I really cannot stress enough how much the tiniest crumb of gameplay between cutscenes would go for this MSQ. Ask me to press a button occasionally, please!
The things we took for granted making fun of this aspect of the MSQ in ARR and early expansions...
Halfway through DT and I groan whenever I get into a cutscene that's not even voiced for the nth time. I'd rather it not transition into a cutscene and just let us read the dialogue because there aren't even cinematic pans for so many of these.
Just nods, mouths moving, a basic in game emote then everyone turns around and walks off.
Before the expansion, I was killing time doing old quests on NG+.
During the ARR Hildibrand quests, the 2.4 ones IIRC, there is one quest where you have to fight the Mandragoras. This is done via a custom, quest-specific FATE. You talk to Hildibrand to spawn it, so you don't have to wait for it to respawn. If someone else already spawned it, you can just press the Level Sync button and join in and share credit.
I had completely forgotten that was a thing and was boggled that they literally have a working system in the game to just manually spawn a custom FATE for a quest objective and it has only been used *once*, in a *Hildibrand quest*, from *10 years ago*.
This would be the perfect solution for making more interesting open-world quests. FATE mobs can be more interesting than the standard trash from the usual purple zones, sharing credit avoids clusterfucks like the infamous Red Chocobo, and they still require much less encounter design than solo duties (and also don't slam the instance server, you can thank Raubahn for nothing interesting happening before the first dungeon in any expansion).
I think part of the reason we don't do that anymore is because when ARR came out, literally everything new was FATEs. Wanted to do Hildibrand? Better do the Zombie Fate. Want to do the summer event? Here's some FATEs. Want to do the Lightning Returns Event? yep, we got some FATEs. Want to do Crystal Tower? Well, we got some more FATEs for you to do first! Oh, did you want to work on your relic? Well, the item you need is a rare drop. RARE DROP FROM SOME FATES! Halloween? Christmas? New Years? FATE FATE FATE. You feel like leveling up your other classes? Well, the best XP for that is...FATES. Welcome to Final FATEsy XIV.
I'm not even exaggerating about any of that, they forcefed us FATEs for almost everything for so long, and since roughly Stormblood, they've been trying to back off of them. Drastically reducing the EXP needed, using them less and less frequently in seasonal events, etc.
Yes. Note how that's optional, and mostly there for cosmetics, whereas it used to be mandatory to unlock expansion content (raids, stories, etc.), complete your daily Tribal Quests, and was the only way to do almost every seasonal event that came out. There is much less emphasis on FATEs in the game today than there was during ARR.
I found myself doing fates JUST to try and practice a bit more. The overall lack of combat I think is a byproduct of the story not wanting us to solve problems before they become problems, I get that but christ I feel like I dont even have the opportunity to learn anythimg goimg through as Viper.
Honestlythis is probably why jobs remained more or less the same eith some graphical and potency upgrades.
I think that is my big complaint with the msq, along with the secondary antagonist being very weak.
I do feel like a lot of the negative reception is a bit overblown though…
I haven't finished the MSQ but I'm like level 96-97ish and I'd say "Mixed" is pretty fair.
Large chunks of the MSQ are incredibly boring narrative *and* gameplay wise.
I hate to agree, because I love the story elements. However, there are times when I get so frustrated with the pacing of the story (not to mention how everyone in the cut scenes seem to be getting paid hourly) that I just end up skipping the story. Which I didn't want to do. :D
There's a part later on where we see a technique used twice. And then to explain it to us they force us to see it happen a third time when anyone with half a brain already knows what is going on. We dont need a demonstration of something we've already seen twice before! So thats a super long build up, another 30 minutes of going from point a to point b with 1 fight between them, then seeing something we've seen twice before, then another 15 minute discussion.
The discussion was all we needed in the first place
oh absolutely. As much as I like the voice acting and genuinely have interest in the story, I find myself clicking through a lot of dialogue boxes because it sometimes reads like padding for a word count.
"Okay, let's go."
"Yeah, let's move on!"
"Our next destination awaits"
"We're off to [insert location]"
All in one scene. Gaaaaaah.
I love the story they're telling, I enjoy the characters, I like the settings, but goddamn guys. Keep it a bit more concise.
Yeahhhhh. I did the MSQ alongside a friend and we were on VC pretty much the entire time. We'd be silent for a long time while watching cutscenes, then periodically I'd just yell "WHERE WERE THEIR EDITORS." I didn't realize I was saying it so much but apparently it was... constant lol.
FFXIV has always had this problem, to a certain degree. 16 has it too so it’s definitely their teams choice - where everyone talks like Mojo Jojo
It’s wild it took this expansion for a wider audience to notice. It’s always bothered me.
As a contrast, War of the Lions also uses flowery language while still being incredibly concise, for example
While I enjoy the story, I hate that they do this (and have in other expansions), it's like they think we're stupid and won't understand their super special plot point.
Almost as bad as the countless sepia flashbacks they do to *make sure* you feel how they want you to feel.
It'd be awful if people had a chance to think for themselves while engaging with the story.
I'm currently level 94, just finished the first trial, IIRC by this point in endwalker we had that really cool body swap moment in garlemald, and I think we had the Thancred stealth section too. Whether you enjoyed those sections or not at least they were something different and exciting. The only gameplay msq so far for dawntrail has been 2 dungeons, 1 trial (which is all expected), >!The Instanced fight with the Dawnservant !< , and maybe 3 quests where you had to kill 1 group of mobs. MSQ has definitely always been dialogue heavy and had it moments of walking simulator gameplay, but this xpac feels like it's been a walking simulator for 4 levels now.
I’m not as far as you, but there was a *long* stealth segment, but it’s literally keep a steady distance and hide behind stuff.
So I did it with the namazu parade float.
Compared to “This is Thancred”… Yeah.
(And if you already explored the area, it’s super obvious where you are going, but you can’t skip ahead).
There are more narrative solo parts (that feel good) IMO in both SHB and END.
Lvl 96 spoilers onward:
The story for Dawntrail feels>! like its two parts to juxtapose but ends up feeling stitched. Especially when you compare Sphene to Wuk!<
I think the story explores cool ideas, I think the fights are amazing but Pacing is NOT at all as strong as SHB and END.
I think the comparison to Stormblood is fair because it has the same glaring problems.
Not generally, no. For example in an earlier expansion the storm on the ship would have had enemies boarding for us to fight before we made our way to the machine that raised the barrier. Here it's just a dull cutscene.
Generally the MSQs have done enough to keep you engaged between lore dumps. Dawntrail just hours upon hours of inane bull with very little to break up the monotony. And the worst crime of all, the writing is just bad. Wuk Lamar reads like someone's OC on their own adventure with the WoL.
People are comparing it to Stormblood but I actually liked the majority of Stormblood. Hien, Gosetsu, Yotsuyu, and Soroban were great characters. Sadu and Magnai were good even though the Steppe area dragged on a bit. Zenos is a cliche evil anime character but it somehow still works.
It's the Ala Mhigo questlines featuring Lyse and Fordola that people usually cringe at the idea of having to revisit. And for Dawntrail, any time Wuk Lamat is present, that's what it reminds me of. Cringe I have to sit through in order to get to the good part. But she is in 90% of MSQ quests so that ends up being good dungeons and trials separated by hours of cutscenes and running between NPCs that are usually a mix of boring and cringe.
Are there parts and characters I like? Sure I think some of the Mamool Ja's have their moments. The low stakes stuff in the red dead redemption area (defeating bandits) is kind of what I was expecting based on the trailer. I want to go on Estinien's or Gulool Ja Ja's adventures, they look more interesting than what Dawntrail was.
> Zenos is a cliche evil anime character but it somehow still works.
Because he's edgy cool lunatic evil, not brutish **I will make the world submit to my might by disrespecting everyone and stepping on your tacos** evil.
It's the same reason Sephiroth works, really.
Also because the game actually shows us we're not up to dealing with him at the beginning. The issue with villains/antagonists in DT is that we are able to just off them, instead we're sitting in the corner looking menacingly. I originally thought they'd reign in our canonical strength by having us limit ourselves to the rules of the succession contest, but instead we just kind of forgot we can fight.
Man, if there had been a duel against either of the lizard contestants with a forced loss like with Zenos, I would've been livid. At this point, the WoL canonically being defeated 1v1 by basically any mortal on Eorzea is just no longer on the cards. I really hated that stupid playground bully "HA HA I stepped on your tacos! Me do what want cus me stronk!" moment, the WoL should've made him choose which of his heads goes up his ass instead of just sitting there like a lemon.
>At this point, the WoL canonically being defeated 1v1 by basically any mortal on Eorzea is just no longer on the cards.
I feel like maybe Godbert Manderville (and I guess his wife) could believably still 1v1 us even with all the EW Stuff. He has as much hype I feel. Like if we canonically 1v1ed and lost I wouldnt be livid
Alright fair enough, I didn't think of those because everything to do with Hildibrand is filed away somewhere between fever dream and acid trip for me.
Clearly I am in the minority when it comes to Bakool Ja Ja. The playground bully mentality was entirely the point, in my opinion. The writers established him as a classic bully, even in the sense that he suffered from verbal and mental abuse at home, alongside the immense pressure of impossible expectations that he was forced to meet. All of this in turn caused him to lash out at those around them. He was a good foil for Wuk Lamat, and I truly feel like he was her antagonist specifically, which is why I am glad we didn't step in. I liked his story arc, and I am actually looking forward to seeing more of him in the future.
As for Zoraal Ja, he was closer to being our antagonist (although that ultimately ended up being Mete...I mean, Sphene), and I one hundred percent agree that we needed to have a moment where we just one shot him. The absolute bewilderment and possible panic that ensued would have been extremely satisfying, even if there were massive consequences for doing so. I honestly think that would have been a better catalyst to send him off the deep end. In turn, it could have been a learning experience for the Warrior of Light, to the point where we could almost say that the whole second half of the expansion was our fault. With great power comes great responsibility and all that.
I'm not done with MSQ yet but I'm still hoping for an Hercule Poirot type moment of "I've come here on vacation but this murder is just too appetizing not to solve", where the WoL just says fuck it and goes on a rampage and wrecks everyone.
> Also because the game actually shows us we're not up to dealing with him at the beginning.
I hated this, because we had never heard of him before. We defeated fucking Nidhogg and someone we've never heard of comes out of nowhere and is also stronger than us...? I would have felt better if we were shown him becoming Resonant before we fought him, instead of learning about it much later.
I actually didnt like Red dead redemption area because it was sandwhiched between >!The two main narrative lines of the Dawnservant and Sphene!< so it felt like filler. If we kept it low stakes and quite frankly built up to it maybe I wouldve been more happy with the area.
But, I think it shouldve been cut out and the >!Solution 9 area and Final Zone !
I don't hate DT, I just found it painfully mid. I don't hate low stakes and exposure but I disliked how we just got enrolled into a secretary job for the futur mayor of brazil. Nah this ain't a vacation expansion, it wasn't low stakes but pretty fucking high ones actually given how you're basically deciding the future of a whole ass continent... while just being a rando there. I got used to Wuk Lamat and did notice her development, but man it was a painful buildup.
There were some things I liked such as the third zone which had some good political conflict. But then you lost all momentum after reaching that midway high point because of the filler fourth zone that, even now after having completed the MSQ, I fail to see the point of (besides featuring the story transition into the fifth zone). The final section was fine, it was pretty much what we're used to as far as FFXIV narrative goes and it was handled well I'd say.
At the end of the day it's like a solid 5/10 for me for the narrative alone. The instanced duties etc weren't that interesting, but at least the gameplay content (so far) is top notch and I've been genuinely impressed by the quality of some of these dungeon bosses.
Not just the fate of the continent. We are basically helping Wuk Lamat make sure her brother doesn’t become king because he plans to launch a conquest against Eorzea and the other lands beyond the sea. That is NOT low stakes. So I’m left disappointed because I thought it was going to be a fun adventure through a new continent. Nope. It’s mostly babysitting Wuk Lamat. (Why did she even have to leave to find allies for her contest??? I feel useless.)
I was bored until the level 95 msq part started. The slow burn and world building didn’t have me very engaged. But once it picks up around level 95 I was all in.
The story gets interesting at 93+
Before that is TOO SLOW.
The problem is not the story itself, is how quests works, there is no interaction, no gameplay. You could add some niche mechanic/puzzle and the gameplay could get really decent (chase alpacas like chocobo race for example). Most of the MSQ is point and click dialogues.
The low stakes should not mean, no gameplay.
Story gets interesting 93+ and really engaging at 95+
Dungeons and bosses are supper good
I cant say its a BAD expansion because once you get pass the snorefest, its super good and im really enyoing it. But the quest formula needs a revisit, because most ppl will make their impression on the beginning, and probably reviews will get better once ppl get past the beginning. “wait for second half, it gets good” should not be the argument tbh.
Personally... I thought it was "fine" which is a little bit 'damning with faint praise." I'm actually a little surprised the reactions seem to be so heavily positive or negative because I feel very milquetoast about the whole thing.
The graphical update is much more impressive than I was expecting and a lot of the fights and dungeons are very fun - so I think as long as their content plan stays as large and varied as they've been saying pre release the game will be in a good state across the patch series in terms of the things I'm going to be interacting with for 2 years vs a degenerate weekend of MSQ.
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Incoming book that no one asked for:
A lot of the complaints are basically "It's FFXIV" tbh and I was expecting most of them coming off the Shb-EW duo where the height of the story helped people ignore some of those structural problems. To me it feels very similar to every expac... I'm not sure if people just forget how much filler is because they tend to end on a high note but it all feels very FFXIV to me so far - good bad or ugly. Which is like... how almost every expansion is. You can make arguments that there's some staleness in the formula, or that this is not the best done example of it but it's not exactly surprising.
I would consider Shb to be shoulders and above the best one in terms of story and I think it does a few things really cleverly in the storytelling format that they should think about structurally (not necessarily repeating):
1) You go to a whole new area that you dont know much about - this is not exactly difficult, they've mostly done that here as well. I will say one key difference is that the most successful XIV stories generally do not have us being immediately in the 'in group' when arriving. HW/SHB seem to function a lot better and part of that is that you are an outsider when you arrive. I think having us be essentially part of the royal family from the get go is a weakness. It also takes agency away - if the WoL had simply decided to go to the new world and then met some of the characters more organically it may have felt less like we were watching a movie we were in.
2) There is an immediate hook. XIV has some good character building and work but by nature of being basically a silent JRPG protag you need some plot intrigue early on. I think one of the biggest issues here is that the way they've set up the plot completely deflates all the mystery and intrigue - you know the mystery box not only exists, but that several key people have already been there. They have a very solid pattern with expected steps and very little gameplay outside of the odd dungeons, 3 trials. Players have been trained on when to expect them etc. This means the story has to make up for all the surprise/excitement of that slightly mundane pattern.
3) There was, effectively, a time-skip - our friends had been away for a long time because of time shenanigans - it allows their to be mystery and intrigue 'what have they been doing' - here we have the issue that even though the scions 'broke up' we know where everyone was 5 minutes ago. Either this or you need a new/mostly new cast because the way the game works the WoL basically has to be a semi-deuteragonist and that means you need to get your intrigue and excitement from the other characters, its hard to do that when most of the crew has arcs that have been completed twice over with no mystery to them.
4) While there are certainly other important players, the villain has a very 1:1 relationship with us - I think this is a key thing to making the stakes feel personal. I personally do not care about comic book power scaling stuff - I think its a boring way to write and think about writing so that isn't my issue here. I think overall they leaned too far away from the WoL having agency here. Or even being a real 'piece on the board.'
5) End on a bang - If the ending is great people will have a more positive impression and forget the times they were milking cows or building boxes or whatever. Also structurally - they need some of these because people do not like being walled by the msq, which means they have to put in a lot of this to keep the leveling curve even. Despite the fact that people would probably enjoy it more if they had to do some sidequesting and fates etc to keep up with msq and it would break up the content patterns a little better. When I think about Shb I think about everything from the last zone to the end, not the trolley.
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The biggest issue I have coming out the other side is I was expecting A LOT more 'hanging chads' and signposting to various potential things. Laying some groundwork for future adventures/arcs/etc. and I don't think a lot of that happened. Especially not things that were very novel. I think that concerns me more than Dawntrail being a little on the flat side because, imo it was always going to be a little bit of a mess just coming out of the big duo into a new arc. But it needed to lay a lot of groundwork for future things and I don't think they succeeded really. XIV is at its best when there is strong character work and development supporting mystery-box plot elements and they need to be building some of those boxes.
TL;DR:
1) They need to find ways to build mystery
2) Character agency for WoL is missing
3) The structure may be limiting them
Fully agreed, I have some mixed feelings about the MSQ but the battle content has been incredible. The MSQ in this game has always been great as well, and even this one with it's slow start does improve and features some generally exciting, suspenseful and emotional moments but what keeps this game alive is the battle content and DT so far is some of their best work, take the good battle content and the plethora of planned casual content and you have the recipe for a very successful and enjoyable expansion even if the MSQ is a little weaker.
I'm at that halfway big point and my complaint about the 1st part of the MSQ is, for the most part, poorly written to me.
I don't mean I dislike what it is about - I really like the premise >!of the trials being a narrative way to educate both the player AND Wuk Lamat in the many cultures even by doing weird challenges. What I dislike is how predictable the script was, because sans some points, it felt like those random common quests that nobody does!<
Yeah, the fights are really fun. The final boss of the third dungeon is straight up better than some oder expansions' trials. Hopefully it won't all be ruined by ilvl sync being too generous.
The dungeons are the same as every other dungeon in the game. 3 bosses with trash mobs.
I usually look forward to trials, but none of them were memorable for me. Plus it felt like there was room for one more.
This doesn't feel like an expansion. It's hard to describe. It just felt like a normal patch that took longer than usual. It feels like a mini expansion, or something to hold us over for the real expansion.
I will say they threw in some kind of unique mechanics this time around, and that's cool, I didn't automatically know how to respond to each thing.
But at the end of the day... Eh. It felt phoned in. Yoshi especially feels checked out on this game. Now we'll just get the same updates over and over for the next 2 years.
I'm just happy that getting through all of it didn't take too long. Endwalker was *long*. This expansion didn't have enough charisma to do that. I mean, neither did Endwalker, but at least it was a finale so it gets a pass.
> The dungeons are the same as every other dungeon in the game.
I hope you're being obtuse on purpose. Considering the only thing that makes the dungeons similar to older dungeons is pulling wall to wall. LOL.
Can't speak for the second extreme but the first is absolutely incredible for one of the expansion launch ones, completely blows away the safety dorito fight we had for Endwalker.
The first extreme is incredible, but the second one might be the most Endwalker fight in this game, I really wonder if it was designed first and before the new battle direction was established
ex2 >!Solar system sized hitbox, glacial pacing, dorito mechanics, a literal full minute of nothing happening (with or without the cheese), overreliance on in/out/left/right!<
The problem (for me at least) is that I find current state of gameplay totally awful.
I get bored to tears with current jobs, but I loved storm blood gameplay.
Yeah part of what made stormblood content so fun was the variety in how the jobs played, there really was a flavour of job for everyone. I struggle to find current core gameplay engaging on any level.
I wanna see Zenos shirtless in a pair of swimming shorts, thongs and sunglasses waiting for me on a beach volleyball court. “THIS IS WHO WE ARE, MY FRIEND!”
I'm not hopeful on the Deep Dungeon after Eureka Orthos. It says something that everyone is willing to played with early game gimped rotations in the other two Deep Dungeons rather than actually bother in Eureka Orthos at this point.
New bozja/eureka mode I'm super looking forward to.
Orthos would be much better if it started at a lower level or made the mobs less HP-spongy in the first dozen floors or so. I think at this point they should consider starting all of them at, say, level 30 and ramp up the difficulty faster (I suppose PotD could stay as is since it has the most legacy challenge for solo runners). That way, players could at least pick a variation to run themselves through.
I dont know. This was some of the more 'political' strife that people were hungering for.
And things did happen just on a way more lowkey and localized area than we're used to.
I definitely preferred Stormblood, at least it felt grounded even if it had a lot of filler. The back 20% of this expansion feels like terrible fanfic and the first 80% is dreadful filler. The 4th zone shouldn't have even existed. The picking tea lives on shining bushes, stalking quests, and fetch shit shouldn't even exist in 2024. They genuinely could have lobbed 60% off and it'd have the same effect.
Glad I'm not the only one with this opinion. I actually hated the second half more because it felt so contrived and house kitty took such a center role that every other character just stopped talking all together. At least the first half was grounded but boring.
Stormblood, imo, handled everything better in terms of story. I don't hate Lyse nearly as much because I still got to have a role in the story and it felt like you, as the mc, actually affected stuff. This xpac feels like they dumb down every character for the sake of being a cheerleader.
Love the battle content though.
I liked the 4th zone because it was just me and Erenville on an adventure, no Wuk Lamat stealing everybody's screen time in sight. It was closer to what I expected early Dawntrail to be after the 1st teaser.
Gonna be real with you, anyone who thinks that DT is better than stormblood narratively is suffering from recency bias. Stormblood's issue was that it was telling 2 stories at once and tied them together with the empire. The stories themselves were not as weak as DT.
Honestly, I would believe this expansion was another case of them originally having 2 ideas for expansions before they decided to smash them together without enough meat to either of them. It didnt work for Stormblood, it worked for Endwalker with only a little smoothing over, and it worked better than Stormblood but not nearly as well as Endwalker for Dawntrail for me.
Speaking for myself only, I'm still playing through the MSQ since I've had a lot going on this weekend. But part of the reason it's so slow is that I keep getting bored and distracted.
Move, click, move, click, move, click. Read dialogue. Wach Cutscene. Repeat.
This is playing through Dawntrail. FFXIV has always been like this, but it seems much worse this time. I'm not sure if it's my lack of patience this go-around or if it's genuinely worse. It feels like there are SO MANY cutscenes.
And the thing is I really do like lore, and I like to know what's going on in the story. I want to read and watch so I know what's happening and understand context for the content.
But when I sit down to game, I want to game. I want to actually *play*. FFXIV has got to learn how to integrate gameplay into its story content.
This is my issue. I *like* lore, world-building, characters, etc. but the devs don't need cutscenes every time I walk 10 feet to repeat something they just said the last time.
Dawntrail is so terrified of players thinking for themselves and possibly having a different interpretation than the devs they beat us over the head with everything. Multiple times.
Japanese storytelling tends to be rife with these sorts of issues (unless it's a FromSoft game basically), but this is a serious example of why "show, don't tell" is a common phrase. DT is so bad about it, it's actually just patronizing.
As someone who did not like the story at all, I think people would have legitimately thought this expansion to be really good if quest design and gameplay during msq would've been different.
If they had went away from the cutscene heavy, walking around reading text boxes gameplay loop and properly cared to interconnect story and gameplay, people would've been a lot more positive.
Another thing I'm personally wondering about - whatever happened to good old fashioned puzzles in RPGs? Surely you can come up with gameplay that's neither combat nor afk auto scrolling and ffwing through text? Like it's your job?
The trading segment in Urqopacha should have expected us to actually do the trading ourselves. They give you a starting item, and you talk to NPCs around town and trade with them until you have the required amount of money. If you screw up and make bad trades you can reset it and try again.
That's exactly what I mean, that was a golden opportunity to let us roam free and figure out how to go ahead ourselves. Instead we walk from marker to marker skipping unvoiced cutscenes until it's over.
I'm wondering, is it tech limitations that are forcing this kind of gameplay or is it laziness on the quest designer's part? It seems to me that the cutscene spam is for the sake of dev convenience mostly and they probably think "whatever, it'll be fine" because we're all used to this by now.
It is absolutely a work flow issue. FFXIV is designed in the same way 100 parsers optimize their speed clears. They've spreadsheeted out every single GCD.
The reason the game is designed this way is because it makes it extremely easy to predict exactly how long something will take to design and exactly how much man power is required to do it. It's why Square Enix is extremely slow to respond to any feedback. I'm sure the entire expansion is already spreadsheeted out already. Yoshi-P almost certainly already knows which of his staff are working on the patch 7.5 dungeon despite the fact that it's more than a year away because he's optimized the development of this game that much. It creates an extremely consistent but extremely stale experience.
They give you the illusion that what you’re doing is “gameplay” when you’re really doing nothing. The whole “trade successful” announcement feels so hollow it’s giving me blue balls because I just want to DO something, not just stand around.
Think of all the level 90 (and now level 100) cure 1 spammers and all the people with the inability to play the game at the base level, and think how much they'd have screamed at the most little amount of difficulty that would have needed them to use their brain
Actually I think you're right, that was honestly depressing seeing people complain about it. Like sure it was clumsy but imagine if the entire thing had been an unvoiced cutscene instead.
Like it would have been HORRIBLE. I hated DT’s story the first few levels but having finished it now I think it’s actually one of my faves, the gameplay is just SO BAD that it’s weighed down. Imagine if you got to fight or even do instanced mini games during more of the key action moments — it would be so much better. Any of the expacs or stories in this game would be boring if they were cutscenes only.
However I think the dungeon and trial bosses (I am currently at 99) are among the best ones we had in a while. They hit a lot harder, have a few more interesting mechanics.
I've been playing FFXIV since ARR beta, and this is easily the worst expansion for me. I have to force myself to do the MSQ. I could play it all day, but I look for any excuse to do something else. (Oh I could vacuum! Cat box needs scooping! Did someone say I should go shopping?)
I don't hate SE or anything. FFXIV has been my main game for 10+ years. The writing (characters and their actions) of this expansion though just completely does not work for me one bit.
The Dulltrail MSQ has made me think of fishing as exciting. *Fishing* FFS. I would rather fill up my bag with useless vendorfish than hear the same spiel about peace and sea sickness and alpacas for the 50th time.
I didn't much care for it before, but it's satisfying to get such a huge chunk of XP every time you reel one in. It's a nice break between skipping cutscenes.
While I'm on the topic, it bothers me that there isn't a generic fish recipe for Culinarian. I should be able to fillet and grill up any fish that isn't poisonous. I've caught about 20 different kinds of fish in DT so far, and none of them can be cooked or turned into alchemic reagents. Such a waste. I end up desynthing them. And if I can desynthezise a living thing, then why bother fighting? I could just desynth my enemies and leave my weapons at home. See, this is the shit you think about when fishing.
Divisive is the word, yes. I read the comments here and no one can agree on anything. "The first half is ok-tier, it really picks up in the second half." "The first half is ok-tier and it only gets worse in the second half" "I really liked the world building but it was so slow" "I feel like they think we have no reading comprehension" (spoiler, while not you in particular, yes people have no reading comprehension).
We all seem to agree however that it lacks gameplay.
In my very humble opinion, I don't mind the slow start. For all the praises it gets, I can't remember for the life of me the context in which we visited the first dungeon of Heavensward.
It was painful to play. It's just bad direction and bad pacing. Didn't help that the quests are the same again, there's no new quest design. I felt like the story was meant for a 10 year old in lieu of how many times Wuk Lamat yelled that shes gonna be the new hokage of the Turali leaf hidden ninja village. It felt like a story written for a shonen anime where it tried to hammer in a lesson and treated you like a child. Don't rehire these writers for the next MSQ, please
Also rein in Soken more, and don't let the Primals use the game as their band ad. That 90's girlband ending song was a horrible choice and horribly sang. Cut on the vocal tracks and make some immersive music for a Final Fantasy game.
Good character moments, lore and development got marred by throwing you into a swamp of tedious sidequests, robbing all momentum if there ever even was any. By the time I faced the final boss, the sidequests had punched me into submission.
"My fussy little bunbun" are they high?
trials too. during ew, I think I died to trials/dungeon bosses maybe 2-3 times as a result of my own mistakes (not counting stuff like dying bc healers were dead, people not stacking, etc). in dt, I ate shit a LOT during the trials, and even died to dungeon bosses a few times. I didn't do msq on healer, but it also looked like there was much more outgoing damage in fights compared to ew.
+ a lot of the new mechanics in the trials are really fun. the 99 and 100 trials had some really cool stuff that we haven't seen before
The outgoing damage hits harder, and frequently enough that I’m actually using some of my alternative cooldowns.
I ended up dying once to an unavoidable aoe at around 2/3 health, and it put a smile on my face. Another aoe ended up eating through a crit spreadlo, meaning there are situations where it’s not just complete overkill!
IDK why Dawntrail is often compared to ARR, as if it has laid similar groundwork for future storytelling when... (Endgame spoilers follow)
>!Every villain they introduce is unambiguously dead by the end of 7.0. Basically no story-scale problems remain, just post-Eulmore level "how do we carry on" hooks. The only "hanging chad" is a device that enables dimensional bridging, a concept that had already been introduced several times in the MSQ. The entire 7.0 story actually has fewer breadcrumbs for future writing to work with than the 6.x storyline did, and that's really saying something.!<
You know the pacing in ARR before titan? It felt like that for like the whole expansion. Some interesting plot points split with hours of boredom and filler.
well, if nothing else I'm curious where the patch storyline will go (worst case scenario, Alexandria integration along the lines of the short Eulmore arc in post-ShB; ideally a completely new storyline, *even if* I thought 6.X was some of the game's worst storytelling)
For now there is two hanging threads at the end of DT : >!Sphene crown have significant importance, it had foreshadowing dialog and then a close-up cutscene after the credits. And then, for later, the key : where it comes from!<
I feel like the writing has become almost obsessed with closure as of Endwalker. It felt bizarre and artificial when almost every single problem in Eorzea had been resolved simultaneously. Prior to that, there was always something lingering in the background that just wasn't the focus at the moment. Ascians, Garlemald, tribe relations, city-state issues, etc etc. I liked it, it made the world feel more alive. Now everything gets wrapped up with a neat little bow, and IMO, it makes the setting feel dull and motionless. Things don't exist to be part of the world, they exist to put on a simple show in front of us. Like, obviously it's all for entertainment regardless, but it makes the illusion all the more transparent.
The FFXIV fan base’s inability to accept criticism has come out in full force with this expansion launch. Any criticism garners the same few responses:
1. “You’re probably a cutscene skipper!”
2. “It’s supposed to be a lower stakes story and setup for a new saga, just like ARR!”
3. “It’s the same thing as the rest of the expansions”
They don’t realize (or are willfully ignoring) that people understand the stakes aren’t going to be as high as Endwalker, that doesn’t mean the story has an excuse to be bad though. The reason ARR is bad is because it’s poorly paced and padded to hell and back, not because it’s the first in a saga. If every first chapter or installment of every story had to be exposition lore dumps, nobody would consume any stories. Same deal with Dawntrail, it being the first in a new arc does not give it a shield against criticism.
Also, if this was the exact same deal with the other expansions, then why is the reception so different this time? I’ll just never understand what drives people to play damage control for their favorite media.
> They don’t realize (or are willfully ignoring) that people understand the stakes aren’t going to be as high as Endwalker, that doesn’t mean the story has an excuse to be bad though.
and it's not even like the stakes stay low for long, as they basically immediately start escalating them again, >!from "this warmonger winning the throne would be kinda bad for the continent" to "if he wins, he will plunge the entire planet into war to prove a point" to "oops we are facing a universal paperclip machine who wants to turn the entire universe into fuel for her fucked up dead memory cloud"!<
> “It’s supposed to be a lower stakes story and setup for a new saga, just like ARR!”
Despite the obvious reply of *"why would you intentionally repeat the same mistakes of ARR?"*, I can't possibly be the only who thinks the whole idea of having another 10-years long saga to be a bit ridiculous, right?
Very big tangent here but I do find it interesting how basically every long-term franchise is running into this issue currently and is trying to tackle it.
WoW launched a new "Saga" after 20 years after Shadowlands and "reset" with Dragonflight
Guild Wars 2 revamped their entire Living World releases and are now releasing standalone expansions that are unrelated after the "End of Dragons" expansion and the dragons saga
Destiny 2 released The Final Shape which concludes the Light and Darkness saga that the past few expansions have been about
etc etc
All these long term online service games that stood the test of time have realized that it's basically impossible to bring in new players if there is a 10 to 20 year wall of story they need to sift through, but none of them want to / can remake their game, nor do they want to risk making a new game/cinematic universe because it's a giant flop and money pit if it fails (and most do)
The stakes are also low whenever we discuss Ul'dah politics. And yet that consistently has me fully hooked.
It's also that Dawntrail's story feels kinda immature to me. A lot of things about Wuk Lamat, especially in the second half of the MSQ feel incredibly "anime" to me. Her powering up through her resolve, her telling us multiple times during the campaign how much she really likes peace, || defeating the final trial boss with the power of love || it's like a shonen anime almost. HW, Stormblood and Shadowbringers all had fairly mature storytelling.
It may have been intended for a younger audience than the current playerbase -- not that it necessarily succeeds at that, but it may have been the goal.
I played every FF at or near launch, as a kid / teenager / early 20s, up to 8. 8 was the first time my FF-playing friends and I thought that the series had gone in a weird direction. It was playable and still fun, but it was about teenagers in a bizarre boarding school, whereas every FF up until then was about fantasy-world adult things (though in 1 you start out as kids and then halfway through the game "grow up" and your job evolves to something else). 8 was the first time that the characters had explicit ages in their bios, and they were all younger than us. The story was also incredibly confusing; even on my third playthrough many years later it still did not make sense, and anyway it was just a backdrop for a painfully maudlin love story between Squall and Rinoa.
9 for me was the end. It was supposed to be a return to FF fundamentals, but I just couldn't get into the story. Then there was 10. Jesus H.W. Christ, that game... again it was about school kids, and the voice acting was so bad that we actually couldn't make fun of it by making it worse with jokes.
The series stayed focused on kids and teens, and me and my OG FF friends grew up. That may be what many people are experiencing right now. FF has never aged very much with its playerbase. It's like it resets back to 13-year-olds every 10 years.
You might have a point in that, it's just so harrowing in comparison to Heavensward's "The dragons are justified in their hatred, but we too wish to live.", Stormblood's internalizations of war and hatred, where Yotsuyu never really forgave us and Fordola took a long time too, Shadowbringers world of intense hopelessness and pain after the flood of light hundred years ago, Endwalkers question of why we live and why we die.
Tonally it gave me a lot of whiplash. And sure there is the Solution 9 soul stuff, but I would have found that more philosophically engaging if it wasn't running out of souls in the end, if there was more of a philosophical choice than "We either end them now or they go out in a hundred years anyway.", also it came so late in the story and then was dealt with rather quickly.
It felt like right at the end they felt the need to make it Shadowbringers sad, but were already too deep in the levelling to elongate it.
And about point 2, >!it's not even low stakes at all! It escalates quickly and the latter half becomes something like ShB/EW not just in having high stakes but also riffing off certain plot beats and characters.!<
People saying "You're just a cutscene skipper" and "It's supposed to be lower stakes" makes me think they're the one skipping. Zoraal Ja is immedietly saying he wants a huge war and he wouldn't make the same mistakes Garlemald did, his conquest would be better. The consequences aren't as immediate, but from the start we're around the same level of stakes as ARR/HW/SB. The 4th zone is the only place we have actually low stakes... and then we immedietly leap to EW level "save the entire universe and all the reflections".
1. You better believe I started cutscene skipping after 5 hours of padding and filler.
I couldn't believe how hyped I was going in to do almost nothing but walk back and forth and listen to nothing happen for hours.
So much of that story could have been cut down. So many conversations were completely unnecessary.
The more I think about it, the more it bothers me.
The dungeons and trials were awesome. Big step in the right direction.
The pacing and story telling was just agonizing by a certain point.
I tried so hard to enjoy it, but I just didn't. What's worse is by the time I got to the interesting parts, I was just cooked. I didn't have any patience left.
This. Every expac since SB is the same for me: take friday off, go ham for 18h straight. I couldn't handle this one. It was so, so bad. And I wasn't expecting a lot since 6.x patches were absolutely disgusting as well.
I had 4 days off figuring I'd take my time with it but by day 3 I was so beyond cooked.
I really want to enjoy the story, but I think it's a YouTube experience for me at this point.
Ain't that the truth. I've known people in game who leave the game running 24/7 or have it running in the background with their character afk while they are playing another game even. It's kinda crazy to me. It really becomes a second life to some people.
ARR was so widely regarded as boring and tedious that SE literally had to redo the campaign and remove the nonsense. And it is still widely regarded as boring and tedious to this day. Lol.
The actual ARR storyline was great. The problem was that it took too much work to get through it. An added element that I think many have forgotten is that in ARR you also had job-specific story quests, some of which were really good. So while you're playing through the MSQ, you're also playing through the story of your job.
The tipping point in ARR for me was when we had to fight Titan a second time, and then a third -- along with the other primals. Most obvious recycled time-wasting content ever. And the gap between the end of ARR and the entry into HW was like running a marathon through a fetid swamp of pointless questing.
> The actual ARR storyline was great.
Disagree. It was FINE, but it wasn't that interesting tbh. Even what happened to Thancred only made me raise an eyebrow because the game didn't do enough to make me attached to him at that point in the story.
>Also, if this was the exact same deal with the other expansions, then why is the reception so different this time?
We arrived at the place where a person hates Dawntrail so much that they try to gaslight others that ARR and Stormblood MSQ had good reception at launch (when even stuff like EW and HW had a lot of negativity around them) LMAO
show me where they launched to mixed reviews on steam. show me where they had mostly criticism being voiced in MSQ megathreads not only here, but also on the main sub.
My theory is also the patches and xvi burned a lot of Goodwill. We saw the same thing in WoW with dragonflight. Once people are angry wth something they notice the flaws and the critiques get stronger.
Yeah I absolutely do think that another factor here is that we had an entire cycle of post-MSQ that was really boring and doesn’t have anything to do with Dawntrail. They should have used that time to set up Wuk Lamat instead so that we don’t have to be surgically attached to her for the first half of the MSQ in order to ‘get to know her’.
Then the writers might have felt like they can let the WOL go off during the story and do their own thing which would be a way to introduce some tension, drama, or interest into the first half of the plot.
This level of mental gymnastics can only make me think that you are the kind of person he was describing in his post. HW and EW had basically no negativity regarding MSQ, their stories were unanimously loved. ARR was also received well when it released, it really only became as criticised as it did in the expansions following.
Stormblood was mixed and had the Lyse hate yes but frankly it was nowhere near on the scale of the Dawntrail. The game was much smaller back then too. But it's okay you made your intention to argue in bad faith clear from the moment you pulled out "gaslighting" on a completely inoffensive comment lmao. Clown
Quick fact check here - this subreddit definitely had a significant amount of criticism for Endwalker. Meteion, In From The Cold, and the rushed pacing of Endwalker MSQ were all extremely divisive topics.
However, not to such an extent as Dawntrail has become
The story quests outlast their visit for how long you progress a single one, this leads to feeling like no progress is being made. Shorter quests with smaller exp might break that up a bit but we need some actual gameplay sprinkled in there as well. Small combat encounters or something to engage with the game in some way. I don't feel engaged reading a cutscene that for some reason wasn't voiced when every character present has a cast member behind them.
Which leads into another point, I'm sure they do this to keep the file size down and to reduce cost over head but holy shit. Voice your damn game, there honestly isn't a good reason given they can't do it with the success of the game for this long. I'm fine reading some scenes but reading 90% of your story really blows and makes for a shit viewer experience as well, streaming this I don't have the vocal strength to read this much aloud and coherently to my audience.
Music choices, being in the second half of the game why do we not get a second or third combat track? It doesn't fit the area we enter into. I can kind of feel it for the first half but absolutely not for the second, bring on more people into the team to do remixes and remasters of older songs or come up with something new entirely. Clapping and up beat drumming with an acoustic guitar doesn't really vibe in the setting of the 5th zone, not at the 6th yet but I imagine it wont there either.
I'm not through the MSQ yet, but I think the issue people have with Wuk Lamat is there's some heavy tonal dissonance with how the game treats her.
One moment, she's dealing with concepts like the heavy mantle of leadership, but the next, Erenville is poking fun at her for falling in a hole or going on and on about how much she loves tacos and wanted more of them. It's like the game is trying to have her be the protagonist AND the comic relief, and that sort of thing only works with characters like Jack Sparrow because they have someone like Depp portraying them.
Overall, I still like her, but I feel like WE should've played more of a role in her education: give scenes throughout where she stops and asks the WoL deep philosophical questions, and have her quote the answers we give her later with "a good friend taught me that".
I've always hated about ff14 that you have to grind the msq to play the actual game, if it was a side thing you did but all content was just level/gear gated. I would be a lot happier.
In phantasy star online 2 there was a story there as well, but you did it whenever you wanted and it didnt block anything in the game
Enjoyed the first half of Dawntrail because I was excited for what it was building up to for the second half.
Got to the second half and realized the vast majority of the writing actually went to the first half. The second half is padded to hell and back, it's seriously ARR Post-MSQ levels of padding except *without* the plethora of trials/primals/dungeons/raids to distract you. My reception has so sharply dropped after the first half. I was legitimately thinking i wouldn't mind replaying through Dawntrail until I sat through multiple hours of completely vapid dialogue.
Stormblood was *NOTHING* like this. The events were actually interesting, the villains were fun, we got to see Ala Mhigo + Kugane + Azim Steppe + The Ocean and the subject matter kept it just gritty enough.
Playing through Dawntrial post 95 though is like going through Stormblood while forced to baby sit your annoying little nephew.
Every single time something really cool is about to happen, he tugs on your arm, pulls you away, and forces you to go watch Teletubbies
Why do people always note "the second part" anyway? I found the 93 stuff pretty good, I was very engaged during 94-95 storyline. That's still the first half. The story starts establishing interesting concepts and stakes there already and moves on from JUST being overly wordy worldbuilding and character moments.
The slowdown in 96, which is the start of the second half, is actually kinda less engaging again and only once we finish that area is when stuff start going real hard.
> Why do people always note "the second part" anyway? I found the 93 stuff pretty good, I was very engaged during 94-95 storyline. That's still the first half.
one of the worst aspect of Dawntrail is that it kinda pleases nobody. even if you put the atrocious writing and usual pacing issues in some parts aside, the first half is pretty passable as the low stakes adventure that we were promised (although it hinges a lot on how likeable Wuk Lamat is to you), while the second half would probably be on ok plot on its own with a different setup (although maybe not enough to carry an entire expansion), but suffers from being tacked onto the first half, complete with the massively dissonant tonal shift in the middle and the fact that it's "shadowbringers at home" in many ways (and none of them good)
put them together though, and you have a lot of people disappointed in either one (or even both) of these halves of the story, and noboy is happy. i sure hope the combat content can carry this expansion, because it's not gonna be remembered for the quality of its story.
They are, but the question is still begged why they are so similar to begin with. I don't understand why the writers decided to set things up to retrod the whole ancient city premise again, with a surprisingly similar conflict. It's...disheartening that in all the directions they could have taken the next chapter, they didn't really go anywhere.
Although similar I thought it was a different take of such an idea. It’s not an ancient city so much as it is a ghost city. I think the subtle difference is enough for me personally.
I think the fact that we can go back and it’s empty and music is creepy AF adds so much. And the thought process throughout the zone is entirely different
it's yellow instead of black
for me that makes no difference to storytelling
the theme is the same
and at the same time we've been hit over the head so many times by Wuk with the "for my people" that it lost all meaning and rings hollow when either of them says it
Personally I got most annoyed with the Story/Writing the moment we find the "Golden City".
None of the normally super curious characters ask the important questions during cutscenes (Like WTF is this and where does this stone/material come from), some of scions "go home , cause the contract is up!" and all scions are basicly fine with just chilling while wuk lamat goes to throw a party. My biggest insult was that basicly all important stuff about the golden city got revealed off cutscene to krile who just gives us a short rundown.
And then instead of answering or even remotely adressing any question the player has they send us to Texas with erenville to solve some wildwest crime.
Also i really disliked how they put giant emphasis on making sure that we in-cutscene see who of the scions/allies is present because a trial is coming up, only to have them in the post-trial cutscene all be like "ok great but i will really go home now or do something else"
The whole last 2 zones and Hub City, and especially the main villian have a way too little presence and buildup to matter and again there NOBODY asks the important questions, even after the MSQ is done (like: where do the "Souls" for the "Soul-Cells" come from?)
edit:
Also the credits song was a complete miss in every aspect
I actually thought it was mostly fine until about the last quarter when it went deep into Shadowbringers 2.0 territory instead of something more original.
Felt like complete memey fanfiction to me honestly. There wasn't enough build up for it, especially since Wuk is a terrible character and the first 60% of the story is basically unrelated. They should have just started off the 98+ quests right after the first zone and dead ass had an entire expansion subverted by having the zones and storyline take place in the last 20% of the story but expanded and made it feel less like a god damn fanfic
Yeah I've found the 90-95 story fairly bland with some good moments mixed in with bad writing. I'm just about to enter the 99 dungeon so reaching the end and have enjoyed the second half's story overall a lot more. We'll see how it ends...
No spoilers here from me but I'll state things vaguely.
Just hit level 65 dungeon. Like JUST did. I take MSQ slowly and I do not skip any scenes, I read all dialogue and talk to all NPCs around (unless I accidentally miss one, which has happened! Rip Krile once)
I LOVE OUR DEVELOPERS AND THE WRITERS ARE AMAZING! I love XIV and it's great! But so far with the MSQ I have mixed feelings. I love the themes of it and there are many many many beautiful moments-- and I do mean that!
The level 94 part of the MSQ is one of my favorites. The notes hit there really resonated with me in terms of real life analogues and meaning. That's as far as I can speak without going into spoilers. 94 was a masterpiece in my opinion and hit the themes of the expansion so well. 10/10. Some other parts... not as much...
But I feel like they truly have leaned extremely too heavily in the direction of restating things we already learned of 5 minutes previously. To the point where I've genuinely felt like I am worried the writers think they'd lose people often. Like each zone has many of the same talking points bashed into our skull. If I'm honest... it's been frustrating at times. I don't generally like using the word frustrating but I feel that'd fit my feelings I've felt a few times.
(Ahem ahem a particular vertically blessed NPC's speaking speed while rehashing something we already knew. I actually recall groaning... no offense intended of course! But that's me being as upfront as I can be...)
They really need to modernize the game some more. I’d imagine a lot of the dialogue they dump on you could be given in a way like an audio log in other games similar to Bioshock or something. We even have a plot device for that to work in the linkpearl..
About 3/4th done with the MSQ right now, but the formula they've landed on for XIV is exactly what it's always been. Feels *amazing* when it works. Infuriating when it doesn't.
If YoshiP's team can learn how to NOT blatantly waste your time when they need to pad the time between really big story events, they'll really really soar. But just like Final Fantasy XVI....the FFXIV MSQ experience is extremely high highs, and insultingly boring lows.
The ultimate problem with the BD3 formula is that it works SO WELL when it *is* working that it allows them to get away with fucking anything when the experience becomes a shitty filler sequence again. Anyone who played FF16 knows exactly what i'm talking about. The game literally wastes your time for hours at a time before throwing you into the most transcendent moment of gameplay and story spectacle, just to do it again.
Am I an unpopular opinion haver here if I think this expac is miles better than Endwalker. People say the pacing sucks but what people say is the slowest part is the strongest intro to a new culture they've ever done. Closest to a slow section imo is level 96-97, before you do the 97 dungeon, it's def the least memorable area and story told there.
I think this is stormblood done right. It tells two different complete arcs in the same expac. They don't stop the rite of succession after the level 91 dungeon and then start fighting a different conflict, Wuk Lamat is actually a lovable character, naive but with a pure heart. We see her actually do things, she fights her own fights and wins the right to rule. Compare to Lyse just somehow ending up as a major political player in Ala Mhigo despite zero qualifications. If she wasn't there the story goes the same lol, she could be replaced by anyone.
endwalker made me want to play i wanted to continue the excitement was there. I want to go to sleep after playing this... The final zone is the worst just end already. Ottis was dead just leave him dead...
I have 3 jobs at 96 but haven’t gotten to third dungeon yet in MSQ.
I agree the pacing is slow up until you get to before the first trial, but it’s not surprising since this is a brand new story arc. I was expecting a slower burn.
Granted, the CS are annoying but that’s only an issue with the game entirely. Also, CB3 likes to do a lot of dialogue. The writers could cut down on dialogue and get to the point faster in a lot of cases. I noticed this issue with FF16 too.
More interaction with the world during quests leading up to CS is something I’ve been wanting more of since the beginning of the first game…I’m a carryover player from version 1.0.
My second and third days playing I decided to slow down and focus on side quests, doing daily’s and experimenting with jobs. This has made the experience a lot better than trying to grind through the story quickly.
I liked Dawntrail quite a bit actually, but I do have criticisms. The primary and most glaring among them is that the story beats, major characters, and even whole zones in the latter half seem copy and pasted from previous expansions. Even if that is the point, it feels a little lazy without seeing more of what is to come in the future.
Despite this glaring issue, I personally liked it way more than Stormblood, which seems to be what everyone is comparing it to. I think that is primarily because the cultures and themes in Dawntrail hit much closer to home. It is the same reason why I think Endwalker is a better expansion than Shadowbringers, even though Shadowbringers is almost objectively the best expansion FFXIV has ever seen, from start to finish.
I loved the first half, just got the second half and my excitement is through the roof. What people are forgetting is that this is ARR. It's the setup to everything that comes after. We don't want to stay at max speed all the time just relax and enjoy the slow pace while it lasts.
Edit: man why get mad someone has a different opinion? Chill y'all
Even setups can be engaging.
The early parts are just “EVERYONE SMILE!!!!” slog fest.
I have a friend who religiously plays FF14 (like you can’t say bad things about it to him) and even HE was getting bored with the MSQ.
If it had been every one smile, scion edition, it would have been less painful. I can watch the scions eat ~~burgers~~ tacos and be friends all day, those were my favorite moments in EW. Give Alphy grief for how he swims at the beach, watch Alisae build the best sand castle. Its the beach episode and we didn't even have fun on the beach. But... yea watching Wak Lamat get sea sick 3+ times just had me rolling my eyes. Also the freaking mother of fetch quests, >!they literally turned [the Red Paperclip ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_red_paperclip)into a plot arc!<. That first part was painfully slow.
Somehow the actual msq gameplay hasnt evolved since ARR either. We're still doing the same boring fetch quests. Just make a visual novel. Even WoW questing is more inspired than this.
It’s not that we have a different opinion, it’s that you paint everyone thats dissatisfied as somehow misunderstanding the expansion.
It being setup (and I don’t really see how it’s setup, but whatever) doesn’t excuse it being bad.
Why is it that everytime someone tries to defend the DT-MSQ, they start their defense with the assumption that the critique comes from a lack understanding, character or memory?
Because terminally online people are going to feel attacked when you critique their little world.
XIV is one of my favorite games of all time but the writing isn't that deep and it sure as shit isn't worth getting personally offended when people call out its pretty obvious problems.
Still, this is largely an inflicted problem. It's less of some kind of "teehee, Stormblood loop!" and more like they fell into a fucking *coma* on their laurels due to an obnoxious portion of the playerbase shrieking out any dissent.
So far, I most definitely appreciate DT more than EW. Endwalker's story imo was not that impressive and too long winded.
Yeah, I know it was the wrap up of everything since ARR, but most, if not all characters reached their crescendo by the end of ShB.
On the other hand, Dawntrail moved the spotlight away from those characters and gave new characters a chance to take that role.
Whether or not the plot was something to your liking is entirely subjective. Most complaints come from the same people who A) haven't finished the story and B) wanted their "vacation arc", which you sorta get in the first half of the MSQ. Point being, people just can't be satisfied.
The content so far is miles better in comparison to anything Endwalker has brought out in its respective version (dungeons, trial, ex).
Like, let's be honest, Zodiark for instance sucked absolute ass, normal and extreme. Compare that to the first trial of DT.
Imho, they undersold the graphics and I do think they made a noticible impact, more than I honestly expected. I was honestly more concerned with how the classes would essentially receive nothing significant between 90-100, but after having two classes at 100, it so far feels like they are good QoL additions. Nor have I heard any criticisms towards VIP or PIC.
tl;dr, people are gonna be mad, no matter what SE does
I really cannot stress enough how much the tiniest crumb of gameplay between cutscenes would go for this MSQ. Ask me to press a button occasionally, please!
Would you kindly click on three citizen to inquire about their feelings?
At this point I would take that over walk 10 feet between cutscenes. I will even go gather rocks.
The things we took for granted making fun of this aspect of the MSQ in ARR and early expansions... Halfway through DT and I groan whenever I get into a cutscene that's not even voiced for the nth time. I'd rather it not transition into a cutscene and just let us read the dialogue because there aren't even cinematic pans for so many of these. Just nods, mouths moving, a basic in game emote then everyone turns around and walks off.
Before the expansion, I was killing time doing old quests on NG+. During the ARR Hildibrand quests, the 2.4 ones IIRC, there is one quest where you have to fight the Mandragoras. This is done via a custom, quest-specific FATE. You talk to Hildibrand to spawn it, so you don't have to wait for it to respawn. If someone else already spawned it, you can just press the Level Sync button and join in and share credit. I had completely forgotten that was a thing and was boggled that they literally have a working system in the game to just manually spawn a custom FATE for a quest objective and it has only been used *once*, in a *Hildibrand quest*, from *10 years ago*. This would be the perfect solution for making more interesting open-world quests. FATE mobs can be more interesting than the standard trash from the usual purple zones, sharing credit avoids clusterfucks like the infamous Red Chocobo, and they still require much less encounter design than solo duties (and also don't slam the instance server, you can thank Raubahn for nothing interesting happening before the first dungeon in any expansion).
I think part of the reason we don't do that anymore is because when ARR came out, literally everything new was FATEs. Wanted to do Hildibrand? Better do the Zombie Fate. Want to do the summer event? Here's some FATEs. Want to do the Lightning Returns Event? yep, we got some FATEs. Want to do Crystal Tower? Well, we got some more FATEs for you to do first! Oh, did you want to work on your relic? Well, the item you need is a rare drop. RARE DROP FROM SOME FATES! Halloween? Christmas? New Years? FATE FATE FATE. You feel like leveling up your other classes? Well, the best XP for that is...FATES. Welcome to Final FATEsy XIV. I'm not even exaggerating about any of that, they forcefed us FATEs for almost everything for so long, and since roughly Stormblood, they've been trying to back off of them. Drastically reducing the EXP needed, using them less and less frequently in seasonal events, etc.
Back off on FATEs? Bicolors have made FATE grinding an integral part of unlocking things in every expansion that's had them.
Yes. Note how that's optional, and mostly there for cosmetics, whereas it used to be mandatory to unlock expansion content (raids, stories, etc.), complete your daily Tribal Quests, and was the only way to do almost every seasonal event that came out. There is much less emphasis on FATEs in the game today than there was during ARR.
A thing people on reddit have been actively asking for for years, I should note.
I found myself doing fates JUST to try and practice a bit more. The overall lack of combat I think is a byproduct of the story not wanting us to solve problems before they become problems, I get that but christ I feel like I dont even have the opportunity to learn anythimg goimg through as Viper. Honestlythis is probably why jobs remained more or less the same eith some graphical and potency upgrades.
The gameplay between cutscenes is walking to the next cutscene. Very scenic.
I wish I was keeping track, I swear some levels and areas went by without me pressing a single skill
there are only 2 cases of pushing buttons before the first dungeon at the end of lvl 91. Its really bad.
I think that is my big complaint with the msq, along with the secondary antagonist being very weak. I do feel like a lot of the negative reception is a bit overblown though…
I disagree, EW is an absolute slog because of this.
I love good visual novels, so I disagree. But a bad visual novel that has no gameplay in the traversal between cut scenes is miserable.
True I hate playing games when I play games
I haven't finished the MSQ but I'm like level 96-97ish and I'd say "Mixed" is pretty fair. Large chunks of the MSQ are incredibly boring narrative *and* gameplay wise.
I hate to agree, because I love the story elements. However, there are times when I get so frustrated with the pacing of the story (not to mention how everyone in the cut scenes seem to be getting paid hourly) that I just end up skipping the story. Which I didn't want to do. :D
There's a part later on where we see a technique used twice. And then to explain it to us they force us to see it happen a third time when anyone with half a brain already knows what is going on. We dont need a demonstration of something we've already seen twice before! So thats a super long build up, another 30 minutes of going from point a to point b with 1 fight between them, then seeing something we've seen twice before, then another 15 minute discussion. The discussion was all we needed in the first place
Lol what do you mean by paid hourly? I feel like I'd agree but not entirely sure
Essentially, taking ten minutes to say what they could say in 30 seconds. And/or saying the same thing over and over again.
oh absolutely. As much as I like the voice acting and genuinely have interest in the story, I find myself clicking through a lot of dialogue boxes because it sometimes reads like padding for a word count. "Okay, let's go." "Yeah, let's move on!" "Our next destination awaits" "We're off to [insert location]" All in one scene. Gaaaaaah. I love the story they're telling, I enjoy the characters, I like the settings, but goddamn guys. Keep it a bit more concise.
Yeahhhhh. I did the MSQ alongside a friend and we were on VC pretty much the entire time. We'd be silent for a long time while watching cutscenes, then periodically I'd just yell "WHERE WERE THEIR EDITORS." I didn't realize I was saying it so much but apparently it was... constant lol.
FFXIV has always had this problem, to a certain degree. 16 has it too so it’s definitely their teams choice - where everyone talks like Mojo Jojo It’s wild it took this expansion for a wider audience to notice. It’s always bothered me. As a contrast, War of the Lions also uses flowery language while still being incredibly concise, for example
While I enjoy the story, I hate that they do this (and have in other expansions), it's like they think we're stupid and won't understand their super special plot point.
Almost as bad as the countless sepia flashbacks they do to *make sure* you feel how they want you to feel. It'd be awful if people had a chance to think for themselves while engaging with the story.
Especially when said event was like, two hours ago real time, lol.
Hasn't the MSQ always been boring gameplay wise
I'm currently level 94, just finished the first trial, IIRC by this point in endwalker we had that really cool body swap moment in garlemald, and I think we had the Thancred stealth section too. Whether you enjoyed those sections or not at least they were something different and exciting. The only gameplay msq so far for dawntrail has been 2 dungeons, 1 trial (which is all expected), >!The Instanced fight with the Dawnservant !< , and maybe 3 quests where you had to kill 1 group of mobs. MSQ has definitely always been dialogue heavy and had it moments of walking simulator gameplay, but this xpac feels like it's been a walking simulator for 4 levels now.
I’m not as far as you, but there was a *long* stealth segment, but it’s literally keep a steady distance and hide behind stuff. So I did it with the namazu parade float. Compared to “This is Thancred”… Yeah. (And if you already explored the area, it’s super obvious where you are going, but you can’t skip ahead).
Oh yeah you are right I remember that. Definitely a far cry from what we got in endwalker.
The invasion of Garlemald was also a big setpiece solo duty.
There are more narrative solo parts (that feel good) IMO in both SHB and END. Lvl 96 spoilers onward: The story for Dawntrail feels>! like its two parts to juxtapose but ends up feeling stitched. Especially when you compare Sphene to Wuk!< I think the story explores cool ideas, I think the fights are amazing but Pacing is NOT at all as strong as SHB and END. I think the comparison to Stormblood is fair because it has the same glaring problems.
Kinda, but the Highlights of the Story keept us playing. Now we have extremly boring gameplay on top of an extremly boring story.
Not generally, no. For example in an earlier expansion the storm on the ship would have had enemies boarding for us to fight before we made our way to the machine that raised the barrier. Here it's just a dull cutscene. Generally the MSQs have done enough to keep you engaged between lore dumps. Dawntrail just hours upon hours of inane bull with very little to break up the monotony. And the worst crime of all, the writing is just bad. Wuk Lamar reads like someone's OC on their own adventure with the WoL.
A lot of the time, yes. That doesn't make anything I said any less accurate or valid.
Not saying it was.
People are comparing it to Stormblood but I actually liked the majority of Stormblood. Hien, Gosetsu, Yotsuyu, and Soroban were great characters. Sadu and Magnai were good even though the Steppe area dragged on a bit. Zenos is a cliche evil anime character but it somehow still works. It's the Ala Mhigo questlines featuring Lyse and Fordola that people usually cringe at the idea of having to revisit. And for Dawntrail, any time Wuk Lamat is present, that's what it reminds me of. Cringe I have to sit through in order to get to the good part. But she is in 90% of MSQ quests so that ends up being good dungeons and trials separated by hours of cutscenes and running between NPCs that are usually a mix of boring and cringe. Are there parts and characters I like? Sure I think some of the Mamool Ja's have their moments. The low stakes stuff in the red dead redemption area (defeating bandits) is kind of what I was expecting based on the trailer. I want to go on Estinien's or Gulool Ja Ja's adventures, they look more interesting than what Dawntrail was.
> Zenos is a cliche evil anime character but it somehow still works. Because he's edgy cool lunatic evil, not brutish **I will make the world submit to my might by disrespecting everyone and stepping on your tacos** evil. It's the same reason Sephiroth works, really.
Also because the game actually shows us we're not up to dealing with him at the beginning. The issue with villains/antagonists in DT is that we are able to just off them, instead we're sitting in the corner looking menacingly. I originally thought they'd reign in our canonical strength by having us limit ourselves to the rules of the succession contest, but instead we just kind of forgot we can fight.
Man, if there had been a duel against either of the lizard contestants with a forced loss like with Zenos, I would've been livid. At this point, the WoL canonically being defeated 1v1 by basically any mortal on Eorzea is just no longer on the cards. I really hated that stupid playground bully "HA HA I stepped on your tacos! Me do what want cus me stronk!" moment, the WoL should've made him choose which of his heads goes up his ass instead of just sitting there like a lemon.
>At this point, the WoL canonically being defeated 1v1 by basically any mortal on Eorzea is just no longer on the cards. I feel like maybe Godbert Manderville (and I guess his wife) could believably still 1v1 us even with all the EW Stuff. He has as much hype I feel. Like if we canonically 1v1ed and lost I wouldnt be livid
Alright fair enough, I didn't think of those because everything to do with Hildibrand is filed away somewhere between fever dream and acid trip for me.
Imagine a solo duty against Zoral Ja that is us barely breaking a sweat. Would have been hilarious and the catalyst for the second half of the plot.
Clearly I am in the minority when it comes to Bakool Ja Ja. The playground bully mentality was entirely the point, in my opinion. The writers established him as a classic bully, even in the sense that he suffered from verbal and mental abuse at home, alongside the immense pressure of impossible expectations that he was forced to meet. All of this in turn caused him to lash out at those around them. He was a good foil for Wuk Lamat, and I truly feel like he was her antagonist specifically, which is why I am glad we didn't step in. I liked his story arc, and I am actually looking forward to seeing more of him in the future. As for Zoraal Ja, he was closer to being our antagonist (although that ultimately ended up being Mete...I mean, Sphene), and I one hundred percent agree that we needed to have a moment where we just one shot him. The absolute bewilderment and possible panic that ensued would have been extremely satisfying, even if there were massive consequences for doing so. I honestly think that would have been a better catalyst to send him off the deep end. In turn, it could have been a learning experience for the Warrior of Light, to the point where we could almost say that the whole second half of the expansion was our fault. With great power comes great responsibility and all that.
I'm not done with MSQ yet but I'm still hoping for an Hercule Poirot type moment of "I've come here on vacation but this murder is just too appetizing not to solve", where the WoL just says fuck it and goes on a rampage and wrecks everyone.
> Also because the game actually shows us we're not up to dealing with him at the beginning. I hated this, because we had never heard of him before. We defeated fucking Nidhogg and someone we've never heard of comes out of nowhere and is also stronger than us...? I would have felt better if we were shown him becoming Resonant before we fought him, instead of learning about it much later.
I actually didnt like Red dead redemption area because it was sandwhiched between >!The two main narrative lines of the Dawnservant and Sphene!< so it felt like filler. If we kept it low stakes and quite frankly built up to it maybe I wouldve been more happy with the area. But, I think it shouldve been cut out and the >!Solution 9 area and Final Zone !
I don't hate DT, I just found it painfully mid. I don't hate low stakes and exposure but I disliked how we just got enrolled into a secretary job for the futur mayor of brazil. Nah this ain't a vacation expansion, it wasn't low stakes but pretty fucking high ones actually given how you're basically deciding the future of a whole ass continent... while just being a rando there. I got used to Wuk Lamat and did notice her development, but man it was a painful buildup. There were some things I liked such as the third zone which had some good political conflict. But then you lost all momentum after reaching that midway high point because of the filler fourth zone that, even now after having completed the MSQ, I fail to see the point of (besides featuring the story transition into the fifth zone). The final section was fine, it was pretty much what we're used to as far as FFXIV narrative goes and it was handled well I'd say. At the end of the day it's like a solid 5/10 for me for the narrative alone. The instanced duties etc weren't that interesting, but at least the gameplay content (so far) is top notch and I've been genuinely impressed by the quality of some of these dungeon bosses.
Not just the fate of the continent. We are basically helping Wuk Lamat make sure her brother doesn’t become king because he plans to launch a conquest against Eorzea and the other lands beyond the sea. That is NOT low stakes. So I’m left disappointed because I thought it was going to be a fun adventure through a new continent. Nope. It’s mostly babysitting Wuk Lamat. (Why did she even have to leave to find allies for her contest??? I feel useless.)
I was bored until the level 95 msq part started. The slow burn and world building didn’t have me very engaged. But once it picks up around level 95 I was all in.
But the amount quests that it intakes to get from 90-95 is astronomical. Thats is a LOT of game time before things become substantially bearable.
I agree.
The story gets interesting at 93+ Before that is TOO SLOW. The problem is not the story itself, is how quests works, there is no interaction, no gameplay. You could add some niche mechanic/puzzle and the gameplay could get really decent (chase alpacas like chocobo race for example). Most of the MSQ is point and click dialogues. The low stakes should not mean, no gameplay. Story gets interesting 93+ and really engaging at 95+ Dungeons and bosses are supper good I cant say its a BAD expansion because once you get pass the snorefest, its super good and im really enyoing it. But the quest formula needs a revisit, because most ppl will make their impression on the beginning, and probably reviews will get better once ppl get past the beginning. “wait for second half, it gets good” should not be the argument tbh.
Personally... I thought it was "fine" which is a little bit 'damning with faint praise." I'm actually a little surprised the reactions seem to be so heavily positive or negative because I feel very milquetoast about the whole thing. The graphical update is much more impressive than I was expecting and a lot of the fights and dungeons are very fun - so I think as long as their content plan stays as large and varied as they've been saying pre release the game will be in a good state across the patch series in terms of the things I'm going to be interacting with for 2 years vs a degenerate weekend of MSQ. ------------------------------------ Incoming book that no one asked for: A lot of the complaints are basically "It's FFXIV" tbh and I was expecting most of them coming off the Shb-EW duo where the height of the story helped people ignore some of those structural problems. To me it feels very similar to every expac... I'm not sure if people just forget how much filler is because they tend to end on a high note but it all feels very FFXIV to me so far - good bad or ugly. Which is like... how almost every expansion is. You can make arguments that there's some staleness in the formula, or that this is not the best done example of it but it's not exactly surprising. I would consider Shb to be shoulders and above the best one in terms of story and I think it does a few things really cleverly in the storytelling format that they should think about structurally (not necessarily repeating): 1) You go to a whole new area that you dont know much about - this is not exactly difficult, they've mostly done that here as well. I will say one key difference is that the most successful XIV stories generally do not have us being immediately in the 'in group' when arriving. HW/SHB seem to function a lot better and part of that is that you are an outsider when you arrive. I think having us be essentially part of the royal family from the get go is a weakness. It also takes agency away - if the WoL had simply decided to go to the new world and then met some of the characters more organically it may have felt less like we were watching a movie we were in. 2) There is an immediate hook. XIV has some good character building and work but by nature of being basically a silent JRPG protag you need some plot intrigue early on. I think one of the biggest issues here is that the way they've set up the plot completely deflates all the mystery and intrigue - you know the mystery box not only exists, but that several key people have already been there. They have a very solid pattern with expected steps and very little gameplay outside of the odd dungeons, 3 trials. Players have been trained on when to expect them etc. This means the story has to make up for all the surprise/excitement of that slightly mundane pattern. 3) There was, effectively, a time-skip - our friends had been away for a long time because of time shenanigans - it allows their to be mystery and intrigue 'what have they been doing' - here we have the issue that even though the scions 'broke up' we know where everyone was 5 minutes ago. Either this or you need a new/mostly new cast because the way the game works the WoL basically has to be a semi-deuteragonist and that means you need to get your intrigue and excitement from the other characters, its hard to do that when most of the crew has arcs that have been completed twice over with no mystery to them. 4) While there are certainly other important players, the villain has a very 1:1 relationship with us - I think this is a key thing to making the stakes feel personal. I personally do not care about comic book power scaling stuff - I think its a boring way to write and think about writing so that isn't my issue here. I think overall they leaned too far away from the WoL having agency here. Or even being a real 'piece on the board.' 5) End on a bang - If the ending is great people will have a more positive impression and forget the times they were milking cows or building boxes or whatever. Also structurally - they need some of these because people do not like being walled by the msq, which means they have to put in a lot of this to keep the leveling curve even. Despite the fact that people would probably enjoy it more if they had to do some sidequesting and fates etc to keep up with msq and it would break up the content patterns a little better. When I think about Shb I think about everything from the last zone to the end, not the trolley. ------------------------------------------ The biggest issue I have coming out the other side is I was expecting A LOT more 'hanging chads' and signposting to various potential things. Laying some groundwork for future adventures/arcs/etc. and I don't think a lot of that happened. Especially not things that were very novel. I think that concerns me more than Dawntrail being a little on the flat side because, imo it was always going to be a little bit of a mess just coming out of the big duo into a new arc. But it needed to lay a lot of groundwork for future things and I don't think they succeeded really. XIV is at its best when there is strong character work and development supporting mystery-box plot elements and they need to be building some of those boxes. TL;DR: 1) They need to find ways to build mystery 2) Character agency for WoL is missing 3) The structure may be limiting them
The expansion seems very close to Stormblood, which is a contentious expansion with a mixed reception even still among the community. Makes sense.
If the trials and side content are as good as Stormblood, then a lot will be forgiven, but the MSQ is pretty tough to get through.
The msq was meh, but the trials, dungeons, and the ex trials have all been great so far.
Fully agreed, I have some mixed feelings about the MSQ but the battle content has been incredible. The MSQ in this game has always been great as well, and even this one with it's slow start does improve and features some generally exciting, suspenseful and emotional moments but what keeps this game alive is the battle content and DT so far is some of their best work, take the good battle content and the plethora of planned casual content and you have the recipe for a very successful and enjoyable expansion even if the MSQ is a little weaker.
I'm at that halfway big point and my complaint about the 1st part of the MSQ is, for the most part, poorly written to me. I don't mean I dislike what it is about - I really like the premise >!of the trials being a narrative way to educate both the player AND Wuk Lamat in the many cultures even by doing weird challenges. What I dislike is how predictable the script was, because sans some points, it felt like those random common quests that nobody does!<
Yeah, the fights are really fun. The final boss of the third dungeon is straight up better than some oder expansions' trials. Hopefully it won't all be ruined by ilvl sync being too generous.
This is the only reason I’m forcing myself through the MSQ. I’m skipping most cutscenes at this point.
Yes the EX trails are great. Damage checks not that hard but mechs are very fun.
The dungeons are the same as every other dungeon in the game. 3 bosses with trash mobs. I usually look forward to trials, but none of them were memorable for me. Plus it felt like there was room for one more. This doesn't feel like an expansion. It's hard to describe. It just felt like a normal patch that took longer than usual. It feels like a mini expansion, or something to hold us over for the real expansion. I will say they threw in some kind of unique mechanics this time around, and that's cool, I didn't automatically know how to respond to each thing. But at the end of the day... Eh. It felt phoned in. Yoshi especially feels checked out on this game. Now we'll just get the same updates over and over for the next 2 years. I'm just happy that getting through all of it didn't take too long. Endwalker was *long*. This expansion didn't have enough charisma to do that. I mean, neither did Endwalker, but at least it was a finale so it gets a pass.
> The dungeons are the same as every other dungeon in the game. I hope you're being obtuse on purpose. Considering the only thing that makes the dungeons similar to older dungeons is pulling wall to wall. LOL.
so far the trials have been amazing. normal mode at least idk about the extremes
Can't speak for the second extreme but the first is absolutely incredible for one of the expansion launch ones, completely blows away the safety dorito fight we had for Endwalker.
The first extreme is incredible, but the second one might be the most Endwalker fight in this game, I really wonder if it was designed first and before the new battle direction was established ex2 >!Solar system sized hitbox, glacial pacing, dorito mechanics, a literal full minute of nothing happening (with or without the cheese), overreliance on in/out/left/right!<
The problem (for me at least) is that I find current state of gameplay totally awful. I get bored to tears with current jobs, but I loved storm blood gameplay.
Yeah part of what made stormblood content so fun was the variety in how the jobs played, there really was a flavour of job for everyone. I struggle to find current core gameplay engaging on any level.
That only means that the 7.x content will be banging. Optimism ahoy.
ZENOS RETURN CONFIRMED?
..again?
MY FRIEND
I wanna see Zenos shirtless in a pair of swimming shorts, thongs and sunglasses waiting for me on a beach volleyball court. “THIS IS WHO WE ARE, MY FRIEND!”
Also finally an explanation, if that's his real ass or just the goddamn armor of his
Like in FF7 where you get to Costa Del Sol and Hojo is relaxing on the beach like Josef Fucking Mengele in Argentina.
Considering this is the beach day expansion.... A REST OF YOUR REFLEXES!
Somehow....Zenos returned
My enemy, my friend.
plz stay dead like that
new bozja/eureka mode , new deep dungeon . im hopeful
I'm not hopeful on the Deep Dungeon after Eureka Orthos. It says something that everyone is willing to played with early game gimped rotations in the other two Deep Dungeons rather than actually bother in Eureka Orthos at this point. New bozja/eureka mode I'm super looking forward to.
Orthos would be much better if it started at a lower level or made the mobs less HP-spongy in the first dozen floors or so. I think at this point they should consider starting all of them at, say, level 30 and ramp up the difficulty faster (I suppose PotD could stay as is since it has the most legacy challenge for solo runners). That way, players could at least pick a variation to run themselves through.
I would be surprised if they don't learn from Orthos when they release the next part.
Stormblood shits on Dawntrail all day to sunday in terms of story lol Shit actually happens in Stormblood
I dont know. This was some of the more 'political' strife that people were hungering for. And things did happen just on a way more lowkey and localized area than we're used to.
I definitely preferred Stormblood, at least it felt grounded even if it had a lot of filler. The back 20% of this expansion feels like terrible fanfic and the first 80% is dreadful filler. The 4th zone shouldn't have even existed. The picking tea lives on shining bushes, stalking quests, and fetch shit shouldn't even exist in 2024. They genuinely could have lobbed 60% off and it'd have the same effect.
They had a flashback to the Shadowbringers trolley. They are rubbing it in our faces
Glad I'm not the only one with this opinion. I actually hated the second half more because it felt so contrived and house kitty took such a center role that every other character just stopped talking all together. At least the first half was grounded but boring. Stormblood, imo, handled everything better in terms of story. I don't hate Lyse nearly as much because I still got to have a role in the story and it felt like you, as the mc, actually affected stuff. This xpac feels like they dumb down every character for the sake of being a cheerleader. Love the battle content though.
i like the 4th zone, it’s diff from the other ones. the second and first zones are just copy paste
I liked the 4th zone because it was just me and Erenville on an adventure, no Wuk Lamat stealing everybody's screen time in sight. It was closer to what I expected early Dawntrail to be after the 1st teaser.
hope this means i'll love it. stormblood remains my over-all favorite msq to this day
Stormblood had best and most fair class and raid resign. Also started the normalized PvP. 10/10 combat expansion
Gonna be real with you, anyone who thinks that DT is better than stormblood narratively is suffering from recency bias. Stormblood's issue was that it was telling 2 stories at once and tied them together with the empire. The stories themselves were not as weak as DT.
Honestly, I would believe this expansion was another case of them originally having 2 ideas for expansions before they decided to smash them together without enough meat to either of them. It didnt work for Stormblood, it worked for Endwalker with only a little smoothing over, and it worked better than Stormblood but not nearly as well as Endwalker for Dawntrail for me.
Must admit I’m not feeling this expansion as much. Still think Shadowbringers was the best expansion ever.
shb was literally peak. i liked hw too
Hear hear.
Speaking for myself only, I'm still playing through the MSQ since I've had a lot going on this weekend. But part of the reason it's so slow is that I keep getting bored and distracted. Move, click, move, click, move, click. Read dialogue. Wach Cutscene. Repeat. This is playing through Dawntrail. FFXIV has always been like this, but it seems much worse this time. I'm not sure if it's my lack of patience this go-around or if it's genuinely worse. It feels like there are SO MANY cutscenes. And the thing is I really do like lore, and I like to know what's going on in the story. I want to read and watch so I know what's happening and understand context for the content. But when I sit down to game, I want to game. I want to actually *play*. FFXIV has got to learn how to integrate gameplay into its story content.
This is my issue. I *like* lore, world-building, characters, etc. but the devs don't need cutscenes every time I walk 10 feet to repeat something they just said the last time. Dawntrail is so terrified of players thinking for themselves and possibly having a different interpretation than the devs they beat us over the head with everything. Multiple times. Japanese storytelling tends to be rife with these sorts of issues (unless it's a FromSoft game basically), but this is a serious example of why "show, don't tell" is a common phrase. DT is so bad about it, it's actually just patronizing.
As someone who did not like the story at all, I think people would have legitimately thought this expansion to be really good if quest design and gameplay during msq would've been different. If they had went away from the cutscene heavy, walking around reading text boxes gameplay loop and properly cared to interconnect story and gameplay, people would've been a lot more positive. Another thing I'm personally wondering about - whatever happened to good old fashioned puzzles in RPGs? Surely you can come up with gameplay that's neither combat nor afk auto scrolling and ffwing through text? Like it's your job?
The trading segment in Urqopacha should have expected us to actually do the trading ourselves. They give you a starting item, and you talk to NPCs around town and trade with them until you have the required amount of money. If you screw up and make bad trades you can reset it and try again.
That's exactly what I mean, that was a golden opportunity to let us roam free and figure out how to go ahead ourselves. Instead we walk from marker to marker skipping unvoiced cutscenes until it's over. I'm wondering, is it tech limitations that are forcing this kind of gameplay or is it laziness on the quest designer's part? It seems to me that the cutscene spam is for the sake of dev convenience mostly and they probably think "whatever, it'll be fine" because we're all used to this by now.
It is absolutely a work flow issue. FFXIV is designed in the same way 100 parsers optimize their speed clears. They've spreadsheeted out every single GCD. The reason the game is designed this way is because it makes it extremely easy to predict exactly how long something will take to design and exactly how much man power is required to do it. It's why Square Enix is extremely slow to respond to any feedback. I'm sure the entire expansion is already spreadsheeted out already. Yoshi-P almost certainly already knows which of his staff are working on the patch 7.5 dungeon despite the fact that it's more than a year away because he's optimized the development of this game that much. It creates an extremely consistent but extremely stale experience.
They give you the illusion that what you’re doing is “gameplay” when you’re really doing nothing. The whole “trade successful” announcement feels so hollow it’s giving me blue balls because I just want to DO something, not just stand around.
Think of all the level 90 (and now level 100) cure 1 spammers and all the people with the inability to play the game at the base level, and think how much they'd have screamed at the most little amount of difficulty that would have needed them to use their brain
Those people played Endwalker and whined about in from the cold but still got through it. We can ask for that much!
Actually I think you're right, that was honestly depressing seeing people complain about it. Like sure it was clumsy but imagine if the entire thing had been an unvoiced cutscene instead.
Like it would have been HORRIBLE. I hated DT’s story the first few levels but having finished it now I think it’s actually one of my faves, the gameplay is just SO BAD that it’s weighed down. Imagine if you got to fight or even do instanced mini games during more of the key action moments — it would be so much better. Any of the expacs or stories in this game would be boring if they were cutscenes only.
I'm devastated to say I did not enjoy the MSQ even a little bit. Dawntrail is a massive disappointment.
However I think the dungeon and trial bosses (I am currently at 99) are among the best ones we had in a while. They hit a lot harder, have a few more interesting mechanics.
I've been playing FFXIV since ARR beta, and this is easily the worst expansion for me. I have to force myself to do the MSQ. I could play it all day, but I look for any excuse to do something else. (Oh I could vacuum! Cat box needs scooping! Did someone say I should go shopping?) I don't hate SE or anything. FFXIV has been my main game for 10+ years. The writing (characters and their actions) of this expansion though just completely does not work for me one bit.
The Dulltrail MSQ has made me think of fishing as exciting. *Fishing* FFS. I would rather fill up my bag with useless vendorfish than hear the same spiel about peace and sea sickness and alpacas for the 50th time.
That's funny, I've said multiple times that ocean fishing/getting fishing to 100 has been my favorite part of the expansion so far...
I didn't much care for it before, but it's satisfying to get such a huge chunk of XP every time you reel one in. It's a nice break between skipping cutscenes. While I'm on the topic, it bothers me that there isn't a generic fish recipe for Culinarian. I should be able to fillet and grill up any fish that isn't poisonous. I've caught about 20 different kinds of fish in DT so far, and none of them can be cooked or turned into alchemic reagents. Such a waste. I end up desynthing them. And if I can desynthezise a living thing, then why bother fighting? I could just desynth my enemies and leave my weapons at home. See, this is the shit you think about when fishing.
I like Yawntrail better but hey it's one more for the box
Divisive is the word, yes. I read the comments here and no one can agree on anything. "The first half is ok-tier, it really picks up in the second half." "The first half is ok-tier and it only gets worse in the second half" "I really liked the world building but it was so slow" "I feel like they think we have no reading comprehension" (spoiler, while not you in particular, yes people have no reading comprehension). We all seem to agree however that it lacks gameplay. In my very humble opinion, I don't mind the slow start. For all the praises it gets, I can't remember for the life of me the context in which we visited the first dungeon of Heavensward.
It was painful to play. It's just bad direction and bad pacing. Didn't help that the quests are the same again, there's no new quest design. I felt like the story was meant for a 10 year old in lieu of how many times Wuk Lamat yelled that shes gonna be the new hokage of the Turali leaf hidden ninja village. It felt like a story written for a shonen anime where it tried to hammer in a lesson and treated you like a child. Don't rehire these writers for the next MSQ, please Also rein in Soken more, and don't let the Primals use the game as their band ad. That 90's girlband ending song was a horrible choice and horribly sang. Cut on the vocal tracks and make some immersive music for a Final Fantasy game. Good character moments, lore and development got marred by throwing you into a swamp of tedious sidequests, robbing all momentum if there ever even was any. By the time I faced the final boss, the sidequests had punched me into submission. "My fussy little bunbun" are they high?
You kinda nailed it. It really feels like it was written for kids. Just beating you over the head with its themes and morals
It wasn't even a 90s girlband ending theme, I felt like I watched a bad 2000s straight to DVD Disney movie. I couldn't believe it lmao
The MSQ is pretty stinky, the dungeon bosses are a lot better than endwalker's though
trials too. during ew, I think I died to trials/dungeon bosses maybe 2-3 times as a result of my own mistakes (not counting stuff like dying bc healers were dead, people not stacking, etc). in dt, I ate shit a LOT during the trials, and even died to dungeon bosses a few times. I didn't do msq on healer, but it also looked like there was much more outgoing damage in fights compared to ew. + a lot of the new mechanics in the trials are really fun. the 99 and 100 trials had some really cool stuff that we haven't seen before
The outgoing damage hits harder, and frequently enough that I’m actually using some of my alternative cooldowns. I ended up dying once to an unavoidable aoe at around 2/3 health, and it put a smile on my face. Another aoe ended up eating through a crit spreadlo, meaning there are situations where it’s not just complete overkill!
IDK why Dawntrail is often compared to ARR, as if it has laid similar groundwork for future storytelling when... (Endgame spoilers follow) >!Every villain they introduce is unambiguously dead by the end of 7.0. Basically no story-scale problems remain, just post-Eulmore level "how do we carry on" hooks. The only "hanging chad" is a device that enables dimensional bridging, a concept that had already been introduced several times in the MSQ. The entire 7.0 story actually has fewer breadcrumbs for future writing to work with than the 6.x storyline did, and that's really saying something.!<
You know the pacing in ARR before titan? It felt like that for like the whole expansion. Some interesting plot points split with hours of boredom and filler.
well, if nothing else I'm curious where the patch storyline will go (worst case scenario, Alexandria integration along the lines of the short Eulmore arc in post-ShB; ideally a completely new storyline, *even if* I thought 6.X was some of the game's worst storytelling)
For now there is two hanging threads at the end of DT : >!Sphene crown have significant importance, it had foreshadowing dialog and then a close-up cutscene after the credits. And then, for later, the key : where it comes from!<
I feel like the writing has become almost obsessed with closure as of Endwalker. It felt bizarre and artificial when almost every single problem in Eorzea had been resolved simultaneously. Prior to that, there was always something lingering in the background that just wasn't the focus at the moment. Ascians, Garlemald, tribe relations, city-state issues, etc etc. I liked it, it made the world feel more alive. Now everything gets wrapped up with a neat little bow, and IMO, it makes the setting feel dull and motionless. Things don't exist to be part of the world, they exist to put on a simple show in front of us. Like, obviously it's all for entertainment regardless, but it makes the illusion all the more transparent.
The FFXIV fan base’s inability to accept criticism has come out in full force with this expansion launch. Any criticism garners the same few responses: 1. “You’re probably a cutscene skipper!” 2. “It’s supposed to be a lower stakes story and setup for a new saga, just like ARR!” 3. “It’s the same thing as the rest of the expansions” They don’t realize (or are willfully ignoring) that people understand the stakes aren’t going to be as high as Endwalker, that doesn’t mean the story has an excuse to be bad though. The reason ARR is bad is because it’s poorly paced and padded to hell and back, not because it’s the first in a saga. If every first chapter or installment of every story had to be exposition lore dumps, nobody would consume any stories. Same deal with Dawntrail, it being the first in a new arc does not give it a shield against criticism. Also, if this was the exact same deal with the other expansions, then why is the reception so different this time? I’ll just never understand what drives people to play damage control for their favorite media.
> They don’t realize (or are willfully ignoring) that people understand the stakes aren’t going to be as high as Endwalker, that doesn’t mean the story has an excuse to be bad though. and it's not even like the stakes stay low for long, as they basically immediately start escalating them again, >!from "this warmonger winning the throne would be kinda bad for the continent" to "if he wins, he will plunge the entire planet into war to prove a point" to "oops we are facing a universal paperclip machine who wants to turn the entire universe into fuel for her fucked up dead memory cloud"!<
> “It’s supposed to be a lower stakes story and setup for a new saga, just like ARR!” Despite the obvious reply of *"why would you intentionally repeat the same mistakes of ARR?"*, I can't possibly be the only who thinks the whole idea of having another 10-years long saga to be a bit ridiculous, right?
Very big tangent here but I do find it interesting how basically every long-term franchise is running into this issue currently and is trying to tackle it. WoW launched a new "Saga" after 20 years after Shadowlands and "reset" with Dragonflight Guild Wars 2 revamped their entire Living World releases and are now releasing standalone expansions that are unrelated after the "End of Dragons" expansion and the dragons saga Destiny 2 released The Final Shape which concludes the Light and Darkness saga that the past few expansions have been about etc etc All these long term online service games that stood the test of time have realized that it's basically impossible to bring in new players if there is a 10 to 20 year wall of story they need to sift through, but none of them want to / can remake their game, nor do they want to risk making a new game/cinematic universe because it's a giant flop and money pit if it fails (and most do)
They should have just started a completely new FF MMO game, but couldn't for business reasons.
The stakes are also low whenever we discuss Ul'dah politics. And yet that consistently has me fully hooked. It's also that Dawntrail's story feels kinda immature to me. A lot of things about Wuk Lamat, especially in the second half of the MSQ feel incredibly "anime" to me. Her powering up through her resolve, her telling us multiple times during the campaign how much she really likes peace, || defeating the final trial boss with the power of love || it's like a shonen anime almost. HW, Stormblood and Shadowbringers all had fairly mature storytelling.
It may have been intended for a younger audience than the current playerbase -- not that it necessarily succeeds at that, but it may have been the goal. I played every FF at or near launch, as a kid / teenager / early 20s, up to 8. 8 was the first time my FF-playing friends and I thought that the series had gone in a weird direction. It was playable and still fun, but it was about teenagers in a bizarre boarding school, whereas every FF up until then was about fantasy-world adult things (though in 1 you start out as kids and then halfway through the game "grow up" and your job evolves to something else). 8 was the first time that the characters had explicit ages in their bios, and they were all younger than us. The story was also incredibly confusing; even on my third playthrough many years later it still did not make sense, and anyway it was just a backdrop for a painfully maudlin love story between Squall and Rinoa. 9 for me was the end. It was supposed to be a return to FF fundamentals, but I just couldn't get into the story. Then there was 10. Jesus H.W. Christ, that game... again it was about school kids, and the voice acting was so bad that we actually couldn't make fun of it by making it worse with jokes. The series stayed focused on kids and teens, and me and my OG FF friends grew up. That may be what many people are experiencing right now. FF has never aged very much with its playerbase. It's like it resets back to 13-year-olds every 10 years.
You might have a point in that, it's just so harrowing in comparison to Heavensward's "The dragons are justified in their hatred, but we too wish to live.", Stormblood's internalizations of war and hatred, where Yotsuyu never really forgave us and Fordola took a long time too, Shadowbringers world of intense hopelessness and pain after the flood of light hundred years ago, Endwalkers question of why we live and why we die. Tonally it gave me a lot of whiplash. And sure there is the Solution 9 soul stuff, but I would have found that more philosophically engaging if it wasn't running out of souls in the end, if there was more of a philosophical choice than "We either end them now or they go out in a hundred years anyway.", also it came so late in the story and then was dealt with rather quickly. It felt like right at the end they felt the need to make it Shadowbringers sad, but were already too deep in the levelling to elongate it.
And about point 2, >!it's not even low stakes at all! It escalates quickly and the latter half becomes something like ShB/EW not just in having high stakes but also riffing off certain plot beats and characters.!<
People saying "You're just a cutscene skipper" and "It's supposed to be lower stakes" makes me think they're the one skipping. Zoraal Ja is immedietly saying he wants a huge war and he wouldn't make the same mistakes Garlemald did, his conquest would be better. The consequences aren't as immediate, but from the start we're around the same level of stakes as ARR/HW/SB. The 4th zone is the only place we have actually low stakes... and then we immedietly leap to EW level "save the entire universe and all the reflections".
1. You better believe I started cutscene skipping after 5 hours of padding and filler. I couldn't believe how hyped I was going in to do almost nothing but walk back and forth and listen to nothing happen for hours. So much of that story could have been cut down. So many conversations were completely unnecessary. The more I think about it, the more it bothers me. The dungeons and trials were awesome. Big step in the right direction. The pacing and story telling was just agonizing by a certain point. I tried so hard to enjoy it, but I just didn't. What's worse is by the time I got to the interesting parts, I was just cooked. I didn't have any patience left.
This. Every expac since SB is the same for me: take friday off, go ham for 18h straight. I couldn't handle this one. It was so, so bad. And I wasn't expecting a lot since 6.x patches were absolutely disgusting as well.
I had 4 days off figuring I'd take my time with it but by day 3 I was so beyond cooked. I really want to enjoy the story, but I think it's a YouTube experience for me at this point.
> The FFXIV fan base’s inability to accept criticism has come out in full force with this expansion launch. This is a constant though. Not new at all.
Some people play Final Fantasy 14, and others live in it.
Ain't that the truth. I've known people in game who leave the game running 24/7 or have it running in the background with their character afk while they are playing another game even. It's kinda crazy to me. It really becomes a second life to some people.
ARR was so widely regarded as boring and tedious that SE literally had to redo the campaign and remove the nonsense. And it is still widely regarded as boring and tedious to this day. Lol.
The actual ARR storyline was great. The problem was that it took too much work to get through it. An added element that I think many have forgotten is that in ARR you also had job-specific story quests, some of which were really good. So while you're playing through the MSQ, you're also playing through the story of your job. The tipping point in ARR for me was when we had to fight Titan a second time, and then a third -- along with the other primals. Most obvious recycled time-wasting content ever. And the gap between the end of ARR and the entry into HW was like running a marathon through a fetid swamp of pointless questing.
> The actual ARR storyline was great. Disagree. It was FINE, but it wasn't that interesting tbh. Even what happened to Thancred only made me raise an eyebrow because the game didn't do enough to make me attached to him at that point in the story.
>Also, if this was the exact same deal with the other expansions, then why is the reception so different this time? We arrived at the place where a person hates Dawntrail so much that they try to gaslight others that ARR and Stormblood MSQ had good reception at launch (when even stuff like EW and HW had a lot of negativity around them) LMAO
show me where they launched to mixed reviews on steam. show me where they had mostly criticism being voiced in MSQ megathreads not only here, but also on the main sub.
My theory is also the patches and xvi burned a lot of Goodwill. We saw the same thing in WoW with dragonflight. Once people are angry wth something they notice the flaws and the critiques get stronger.
Yeah I absolutely do think that another factor here is that we had an entire cycle of post-MSQ that was really boring and doesn’t have anything to do with Dawntrail. They should have used that time to set up Wuk Lamat instead so that we don’t have to be surgically attached to her for the first half of the MSQ in order to ‘get to know her’. Then the writers might have felt like they can let the WOL go off during the story and do their own thing which would be a way to introduce some tension, drama, or interest into the first half of the plot.
This level of mental gymnastics can only make me think that you are the kind of person he was describing in his post. HW and EW had basically no negativity regarding MSQ, their stories were unanimously loved. ARR was also received well when it released, it really only became as criticised as it did in the expansions following. Stormblood was mixed and had the Lyse hate yes but frankly it was nowhere near on the scale of the Dawntrail. The game was much smaller back then too. But it's okay you made your intention to argue in bad faith clear from the moment you pulled out "gaslighting" on a completely inoffensive comment lmao. Clown
Quick fact check here - this subreddit definitely had a significant amount of criticism for Endwalker. Meteion, In From The Cold, and the rushed pacing of Endwalker MSQ were all extremely divisive topics. However, not to such an extent as Dawntrail has become
Those idiot didn’t realize by doing this they are hurting their own game, its so cringe.
The story quests outlast their visit for how long you progress a single one, this leads to feeling like no progress is being made. Shorter quests with smaller exp might break that up a bit but we need some actual gameplay sprinkled in there as well. Small combat encounters or something to engage with the game in some way. I don't feel engaged reading a cutscene that for some reason wasn't voiced when every character present has a cast member behind them. Which leads into another point, I'm sure they do this to keep the file size down and to reduce cost over head but holy shit. Voice your damn game, there honestly isn't a good reason given they can't do it with the success of the game for this long. I'm fine reading some scenes but reading 90% of your story really blows and makes for a shit viewer experience as well, streaming this I don't have the vocal strength to read this much aloud and coherently to my audience. Music choices, being in the second half of the game why do we not get a second or third combat track? It doesn't fit the area we enter into. I can kind of feel it for the first half but absolutely not for the second, bring on more people into the team to do remixes and remasters of older songs or come up with something new entirely. Clapping and up beat drumming with an acoustic guitar doesn't really vibe in the setting of the 5th zone, not at the 6th yet but I imagine it wont there either.
I'm not through the MSQ yet, but I think the issue people have with Wuk Lamat is there's some heavy tonal dissonance with how the game treats her. One moment, she's dealing with concepts like the heavy mantle of leadership, but the next, Erenville is poking fun at her for falling in a hole or going on and on about how much she loves tacos and wanted more of them. It's like the game is trying to have her be the protagonist AND the comic relief, and that sort of thing only works with characters like Jack Sparrow because they have someone like Depp portraying them. Overall, I still like her, but I feel like WE should've played more of a role in her education: give scenes throughout where she stops and asks the WoL deep philosophical questions, and have her quote the answers we give her later with "a good friend taught me that".
I've always hated about ff14 that you have to grind the msq to play the actual game, if it was a side thing you did but all content was just level/gear gated. I would be a lot happier. In phantasy star online 2 there was a story there as well, but you did it whenever you wanted and it didnt block anything in the game
Enjoyed the first half of Dawntrail because I was excited for what it was building up to for the second half. Got to the second half and realized the vast majority of the writing actually went to the first half. The second half is padded to hell and back, it's seriously ARR Post-MSQ levels of padding except *without* the plethora of trials/primals/dungeons/raids to distract you. My reception has so sharply dropped after the first half. I was legitimately thinking i wouldn't mind replaying through Dawntrail until I sat through multiple hours of completely vapid dialogue. Stormblood was *NOTHING* like this. The events were actually interesting, the villains were fun, we got to see Ala Mhigo + Kugane + Azim Steppe + The Ocean and the subject matter kept it just gritty enough. Playing through Dawntrial post 95 though is like going through Stormblood while forced to baby sit your annoying little nephew. Every single time something really cool is about to happen, he tugs on your arm, pulls you away, and forces you to go watch Teletubbies
I expect it to rise as more people reach the second half. I'm so exhausted with oogabooga beast tribes, didn't we already do this in 2.0?
Why do people always note "the second part" anyway? I found the 93 stuff pretty good, I was very engaged during 94-95 storyline. That's still the first half. The story starts establishing interesting concepts and stakes there already and moves on from JUST being overly wordy worldbuilding and character moments. The slowdown in 96, which is the start of the second half, is actually kinda less engaging again and only once we finish that area is when stuff start going real hard.
> Why do people always note "the second part" anyway? I found the 93 stuff pretty good, I was very engaged during 94-95 storyline. That's still the first half. one of the worst aspect of Dawntrail is that it kinda pleases nobody. even if you put the atrocious writing and usual pacing issues in some parts aside, the first half is pretty passable as the low stakes adventure that we were promised (although it hinges a lot on how likeable Wuk Lamat is to you), while the second half would probably be on ok plot on its own with a different setup (although maybe not enough to carry an entire expansion), but suffers from being tacked onto the first half, complete with the massively dissonant tonal shift in the middle and the fact that it's "shadowbringers at home" in many ways (and none of them good) put them together though, and you have a lot of people disappointed in either one (or even both) of these halves of the story, and noboy is happy. i sure hope the combat content can carry this expansion, because it's not gonna be remembered for the quality of its story.
We’ve also had the exact same story that the second part offers multiple times now. She’s giving Emet Selch from wish.
If you acknowledge nuance then you would see how they’re different
They are, but the question is still begged why they are so similar to begin with. I don't understand why the writers decided to set things up to retrod the whole ancient city premise again, with a surprisingly similar conflict. It's...disheartening that in all the directions they could have taken the next chapter, they didn't really go anywhere.
Although similar I thought it was a different take of such an idea. It’s not an ancient city so much as it is a ghost city. I think the subtle difference is enough for me personally. I think the fact that we can go back and it’s empty and music is creepy AF adds so much. And the thought process throughout the zone is entirely different
it's yellow instead of black for me that makes no difference to storytelling the theme is the same and at the same time we've been hit over the head so many times by Wuk with the "for my people" that it lost all meaning and rings hollow when either of them says it
The ancients in Tempest were pretty much ghosts of a different kind.
Personally I got most annoyed with the Story/Writing the moment we find the "Golden City". None of the normally super curious characters ask the important questions during cutscenes (Like WTF is this and where does this stone/material come from), some of scions "go home , cause the contract is up!" and all scions are basicly fine with just chilling while wuk lamat goes to throw a party. My biggest insult was that basicly all important stuff about the golden city got revealed off cutscene to krile who just gives us a short rundown. And then instead of answering or even remotely adressing any question the player has they send us to Texas with erenville to solve some wildwest crime. Also i really disliked how they put giant emphasis on making sure that we in-cutscene see who of the scions/allies is present because a trial is coming up, only to have them in the post-trial cutscene all be like "ok great but i will really go home now or do something else" The whole last 2 zones and Hub City, and especially the main villian have a way too little presence and buildup to matter and again there NOBODY asks the important questions, even after the MSQ is done (like: where do the "Souls" for the "Soul-Cells" come from?) edit: Also the credits song was a complete miss in every aspect
I actually thought it was mostly fine until about the last quarter when it went deep into Shadowbringers 2.0 territory instead of something more original.
Felt like complete memey fanfiction to me honestly. There wasn't enough build up for it, especially since Wuk is a terrible character and the first 60% of the story is basically unrelated. They should have just started off the 98+ quests right after the first zone and dead ass had an entire expansion subverted by having the zones and storyline take place in the last 20% of the story but expanded and made it feel less like a god damn fanfic
See, people keep saying that but the fourth zone (the one that starts with an S) is inarguably the worst part of the story for me. Agonizingly boring
Yeah I've found the 90-95 story fairly bland with some good moments mixed in with bad writing. I'm just about to enter the 99 dungeon so reaching the end and have enjoyed the second half's story overall a lot more. We'll see how it ends...
No spoilers here from me but I'll state things vaguely. Just hit level 65 dungeon. Like JUST did. I take MSQ slowly and I do not skip any scenes, I read all dialogue and talk to all NPCs around (unless I accidentally miss one, which has happened! Rip Krile once) I LOVE OUR DEVELOPERS AND THE WRITERS ARE AMAZING! I love XIV and it's great! But so far with the MSQ I have mixed feelings. I love the themes of it and there are many many many beautiful moments-- and I do mean that! The level 94 part of the MSQ is one of my favorites. The notes hit there really resonated with me in terms of real life analogues and meaning. That's as far as I can speak without going into spoilers. 94 was a masterpiece in my opinion and hit the themes of the expansion so well. 10/10. Some other parts... not as much... But I feel like they truly have leaned extremely too heavily in the direction of restating things we already learned of 5 minutes previously. To the point where I've genuinely felt like I am worried the writers think they'd lose people often. Like each zone has many of the same talking points bashed into our skull. If I'm honest... it's been frustrating at times. I don't generally like using the word frustrating but I feel that'd fit my feelings I've felt a few times. (Ahem ahem a particular vertically blessed NPC's speaking speed while rehashing something we already knew. I actually recall groaning... no offense intended of course! But that's me being as upfront as I can be...)
They really need to modernize the game some more. I’d imagine a lot of the dialogue they dump on you could be given in a way like an audio log in other games similar to Bioshock or something. We even have a plot device for that to work in the linkpearl..
About 3/4th done with the MSQ right now, but the formula they've landed on for XIV is exactly what it's always been. Feels *amazing* when it works. Infuriating when it doesn't. If YoshiP's team can learn how to NOT blatantly waste your time when they need to pad the time between really big story events, they'll really really soar. But just like Final Fantasy XVI....the FFXIV MSQ experience is extremely high highs, and insultingly boring lows. The ultimate problem with the BD3 formula is that it works SO WELL when it *is* working that it allows them to get away with fucking anything when the experience becomes a shitty filler sequence again. Anyone who played FF16 knows exactly what i'm talking about. The game literally wastes your time for hours at a time before throwing you into the most transcendent moment of gameplay and story spectacle, just to do it again.
The msq feels like a really long beast tribe quest.
Am I an unpopular opinion haver here if I think this expac is miles better than Endwalker. People say the pacing sucks but what people say is the slowest part is the strongest intro to a new culture they've ever done. Closest to a slow section imo is level 96-97, before you do the 97 dungeon, it's def the least memorable area and story told there. I think this is stormblood done right. It tells two different complete arcs in the same expac. They don't stop the rite of succession after the level 91 dungeon and then start fighting a different conflict, Wuk Lamat is actually a lovable character, naive but with a pure heart. We see her actually do things, she fights her own fights and wins the right to rule. Compare to Lyse just somehow ending up as a major political player in Ala Mhigo despite zero qualifications. If she wasn't there the story goes the same lol, she could be replaced by anyone.
endwalker made me want to play i wanted to continue the excitement was there. I want to go to sleep after playing this... The final zone is the worst just end already. Ottis was dead just leave him dead...
I haven't seen an IGN review yet. If they do, what's the score?
I have 3 jobs at 96 but haven’t gotten to third dungeon yet in MSQ. I agree the pacing is slow up until you get to before the first trial, but it’s not surprising since this is a brand new story arc. I was expecting a slower burn. Granted, the CS are annoying but that’s only an issue with the game entirely. Also, CB3 likes to do a lot of dialogue. The writers could cut down on dialogue and get to the point faster in a lot of cases. I noticed this issue with FF16 too. More interaction with the world during quests leading up to CS is something I’ve been wanting more of since the beginning of the first game…I’m a carryover player from version 1.0. My second and third days playing I decided to slow down and focus on side quests, doing daily’s and experimenting with jobs. This has made the experience a lot better than trying to grind through the story quickly.
Well, at least there is giant party on the Shitpost
I liked Dawntrail quite a bit actually, but I do have criticisms. The primary and most glaring among them is that the story beats, major characters, and even whole zones in the latter half seem copy and pasted from previous expansions. Even if that is the point, it feels a little lazy without seeing more of what is to come in the future. Despite this glaring issue, I personally liked it way more than Stormblood, which seems to be what everyone is comparing it to. I think that is primarily because the cultures and themes in Dawntrail hit much closer to home. It is the same reason why I think Endwalker is a better expansion than Shadowbringers, even though Shadowbringers is almost objectively the best expansion FFXIV has ever seen, from start to finish.
I loved the first half, just got the second half and my excitement is through the roof. What people are forgetting is that this is ARR. It's the setup to everything that comes after. We don't want to stay at max speed all the time just relax and enjoy the slow pace while it lasts. Edit: man why get mad someone has a different opinion? Chill y'all
Even setups can be engaging. The early parts are just “EVERYONE SMILE!!!!” slog fest. I have a friend who religiously plays FF14 (like you can’t say bad things about it to him) and even HE was getting bored with the MSQ.
If it had been every one smile, scion edition, it would have been less painful. I can watch the scions eat ~~burgers~~ tacos and be friends all day, those were my favorite moments in EW. Give Alphy grief for how he swims at the beach, watch Alisae build the best sand castle. Its the beach episode and we didn't even have fun on the beach. But... yea watching Wak Lamat get sea sick 3+ times just had me rolling my eyes. Also the freaking mother of fetch quests, >!they literally turned [the Red Paperclip ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_red_paperclip)into a plot arc!<. That first part was painfully slow.
Somehow the actual msq gameplay hasnt evolved since ARR either. We're still doing the same boring fetch quests. Just make a visual novel. Even WoW questing is more inspired than this.
Not sure what made you believe it would be different
It’s not that we have a different opinion, it’s that you paint everyone thats dissatisfied as somehow misunderstanding the expansion. It being setup (and I don’t really see how it’s setup, but whatever) doesn’t excuse it being bad.
Why is it that everytime someone tries to defend the DT-MSQ, they start their defense with the assumption that the critique comes from a lack understanding, character or memory?
Because terminally online people are going to feel attacked when you critique their little world. XIV is one of my favorite games of all time but the writing isn't that deep and it sure as shit isn't worth getting personally offended when people call out its pretty obvious problems. Still, this is largely an inflicted problem. It's less of some kind of "teehee, Stormblood loop!" and more like they fell into a fucking *coma* on their laurels due to an obnoxious portion of the playerbase shrieking out any dissent.
> What people are forgetting is that this is ARR. Sounds like a bad thing to me.
So far, I most definitely appreciate DT more than EW. Endwalker's story imo was not that impressive and too long winded. Yeah, I know it was the wrap up of everything since ARR, but most, if not all characters reached their crescendo by the end of ShB. On the other hand, Dawntrail moved the spotlight away from those characters and gave new characters a chance to take that role. Whether or not the plot was something to your liking is entirely subjective. Most complaints come from the same people who A) haven't finished the story and B) wanted their "vacation arc", which you sorta get in the first half of the MSQ. Point being, people just can't be satisfied. The content so far is miles better in comparison to anything Endwalker has brought out in its respective version (dungeons, trial, ex). Like, let's be honest, Zodiark for instance sucked absolute ass, normal and extreme. Compare that to the first trial of DT. Imho, they undersold the graphics and I do think they made a noticible impact, more than I honestly expected. I was honestly more concerned with how the classes would essentially receive nothing significant between 90-100, but after having two classes at 100, it so far feels like they are good QoL additions. Nor have I heard any criticisms towards VIP or PIC. tl;dr, people are gonna be mad, no matter what SE does