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

[Rulakir]

As much as I like that idea, I think it's clear the 'powers that be' weren't interested in an evil or even antagonistic Hydaelyn. I've said before, I thought she'd be presented similarly to Emet. Sympathetic motivations, but ultimately someone we had to stop. I still believe that it was Ishikawa's intention to present her as actually morally grey, especially as by action and deed she is unquestionably an antagonist to the extent of being compared to Emet (and Hermes), but likely had to rewrite it (hence the copious gaslighting) to appease others. Interviews from ShB would also hint at this being the case with Yoshi-P saying that we hadn't heard Hydaelyn's side of the story yet.

Venat remaining a 'good guy' would've meant either her memories were also erased or (as I've also mentioned before) going the Greek tragedy route where by attempting to avert the future, or 'prophecy', the WoL describes she ends up inadvertently causing it. It's one of the few ways I've thought of where she'd remain a likeable and tragic character. As it is, during her infamous cutscene, when she says, "All is excruciating pain. I breathe fire and torment." All I can think is, "Good, it's the least you deserve."

I think Venat having an opposing ideology, which was essentially the case, would've worked out fine. It's unfortunate that my character still canonically speaks of her in "fond" or "friendly" terms, depending on language translation, even if I choose that she wasn't justified or I believed someone other than her was. I suppose I begrudgingly have to accept it the same way Emet haters were forced to watch their characters reach out for him in anguish after Ktisis. It would just be nice if the MSQ itself (and the codex) acknowledged it and it wasn't tucked away in a side quest locked behind 'old' content.

At this point, I'm most concerned about the short stories. I've been giving Hydaelyn's summoners the benefit of the doubt that they didn't know the truth of the future or Venat's intentions. I think having 12 other people on board with genocide with no guarantee of success is just going to further tarnish their image as essentially a civilization of people on the edge all too willing to wipe each other out for conflicting mindsets, which aside from the two extremists we're introduced to doesn't appear to be the case at all. In fact, even the Watcher's dialog in the Omega quest chain would suggest Venat was so resolved in her convictions he couldn't change her mind if he wanted.

Most of us here were already unhappy with the messaging surrounding the Ancients in EW without the writers making it even worse. Having spoken with several in this thread (join the discord if you haven't :P), many of us have one foot out the door depending on how they're handled going forward.

[Misplaced_Marbles]

"everyone's mother."

This reminds me, she calls the sundered her children much in the same way the pixies call the leafmen their children. The fact is that they are their victims while she and the pixies are simply detached from reality.

[aveyond-dreams]

I do enjoy the shades of gray in that regard, especially in that not every Garlean is the same. More of that would be fun to work with. But arriving in Garlemald and trying to figure out how to not kill the poor, poor tempered Garlean soldiers that would happily fight us to the death even if they weren't tempered? They were laying on the concepts of 'if you kill your enemy you're as bad as them' a little too thick. Sometimes I'd rather the people in the story be a little more emotional and human than just... the good guys. I think that's the biggest issue with FFXIV's story as a whole though, especially in Endwalker. The protagonist has no emotional agency (or agency in general) and everyone acts like robots that have a fleeting emotion and then are immediately over it, regardless of what's happening.

In this regard, I believe Estinien’s character could’ve been put to better use because I specifically recall him having no qualms about eliminating the immediate threat in front of him. I think he was stopped from doing this or scolded by Y’shtola from doing so, which was frustrating. He is a soldier. Let him act like one. Leave the mercy for characters who are more suited to that sort of thing.

Or better yet, have an argument about whether or not someone should be spared. In Dragon Age, your allies will argue for and against sparing other characters and that includes other party members depending on how shady their origins are. Instead we got Alphinaud and Alisae making an enormous mess of things not 30 minutes after they arrive because they fundamentally didn’t understand how to manage the situation.

Admittedly, I would have preferred for some citizens of Garlemald to survive the conflict that engulfed the capitol but I wonder about the other ways that they could have managed this. FFXV comes to mind, with a far larger imperial capitol that was largely void of any remaining human life. The mission wasn't, "let's save whoever we can" (this task fell to other characters and DLC that was never released), the mission was navigate this place, survive, and get the thing you came here for. I know it's a stretch to compare the Gralea segment in that game to something like Resident Evil but it's about as close as you can get in Final Fantasy to that.

We got a Garlemald zone whose goal was to humanize, not to necessarily show off all the creepiness and dark underbelly of the city like how people understandably may have wanted. The weapons storyline does do some of this, but it's simply not the same as the dark treck through Zegnautus Keep or the discovery of the clones in Episode Prompto, only to watch them disperse into miasma not long after. They are both dark segments, but the sense of tension is higher in FFXV's case compared to Endwalker's Garlemald.

When imagining what kind of zones a Garlemald expansion may have had, I picture the following:

1. A former territory in a warmer climate where "magic vs magitek" is put on center stage. A fallen kingdom like Dalmasca for example, and all the associated political storylines. Anima and the tempering is introduced somewhere around here.

2. Those of us who have played FFXII and FFXIII may remember several enormous airships where significant portions of the plot took place. Some as huge as Sky Fortress Bahamut, what about a zone where there are several of these large airships that you work through in order to reach the largest in the centre? Basically the Sea of Clouds/the Churning Mists, except instead of islands you have the ships.

3. Think about the carnival from NieR Automata or Nautilus from FFXIII. The empire’s “resort” area, possibly the end result of their occupation of Locus Amoenus, where we could see a display of festivities and decadence. Something like the holographic parade from FFXIII that depicted the War of Transgression, as an effective way of delivering imperial propaganda. Magitek battles against such a backdrop would prove interesting, and adds some much needed color to a nation that many players believe is just black and red.

4. A “battlefield” and when I say this I don’t mean a bland, boring design like Bozja with just trenches and burning wreckage. Bloodstained mountains and geography on par with Coerthas – all while the city lights loom in the distance. For added dramatic effect, perhaps a neighbouring beast tribe may summon a giant primal that fell in battle nearby, making it a landmark of the region.

5. The outer capitol, where a segment similar to Endwalker’s Garlemald segment would have played out. People try to help the Garleans to varying results, as the mystery of Anima and the tempering reaches very high tension.

6. The innermost segment of the capitol where the imperial palace stands. Instead of the Tower of Babil being a structure that it was built and twisted into, it could have simply referred to the highest spire of the building like in the case of Syrcus Tower being the tallest part of the Crystal Tower. The final showdown and reveal of Anima, etc.

[Jagick]

In this regard, I believe Estinien’s character could’ve been put to better use because I specifically recall him having no qualms about eliminating the immediate threat in front of him. I think he was stopped from doing this or scolded by Y’shtola from doing so, which was frustrating. He is a soldier. Let him act like one. Leave the mercy for characters who are more suited to that sort of thing.

Or better yet, have an argument about whether or not someone should be spared. In Dragon Age, your allies will argue for and against sparing other characters and that includes other party members depending on how shady their origins are. Instead we got Alphinaud and Alisae making an enormous mess of things not 30 minutes after they arrive because they fundamentally didn’t understand how to manage the situation.


*Snip for brevity*

So many good ideas here and I'm sad we basically just got Diet-Coerthas. I'm also frustrated that we keep allowing Alphinaud and Alisaie (especially Alphinaud) to be in charge of absolutely anything. I get that they're beloved characters by many but how many screw ups is too many for these literal children?

Alphinaud in particular has been making massive mistakes that impact every single person around him over and over again since A Realm Reborn. The same story beat with him trying to do this grand, good thing and taking the lead in doing so is used time and time again with the same result: He screws up and everyone suffers immensely. People talk about his character growth and yes, him realizing his flaws and mistakes is definitely growth but what does it matter when he continues to be an arrogant, ignorant, and self-certain fool that makes the same mistakes due to his own hubris time and time again? His sister is similar, but a little more bullheaded.

I'm probably complaining too much, but I just wish the writing in this game didn't cheesy anime-trope away everything bad that happens or prevent the characters from acting or reacting like actual human beings. Unconditional forgiveness, pacifism and benevolence to an objective fault, and the power of love and friendship overcomes all. Just get so tired of being told the same exact story over and over in this game, even if there are some absolutely GEMS spread throughout.

Addendum: And now three Garlean refugees are seriously wounded and two (including a child) are now dead as a direct result of the actions these two took. This is also of course after the writing requires the WoL to be an absolute ignoramus and not be even remotely suspicious about the voice coming from the building all these people just inhabited while buying the obvious lie that it's an animal that somehow got inside in the few minutes we've been standing at the only entrance. Anyway, these people go from calling us savages to our faces to abruptly seeming to trust us and the twins IMMEDIATELY lower their guard. Not only that, but Alisaie immediately abandons Alphinaud to look after all of them (three of them) alone to follow me across the ice fields just because she is apparently good at carrying barrels. This leads to, as anyone with a braincell could have guessed, the garlean civilians who do not trust us attempting to jump and kill Alphinaud while the ones under direct supervision flee into the wilderness from the foreign invaders and die as a result while the others are severely injured, put to sleep, and then hidden in an unheated building while we return to camp?

Seriously. Who wrote this and thought it was good? And why the absolute KUPO are we letting these children do anything other than stay home and help Tataru with chores and basic logistics? I have not been this frustrated about bad writing and a lack of agency since a realm reborn. It's difficult to be emotionally invested when the tragedy and trauma is dependent upon the incompetence of characters who should otherwise be smarter than this by now, even more so when you're forced to go along with and accept this terrible decisions and story beats when an alternative or the correct course of action is clear to anyone of sane mind. I'd even accept a dialogue option to tell these characters off or at least disagree with them even if we still have to go along with everything anyway. Catharsis. Please.

[Theodric]

I would have liked the nuance for Garlemald that was present for Nilfgaard in The Witcher 3. It'd be rather wonderful to have visited a province of Garlemald in Ilsabard that proved to be as prosperous and as beautiful as Toussaint:



I'd like more grit and genuine intrigue in general and less effete 'we must all be fwends and let bygones be bygones' on both sides of any given conflict.

[Jagick]

I would have liked the nuance for Garlemald that was present for Nilfgaard in The Witcher 3. It'd be rather wonderful to have visited a province of Garlemald in Ilsabard that proved to be as prosperous and as beautiful as Toussaint:



I'd like more grit and genuine intrigue in general and less effete 'we must all be fwends and let bygones be bygones' on both sides of any given conflict.

So much this.

[CrownySuccubus]

Ok, and what's your goal in doing so? Quickly.

"Goal"? I need a goal to state an opinion now?

How about you? What's your goal here?

----

In regards to Garlemald, they had five expansions to introduce some nuance to Garlemald other than "well, some of them AREN'T racist monsters", but that's pretty much the direction they went to the very end. I was hoping that the Stormblood expacs leading into Shadowbringers would add more nuance to Varis (and thus, the Empire), but we basically just got "I want to cause rejoinings because something-something one true race". I honestly would've saw trying to cram all that into 6.0 or later as a cop-out.

[Theodric]

I think there's a big difference between stating an opinion and subtly or not so subtly attempting to stifle topics of discussion altogether.

[CrownySuccubus]

I think there's a big difference between stating an opinion and subtly or not so subtly attempting to stifle topics of discussion altogether.

Which one is your post right here doing, I wonder?

See, that's the problem with this "gatekeeping" argument. Bringing up a topic of discussion does not mean that people can't have an opinion ON an opinion. If someone in here right now came in this thread, and said, "I didn't like Endwalker because it didn't have Captain America in it", they would rightly be called out for it. Having a rant thread isn't a declaration that every single rant is equally valid or reasonable.

I just happen to find this constant vitriol about burgers to fall into the "unreasonable" area, and will continue to say as much unless something changes my mind.

[aveyond-dreams]

I just happen to find this constant vitriol about burgers to fall into the "unreasonable" area, and will continue to say as much unless something changes my mind.

When we can go a whole patch with no slice of life nonsense or cringeworthy fanservice in the MSQ then I will calm down on the issue. Till then? I will absolutely speak out against what I feel is off-topic and damaging to the game's story. It has veered too far from what I came here for, and belittling that fact doesn't make me feel any less betrayed or upset by what I'm seeing in game.