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

[Teraq]

Which is precisely why I am rather firmly opposed to subtle or not so subtle attempts to ridicule or portray posters as 'bad people' for liking or arguing in favour of the 'wrong' characters in a fictional setting. That some people are unable to separate fiction from reality is, quite frankly, not my concern. Someone immersing themselves in a fictional story and rooting for the 'bad guys' is not in any way a statement in support of such events happening in the real world.

It's perfectly possible to say 'I don't like this character or faction' without drawing bizarre conclusions about those who do. Which is precisely why I'm not petty enough to go around declaring that if someone likes Venat then that means that they support genocide in the real world.

I literally cannot believe we still have to say this again, again and again in the year of Our Lord Zodiark 2022.

The type of characters I enjoy in fiction does not align with who I am in real life. I have loved villains since I was a little girl. That's just how it is. I cannot stand conflict in real life. I have been removed from my job for being overwhelmed by my own empathy. (Funny that, by the way... there's this dude in Endwalker......)

Speaking of conflict!

I'm convinced at this point there's a vested interest in seeing this thread crash and burn, especially as efforts to derail it have increased in both intensity and frequency since the Zepla mention. I've had people message me to say they felt 'run off' so, you know, good job. This was supposed to be a bastion of catharsis for those who didn't enjoy the EW MSQ and instead it's turned into dozens of pages of pettiness that's not going to result in any meaningful change in story direction, which is at least what I wanted.

Not that I expect my speaking on it (again) will change anything since it didn't before but, yeah, it's very much not appreciated.

It’s almost like an insidious plot to fill as many pages as they can with trolling and infighting in order to make that the entire thread’s image when people read through the recent pages. I’m no conspiracy theorist so I’m mostly joking, but it’s certainly going to look that way upon first impression if things keep going the way they are.

The poster in question had a couple decent posts, then quickly descended into thread troll argue-for-arguing-sake mode while being a twitter first-reply-guy to certain posters she has a grudge against, use of the ignore list and not responding is recommended.

I also recommend the bolded part. Please. The derail efforts have very obviously been conducted by a single person, and nothing good has come out of it for the last sixty pages save for Theodric's post quoted above.

It's useful to be able to distinguish - from both a writing and a reacting position - pointing out something Weird about what someone is writing/saying, versus applying that as a judgment to that person's personal character. I can point out that Endwalker's writing Did A Genocide Apologism, Using Classic Apologism Techniques, and that is Really Not Okay, without that meaning I actually think Yoshida and company are literally pro-genocide. There's no way to absolutely know that - but I don't have to know that to think the disingenuous way they went about communicating the story and uplifting a single character felt gross and harmful. Similarly, I think most of this thread can agree we can point out that a lot of the rhetoric used to defend Venat's actions align very closely with abuse apologism, but don't think that means we're specifically pointing the finger at anyone for Literally Being An Abuse Apologist. But using the rhetoric still sucks and is worth calling out.

Fully agreed, but Ishikawa's "Was what Hermes did wrong, or was it the first step for humanity?" does not exactly fill me with confidence. I suppose you could say phrasing it as a question allows for the benefit of doubt... but I'm never getting over entertaining the thought of Was the Joker the first step for Gotham City? on a planetary scale.

The answer to that should plainly be No, but then it was pushed in-game by Omega outright (disregarding 6.0's not-too-subtle othering of the Ancients to make them suitably genocidable). I cope by telling myself it's Insane Troll Logic coming straight from the speakers of an extraterrestrial war machine whose society revolved around warfare and conquest.


Going off on a tangent here, I am still baffled, nearly 7 months after the fact, that people who loved Shadowbringers would love Endwalker even more. Particularly people who love Ancients and/or Ascians. I simply cannot compute this. I wish I could say Endwalker merely disappointed me in a way I could shrug off, but I viscerally hate the fact that it's actively made Shadowbringers worse with its inane plot, stupid reveals (lmao the unsundering), memory wipes-unwipes pulled straight out of a desperate writer's lower digestive tract, and presenting itself wrapped with a pretty little bow and the premise of "finale of the Hydaelyn and Zodiark arc!" only to come up short at literally everything involving the Zodiark side of things and either not answer questions or answer them in the dumbest way.

The more I look back on it, the more I believe Shadowbringers's nuance and morally grey conflict were simply a fluke. Perfectly unintended stroke of brilliance. They gave me a premise and an antagonist cast I loved by sheer accident.

Just thinking about how Endwalker tainted my favorite character moment in the entire game, the Seat of Sacrifice intermission, with its ridiculous retroactive plot almost makes me physically sick. I guess I have to applaud the feat.