Dear Yoshi, all other complaints aside, I just want that feeling back...

While flipping thru youtube on my TiVo tonight I started watching old vids and one of the ones I stumbled upon was The End of an Era.

Now I know you are thinking, omg another fool with rose colored glasses, but hear me out.

Version 1 was not the greatest, some of the maps (I miss you old Coerthas!), the battle system, the fatigue system, the lack of animations and the non-existent story (at original launch anyway) were atrocious. The game was fundamentally broken. I joined at beta and stayed for a couple weeks after launch and then focused my attention back to Vana'diel. But then Yoshi came in and made promises of a new tomorrow, so I came back. I mean, I had to see if they could actually pull it off and if they could, wanted to experience it first hand. As in love with Vana'diel as I was, I knew Eorzea could potentially be something great.

Although the game itself, the mechanics, the lag, the maze of a shroud that needed to be navigated were still bad something started to happen. I really started to feel for Eorzea. I connected with the characters, the city-states and the Scions. I really started to care about what happened. I stayed until final shutdown and, I will admit, cried my eyes out when the end of an era first played itself out on my screen. In fact, I was not alone. I was in voice chat with a large group and all you heard were sobs and sniffles for a long time after.

I was eager for Eorzea to come back. I wanted to know the fate of Bahamut, Louisoix, the Scions and the leaders of the Grand Companies and City-States themselves.

Yoshi and the devs created such a good story, and through active participation with us as players, made us really care about this game and this world.

So aside from small bugs, the overuse of rng on things rng shouldn't even be factored into, the grind that every mmo with inevitably have and all the other things people race to the forums here to complain and QQ about. I just want to say...

Make me care again. After arr started coming to a close and definitely after heavensward launched there has been a disconnect. Not only from the game but between you and the players. I actually felt like part of the dev team during version 1. I actually felt like I was fighting for my home. You made a story, characters and an environment THAT good.

Many things have been fixed, that is true. And I can understand that the whining from the overly entitled or those who won't, or don't want to, put in effort or time can really grind on a person. But don't let that make you shut us out. Some of us on here and other places have some truly good ideas and suggestions, even if they get poo'd on from a very vocal minority. But don't cut us out anymore. At least a check in here and there would be wonderful.

And as you craft future content for X|V please look back at what you did and how you made us Legacy players feel with version 1 and try to keep that life alive in the game. Make us care about Eorzea. Make us feel like we are actually saving the day. ARR was good at that. Crystal tower, although a bit lacking, was good at that. Coil was wonderful at that.

Make us care about Eorzea again.


To other forumers, I am off to bed, so troll away if you must, but I hope if you feel the same, you will express it as well. I would love to have that feeling of Eorzea again and I hope you want the same.

I think I heard about a private server re-opening for FFXIV 1.0. Not sure if its still going on but maybe. Back on topic, I hope they fulfill your wish. I never played 1.0 before but I always wanted to experience it, I mean the shrouds looked amazing in the videos like I could get lost or something XD. If a world can get me lost and keep me immersed enough to find my way then that's a world for me.

Well, I'd say your rose tinted goggles are particularly strong regarding 1.0.

Pretty heavy spoilers up until the end of the game below, forewarning.

But yeah, overall the story in HW hasn't really been up to snuff. There's been a ton of great character moments, and I feel far more attached to the Scions than I ever was, but it's come at the cost of not caring about the world at all anymore. From the complete cop-out and backdown from what happened in 2.5, to Midgardsomr playing a passive spectator and doing NOTHING AT ALL UNTIL THE VERY END FOR NO DISCERNIBLE REASON, to virtually zero continued exposition on what our tempered status to Hydaelyn is all about. (It seems they backed down again and gave it back to us, although Midgardsomr implied he was doing us a favor by taking it away, which would make some sense if we were tempered.) And, what I think is the worst contrivance, that was corrected in an out-of-game supplement. "Dragon's just have such painfully emotional dragon emotions that they're immune to feeling different, and their emotions are really strong so you mortals wouldn't understand, shutup." You either have living characters or you don't. If you add a brick wall of a character, they might as well be an inanimate object.

Honestly, the only good story telling in HW has been character focused. (The WoL actually gets their own character development in the DRK questline!) The plot has lost almost all of it's consistency and believeability, and nothing really compelling is happening, or if it is, it's at a snails pace and at the cost of ignoring other more pressing or interesting matters.

In terms of story engagement, I'm more engaged in HW than I ever was in ARR (though I didn't play 1.0). ARR's story had a lot of pacing problems and issues of narrative structure. Especially in the post-50 storyline, there are long stretches of fetch quests and time spent on Ul'dahn politics that doesn't feel particularly well-connected to the main (Ascian/Primal-focused) narrative. While there were some real gems in 2.xx (such as Moenbryda's arc), overall, the HW story is structured much better as a gameplay infused narrative, allowing the player to better engage with it.

Granted, as with all artistic endeavors, beauty is going to be in the eye of the beholder, so what immerses one player in the story may not do so for another.

This post is more about immersion than story in total:

I played ffxi (among many other MMO's) and I do enjoy XIV, but the feeling of your character "belonging" in that world just isn't there. It could be due to the story, the "one to save them all" instead of "one of many" kinda takes you out of the world building. FFXI just had that awe about it, exploring and seeing new things etc, there was a sense of wonder, ffxiv doesn't have that. It's: get quest, go to quest hub, kill x mobs (or gather shiny things) return to quest giver, rinse repeat. I think a lot of it has to do with XI (and other MMO's) being a bit more open world, allowing you to choose the path to level and explore rather than the theme-park style. But that's just how Theme-park MMO's are, exploration goes to the side for quest (or in ffxiv's case, fates) grinds. Other things (that are seen as QoL) that can take you out of immersion are items like frequent quick travel, and I'd hate to say it, but flying. I think one of the worst things in MMO's to come out (other than item level scoring) is the idea of flying. It's convenient, sure, but you end up skipping over a lot of the world by going from one fate (quest) to the next. I think that SE was already on the path of WoW inspired design and thought the next logical step was flying (much like blizzard did with their first expansion).


I didn't even care about the story in ARR, I did enjoy the HW story (it was far more streamlined and less fetch b.s. quests from the scions), but again, my character doesn't seem to even BE a part of the scions, she's just an intern who does all the dirty work for them while they sat in Waking sands drinking tea. In HW I was at least doing something for "myself".

To be honest I would love to see Ishgard burn, I hated that area since the beginning of HW.

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Originally Posted by Shyle

This post is more about immersion than story in total

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Immersion is the result of great story telling. However we are still in 3.1 so there's still time for it to develop.

I never felt like I belonged in Eorzea given how awkward my character is always placed in cut scenes; always off to the side and silently staring. However that all changed when I stepped into Coil. That first pan of the giant crystal in T1 made me feel like this is gonna be one hell of a ride and it was. Yoshi needs to make the story more intertwined with the content. This is probably why Alexander is getting such a bad rap since it has no integral ties to the msq and offers no context on the current plight of the realm other than being just another summoned primal sucking the land dry.

Shyle: Its because the DF is the death of this game. Everything is in a closed duty finder envoirment that takes away any exploration joy that you are asking for. I wish Yoshi P would wake up from trying so hard for this catering to WoW and Casual and instead shape the player instead of adapting to the player.

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Originally Posted by FizzleofHyperion

Shyle: Its because the DF is the death of this game. Everything is in a closed duty finder envoirment that takes away any exploration joy that you are asking for. I wish Yoshi P would wake up from trying so hard for this catering to WoW and Casual and instead shape the player instead of adapting to the player.

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DF is the result of Theme-park design and the prevalence of instances (dungeons), I think WoW in the first few years did it right, took already established designs and improved upon them. The dungeons were solid, the world was still open to explore and experience etc. SE relies too heavily on the theme-park and instances more than anything which is why there's no exploration. DF can be nice to have, as I use it constantly to level my alts (since it's either dungeons of grind on fates), but the world has to be open too, otherwise dungeons will just be the primary venue of exp (as we currently have it).

I'll have to respectfully disagree in terms of the story.

I'm more engaged with Heavensward's story thus far compared to A Realm Reborn's, especially just comparing base stories and ignoring major patch updates. The only criticism I would have for Heavensward's plot is how they handled the whole Ul'dah subplot. Heavensward actually felt more like a journey than a legion of fetch quests that I felt throughout A Realm Reborn's base narrative. I'll be fair and say the subsequent updates to the story line made me like/appreciate the characters and overarching plot a lot more, which may have had an influence in me being engaged from Heavensward from the get-go.

Whatever else Heavensward might be, it really nailed the story down.