Spoiler, Sploilers, and more Spoilers

Sorry i have to say it: enemy not at full strengh, time travel, memory erase.

All this is a really, really cheap resource to tell a history.

Is used a lot becouse is easy to fix or manipulate everything.

im dissapointed nothing else.

You are right, and you forgot how overly sentimental it is to appeal to feelings rather than logic.
Also, how does time travel work? Sometimes you have different time lines (G'raha from ShB) sometimes you don't, like in EW. They tell you you can't change anything and all of a sudden you might as well be the cause of the Final Days. If we hadn't been there, would it all had been the same? Elpis just took place so we met the final boss and it didn't feel as it had appeared out of the blue and to go full fanservice. And what with the meteor showers? Why did they happen?
All in all, I enjoyed the story, but I was expecting a lot more and I hate time travels precisely because these kinds of things happens.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ranhansha

They tell you you can't change anything and all of a sudden you might as well be the cause of the Final Days. If we hadn't been there, would it all had been the same?

---

Yes, because Hermes already released Meteion's sisters to the expanse and Meteion was already "corrupted". What our presence there helped do was give Venat the foresight to one day fight against the Final Days.

Also, the starshower was explained in Shadowbringers. But if you're asking what they really are, it's a visual representation of the chaos caused by dynamis running rampant.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ranhansha

You are right, and you forgot how overly sentimental it is to appeal to feelings rather than logic.
Also, how does time travel work? Sometimes you have different time lines (G'raha from ShB) sometimes you don't, like in EW. They tell you you can't change anything and all of a sudden you might as well be the cause of the Final Days. If we hadn't been there, would it all had been the same? Elpis just took place so we met the final boss and it didn't feel as it had appeared out of the blue and to go full fanservice. And what with the meteor showers? Why did they happen?
All in all, I enjoyed the story, but I was expecting a lot more and I hate time travels precisely because these kinds of things happens.

---

Elpis could've been cut from the game and it would've been a lot better. Really thought they were gonna go with Hydaelyn as the big bad but nope, sad bird girl is the big bad. Completely stupid.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kyrj

Elpis could've been cut from the game and it would've been a lot better. Really thought they were gonna go with Hydaelyn as the big bad but nope, sad bird girl is the big bad. Completely stupid.

---

She IS the big bad. She is the most morally corrupt character in all of FFXIV. I don't get how the game just accepts her warped immoral logic as truth when everything we go through is her fault.

She is like Vauthry is to Shadowbringers, not the last boss, but the biggest culprit.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Lium

Yes, because Hermes already released Meteion's sisters to the expanse and Meteion was already "corrupted". What our presence there helped do was give Venat the foresight to one day fight against the Final Days.

Also, the starshower was explained in Shadowbringers. But if you're asking what they really are, it's a visual representation of the chaos caused by dynamis running rampant.

---

Yeah, I know sooner or later the sisters' corruption would catch up to Meteion, but our interference was what got Emet, Hyth and Venat involved, so how did all that change things? That means we are actually responsible for what is happening in the present, which wouldn't make sense because the future takes place after the past. Time paradoxes suck because they don't make sense and then your story doesn't make sense.

Also, I think I read somewhere in EW that they had to rebuild what had been destroyed by the star shower, which would mean they are not just visual. It was just visual, as you say in ShB, when Elidibus made everyone see it to awaken their Echo. By the way, why does no one in the Source awaken to it when they see the stars? I hope it's included in 6.1. The Final Days were kind of disappointing. We had this amazing trailer and build-up since ShB and then it's just like Aurora Borealis. At that time of year, at that time of day, in that part of the country, localized entirely within Radz-at-han.

There is not a single story in the world that is good by everyones standard, because everyone has another opinion. What one may concider a masterpiece can be absolute garbage in the eyes of another. What you might concider a good story can and will 100% be waste of time for another person. I guarantee you.

I for one loved the whole experience Endwalker gave me for me it did everything right, outside of very few low points but you can't only have highs.

What happened first? Hydaelyn giving us the flower to set us down the path to discovering and traveling to Elpis

OR

Meeting with Venat in Elpis and setting her down the path to become Hydaelyn.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ranhansha

Yeah, I know sooner or later the sisters' corruption would catch up to Meteion, but our interference was what got Emet, Hyth and Venat involved, so how did all that change things? That means we are actually responsible for what is happening in the present, which wouldn't make sense because the future takes place after the past. Time paradoxes suck because they don't make sense and then your story doesn't make sense.

---

Man it seems like everyone hates time travel all of a sudden. I thought it was fine, you go back in time, Venat gets some crucial information, nothing about your world is significantly changed, no need to split the timeline, all works out cool.

Or maybe I've just watched so much Doctor Who that I've inured myself to it.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ranhansha

Also, I think I read somewhere in EW that they had to rebuild what had been destroyed by the star shower, which would mean they are not just visual. It was just visual, as you say in ShB, when Elidibus made everyone see it to awaken their Echo. By the way, why does no one in the Source awaken to it when they see the stars? I hope it's included in 6.1. The Final Days were kind of disappointing. We had this amazing trailer and build-up since ShB and then it's just like Aurora Borealis. At that time of year, at that time of day, in that part of the country, localized entirely within Radz-at-han.

---

Hydaelyn is too weak to do the big floaty crystal introduction from the start of ARR. That's my guess anyway.

They start to awaken, they get whisked away for the Hydaelyn meet and greet, they get an 'Error 5005: Mothercrystal not found', they get dumped back into the real world with no awakening.

It's a meta-commentary on login server failures. :p

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Atreides

I for one loved the whole experience Endwalker gave me for me it did everything right, outside of very few low points but you can't only have highs.

---

How thematically appropriate. Maybe Labyrinthos felt like it was never going to end on purpose. :D

I think that we really needed this story to conclude with 7.0 as originally planned. Far too much happened in too short a period of time and as such it wasn't able to properly 'settle'. Much of the story also ended up being needlessly convoluted and I daresay it almost feels as though it was written to get maximum 'feels' even at the cost of what made sense to actually occur. Worse yet, certain characters and zones were clearly not given their fair share of time in the spotlight in order to mash everything together.

I also think it jumped the shark and escalated things to a ridiculous degree. I wasn't pleased when WoW did that and I am certainly not pleased with FFXIV going down the same route.

There's this genre in literature called picaresque novel, prominent features of which are:
1. Everything that happens to the main protagonist is destined and predetermined.
2. There are higher forces at play, such as gods, rulers, power of nature etc.
3. These forces guide their protagonist through quite random and out of the pocket situations, which change rapidly throughout the story.
4. Concept of time is irrelevant and sometimes 600 pages make up the story of several days despite the fact that within this time protagonist may go through what normal people wouldn't be able to in their whole lives.

Endwalker checked the box on every of these for me and this is the problem. Picaresque novel is a fun silly thing, a relic of time packed with ridiculous stories, over the top characters, linear storytelling (meaning you already know the ending when you start reading), but never it tries to provide you with a deep narrative and it shouldn't. I really expected to get some serious writing packed with psychological and philosophical dilemmas, deep characters and meaningful story. Instead what I got was some poorly made anime from the 80s that doesn't take itself seriously. Well, if they're going this route then I suppose I'll just start skipping every msq dialogue entirely, because it's just not worth the time investment.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Theodric

I also think it jumped the shark and escalated things to a ridiculous degree. I wasn't pleased when WoW did that and I am certainly not pleased with FFXIV going down the same route.

---

Agreed. Pacing issues were bad enough, but this feels like some weird Kojima-esque fever dream with the power creep of WoW. Where do we even go from here? How do we up the stakes again so that it's even remotely believable? Why did we add in so many things that have never really been mentioned before and why are the scions and everyone around you seemingly totally fine and dandy with finding out their entire existence and everything they thought they knew about the universe was wrong?

This should be world-rattling events and everyone on Eorzea should be flipping the hell out. But everyone seems to be doing just fine. It's so jarring.

How they explained things made sense, and it help add flavor to all we went through. You know it is a good story when you can go back to the older content and be like OOOH so that is why.

Time Travel is done right here, and used in just the right way.
Did they over use the feels moment when you had to give up everyone for a short time? Yes for sure. A good story will always make you feel something, and they did that for sure.


And that ending was perfect. For one brief moment. I was not the warrior of light. I was an adventure, my selfish nature was able to come out and point out zenos was right all along.


This expansion had it all. I mean could they told the story better? Maybe, but one thing for sure. I'm excited to see where they go from here.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Rhysati

This should be world-rattling events and everyone on Eorzea should be flipping the hell out. But everyone seems to be doing just fine. It's so jarring.

---

It was a seemingly inexplicable plague that turned anyone who got too sad in to a monster. The revelation, as far as the layman is concerned at least, that it was all caused by a scary monster from outer space actually makes it less world-rattling.

This is after all, the 2nd scary monster from outer space attack in less than a decade.

What i am hoping in the future is things scale back from here. We lose the blessing of light and echo powers, and we have to adjust to new adventures without it. Our power scaling from a story telling sense gets scaled way back, and we go through struggles of an adventurer.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Theox

There's this genre in literature called picaresque novel, prominent features of which are:
1. Everything that happens to the main protagonist is destined and predetermined.
2. There are higher forces at play, such as gods, rulers, power of nature etc.
3. These forces guide their protagonist through quite random and out of the pocket situations, which change rapidly throughout the story.
4. Concept of time is irrelevant and sometimes 600 pages make up the story of several days despite the fact that within this time protagonist may go through what normal people wouldn't be able to in their whole lives.

Endwalker checked the box on every of these for me and this is the problem. Picaresque novel is a fun silly thing, a relic of time packed with ridiculous stories, over the top characters, linear storytelling (meaning you already know the ending when you start reading), but never it tries to provide you with a deep narrative and it shouldn't. I really expected to get some serious writing packed with psychological and philosophical dilemmas, deep characters and meaningful story. Instead what I got was some poorly made anime from the 80s that doesn't take itself seriously. Well, if they're going this route then I suppose I'll just start skipping every msq dialogue entirely, because it's just not worth the time investment.

---

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Rhysati

Agreed. Pacing issues were bad enough, but this feels like some weird Kojima-esque fever dream with the power creep of WoW. Where do we even go from here? How do we up the stakes again so that it's even remotely believable? Why did we add in so many things that have never really been mentioned before and why are the scions and everyone around you seemingly totally fine and dandy with finding out their entire existence and everything they thought they knew about the universe was wrong?

This should be world-rattling events and everyone on Eorzea should be flipping the hell out. But everyone seems to be doing just fine. It's so jarring.

---

Unfortunately this convoluted mess of a story is why I am simply going to let my sub lapse at this point and be done with the game. I doubt there will be any marked improvement in the future in terms of story content. I don't really like Ishikawa's style much (at least what we've seen of it in SHB and EW), and she's failed to instil any sympathy for Venat's actions, even through this very tortured method of story telling. The game's mechanical aspects are just about mediocre as it is, so there's nothing really holding me to it. I was willing to give it a chance even though 5.3 disappointed me in a similar manner but this was more - and even worse - of the same.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Rhysati

Agreed. Pacing issues were bad enough, but this feels like some weird Kojima-esque fever dream with the power creep of WoW. Where do we even go from here? How do we up the stakes again so that it's even remotely believable? Why did we add in so many things that have never really been mentioned before and why are the scions and everyone around you seemingly totally fine and dandy with finding out their entire existence and everything they thought they knew about the universe was wrong?

This should be world-rattling events and everyone on Eorzea should be flipping the hell out. But everyone seems to be doing just fine. It's so jarring.

---

Did Emmet Selch not remind us there is still so much to see and do jut on Etheriys alone?

After reading the thread, Im not sure what some were expecting here. This was one of the best stories Ive ever experienced, and I do think the best in any video game ever in my life. It was fantastic. The comments I see in game constantly align with this as well.

Leave it to the forums to find fault with anything though.

The time travel part is the most difficult to accept part.
That and "introduce big villain that turned out to be the big villain behind everything"

The time travel was good but forced. I feel like they originally wanted to remember Azem's memories, but that would've been harder to write with major plot holes with extra crap like establishing Azem and the other Ascien relationship.

The big bad suddenly introduced, I also feel like it was supposed to be a natural event but it was easier to put a face on the cause behind the final days rather than a natural cause.

Both together present Dynamis, Dynamis is clearly introduced but it ties a lot together. From the limit break to Omega who couldn't find the reason why weaker characters are able to defeat impossible foes.
Dynamis was also necessary as how an advanced and godlike civilization couldn't figure about Dynamis but weaker human can?

There is good, there is bad.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Necrodamus

Sorry i have to say it: enemy not at full strengh, time travel, memory erase.

All this is a really, really cheap resource to tell a history.

Is used a lot becouse is easy to fix or manipulate everything.

im dissapointed nothing else.

---

ok bye .

If I had to nit pick, I would us not losing a scion, As much as some people would not be happy, Losing someone you are close with, would have made the despair part have a bigger impact to stand in the face of it at the end.


I feel like the developers played it safe some with that. Every expansion they have us wondering who is going to die. Now I'm at the point where I don't see that being a huge impact again. Not sure if it is because the developers have grown attached to the scions, and don't got the courage to off one of them, or they worried about back lash.


It really needed to happen though, and it did not.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Necrodamus

Sorry i have to say it: enemy not at full strengh, time travel, memory erase.

All this is a really, really cheap resource to tell a history.

Is used a lot becouse is easy to fix or manipulate everything.

im dissapointed nothing else.

---

Yes sadly this was the cheap part. It's never good when you need to e travel and memory erase to tell as story. It's a shame as there really strong part in the story.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Lium

Yes, because Hermes already released Meteion's sisters to the expanse and Meteion was already "corrupted". What our presence there helped do was give Venat the foresight to one day fight against the Final Days.

---

Blows my mind how some have missed this part. By the time we arrived in Elpis the damage had already been done. Meteion's sisters had already left to explore the universe. With or without our presence Hermes would have requested an update on what they found. Him sending them off to the universe is what caused the Final Days. Not us going back in time.

Venat may have done the Sundering anyway due to a distaste for the repeated sacrifices being made to Zodiark. If our unsundered self didn't approve of it, then why couldn't anyone else? Especially someone who held the same seat as we did. Furthermore our unsundered self felt this way even without knowing about any of the time travel Venat knew about.

I think making Venat a villain would have been very cliché because over and over again we ended up in conflict with those who summoned or became primals. She would have been "just another primal" if she turned out to be a villain. And before anyone brings up Iceheart remember that she was at first treated as a villain to the point that we fought her to undo her summoning. We did not go to Hydaelyn with this intention even though we knew what she was. Instead Venat turned out to be someone who only had bad choices presented to her and chose to do what she believed to be the least terrible decision.

Going to Elpis showed us that the past was not the perfect paradise Emet-Selch had lead us to believe. Everyone was expected to be happy and Hermes felt isolated because of this. Had his depression been properly acknowledged by his peers he may had never made Meteion. He couldn't find proper connection among his people so he sought it among the stars. If people had simply thought twice about how messed up it is to just coldly erasing creatures they made Hermes may not have felt so alone with his thoughts and feelings.

Also Meteion explains why the Ancients had no choice but to summon Zodiark. They had no idea that what was responsible for the Final Days was something from outside the planet so they couldn't even fight it. All they could do was create a shield and hope that would be enough. Sure Venat could have told them but it's not like they would all believe her. It would have divided their people even more and Zodiark would have been summoned anyway.

And without the sundering the Ancients would have been doomed to be entirely wiped out instead of just have their souls sundered. Eventually they would have explored the stars when their great work on their planet was done, and they would sooner or later encounter Meteion. People would have gone back to their home with their overpowering despair and use their creation magics to end themselves. Something similar to that already happened with another Ancient-like race Meteion found. Her repeated questions about happiness drove them to scrutinise themselves too much so they concluded that death was the only path.

I like that there is no clear villain in this situation. Hermes' personal problems being largely ignored drove him to make a reckless well-intentioned mistake when he had the Meteia explore the stars. The Meteia were tasked with answering a deceptively complex question that has no clear answer and they lacked the life experience to understand nuance, so they were doomed to be drowned in despair. Zodiark had to be summoned to stop the Final Days. The Sundering had to happen because at best Zodiark was a temporary solution that only protected the Ancients as long as they never left the planet, but without knowing that the Final Days came from outside their planet they wouldn't have known to never leave. The ascians only wanted to revive their people, they didn't induce calamities for fun or conquest.

The story shows that you don't need an ill-intentioned entity for disaster to happen, sometimes people have the misfortune of being presented with only terrible choices and that knowledge is power but you need to be careful about the questions you ask.

/wall of text

I enjoyed the EW msq a lot.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Penthea

snip

---

I agree with this, The impact it had when we showed that we also felt sad at times was huge. Not only that but Metelon might have been a double edge sword for him, because he cared for her deeply, but his doubt, his pain caused her to feel that as well, and it kinda made him bottle it up so much, that we saw it at last exploded at the end in the dungeon.

As much as I like Venat, her comment at the end, about how Hermes has to live with it, that his doubt of his people caused all this...Showed that Venat while a very good person, was not perfect as well. Hermes had reasons to doubt his people, and how they treated life. Sure she could have not meant anything by it, but it came off as she also was jaded by the views of her people. I could be looking way too much into it, just how it felt.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Lauront

Unfortunately this convoluted mess of a story is why I am simply going to let my sub lapse at this point and be done with the game. I doubt there will be any marked improvement in the future in terms of story content. I don't really like Ishikawa's style much (at least what we've seen of it in SHB and EW), and she's failed to instil any sympathy for Venat's actions, even through this very tortured method of story telling. The game's mechanical aspects are just about mediocre as it is, so there's nothing really holding me to it. I was willing to give it a chance even though 5.3 disappointed me in a similar manner but this was more - and even worse - of the same.

---

Agreed. The amount of plot holes are crazy as well. This whole sundering allowing people to harness dynamis thing. In that case should the sundered ascians not have been stronger? Like Nabriales? The time travel stuff is a mess. I remember back in ShB they were ragging in the ascians telling them it’s not right to mess with time, that they need to move on and not live in the past and then time travel is used twice for the protagonists…nice double standard there. I found it kind of funny how as much as i despise Zenos, we didn’t even get to offer up a thanks at the end and instead basically tell him to f off yet, we hug the main creature behind all this who has destroyed countless planets. It’s funny too because i guarantee if Meteion and Venat weren’t pretty girls and if they looked more like Varis people wouldn’t be so inclined to protect their bad writing lmao.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Theodric

I think that we really needed this story to conclude with 7.0 as originally planned. Far too much happened in too short a period of time and as such it wasn't able to properly 'settle'. Much of the story also ended up being needlessly convoluted and I daresay it almost feels as though it was written to get maximum 'feels' even at the cost of what made sense to actually occur. Worse yet, certain characters and zones were clearly not given their fair share of time in the spotlight in order to mash everything together.

I also think it jumped the shark and escalated things to a ridiculous degree. I wasn't pleased when WoW did that and I am certainly not pleased with FFXIV going down the same route.

---

They could had done it all throughout the entirety of EW and not just a single patch.
The pacing issues is everything shoved into one patch which happened in SB.
All of Ala Mhigo was said it done in a single patch and it was pretty underwhelming...
So much so, I can barely remember what happened. I just know Lyse is such a bad character now and I miss Yda lol.

Also, why was Zodiark the level 83 trial boss...That really through me for a loop. O_o

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Jybril

Also, why was Zodiark the level 83 trial boss...That really through me for a loop. O_o

---

Honestly this upset me a lot. They completely shafted both Elidibus and Zodiark, what are supposed to be key figures in this entire arc and expansion, yet they got nothing more than 10 minute cameo’s. Meanwhile Venat gets an entire section dedicated to her lmao. And more. At this point it feels like it’s the end of the Emet,Hythlo,Venat arc. Not the Hydaelyn and Zodiark one.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Penthea

Blows my mind how some have missed this part. By the time we arrived in Elpis the damage had already been done. Meteion's sisters had already left to explore the universe. With or without our presence Hermes would have requested an update on what they found. Him sending them off to the universe is what caused the Final Days. Not us going back in time.

---

Convenient for the story right?

Quote:

---

Also Meteion explains why the Ancients had no choice but to summon Zodiark. They had no idea that what was responsible for the Final Days was something from outside the planet so they couldn't even fight it. All they could do was create a shield and hope that would be enough. Sure Venat could have told them but it's not like they would all believe her. It would have divided their people even more and Zodiark would have been summoned anyway.

---

Good ol' Communication problem trope that's worse than the Good was Always Evil one.

EVEN THOUGH it was made obvious that Herme's magical 2002 memory erasing device DID something to Emet and Hythlodaeus. They were made aware their memories were erased. Somehow Venat could not communicate to those two at the very least. But us, non corporeal and all could be made to be given form, ALLOWED US to tell our story and as ridiculous it seemed was worth investigating by the very same duo. ...okay. Oh wait, she can't change the future - but that's not to say NOT telling would have done the same because it's not like WE told her how events with Emet and Hythlodaeus specifically played out since we only got bits of it BECAUSE WE WEREN'T THERE.

But then again, we actually already died in the 8th Umbral Calamity. So...protecting the 'future' doesn't cut it as we already had time branching off

Look I did like most of Endwalker and did enjoy Elpis and glimpse of Ancient life through Elpis but there's really some jank parts of the story that just broke me out of it. I think the montage made it worse since even though I know it was to focus on Venat - it made her feel like a totalitarian authority even though in Anamesis Anyder there was a group, and convenient how Azem was "missing"...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Xaruko_Nexume

After reading the thread, Im not sure what some were expecting here.

---

Cool, let me help you with that as far as I'm concerned: What I expected was a story that made logical sense. I expected a story that didn't throw a ton of random stuff at the wall in the hopes that it all stuck.

Why build up Zodiark since the beginning of the game's existence only to kill him like he's nothing a couple levels in? Why did none of the scions, nor the Warrior of Light understand that killing Zodiark would be really, terribly, horribly bad? I sure knew that straight away. When you have to deities locked into a tense balance and you straight up murder one of them...gee, who would have thought bad things would happen?

What I wanted was to NOT have a Hitchhiker's ripoff that handwaved a bunch of stuff because suddenly the moon is actually a spaceship piloted by bunny people. What I wanted was to not have people build a mass-effect level spaceship in a universe that doesn't HAVE any technology that looks like that. I wanted the tying up of things in Garlemald to feel longer than 20 minutes since the plot from day one has been about the Garlean empire. What I wanted was to not travel back in time and spend 2-3 levels of xp talking to Emet and company while the ending of the world had literally JUST begun.

This whole expansion jumped the shark for me and I flatly stopped caring about any of it. This expansion took everything that I enjoyed about FFXIV and its storytelling and dumped that off a cliff to tell a rushed story filled with tons of new things we haven't known anything about until it is a convenient plot device.

I went from being so pumped over the previous expansion being hands down the best expansion I've played for any MMO in a very long time to actually wondering how they managed to make a worse expansion than WoW.

I despise JRPG stories for one simple reason: if you think about the story for all of one second, it becomes clear it's stupid. After that, the writing solely relies on the fanbase to fill numerous holes in the writing to provide reason to everything established in the story.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Misplaced_Marbles

I despise JRPG stories for one simple reason: if you think about the story for all of one second, it becomes clear it's stupid. After that, the writing solely relies on the fanbase to fill numerous holes in the writing to provide reason to everything established in the story.

---

Clear stupid? A story is a story. A story does not have to make sense. I mean life does not make sense at times. A story does not need to be perfect.

Did the story make you feel something? Even negative feelings, than it did its job.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Misplaced_Marbles

I despise JRPG stories for one simple reason: if you think about the story for all of one second, it becomes clear it's stupid. After that, the writing solely relies on the fanbase to fill numerous holes in the writing to provide reason to everything established in the story.

---

Yeah and that latter part is very evident. The fact no main protag’s have died in the story since SB, which is ironically where it seems more of the fan base feedback seemed to start getting to the devs. The fact we went through an entire apocalypse without loss when the main themes of this game since ARR have been sacrificing for the good of others etc is ironic. It seems those only apply to other characters but not the main heroes who will constantly come back lmao. Just makes the story lose the few stakes it barely had.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by van_arn

What happened first? Hydaelyn giving us the flower to set us down the path to discovering and traveling to Elpis

OR

Meeting with Venat in Elpis and setting her down the path to become Hydaelyn.

I'm hesitant to call it a "bad" idea, but I don't see an escape out of this situation without making Azem (the original, as known by the Convocation) a literal time and causality god. Maybe that's the point, but it feels a little janky.

It feels very FF-esque for our character to just be a god's familiar in a distant time, but it also feels like we're not... us. Like everything we do in the game, everything we see, and everyone we meet, is predetermined and decided in advance. Insert the struggle against fate here. I can't say I'm too fond of the concept as it is in my head, but at least that seems more interesting than us being a literal god that just "forgot" they were a god.

With all of the Greek references and Azem being associated with fire (the sun, burning soul, orange color of soul) I could see them drawing some potential parallels with Prometheus. Maybe Azem "stole" the "fire" of creation magic from whatever-the-hell-the-actual-creator(s) are/were, and his/her punishment was to be torn from the heavens. To not be a god that is a god.

---

It's like terminator. Because a terminator 2as 8n the past later from the remains of it the terminators was made. It's a loop.

Honestly the story is actually fine, it's well set up to me and does make sense, it also ties as much as possible back into thing's we've already seen, I also believe we'll eventually encounter our unsundered selves at some point in the future there's still questions yet to be answered like how the 3 "unsundered" well managed to evade a world shattering event to begin with, what what our original self doing during that period since we neither sided with the convocation over the obvious sacrifice involved and we seemingly didnt side with Venat either (though considering what was revealed it's very possible Venat knew our original COULDNT side with her since our future selves is what alerts her to the final days to begin with). I have a feeling our original self might have had something to do with those 3 escaping the sundering to begin with.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Necrodamus

Sorry i have to say it: enemy not at full strengh, time travel, memory erase.

All this is a really, really cheap resource to tell a history.

Is used a lot becouse is easy to fix or manipulate everything.

im dissapointed nothing else.

---

Don't forget about the incessant info-dumping and head-hopping moments throughout the story!

It's Final Fantasy. Is it cool? Is it fun? I'd say it was.

Having a crazy bird goddess smash together the planets of dead civilizations to explode me and my friends is pretty cool and fun.

Using thoughts and prayers to summon ancient magical beasts to fuel the propulsion system of a spaceship so we can fly across the universe is pretty cool too imo.

I can understand people not liking it. It's not for everyone and that's cool. However, its Final Fantasy there's been over a dozen of these games and they are just as nuts. You should know what this is all about by now.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Rin_Kuroi

It's Final Fantasy. Is it cool? Is it fun? I'd say it was.

Having a crazy bird goddess smash together the planets of dead civilizations to explode me and my friends is pretty cool and fun.

Using thoughts and prayers to summon ancient magical beasts to fuel the propulsion system of a spaceship so we can fly across the universe is pretty cool too imo.

I can understand people not liking it. It's not for everyone and that's cool. However, its Final Fantasy there's been over a dozen of these games and they are just as nuts. You should know what this is all about by now.

---

Except past final fantasies have also killed off main characters to move the story forward. Past final fantasies baring a few have at least given proper exposition to lore plot points and try to leave out as few plot holes as possible. 14 has done neither of these things in a long time. It’s just a lot of asspulls and low stakes moments with a very mediocre outcome. It’s a shame because i’d say the beginning of this expansion was very strong, but they ruined it with the convoluted mess and backtracking and fluff that it just made a lot of it unbearable.People are free to like it though of course. Just as people are free to dislike it, but i don’t think it’s good to compare it to past final fantasies as those had MUCH higher stakes and also didn’t have a dev team catering to a community for.

This game had alot of deaths already, you don't need your main cast die in every expansion. I would actually hate it. Would it have impact? Sure, but for the wrong reasons.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Rin_Kuroi

However, its Final Fantasy there's been over a dozen of these games and they are just as nuts. You should know what this is all about by now.

---

Perhaps they are waiting for Final Reality. With that, I see myself out.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KizuyaKatogami

Except past final fantasies have also killed off main characters to move the story forward. Past final fantasies baring a few have at least given proper exposition to lore plot points and try to leave out as few plot holes as possible. 14 has done neither of these things in a long time. It’s just a lot of asspulls and low stakes moments with a very mediocre outcome. It’s a shame because i’d say the beginning of this expansion was very strong, but they ruined it with the convoluted mess and backtracking and fluff that it just made a lot of it unbearable.People are free to like it though of course. Just as people are free to dislike it, but i don’t think it’s good to compare it to past final fantasies as those had MUCH higher stakes and also didn’t have a dev team catering to a community for.

---

All of the final fantasy games have had major plot holes when you look at them close enough. Final Fantasy 4, 6 and 7 for sure did. It's just not the point of playing these games. It's the complete off the wall fantasy. The rule of cool. It's that's not your thing then fine. It's not like this is a mystery.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Atreides

Perhaps they are waiting for Final Reality. With that, I see myself out.

---

Nah. You got the spririt. :D

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Atreides

This game had alot of deaths already, you don't need your main cast die in every expansion. I would actually hate it. Would it have impact? Sure, but for the wrong reasons.


Perhaps they are waiting for Final Reality. With that, I see myself out.

---

A lot of nameless npc deaths sure, but when you see the plot and lore literally doesn’t apply to the main cast time and time again, it becomes dull. Especially when you have characters that just stand in the background. What did Yshtola do of any huge meaning in Endwalker lol. How can you know it would have impact for the wrong reasons? Look at the end of Endwalker, they all give these huge emotional speeches as they die, however it means nothing because you know they’re going to come back. What’s the point? Them coming back literally undermines one of the main themes of ARR+, of dealing with sacrifice and sacrifice for the greater good. That seems to never apply to the main cast though and they’re always fine in every situation. Somehow, an apocalypse that affected even god-like beings didn’t affect the scions at all. Funny how that works. Also it wouldn’t be every expansion, they already didn’t do it for shadowbringers, they already didn’t do it for stormblood. The last main cast death we had was papalymo in HW lmao.I dont think its a coincedence the most well-received ff games have had some form of main cast deaths. Its also very evident that you need some form of stakes or loss impact in the story otherwise you end up with the mess of Endwalker. Full of asspulls and plot armor all around.