Lore, FFXI or FFXIV

I spend a lot of time at work on wiki during down time, and have been recently going through both ffxi and Ffxiv lore and storylines through various expansions and what not.
Now there's always been debates and topics conparing the two games gameplay, classes, mechanics and what not... But I was curious... What do many find different/better/worse when comparing the two games rich stories and lore?

It seems like FFXIV is a bit more dedicated to fleshing out the world of Hydaelyn compared to XI's treatment of Vana'diel. I feel like even though HW isn't even finished yet we've already learned more about the Allagans than we learned about the Zilart during their relevance to XI's story (which was the first two expansions). XI certainly had some pretty cool ideas for Vana'diel (like the fact that the Avatars, XI's version of Primals, each had their own constellation that was plainly visible in the night sky) but it also left a bunch of hanging plot threads (like the Olduum, which were introduced in the 3rd expansion but never followed up on).

FFXIV is handling its lore and world building much better than FFXI did. I still have a place in my heart for Vana'diel, but I'm glad that the devs seem to care about making Hydaelyn feel like a world with a rich history behind it.

Edit: How do I add spoiler tags to posts? I had a big block of text I had to remove because of character limits :(

Even though they're trying to flesh out the lore in FFXIV a bit (and I emphasize a bit) further than in FFXI, the fact that the world feels empty and uninteresting gameplay-wise makes it a chore for me to get into it in many cases, because it doesn't make me wonder about what has happened in X or Y place. One of my favourite places in the game are the Hinterlands, because it's beautiful, but I truly don't care about what might've happened solely because of what I said. If traveling was a thing, and if it felt like a true adventure it would bring the game to a whole new level to me.

I do not believe in comparing which is objectively better, but I do feel that some have stronger suits.

The God-meta is completely crazy in XI, and possibly even inconsistent within itself with the introduction of Hades in Seekers of Adoulin. By virtue of having some form of sanity (so far), XIV wins here.

I felt a lot more immersed in the world of XI. This likely comes for two reasons:
1. The style of MMO. XI's expansive world doesn't really lend itself well to modern MMOs.
2. Less hand-holding, so you had to go around talking to NPCs and putting together clues for what/where you're supposed to look for. Of course, this borders on absolutely stupid at times when you have to go somewhere completely on the other side of the world for a side quest with no information on where to go, how to pop a monster, and sometimes even how to kill it.

I am a firm believer that ToAU is one of the best newly introduced lore-intensive expansions in a MMO. A lot of the time with Expansions, as was the problem with Heavensward (and Seekers of Adoulin), an area sounds much more interesting and appealing before you visit it due to the mystery. You fill in the blanks in your head and therefore have an amplified picture of it that the "real deal" almost never matches up to. ToAU broke that rule completely.

I'm also fully convinced that XI's BLU is the most interesting class, lore-wise, in the entire series. There's a cutscene in there where you have to hunt down an insane colleague and, when you find him, he's walking on the roof with his spine shattered and a broken neck turning into a soulflayer. ****'s crazy.

So far, XI has done multiverse better than XIV, despite XIV canonically having one. This isn't really a fair comparison yet, though, because XI had a full expansion, three mini-expansions, and two battle systems (Dynamis, Provenance) detailing some of these multiverses. In XIV we've no elaboration at all because we've barely had the fact that they exist confirmed. I vote "give it time" for this one, it's impossible to make a judgement.
(though honestly, unless we get to face a tainted AU version of ourselves in battle, it's going to be hard to top XI here, and even then it probably won't; if there's one thing XI did extremely well, it was multiverses).

I'm fond of Primals over Avatars in just about every way and I feel like they're more developed on the lore-scale in general. The same goes with magic in XIV. However, I'd put the XI summoning of Fenrir right up there with XIV Bahamut in terms of lore impact, because it led to some incredible side stories and characters.

On the subject of Bahamut. . .
The biggest difference in lore between modern XIV and XI is that the "world changing" event happened very recently, vs 20 years in the past. It's basically just whichever you prefer here, however I will say that the original XIV (not ARR) handled the Calamity much better than WotG did. While WotG was extremely interesting on the meta and multiverse scale (and XIV will be taking cues from it, if Yoshi is to be believed), what it was actually supposed to focus on - the war - was handled miserably.

On the subject of more ancient history, I find the Zilart far more interesting than the Allag, but I do love just about everything on the War of the Magi. Tie.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CyrilLucifer

I'm fond of Primals over Avatars in just about every way and I feel like they're more developed on the lore-scale in general.

---

Hmm... I'm much more fond of XIs Elemental six than XIVs... The backstory surrounding the Avatars just blows what most of the Primals have out the water... We've got some mythology for Primals, but for the most part its a couple sentences at best... Good King is probably my favorite, just from speculation on his origin (their relation to the Twelve being Thordans Twelve Knights, rather than the Twelve, the calamity in the sky being Nidhoggs rage, rather than second(?) Umbral Era, etc.), but even that pales in comparison to the short stories we got with the six Avatars...

I think XI did a much better job of making the summons part of its world, where as with XIV they're just there because its a Final Fantasy title and here's a quick justification for their existence... Even if most of the short stories revolving around the Avatars had absolutely no grounding in the game (though Ramuhs Olduum civilization eventually bore fruit).

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Nalien

Hmm... I'm much more fond of XIs Elemental six than XIVs... The backstory surrounding the Avatars just blows what most of the Primals have out the water... We've got some mythology for Primals, but for the most part its a couple sentences at best... Good King is probably my favorite, just from speculation on his origin (their relation to the Twelve being Thordans Twelve Knights, rather than the Twelve, the calamity in the sky being Nidhoggs rage, rather than second(?) Umbral Era, etc.), but even that pales in comparison to the short stories we got with the six Avatars...

I think XI did a much better job of making the summons part of its world, where as with XIV they're just there because its a Final Fantasy title and here's a quick justification for their existence... Even if most of the short stories revolving around the Avatars had absolutely no grounding in the game (though Ramuhs Olduum civilization eventually bore fruit).

---

I remember avatars having a developed lore, and they had stories explaining how they turned to be celestial avatars, so I agree with this. FFXIV's feel somewhat shallow, most of them.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Nalien

I think XI did a much better job of making the summons part of its world, where as with XIV they're just there because its a Final Fantasy title and here's a quick justification for their existence... Even if most of the short stories revolving around the Avatars had absolutely no grounding in the game (though Ramuhs Olduum civilization eventually bore fruit).

---

I originally had something similar to that typed up with the Fenrir comment. Fenrir really felt like his summoning impacted and molded so much of Windurst's current culture. In XIV, I want to say the summoning almost feels detached. However, I prefer the idea of strength based upon the summoner's faith, and how it can be twisted and mutated so yes, Thordan is exactly what I enjoy about XIV's summons.

Actually, I feel the same with Beast Tribes. Again this may just be the XIV method of storytelling, but I feel like XI's beast tribes are a lot more integrated into the culture of the cities. XIV suffers a lot by using the current modern MMO storytelling methods for quests, in my opinion.

Belated edit: I'd also like to give Bastok a neat little thumb's up for basically being the only "industrial" city in a fantasy MMO that I enjoy from a lore perspective. I love the struggle for natural resources with the Quadav, I love the class struggle and racial struggle, and I love how those all accumulated into an embodiment of hate that almost destroyed the world (or actually did, in the true XI universe. yay multiverses). It's not like the fake pretentious "aloof" racism in San d'Oria or what we see in Gridania that is more of a "tell, don't show" type racism. I feel like Ishgard is trying to emulate it, but it isn't really working.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Tanathya

I remember avatars having a developed lore, and they had stories explaining how they turned to be celestial avatars, so I agree with this. FFXIV's feel somewhat shallow, most of them.

---

I think the Avatars had more gravity behind them... They were old gods, somewhat similar to Zodiark I guess, that had to be kept in slumber for the same reason we don't want Zodiark revived, they'd want to return the world to how it was and that's bad for reasons... Except, if the short stories they all had are to be believed, Altana took measure to invest them in Vana'diel by merging them with mortals, who were the subject of the short stories. That was a lot more interesting than "lawl, aetherial god like beings", at least so far since Primal mythology really hasn't been fleshed out much. More so when you get to Alexander and Odin... I was convinced ToAU was essentially going to an expansion telling the story of Alexander and Odin getting the same treatment the elemental six got in their short stories... The entire expansion played out like one of those short stories... All the way though Wings of the Goddess, I was expecting Treasure (since there was more overlap with expansions in XI) to conclude with Altana merging Odin and Luzaf, Alexander and Razfahd... Instead Odin pops up and is responsible for the Shadow Lord? Meh... Dread to think where they went with RoV...

I view Promathia more like Zodiark and I'm almost positive that's the intention (Promathia was Altana's counterpart/lover, Zodiark is Hydaelyn's other half/possible other things that we don't know).

But the Avatars embody what I mean by the Gods being absurd in XI. They come in so many layers and flavors that organization is almost impossible. Terrestrial, Celestial - and then you have the 'higher' Gods above them. I mean, it's not terribly different from Eikon/Primal, I think the difference is "false" versus "true."

I just wasn't fond of XI's God meta, I guess. I'm also not terribly fond of XIV's Twelve for the same reason; it just isn't the flavor I prefer my lore in.

I will say that Odin being behind basically everything was pretty obnoxious, straight out.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Nalien

Snip

---

Primals feel kinda forced, and they're an essential part of the story, so that is why I feel the story of FFXIV to be not as interesting under my point of view.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Nalien

Good King is probably my favorite, just from speculation on his origin (their relation to the Twelve being Thordans Twelve Knights, rather than the Twelve, the calamity in the sky being Nidhoggs rage, rather than second(?) Umbral Era, etc.), but even that pales in comparison to the short stories we got with the six Avatars...

---

Where was that mentioned? o.o I can't honestly remember anything like that, but it sounds super interesting. Was it the moogle sidequests? Must've been, because I didn't have the patience to read through all those kupos.

What bothers me too about the primals is the very uneven amount of lore (as little they give) between them. Shiva has an entire saga after her and ifrit.. Well he's just angry.

I said I'm staying away from gameplay but I will say the massiveness of ffxi and having to run everywhere played a huge part in my opinion in its vastness. I easily felt overwhelmed (in a good and bad way) and every bit of story had more impact. I felt small. Every monster my level could almost kill me... Let alone story content where I needed people desperately. I was an adventurer! Eventually a hero! Not some over powered god like Ffxiv.

As for the cities, I think they did them near perfect and different from one another. Juneo being.. Woah. Ishgard just fails to me.

The beast men were scary and ... An actual race of creatures! There's nothing of notice with these beast men. They went the right way in 1.0 then just dropped the ball. I want to see a beastman city I have to infiltrate!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CyrilLucifer

I will say that Odin being behind basically everything was pretty obnoxious, straight out.

---

Agreed. Wings of the Goddess is where I completely switched off with XI... Partly because I had to, I mean the rate we got story with that expansion was appalling... Odin did it, though? Christ... Why? The general Cloud of Darkness plot RoV gave made much more sense to me... The opening cinematic mentioned the crystal banishing the darkness, yet that darkness never manifested until RoV, I was convinced Wings was going to involve that for explaining Shadow Lord, but nope... Odin...

Before that though? I really quite enjoyed the God meta XI had going on... Celestials were the "old" Gods, while the Terrestrials arose from Vana'diel... Throw in a plot to "humanize" the old Gods with those short stories and it was much more enjoyable than the frankly pathetic amount of information we get on Primals... Primals, for the most part, exist because magic, there's some mythology tied to that, but they've not explored that nearly enough to satisfy me...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Haprimac

Where was that mentioned? o.o I can't honestly remember anything like that, but it sounds super interesting. Was it the moogle sidequests? Must've been, because I didn't have the patience to read through all those kupos.

---

It's speculation, and yes, it's tied to the moogle sidequests.

Good King was based on the legend of how the Moogles got to the Twelveswood; They once worshiped the Twelve in the Sky, but a calamity occurred and fire rained down from the sky, so the Good King lead a group down to the surface.

If you view that in terms of Eorzean history, it sounds like perhaps the Second Umbral Era (IIRC that was fire?), except the Gods (Twelve) left Eorzea before/during the First Umbral Era, so that doesn't line up... When you take the Moghome stuff into consideration, though... You have Moogles serving Sky (Dragon) and Land (Thordan) Lords prior to the Dragonsong War... Thordan had Twelve Knights... Nidhogg (a dragon, who spits fire...) clearly caused a mini-calamity when he went nuts, given the damage can still be seen all around Dravania... I'd imagine the Twelveswood Moogles left at the start of the Dragonsong War and the Twelve they served were Thordans Knights...

In some ways, I love that... It's speculation and is never out right explained... Shame the rest can't be on that level... At the very bottom you've got Leviathan, they completely butchered him... This is actually a large part of why I want a Beast Tribe expansion next, that takes us into their territory (that and it would be the perfect expansion to provide new GC Ranks, FC Primal Summoning, Hamlet Defense, and pretty much everything I'd hoped 2.0 would add that still haven't been added...).

XI didn't leave the same room for speculation with the short stories basically spelling out the Avatars origins, but at least all of them had a solid piece of lore behind them... Here? Shiva and Thordan do, but those weren't Primals, they were people playing Primals... Bahamut does thanks to Tiamat (who we can't tell about Dalamud or Coil because screw satisfying conclusions), but that is it... Best case you've got Ramuh, who gives us a nice bit of dialog, worst case you've got Leviathan, who was just there...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CyrilLucifer

The God-meta is completely crazy in XI, and possibly even inconsistent within itself with the introduction of Hades in Seekers of Adoulin. By virtue of having some form of sanity (so far), XIV wins here.

---

I'm not sure what you mean by Hades adding inconsistency.

The Adoulin storyline makes it clear that Hades is NOT a natural part of Vana'diel in any way. He's an extradimensional invader. Or, to be more specific, he's a mortal from Vana'diel who found his way to that other dimension (Tartarus) and used the power he found there to transform himself into a nihilistic god-like being. In either case, though, he has no relation to the various gods and god-like beings found in Vana'diel, and doesn't interfere with the lore of those beings in any way I can think of.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LineageRazor

I'm not sure what you mean by Hades adding inconsistency.

---

He adds an inconsistency is because he is an anomaly. He has control over spirits and undead (Ra'Kaznar is filled to the brim with fomor, not to mention the whole totally-not-a-vampire-we-swear Teodore; his servants also include Umbrils and Dullahans, which presumably work the same way in XI as they do in XIV, being spirits inhabiting an armor.), which fall under the realm of true Gods, and higher gods like Promathia/Altana at that. He's Hades, but he's not Hades. He's somewhere in-between man and God without a place really specific for him - something of a false God, if you will, in a game that previously lacked false Gods. All of the Avatars are true Gods.

He just doesn't fit.
I actually feel like he wouldn't be out of place in XIV at all specifically because of what I mentioned. You can tell they were drawing from Ascians with him already.

Edit:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Nalien

Best case you've got Ramuh, who gives us a nice bit of dialog, worst case you've got Leviathan, who was just there

---

Ah, if you didn't at least finish WotG you should. I actually quit then, too, for exactly the same reasons you did, but went back. Twice. I'm like FFXI's battered wife at this point, that keeps being abused and goes back for more.

As for the above, can I just say how disappointing Levi is? He's my favorite summon and just...blarg. The Sahagin, however, are very interesting. Easily better than their XI counterparts. XI's Sahagin were cuter, though.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Keramory

What bothers me too about the primals is the very uneven amount of lore (as little they give) between them. Shiva has an entire saga after her and ifrit.. Well he's just angry.

---

I believe much of how the lore is uneven is down to the place in the story the Primals occupy - they are more deconstructions of deities than actual deities, as often as the stories that involve them are centered on the faith and beliefs and current status of the culture that births their current form. For each of those cultures we get a fair amount of exposure, even if we don't get much background on the summoned being itself.

Even with Shiva, who has one of the most fleshed out backgrounds of just who served as the inspiration, is more about the beliefs of Ysale and the heretics and the manipulation or action/inaction of certain dragons than it is about a deity-like being.

So the Avatars themselves do seem more interesting, because they occupy a different place in the story...a higher tier of sorts, due to being actual deities.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CyrilLucifer

Ah, if you didn't at least finish WotG you should. I actually quit then, too, for exactly the same reasons you did, but went back. Twice. I'm like FFXI's battered wife at this point, that keeps being abused and goes back for more.

---

Thankfully (I guess), I can't bring myself to go back... I've attempted to view summaries of recent stuff, but it's not exactly drawing me back... Some of what I've seen from RoV is just down right off putting... SoA interested me with what seemed like some Zilart technology being involved? It's hard to get invested when you're not playing it, though...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CyrilLucifer

As for the above, can I just say how disappointing Levi is? He's my favorite summon and just...blarg. The Sahagin, however, are very interesting. Easily better than their XI counterparts. XI's Sahagin were cuter, though.

---

He's fallen far from the King of all Summons...

On that subject though, I'd say beast tribes are much better in XIV than XI. XI they were just kinda there, and we maybe got something with the nation missions... XIVs done a much better job exploring them so far, and with large portions of Eorzea locked off as their territory, I have hopes we'll one day see an Beast Tribe Expansion...

And that's fine, I actually liked how they showed shiva off and explained primals (although a complete rip off fma humuculous where reviving goes totally wrong) I just don't understand the lack of info on ifrit.
The sad part is he was the first! By far! Think he was the only dude the original staff made. And we get like two sentences on him which sums up... He's crankier then the other primals (which says a lot).
We could have an npc just say a paragraph to give in detail. He's based from an anorexic beastmen who was made fun of so he got really angry and became a strong warrior for the a-team tribe. Things went south when they tried to bring him back. Better story then "oh hell these guys got guns, we're calling daddy"

I dunno, I liked XI's beast tribes better honestly. I mean for the Yagudo, (XIs Ixali) they had Giddeus and Ozortra. Every beast tribe had about two areas devoted to them, fleshing out their cities and having quests making you sneak through these cities. If you explored them on you own and went in deep enough, you could actually fight their bosses in the form of notorious monsters. These nms where rare spawns and they couldn't be soloed, at least at lvl 75!

Edit: Ozotra was almost like a keep, where you had to solve puzzles, find secret doors desguised as walls, hit hidden switches to go deeper. The switches reset daily (vanadeil time) or was it weekly? And when you hit the wrong switch a trapdoor would open and dump you into the basement.

The Yagudo and Quadav were interesting, especially the Yagudo. Their idol was a female child chosen for her singing voice and placed in the role against her will. The Quadav had an interesting give and take relationship with Bastok. The Lamia and Merrows are also neat for the same reasons BLUs are.

I also liked the Gobbies in XI. While XIV absolutely gives the Gobbies more personality, XI gave them more of a sense of danger. Someone on this board is always saying Alexander is flaws because it suffers from "tell, not show -" XI's Gobbies are exactly opposite, they're "Show, don't tell." Some Gobbies hired the Troll Mercenaries. Because they had the funding and because they wanted to. They had the power and they used it. While they could be helpful and sell things or upgrade your pack, they could also be unpredictable and dangerous. It was based on the individual, rather than the faction; they were true neutral and I really loved them.

Also, times have changed, Rhodkr. Nowadays, you can even solo the ToAU beast kings!

The Orcs were basically just humor fuel, especially in WotG, and the Sahagin were throwaway. The Tonberries in XI were equally amazing as XIV's though, from an interest perspective.

FFXI's design allows for more depth, in my opinion. FFXIV is still a very good game and there's a lot of interesting lore. It doesn't feel as dark or as dangerous as FFXI did. I mean, I don't mind that the game world isn't as dangerous in FFXIV as it is in FFXI...because that's just the reality of sensible design for a modern MMO. That doesn't really excuse the fact that very few antagonists are allowed to be an actual threat in FFXIV though. I don't want to derail this thread with my usual thoughts about how much of a cop out the 'fake deaths' of various FFXIV characters is though.

On the plus side, the developers do seem to be listening to feedback and it is my hope that they will avoid giving the WoL and the Scions so much plot armour in the future.

This is interesting! I just started playing XI, and while I've in no way experienced what those who played it even 5 years ago did, I can give a crack at my impressions so far. Disclaimer: I'm still very much at the beginning of the story, so I can't comment about how the Primals compare to the Avatars (although I deeply disagree that anything related to Primal lore is shallow), or how the Beast Tribes compare (so far, about the same, but it's not hard to imagine XI going more in-depth than XIV, where much of the BT conflict is basically flavor text), or whatever. And despite what I'm about to say, I am enjoying my time in Vana'Diel.

That said, so far? Lore-wise and world-wise, XIV is trumping it. I appreciate XI's method of going about things - it certainly does feel more like a big, dangerous world - but it doesn't actually make me feel immersed nor does it bleed history in the way XIV does. Early on, XIV's lore and the sense of Eorzea being a lived-in world with a long history behind it is what snagged me and kept me playing (I believe it was walking up to Ul'Dah and seeing "The 80 Sins of Sasamo" flash up on the screen that first gave me that sense, but it was far from the last thing). Nothing in XI has made me feel that. The cities don't feel as alive, the world doesn't feel as vibrant. Part of that is likely age, but I really do think XIV goes out of its way to make its world stand out as and feel like an Actual Place far earlier and more often than XI.

It probably doesn't help that, as far as story presentation goes, XIV is trumping XI too. I haven't actually hit any real story yet (just the city stuff up to around Jeuno, and whatever Rhapsodies is on about), but for all that XIV could work on its presentation, it's LEAGUES better at that than XI has been. Stuff just kind of happens in XI; there's no sense of narrative flow or build, and having every single add-on and expansion start up when I enter the relevant area is disorienting and distracting. And main stories aside, I feel like much of the world's lore has to be sought out and discovered on one's own...which would be fine, if the world was actually one conducive to exploring and seeking out stories in. XI is not that world. Maybe the story is super rewarding for those who find it, but when you need to spend months to years digging around a game (or using the internet) to experience it, it's far from the first thing I'm going to turn to when I want to have a story told to me.

I hear Chains of Promathia is excellent, though. Really interested in working my way up to that.

What a lot of new players don't know about XI is that there used to be a ton of lore on the official site. Like, absolute buttloads. I believe a lot of it has been removed, though, which is unfortunate because there's a lot of world building in that lore that SE continually updated when the game was in its prime.

For example, there's one very, very important character in SoA that actually has his diary on the SoA website that explains who he is, who his role is, what his political alignment is, and his current opinions of the politics of his country are. It also shows his decaying mental state as the expansion progresses. This one should still be up, at least.

Fortunately, you can still find it on the wiki. For example:
http://ffxiclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/G...l_War,_Vol._II

One of my absolute favorite lore tidbits is from one of these excerpts and is about the Hydra Corps (and shows you how absolutely terrifying Dynamis is, in case the game didn't make it clear enough):
http://ffxiclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/L...From_the_Hydra

"...maybe ten days have passed. I still have no idea of where I am. The area appears to be Beaucedine Glacier, but I see no sign of the allied forces. Neither day nor night has dominion here. There is no sense of time passing at all...

"We were fighting with the Kindred when a sudden darkness engulfed us... When I came to my senses I saw the sprawled forms of the other Hydra members, as well as those of our opponents. It seems our enemies were just as surprised as we were. In any case, our battles with them continue. We do not intend to fall in this place..."

Excerpt from undelivered letter dated 9/10/867 CE

"My dearest ****,

This may be my last letter to you. I have continued my correspondence in the hopes of retaining the gift of words, and some sense of time. But there is no escape from this hell. This realm stands apart from Vana'diel. It is a prison. There are those among the Hydra who have begun to think the world was destroyed as we lay unconscious, and this shade of reality is all that remains.

"Our battle has been never-ending. All for the brief flowerings of scarlet color on the endless fields of snow... Most of my companions have lost their grip on sanity, and pursue our enemies with a dull single-mindedness. Why do they fight? Why bother to spill each other's blood anymore? I am losing the will to care the longer I stay here...
"I don't want to become like them. I don't want to forget you. That is why I have decided to entrust my spirit to Mandau. If gentle Altana has any presence here, then surely she will see my letter delivered to you. I will not say goodbye. We will meet again one day, I swear it…"

The isolated realm spoken of in the letters must surely be the place adventurers know as "Dynamis." There are many who claim to have been attacked in that land by soldiers resembling the members of the Hydra Corps. These attackers supposedly have eyes that have lost the light of hope...

We pray that the efforts of adventurers will allow the spirits of these poor wretches to return to Altana's embrace.

Either way, yes, it gets better with CoP and ToAU. WotG andSoA basically have the same storytelling method as FFXIV, except with longer cutscenes. The basic FFXI story is pretty dry until you hit Rank 6. Even Zilart is relatively dry because it was the first expansion and it was more focused on the act of physically expanding the world and lore rather than telling a story. It was telling a story of lore, rather than a story to entertain you. Don't do Rhapsodies yet, you have about 5 expansions of story to go through before you'll even know all the characters.

Edit: Ah, here's some of it!
http://www.playonline.com/ff11eu/gui...ber/index.html

This might be kinda strange, but I didn't like the fact that we only fought living members of the 5 races in story mode in XI. There were plenty of undead, but you mostly the only humanoids you fight were the beastmen. And if you thought XIV had too many fakeout deaths, look at XI. Lion sacrificed herself at the end of Rise of the Zilart...but they brought her back for Rhapsodies of Vana'diel.

I will agree with Cyril (I think it was?) that BLU was the coolest job as far as lore went. I was really hoping that Raubahn would be so distraught after what happened to Nanamo in 2.55 that he'd summon a Voidsent and let it reside in his arm, creating something like a BLU in the process. Hell, he has the same name as the BLU trainer AND he has the BLU mythic weapon :o

Yeah ffxi was much darker. Although in its defense, Ffxiv has some death... Sometimes I feel like I'm playing Pokemon where nothing and no one dies... Just knocked out until they go to the poke center (aether stream). Ffxi was a little guilty of that but when they were it was... Years later. Also if someone died you didn't have several cutscenes to it, for the most part it was walking right over their corpse

My biggest problem with XI was the apparent disconnect between Celestial Avatars and the whole Altana/Promathia story, and the way everything was dragged out with WotG. Odin was a particularly vexing case; CoP seemed to imply the Shadow Lord had him awoken from his protocrystal in the Northlands with that girl's song, and the beastmen mistakenly thought he was Promathia for some reason. Then in ToAU, Odin is wandering around like a hobo god ion another continent until he can do battle with the Iron Colossus Alexander....which they had previously done 1000 years ago. So did he get stuffed into the protocrystal that recently, and where was Alexander's protocrystal? And in WotG, the Dark Divinity apparently was the one behind the Shadow Lord's power, who somehow caused the Zilart to awaken from stasis when did something to the Crystal Line. (I never understood what Eald'narche meant by "noise" in that network)

The story seemed so confusing and incoherent at that point, and given how much of an ordeal it usually was to do get people to help with anything in that game, I couldn't justify keep playing. I remember trying it again with Abyssea, but that just exposed how terrible the core design of the game was, and Abyssea's story didn't make much sense either. Apparently in an alternate timeline, Promathia was not stopped and absorbed the Phoenix/Selh'teus....which turned him into Shinryu who was on the moon for some reason.

All in all, Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn has shown itself to be an order of magnitude better than XI in terms of world-building and playability. The only significant flaw I see in XIV right now is that the histories of the beast-tribes and their primals are not as fleshed out as well as they could be.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Zohar_Lahar

snip

---

Wasn't Alexander's protocrystal destroyed when Gordeus blew up during that last clash or whatever? I could've sworn I heard that somewhere.

Another thing I appreciate about 14 over 11 is the fact that the job story lines are evolving as the game expands. In 11, you had job quests at 40 (where you got a weapon) and 50 (where you got the artifact armor) and...that's it. There were a few cases where you had an extra quest or two for unique spells (Geomancer, SCH, and SMN are the only ones I can remember right off the top of my head). The advanced jobs that you unlocked at 30 were a bit better since the starting quest had a bit of story, but yeah...not much about the jobs in that game.

Edit with something I wanted to add earlier but didn't know how to add spoiler tags for lol:

I like my raid bosses to have some sort of story behind them. The big events of XI had hardly any lore attached - there were 6 "bosses" on the ground (Behemoth/King Behemoth, Fafnir/Nidhogg, and Adamantoise/Aspidochelone), 5 "bosses" in the sky (Genbu, Byakko, Seiryu, Suzaku, and Kirin), and 8 "bosses" in the trans-dimensional capital of the Zilart (Jailers of Love/Fortitude/Justice/Temperance/Hope/Faith/Prudence and Absolute Virtue) which had literally 0 story attached to them. And that's just from the base game and the first two expansions (so roughly where XIV is so far, I suppose). As far as I know there wasn't really any story/NPC dialogue that even hints to the existence of these monsters...yet there they are, and they drop good stuff. Fafnir and Nidhogg at least had drops that related to Norse mythology. Why were the "Gods" sealed up in Tu'Lia (aka "sky"), what were the Jailers, and what was Absolute Virtue? Why were they in the ancient capital of Al'Taieu? Who knows? At least Dynamis/Salvage/Einherjar/Limbus/etc had some sort of story attached.

I feel like XIV tells its story better, but XI felt like it had more depth. Does that even make sense?

If there's one thing I really find to be quite weak in comparison to XI though it's the primals. Whilst the primals themselves are interesting characters the fact that they're just thought made manifest makes them somewhat inconsequential. In XI the avatars were serious business and represented a true primal power but here in XIV they're really just frauds masquerading as primal forces. As much as they're a major threat they just don't feel as significant in any singular incarnation since their identity is irrelevant. A powerful primal is powerful just because it got fed a lot of prayer and aether; it doesn't matter what they look like,what we call them or what their backstory is (as interesting as it might be). I feel this really hurts the impact they have.

I understand what you're saying, xiv goes out of its way to tell their stories, of what they have anyway.

I think xi had a better structure in general though. Even from the bear beginning.

3 starting cities. One a kingdom, one a republic, one a federation. Sounds Kidish but it worked. Then there was juneo, placing it all together and the city everyone meets regardless of where they started.

Then the crystal war. Beastmen vs us. Ultimate bad guy, the shadow lord! King of the beastmen armies! Each beastmen type affiliated with a city, more or less controlled by the kindred, the shadow lords people. There was a structure for both sides.

And you could feel the aftermath and the still real threat of that war. I was from San. Orcs were scary as a new player. Going into that first outpost was terrifying at first. I had the feeling I could die in there. They played that all well.

I feel like Ffxiv tried to copy this but it by no means played off the same.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Hinoto-no-Ryuji

and having every single add-on and expansion start up when I enter the relevant area is disorienting and distracting.

---

If this bothers you, you might be disappointed to know that this is the likely future of FFXIV, as well. YoshiP has stated that future expansions will likely NOT require completion of previous expansions in order to access their story or content. This is a good thing: As the game ages and piles on more and more content, new players are going to get more and more discouraged if they have to slog through the main scenario of all the previous content just to get access to the stuff that the bulk of the player base is already working on. New players are the lifeblood of any MMO; better that the old Main Scenario stuff be treated as optional content that players can explore at their leisure if they choose to, not something they are forced to do.

While FFXI might have been a bit overwhelming in the way that it would open all of its expansions to you at once, imagine how horrible it would be for a new player if it didn't - but the only way to get to Seekers of Adoulin where the vast majority of players were hanging around, was to work through the Shadowlord, then complete Zilart, then complete Promathia, then complete Aht Urhgan, and then complete Wings. That's not even getting into the mini expansions and Abyssea.

As it stands, instead a player has the leisure to start pretty much wherever they want. If they do the Main Scenario and are curious about where it goes from there, they're free to continue on to Zilart. If they love Blue Mage and want to know more about the intrigues of the Aht Urhgan Empire, they can go there instead. If they want to jump straight to the endgame, they can drive straight into Seekers of Adoulin.

As for the story in FFXIV being better than in FFXI, I do agree to a point. Certainly, the initial Main Scenario story is leagues better; the original Main Scenario for FFXI was pretty uninspired. The tragedy of Raogrimm tugged at the heartstrings a bit, but the story was pretty predictable. The continuation on to Zilart was REALLY rough, what with the whole, "Oh, did you forget, this is how Main Scenario REALLY ended last time!" flashback retcon. Chains of Promathia was a bit better, but got bogged down by its own worldbuilding, drowning the player in half-revealed bits of lore that were difficult to keep track of - particularly since the slow pace and difficulty of the game often meant it'd be weeks or months before you'd be able to pick the story up again (sometimes that time was spent leveling to the point where you could handle the content, other times it was spent trying to put together a party capable of completing the content).

Aht Urhgan was where the storytelling really started to come into its own, in my opinion. It was definitely interesting working FOR the evil empire for a change, even if it was in such a way that you're trying to make things better from the inside. Wings of the Goddess was a bit weaker, but made up for it with fantastic cutscenes and some excellent characters - and they did a great job of portraying just WHY the Shadowlord was a figure to be feared in his heyday, considering that he was such a pushover when you fought him in the Main Scenario.

Seekers of Adoulin was at about the same level as Wings of the Goddess in terms of quality. Rhapsodies of Vana'diel was an interesting experiment in tying all the previous expansions together, and explored some very interesting ideas regarding Altana and Promathia, but I was annoyed by the generic characterizations they gave some of the Prime Avatars (Odin and Alexander, in particular, did not at all resemble how they were presented in Aht Urghan). Abyssea, interestingly enough, while very sparse in terms of storytelling DID provide an enjoyable perspective on how the world would turn out without you (answer: not very well at all).

I feel that the storytelling from Aht Urhgan onwards surpassed FFXIV ARR's Main Scenario in quality. ARR's storytelling was clumsy, largely due to the fact that they needed to salvage remnants of plots and characters from FFXIV 1.0; plots and characters that some of the playerbase would know, and others wouldn't - and the ones who didn't would not have the ability to play through themselves to get introduced to them properly. It felt a lot like starting in the middle of a book. For example, when Thancred was revealed to be host to Lahabrea, I was like, eh, whatever, I barely knew the guy. It did improve a bit from 2.1 through 2.5, but it was really a rough start.

The storyline in Heavensward so far, on the other hand, pretty much blows away anything from FFXI. Its only weak spot was one inherited from the ARR storyline: the giant cop-out where all the horrible stuff that happened at the end of 2.5 was undone, bit by bit. I'm not the sort of person that wants to see FFXIV devolve into a Game of Throne-esque bloodbath - but if you're gonna have a dramatic plot twist like that, stick to your guns and see it through!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LineageRazor

snip

---

Which is all fine and good, but my issue wasn't that you can do anything whenever, but instead that the game tosses you into everything without you having a say in the matter, and whether you've established the context you need to enjoy it or not. A bunch of nonsense being thrown at me doesn't make me want to pursue it further - at best, it's a tedious roadblock to whatever I'm trying to do at that time, and at worst it destroys any narrative flow that the game might otherwise have. XIV clearly marks story quests and gives you the option to start them whenever; XI has nothing like the former and outright forces the opposite of the latter. And while I'm sure that XI's refusal to use such petty things as "quest markers" is more immersive for some, the alternative it offers results in very poor storytelling structure.

The thing that really grinded my gears about XI was some of the time sponge gating they did. Having to wait for JP midnight on ToAU missions, having to do story sidequests for WotG, or having to have a certain amount of Coalition fame for SoA kinda sucked lol. Despite that though the game still holds a special place in my heart.

JP midnight, as much as I loathed it at the time, did provide a fairly nice narrative function... It gave events more weight, as you couldn't just jump forwards with the plot... As much as I loved 3.2, events did move ridiculously quickly...

We had a disaster at Falcon's Nest, then did the Grand Melee, then back to Falcon's Nest ready to put that show back on despite the previous issues... Knocked all that out in a matter of minutes... It left me going "How would the general population even know about the Grand Melee? We literally just decided to do it and now we're back here doing this like nothing happened...", sure NPCs mentioned it, but considering I'd only just done it literally 5 minutes prior, I had a hard time believing that...

Were this XI? We'd have had a disaster at Falcon's Nest, then had to wait for JP midnight to let things sink in... Then we'd do the Grand Melee! Then wait for JP midnight again... Then we read the mood in Ishgard a day later and the event is back on!

You know... I actually wouldn't mind that... Right now I just blow through the story in a day and I'm stuck waiting until the next major patch... Throw in JP midnight and the plot lasts a bit longer at least... It's a shame content tends to be locked behind story progression here, too... That was probably the biggest issue I had with JP midnight in XI, and I likely see no issue with it here because I'm not playing catch-up with this game... Though I'm also sure a large part of it was just how utterly inane some of the JP midnight waits were...

On that subject of ToAU though, remember how you had to wear specific attire before you could have an audience with the Empress in ToAU? Damn I miss little things like that... How much better 2.55 would have played out had we a system like that... Sadly we can't even unequip our weapons though, so that goes completely out the window...

Fame is definitely a mechanic I'm glad to see the back of, even if Beast Tribe dailies do a similar thing... I think here it works because the "Fame" quests are so closely tied to the story progression of the tribes, where as in XI I was turning in bat wings and crystals so I could get enough Fame to do the next Nation quest? lolwut?

I agree. While at the time I really found JP midnight obnoxious, but after playing XIV and how the MSQ really feels like I'm doing nothing but pushing forward, I think XI's breaks after big events were rightly placed.

For example, I'm really of the belief that we should have taken some "off time" after the Vault, not just rushed into Bismarck. You can't just run the WoL into the ground; their mental stability is important, too.

I think the way SE does it now in XI, where it's one in-game day, works better as a balance. You're still getting the sense of time passing as you recover, but you don't have to wait that long.

Maybe the breakneck pace at which we can do the MSQ kinda ties into some theories about how the WoL (us) is going through some rough times when it comes to mental health? :O

But to be more serious, I suppose the JP midnight stuff wasn't really all that bad if you were doing it as it came out like Nalien said...but having gone back to XI a bit before RoV came out and rushing through the stories...those breaks were killer. It was especially annoying since the ToAU jobs had crafted AF pieces that were tied to the same JP midnight junk still! Of course if you were a smart BLU you'd get the hands made first and maybe get the other crafted pieces for vanity.

...I miss Blue Mage :( XI's was probably the most badass iteration of it in the series

I felt FFXI was definitely more immersive and pulled you in to it's world over time as you talked to NPC's and did the various story missions and learned about the background of what happened to the different races. The San D'oria storyline told you about the creation of an entire continent, showed you the current infighting in the royal family, and showed you a great deal of what life was like for them in their war against the orcs.

The class storylines were memorable for me also, Zeid in particular stood out as my mentor and his final words always stuck with me when I was RPing my character and I still remember them now and I'm going to quote them here because they're awesome, "if you ever doubt the path you have chosen, look at your blade and ask yourself, does it shine with true darkness?" It was a little awkward doing the level 50 story quests as a 60+ though since you do the drk storyline and then you meet Zeid in the 50 stuff and he doesn't know you... but I digress. Or the pld story quests where you meet the strict dad and his son and help them out to.

The storylines and lore from FFXI that stood out to me most were the drk storyline, san d'oria storyline, and all of CoP where you learn the truth of the evil god. I was so sad when it ended as well, no more adventures with Prishe or Tenzen (at the time) and beating CoP when it was still considered hard as a dark knight which everyone had said couldn't beat CoP but I managed to do it without being carried. Then after that going to Aht Urgan, the entire area was really interesting, the different classes had an interesting lore, the monsters and enemies were pretty cool also, from the chigoe infested mammoths to the troll mercenaries and the mamool ja.

All I will say is I hate how dumbed-down XIV is compared to XI. XI actually had difficult things you had to achieve, like going from Windy to Jeuno that first time. It was nerve-wrecking. But thanks to (and im probably an old grouch now) what i see is a massive influx of WoW gamers into this game, SE had to dumb it down, cause "everybody" kept bitching and whining that "things are far too hard, i cant figure stuff out/things are too hard, Im not used to having to think" (sorry; but thats how I feel, I'm sure thats is alot of exWoWers that also likes a good challenge). I feel that SE toning down things in this game, as opposed to the difficulty of XI, made this a lesser game then what it could have been, and tbh its kinda runing the game as it stands today for me.

XIV offers plenty of good challenges. Pretending that the game's accessibility is somehow only enjoyable by drooling, filthy casuals and that it offers nothing for those who like a challenge is as unfair as saying that XI is an obtuse nightmare with no respect for anybody who might not want to dedicate every waking moment to it. I think both games have a healthy amount they do better than the other one, though I won't really go much more in-depth on gameplay comparisons, considering the original intent of the thread.

Instead, I'll ask: what about the story, world, and characters do you find is dumbed down in XIV, in comparison to XI?

In regards to the world?

Everything. Literally everything - and that's even discounting zone sizes and possible immersion (because I loathe when people use immersion as an argument).

Terrifying, multi-storied beast dungeons where the enemies are actually a threat and don't leash and become more difficult as you go deeper and deeper. In RotZ you actually kill one nation's leader and the characters that appear from then on out in any cutscenes where he would play a role are different, as does the dialogue. This is nothing at all like how XIV dropped the ball at the end of 2.5. FFXI even has seasons where the leaves on trees in La Theine would change, which also influenced weather patterns.
Ifrit's Cauldron erupted; seeing it was incredible.
Weight doors in Altepa, while annoying, were a really neat idea. You needed 1 Galka, two Elvaan/Hume and like 4 Tarutaru or something? You only needed 1 Galka because the areas were intended for Galka.
I also like the Word puzzle door in Castle Oztroja; please don't hurt me.
And who can forget going into Gusgen Mines the first time and seeing the crying ghosts, wondering what happened in there?

XIV's world is just dreadfully static in comparison. XI's world has an absurd amount of detail in it.

The other topics are really opinion, but I believe that more (in quantity) of the minor NPCs in XI have a background and personality than XIV's, but most of this is due to out of game lore tidbits that SE spent years developing. If you want to ignore them, go right ahead, but they still exist. Minor being just generic NPCs in, say, Selbina and Mhaura, not characters like the Serpent Generals (who were definitely better developed than most characters in both XIV and XI). The only thing XIV really has in comparison is the Moogle Postman quests.

I see a lot of people throw around things like "XI has had more time for lore-building!" - but XIV has also had quite a bit of time for its basic mythological and metaphysical lore to be built up, since that stuff doesn't change from XIV to ARR, hence why it is so developed.

That being said, how many times are we going to have to complain before we get more Hellsguard and Duskwight lore? I felt the cultures and races were a lot more developed in XI because it went for quality over quantity. Meanwhile, in XIV we have a puddle for everything except 2 or 3 races.

The big difference in lore between games is scale. XI spent a lot more time on individuals and minor groups (eg SOB, the Adoulin factions), where XIV's lore has focused on a larger scale overall - hence why one person may prefer some traits of one over the other. There's not really a right or wrong answer in preferences on things like this.


On a final note:
FFXI Raubahn + Immortals > XIV Raubahn + Immortals

Sorry Cyrill, that was more directed at SinSiew; bit of a knee-jerk reaction at the implication that enjoyment of XIV is predicated on being some kind of inferior "WoW Casual", or whatever. I imagine their answer is quite the same as yours.

And that's fine. But I haven't experienced any of all that in XI. The game does not give up its lore, or story, very easily. Which is all fine and good, but (a) XIV is a far cry from being shallow, lore-wise (it too has an absurd amount of detail to it, or at least more detail readily visible to player) and (b) the history it's crafted for itself makes itself apparent much more quickly, thus sucking me in faster. I'm getting a decent-quality story taking place in a high-quality fantasy world told to me at a reasonable pace. Now, I'm far from a mouth-breathing casual idiot (not that I think anyone's implied this, mind), and yet I haven't felt a connection to Vana'Diel like I had to Eorzea at a similar point in playing. As a new player, I don't think that's nothing. There's something to be said for accessibility.