I hope 7.0's has a way to skip most of the current story

[Shougun]

But it's also ridiculous to argue that they have to invent a fully new entry point to get around this issue.

It would complicate any future references to the existing plot, confuse the timeline, make New Game Plus into a bizarre contradiction – if you start with the new entry point then go back to review these quests, did they happen to you or not?

It is phenomenally simpler to just keep the story continuous and let people join it at an updated entry point (for free) without any story concessions for the skip.

One free story skip to 7.0 and one free job skip to level 90 with the purchase of future expansions is all that is necessary to get people into the new story arc.

It's also ridiculous to throw someone into the deep end without anything to help ground them. Also no new entry has to generate some weird blip into the timeline that causes huge issues. If you do a side quest in the game that theoretically happened before an event you've already done we don't come crashing to a halt, particularly if that side quest isn't hyper generative (as in it doesn't get referenced itself too much, or at all- even if itself references a lot).

You're purposefully putting in road bumps that do not need to exist for such an idea. You can create a new entry that references the world, but isn't needed to be referenced /by/ the world in the future. Many games that do have alternate starts, at the beginning of the game, don't reference them for this very reason- the difference is not much at all. Just like with people making up rules on how we can't have SMN egi, beast tribe differences, Reaper impossible, or whatever, when it comes to lore it seems people often tie themselves up extremely unnecessarily and SE themselves frequently disagrees with this too.

(Though they do obviously also agree with people that story is a core part of FFXIV, I wont cherry pick what they think lol).

If SE made an alternate start that was paramount to understanding future content, and it was either optional or it wasn't even achievable content for current players, then that would be a bit silly. But like, how about you don't do that? "Why do you have an alternate start then?". So you can help stick people to the landing.... It's just like new seasons of TV shows will often either do literal recaps before the start or will act like you forgot a bunch of stuff.

The much worse decision here, imo, is to do what you suggest and just toss people into the deep end. Such a low quality solution for people who are concerned about 350 hours of story, when I believe the best solution is to get them invest as best you can in as short a time as possible before you put them near the content they wanted for the purpose of the skip. You could always strip all story from an 'alternate start', and it's just a skippable part of the potion that gives you some cool non-story tutorials if people are very afraid of a new what is essentially just a side quest.

Having profound story impacts, as you suggest, is entirely optional issue that should obviously not be done.

[Iscah]

It's also ridiculous to throw someone into the deep end without anything to help ground them.

It's not tossing them in the deep end to start them off at the beginning of Season 2. There would, hypothetically, be a new plot arc starting and the core concepts explained within the new section of plot that they begin from. At the same time, they would naturally pick up the basic personalities of the characters from interacting with them, and can choose to read deeper into their backstories through the Unending Codex if necessary.

If they want to get every scrap of story detail, they need to start from the start. Or they can choose to skip over it and start at a later point in the story, at the expense of missing some details. Catering to them shouldn't come at the expense of sacrificing the story structure for the long timers.

If you do a side quest in the game that theoretically happened before an event you've already done we don't come crashing to a halt, particularly if that side quest isn't hyper generative (as in it doesn't get referenced itself too much, or at all- even if itself references a lot).

The thing with those side quests is that they stay in that one piece of the timeline where they are set. At most you have multi-part narratives like Ivalice into Bozja, but their progression is gated by MSQ so you can't just follow the Bozja storyline disconnected from time also passing in the main story.

If you introduced a whole second thread of MSQ branching off from Heavensward, the world is stuck in Heavensward time frame. You can't reference anything from after it, can't call on the regular cast from Endwalker, have to wall it off as a fully separate plotline that will never cross. I just can't see it being worth the loss to the core experience of the game being one long-running narrative with a clear progression and timeline from one story to the next.

[Shougun]

It's not tossing them in the deep end to start them off at the beginning of Season 2. There would, hypothetically, be a new plot arc starting and the core concepts explained within the new section of plot that they begin from. At the same time, they would naturally pick up the basic personalities of the characters from interacting with them, and can choose to read deeper into their backstories through the Unending Codex if necessary.

If they want to get every scrap of story detail, they need to start from the start. Or they can choose to skip over it and start at a later point in the story, at the expense of missing some details. Catering to them shouldn't come at the expense of sacrificing the story structure for the long timers.




The thing with those side quests is that they stay in that one piece of the timeline where they are set. At most you have multi-part narratives like Ivalice into Bozja, but their progression is gated by MSQ so you can't just follow the Bozja storyline disconnected from time also passing in the main story.

If you introduced a whole second thread of MSQ branching off from Heavensward, the world is stuck in Heavensward time frame. You can't reference anything from after it, can't call on the regular cast from Endwalker, have to wall it off as a fully separate plotline that will never cross. I just can't see it being worth the loss to the core experience of the game being one long-running narrative with a clear progression and timeline from one story to the next.

For the first part, depending on where yeah- the story might help be eased in by design of the expansion. I was thinking more than just story though. For example having players in a moment of level 30, and then again at 50, then end at whatever they were ending up at like 70 or something. With mechanics, like markers, being taught in those opportunities. Giving players roots not just into the story but the game structure itself, so when they're released it's not like "uuh......... ..... I guess MSQ because I have no idea what these 500000 icons on my screen mean".

Introductions are, imo, important and story might be slid into via an expansion that is mindful of potential skips, yet there is a lot more than story that a good introduction contends with. So just skipping people forward fails on a lot of steps. Of course if people are able the best way to get the full experience would be to... Get the full experience lol. But we're not talking about people like that, as they are not the focus of such a design... Like talking about casuals when designing ultimate XD

For the second, I think we are picturing different styles. One example I gave was during the light warden story an alternate start might be a Cloud (FF7) mako inspired / fanfare experience with the WoL struggling at the very precipice of mind faltering destruction. You get a bunch of cool scenes and recaps, meet some characters that will be important and the way they're introduced set the stage, and then finish it off. None of this would require altering future content (and might never be referenced, all the content that existed would exist as it did- all planned references too).