Happy Alternatives

[Rueby]

During EW when the post MSQ gave me a stroke I actually went and played

• Baldur's Gate 3 - And get destroyed by Astarion romance
• Genshin and currently Wuthering Waves - Succumbed to gacha overlords out of boredom

I don't know if watching anime counts as stepping away from the game but I watched

• Claymore - I loved Teresa alot...if you know you know.
• Chainsaw man
• Solo Leveling
  

I've been trying to do the post EW msq, but everytime I try, I see immersion breaking bug or get a headache and I go play Wuthering Waves while hoping my favorite mmo would stop going nuclear on my retinas.

[Carolingian]

Lord of the Rings Online is honestly a really good alternative. It's older, obviously, but it's also an MMO that's focuses quite a bit on the story just like XIV.

[Sivante]

Right now I'm devoting nearly all my gaming time to FF14 because despite the complaints I have with some aspects of the expansion, I am overall having a very good time. But here are some of the games I played recently when I wasn't playing FF14:

Our lists actually have a lot of overlap. Power to the Fromsoft! I'll give Tunic a try.

[Sivante]

I don't know if watching anime counts as stepping away from the game but I watched
- Claymore
- Chainsaw man
- Solo Leveling

Loved all of these, manga of them all as well. Claymore was... Claymore was amazing but yeah, that was... that was rough.

[LynxDubh]

I’m so hyped for Monster Hunter Wilds. The new weapon gameplay teasers they’ve bern releasing have been so fun to comb through.

[Rueby]

Loved all of these, manga of them all as well. Claymore was... Claymore was amazing but yeah, that was... that was rough.

I read the manga and uh...Sad that the anime got discontinued tho...
Spoiler

Teresa was amazing and my favorite so it was painful to see what happened to her. I kinda am coming to accept everything I love ends up dying.

[Astrus]

As far as MMOs go my side games have always been Warframe and Guild Wars 2, though I'll have to check how compatible the new release format of the latter is with my habit of just dropping in to the game every six months or so and catching up on the content that released in the meantime.

Besides those I play a lot of co-op titles with all one of my good friends and enjoy bashing my head against all sorts of metroidvanias and puzzlers.
When the Grim Dawn expansion releases that will likely see me step away from FF for a while, too.

[Shinku_Tachi]

Currently, my alternate game is College Football 25. We haven't gotten a College Football game in 10 years, so I can't tell you how excited was for that.

It's great for when I want to step away from 14 for a bit, maintenance down time, and just when I wanna play something else.


I can also recommend Yakuza / Like a Dragon / Judgment, Persona, Shin Megami Tensei, 'Tales of' Series, The Legend of Heroes, Ys, Tokyo Xanadu

All great alternatives if you're feeling the need to take a break from 14

[Kacho_Nacho]

I play No Man's Sky occasionally.

[koko-on-da-forumz]

maybe.. but I never played FFXI before Idk if it is welcoming new players

The community is, the systems are not.

Well, the systems kind of are if you go into it with a 2002 mindset. If you go in expecting to shovel through waves of mobs single-handedly without any effort and understand every menu intuitively, you're going to have a bit of a bad time. That said, the XP boosts and trusts kind of turn it into that experience, difficulty-wise. The menus are still pretty archaic, though. Try playing on Horizon, it's wonderful.