Missed gameplay opportunities in DT MSQ (spoilers)

Does anyone else feel they are leaning too much into cutscenes at the cost of player interaction?

For me that prime moment was just before the vanguard unlock. I couldn't help but think this should be a minigame where you use the aether cannon to shoot down the enemy aircraft.

It's a prime example to me because we know that minigame is possible. We've already had that minigame in SB when we had to blowgun dart some people. Or when the game returned in ShB when we had to shoot lala's in the head.

What other parts of DT do you think should of been a gameplay moment rather than a CS?

I did think the scene before the Vanguard should have been a duty. It was strange to me that it wasn't, so I guess they just didn't feel they could make us use an aether cannon or maybe they felt it would prevent them displaying the other scenes because you're busy shooting aircraft.

But in general, I didn't really notice the amount of solo duties because I'm used to the MSQ working like this where it's mostly cutscenes and interaction. I also think I didn't notice it much because they used features like "NPCs follow you", "follow an NPC", "sneak behind an NPC" and "travel with an NPC while they talk" to replace what they used to do with solo duties.

Total wishful thinking, since it relies on players being familiar with side-content they might not have played....

But as great as the scene was, I was kinda wishing that someone could've sent the G-Warrior along with Vrtra to tackle the air forces. Would've been so awesome to pilot that thing again under those circumstances.

Though I'd have to concede that Vrtra didn't really need help!

One that definitely should have happened would be when we go back to Tuliyollal during the invasion. We should have had an instance where we are fighting through the city, saving the people. We are the WoL, this is what we do, but instead, cutscene straight to the throne room seemingly not caring for anything.

Then, in the throne room, there is no reason we couldn't have a small solo boss fight with Zarool Ja after he killed Gullol Ja Ja, which he promptly loses, retreats and use that as an excuse to build a bigger army, then, when you fight him in the 99 trial, he knows he needs a lot of power to best you, so goes mad with powering himself up with souls, which ultimately corrupts him.

As for the train section, the GS minigame, Air Force One is basically what we could have had. You can cut away at various points to see what is going on down the rest of the train, or there could be a section near the end where they destroy the cannons and you have to fight them off as they are boarding the carriages, just to mix it all up a bit.

Oh there are a couple. The first that spring to my mind are:

There is no reason we could not have had a roleplay duty as Wuk Lamat catching an Alpaca.
The WoL should have been the one leading the float procession, bonus points for moving past Hanu that then join the parade.
The cooking part could have given us faux crafter skills to create the dish.
As Tulliyolal gets attacked, we should have been actually fighting. (Would have given us an excuse not to be there for that scene, too.)
Repairing the train could have been more involved. Procuring materials and building them onto the train.
Driving on the train could have been a mix of the GATE shooting minigame and a short battle duty.

I'm still shocked that it wasn't an instance fight when we "rescue" a kidnapped WL from BJJ and his cronies. I was fully prepared for it to be something, but it was just...a cutscene. Very odd and anticlimactic.

The play at the end, Otis mentions we shouldn't be worried if we mess up the lines and that it's all part of the fun.

We then have absolutely no input on how it plays out, either as a mock battle (which would have been a fun callback to the stage play fight at the start of FF9) or even as just dialogue choices where we can (intentionally or not) royally screw up the scene, or play it straight.

I like the amount of cutscenes

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Originally Posted by Carin-Eri

Total wishful thinking, since it relies on players being familiar with side-content they might not have played....

But as great as the scene was, I was kinda wishing that someone could've sent the G-Warrior along with Vrtra to tackle the air forces. Would've been so awesome to pilot that thing again under those circumstances.

Though I'd have to concede that Vrtra didn't really need help!

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G-warrior duty would have been fun. Ya, Vytra's got the air fleet over the capital but we could of taken the other air fleet over the other zones

I agree with every single suggestion in this thread. The train scene absolutely should have been an instance. Fighting in the city should have been an instance. Like Mikey_R said, we are the Warrior of Light. We are not going to just run by innocent people being attacked. We're going to put ourselves between those people and what is attacking them. Even in times we moved on in past expansions, it was when our friends and companions were there to hold the fort and told us to keep going.

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Originally Posted by jadan2000

I like the amount of cutscenes

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The cutscenes are totally fine. I think most of us would have just liked a little more solo duties or gameplay to alleviate the percentage of cutscene to gameplay. STB and SHB really had a sweetspot going for that and we've drifted off slightly.

The most they probably could've done with the Train cutscene was turn the train run into the first third of Vanguard. Although I suppose it wouldn't really make too much sense functionally that the train's trip from the station to Vanguard's wall would be exactly how long it takes for trash mobs to die.

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Originally Posted by sylphlands

I was fully prepared for it to be something, but it was just...a cutscene. Very odd and anticlimactic.

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You can say that about a lot of story beats.

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Originally Posted by Mikey_R

One that definitely should have happened would be when we go back to Tuliyollal during the invasion. We should have had an instance where we are fighting through the city, saving the people. We are the WoL, this is what we do, but instead, cutscene straight to the throne room seemingly not caring for anything.

Then, in the throne room, there is no reason we couldn't have a small solo boss fight with Zarool Ja after he killed Gullol Ja Ja, which he promptly loses, retreats and use that as an excuse to build a bigger army, then, when you fight him in the 99 trial, he knows he needs a lot of power to best you, so goes mad with powering himself up with souls, which ultimately corrupts him.

As for the train section, the GS minigame, Air Force One is basically what we could have had. You can cut away at various points to see what is going on down the rest of the train, or there could be a section near the end where they destroy the cannons and you have to fight them off as they are boarding the carriages, just to mix it all up a bit.

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ya...either the blowgun FPS minigame or the GS airforce one minigame...either would have been great. and we know it's already possible so it wouldn't be hard to do

And on the battle of tuyilol...absolutely we should have been fighting in the street. it was annoying to just stand there and watch him kill daddy. We should of been fighting in the street and then when we "win" the duty it goes the cutscene with "meanwhile" in the subtitles

One that sticks out to me is the scene where Bakool Ja Ja hires mooks to capture Wuk Lamat. We get an obviously suspicious messenger saying the moblins have a message, she takes off alone, and we just kinda stand there for a while. I feel like it would've been more interesting if just the WoL had gone with her, leading to a solo duty alongside her against Bakool Ja Ja. Show him actually fighting, maybe have him hit like a truck but with very telegraphed moves to sell the "strong but not skilled" vibe he gives off. Then when he starts flagging, Sareel Ja interferes, using magic to stun the WoL and knock Wuk Lamat out. They decide that taking the WoL is too dangerous, but the rest of the party is finally arriving, so they don't have time to finish us off and just grab Wuk Lamat and high-tail it. I feel like it would not only sell Bakool Ja Ja as an actual physical threat (which, considering the only other times we see him fight before his heel-face turn are getting one-shotted by Zoraal Ja and then losing to Wuk Lamat, the story doesn't really manage), but it would give the RP duty in Yak'tel more weight as a rematch.

Missed gameplay opportunities: the whole expansion outside combat

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Originally Posted by Rookie1

Does anyone else feel they are leaning too much into cutscenes at the cost of player interaction?

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With one exception, I don't feel like the issue is "at the cost of player interaction," just that there's so many unnecessary cutscenes, often occurring back-to-back. In quite a few cutscenes, I was left wondering why it even was a cutscene in the first place instead of just dialogue, as there didn't seem to be anything in particular happening that needed it to be a cutscene.

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For me that prime moment was just before the vanguard unlock. I couldn't help but think this should be a minigame where you use the aether cannon to shoot down the enemy aircraft.

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This is that one exception. I was so expecting that to turn into the "Air Force One" mini-game they already have in the Gold Saucer. The basis for it is already built into the game...why not use it? Even if it cut out of mini-game mode at the end for Erenville to also take a cannon, we could have still had a good chunk of the ride played out as a mini-game.

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Originally Posted by Rookie1

And on the battle of tuyilol...absolutely we should have been fighting in the street. it was annoying to just stand there and watch him kill daddy. We should of been fighting in the street and then when we "win" the duty it goes the cutscene with "meanwhile" in the subtitles

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Yeah I almost think it would have been better if we hadn't even been there for that because it felt completely out of character that we just stood there able to do something and watching someone die, and being told we had to honor the duel when Zoraal Ja had already dishonored it was just a poor excuse.

I absolutely hated the Sapphire Weapon duty so I wouldn't have enjoyed if they brought that back, but I think if the train was a multi part solo duty, playing as different characters + WoL defending the train it would have been fun. I think the cutscene itself was cool, but definitely could have been better if we took part in it. If you could have played as Krile, they could have shown off pictomancer. In previous expansions they show off new jobs released in that patch through solo duties (Hien/samurai in stormblood, Thancred/gunbreaker in shadowbringers & Alphinaud/sage in endwaker) so I think that was a bit of a missed opportunity.

One for the returning invaded Tulliyolal too, since they do it for Solution 9 later on anyway. Might have been a better way to introduce the enemies/show them taking souls from the dead bodies (instead of showing Krile seeing them do it and then never mentioning it to anyone), and they could have briefly let you see Sphene so her turning up later on has more of an impact. We (the player) know she was there in the invasion, but do any of the characters (WoL included) actually bring up seeing her there? I don't remember at this point.

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Originally Posted by Mikey_R

As for the train section, the GS minigame, Air Force One is basically what we could have had. You can cut away at various points to see what is going on down the rest of the train, or there could be a section near the end where they destroy the cannons and you have to fight them off as they are boarding the carriages, just to mix it all up a bit.

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I was really expecting this to happen too, it's pretty crazy how long that cutscene was without any form of actual gameplay to top it off.