Political Ideology and Storytelling Within FFXIV

[MikkoAkure]

I maintain my position that it would have been better for all that Aymeric took the throne as king, you don't just hand over political power to a peasant class that cannot even read or write nor was the nobility completely tilted in favor of evil. Count Fortemps and the various members of the other high houses were absolutely not bad guys. As for the knights of the Heavens' Ward I sympathize more with their plights and backstories, being equally painful and tragic as those of Aymeric and Estinien who had difficult upbringings themselves but did not go the way of evil. One of the messages I took away from Heavensward is that sons don't necessarily inherit the sins of their fathers and are free to choose better paths-clearly that didn't sink in for you.

Did you miss the whole plotline with The True Brothers of the Faith, the nobles who were so upset at Aymeric for trying to not be king they threw a little girl off Ishgard? And then the whole deal where the Church instigated false trials of heresy against literally everyone they didn't like and dropped them off a cliff, if they fell to their death they were innocent and if they flew away they were a dragon-lover. And there's also the whole backstory for dark knights, where a priest was abused his power against a child so a knight who was born a commoner had to take matters in his own hands and was condemned for it.

To me, the whole point of the plot of Heavensward in the patches was that "a bad apple spoils the bunch" and that Aymeric had to reconstruct his country in order to make it whole again. If you thought that Ishgard was some shining beacon of chivalry and pure, unbridled heroic fantasy, you missed a lot.

FF1-Chaos as a God of destruction
FF2-Christianity seeing as how the Emperor is said to have defeated Satan and took his powers
FF3/4/5-Crystalism, and in FF4's case the creator deity is defeated at the end of the story
FF6-Kefka and the Warring Triad
FF9-the eidolons having powers on the scale of gods and later on the underlying lore regarding crystals, etc
FF10-the dominant big bad here is Sin, and while no gods are present in this story the strong unification of the world under Yevon contributed to the game's consitency and palatability
FF11-Atalanta, Promathia
FF12/Ivalice - needs no explanation
FF7/8-did not require them in favor of FF7's lifestream themes and FF8's sorceresses

Chaos is literally just some dude who gets magic powers. In FFXIV, the "gods" turned out to be summons and fakes and we end up killing them all so I don't know how that makes it much different from some of the others on your list where the gods are summons and/or fakes that end up getting killed.

[KariTheFox]

As for the colonialsm always bad I do believe it depends on the context-there have historically been civilizations that resort to ritualistic human sacrifice or other atrocities and when pitted against literally any other would be colonists that do not engage in such behavior, I would rule in favor of the more benevolent society, and that is where I choose to leave any and all discussions regarding the subject. It is not a black and white issue at all, but this is not the place for an extended conversation about that.

This might not be the place for it but I'm not about to let that go unchallenged, many of the claims of savagery and ritualistic human sacrifice made about indigenous cultures were in fact, distortions and lies told by colonial powers in order to justify their continued mistreatment of native peoples. Yes, some cultures did engage in ritualistic human sacrifice, but it was hardly a majority and it does not justify the way they were treated by colonial powers.

Secondly, if you want to talk about "ritualistic human sacrifice" then you should also look at what Europe was doing at the time with the witch-hunts of the time. Surely women and minorities being murdered by a mob for religious reasons counts as a ritualistic human sacrifice. Would, say, China or the numerous Islamic nations of the time be justified in invading Europe and putting a stop to such a backwards and barbaric culture?

[aveyond-dreams]

...

I'll take adventuring in an imperfect land like Ishgard over a democractic Garlemald and Ala Mhigo/Bozja, if you think that republics such as these are any better by default then you are mistaken. I found myself siding with Misija back in Bozja-I did not trust the nice guys lets be free now act the resistance was putting on. I found them bland and pathetic whereas she was at least driven by something more than a fleeting dream.

The need for a dominant supernatural force (gods) is something that keeps the plot train on the rails and prevents it from spiralling too far off into obscure territory, in absence of more pressing matters. Games like FF7/8 did not need them because there was more interesting stuff going on at the individual level.

A game like FFXIV is lost without them given how nearly everyone's story has wrapped up nicely with a bow and how interesting both gods, Hydaelyn and Zodiark were to people. They were certainly more intriguing than anything going on with the main cast or any of their nonexistent goals besides spreading their nebulous ideals all over the world. Perhaps if better characters were introduced to the cast there would be no need for such forces to keep the plot in check, because there isn't much going on these days with the scions.

...

I have said my piece and directly told you that I am uninterested in continuing to discuss the matter. My opinions are my own, and I retain that I have no interest in seeing similar conflicts play out in game. No amount of appealing to my morals is going to stir my interest in seeing that over a return to a traditional fantasy kingdom setting.

[KageTokage]

Honestly, I thought Bozja was one of the weakest attempts at creating a morally grey conflict to date considering that for all the supposed goodness of their leader, the IVth legion's generals consisted largely of mustache-twirling villains to whom war crimes were second nature and Lyon was basically the only one to actually express any contempt for their methods.

By extension, Misija utterly failed at being a sympathetic character to me and my thoughts only shifted from "Can I kill her now" to "Okay, you can kill her instead" by her last scene.

The Bozjan resistance were just a group of wide-eyed idealists at the core but I'd take that any day over the IVth legion and their "whatever it takes" methodology because if they're willing to embrace that idea to win a war, there's no indication the same wouldn't hold true for their rule as well.

[KariTheFox]

For a game that supposedly about the virtue of democracy, the one long time established democracy that we spend any amount of time in - Sharlayan, is a pretty obstructionist and exclusionary place. Their immigration policy is the second most restrictive in the setting that we know of. Their political system is under the iron grip of one faction, who use the forum to impede our progress in finding out about anything that's going on there for the first half of Endwalker. They also routinely send assassins out to murder people who spread state secrets beyond their borders - and, their food sucks, which as we all know is narrative shorthand for "there is something deeply wrong with this society".

Really, for fans of democracy wank like myself, there's very little fat to chew on. No political parties, no elections, no establishment of a balance of power. Just some fledgling republics formed in the wake of their imperial yoke being removed. Nice as a way to end a story about imperial oppression, but I'd like to see what happens in a couple years as political divides are established and competing interests and powers are elected to office.

I do quite like the setting of FFXIV, and I'd rather see it develop and grow with the established nations and status quo that came about over the past ten years, rather than throwing it all away to go adventuring in some big fantasyland castle, there are other settings and franchises that do that well enough already.

[_Koneko_]

For a game that supposedly about the virtue of democracy, the one long time established democracy that we spend any amount of time in - Sharlayan, is a pretty obstructionist and exclusionary place. Their immigration policy is the second most restrictive in the setting that we know of. Their political system is under the iron grip of one faction, who use the forum to impede our progress in finding out about anything that's going on there for the first half of Endwalker. They also routinely send assassins out to murder people who spread state secrets beyond their borders - and, their food sucks, which as we all know is narrative shorthand for "there is something deeply wrong with this society".

Really, for fans of democracy wank like myself, there's very little fat to chew on. No political parties, no elections, no establishment of a balance of power. Just some fledgling republics formed in the wake of their imperial yoke being removed. Nice as a way to end a story about imperial oppression, but I'd like to see what happens in a couple years as political divides are established and competing interests and powers are elected to office.

I do quite like the setting of FFXIV, and I'd rather see it develop and grow with the established nations and status quo that came about over the past ten years, rather than throwing it all away to go adventuring in some big fantasyland castle, there are other settings and franchises that do that well enough already.

to be fair most of their changes happen after finding out about doomsday their policy used to be much more welcoming in the past as noted by g'raha its only when they came in contact with hydalyne that their stance changed

[aveyond-dreams]

I do quite like the setting of FFXIV, and I'd rather see it develop and grow with the established nations and status quo that came about over the past ten years, rather than throwing it all away to go adventuring in some big fantasyland castle, there are other settings and franchises that do that well enough already.

Well given how each expansion gives us 6 new zones and 2 new cities, I'm afraid that the time to explore and further develop most of these places has come and gone except in the case of Garlemald. 7.0 will send us off to somewhere, and simply put I very much feel that a Heavensward style conflict and setting would make for a more digestable and pleasant start to season 2.

The big fantasyland castle of Ishgard is what Yoship purposefully dangled in front of our faces prior to Heavensward to retain those of us who were getting bored during ARR's drawn-out MSQ. Take out the elements that Ishgard and Coerthas brought in, and you're left with 3 very forgettable starter cities and an Empire that looks so much cooler by comparison I'd rather defect to their side.

FFXIV would not be where it is today had they not taken us to that castle in the sky and given us that golden era. Season 2 deserves something similar, a new castle in the distance or high imperial skyscrapers to look up to, and to be finally free of any unnecessary vestiges, because now that castle is left behind in the past, the empire's towers have all come crumbling down, and the main supernatural forces of the game have exited the stage.

There are no major players left on the chess board, and if FFXIV wants to enter an age bereft of the major pillars of any decent fantasy or even sci-fi story in favor of boring me with the virtues of modern-day political morals and abstract Hermes vs despair plotlines, then I'll go off somewhere else. The average republic is not worth getting attached to, much less those that would fight in the name of that system. It has no appeal, not with the state the main cast is in and the present absence of any villains worth standing off against.

In summary: you can sell FF players kingdoms vs kingdoms, high tech empires vs other high tech ones, character-driven focused plots in otherwise modern settings, but there's very little chance that they'll put up with nationbuilding and democracy: the expansion. There's a lot of things people come to Final Fantasy for, but that just ain't it.

[Veloran]

FFXIV would not be where it is today had they not taken us to that castle in the sky and given us that golden era. Season 2 deserves something similar, a new castle in the distance or high imperial skyscrapers to look up to, and to be finally free of any unnecessary vestiges, because now that castle is left behind in the past, the empire's towers have all come crumbling down, and the main supernatural forces of the game have exited the stage.

I'm pretty concerned about this as well. What grand enemies are we supposed to overcome now? What complex mysteries are supposed to thread throughout the story now?

It wasn't "Meanwhile, in Gridania" or "Meanwhile, in Limsa Lominsa" they've always used as a plot hook cutaway at the end of every patch. It was "Meanwhile, on the moon" or "Meanwhile, in Garlemald". We have a bunch of spoilers from Emet for the future, but those all seem like comparatively tiny, disconnected adventures. There's no looming antagonists like the Garleans or the Ascians, nobody to represent monolithic power or overarching schemes. We're even looking at a dead, empty universe at the moment.

There are some really big narrative shoes to fill, and nobody seems to be around to fill them. The only exception I see could be the Void and the Voidsent... But we've already beaten the best of them multiple times over.

[aveyond-dreams]

I'm pretty concerned about this as well. What grand enemies are we supposed to overcome now? What complex mysteries are supposed to thread throughout the story now?

It wasn't "Meanwhile, in Gridania" or "Meanwhile, in Limsa Lominsa" they've always used as a plot hook cutaway at the end of every patch. It was "Meanwhile, on the moon" or "Meanwhile, in Garlemald". We have a bunch of spoilers from Emet for the future, but those all seem like comparatively tiny, disconnected adventures. There's no looming antagonists like the Garleans or the Ascians, nobody to represent monolithic power or overarching schemes. We're even looking at a dead, empty universe at the moment.

There are some really big narrative shoes to fill, and nobody seems to be around to fill them. The only exception I see could be the Void and the Voidsent... But we've already beaten the best of them multiple times over.

In an earlier thread I posited the idea of new gods arising from the will of the two we've just slain-one of light, one of darkness, and that of darkness could easily throw their lot in with the voidsent and empower them to the degree that they become a more meaningful threat. This would be the overarching conflict that would take center stage as season 2 progresses, culminating in an expansion set within the void itself.

Voidsent are essentially demons, making them a palatable and credible threat *if* they gain enough power to be taken seriously. Right now, they're still basically pushovers for the most part. Looking back to FFXV, I remember the southern continent was the more affected of the two main landmasses whose entire capital was overrun by demons-a setting similar to Gralea or Tenebrae would be amazing to have here, both of which were memorable for various reasons. An empire steeped in darkness, and a land of flying castles home to a line of oracles. Insomnia, both in its thriving and post-apocalyptic states were great fun to explore and be in, and would make for a great hub city or monster-infested zone both.

As for the new gods, what if they not only inherited the wills of their predecessors but also began to behave like fal'Cie? By branding us as their chosen, we would be able to one day rise as WoL-level equivalents once more towards the end of season 2's power creep, or else curse us by subjecting us to the risk of becoming monsters should we fail in our mission. Warriors of Etheirys pitted against Warriors of the Void.

[MikkoAkure]

The big fantasyland castle of Ishgard is what Yoship purposefully dangled in front of our faces prior to Heavensward to retain those of us who were getting bored during ARR's drawn-out MSQ. Take out the elements that Ishgard and Coerthas brought in, and you're left with 3 very forgettable starter cities and an Empire that looks so much cooler by comparison I'd rather defect to their side.

I thought I heard Yoshi-P said that we almost got The Cieldalaes for 3.0 instead of Ishgard. So I don't think it was something that he was "purposefully dangling in front of our faces for those who were bored". We only got it because he said that the players from 1.0 have already been stuck just outside its gates for years only to have it continue so it was him throwing us a bone.