Quote Originally Posted by duckorz View Post
I've been wondering lately if there was a rewrite fairly late into development
Interesting theory. A lot of the issues with EW also arise because of having to condense two xpacs into one.

I don't know why people keep praising FF14 for being so story-focused or that it's an "RPGMMO" when it's so clear that the story has to constantly bend over backwards for its gameplay and MMO formula (Sol 9 as a hub as you mentioned, the necessity of having 3 party members + WoL, the necessity of needing 7 party members + WoL for trials, the necessity of pacing the story so that there's a dungeon every odd level... so on and so forth).

If a rewrite occurred at some point I think it also speaks to just how rigid the formula is (with the release schedule, patch cycle, gameplay systems etc.) that they have to butcher their story just so it can work with the release cycle and gameplay systems.

Honestly I am so tired of FF14's formula and it isn't just the story. If they keep going on this formulaic route the entire game is going to wither slowly.