Square you need to streamline the main story

[Ama_Hamada]

Yes, it is insane to think you can rush through 2.1-2.55 quest worth of content released from the months of December 14 2013 to March 30th 2015.

No idea what that means, nor do I care. Screw having that much tedious filler gating progress, it is not fun. If it did not gate anything sure it would be fine.

Where and what do you really think can be trimmed? I see this a lot "Much/most/large percentage of the MSQ can be trimmed or cut without much work."

Outside of obvious suggestions, like the Tataru bit where you help her check out other professions (it exists for pacing as a calm before the storm moment, but it is technically filler as you essentially end up where you started), I've yet to see anyone present any suggestion for what parts of the story can be trimmed or cut without it impacting other places in the story...especially anything that is voiced, as not only is that not a cheap to re-do, many of the voice actors from the 2.x series no longer voice those characters meaning either you can't cut anything that impacts a voice cutscene (even if it isn't directly referenced, there are frequently comments that make less sense if other content isn't there) or they'd have to re-voice everything that character did. Things like the Company of Heroes...once you start cutting bits then it basically doesn't make sense at all so either all of it would have to be cut or completely rewritten.

True, there are bits and pieces - you could trim out the hide and seek with the kids (it's world building, as it subtly tells you about the state of the lives of Domans - they live in fear but the adults try and hide it from the kids - but it's not strictly necessary) or the helping the old man who can't stand the smell of chocobo a means of riding with the caravan via a perfume laced cloth mask (the oft-mentioned "chocobo sniffing" in case anyone forgot is actually a world building moment to indicate just how unusual the Domans find these creatures, but again is not strictly necessary). Maybe trim down the setting up of Revenant's Toll and the Rising Stones (the rest of 2.1, Minfilia's adoptive mother and the Moogle primal, require reworking other sections of the story)

You could teleport players to/close to their next quest objective the way they do several times in the 3.5 series to reduce travel time.

You could have the experience gaps eliminated so that the MSQ is always there and you're always ready to do the next part.

But even all that will not reduce the MSQ by an appreciable amount without extensive reworking...

To which I always have another question - why should the developers waste their time reworking and removing content for those who don't really care about it in the first place?

Why not advocate for dungeon/raid/trail/region content to be ungated from the MSQ instead? Sure, immersion for those who don't follow the MSQ takes a hit (do they care about that in the first place) but the devs don't have to do nearly the amount of reworking and can instead focus on future content. Like the jump potions, is a one and done style change to the game, only without the cost factor for the players.

Trying to have the "best" of both worlds - a required MSQ that everyone must follow but shortened for players coming through that just want to get to the end - ends up with the worst of any of the available options.

Just trim down all the running around, so much time is burned having to run back and forth for no reason.