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

[Tama-Kanzashi]

But that hadn't even happened yet, by that point in the story.

True, my bad, still doesn't mean it was appropriately placed. It was still just slapped in randomly.

[KizuyaKatogami]

As I've said elsewhere, Endwalker is the "Final Disc" of the FFXIV story. It's the "Hero's Return" portion of the tale where said heroes apply what they've learned into overcoming whatever the final adversary of the plot is. Sure, more dire stakes would have been cool, but it didn't make or break the arc. However, with that said, the reason the problem is so pronounced is because of the constant fake-outs. If you're not going to kill anyone in the main cast, then fine.....but stop trying to pretend that you might.



But that hadn't even happened yet, by that point in the story.

It doesnt matter if its the final disc. Noctis still dies in the final disc portion. So does Serah in 13-2. So does Gabranth in 12 etc. It's no excuse. Whats the excuse for no deaths or consequences in ShB then? Also....said heroes had to apply what theyve learned in this same expansion to defeat the end goal foe so im not sure any of that applies here whatsoever. Regardless, it doesnt change the fact that despite this expansion being advertised as dark and grim and scary, its filled with the most fluff and fanservice than any other expansion.

[CrownySuccubus]

It doesnt matter if its the final disc. Noctis still dies in the final disc portion. So does Serah in 13-2. So does Gabranth in 12 etc. It's no excuse.

FFXV is also infamous for its finale being extremely rushed and being largely incomplete without the DLC/novels to tie things together, with said tie-ins even making a case that Noctis's sacrifice was mostly wasteful.

FFXIII-2 is the second part of a story which not only kills NO ONE in it's ultimate finale a game later, literally brings every main character that did die back from the dead to punch God with the power of friendship.

Gabranth is a "Support character". His death has similar plot significance to that of Zenos, and he's even an "antagonist" that helps the protagonists in the final hour, much like Zenos.

Honestly, you would have made a better point arguing for Shadow at the end of FFVI or Vivi at the end of FFIX. But even then, we're talking about specific exceptions to the FF formula. I'm sure that you really enjoy those games where the heroes have to sacrifice themselves in the end or die, but not EVERY game needs to end that way. I don't care if a story is an unambiguous happy ending or not. Chrono Trigger and FFX are two of my favorite games ever, with two radically different types of endings, but I don't think either is worse for it.

[ReynTime]

To be fair, the story went sideways after the new writer took over during Stormblood. By the way, don't compare Xenogears with Mass Effect, that's just rude, lol.

*To xenogears.

They're not in the same level, I just think they're all way better written than XIV. And despite the ending ME is cohesive enough IMO.
Chrono Trigger has a different strength compared to those examples too, or even the numbered FF titles. It just handles the pacing masterfully and the fact they kept to their limits makes its relatively safe story wrap up very neatly in a way few games compare. It wasn't until Cross that they bit more than they could chew.

[KizuyaKatogami]

FFXV is also infamous for its finale being extremely rushed and being largely incomplete without the DLC/novels to tie things together, with said tie-ins even making a case that Noctis's sacrifice was mostly wasteful.

FFIII-2 is the second part of a story which, not only kills NO ONE in it's ultimate finale a game later, literally brings every main character that did die back from the dead to punch God with the power of friendship.

Gabranth is a "Support character". His death has similar plot significance to that of Zenos, and he's even an "antagonist" that helps the protagonists in the final hour, much like Zenos.

Honestly, you would have made a better point arguing for Shadow at the end of FFVI or Vivi at the end of FFIX. But even then, we're talking about specific exceptions to the FF formula. I'm sure that you really enjoy those games where the heroes have to sacrifice themselves in the end or die, but not EVERY game needs to end that way. I don't care if a story is an unambiguous happy ending or not. Chrono Trigger and FFX are two of my favorite games in the series, with two radically different types of endings, but I don't think either is worse for it.

I’m not saying every game needs to end that way. But when the writers and the devs are preaching how suffering and sacrifice is necessary, it comes across as a rather hollow sentiment when none of the main cast has to actually sacrifice or suffer from anything. Not to mention the amount of plot altering plot armor or plot holes that are created purely to keep these characters alive that ruins the flow of the story. How am i supposed to take certain antagonists or threats seriously if they can’t even land a scratch on the main cast? How am i supposed to feel invested if i know the heroes are always going to win? This was what was interesting back in ARR,HW and other ff games. Games like 7,9,10,12 etc that actually had lasting consequences for the heroes and where they actually had losses. This has been absent from 14 for a long time know and this isn’t some unknown thing, it’s incredibly prevalent.

15 being rushed doesn’t matter. Endwalker was rushed, doesn’t change much.

13-2 is still a game in itself, it still had a “final disc” portion that you want to preach about.

Gabranth was a pretty pivotal member of the main cast, considering he makes numerous appearances throughout the entire game. 6 or 9 aren’t exceptions to the ff formula. If we want to make a case for a formula it’s that a main character usually dies. This has been prevalent as early as ff2, and has since been a thing in ff4,ff5,ff6,ff7 and ongoing.

[CrownySuccubus]

I’m not saying every game needs to end that way. But when the writers and the devs are preaching how suffering and sacrifice is necessary, it comes across as a rather hollow sentiment when none of the main cast has to actually sacrifice or suffer from anything.

This again goes into that "finale" point I was talking about before. Estinien, Thancred, Urianger... even the WOL have all gone through hardships and lost people they care about. Alisaie lost a good friend on the First. I know you don't like G'raha, but even he's been through some stuff for over a century. Alphinaud and Y'shtola...I honestly can't remember, so you kinda got me there.

As I said, I don't particularly care that they didn't "suffer more" in Endwalker specifically.

How am i supposed to take certain antagonists or threats seriously if they can’t even land a scratch on the main cast? How am i supposed to feel invested if i know the heroes are always going to win?

I mean, the antagonists in question are Fandaniel, Meteion and Zenos. The prior two are preoccupied trying to kill pretty much everybody all at once and the latter is hyper-focused on killing one person, who is literally the player. I'm not exactly sure what kind of ending was being expected here.

Also ignoring the "plot armor" part. We've been over that ad nauseam, and I'm not getting into that again.

Games like 7,9,10,12 etc that actually had lasting consequences for the heroes and where they actually had losses. This has been absent from 14 for a long time know and this isn’t some unknown thing, it’s incredibly prevalent.

Again, the only way you can argue the characters haven't suffered "lasting consequences" is if you look at Endwalker completely on its own and divorced from the rest of the story. Again, I don't particularly disagree with the sentiment that the expansion was toothless on its own merits, but again....I don't see this as some absolute, objective failing of writing as you seem to be implying it is.

15 being rushed doesn’t matter. Endwalker was rushed, doesn’t change much.

Not sure what you're on about here.

13-2 is still a game in itself, it still had a “final disc” portion that you want to preach about.

FFXIII-2 ends on a literal cliffhanger which gets undone in the very next game. It being a "game in itself" is irrelevant, because Serah's "death" had zero impact.

Gabranth was a pretty pivotal member of the main cast, considering he makes numerous appearances throughout the entire game.

Sure. He was a pivotal support character.

6 or 9 aren’t exceptions to the ff formula. If we want to make a case for a formula it’s that a main character usually dies. This has been prevalent as early as ff2, and has since been a thing in ff4,ff5,ff6,ff7 and ongoing.

Again, the majority of these games have main characters die in the first or second acts of the story. Not the final act, which is what Endwalker is. Of the games you listed, the ones that count for that are FF6 FF9, and I think FF2....but it's been a while since I've played it.

At this point, I feel like we're going in circles.

[MikkoAkure]

I think we talked about character death in other FFs many pages ago and the fact remains that the one title you can directly compare FFXIV to by virtue of both being MMOs is FFXI and that doesn't exactly have NPCs dropping left and right.

Gabranth was a pretty pivotal member of the main cast, considering he makes numerous appearances throughout the entire game. 6 or 9 aren’t exceptions to the ff formula. If we want to make a case for a formula it’s that a main character usually dies. This has been prevalent as early as ff2, and has since been a thing in ff4,ff5,ff6,ff7 and ongoing.

You can't say Gabranth counts as a "main character" when he's an antagonist, is never playable, and kills Vaan's brother and Ashe's father in the first 15 minutes of the game. The closest we get to the deaths in the main cast are guest characters like Vossler and Reddas (comparable to Moenbryda and Papalymo) and the fake-out death with Fran and Balthier at the end.

None of 12's main, playable characters die.

If you're going to count Gabranth then at that point you may as well count Emet-Selch, Elidibus, Yotsuyu, and Zenos who are all villainous characters who have a change of heart before or after they die and/or help us before or after their deaths.

[aveyond-dreams]

I don't have the energy today to comment at length but it's tiresome seeing the same misunderstandings of people's arguments repeated over and over again. Anything to justify the continued presence of these characters on our screen no matter how little they are contributing to the narrative of the game.

[KizuyaKatogami]

This again goes into that "finale" point I was talking about before. Estinien, Thancred, Urianger... even the WOL have all gone through hardships and lost people they care about. Alisaie lost a good friend on the First. I know you don't like G'raha, but even he's been through some stuff for over a century. Alphinaud and Y'shtola...I honestly can't remember, so you kinda got me there.

As I said, I don't particularly care that they didn't "suffer more" in Endwalker specifically.



I mean, the antagonists in question are Fandaniel, Meteion and Zenos. The prior two are preoccupied trying to kill pretty much everybody all at once and the latter is hyper-focused on killing one person, who is literally the player. I'm not exactly sure what kind of ending was being expected here.

Also ignoring the "plot armor" part. We've been over that ad nauseam, and I'm not getting into that again.



Again, the only way you can argue the characters haven't suffered "lasting consequences" is if you look at Endwalker completely on its own and divorced from the rest of the story. Again, I don't particularly disagree with the sentiment that the expansion was toothless on its own merits, but again....I don't see this as some absolute, objective failing of writing as you seem to be implying it is.



Again, the majority of these games have main characters die in the first or second acts of the story. Not the final act, which is what Endwalker is. Of the games you listed, the ones that count for that are FF6 FF9, and I think FF2....but it's been a while since I've played it.

At this point, I feel like we're going in circles.

Again, look at ShB not just EW where again, the protagonists had 0 consequences despite going against the strongest foes they’ve ever faced and had nothing to show for it. Theyve had more losses from far weaker foes than literal unsundered ancients, yet somehow they triumph with not even a scratch. As for people going through things…Alisaie lost a friend whom we knew for about 5 minutes. Yshtola….lost nothing really. Same with Alphinaud. Urianger’s loss was 9-10 years ago(irl obviously), Graha slept through most of the 8UC but sure i guess we can say he struggled on the first even though i’m pretty sure the npcs say he mostly just stays cooped up in his tower 24/7. Either way, it’s pretty sad when minor npcs have to suffer more than the main cast who fight literal demigods.

As far as the 11 connection goes, while i haven’t played it i did see some comments on here a few days ago where while they might not kill people off left and right, you at least typically get new faces every expansion and not the same bland cast of characters like the scions so….

[Vyrerus]

Again, the majority of these games have main characters die in the first or second acts of the story. Not the final act, which is what Endwalker is. Of the games you listed, the ones that count for that are FF6 FF9, and I think FF2....but it's been a while since I've played it.

FFII kills Josef very early. Kills Scott, Gordon's brother very early. Kills Minwu rather late in one of the final dungeons, second or third to last. Kills Ricard Highwind when he sacrifices himself so that the party and Leon can escape Hell Emperor right before he raises Pandemonium.

FFV has Galuf die right as the final act starts, the final act being the optional tasks of collecting the 12 holy weapons/super spells etc.

FFVI kills Shadow in two different areas. At the end of Floating Continent if you don't wait for him, and then in Kefka's Tower he chooses to go down with the tower to try and repent for his past. It also kills General Leo right before Floating Continent, and kills Cid at the start of World of Ruin if you don't feed him enough of the healthy fish.

FFVII kills Aeris, what, mid way through? I'm not a big 7 fan.

FFX killed Tidus and Auron.

FFXI... it's been a long time, but... It kills Lion in RoZ, only to bring her back through some Crystal Line chicanery if you do all of CoP as well and then the RoZ CoP crossover mission, Apocalypse Nigh. In ToAU they killed some new side characters, and one of the main characters to the expansion. That would be Luzaf, the pirate king of Ephramad, though technically he escaped Hell to come back to try and get revenge on Aht Urhgan, so technically he was already dead/on borrowed time. WoTG killed more side people, some ancestors of NPCs you meet in the current time, and you have several missions dedicated to bringing Lilisette back to life after the first battle with the Spitewardens where her existence shatters due to idk, time paradox or something from her father being turned into a Spitewarden iirc. I don't recall any big deaths or side deaths in Seekers of Adoulin, but I will admit I've only played through it once, and even that was several years ago now. Rhapsodies of Vana'diel had some bad stuff happen that I don't recall fully, only done it once as well. Don't know anything about Voracious Resurgence. Haven't done any of it.

Anyway, it's not beyond Final Fantasy to kill characters in the final act. Endwalker's problem was trying to have its cake and eat it too. Oh boohoo, all the Scions sacrificed themselves. Oh wait, half way through those necessary sacrifices, the Cat Girl Awooga tells you point blank that you can just bring'em all back with the Azem Stone. Killing all emotional impact that could be had, if you were even inclined to think it was going to be permanent.