Anyone else feeling disappointed by Endwalker MSQ? MAJOR MSQ SPOILERS!

[Seraphor]

10. Elidibus + Lahabrea: we didn't get to see their faces the way we did with Emet-Selch and Fandaniel, and we also didn't get to learn their true names; given how important they both are in the majority of the MSQ, when we travelled in the past I had hoped we get to meet them as well.

The post credits scene teasing Pandaemonia may be Lahabrea.

15. Venat and her plan and her promise: this one is huge for me. Basically after spending some days in Elpis with Venat, Emet-Selch, Hythlodaeus and Fandaniel, after Meteion goes rogue, Fandaniel erases his own memories and the memories of Emet-Selch and Hythlodaeus, the memories of the last few days; and only the WoL and Venat manage to escape this; Venat promises the WoL that she will remember everything and use all the information to prevent the Final Days. Yet she fails. Why does she fail? How does she fail? What exactly did she even do to even start to attempt to stop the Final Days? Did she have a solid plan? How soon after the WoL leaves Elpis do the Final Days happen? How much time does Venat have to prepare? Why would she not tell the truth to Emet-Selch and Hythlodaeus and ask them to not tell Fandaniel? If Emet-Selch and Hythlodaeus refused to believe her, she did say that the surrounding aether retains memories of events, so she could have used that to prove to Emet-Selch and Hythlodaeus that what happened was real. Emet-Selch is considered the greatest and most powerful mage of his time, why would Venat not want to have him on her side, especially with the Final Days looming over their world? Again, many unexplored/unanswered questions and I'm very VERY afraid we will never get actual in-game answers to them.

I think this is all adequately explained in the story.
Venat couldn't risk bringing anyone in the convocation into the know about the Final Days, and without Hermes there probably wasn't much she could do about it. We were sent back precisely because it wasn't hopeful that it could be averted in their time, and we needed to solve it in our time.
Plus, as sundered beings, we were much more capable of dealing with Dynamis than the ancients were, too full of aether to perceive, use or combat it. Hermes has created a being the ancients couldn't defeat, only we could.
Even if she did have a plan and put it into motion once she had recruited her confidants, it's implied she would have failed simply because of that fact.


Overall I think Endwalker was done really well. Not as elegant or well-crafted as Shadowbringers, which had a very neat and focused plot with one amazing, really big pay off. Whereas Endwalker's strengths was in tying up four previous expansions worth of plotlines, which is not an easy thing to do, yet it pulled it off. It managed to be more fragmented than Stormblood, but it paid off every plot line really well for the most part.

My main disappointments would probably be:

Zenos, definitely the weak link of the story, seems forced and along for the ride. Probably would have worked better if he did take over Zodiark and he died on the moon.

I also think Anima and Hermes would have made much more interesting trials than the Zodiark and Hydaelyn that we got, but when you only have two mid-game trials to work with, it was inevitable that the more prominent characters would get them.

I suppose it may have been possible to split it into two entire expansions with a bit more world content, in order to give Zenos/Anima/Garlemald, and Amaurot/Elpis/Meteion much more focus and depth, but I'm not sure a two-year gap between them would really work that well.
Maybe Garlean centric expansion, with Anima and Zodiark and the mid-trials, and Zenos as the final trial, with another location in Garlemald (Corvis?) and two lunar zones in place of Elpis and Ultima Thule, then follow up in the patches with, trials for Hermes and Meteion in 6.1 and 6.3, with Elpis and Thule simply being additional smaller instanced zones. But that would leave 6.0 on a bit of a cliffhanger that wouldn't be resolved for nearly a year.
Either way they would likely have to play it as "Yay Zodiark is dead! the Ascian threat is finally over!" then 2-3 patches later it's "The final days are upon us", which would kinda mess up the Sharlayan and Thavnair sections.

[MoofiaBossVal]

Finished it a couple hours ago. It was indeed rather disappointing. Rushed, convoluted story that flip flopped on what it wanted to be, was awkwardly paced, and botched the payoff. The story was also very cynical (despite the repetitive speeches and empty platitudes about hope and such). I found the rolequests to be much more enjoyable.

I will check out the next expansion, but if the future of FFXIV's storytelling is going to be more Kingdom Hearts sob stories from Ishikawa, I'm out.

[KizuyaKatogami]

Finished it a couple hours ago. It was indeed rather disappointing. Rushed, convoluted story that flip flopped on what it wanted to be, was awkwardly paced, and botched the payoff. The story was also very cynical (despite the repetitive speeches and empty platitudes about hope and such). I found the rolequests to be much more enjoyable.

I will check out the next expansion, but if the future of FFXIV's storytelling is going to be more Kingdom Hearts sob stories from Ishikawa, I'm out.

Yeah i agree. Overall i’m just disappointed Zodiark and Elidibus were both shafted yet again, and that there were no consequences or deaths for the scions. So much for that big bad apocalypse that originally ruined the entire planet. Guess now it can be averted with 0 deaths for the main cast via time convolution and friendship.

[Araxes]

The beginning of the MSQ was kinda empty and felt draggy, kinda like Stormblood.
It picks up the further you get in but some parts of the Story feel a bit rushed and weird. I loved the Ending except the Zenos thingy, his role in the final part of the MSQ felt like: "We ran out of dudes to help with stuff, so we just inserted some half baked reason for him to help"

It was not bad at all, it is just not on the Level Shadowbringers was. Its more like Stormblood 2.0

[Puremallace]

I consider it a masterpiece as a whole but in some areas there are pacing issues but that is caused by their habit of giving more information than is required. This to me is effectively Shadowbringers with FAR FARRRRRRR better zone design. Elpis alone blows everything in Shadowbringers away for me.

I have not played an expansion like this since Wrath of the Lick King. The issue you are having is how they define the final days does not match what you would expect but is perfectly logical if you have played other Final Fantasy games.

You can clearly tell Ishikawa was affected by the Corona Virus pandemic in her writing. This mysterious thing that suddenly strikes and starts spreading killing indiscriminately. Personally I think she took multiple plot holes through FF14's history and tried to wrap them up.

There are just certain spots where you are forced into certain situations to keep the timeline of lore consistent with 8 years of information drip fed to the playerbase.

[Exosapien]

Wasn't disappointed at all. I don't know what people expect, but this is one of the best FF stories ever in my opinion and no video game has ever affected me in the way this expansion has.

[MilkieTea]

Maybe it’s because I was a homestuck kid/teen but I found a lot of the story extremely easy to understand and follow (which is good.)

You create a closed time loop (as evidenced by Elidibus saying he might’ve remembered seeing you there at some point… *before* you get there.) You were always going to talk to Venat, and because Venat remembered you talking to her she created Hydaelyn to stave off the threat of Zodiark. Because you helped find Meteion, Hermes heard her report and developed a deep-seated disregard for life that lasted across millennium. This stuff was always going to happen, you were powerless to stop it and infact you were always a part of the catalyst.

A lot of what you’re describing as disappointing seems to be disappointing because you have reader-omnipresence. You are able to see what others (even your player character) cannot. And it seeps into how you view the story and the characters and their motives.

[Deceptus]

1. Zodiark: he was thought to be this huge threat to the entire world, the eldest and strongest primal, but yet we get to fight him and defeat him very early on in the game and it's also quite easy to do so, we don't really struggle that much. For a villain that was written to be this very ancient, very powerful and very dangerous deity, we got rid of him pretty fast and without much risk to us/others, without struggling and suffering just to defeat him. It kind of reminds me of the Night King from Game of Thrones, another villain hyped up to be ancient and powerful, who got destroyed fast and easily. It feels like wasted potential.
.

The in game lore explained this.

Zodiark was weak because he was incomplete. When the source separated so did Zodiark, every rejoining makes him more whole.

[KizuyaKatogami]

The in game lore explained this.

Zodiark was weak because he was incomplete. When the source separated so did Zodiark, every rejoining makes him more whole.

It explains it sure but it still feels like a crazy cop-out. This entity thats supposed to be the opposing half of the other main entity is done with less than halfway through the story. Both him and elidibus got basically nothing compared to how much time hydaelyn and venat have gotten. We didn’t even get to hear Zodiark’s side of things at all. It’s just bam, hes dead and that’s that…

[Lauront]

Well, I enjoyed the ride up to now but I think I'm pretty much content to say I am not really a fan of the game's storytelling, which I'd describe as a saccharine, convoluted mess rife with plot holes, so I will be bowing out at this point. Happy travels in Eorzea or wherever the moon bunnies take you guys. o/