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

[aveyond-dreams]

Did you miss the part where Y'shtola had a magical girl anime sequence and the fact that each patch we are regularly pushed into pseudocrush scenes with G'raha Tia against our will, much like in the style of early visual novel games from the 2000s where that is how they introduce the romance options? Right up there with games like Date Warp and Spirited Heart Deluxe.

The animation budget was blown on putting Estinien's boot on a balcony and somehow Endwalker launched without us getting to see the fight between Hydaelyn and Zodiark. For an expansion set against the backdrop of the literal end of the world, there should have been far more fighting and action sequences than there were. And with 6.1 being the start of a new story, we should have had something a lot better than Y'shtola nearly turning into Sailor Moon.

Meanwhile, us battle content players are desperate to have some long-lasting, repeatable content with good rewards. Cutting deep dungeon from Shadowbringers was the miscalculation of the century overshadowed only by the re-introduction of genderlocked races. Bozja learned from most of Eureka's mistakes and I had lots of fun with it, but it came too late and is ridden with bottleneck duties that I just don't have the time to hunt down parties for so I can push through it on my alts. Our classes are also in crisis mode now since if they are capable of removing an ability like Kaiten then it feels like nothing is actually safe. Except Black Mage, probably.