Overview
The Shanhaijing (Classic of Mountains and Seas) is one of the primary mythological sources that informed the creature, location, and world design of Honor of Kings: World. This ancient Chinese text, compiled between the 4th century BCE and the early Han dynasty, catalogs hundreds of mythical creatures, sacred mountains, exotic peoples, and supernatural phenomena. TiMi Studio Group has cited the Shanhaijing repeatedly in developer interviews and presentations as a foundational reference for building Primaera's ecosystem of fantastical beings and landscapes.
About the Shanhaijing
The Shanhaijing is one of China's oldest and most enigmatic texts. Divided into 18 sections covering the "Mountains" and "Seas" of the known world, it describes over 550 mountains, 300 waterways, and hundreds of creatures and peoples, many of which are fantastical or supernatural. The text reads as part geography, part bestiary, and part mythology. It has been a source of artistic and literary inspiration in China for over two millennia.
For Honor of Kings: World, the Shanhaijing provided a vast catalog of creative raw material. Rather than inventing creatures from scratch, TiMi's art and design teams used the text's descriptions as starting points, interpreting the often sparse and ambiguous ancient descriptions through modern concept art and game design principles.
Creature adaptations
Several creature families in the game trace their design lineage directly to Shanhaijing entries:
Item | Description |
|---|---|
Bi Fang (fire bird) | the Shanhaijing describes a one-legged bird associated with fire. In the game, Bi Fang appears as a phoenix-like creature that inhabits volcanic and high-temperature zones, serving as a challenging open-world boss. |
Qiongqi (wind beast) | described as a winged tiger in the text, Qiongqi is adapted as a powerful aerial predator that swoops down on players in highland regions. Its design combines tiger anatomy with bat-like wings. |
Zhu Yin (torch dragon) | the Shanhaijing's torch dragon, whose opening and closing eyes cause day and night, inspires a massive world boss whose attacks are themed around light and darkness manipulation. |
Jiuwei Hu (nine-tailed fox) | one of the most recognizable creatures from Chinese mythology, the nine-tailed fox appears as an elusive, illusion-casting enemy found in the Dreamweave Plains. |
Xiangliu (nine-headed serpent) | this multi-headed serpent from the text becomes a raid boss whose multiple heads must be targeted independently, each with its own attack pattern. |
Mounts and companions
The Open World Map's mount system also draws from the Shanhaijing. Several obtainable mounts are direct adaptations of mythical creatures:
Character | Description |
|---|---|
Qilin | the benevolent hooved creature associated with prosperity and good fortune. In-game, it is a rare mount with enhanced traversal capabilities over rough terrain. |
Fei Lian (wind deer) | a deer-like mount with wind manipulation abilities, allowing faster movement and brief gliding. Based on the Shanhaijing's descriptions of wind-associated fauna. |
He Bo's chariot fish | a massive freshwater fish mount used for aquatic traversal, inspired by the text's river deity He Bo and his fish-drawn chariot. |
Location design
Beyond creatures, the Shanhaijing influenced the design of the game's landscape. The text's descriptions of sacred mountains with jade peaks, rivers flowing with unusual substances, and forests inhabited by spirits informed the surreal elements of Primaera's geography:
Location | Description |
|---|---|
Crystal formations | mineral outcroppings in several regions glow with inner light, recalling the Shanhaijing's descriptions of luminous stones found on sacred mountains |
Color-shifted forests | areas where foliage takes on unnatural colors (crimson leaves, blue bark, golden grass) matching the text's accounts of mountains where vegetation defies normal appearance |
Floating stones | boulders and rock formations that hover above the ground in high-Flow regions, inspired by the text's descriptions of mountains that move or float |
Design philosophy
TiMi Studio Group discussed their approach to Shanhaijing adaptation during their GDC 2025 presentation on world-building. The key principles they outlined were:
Respect the source: begin with the actual text description, no matter how brief or ambiguous, and build outward from there rather than imposing modern preconceptions
Fill gaps with ecology: where the Shanhaijing gives only a physical description, imagine how the creature would behave, what it would eat, where it would live, and how it would interact with other creatures
Modernize visually, not thematically: use modern rendering, animation, and effects technology to bring the creatures to life, but keep their thematic essence rooted in the original mythology
Integrate into gameplay: every Shanhaijing-inspired creature must serve a gameplay purpose, as an enemy, a boss, a mount, a resource, or a piece of environmental storytelling
This approach produced a creature catalog that feels distinctly Chinese in its mythological roots while being fully integrated into a modern action RPG's design needs. Players familiar with the Shanhaijing will recognize the source material; players unfamiliar with it will encounter creatures that feel both fantastical and internally consistent.
Cultural significance
The extensive use of Shanhaijing material is part of Honor of Kings: World's broader goal of showcasing Chinese cultural heritage through the medium of a AAA video game. By drawing on one of China's most ancient and culturally significant texts, the game introduces a global audience to mythological concepts and creatures that have shaped Chinese art, literature, and folklore for millennia. This cultural grounding differentiates the game's bestiary from the European-derived creature designs that dominate most Western-developed action RPGs.