What is going on with Square Enix and the 14 team?

[Theodric]

The biggest issue with streamers is that they primarily seek to make money off of whatever it is they are playing at the time. The vast majority will predictably put out a video with a thumbnail showing their shocked reaction to something complete with a title that reeks of bait. Some of them are better than others when it comes to providing feedback but it just isn't as authentic to me as someone who has no financial incentive to hold back when it comes to pointing out the perks or flaws of a game. Furthermore, a vocal portion of the FFXIV community is notorious for harassing streamers to react the 'right' way. Some received death threats for not praising the game at every turn. Others were insulted for liking or disliking the 'wrong' characters or accused of 'sUpPorTiNg GeNoCiDe' for sympathising with the Ascians.

So, yeah, I take anything streamers have to say with a hefty pinch of salt. Especially when it's of benefit to any business leaning on them to keep them appeased and with plenty of perks/free merchandise in exchange for positive promotion of the game/products being sold in relation to it.

End of Dragons? It's great. It actually got me to reinstall GW2 and play with my friends. There's just nothing to do in FFXIV right now and Endwalker having been such a big deal as an expansion invalidates the excuse of "well it's normal!". But should it be? Why is that okay? Why do I have to go to an entirely different game made by a different company to have a solid fill of an MMO and only come on FFXIV for the occasional fight and mostly just doing Second Life stuff? This is not what I signed up for all those years ago.

Also Yoshi's comment of "Take a break and play other games" doesn't hold on a sub-based game that punishes you if you have a house. Even GW2, incidentally, silently says this better because, well, no sub. You're always welcome back and only pay for the expansions you play.

Eugh, I feel like a shill, but this is what it's come to.

I might check it out at some point. I tried GW2 back when it first launched and enjoyed playing my Mesmer. He's off gathering dust somewhere but I didn't hate the game or anything - I just ended up falling in love with FFXIV back in the days of ARR and HW.

As someone lucky enough to own a house, that is definitely not in alignment with the advice to just go and play other games. I very much do, but I still need to log on every now and then in order to keep my house because if I lose it, I'm unlikely to get another. Especially not another mansion.As for combat related content, it did annoy me that the dungeon was the only bit of combat in the MSQ's this time around. The Scions have overstayed their welcome for me so I was looking forward to a genuine fresh start and life as an adventurer - but now we're right back to doing favours and errands for the Scions. Exploring a treasure vault and not seeing a single bit of treasure in the process is also pretty weird to me.

I'm easy to please. In many games I'll just pick a direction and run to see what's there - and if even half the effort put into the 'slice of life' elements was channelled into giving me reasons to interact with the game world in the same way as how other MMO's handle it then I'd be very happy.