This story is really underwhelming - it's opened to mixed reviews.

[OdinelStarrei]

Actual spoilers below this.

Living Memory is just a long-form metaphor for FFXIV. We're all dead husks living in denial inside a theme park MMO with no substance. Because it's what we know. There is no taste to anything. It's my favorite area. And now it's grey. Like everything else.

Someone turn the terminals off. Release us.

[Vahlnir]

Honestly, I'm bored and I only just got to the point where I can finally leave Tuliyollal and head to my first zone. I'm hoping it picks up even just a little bit. The general premise isn't terrible, nor are the characters involved.

But...none of it has made me go



And that concerns me. I've never had an issue finding that moment with previous expansions. If they can't sell the story to players from the start, then it's going to be a rough ride.

[ForteNightshade]

After feeling like I've trudged along until somewhere in the 94 MSQ range, I'm more or less going to reiterate a similar sentiment that others have already. Almost the entire early portion of the MSQ, especially the 90 quest split is some of the most dull, uninspired and downright boring experience I've had playing this game in a decade. While there are small nuggets in those quests that I managed to enjoy, they were few and far between--to the point I legitimately dozed during the later part of the Pelu series. It's not even that I dislike them or the Hanu per se. Quite the contrary, I do like delving deeper their culture but every cut scenes seem needlessly verbose. Which isn't necessarily a new criticism with XIV's writing but I honestly can't recall a single expansion where it was this egregious. They all feel like glorified beast tribe quests instead of the beginning of a whole new MSQ arc.

It honestly felt as though I was sitting through a history lesson for the first several hours. If there was something, anything to break up that monotony, be it a different "tribe" of sorts that encountered more gameplay interaction or heck, surprise everyone by putting in two 91 dungeons (and scaling the quest EXP accordingly) just to give us something to do besides endlessly amounts of talking it'd do wonders to liven up that split.

Part of the problem is Wuk Lamat being such an insufferable character. On more then one occasion, I've asked myself why can't I defect to one of the other claimants who are all infinitely more interesting. Not only is she obnoxious but my god, they repeat so many "quirks" to the point I want to scream. Yes, Wuk has motion seasickness. I. GET. IT. You don't have to smack me over the head every other quest as though I've forgotten. Another example of this repetitive writing is a Hrothgar in the Hanu whose odd quirk gets repeated no less than four times throughout the series.

Perhaps what stands out the most though is how utterly irrelevant everyone else feels. Ask yourself if you replaced any one of these characters, including the WoL, with anyone else. Would it make a difference? Now before anyone jumps on about "this is like ARR!!" or whatnot. I'm completely fine with our character taking something of a backseat. There's a way to write that type of story and us still feel relevant though. Maybe if we weren't recruited into the Rites immediately but rather had to deal with each of the siblings ourselves before throwing our lot in with Wuk Lamat and mentoring her, it might work. However, the route they've chosen makes the WoL feel not like a new adventure in a new land but rather a tagalong in Wuk Lamat's story. We're the side NPC yet with less characterization; that random guard handing a missive to Hien rather than Hien himself.

And that makes for a very unengaging, and ultimately, boring "adventure." At least so far. I really want to believe it gets better in the second half.

[Turtledeluxe]

Despite their striking designs, I find myself so incredibly bored with the tribes. Thinking about Matsya vs anyone I've met so far, there's just no comparison. There's no comparison to the Matanga in general in Dawntrail.

[jameseoakes]

Despite their striking designs, I find myself so incredibly bored with the tribes. Thinking about Matsya vs anyone I've met so far, there's just no comparison. There's no comparison to the Matanga in general in Dawntrail.

The tribes from the start just feel so one dimentional

[Larom]

Despite their striking designs, I find myself so incredibly bored with the tribes. Thinking about Matsya vs anyone I've met so far, there's just no comparison. There's no comparison to the Matanga in general in Dawntrail.

I'd care more about Tural if they replaced all of it's citizens with just Matsya. As it stands I don't care about any of the new characters, the "Enigmatic" girl either.

[Katt_Felista]

It's a nintendo expansion.

Minor spoilers :

The 3 last dungeon are nintendo themed. (luigi's mansion, mariokart catcus road, Princess peach (alexandria)'s castle )

/ Minor spoilers
After 3 pretty grim / dark and adult themed expansions (Stormblood, shadowbringers, endwalker), i feel their plan is to catter more to younger generations.

They want to renew the userbase and the story has a very irritating naruto supergirl princess that want to be the hokage of her clan when she will be grown up and strong enough. She self insert at times when she's absolutely not of concern and off "topic" of a particular scene or area, she is said to leave us alone then reappears like a breach of the 4th wall to continuously give her immature / sometimes barely bearable 7 year old 2 cents about everything. We are just there to play chaperon for her and be on 2nd or third base while she just does and discover everything, we are just like an observer resolving the situation by proxy / procuration through her.

So it's clear that the expansion is 2fold strategy, to promoteFF9 remake, be a launchpad for whatever they planned with the anime with it and renewing possibly a playerbase from younger audience. Hence why the story is quite childish and insufferable for adults at most times.

[Garolymar]

Yeah, they're basically just retreads of peoples we've already interacted with but without any of the grit which makes Tural in general pretty boring. Two of them being recolors of other tribes also doesn't help. Honestly at times it feels like this expansion got hit with kiddy gloves, like an anime retouched by 4Kids.

[Raven2014]

The tribes from the start just feel so one dimentional

Because they're not real tribes, in any other expansion they will just be a random minor village/settlement on the map. They're only presented as a tribe here to serve as a simple facet for the rite.

[FlatLined]

I just finished the MSQ...My expectations for the story was low going in but oh boy...I'm personally ranking this the worst story yet...I just did not care anymore, even when I hit the second half where everyone said it picks up. I was just waiting for it to be over.