The big spoiler in the Heavensward opening/trailer was a huge mistake. (spoilers obv)

[Roegadyn_Bear]

Wow, that's a necro.

[Dualgunner]

I'd just like to bring up the concept of in medias res, or starting the story from the middle; it is a common storytelling tactic to begin the story in the middle of action (2.57 ending, for instance) to get the audience interested, and then to go back and explain the context and how everyone got there. End of an Era was a good hook, as well, but 3.0's opener is pretty good too.

Those are just my $.02 though.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_medias_res

[Takfloyd]

Nice necro.

There is nothing "in medias res" about this though. The thing had already happened when the trailer was first shown, and the thing itself was the surprise, how we got there was irrelevant. It was only a spoiler for everyone who wasn't caught up.

Speaking of irrelevant, so is this thread since the "death" turned out to be faked anyway. Whoop dee doo.

[DreamAngel-Ren]

I am not off the mark though, I am 100% correct in that putting spoilers in a trailer is a terrible move from a business standpoint, and the spoiler warning only makes it worse in that regard because it will turn away a good chunk of potential buyers.

You are all just looking at this from the player's perspective, repeating over and over that oh, there's a spoiler warning so it's okay! That's called missing the point. But it's okay, my message clearly wasn't for your ears anyway.

How?? If you want your non-playing friends to play FFXIV, you should show them, "A REALM REBORN" opening movie/trailer because that one introduces the game to the audience and they won't be spoiled too much. With this in mind, if the non playing pals of yours did see the HW trailer, they wouldn't have a clue what went down because they haven't played the game yet; as long as you don't say a word about the story, then they won't be spoiled. DOI!

[Takfloyd]

How?? If you want your non-playing friends to play FFXIV, you should show them, "A REALM REBORN" opening movie/trailer because that one introduces the game to the audience and they won't be spoiled too much. With this in mind, if the non playing pals of yours did see the HW trailer, they wouldn't have a clue what went down because they haven't played the game yet; as long as you don't say a word about the story, then they won't be spoiled. DOI!

What about my friends who played ARR in the past, but had unsubscribed and weren't interested in Heavensward? I would have liked to rekindle their interest with a cool video, but I wasn't going to show them character death spoilers!

Also, personally, if I had seen the HW trailer before starting the game, the spoiler would have annoyed me enough that I wouldn't have bought it. I haven't played Persona 4 despite being a fan of the series because I know who the killer is, and that turns me off playing it entirely. That's just me though.

Anyway, if a mod sees this, please close the thread, there's no reason to talk about this now.

[Colorful]

I can't say I care for the trailer as there was a warning, but to show it in the main menu when you go AFK? Now that's a mistake.

[DreamAngel-Ren]

What about my friends who played ARR in the past, but had unsubscribed and weren't interested in Heavensward? I would have liked to rekindle their interest with a cool video, but I wasn't going to show them character death spoilers!

Also, personally, if I had seen the HW trailer before starting the game, the spoiler would have annoyed me enough that I wouldn't have bought it. I haven't played Persona 4 despite being a fan of the series because I know who the killer is, and that turns me off playing it entirely. That's just me though.

Anyway, if a mod sees this, please close the thread, there's no reason to talk about this now.

There are different videos to show than just the opening movie/trailers. You should have showed them gameplay videos (without cutscenes or people babbling about what just happened), demonstration videos of the new jobs in HW, or TV commericals of the game. Not that difficult.