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

[KageTokage]

People are still dismissing this as a troll thread just because of the topic title, so I'd like to think most of those tags were left by those who didn't even read past the first page and are making foolish assumptions.

I find it commendable when some at least try to offer thoughtful counterarguments to some of the complaints voiced in here instead of just going "No, you're wrong", without bothering to explain why.

[aveyond-dreams]

Sort of, yeah. Seifer from FFVIII, Jecht from FFX, Basch from FFXII, Reeve and Rufus from FFVII are good examples of what I like. I don't know how to explain it but there's something very 'off' to me about a lot of character models in this game. Some border heavily on uncanny valley territory. Maybe the upcoming texture update will change that though.

The male characters who have been pushed into the spotlight in this game recently have been visually unimpressive for the most part, or otherwise too young and boyish looking to accurately portray their ages. Thancred is supposed to be in his 30s yet he has a face that looks like a 17 year old. G’raha Tia has the most offputting of the available miqote faces and only stands to look even stranger when the graphics update comes around in 7.0. Then there’s the case of Estinien, who fulfils the niche in the party of being the “high elf warrior” or whatever else that archetype can be called – only for him to have his hair tied up in a stupid looking ponytail because of how aggressively averse this game is to clipping while failing to accommodate long hair with sensible solutions like giving him a new armor set instead.

Hien was a character who had an excellent visual design and didn't come with the personality and mannerism issues associated with the likes of G'raha Tia, but like Aymeric he is held hostage by writers who refuse to let the city state leaders do anything. This combined with no new main party members confirmed so far leads to a male cast that is utterly lackluster. The only males allowed to take up any spotlight have to either be teenagers or look like them, no gruff and tough looking characters like Gaius are allowed on stage for any prolonged period of time despite him being the obvious choice to take on a trip to Garlemald. The culmination of all this is a cast that is overtly tilted away from traditional "heroic" looking men and those who they insist fulfill that role like Thancred or Estinien have been gutted by both their current writing and visual design.

Other Final Fantasy games do not have this issue so pronounced except for FFV, in which 3 of the 4 remaining party members are female. Most of the time the cast is balanced in such a way that there is a good mix of youthful and older, more masculine figures. FFXII had Vaan, Balthier, and Basch. FFXV had Noctis, Prompto, Ignis, and Gladiolus. Something for everyone, yet in FFXIV it feels like we've been cheated out of having that and the writers continue to rub it in people's faces the more they push nonsense scenes with the likes of G'raha or further dampening down Estinien's personality.

- for better or worse, it at least appears that FFXVI will pivot away from this trend with that game's story now confirmed to last not only from Clive's teen years to his early 20s, but also well into his 30s putting him in the same age range as Jack Garland. A limited AI controlled party was also confirmed and it will be interesting to see if those party members grow up alongside Clive like how FFXV's party members did. A recent tweet from Ishikawa that roughly translates to her only knowing the same information of FFXVI as the general public has been taken by many to suggest that she is not involved at all with FFXVI's writing, and Yoship recently reaffirming that this game will appeal to those of us who enjoyed the story of Heavensward.

The problem for FFXIV however is why we can't have Heavensward return here? After literally going to the edge of the universe and promises to reground the story at the start of Season 2, so many potential plot threads were sloppily ended and for now at least we appear to still be stuck with the same cast. It's impossible to know which writers are responsible for what issues have appeared in recent patches, all I know is that too many things went wrong in quick succession. The only saving grace in recent memory was the Omega questline which offered the player some agency, even if it was quite limited. Given the direction the writing for this game seems to be going in, following in WoW's footsteps in veering into further and further absurd situations, combined with a mix of other gameplay and content issues no wonder people are concerned for what surprises await us in 6.2.

[CrownySuccubus]

Other Final Fantasy games do not have this issue so pronounced except for FFV, in which 3 of the 4 remaining party members are female. Most of the time the cast is balanced in such a way that there is a good mix of youthful and older, more masculine figures. FFXII had Vaan, Balthier, and Basch. FFXV had Noctis, Prompto, Ignis, and Gladiolus. Something for everyone, yet in FFXIV it feels like we've been cheated out of having that and the writers continue to rub it in people's faces the more they push nonsense scenes with the likes of G'raha or further dampening down Estinien's personality.

I'm 100% on board of having more body types to work with, especially if it goes both ways and we start seeing more "amazon" ladies like female Roe, more female "beasts" like Kimahri or the Hrothgar, or (dare I say it) huskier body types like FF8's Ward. However, I do need to question the idea that the bishounen saturation was not prominent in older titles.

Pretty male protagonists has been the standard in the series since the beginning. Yoshitaka Amano's signature art style is all about making the central characters look as effeminately beautiful as possible. The default Warrior of Light template from the very first game is literally what Elidibus transforms into in 5.3.

Likewise our protagonists in FFII (with one exception).



FFIII, and FFIV, etc, etc..



I could keep going, but I think the point is clear. (FF4 had Yang, Tellah and Cid, but they definitely get a lot more downplayed compared to the main cast.) Tetsuya Nomura isn't much better, either. Cloud Strife was, after all, pretty enough to not just pass for a woman...but be considered more beautiful than his actual female companions. The benefit of Nomura's work is that he does, at least, diversify his male character roster, as with the aforementioned Ward, in addition to Barret, Setzer, Snow, Wakka, and half of the FFXV cast.

[aveyond-dreams]

I'm 100% on board of having more body types to work with, especially if it goes both ways and we start seeing more "amazon" ladies like female Roe, more female "beasts" like Kimahri or the Hrothgar, or (dare I say it) huskier body types like FF8's Ward. However, I do need to question the idea that the bishounen saturation was not prominent in older titles.

Pretty male protagonists has been the standard in the series since the beginning. Yoshitaka Amano's signature art style is all about making the central characters look as effeminately beautiful as possible. The default Warrior of Light template from the very first game is literally what Elidibus transforms into in 5.3.

There's a huge gap between pretty male protagonists (Aymeric, Estinien, Elidibus) who lean more towards the Amano style heroes and...whatever it is G'raha and Thancred are supposed to be. Overly animated catboys or colorless blobs of indistinguishable features. In my eyes, they are too different from each other to fit the same category. There's no otherwordly or beautiful look to them, they just look dated and off putting. One of the main reasons why I was so blown away by male Viera when they launched is because I could finally have a hero with the Amano/"high elf" type of look, which is as important as having some muscle in the party. Elezen do not fulfill this for a huge swathe of the playerbase for a number of factors, all boiling down to them just being too far removed from what people want in an elf race.

The pretty boys of older titles also were just nowhere near as annoying. Bartz and Locke were funny (I vaguely to this day remember some argument that Bartz had with Ghido the turtle and Locke saying something about the price is right), Cecil going from Dark Knight to Paladin was one of the coolest things I'd ever seen in a video game when I first played FFIV, and so on. Also, if you play those titles in their gameboy or pixel remaster versions then it's not really the same visual saturation since it's just pixel sprites at that point. When it comes to later titles, FFVII's most effeminate male is Cloud as you say but it's balanced out well enough by Barret, Vincent, and Cid.

Overall, the earlier titles just did a better job characterizing the male protagonists. Their looks were varied, but their personalities weren't as bad or stagnant as the current state of the cast. It does look like FFXVI will turn this trend around after the game passes the point where Clive's teen years end, I just wish we could get a similar character here in FFXIV. Let him be unfiltered, unapologetic, and defiant like Estinien used to be. Have them clash with each other and reignite the same kind of rivalry Cecil and Kain had between them. Just no more stoic nodding and "scholar types" please.

[RyuDragnier]

Bishounen has always been prevalent in FF, that comes with the territory. Look at any of the FF games and the sketches, and you will see bishounen everywhere. Complaining about it is kind of silly considering that, but I do agree a bit more variety would be nice. It's why I've been pleasantly surprised by NPCs they've thrown our way from time to time that have been outside of the norm. Kind of hoping the next main "party member" we get next expansion isn't effeminate, and lasts for more than just that expansion. I'd kill for a non-human tribe member to hang out with for a few expansions. Maybe an actual lizardman, to spice things up.

[CrownySuccubus]

There's a huge gap between pretty male protagonists (Aymeric, Estinien, Elidibus) who lean more towards the Amano style heroes and...whatever it is G'raha and Thancred are supposed to be. Overly animated catboys or colorless blobs of indistinguishable features. In my eyes, they are too different from each other to fit the same category. There's no otherwordly or beautiful look to them, they just look dated and off putting.

"Blobs of indistinguishable features" is certainly how you can describe pretty much every FF main character prior to PS1 hardware. If it weren't for Amano's artwork, or some sort of accessory, you'd have no way of telling Bartz apart from Fighter. Hell, even with Amano's art, Firion from FFII has the same face as the original WOL, Cecil, Edge, Bartz, Locke, and Zidane.

But again, we're talking about your personal preferences here, which don't apply across the overall playerbase. What design is more intriguing to who is purely based on personal or mass appeal.

The pretty boys of older titles also were just nowhere near as annoying. Bartz and Locke were funny (I vaguely to this day remember some argument that Bartz had with Ghido the turtle and Locke saying something about the price is right), Cecil going from Dark Knight to Paladin was one of the coolest things I'd ever seen in a video game when I first played FFIV, and so on.

This really has nothing to do with their designs and, again, comes down to what you personally find appealing, which still varies by mileage.

Overall, the earlier titles just did a better job characterizing the male protagonists. Their looks were varied, but their personalities weren't as bad or stagnant as the current state of the cast.

Agree to disagree. Like I said, no matter if you were talking about Amano's character designs or character sprites, there was definitely a sameness to most of the old protagonists that forced the older games to rely on gaudy accessories and/or different hair colors to make them seem different. Likewise, I don't think I need to keep repeating the whole thing about personal preferences regarding personality.

[Theodric]

I'd rather not see the male side of character design be held hostage by aesthetics that are more common in games made before some of us were even born. I daresay that they were arguably pushed hard back then as a direct consequence of not being able to make use of advanced designs given how limited video game design was back then in general.

More variety would be nice, sure, though hopefully such would not come at the cost of good looking male characters.

I never cared much for Amano's style, personally. If anything, when it comes to FFXIV the character models are held back by questionable design decisions such as the lack of eyebrows for Highlander men - a trait which, mysteriously, the women don't share!

I'm hoping that when the character models are upgraded I'll finally be able to use revamped Highlander men to design a tall, classically handsome beefy male character with no 'weird' additions such as a horn or a tail.

[CrownySuccubus]

I'm hoping that when the character models are upgraded I'll finally be able to use revamped Highlander men to design a tall, classically handsome beefy male character with no 'weird' additions such as a horn or a tail.

Sure. Variety is always good. But "classically handsome" means different things in different parts of the world, cultures and eras, and has not simply had one single standard of acceptance.

[Rulakir]

My type are tall, skinny, pale guys. Were it not for the fact I don't find most male Elezen attractive I'd be living the dream in FFXIV.

Also, latest plug for the thread discord. :P https://discord.gg/htS5TTP2

[MoofiaBossVal]

I don't hate Thancred's face. I think it's okay. I do wish that there was more visual variety among the main cast, ie throw in more rougher faces like Varis or Gosetsu or Gaius or Raubahn.