I just want a narrative from my Relics... I want to feel like I'm on an epic quest to forge a legendary weapon... Instead I feel like I'm doing chores to obtain a glorified tomestone weapon... I'm not putting any extra effort into obtaining these things, the upgrade process is practically automatic at this point... "Oh, I've nearly capped Esoterics, time to buy Umbrite"... First two steps were bad, but the latest three are worse... FATE grinds, though I loath them, at least meant I had to put effort into getting the weapon... Same for dungeons, I have to go out and clear those dungeon, else I'm not progressing... Unidentified items? While they gave us options, they took away the feeling of doing something specific to progress... I'd have loved a second version of Alexandrite Maps here, so rather than getting the Unidentified item directly, you have to go do a special Map for it... Aether Oil? Literally just a Esoterics grind you can get done while capping Lore, no extra effort required unless you want to speed up the process... Umbrite? Same deal...

They've made Anima weapons practically automatic these days... So long as you're playing the game, you're likely to finish the damn thing... You don't have to go out of your way to do anything after the dungeons, it's just a slow tomestone grind... That doesn't make for an interesting reward... Nobody gets to the top of an escalator and cheers because they got to the top... They just stood there and you took them to the top... That's how Anima weapons feel to me now... I can sit on the escalator or run up the stairs, either way there is no achievement...

I actually imagine I'll be more interested in the Scriptures weapons at this point... Presumably we'll have to go out of our way to farm Creator for those as well as tomestones... Unless they give me a Balrahn style solo challenge for the final step, the Anima weapons are just an incredibly dull tomestone grind... The flavour around the weapon is the only redeeming feature, and that honestly sucks... My Nothung and Kannagi are functionally the same, they gave us "living" weapons, and pretty much instantly separated the Anima from the weapon, removing any individuality across weapons... They're all just the same little spirit thing... Doesn't help that the current step feels like something out of Breaking Bad, my Anima seems to have developed an addiction to this blue crystal sand substance... I hope at the very least, the final step isn't some obnoxious glow, but instead an obnoxious text bubble coming off our weapons... I'm meant to be making a living weapon, give the weapon some personality... Christ, XI did a better job of this with a single cutscene, and Wings of the Goddess took us back to see some of the Relics talking in combat...