FFXIV has lost it's heart

[Daralii]

The new world (xak tural / yok tural) just feels kind of, solved? Like it speed runned through the discovery and development phases of a continent that has largely been cut off from much of the world because of natural hazards. Especially what with the dome and the "Okay, so in addition to fantasy South American and North America, we are going to do some time dilation 30 years into the future to introduce a cyberpunk society to a continent you barely got connected to".

Like I can only imagine what weirdness that Meracydia is going to be like if this is how the new world is. At most I am expecting one desert zone that is kind of what I imagine Meracydia to be like, such as the outback. Then a bunch of other zones that might or may not fit. Then with one endgame zone, the last zone of the msq, that is meant to be a rehash in some manner to Living Memory or Ultima Thule or Amaurot or Azys Lla. I can't imagine Meracydia being underdeveloped or cut off from the rest of the world.

I don't think there's any lore on Meracydia more recent than Allag's invasion.

[Chasingstars]

I don't think there's any lore on Meracydia more recent than Allag's invasion.

"Nearly the entire continent being rendered a wasteland. While some areas remain uninhabitable even today, those which have been repopulated remain recluse and very rarely welcome contact with the civilizations of the northern hemisphere, often times attacking any who approach, whether it be by sea or by air." The art associated with Meracydia from the partial quote I gave is a desert.

So my apologies, I mispoke, it is largely cut off, but because the locals are hostile. What this means on an expansion there could be anyones guess. Maybe Garlemald style where the locals are slow to warm up to you. But I can't imagine they would make it a whole expansion. Maybe as one of two continents you visit.

[Hallarem]

"Nearly the entire continent being rendered a wasteland. While some areas remain uninhabitable even today, those which have been repopulated remain recluse and very rarely welcome contact with the civilizations of the northern hemisphere, often times attacking any who approach, whether it be by sea or by air." The art associated with Meracydia from the partial quote I gave is a desert.

So my apologies, I mispoke, it is largely cut off, but because the locals are hostile. What this means on an expansion there could be anyones guess. Maybe Garlemald style where the locals are slow to warm up to you. But I can't imagine they would make it a whole expansion. Maybe as one of two continents you visit.

Thavnair was supposed to have slaves, corruption, nobles and pleasure barges, and all that jazz according to some lore items. But it was pretty much solved too and rounded off as a happy go lucky place with just a representative of the nation and a dragon behind it, aside from the apocalypse that lasted for.. half a day? I wouldn't expect much with this writing team, they are doing their best to cut out any nuance and destroy anything (including Garlemald) that would make us look at anything "problematic" or solving politics that they had courage to tackle head on with Heavensward and partially in Stormblood. Anything that isn't "Good vs bad" "Happy vs sad" seems to be hard for them now. I miss that scene where Varis stuck the heads of the Eorzean City States with some hard facts of their hypocricy, and Nanamo fired back at him.

You know what, hot take. But if they are so adamant in simplifying everything into an emotional simple soup of goop. They might as well make the next expansion a straight up love story between two characters in the MSQ. Mix in some politics into that, a bit of Romeo and Juliet, us in the middle of it as observers and solving adventurey stuff. Easy win.

[Absurdity]

Thavnair was supposed to have slaves, corruption, nobles and pleasure barges, and all that jazz according to some lore items. But it was pretty much solved too and rounded off as a happy go lucky place with just a representative of the nation and a dragon behind it, aside from the apocalypse that lasted for.. half a day? I wouldn't expect much with this writing team, they are doing their best to cut out any nuance and destroy anything (including Garlemald) that would make us look at anything "problematic" or solving politics that they had courage to tackle head on with Heavensward and partially in Stormblood. Anything that isn't "Good vs bad" "Happy vs sad" seems to be hard for them now. I miss that scene where Varis stuck the heads of the Eorzean City States with some hard facts of their hypocricy, and Nanamo fired back at him.

You know what, hot take. But if they are so adamant in simplifying everything into an emotional simple soup of goop. They might as well make the next expansion a straight up love story between two characters in the MSQ. Mix in some politics into that, a bit of Romeo and Juliet, us in the middle of it as observers and solving adventurey stuff. Easy win.

Nuance flat out died when we went from Shadowbringers' MSQ back to "Hydaelyn good, Zodiark bad".
But on top of that they did an any % speedrun to kill any and all mystery in the game as well. Everything has just been Ascians or Ancients all along, even the gods.

Dawntrail is simply continuing that atrocious trajectory. It's actually very reminiscent of Blizzard rushing through all their actually interesting lore every expansion until they had to scrape the bottom of the barrel with clown shows like the Shadowlands and the Jailer.

[Hallarem]

Nuance flat out died when we went from Shadowbringers' MSQ back to "Hydaelyn good, Zodiark bad".
But on top of that they did an any % speedrun to kill any and all mystery in the game as well. Everything has just been Ascians or Ancients all along, even the gods.

Dawntrail is simply continuing that atrocious trajectory. It's actually very reminiscent of Blizzard rushing through all their actually interesting lore every expansion until they had to scrape the bottom of the barrel with clown shows like the Shadowlands and the Jailer.

Elune is a robot, oh yeah, I know the feeling well. The afterlife, what about beeeehind the afterlife?
Every curtain doesn't need to be opened.

But it's a very japanese rpg thing to kill all gods and remove all mysticism. I absolutely despise this trope, but it is what it is. It leaves fantasy worlds devoid of fantasy and mystery. Destroying your imagination or any theorycrafting.

[Chasingstars]

Thavnair was supposed to have slaves, corruption, nobles and pleasure barges, and all that jazz according to some lore items. But it was pretty much solved too and rounded off as a happy go lucky place with just a representative of the nation and a dragon behind it, aside from the apocalypse that lasted for.. half a day? I wouldn't expect much with this writing team, they are doing their best to cut out any nuance and destroy anything (including Garlemald) that would make us look at anything "problematic" or solving politics that they had courage to tackle head on with Heavensward and partially in Stormblood. Anything that isn't "Good vs bad" "Happy vs sad" seems to be hard for them now. I miss that scene where Varis stuck the heads of the Eorzean City States with some hard facts of their hypocricy, and Nanamo fired back at him.

You know what, hot take. But if they are so adamant in simplifying everything into an emotional simple soup of goop. They might as well make the next expansion a straight up love story between two characters in the MSQ. Mix in some politics into that, a bit of Romeo and Juliet, us in the middle of it as observers and solving adventurey stuff. Easy win.

Yeah, something has changed within the writing team. As much about prior expansions, like shadowbringers and before, was how dysfunctional things were, how there was just an abundance of corruption and suffering, from the elite to those barely getting by on the streets. Like with dawntrail my assumptions based on the teaser stuff was there would be a lot of disputes between tradition and progress, of natives and foreigners, of ceruleum being strip mined by eorezan mining companies (as demonstrated in the blue mage quests). Instead, no, there is hardly any disputes, at most "Those dang trains are too loud and the rnnoek keep getting on the tracks", and both are solved with relative ease. The closet this gets is like a side questline with a pelu who gets scammed by a ul'dah lala, and the lala later apologizes. And like a side quest of how an old guy sold some Shaaloani land for less than it was worth like 20 years ago, but the descendant of the old guy is doing fine as a money loaner.

That it almost feels saccharine sweet with how clean the morality of the Tural societies are. The most morally bankrupt it gets is like over in Solution 9 and Heritage Found, but that is like "You mean the cultish society that likes to memory police people to prevent them from remembering dead loved ones, performs inhumane experiments, and also collects and abuses other's souls for personal survival is...evil? Nah, really?" Its like finding out Sauron and his orcs are the bad guys. Like what gave it away?

[Hallarem]

Yeah, something has changed within the writing team. As much about prior expansions, like shadowbringers and before, was how dysfunctional things were, how there was just an abundance of corruption and suffering, from the elite to those barely getting by on the streets. Like with dawntrail my assumptions based on the teaser stuff was there would be a lot of disputes between tradition and progress, of natives and foreigners, of ceruleum being strip mined by eorezan mining companies (as demonstrated in the blue mage quests). Instead, no, there is hardly any disputes, at most "Those dang trains are too loud and the rnnoek keep getting on the tracks", and both are solved with relative ease. The closet this gets is like a side questline with a pelu who gets scammed by a ul'dah lala, and the lala later apologizes. And like a side quest of how an old guy sold some Shaaloani land for less than it was worth like 20 years ago, but the descendant of the old guy is doing fine as a money loaner.

That it almost feels saccharine sweet with how clean the morality of the Tural societies are. The most morally bankrupt it gets is like over in Solution 9 and Heritage Found, but that is like "You mean the cultish society that likes to memory police people to prevent them from remembering dead loved ones, performs inhumane experiments, and also collects and abuses other's souls for personal survival is...evil? Nah, really?" Its like finding out Sauron and his orcs are the bad guys. Like what gave it away?

Eorzea and everything is just being washed squeaky clean. I didn't play 1.0 but I hear a lot of stuff including the horrid things the elementals did to people, like turning them into wildlings was washed away. I think the mining guild in Ul'dah was a bordello too? Aaand lo and behold, rubber bullets and happiness, and people casting aside ages of conflict because they like tacos.

[Daralii]

Eorzea and everything is just being washed squeaky clean. I didn't play 1.0 but I hear a lot of stuff including the horrid things the elementals did to people, like turning them into wildlings was washed away. I think the mining guild in Ul'dah was a bordello too? Aaand lo and behold, rubber bullets and happiness, and people casting aside ages of conflict because they like tacos.

The miner's guild dancers were touched on very briefly in some dialogue where the current guildmaster established that she used to be one.

[Dikatis]

Thavnair was supposed to have slaves, corruption, nobles and pleasure barges, and all that jazz according to some lore items. But it was pretty much solved too and rounded off as a happy go lucky place with just a representative of the nation and a dragon behind it, aside from the apocalypse that lasted for.. half a day?

Source on the slaves, corruption, nobles and pleasure barges? I remember absolutely nothing like that aside from the one jerk in the Hildibrand quests.

[Hallarem]

Source on the slaves, corruption, nobles and pleasure barges? I remember absolutely nothing like that aside from the one jerk in the Hildibrand quests.

Ahldskyf: “I would have the ship’s cook bake some bread using La Noscean flour and offer it as a gift to the ruling houses of Radz-at-Han, telling each house that the others had found its flavor to far surpass that of bread made from Ul'dahn sunset wheat. The nobles would have no choice but to agree, of course, and, not wishing to be outshone by their peers, demand that their kitchens also stock La Noscean flour.”

Ahldskyf: “The nobles of Radz-at-Han are obsessive about their odor. I suppose it comes from living in a land that is subject to the incessant beating of the sun’s harsh rays. The sweltering days and muggy nights leave nearly everyone on the island drenched in a perpetual patina of malodorous wetness. To cope, they spend absurd amounts of coin on all manner of fragrances and perfumes - and as luck would have it, one of the most prized is scented with none other than Althyk lavender! You see, my friend, the plant is very rare, with most wild varieties nigh on impossible to find in even the most fertile corners of Eorzea, let alone an isolated rock in the middle of the sea!”

Humble Servant: “Master sent you to find me? Yes, I suppose I was running a bit late. Please, do spare me the lash. I’m still raw from Master’s last bout of rage. I meant to make my way to the artisan’s shop to pick up Master’s order, but lost my way. Begging your pardon, I am newly come to this place, and have never known such city streets. Surely one so traveled as yourself has no such problems. No doubt the lash awaits me upon my return, but I fear the deed hopeless for me.”

Near Eastern Merchant: “I heard all from my useless servant. Thank you for your help in this. I confess, I know not which I am more eager to see─my servant put to the lash, or my new paper lantern hung aboard my pleasure barge. By the gods, this is a work of art if ever I have seen one. Just as I asked, it is a perfect blend of my own delicate tastes and a faraway exoticism. Servant! What of the job I put to you?”

Humble Servant: “If Master refers to the figureheard carving for her pleasure barge, then all is proceeding smoothly, save for just one small thing. The shipwright is a man of great pride. I fear he insists the special request Master made will require a sum more gil than originally anticipated.”

There's plenty of talk of alchemy houses, nobles.