What's the point with that quite lackluster story in Endwalker?

[Rulakir]

I felt like they made it pretty clear that their intent was to truly bring them back to life because it was mentioned that they would "resume their vigil over the star together" (I can't recall whether it was Hythlodaeus or Elidibus who said that), which doesn't sound like a metaphor for returning to the Lifestream.

I believe their ultimate goal was to restore everyone but, barring that, they would still seek to release their souls even if resurrection weren't possible.

To be honest, I never got the idea that the Warrior of Light was never in control of their actions. Even if Hydaelyn does come to us at the start and tell us that Lahabrea is our enemy, we start the story as just some adventurer looking for fame and fortune. It's only because the Ascians directly try to kill us and we meet the Scions that we end up going around fixing the world.

The WoL was recruited specifically because they have the Echo. All of the Scions were tasked with seeking out people who have it. Despite the WoL conveniently showing up during encounters, I didn't get the impression we would've been given a formal invitation without that gift.

I'd forgotten that the opening cinematic is Hydaelyn showing Lahabrea as an enemy. The grooming started early, eh?

If she did, it would only confirm Hydaelyn is good. I remember hearing about how she was a bit upset that two of her characters, Horsefart and Icequeen (not bothering to look up the spelling of their names) were killed off.

This is what I don't understand. Ishikawa gets attached to all of her characters, even ones explicitly meant to be killed off (I believe Moenbryda is also one of hers) or inconsequential ones, which would've been the Crystal Tower cast before G'raha was brought back as a main character and Amon as a main antagonist. So why permanently kill off the Ancients? This is the same writer who introduced alternate timelines in order to save the WoL's life, but we don't get the same in the followup expansion to give the Ancients a happy ending?

Venat is also gone-gone, so I could almost take that as a sign she didn't actually like her character if she leaves no opening for her to return in the future (something even Fandaniel has). I have a theory that the original vision for Hydaelyn was quite different than what we got and perhaps she was pressured into making her a "good guy". It would certainly explain the inconsistencies between ShB and EW, why everything Venat does fits an antagonist, the copious amount of gaslighting, and the finality of her fate.

I'm trying to remain positive about the next expansion, but it's kind of hard. I think about all the things that Endwalker was up against and Yoshida just wanting to end it and not caring being the bulk of the reasons why it ended up so bad.

On another note, an acquaintance at work that knew I played the game asked about how the expansion was going I don't know if it was my pausing or something else, but he said " I heard it was pretty bad?". Where would people be saying Endwalker, or the story for it was bad? Because it's not in the reviews, not on reddit.

I only ever see Metacritic cited and someone noted it's only reviews from 1200 players that were made during the initial hype (and before the LL). I've seen a few people now who said they loved EW at the time, but have changed their mind since reflecting upon the story. I've been seeing more anti-Venat sentiment on Reddit too. Granted, it's still not a lot, but a recent fanart someone posted of her ended up with a long thread chain about how she and what she did was bad, which is not something that would've happened a couple of months ago.

I'm not enthusiastic about the story going forward at all. I'm just loathe to quit because FFXIV is doing a lot of things I've wanted in an MMO for years, particularly anything related to making it more solo friendly.