For the writers of the FFXIV story

You players have probably read dozens of reviews, hundreds of comments about Dawntrail, about pacing breaks, about Wuk Lamat, about repeated dialogues, about the slowness of the story, but this message is not for you.
I know it's very difficult for the devs to read other very active forums like Reddit, so I had to come here.

This is an appeal to them. You know that the FFXIV player base is made up of adults. You know that we all work, study, have families, or whatever, we are all adults.
So please, please, go back to making adult stories. FFXIV only rose in popularity because the general public discovered it is a JRPG with a considerably adult story. We don't want "beach/holiday episodes." Please, we want an emotional rollercoaster, don't be afraid of your player base. Everyone loved Heavensward and Shadowbringers for a reason, and that reason is the mature story, a story we can relate to. The latest Endwalker patches and Dawntrail have certainly lowered the bar of the main aspect that everyone loved in this game, but there is still a way to elevate it. That's why I ask the devs to look at other media, look at reviews in other languages especially, be it Steam, Reddit, etc., but avoid staying in a bubble.

That's what I wanted to say. I love FFXIV and hope to continue for another 10 years in this game.

I just got to the fourth zone and I like the story so far. This is exactly the story I expected when they announced Dawntrail. The world building is really good. I enjoyed the sidequests where each of the two towns in a zone has a quest line (one of the aether current quests in each town) and they ended with a combined story of the two towns. Best side quests since Stormblood (where it had similar side quests structure in each zone).

Speak for yourself. After Shadowbringers and Endwalker, I'm absolutely fine with a "beach episode", especially considering it won't last. Not to mention that constant darkness and despair isn't exactly good writing and it isn't "adult". You need levity and quiet moments.

'Beach episode' was a joke when they said it at fanfest and the msq is definitely not a beach episode. Especially in the latter half. Though I do think the story was a step down from SHB/EW you can't call this a beach episode with a straight face after actually playing through 7.0.

I find it ironic when people say that Dawntrail isn't an 'adult' or 'mature' expansion, becuase honestly I feel like the only way you could reach that is by being distracted by the aesthetics of 'beach vacation and cool tech'. I'd actually say that it concerns itself with very mature themes and subjects.

Broadly speaking, once we zero in on a core theme, we're talking about death again; that's not new, or itself all that mature, but it's a very broad subject. And I actually find that Shadowbringers, Endwalker and Dawntrail almost form sort of a triptych of different ways to approach, think about and deal with death.

Shadowbringers is almost surface-level; 'death is bad'. We visit a world on the brink of death, filled with death, and the final villain is someone who is haunted by death and trying to undo it. There's nothing wrong with that at all, death exists as this primal fear and base, end-all threat, but it's all sort of ending there. Emet flirts with there being more to it, but he's lamenting death as if it were still fresh, it doesn't feel like it's developed into something further to him.

Endwalker gets existential; out of the three it's probably the one least about death itself, but death is a part of its focus on the inevitability of suffering, pain and despair; the logical endpoint, but also something that's dotted all across your journey. If we consider Shadowbringers as a story focused on death in the immediate, Endwalker is the creeping terror that follows; you escaped death, or maybe only observed it, but now it's real, now you have to come to terms with it.

And then we have Dawntrail. And I'll try to keep this vague because I know at least some people are here without having finished yet (I admire your ability to either not care about spoilers, or expertly dodge them), but Dawntrail looks at death almost... externally. Not as someone who won't die--it actually racks up quite a bodycount by the end--but as the people who live after someone else dies. There's this deep focus on memorials, legacy, the afterlife not as 'a place/state you go to after death', but as the conceptual way that the living think about and relate to the dead. Far from thinking about your own death either immediate or eventual, Dawntrail's relationship with death is closer to the day of someone else's funeral; you surround yourself with these thoughts and feelings about what the dead mean to you, and then you leave that funeral and have to carry those thoughts into a world that's still going, and have to figure out how to reconcile all of that. I actually find that a deeply mature approach to the subject, this realization that death just happens and the world keeps going.

@Cleretic: this is tongue-in-cheek, but in very broad strokes, would you say the past few expansions match the stages of grief (at least in final zones)?

denial, (HW), The Ishgardians lied for ages about the Dragonsong war
anger, (SB), I mean… it’s about revolution…storming castles and whatnot.
bargaining, (ShB), with Emet trying to reason with us/get our sympathies
depression, (EW), with various races just…dying or giving up hope
acceptance, (DT), with the Endless accepting that death is part of life.

It’s always seemed to be about death in some way.

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Originally Posted by kaynide

@Cleretic: this is tongue-in-cheek, but in very broad strokes, would you say the past few expansions match the stages of grief (at least in final zones)?

denial, (HW), The Ishgardians lied for ages about the Dragonsong war
anger, (SB), I mean… it’s about revolution…storming castles and whatnot.
bargaining, (ShB), with Emet trying to reason with us/get our sympathies
depression, (EW), with various races just…dying or giving up hope
acceptance, (DT), with the Endless accepting that death is part of life.

It’s always seemed to be about death in some way.

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Hah, I doubt it's intentional but that is a fun observation.

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Originally Posted by kaynide

@Cleretic: this is tongue-in-cheek, but in very broad strokes, would you say the past few expansions match the stages of grief (at least in final zones)?

denial, (HW), The Ishgardians lied for ages about the Dragonsong war
anger, (SB), I mean… it’s about revolution…storming castles and whatnot.
bargaining, (ShB), with Emet trying to reason with us/get our sympathies
depression, (EW), with various races just…dying or giving up hope
acceptance, (DT), with the Endless accepting that death is part of life.

It’s always seemed to be about death in some way.

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I think you can swing it, and in conversation Iw as trying to fit some of it through with ShB-EW-DT, but the thing that caught me was that the cycle of grief is when dealing with the loss of another. And only Dawntrail's really preoccupied with that, the others are more focused on people dealing with their own deaths, with Emet being the only real exception.

I'd actually say that Heavensward and Stormblood are more about war than death (ARR too but it's a lot less 'theme-ey'), and with those too you can see that there's some variety in where that broad theme can go. But at the scale FFXIV tells its stories, a war story is always very much about the war, which sorta limits the range.

I don't really have a problem with the storyboard itself so much as the pacing and execution, which I felt was substandard.

But I do have to ask: Why the rubber bullets?

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Originally Posted by Lyth

I don't really have a problem with the storyboard itself so much as the pacing and execution, which I felt was substandard.

But I do have to ask: Why the rubber bullets?

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That whole zone was such a waste tbh. Some people may enjoy it and that is absolutely fine.... but man... it was cartoonist bad. The only thing the Vulture was missing was a Snidely Whiplash mustache, and maybe tying someone to the train tracks.

I get they felt some need to have yee-haw land in there because it's "the Americas", but they really shoulda just stuck with Meso/South America and mayyyybe done some yeehaw mad max in a later expansion.

I think the shortfall of Dawntrail as a whole is the first trip to Shaaloani, but it's more just because that particular storyline was weak than anything deeper.

I get that by structure of the expansion that story basically had to be disposable, because its actual purpose is to get the WoL helplessly far away from Tulliyolal when the attack hit; I actually approve of that direction, the notion of a villain causing some serious damage because we just weren't there to stop them is actually something we've floated in this subforum. But a disposable story doesn't need to be a weak story, and the first Shaaloani trip was really weak.

I'd also put part of that blame on Erenville, but not in a way where it could've been fixed. Erenville just isn't a particularly extroverted, center-stage character, and has a skillset that doesn't exactly translate into compelling combat setpieces. Of course the part of the story that's a WoL-Erenville double act feels a little empty in comparison to the rest of the expansion, that's just the sort of story Erenville brings.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

I think the shortfall of Dawntrail as a whole is the first trip to Shaaloani, but it's more just because that particular storyline was weak than anything deeper.

I get that by structure of the expansion that story basically had to be disposable, because its actual purpose is to get the WoL helplessly far away from Tulliyolal when the attack hit; I actually approve of that direction, the notion of a villain causing some serious damage because we just weren't there to stop them is actually something we've floated in this subforum. But a disposable story doesn't need to be a weak story, and the first Shaaloani trip was really weak.

I'd also put part of that blame on Erenville, but not in a way where it could've been fixed. Erenville just isn't a particularly extroverted, center-stage character, and has a skillset that doesn't exactly translate into compelling combat setpieces. Of course the part of the story that's a WoL-Erenville double act feels a little empty in comparison to the rest of the expansion, that's just the sort of story Erenville brings.

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Yep.

This was the perfect opportunity to assemble the scions and do some deep research on the portal lock near Mamook. It would have been poignant to learn that Galuul once opened it and is the “king” of Alexandria, making the key only react to like DNA (Zoraal in this case).

Zoraal could have snatched the artifact from us right there and run in the gate. This would allow us to get to the throne room just too late to help instead of standing around like idiots. This would also add a “didn’t he just bampf away from us? How did he get here before us?” Etc etc.

Or a million other ways to do it. Then zone 4 could have been more lead up to Alexandria and not yeehaww rubber time.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Broadly speaking, once we zero in on a core theme, we're talking about death again; that's not new, or itself all that mature, but it's a very broad subject. And I actually find that Shadowbringers, Endwalker and Dawntrail almost form sort of a triptych of different ways to approach, think about and deal with death.

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I agree with this. I am at a stage now where I am struggling with my parents' aging and likely dying in the next few months. As a result, the game really made me think a lot about my own situation. I wouldn't mention any names because that would spoil the story, but I think this expansion really focuses on how we deal with the death of loved ones and how there are different interpretations on memorializing the dead. It really felt like classical sci-fi.

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Originally Posted by kaynide

Yep.

This was the perfect opportunity to assemble the scions and do some deep research on the portal lock near Mamook. It would have been poignant to learn that Galuul once opened it and is the “king” of Alexandria, making the key only react to like DNA (Zoraal in this case).

Zoraal could have snatched the artifact from us right there and run in the gate. This would allow us to get to the throne room just too late to help instead of standing around like idiots. This would also add a “didn’t he just bampf away from us? How did he get here before us?” Etc etc.

Or a million other ways to do it. Then zone 4 could have been more lead up to Alexandria and not yeehaww rubber time.

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I mean, there's large-scale ways to fix a problem and there's small-scale ways. Yours kinda rewrites out a huge chunk of the back half of the expansion, but my angle is to look at the things that first Shaaloani trip is supposed to do on a functional level, and try to fix it in the smallest way. Which is:

1. Get us away from Tulliyolal so we're too late for the attack,
2. Gets us close to where the attack comes from so we still see it (technically optional, but hey, if you can you might as well)
3. Introduce us to the region that's then going to be the backdrop for getting to said source of the attack,
4. Reintroduce Estinien, if only as an 'also he's here'
5. Give us some time with Erenville

And the direction they took was basically 'corrupt sheriff in cowboy town'. Not a bad angle by itself, but Erenville can't really mesh with it, and Zekowa doesn't carry it by himself.

My briefest edit might be that there's already a fix in that list: bring Estinien. As an ex-Bad Cop himself, he's a natural inclusion that'd bring some extra spice, and his dynamic with Erenville could be interesting.

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Originally Posted by Ghost_of_Ebina

I agree with this. I am at a stage now where I am struggling with my parents' aging and likely dying in the next few months. As a result, the game really made me think a lot about my own situation. I wouldn't mention any names because that would spoil the story, but I think this expansion really focuses on how we deal with the death of loved ones and how there are different interpretations on memorializing the dead. It really felt like classical sci-fi.

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A friend of mine directly compared parts of Dawntrail to end-of-life discussions about family, and yeah, I think that's very deliberate.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

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Agreeeeed on Estinien. We don't know what the .x patches will bring, but it felt very weird that most of what we saw in the trailer with Scions either happened at the very very end cutscene or haven't happened at all.

Just having Estinien in play should have brought a lot to the table in certain downtime bits, and Zone 4 would have been PERFECT to do some shenanigans. Or at least bring in the tribe from the Blu quest line that's supposed to be around here.

Erenville, who seems to be our posterboy for future Beastmaster Party Member, could have had us looking for some rare/unusual beast that's terrorizing the town, or damaging the train tracks, or whatnot. A Cryptid hunt would've fit "USA" quite well.

Here's a simple little fact about the DT story. Every portion of the game up to this point has had at least one scene that was known as "that scene". A scene that sticks with you forever. A scene that makes you want to see how the streamers react to it. DT has no such scene. There hasn't been a single thing happen in this story that I'd like to see again.

Being grim, dark, and dramatic doesn't make a story "mature."

Dawntrail actually features some very mature themes (racial tension, cultural dissonance, and legacy), I just don't think it was written particularly well. A big part of that is the front half of the story spends so much time worldbuilding Yok Tural there's not much room for the back half (Shaaloani, Yyasulani / Heritage Found + Solution Nine, and Living Memory) to actually engage the players with the story. Tellingly, according to the (now somewhat infamous) chart showing who has how many lines in the story, Sphene is second despite only being present for approximately 1/3 of the story. (How valid that data is I couldn't tell you, but it's still true that outside of a glimpse during the attack on Tuliyollal Sphene doesn't show up until Heritage Found and has a lot of lines.)

After the heavy moral and existential themes of Shadowbringers and Endwalker, a more relaxed atmosphere is exactly what Dawntrail needed.

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Originally Posted by Acesfool

Here's a simple little fact about the DT story. Every portion of the game up to this point has had at least one scene that was known as "that scene". A scene that sticks with you forever. A scene that makes you want to see how the streamers react to it. DT has no such scene. There hasn't been a single thing happen in this story that I'd like to see again.

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I actually have been thinking about something around this, but I don't think it's a problem with Dawntrail that we don't know what 'That Scene' is yet. That's usually something that comes through in retrospect once the community's really had a chance to chew on all this, it's damn near impossible to identify them in the moment; I think the only one I ever correctly saw as a 'yeah, this is big' scene in the moment was 'together, we shall walk' in Endwalker.

If anything, my struggle in guessing what 'That Scene' will be in Dawntrail is having too many options. In the long arm of history only a couple will really stick in people's minds, but I don't know which ones, especially because we've honestly got a few different categories with contenders.

Emotional death scene? Gulool Ja Ja's the obvious, but I wouldn't count out Zoraal Ja, and I bet a few people would root for Otis'.

Cool action sequence? The defense of Shaaloani, Gulool vs. Zoraal, both attacks on Tulliyolal. Hell, the duel in Shaaloani's got a solid claim if that's your style instead.

The Lore Reveal? I'd personally put my money on seeing Living Memory, but even just the gradual reveal of the gate to the golden city in the Skydeep Cenote holds strong, as does 'the Head of Reason's been dead for years', learning that thirty years have passed in Heritage Found, and the truth behind the blessed siblings, maybe even the south sea isles reveal for a certain crowd. The regulators and 'Alexandria's from another shard' are probably up there as lore reveals by themselves, but those reveals are probably too slow-burn for any part of it being That Scene.

Just the full-force 'this would be in an Oscar reel if it were a movie' emotional scene? Oh, that's got a lot of contenders (and only a few of them are Wuk Lamat). I think the leading contenders are Bakool Ja Ja's and Cahciua's big scenes (you know the ones), but Krile's parents put in some legitimate work, Wuk Lamat's if anything suffering from competition with herself, and I could even see G'raha's gondola ride holding the distance for a certain crowd.

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Originally Posted by Acesfool

Here's a simple little fact about the DT story. Every portion of the game up to this point has had at least one scene that was known as "that scene". A scene that sticks with you forever. A scene that makes you want to see how the streamers react to it. DT has no such scene. There hasn't been a single thing happen in this story that I'd like to see again.

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Oh come on guys! Didn't ya'll just LOVE that scene where we spent like 3 days stretching and hammering crap onto a train to the loud happy music? That was so emotional and fun! Guys?


Or that scene where someone finally actually got to eat a taco? That was a blast right guys!!?

guys?

...guys..?

I especially enjoyed the scene where we found out about Lamaty'i's desire for peace.

Jokes aside, I think Dawntrail borrows too many tropes that were better executed in previous installments to be particularly memorable.

In all honesty, if we're trying to ding Dawntrail for not having 'That Scene' (even though I do think it'll have it and we just haven't figured it out yet), I have a question: What's 'That Scene' for Stormblood?

Endwalker has Venat's big elaborate scene, Shadowbringers has Tesleen and the post-Amaurot pre-Dying Gasp bit, and Heavensward has Harchefaunt's death, with both Endwalker and Shadowbringers having a few other highlights. But what does Stormblood have in terms of standout scenes that people really turn up for? Yotsuyu's not-really-a-death scene? Zenos' also-not-really-a-death scene? Yotsuyu's actual death scene in the patches?

'That Scene' isn't something we just made up here, even if nobody's really called them that, it's actually a known phenomena; people doing first-time streams of FFXIV's MSQ have noticed that viewership spikes for very specific moments, as people just want to see them react to that one thing. But to my knowledge, Stormblood just... doesn't have those.

My favorite scene in Stormblood is Nanamo releasing Raubahn from his duty so he can go home and serve Ala Mhigo.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

...my angle is to look at the things that first Shaaloani trip is supposed to do on a functional level, and try to fix it in the smallest way. Which is:

1. Get us away from Tulliyolal so we're too late for the attack,
2. Gets us close to where the attack comes from so we still see it (technically optional, but hey, if you can you might as well)
3. Introduce us to the region that's then going to be the backdrop for getting to said source of the attack,
4. Reintroduce Estinien, if only as an 'also he's here'
5. Give us some time with Erenville

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One more purpose (for better or worse) is to introduce the landscape of Shaaloani so when we get to Heritage Found we can recognise it as the same landscape elements but twisted.

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Originally Posted by kaynide

Or at least bring in the tribe from the Blu quest line that's supposed to be around here.

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Putting the Whalaqee in the one tiny visitable sliver of Xak Tural would make the continent feel very small. Better for them to be off somewhere in the distance.

It probably could have worked to have them as one of the robbed tribes we deal with in the battle role quests, though. The totems we're tracking down even seem to be the same concept as BLU's spell-learning totems.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

What's 'That Scene' for Stormblood?

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To be fair, story-wise Stormblood is by far my least favorite expansion pack, but I would say the standout moments for me were:

My top is probably when Emet (Solus) revealed the Ascian machinations. That the Garlean empire itself and the overall Eorzean conflict were just a cogs in his elaborate plans to a rejoining.
Basically the wind-up to Shadowbringers.

I'd say other stand-outs are:

Yotsuyu's trial-fight (not technically a cutscene, but more the despirete holding-onto-hope that we wouldn't have to kill her...though granted her death tells a better story.
The actual retaking of Doma with our Steppe allies
Fordola's surrender (the "I will never forgive you, but I will thank you" bit)

Buuuut, I wouldn't really put any of those above really good scenes in other expacs, like say, Shiva's sacrifice. Or even Estinien getting bullied into joining the Scions.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

Putting the Whalaqee in the one tiny visitable sliver of Xak Tural would make the continent feel very small. Better for them to be off somewhere in the distance.

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That would have been cool- a small outpost (like the native village we already have), with them saying (some area they've blocked off) is sacred/off limits to outsiders, then show some stuff in the distance to imply there's a lot going on over there.

...Double points if that off limits area became a dungeon/exploration area that shows a lot of wide open tribal stuff (like Paglth'an); Triple points if it's modeled after yellowstone.

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Originally Posted by kaynide

That would have been cool- a small outpost (like the native village we already have), with them saying (some area they've blocked off) is sacred/off limits to outsiders, then show some stuff in the distance to imply there's a lot going on over there.

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I mean more hypothetically off in the distance – they're *somewhere* in Xak Tural but that doesn't mean we're going to be anywhere near them just because we visit one random stretch of desert. A continent is a big place to expect to cross paths with the one village we previously knew was located there.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

I mean more hypothetically off in the distance – they're *somewhere* in Xak Tural but that doesn't mean we're going to be anywhere near them just because we visit one random stretch of desert. A continent is a big place to expect to cross paths with the one village we previously knew was located there.

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I gotcha, but even so one of the only things we knew about Tural WELLLLL before DT was that the Whalaqee were somewhere there, somewhere near where Ceureleum fields exist, and that they were big-enough of a thing to have Mamook members and at least one guy wanting to bring it back to Eorzea, even if it was kinda a con. It's kinda like if your parents booked a vacation to Orlando and just didn't go to any of the theme parks.


I don't expect a future expansion to further detail the Tural continent outside of DT itself (exploratory zone or deep dungeon etc)- too much low hanging fruit in Meracydia, the north viking-lands, the 4 remaining shards.

Shame really that we'll never really get to interact or at least see it.

Could be wrong though; the world map we got has a few regions we haven't visited (Loazeniheta NE of Shaaloani) and Ty'ak Tyak south of Yak T'el. Could be dungeons. Could be exploratory things. Could be -whatever replaces island sanctuary for this expac-.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

Putting the Whalaqee in the one tiny visitable sliver of Xak Tural would make the continent feel very small. Better for them to be off somewhere in the distance.

It probably could have worked to have them as one of the robbed tribes we deal with in the battle role quests, though. The totems we're tracking down even seem to be the same concept as BLU's spell-learning totems.

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For what it's worth, the Whalaqee do get a storyline, and a fairly decent one at that. It's just in the absolute last place you'd expect.

It's Fisher. The two 'minigame jobs' have teamed up, Fisher's storyline is about the Whalaqee's magic.

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Originally Posted by Yuella

I just got to the fourth zone and I like the story so far. This is exactly the story I expected when they announced Dawntrail. The world building is really good. I enjoyed the sidequests where each of the two towns in a zone has a quest line (one of the aether current quests in each town) and they ended with a combined story of the two towns. Best side quests since Stormblood (where it had similar side quests structure in each zone).

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Wait for judgment until you finish the story

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

I mean, there's large-scale ways to fix a problem and there's small-scale ways. Yours kinda rewrites out a huge chunk of the back half of the expansion, but my angle is to look at the things that first Shaaloani trip is supposed to do on a functional level, and try to fix it in the smallest way. Which is:

1. Get us away from Tulliyolal so we're too late for the attack,
2. Gets us close to where the attack comes from so we still see it (technically optional, but hey, if you can you might as well)
3. Introduce us to the region that's then going to be the backdrop for getting to said source of the attack,
4. Reintroduce Estinien, if only as an 'also he's here'
5. Give us some time with Erenville

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Originally Posted by Iscah

One more purpose (for better or worse) is to introduce the landscape of Shaaloani so when we get to Heritage Found we can recognise it as the same landscape elements but twisted.

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I feel another purpose of the zone was to remind the player about Namikka before we see her again in Heritage Found and Living Memory.

As a FSH main who plays BLU solely to get the job lore and because I adore Martyn as a character, the fisher quests were a perfect fit.

Flying Sardine is such an iconic spell to XIV's version of Blue Magic that our level 80 right-hand gear was all Sardine-themed jewelry.

And I prefer the fact that the Whalaqee homeland remains off-screen but in the questline and elsewhere you can mention if you are familiar with them and Martyn if you completed BLU.