JP Official Forums are also criticizing the Dawntrail MSQ.

[PaleYonder]

Yeah, and ths degree of substantial negative feedback is a warning to the developers that at least parts of the customer base may not purchase the product anymore. A developer that wants to continue to sell should listen to that. This isn't one-sided entitlement; we want a good product for the money we spend or we won't spend the money anymore, and the developer wants our money. Who does it help if we just leave quietly instead of things being rescued and improved? Neither side.

There's also the fact that FF14 has spread a whole lot via word of mouth, people recommending it to others who may have been hesitant (Isn't that too anime? Isn't there too much content to get through till endgame? And so on), and those who gave it a chance being won over by the story. How often do you hear that? You had to coax people past ARR sometimes, and sometimes past Stormblood. Now you have this.
If someone is in it for the story, and dislike it so much this time around, can they seriously recommend the game anymore? In the past, I could say, "if you're not into the anime style or whatever, that's cool, but the story is really good", whereas now the most I could recommend to someone new is, expect to play till Endwalker, and then if you've got other stuff you enjoy, cool, but the story gets painful after that, and we don't know if this is just the way it's going to be now. So it may well be a finite experience.
That's the worst word-of-mouth for a game that used to rely on its story so much.

I also hardly think that this direction is some highly artistic choice that's essential to a writer's spirit as an auteur. It's all simply way too incompetent and unartistic for that. So they have no reason to keep going with this despite bleeding their customer base.

[Malthir]

Yeah, and ths degree of substantial negative feedback is a warning to the developers that at least parts of the customer base may not purchase the product anymore. A developer that wants to continue to sell should listen to that. This isn't one-sided entitlement; we want a good product for the money we spend or we won't spend the money anymore, and the developer wants our money. Who does it help if we just leave quietly instead of things being rescued and improved? Neither side.

There's also the fact that FF14 has spread a whole lot via word of mouth, people recommending it to others who may have been hesitant (Isn't that too anime? Isn't there too much content to get through till endgame? And so on), and those who gave it a chance being won over by the story. How often do you hear that? You had to coax people past ARR sometimes, and sometimes past Stormblood. Now you have this.
If someone is in it for the story, and dislike it so much this time around, can they seriously recommend the game anymore? In the past, I could say, "if you're not into the anime style or whatever, that's cool, but the story is really good", whereas now the most I could recommend to someone new is, expect to play till Endwalker, and then if you've got other stuff you enjoy, cool, but the story gets painful after that, and we don't know if this is just the way it's going to be now. So it may well be a finite experience.
That's the worst word-of-mouth for a game that used to rely on its story so much.

I also hardly think that this direction is some highly artistic choice that's essential to a writer's spirit as an auteur. It's all simply way too incompetent and unartistic for that. So they have no reason to keep going with this despite bleeding their customer base.

It's actually worse than that, this level of dislike over the whole of the MSQ of an expac is a massive barrier to entry as the MSQ is mandatory. Try getting in new players when they know they will have to slog through something that's being called terrible by the people that loved the game.

[PaleYonder]

It's actually worse than that, this level of dislike over the whole of the MSQ of an expac is a massive barrier to entry as the MSQ is mandatory. Try getting in new players when they know they will have to slog through something that's being called terrible by the people that loved the game.

That's a really good point, there's no skip right to endgame like in some games. So even the ones that don't care about the story and just want to raid etc have to do Dawntrail of all things.

[chizLemons]

It's actually worse than that, this level of dislike over the whole of the MSQ of an expac is a massive barrier to entry as the MSQ is mandatory. Try getting in new players when they know they will have to slog through something that's being called terrible by the people that loved the game.

Considering how Dawntrail is going, and that the biggest selling point of the game is still Shadowbringers + Endwalker, they can NEVER add ShB to the free trial. It's the only motivation to make new players pay for the game. And honestly, if things don't improve from how they are, even though I'd still recommend the game so they can go through ShB, I wouldn't waste my time convincing someone to stay for DT.

[RabendaShin]

It's actually worse than that, this level of dislike over the whole of the MSQ of an expac is a massive barrier to entry as the MSQ is mandatory. Try getting in new players when they know they will have to slog through something that's being called terrible by the people that loved the game.

And honestly, if things don't improve from how they are, even though I'd still recommend the game so they can go through ShB, I wouldn't waste my time convincing someone to stay for DT.

Here you have a game that has been recommended for the story, and the first thing you hear from fans is 'Yes, ARR is slow, but it's worth it! It gets better!'. They suffer through the slog, but it does get better despite ups and downs. It's worth it. Now imagine these players finally finishing Endwalker. They get to the post-MSQ quests, and make their way into the Dawntrail story. The sudden onset whiplash they would receive from the inexplicable drop in quality would be painful. They survived all the lows and enjoyed the highs, spent so many hours, and now they're back to being bored in what was advertised to be an exciting palate cleanser. I don't know how they would be able to trim Dawntrail's content down for future installments, but I won't be recommending this game without skipping Dawntrail until they do.