Are we destroying "our own" game?

[chizLemons]

Who are you talking to? I loved the DT MSQ.

Furthermore, no, when it comes to MSQ they shouldn't care, there's no way to please what everyone's looking for in an msq. Scientifically msq will always be "mixed reviews" with only the outliers being "mostly positive." The only type of feedback they should care about is what occupies 80% of the game's playtime, which is battle content, housing, and the other miscellaneous content types. Those types of content is what keeps your customers subbed. MSQ-only enjoyers are not long term subscribers. They'll always buy your initial expansion no matter what since they're story lovers. Yes, they might resub for 1 month 6 months later, but is that really your bread and butter subscriber as a company? I'd say no. If you're a msq enjoyer but you also stay subbed for other content then you prove my point that the devs shouldn't care about msq feedback and focus more on battle content/other type of content feedback which are more crucial/high priority.

You "loved the MSQ", yet you say the only content that MATTERS is everything else. So, no, I don't think you CARE about the MSQ. If you did, you would know how valuable feedback is, and would be able to at least understand where it comes from.

[Rekh]

You "loved the MSQ", yet you say the only content that MATTERS is everything else. So, no, I don't think you CARE about the MSQ. If you did, you would know how valuable feedback is, and would be able to at least understand where it comes from.

I sincerely hope you understand that no story whether in a book, movie, or video game will appeal to everyone, right? The main difference in xiv is that it's an mmo and by its nature mmos don't ride out a story between content patches. You can't msq your away from july 23, 2024 until whenever 7.1 comes out which is most likely late this year. If this was a single player game like FFXVI then railing against the msq/story and giving feedback on it would be valuable, but in an mmo you will always get mixed reviews when it comes to that, specially the bigger the mmo becomes.

square enix knows what will hold dawntrail together will be all content outside of msq, as it's an mmo at the end of the day.

There's a reason that a lot of those threads are getting heavily dissenting voices. Historically a lot of people have ignored the forums as it's something of an archaic method of communication in modern society, kind of a relic of bygone times. However, Shadowbringers and Endwalker brought a bunch of changes that most people never wanted or asked for, and eventually SE stated that they are focusing on the forums for feedback. There are some very loud individuals with some really awful takes claiming to represent the community at large. All the conflict you are seeing is largely just because the player base is sick and tired of being misrepresented by the people claiming to 'represent the casual community' with their anecdotal experiences and individual preferences. There are many people that are enjoying the content of the game, it's just hard to see that because there's also a battle going on against the people that would squander all the good that has come out of this expansion. Essentially we are no longer letting people get away with sabotaging the game.

Great points; and I have to agree; it takes a nuanced and objective approach to really tackle Endwalker, the issues with it and the release of Dawntrail as its own product and the separation between content types and how they measure up.