Zenless Zone Zero vs Wuthering Waves – Which should you play?

Both Zenless Zone Zero and Wuthering Waves are relatively new gacha games. Since they share a similar genre, players often wonder which game is worth their time. 

We’re here to help you decide whether to play Zenless Zone Zero or Wuthering Waves. 

Should you play Zenless Zone Zero or Wuthering Waves?

Before giving you our final verdict, we’ll cover everything you need to know about gameplay, monetization, and new player experience. 

Gameplay

Collecting characters and building them is the main mechanic in Zenless Zone Zero and Wuthering Waves, but the games are different when it comes to pure gameplay. Although both games use their respective elements known as Attributes, and teams consist of three characters, Zenless Zone Zero is more casual-friendly. While it’s mainly a fighting game, it has a good mixture of mini-games to add extra flavor and uses unique fighting mechanics such as Dodge, Daze, and Combo Attack.

Wuthering Waves is a more RPG-focused game that offers massive world exploration, has a ton of quests, and more fleshed-out endgame content where you can test your character builds. With more fluid gameplay and unique gear known as Echoes, Wuthering Waves offers more content and has overall better gameplay.

Monetization

We’ll be straightforward with this one: Wuthering Waves wins by a landslide. While you can certainly get more than 100 pulls in Zenless Zone Zero, and you even get to choose an S-Rank Standard agent after 300 pulls, the gacha system is simply unforgiving. You need a total of 180 pulls for a guaranteed Limited S-Rank agent, and on top of everything, you need 160 pulls for their W-Engines (weapons) and 80 extra pulls for a Bangboo of your choice. 

In Wuthering Waves, you get a bunch of free five-star characters and weapons and need 160 pulls for a guaranteed Limited five-star character, which is a better pity system than Zenless Zone Zero. To top everything off, the Limited Weapon banner doesn’t have pity, meaning that you’re always guaranteed to get a weapon in the first 80 pulls.

New player experience

Regarding new player experience, Zenless Zone Zero takes it hands down. This doesn’t mean that Wuthering Waves is the most challenging game ever, but it’s certainly more engaging and requires more time to get the hang of it.

But even though it’s mainly a fighting game, Zenless Zone Zero took a more casual-friendly approach by mixing fighting opponents and mini-games. Its mechanics are easy to understand, Attack Combos are easy to perform, and the overall art style and design just scream casual-friendly.

The final verdict

Wuthering Waves takes the overall win. While we love Zenless Zone Zero and recommend it to all newcomers, considering that Wuthering Waves is also a free-to-play gacha game, it simply offers way more. It has a more engaging combat system, massive overworld exploration, more quests, better endgame content, and above all else, the gacha system is more generous.