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

[CrownySuccubus]

I both agree and disagree with the "MSQ time is too precious to waste on mundane scenes" sentiment because, on the one hand...it's pretty clear that MSQs by design reject economical storytelling. They're designed to primarily waste your time with as much inanity and busywork as possible so that game time is stretched out for as many hours as feasible. There's a ton of segments that could and should have been cut down or cut out entirely.

On the other hand, I don't think the scenes in question are examples of that. If I were to cut down on MSQ fluff in 6.0, first on my list would be chasing Meteion over and over again in Elpis, wasting time in Yedlihmad, and looking for random people in Labyrinthos. I don't see the character segments in FFXIV as actually detrimental to the story in any significant sense, even though (and I can't repeat this enough) the jokes didn't land for me. I didn't find them particularly funny, but that's okay -- I personally don't have to find everything to my tastes. If I wished that everything I personally didn't care for got removed, we never would have had Return to Ivalice or the Bozja arcs. I've mentioned before that Matsuno's writing just really doesn't do it for me...but again, that's okay, because other people sing his praises and love the man's work.

[Theodric]

History has shown us that when the rot has become this bad then there is very little chance of the devs to fix it, doubly so if the income is still there. In hindsight I feel like I got bamboozled by buying the two encyclopedia eoreza books since the lore seems to change from expansion to expansion. At this point it feels like i'm playing WoW again and seeing everyone go "No, cata's story is actually pretty good!" while those that point out how cata is stretching the lore at best and flat out breaking it at worst are just "haters". XVI looks pretty good but it is a SE product so I do worry that half of the story will be broken up and sold as dlc and I do worry about what "online features" the game will come with, and let's not forget SE's ethics department. The worrying part is that I am playing less and less of XIV and more of my backlog but that backlog is starting to dry up. I need to expand my horizons, lol.

Yeah, in hindsight I regret purchasing the lore books. The WoW comparison is very apt since it, too, decided to make sweeping retcons to large swathes of the existing lore and characters in order to prop up something else. It's a delicate balancing act because introducing new stuff is fine but if it's coming at the expense of what came before it then it's going to lead to a lot of disillusionment.

FFXVI is supposedly going to be 'complete at launch' so I guess we'll see if that remains the case. As for my own backlog, I've still got a decent amount of things to get through - it's mostly a new, fresh MMO I want at this point though the intriguing options to me are at least a year or two out.

[Lustre]

I wonder where OP went. Maybe she found a good story elsewhere.

[YukikoKurosawa]

They're thankfully being designed in such a way as to not really appeal to the 'Second Life' and 'Twitter Enthusiasts' that this game has unfortunately come to attract in droves.

You might have said this part in half-jest, but browsing twitter lately I've seen a shocking number of peope who quite literally mod their characters to look exactly like Second Life character models. Don't even want to imagine what these people actually do ingame.

But this is what the devs see when they look at FF twitter. Mayhap it explains the increased amount of modern-style clothing glams being put onto the mog station of late. They've realized the audience they've attracted and are banking off of it.

[Raoabolic]

You might have said this part in half-jest, but browsing twitter lately I've seen a shocking number of peope who quite literally mod their characters to look exactly like Second Life character models. Don't even want to imagine what these people actually do ingame.

You don't want to know. All I have to say is Miss Triss was a mistake and each day we stray further and further from the crystal.

[Midareyukki]

I wonder where OP went. Maybe she found a good story elsewhere.

...or they became Meteion.

"I have scoured the cosmos for a better story. There is no good story anywhere. Everything is subjective. My whole life is a lie! I shall sing a song of how subjective things are, and those who listen will feel an overwhelming urge to say they disagree with my song because it too is subjective!"

[YukikoKurosawa]

Miss Triss

Whomst? Some mod creator or something?

[YukikoKurosawa]

...or they became Meteion.

"I have scoured the cosmos for a better story. There is no good story anywhere. Everything is subjective. My whole life is a lie! I shall sing a song of how subjective things are, and those who listen will feel an overwhelming urge to say they disagree with my song because it too is subjective!"

Maybe the quite lackluster story was the friends we made along the way.

[Midareyukki]

Maybe the quite lackluster story was the friends we made along the way.

*looks at the Scions and their "sacrifice" in Ultima Thule*

...you are eerily on the nose with this.

[Rulakir]

Thread Discord shill. :P

https://discord.gg/rhY7pJez

There's now a lobby area because we were having a lot of people join and never say anything, so if you want to be added to the main chat you need to introduce yourself and give some brief thoughts on the story (especially as we've gotten several thread lurkers who read but never post).

I know it's inconvenient, especially if you're socially shy, but we want to make sure people are joining for the right reasons.