This story is really underwhelming - it's opened to mixed reviews.

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Originally Posted by Verathel

Haven't finished yet but really wish they would have a cutscene where we fight and it actually shows us fighting like Estinien had with the Dawnservant.

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I just had a "battle" in a cutscene where the scions and Wuk had action, and they just didn't know what to do with the WoL so they scripted us running to check on an injured person even though we are the most powerful combatant there. I literally laughed at how pointless we are. As a WhM I didn't even heal the person, I just waited for Alphinaud to get there.

I'm assuming that they don't know what to do with us in cutscenes as we can be any job. But I'd love to have done....SOMETHING!

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Originally Posted by NekiUno

From all of the post I am reading, there is one thing I want to say

"Shadowbringers just spoil you all badly"

Indeed, lengthy stories often begin at a slow pace and gradually intensify. Many of us are familiar with epics like Star Wars and LOTR, among others. Currently, this is slightly better than ARR was at its initial release.

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The problem is not that shadowbringers was too good and DT is the normal level we have just forgotten about because ShB's quality spoiled us too much. Other stories didn't take as long to get interesting either. HW, EW and iirc even SB became interesting faster and had better pacing in the beginning. The pacing of DT on the other hand is, in my opinion, unusually slow.

As for epics, I do think that the first LotR book is a real test of patience for some people, though I'm not saying that makes it bad. But it's understandable that not everybody will enjoy a whole book of slowburn setup (even if it's good slowburn). Either way, slowburn is a valid genre in its own right, but it also has to be done well. And I think many people just feel like that's not the case regarding DT's beginning.

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Originally Posted by Loggos

The problem is not that shadowbringers was too good and DT is the normal level we have just forgotten about because ShB's quality spoiled us too much. Other stories didn't take as long to get interesting either. HW, EW and iirc even SB became interesting faster and had better pacing in the beginning. The pacing of DT on the other hand is, in my opinion, unusually slow.

As for epics, I do think that the first LotR book is a real test of patience for some people, though I'm not saying that makes the book bad. But it's understandable that not everybody will enjoy a whole book of slowburn setup (even if it's good slowburn). Either way, slowburn is a valid genre in its own right, it also has to be done well. And I think many people just feel like that's not the case regarding DT's beginning.

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That's the nature of storytelling; for instance, would you be comfortable if a story unfolded so rapidly that you're left bewildered, or if it omitted details you wished to know? Currently, I'm engaged in 'Honkai Star Rail,' which boasts an excellent narrative. It begins gradually, but as time progresses, you find yourself growing attached to the characters and eager to see where the journey leads. By the way, Penacony is considered peak fiction. I've been observing this since 2014, noticing similar remarks about ARR/HW/Stormblood, so I'm curious to see what they have in store.

MINOR SPOILERS


SPOILERS I almost vomited when Krile just randomly LPed scions that were literally across the world, and they walked in seconds later. They've given up.


MINOR SPOILERS

okay, I know, I know, story bad, but HOLY, the dungeons are going so hard! 95 dungeon anyone?????

The mechanics of the dungeons surprised me a little, felt a definitive step up than early EW dungeons.

The last boss of the first dungeon was especially a little jarring, the telegraphs for his attacks and the level of mechanics felt in place for a max level dungeon or even early raid boss lol.

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Originally Posted by Boblawblah

okay, I know, I know, story bad, but HOLY, the dungeons are going so hard! 95 dungeon anyone?????

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They're more difficult than the 6.X dungeons, for sure, but they're about in line with other levelling dungeons before we outgear them. They're at least conceptually mechanically interesting, which is nice.

Except the final dungeon, weirdly, which is by far the easiest and most uninteresting dungeon. It feels like it was the first one they did before they decided to go back and try to fix some of the encounter design.

There's a lot of this expansion that feels like it was done under terrible time constraints or a shoestring budget, which is weird only because we have been waiting for three years with nothing to do and FFXIV is almost single-handedly keeping Square Enix afloat.

I see talk excusing the story because its about being a simple adventurer again. I completely disagree. The story is boring, and it's not because our character has become "a simple adventurer" again. It's not because there is no "world ending threat". Some of the most interesting stories ever told don't involve a "world ending threat". How many great films, TV dramas, and books have a world ending threat as the premise? We don't need a world ending threat to make it interesting. That's not the issue. It's something else. A boring story, or one that is told in a boring way, shouldn't be excused just because its about being a simple adventurer (and we're not even that in the story btw!).

Has anyone got to solution 9? That's my final hope for the story. I'm almost there and have resorted to skipping scenes. I'm now a damn skipper... I'd never thought I'd see the day. I broke after 3 Wuk Lamat fetch quests in a row with no substance. I'm sorry Lyse, you were fine, I was too hard on you.

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Originally Posted by NekiUno

That's the nature of storytelling; for instance, would you be comfortable if a story unfolded so rapidly that you're left bewildered, or if it omitted details you wished to know? Currently, I'm engaged in 'Honkai Star Rail,' which boasts an excellent narrative. It begins gradually, but as time progresses, you find yourself growing attached to the characters and eager to see where the journey leads. By the way, Penacony is considered peak fiction. I've been observing this since 2014, noticing similar remarks about ARR/HW/Stormblood, so I'm curious to see what they have in store.

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There's a difference between slow world building and a slog though. There has to be some hook.