a bop, and now, Burnice has infected all my social media feeds. Many people have been sharing fan edits of the character. Others have been analyzing the references and dance styles. Some dedicated fans have already recreated portions of the video while cosplaying as her. You can see some of the examples below.
The Burnice video and the reactions to it are part of a larger trend where Hoyoverse increasingly uses music to market its mega games. Leadership at the company has consistently said that it aims to develop several kinds of media, and that includes music. Just this month, the team released three music videos tied to its games. On Monday, developers released an intense electronic song to show off Honkai: Star Rail’s new character Rappa, and a few weeks before that, fans got to see Genshin Impact’s Xilonen rap in her teaser. Then, of course, we had Burnice.
So what does it all mean at the end of the day? Music has always been an important part of the anime and video game formula — just look at Vtubers! The trio of music videos feels like just the start for Hoyoverse; it’s possible the company will release its own version of K/DA, the K-pop girl from League of Legends, down the line. So maybe if she’s lucky, Burnice herself will take to center stage some day.
