The issue with Dawntrail and importance of 8.0

[Voidmage]

Too late.

7.0 was that breakpoint. And it turned out being bad. So, no faith for 8.0, that will just continue what is happening in DT.

It's best already begin playing another game. 2025 will have interesting game releases.

I don’t think so personally.
For how unhappy I am right now one single expansion is not enough to completely break me after all the fun I had till now and I think many others think so too.

Yes the DT MSQ was horrible but on the other side the 8man raid story is pretty good till now with interesting characters (far more interesting than for example the 4 lords were for me).
Same with dungeons and trials. They are fun.

I honestly can’t imagine we will see the same low quality of story in 8.0. I really think they learned their lesson in that regard with all the backlash they got and honestly somehow I have the feeling the complete quietness of Yoshida regarding the feedback is him being humbled to an extent because his usual PR didn’t work as intended this time.
7.0 seemed like a half hearted thing because the fans will defend anything. But the fans can turn pretty quick if their favorite thing (MSQ) is bad.

For all my whining I am cautiously optimistic and I think 7.2 onwards for content and 7.3 onwards for the story will be a deciding factor for quite a number of players including preordering of the next expansion.

I agree with OP that 8.0 will be extremely important for the future of the game and decide if DT was a short low or the beginning of the end.

That’s why I post here. In the hopes that somehow it will be regarded as feedback.
If I had already given up I wouldn’t do that here and honestly from all what I have seen in this forum. Most seem to be in the same boat.
Unhappy but no having given up.

What the devs needed was some much needed humbling after how long they swam on the automatic wave of success imo and I think DT could be a chance to get that across.

[Absurdity]

If we haven't seen any change yet why does anyone think they'd change it for 8.0?

That's mostly copium as well.

We know nothing is going to change in this expansion, so people hold out hope that 8.0 will finally bring that change, maybe because they always planned for that to happen or because it gets bad enough in the meantime that they have to emergency course correct.

[Daralii]

Guys, we aren't at 7.2 at this time. Hyping up 8.0 and riding on it is waaaay too soon.

Even Yoshida's damage control for 7.0(some even before early access) was about 8.0. The next 2 1/2 years are looking bleak.

[BabyYoda]

Yoshi P already hyped DT when we got post EW story and it was bad written,

and what happened next? DT was a failure in terms not only for story but also gameplay, they didn't stick to the standards of FFXIV story and didn't give enough changes to gameplay, and now

I am suppose to trust this guy? formula didn't change since SHB and I believe changing it now it is too late to test it on new players, not all will adapt.

I wish FFXIV get better but I don't see it and even Yoshi P didn't tell us what changes that he will do, it seems that "trust me bro" moment and I am not buying into that

[TemporalFruitsAndVeggies]

I think the game has been designed into a corner for years and years and the devs have no idea how to design their way out of it. Most of the issues boil down to the roulette system -- everything has to feed into it, everything has to be roughly the same length (for the selected roulette type), everything has to be roughly as difficult, and every job has to be roughly as effective in it. It can't be removed, or some content will simply be impossible to do. So the entire game has been homogenized to accommodate it. I find it exceedingly unlikely that this will change with 8.0.

[Jeeqbit]

These things caused a decline in population, but even more pressing I think is that it heavily damages the image of FFXIV and devs.

I'm not saying that these things can't be perceived as issues. But it has always been this way.

"Lack of long-lasting content", "timeframes between patches causing people to get bored", juggling casual and hardcore content depending on the patch - that has been their way since even Heavensward (the first expansion).

And even in the first expansions I would see people unsubscribe for a few months, or say they are bored and there's nothing to do, or that there's no content, because at the end of the day, you have to make your own content in this game like a pick-and-mix.

They keep saying 8.0 is going to be the expansion where they plan to rework all classes.
Frankly I don't trust them to actually commit to that.

Regardless, like you said, they have consistently said 8.0 will be the job rework expansion. They also have said they decided what will happen after level 100 (so at fanfests we will find out whether we get something like Skill Trees, Talents, Ability Points or some other system) which could have big implications for the job reworks as a whole.

Their recent changes to jobs have been either lazy or destructive to fit them into the 2 minute Meta.

I don't think it is meant to be lazy so much as fitting them into the meta whilst making them super simple and intuitive for new players, so that it's hard for a new player to significantly mess up the rotation (and its subsequent damage output). I think it's the amount of self-imposed constraints and shackles that have brought them to this point.

Then there's the usual content an expansion brings. MSQ.
They need it to be a hit. No way around that. If that fails flat on its face they are in for a very rough time and given how long one expansion lasts nowadays I don't think another bad MSQ is something FFXIV will survive in a healthy state.

People weren't exactly enthusiastic about ARR or Stormblood and the game didn't see long-term growth from it (returned to ARR active character numbers). So you're right that if the MSQ is not a hit, then the game doesn't get as much hype in social circles.

But the game was just fine the moment they came out with something really cool like Shadowbringers or Endwalker, which easily pushed up the active character population for years.

8.0 is most likely gonna be FFXIVs breaking point
If the devs screw it up I don't think FFXIV will be able to recover from it. FFXIV isn't WoW, I doubt it can take 2 bad expansions back to back.

If the game reduced to half of what it is now (500k), it would be just fine. Because it was when I joined the game... realistically it won't get that bad though.

[ReynTime]

EN localization group taking too many freedoms

This is sadly just how US localization teams like to work. It's not just XIV. You know it happens in XIV because there were more people putting the magnifier over it.
American localizers love to play pretend writer using other people's work and defend that as being part of the job, even though it's way less prominent in other languages.
They've been doing that since the 90s. Look up Working Designs. It's not even about "agendas". It could be for any reason. The original producers always say "they work with" the EN localization, but the truth is they can't even understand the language, they mostly trust the localization knows best how to appeal to their region's demographic.

And the usual fanboys will still say they're right, that if you disagree you want a "translation" not a localization. You can localize without changing the image of characters, nuances of their personalities, genders, etc. It's done in several games. But XIV will do all of that, and has been doing that since at least 2.0.

Don't expect that to change. The average US player is completely oblivious to the difference, and grew in a culture that would rather mock someone for consuming material in a non-English language they're not native to than to understand why characters are written the way they are in the originals.

[NamiRocket]

Except it's not the "filthy westerners", just NA.
Both the german and french translations do not have these issues from what I've heard.

Rest assured, North America doesn't, either. Y'all just like to role play that it does.

[PorxiesRCute]

I agree that they can't afford for 8.0 to be a miss, but...EN taking too many liberties? What happened this time? What'd I miss?

The people who say this will never bother explaining what they mean.

I can think of a few examples, but I doubt that's what they mean? Like:

* Haurchefant's characterization, but that was four expansions ago
* Midgardsormr's dialogue when you first meet him being way more ominous in English than Japanese, but that was also four expansions ago
* The DRK storyline was completely changed, but that was also three-four expansions ago
* English voice directors not giving proper direction to the VAs -- not just Wuk Lamat, there's also the infamous example where Colin Ryan was told to "make a noise" but didn't know Alphinaud would be falling into water when he made that noise; there's also the absolutely garbage voice direction the Mage Soul and Pugilist Soul in P9 were given; but this is, again, a voice direction issue, not a translation issue
* Too many silly puns in quest names? Those are quest names. They barely matter. The silliest ones are usually the ones that extra don't matter, like sidequests and FATEs.

Mind, if there are actual examples, I would love to see them in place of the vagueposting this topic always attracts.

[ReynTime]

There have been multiple threads touching on the EN localization. Including how what's-her-face changed characters' perspectives in post 6.0 dialogue to give a stronger black and white depiction of Zodiark and Hydaelin compared to the JP, FR and GER scripts.