Dawntrail’s Narrative Missteps: Why Natsuko Ishikawa’s Touch Is Sorely Missed

[Jeeqbit]

The pacing was inconsistent

To me the pacing was alright. We simply went through each zone and spent a reasonable amount of time in each. Actually felt less tedious to me than prior expansions up until the ceremony (half-way point).

The sudden completion of it and Wuk Lamat becoming Dawnservant so suddenly, half-way through, was quite shocking. I did think she didn't really need to come along with us after that, but I can also see how she was a central character of the expansion so they wanted her there all the way through it. I think the overall idea was it would change it from merely Wuk Lamat vs Zoraal Ja to Nation Leader vs Nation Leader which is a "bigger" kind of fight, and their goal is to create a "big" larger-than-life fight like that always.

The actual pacing of the zones after that felt good. To me personally, it was more about the aesthetic not appealing to me much.

If you mean in terms of battles, the one thing I will say is that even I noticed the lack of a battle on the train. That part really sticks out as a missed opportunity for a battle more than anywhere else.

The other thing I can agree with people on is they over-explained things. When I got to Yyasulani and talked to Alisaie I was immediately thinking "I get it, time has accelerated by decades here similar to on The First", then I had to painfully watch the NPCs figure this out very slowly and not always voice cutscenes.

the stakes felt low

They were as high as always because they were going to steal our souls to power the endless, threatening everyone across the shards. It's just that to the Warrior of Light, this is not high stakes, it's just "another day at work".

character arcs lacked the emotional weight we’ve come to expect.

There were arcs that felt alright like Gulool Ja Ja or Krile, but it was bizarre with how suddenly Bakool Ja Ja did a wrestling face turn out of the blue. That happens in wrestling not usually in proper stories. That one did actually have emotional weight, it was just an overly sudden 180.

It makes me wonder if this is due to Natsuko Ishikawa’s absence from a lead writing role.

They have different people write different stories but Yoshi-P is obviously heavily involved in it. For example, it was his idea to kill sin eaters to restore literal darkness (night sky) to the First. I forget exactly, but I think initially Eden was going to be the last boss (since it was the root cause of the flood) and making it more about the actual night sky probably detracted it away from Eden. It was because the original idea was less visual or impactful to the eye as seeing a night sky and the visual progression that you feel doing it.

As you said, they still oversee things.

It makes me think the game could benefit from treating its writing team with the same consistency as it does its music.

I don't think this is entirely a good idea. It should have some of the same people oversee it and make sure it's good, but they should also train new staff so that it doesn't overly rely on one person for decades.

The issue wasn't neccessarily new writers, but that the oversight did not sufficiently correct issues with it.

Masayoshi Soken, the principal composer, has worked on every expansion since A Realm Reborn

While true, even he has been training new people to make music such as the tracks in Eden's Verse. There was a blog entry about it in Shadowbringers.

[BigCheez]

To me the pacing was alright. We simply went through each zone and spent a reasonable amount of time in each. Actually felt less tedious to me than prior expansions up until the ceremony (half-way point).

The problem isn't the amount of time spent in each zone, the main issues with the pacing are:

1) The constant flip-flopping between the main plot thread and unrelated worldbuilding whimsy that would be better suited to sidequests. I constantly had the feeling that the story was starting to spice up and then someone just slammed on the brakes and put the story that I was just starting to care about on hold for some random BS that I'm not particularly interested in.

2) Wuk Lamat eating up so much screen time by using so many words to say nothing at all and then Krile and Erenville's story being crammed in right at the end because there's no time left.

[Kuroka]

The other thing I can agree with people on is they over-explained things. When I got to Yyasulani and talked to Alisaie I was immediately thinking "I get it, time has accelerated by decades here similar to on The First", then I had to painfully watch the NPCs figure this out very slowly and not always voice cutscenes.

This so much, sometimes i feel like they make the game for 8 year olds... or our friends are all... well... stupid lol

It was the same at UT when you get there, see the same area as back then at omega 10, find the base with the same stuff that was found within Omega's Zone...


Like if it was only Erenville and Wuk, sure, but those who HAVE BEEN on the first, witnessing the faster timeflow themselfs... its sad...

[Jeeqbit]

This so much, sometimes i feel like they make the game for 8 year olds... or our friends are all... well... stupid lol

I do get why to a degree. There are returning players from years ago who probably forgot stuff. But personally, I find the most important stuff comes back to me when I need it, maybe in an extremely vague way but it's enough to figure out what's going on. And perhaps also because there are people who don't follow the story properly, read it in a sloppy way and just skip through text a lot, so they made sure to repeat everything a lot to make sure it was conveyed.

But by the point you get to Dawntrail, you've had super complicated stuff discussed since ARR like the details of a sharlayan scholarship from all the former Sharlayan students surrounding you, Eorzean and Gyr Abanian politics that involve us sitting in on regular political meetings, frequent use of "New World" and "Old World" to confuse players who didn't reach Old Sharlayan or Tural yet, the scentific nature of aether that translates to what we know in real life as physics and biology that is over most people's head, the difference between The Echo, the Blessing of Light and their capabilities and origins.

After all that, wanting to make everything easy to understand is too much too late.