Can 7.0 focus on a storyline without the philosophizing

**IkaraGreydancer** · 07-11-2023 03:01 AM

Originally Posted by TheDecay

The "what happens" and "why" really aren't that big of a problem. Hermes being Amon is a cool concept in my humble opinion.

It's the writing that's the problem, and we really don't quite need more "the power of friendship" or inane fanservice/anime-style "slice of life" moments in the writing.

These concepts themselves are not the problem. Slice of life is actually important to a story, for example by demonstrating how Thavnairians are recovering from the Final Days. Slice of life such as having Zero looking at Estinien's abs is not.

Sure there should be a balance there in terms of how SoL is handled but is 10 secs of ab staring really a point to make about it being used badly? It was there then it wasn't in a blink. Not every single scene in a game needs to to be important to the overarching story. Sometimes characters just have fun. FF games have always been this way.

Power of friendship didn't beat, Ultima Weapon, Niddhogg, Emet or Zenos. That theme was only heavy against Endsinger and that made sense. Now do we need that again going forward? No. Odds are it won't happen for awhile to that degree. Saying we don't need fanseevice in xiv is also odd, because XIV is literally fanservice incarnate. It's an integral part of the game for better or worse. XIV has never been some super dark edgy game that's super serious all the time. Many claim ARR and HW were but replying these will show you that's not the case. The cast was just smaller.

**Deo14** · 07-11-2023 03:23 AM

Originally Posted by IkaraGreydancer

Sure there should be a balance there in terms of how SoL is handled but is 10 secs of ab staring really a point to make about it being used badly? It was there then it wasn't in a blink. Not every single scene in a game needs to to be important to the overarching story. Sometimes characters just have fun. FF games have always been this way.

If the rest of the story wasn't lacking, it would be fine. But what happened in patch really? We went on a 357th mission to get some aether, now with a dash of penguin genocide. Then we rode a dragon to another shard, just to fight Golbez, where we won, but actually didn't. End of a patch.

SoL is fine, but not when it's clear that it's there only as a filler. This is not a slice of life anime, this is supposed to be fantasy story, adding this kind of stuff should be done with low priority, you need to have decent story first. It really just comes of as an attempt to distract players from poor story.

**IkaraGreydancer** · 07-11-2023 03:43 AM

Originally Posted by Deo14

If the rest of the story wasn't lacking, it would be fine. But what happened in patch really? We went on a 357th mission to get some aether, now with a dash of penguin genocide. Then we rode a dragon to another shard, just to fight Golbez, where we won, but actually didn't. End of a patch.

SoL is fine, but not when it's clear that it's there only as a filler. This is not a slice of life anime, this is supposed to be fantasy story, adding this kind of stuff should be done with low priority, you need to have decent story first. It really just comes of as an attempt to distract players from poor story.

Is that really all that happened? I guess we gloss over more of Golbez' and Zeros back story. The alliance Garl now has that will allow them to rebuild their nation without compromising themselves. The creation of Zeromus? Like you can't purposely leave very key story beats out to make a point, that doesn't breed a fair discussion especially with the point you're making.

How can one of the shortest scenes in the patch be filler? And even if it was that little segment lasted no time so why is that even a point? Last I checked Fantasy can incorporate anything, slice of life included. You say it should be done with low priority but it was factually the shortest part of the patch...if you honestly think this scene is there to "cover up" a poor story that makes little sense. If that were the case wouldn't it be far longer? "Hey guys we have a 3 hour story segment we'd like you guys to play but we're gonna stick a 30 second scene in to cover up how bad the other 2 hours and 59 minutes are". Come on now...

And the story being good, bad, decent etc is purely just opinion.

**Deo14** · 07-11-2023 05:29 AM

Originally Posted by IkaraGreydancer

Is that really all that happened? I guess we gloss over more of Golbez' and Zeros back story. The alliance Garl now has that will allow them to rebuild their nation without compromising themselves. The creation of Zeromus? Like you can't purposely leave very key story beats out to make a point, that doesn't breed a fair discussion especially with the point you're making.

How can one of the shortest scenes in the patch be filler? And even if it was that little segment lasted no time so why is that even a point? Last I checked Fantasy can incorporate anything, slice of life included. You say it should be done with low priority but it was factually the shortest part of the patch...if you honestly think this scene is there to "cover up" a poor story that makes little sense. If that were the case wouldn't it be far longer? "Hey guys we have a 3 hour story segment we'd like you guys to play but we're gonna stick a 30 second scene in to cover up how bad the other 2 hours and 59 minutes are". Come on now...

And the story being good, bad, decent etc is purely just opinion.

After reading Decay's/Gauis' reply, I realized that I completely forgot that we also did some stuff in Garlemald. That's on me, I start to fall asleep whenever anything related to Garlemald and/or politics comes in a story. Creation of Zeromus? Cool I guess, no clue who that is, supposedly someone that players who played 30 years old game are hyped about. Sorry I left key story beats, but I unironically forgot we did some stuff in Garlemald, and I don't even know who this Zeromus is, from my POV, it's just another potential boss.

Just because something is short, doesn't mean that it cannot be filler. We already had that Radz-at-Han restaurant scene (filler #1), which certainly wasn't just 10 seconds, Estinien scene (filler #2), everything surrounding Aetherfont (filler #3), which took 30+ minutes, where only relevant info was that letter foreshadowing, then it was some Garlemald stuff, which I don't want to rate, because I understand some people don't mind or even like it. After all of that, we finally got to the Golbez stuff, where we got blue balled.

I certainly don't claim they intentionally made that Estinien scene to cover up poor story, but it certainly worked like that - all the Estinien fangirls/fanboys were hyped about that scene specifically, which made it feel like some cheap fanservice.

For me personally, whole patch felt like 3/4 filler, and rest was very mid. Up to a point where I started to believe that whole storyline was originally meant as EW's trial storyline

**OdinelStarrei** · 07-11-2023 05:53 AM

Originally Posted by Deo14

After reading Decay's/Gauis' reply, I realized that I completely forgot that we also did some stuff in Garlemald. That's on me, I start to fall asleep whenever anything related to Garlemald and/or politics comes in a story. Creation of Zeromus? Cool I guess, no clue who that is, supposedly someone that players who played 30 years old game are hyped about. Sorry I left key story beats, but I unironically forgot we did some stuff in Garlemald, and I don't even know who this Zeromus is, from my POV, it's just another potential boss.

Just because something is short, doesn't mean that it cannot be filler. We already had that Radz-at-Han restaurant scene (filler #1), which certainly wasn't just 10 seconds, Estinien scene (filler #2), everything surrounding Aetherfont (filler #3), which took 30+ minutes, where only relevant info was that letter foreshadowing, then it was some Garlemald stuff, which I don't want to rate, because I understand some people don't mind or even like it. After all of that, we finally got to the Golbez stuff, where we got blue balled.

I certainly don't claim they intentionally made that Estinien scene to cover up poor story, but it certainly worked like that - all the Estinien fangirls/fanboys were hyped about that scene specifically, which made it feel like some cheap fanservice.

For me personally, whole patch felt like 3/4 filler, and rest was very mid. Up to a point where I started to believe that whole storyline was originally meant as EW's trial storyline

What's the deal with Zeromus and the 13th's moon? Theoretically, considering the environs it is summoned in, I sorta understand why it's a threat, but the entire backing of Zeromus and I suppose this 6.X series has given me quite a bit of pause. I've already pretty much written off the Source as having any kind of engaging storylines for the duration of post-expansion considering nothing I'm interested in is being approached except for the Void (and it's associated history/lore) and other shards. But based on what I've pulled from the encyclopedia's, there's nothing that even references something or someone like Zeromus (either in it's "hero of eld" or the potential "god voidsent" that he currently is". Probably unrankable in the pantheon outside "the new biggest strongest threat". The only thing I could have gotten from echo flashbacks this patch is potentially Original Golbez being the 13th's shard of Azem, but that's...not confirmed, or even possible to, I think, since we can't actually talk to old or new Golbez. Actually, side note, what's the deal with Voidwalker in Eden? I'd sure like to be able to tell Golbez that we have experience in this sort of thing and while the crimes of imprisoning Azdaja are hard to overlook, we have agents on the First also trying to "break the wheel" so to speak. That single void questline there was more interesting to me than almost three patches of whatever this is. I'm not exactly sure why I can't get on board with the Void as I could the First, since the Void has been around for way longer, and is more linked to many main plot events and characters who I actually like sans Zero, but it somehow feels like it's not getting the depth it deserves? Or it's not going in the direction I wanted (less character building, more world building).

Where is the Watcher? Where are those stupid rabbits, and pretty much all of the infrastructure that was required for the Moonship? Did Golbez kill all of them and destroy everything up there? Was the savior ship only meant for people on the Source and the shards were just, totally abandoned if Meteion showed up?

Is this another example of how the Eight Umbral Calamity timeline is like, super screwed now, since no one knows about anything Golbez is doing, and no matter what Midgardsomr does in that permutation of the plot, it can't functionally matter?

EDIT: How did Golbez even get to the moon or know anything was up there? I guess Azdaja could've been "forced" to fly up there, but...why?

**AwesomeJr44** · 07-11-2023 07:03 AM