/r/ffxivdiscussion: Data analysis of Dawntrail negative reviews (Steam)

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Originally Posted by Sotaris

I dunno how the reviews are now after several months but I could tell the first couple of weeks when it was cool to bitch about Wuk, that a majority of the negative reviews were simply a review bombing campaign.

I'm still of the opinion that the expansion is fine, but its neither good or bad. It's mid.

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I'm not sure about Steam, but the review score on Metacritic has continued to slowly go down since the release of DT, as more and more people finish the MSQ. Personally, I didn't feel the need to leave a review until DT. I only tend to review games that are either exceptionally good or exceptionally bad and found FFXIV to be neither. I was already on the fence in Endwalker and Dawntrail really pushed me in the direction of thinking the MSQ was terrible. It's frustrating because the themes they went with are fine, it's just that they're handled in the worst possible way. Same with characters - the ideas of them are fine, but they end up flat and one-dimensional. They feel like someone's first RPG character.

Edit: Just went and checked. The Metacritic scores started out at 7.4 and are now sitting at 5.3. I checked about a month ago and they were still at 6.0. I would hardly call people leaving negative reviews months after an expansion launches and people have had the chance to really experience it "review bombing". A lot of us just didn't like DT and that's it. If you did, good for you, I wish I had liked it as well but alas.

I just wanted to offer an additional viewpoint on the 1,000 hour discussion.

On the 1st character that I had a few years ago, I did hit over 1,000 hours before even starting Heavensward. At that point, I wanted to experience every little niche of what the game had to offer, and I'm sure there are other players that have a similar desire. It wasn't that difficult to hit, either - I got all classes to 50 so that I could get a feel for them, and outfitted them all with Ironworks gear. I also did a lot of crafting/gathering and got the Mor Dhona gear, and relic quests, too, which easily take hundreds of hours on their own.

It definitely wasn't required, but increased my enjoyment of the game as a completionist.

It did give me a very good feel for the game, but I didn't consider myself a veteran by any means, not even making it to endgame content yet by that point.

Just something to consider for the data. :)

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Originally Posted by Erzaa

Yup, I'm someone who enjoyed all of the MSQ, ARR through EW, some I liked more than others. I honestly loved SB too. Even when people complained about the EW patches story, I genuinely enjoyed it, I liked Zero as a character and her journey. I liked Wuk Lamat's introduction even. Liked her on the boat scene at the start of 7.0.

But... just, DT MSQ is such utter drivel, I can't even... I'm of the opinion that it's worse than ARR by alot.

But also, one bad expansion isn't necessarily the death of the game, continued bad expansions will be.

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Even if ARR was a fairly cookie cutter JRPG with a lot of padding, it at least had had a setting that was fleshed out and interesting with a lot of tension even among allies. DT is just a void comparatively.

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Originally Posted by Reinha

I can't leave a review since I don't play on Steam but I read the thread.



This comment sums up how I feel about the game, with the addition that I also no longer have a character design I enjoy (thanks to the graphics update) that would motivate me to collect glamour, take screenshots and do new game plus.

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This is the same for me. I'm okay with one bad expansion. I'm okay with the WoL not being the center of attention. I'm not okay with losing my WoL so bad that I can't go back and play the old expansions or take screenshots.

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Originally Posted by Tint

You can use the text command /playtime

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I'm aware. If I were still playing the game.

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Originally Posted by Tint

People would not review bomb if they had liked what they got.

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Which is fair, but it felt like a review bomb campaign when 90% of the reviews was just bashing on 1 character. I wouldn't say 1 NPC ruined the whole expansion. That's just petty and silly to me. You're free to disagree.

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Originally Posted by PercibelTheren

I'm not sure about Steam, but the review score on Metacritic has continued to slowly go down since the release of DT, as more and more people finish the MSQ. Personally, I didn't feel the need to leave a review until DT. I only tend to review games that are either exceptionally good or exceptionally bad and found FFXIV to be neither. I was already on the fence in Endwalker and Dawntrail really pushed me in the direction of thinking the MSQ was terrible. It's frustrating because the themes they went with are fine, it's just that they're handled in the worst possible way. Same with characters - the ideas of them are fine, but they end up flat and one-dimensional. They feel like someone's first RPG character.

Edit: Just went and checked. The Metacritic scores started out at 7.4 and are now sitting at 5.3. I checked about a month ago and they were still at 6.0. I would hardly call people leaving negative reviews months after an expansion launches and people have had the chance to really experience it "review bombing". A lot of us just didn't like DT and that's it. If you did, good for you, I wish I had liked it as well but alas.

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I haven't checked Metacritic since I thought I was clear about talking about Steam (maybe I wasn't enough clear on that, I only refered to Steam reviews).
It is interesting if the overall score for the game (I assume?) dipped so hard, it sounds like its a lot of negative reviews just based on Dawntrial, no?

Another observation, and maybe I'm a minority, it seems user reviews is based on almost only the MSQ and not the overall experience. It would be interesting to see if it improves as patches is being released or I'm just alone in thinking the expansion is fine, and not a 1/10 as I know many set it as.

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Originally Posted by Jeeqbit

1000 hours in the game isn't necessarily a veteran player. That's about 2 months of playing all day (16 hours a day). Could easily be done during a holiday, summer break or while seeking employment.

I don't think it's necessarily review bombing on Steam, but you're more likely to leave a review for a negative experience than a positive one. It's got to be extraordinarily positive (to the point of changing your view on life or something like that) to motivate you to leave a positive one usually, which to be fair, much of the story does motivate people to want to go out of their way to praise it for that, which probably explains why there are positive reviews at all.

The story in Dawntrail may not be for everyone but it's just one expansion. I don't get the people acting like it's the end of the world because one expansion didn't hit for them.

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I've been playing since 2 0 Beta. The games pacing and lack of content is frustrating for someone who has invested literally 1/3 of their lifetime playing it.. that is probably why some people are so passionate and take the issues so personally
and want the devs to address the issues and want to see them fixed. I think they just want the devs go take the game somewhat seriously and not produce garbage. Which is what we have here.

I don't think I would just instantly classify everyone who hits 1000 hours as a veteran in a 10 year old MMO, that's like maybe two years of casual gameplay. It's a lot for a single player game but not for an MMO.

If you didn't play through the original ARR patch quests before it was trimmed I'm not going to consider you a veteran until you have 365 days of playtime.

Ah dang my review made in early access didn't count for this, off by one day. Overall I still agree with my review that the pacing and characters were far below average and while the instances are fantastic I would wait for whatever content you want to be released before purchasing the game or if you are curious catching the expansion on sale.

I find the methodology flawed.

MANY of the negative reviews over the last month.... have zero to do with Dawntrail.

not saying that DT is the most awesome release ever.. but the OP is again posting rancid bait from Reddit without checking it themselves. is DT lack of story responsible for the game not being available on Steamdeck? is it responsible for account issues? is it remotely connected to people saying DONT BUY IT ON STEAM?

no. so.. my thinking is flawed methodology means a flawed subject and bait post. (as the OP is prone to do with never having their own opinion but just reposting reddit garbage)

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Originally Posted by Sotaris

Another observation, and maybe I'm a minority, it seems user reviews is based on almost only the MSQ and not the overall experience. It would be interesting to see if it improves as patches is being released or I'm just alone in thinking the expansion is fine, and not a 1/10 as I know many set it as.

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Makes sense to me, as FFXIV is marketed as story-first. Most negative reviews I've seen praise the battle content while criticising the MSQ. Patch content could indeed salvage the situation but they need to finally release some. The incredibly long patch cycle isn't doing the game any favors. The fact that field operations have been pushed to something like 7.3 is dire. Most people from my FC subbed for a month and they're off playing other games because there is only so much to do in DT unless you're a Savage raider.