A Storyteller’s Point of View on Final Fantasy XIV

[AngelCheese77]

(https://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Chasing_Shadows)

Right off the bat, we have a storytelling flaw. We ‘have proven ourselves a friend to Gridania’ through our tireless efforts. And we can now be trusted with sensitive intelligence.

I’ve just stood here, finishing one quest, and started this one.

We are told that we are good and important to Gridania, but we haven’t been shown to be so. ‘Show don’t Tell’ is a much-repeated rule in storytelling, and I think that here it matters. Instead of trusting we did help people (which in and of itself doesn’t prove we are trustworthy). We should be given minor tasks and missions where we show we can be trusted to do what we are told.

I get where you are coming from, but if we were made to do X amount of mundane tasks to prove ourselves .. I'm certain many players would quit before a few hours are up.

We get a cut scene that starts with some words I like the least in games like these. ‘Time is of the essence. Unless the mission is on a timer (few are) then time is not of the essence and the NPCs shouldn’t act like it is.

It's to give urgency to the narrative. Doing timers for quests in an MMO doesn't work, IMO. That and the anxiety. Ugh. Besides, some players might want to do other things, and being "forced" to do a quest with an arbitrary timer given kinda stinks. You lose the "sandbox" open feeling that way.

While one of the function of this quest is to get us to interact with an item. On a storytelling level, the problem with it is that there is no story here. We interact with the sword, people show up, including author inserts, there is a fight, basically the end. There is no need to ‘do’ anything story related.

We aren’t part of the story; the story happens around us.

You have figured out the main narrative of FF14. Because we are always "in the right place" when things happen. Remember, we are the chosen of Hydaelyn, the Mother Crystal of the Source (where we live). So things will happen around us, characters will be drawn to us, and we will be pulled into every problem (big or small) that happens.

Welcome to being a hero!

Here we have the first clear indication that we can speak, and yet, our dialog doesn’t show up.

Welcome to us being a silent protagonist as well!

My big problem with this quest is that it’s supposed to be something only I could do, but how could any guard fail to see a sword in a stump? In a story, events have to happen for a reason supported by the narrative. Nothing in the narrative support that I should be the one to resolve this issue. There was no subterfuge involved, no mysterious person to find. Just a sword in a stump anyone passing by could have seen. And guards have been passing by since they made a report about that area.

Remember in the cutscene that strange apparatus Papalymo wore over his face? It senses aether in the world. I believe that sword was covered in that aether and due to the placement of it and the stump, it was in an out-of-the-way area. Hence how only you three found it.