FFXIV Dawntrail reviews are out on Metacritic

[RabendaShin]

Still sitting at an 80. IGN dropped an 8. I foresee it hitting 882 or 83 tops at this point. The lowest rated xpac.

And deserved imo. It was an xpac I finished in spite of its flaws.

I honestly don't trust media outlet reviews anymore. It is clear they are either biased/paid, or they do not have enough time on their hands to properly experience a game/expansion of this scope. Considering the latter, it does seem the journalists spent ample time playing the MSQ since the reviews are only coming out now.

Which makes me wonder - did we experience the same MSQ? I've found maybe only the last 5% of the MSQ worthwhile, namely the parts when we are not babysitting Wuk Lamat. Anything before that seems meaningless fluff we were forced into doing because G'raha pushed us to 'chase adventure'.
(In hindsight: What adventure? The adventue Estinien got to have without us?)

Meanwhile plenty of journalists shower praise upon Wuk Lamat, writing, and story beats we experience/suffer while cheering her on. However, going into any other space than Twitter I find players agreeing on the low quality of the MSQ writing, pace, and its voice acting, making me feel less disconnected from reality.

Sure, there's a confirmation bias, but right now I'd rather trust a passionate 0/10 user review than a soft 8/10 with only minor criticism about the pacing. It doesn't help I've been keeping an eye on the Metacritic ratings for the PC version, where it appears as if every two hours or so a 100 positive ratings get deleted and promptly added again.

[HighlanderClone]

I honestly don't trust media outlet reviews anymore. It is clear they are either biased/paid, or they do not have enough time on their hands to properly experience a game/expansion of this scope. Considering the latter, it does seem the journalists spent ample time playing the MSQ since the reviews are only coming out now.

Which makes me wonder - did we experience the same MSQ? I've found maybe only the last 5% of the MSQ worthwhile, namely the parts when we are not babysitting Wuk Lamat. Anything before that seems meaningless fluff we were forced into doing because G'raha pushed us to 'chase adventure'.
(In hindsight: What adventure? The adventue Estinien got to have without us?)

Meanwhile plenty of journalists shower praise upon Wuk Lamat, writing, and story beats we experience/suffer while cheering her on. However, going into any other space than Twitter I find players agreeing on the low quality of the MSQ writing, pace, and its voice acting, making me feel less disconnected from reality.

Sure, there's a confirmation bias, but right now I'd rather trust a passionate 0/10 user review than a soft 8/10 with only minor criticism about the pacing. It doesn't help I've been keeping an eye on the Metacritic ratings for the PC version, where it appears as if every two hours or so a 100 positive ratings get deleted and promptly added again.

It's not because the reviewers are paid or anything. It's because there's severe grade inflation in video games. A mediocre game in today's scoring system starts at 8.

They only reserve 6 and below for catastrophes.

[MatthiusAbysswalker]

WhErE's YoUr ViSiOn ItS tHe StArT oF a NeW eRa hur dur!

The whole it's a new arc argument I see online is redundant, when they keep rehashing the same story beats.We literally got Amaurot 3 with a repeat of Endsinger too.

[RabendaShin]

It's not because the reviewers are paid or anything. It's because there's severe grade inflation in video games. A mediocre game in today's scoring system starts at 8.

They only reserve 6 and below for catastrophes.

Which means the user rating choice between 'reasonable 6/10, not as good as usual but ok' and 'I'm giving a 0/10 just to show I don't agree with the grade inflation' becomes just that much simpler.

[Malthir]

Which means the choice between 'reasonable 6/10, not as good as usual but ok' and 'I'm giving a 0/10 just to show I don't agree with the grade inflation' becomes just that much simpler.

I had this issue when ff16 came out. People were giving it a 0/10 out of spite. Or a 8 even though they will admit it wasn't great but it doesn't crash or have that many issues,

IMO Rating should be treated as: (put in some examples)
0- Game doesn't work constantly crashes completely unplayable, these come along rarely
1-2 Game can be played but is very buggy lots of missing assets and glitches (The Gollum game)
3-4 Game is not good, there's many issues, bad design choices, story inconsistent/gameplay loop is bad in either design or implementation (FF16, 3-5 this section of rating is tricky it's the most subjective part)
5 Acceptable games ok, not amazing not bad just a decent game(FF16, 3-5 this section of rating is tricky it's the most subjective part)
6-7 Game is good, direction was good, Was a very fun game to play, I would play it again. (Monster Hunter rise)
8-9 Game is great absolute brilliant example of their genres (Witcher 3, Hades, Halo, Gears of War, God of War)
10 - Come along rarely, define genres and are truly outstanding, usually spawn a myriad of copy cats. (Eldenring - Personally I don't enjoy these games but can recognise their impact and success, BG3)

An RPG with a bad story, not personal taste bad but actually written to a poor standard, can't really score more than a 4-5. Imo

[Isala]

I had this issue when ff16 came out. People were giving it a 0/10 out of spite. Or a 8 even though they will admit it wasn't great but it doesn't crash or have that many issues,

IMO Rating should be treated as: (put in some examples)
0- Game doesn't work constantly crashes completely unplayable, these come along rarely
1-2 Game can be played but is very buggy lots of missing assets and glitches (The Gollum game)
3-4 Game is not good, there's many issues, bad design choices, story inconsistent/gameplay loop is bad in either design or implementation (FF16, 3-5 this section of rating is tricky it's the most subjective part)
5 Acceptable games ok, not amazing not bad just a decent game(FF16, 3-5 this section of rating is tricky it's the most subjective part)
6-7 Game is good, direction was good, Was a very fun game to play, I would play it again. (Monster Hunter rise)
8-9 Game is great absolute brilliant example of their genres (Witcher 3, Hades, Halo, Gears of War, God of War)
10 - Come along rarely, define genres and are truly outstanding, usually spawn a myriad of copy cats. (Eldenring - Personally I don't enjoy these games but can recognise their impact and success, BG3)

An RPG with a bad story, not personal taste bad but actually written to a poor standard, can't really score more than a 4-5. Imo

Your scale is pretty nice, but for me personally, a game instantly scores a 0 as soon as it causes me to stop playing due to how bad it is. Now, I'm not counting things like super hard games that make me quit out of frustration. I'm talking, I reach a point, where I literally cannot handle continuing, due to how absolutely miserable the experience is. And DT gave me three of those moments. I had to step away. Because I reached a point where continuing would have been a detriment to my mental health.

[Kaurhz]

You're never going to get a universal metric, as what people value in the game will differ from person-to-person, and the content they dabble in. Regardless of what kind of game it is.

Like for me personally, story I would give a 5 or 6, at best, and a 6 only if feeling really generous, and a 4.5 at worst.

However, the actual combat portion of the game I would rate much more highly. Dungeons and trials aren't difficult but they require paying a modicum of attention, and if you don't then you can very easily die, which is how it should be, as it puts the casual content at a much more healthy balance. Crafting and Gathering were the same, but crafting the Level 100 recipes offered a little more resistance than the previous ones at Level 80, and 90, which is a good indicator of things to come.

The dungeons and trials I would easily rate between a 7-9. This takes much more precedence over story for me, even as a casual player, as it is the content released with the expansion which will dominate the majority of my time. Story-wise, we have, what? 15-18 hours of story collectively left across 7.1-7.55, and the content will easily consume hundreds of hours potentially, so how that plays is much more important. Even levelling the classes alone through dungeons etc., will consume more than the collective story.

The graphics update I easily rate at 8, personally, and the zones as well. Getting used to my new character took a little time, but absolutely love her look at the moment.

So personally overall I would personally rate it as a 7-7.5-ish. Potentially higher if they manage to follow through with their promises in the long-term.

[RabendaShin]

So personally overall I would personally rate it as a 7-7.5-ish. Potentially higher if they manage to follow through with their promises in the long-term.

It is also increasingly hard to rate a game that has a developing story. What score would show the developer team you were unhappy with the story part of the content, but enjoyed the actual gameplay? A 7.5 does not send a message of 'please do better in the story department next patch/expansion' to me. The devs might feel chuffed that they got a passing grade while delivering a story of this caliber, and not course-correct.

I would also argue that the story at launch is far more important than story content added in patches. The MSQ (and quality) we got is now forever grafted onto the experience of playing FFXIV, a game often lauded for its story. You only get one chance for a first impression, and Dawntrail ruined my trust in the people behind its state of release.

[Swordsman]

Metascore and User Score updated. User Score appears to be leveling off at 6.5.

[WeebPolice]

Metascore and User Score updated. User Score appears to be leveling off at 6.5.

That's actually really close to where I would rate it, citizen. A silly and forgettable story deserves such a score.





Forge's glow watch over you.