Am I the only one?

[Izanagi_Fiaresu]

Who really hated Heavensward. Other than Brute Justice and Alexander prime? Didn't like the raid tier. Didn't like the story, bad church is bad. Plus the dragon stuff? Even the music aside from Dragonsong,Brute Justice, and Rise wasn't that great. Warring triad was meh.

Why does everyone I talk to seem to gush over HW?

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Because it was good. It had all of the elements of a good story. Redemption, betrayal, tragedy, success, failure. Plus is presented in a good way. It probably helps that people had been waiting to get into ishgard since 2010.

I disagree on the music, heavensward had a great soundtrack. It's one of my favorites, and I own them all.

[Mirassou]

As someone who recently returned and is still finishing up Dragonsong Wars, I really LOVED Heavensward, so I guess it's different strokes for different folks.

[DarkMasamune]

I think it had its moments, but I very much prefered Stormblood. I guess it's just a matter of taste. Ishgard was very grey-ish in atmosphere, whereas Stormblood was bursting with colors.

Nonetheless, I enjoyed them both, but I have a bit more love for SB

The soundtrack was good thought and still is, imo.

[Izanagi_Fiaresu]

Because it was good. It had all of the elements of a good story. Redemption, betrayal, tragedy, success, failure. Plus is presented in a good way. It probably helps that people had been waiting to get into ishgard since 2010.

I disagree on the music, heavensward had a great soundtrack. It's one of my favorites, and I own them all.

I disagree, I never escaped through the cutscenes but man was I tempted to. The Ala Mhigan stuff in Stormblood held my attention very well!

[Bahati]

I wasn't a fan of Heavensward either! ARR is my favorite but Stormblood was fine as well.

[disturbedcobra]

Even the music aside from Dragonsong,Brute Justice, and Rise wasn't that great.

Dragonsong Enough said. XD (PS. Watch the link, great rendition.)

[Skivvy]

I really wasn't so fond of Heavensward as a whole and I ended up taking a lot of really long breaks during this period. A few of the things that led me to feel that way:

*Bard was ruined for me
*The new zones didn't really appeal to me that much (navigation is really annoying in several of them)
*The music didn't do anything for me either
*The 24 man raids were rather dark - at least the one I did a lot of (Void Ark) - the others I barely touched due to the breaks.

Combine that with being tired of XIV's repetition at that point, I just wasn't feeling the expansion at all. :X

I've actually really enjoyed Stormblood, which was quite surprising to me. The overall feel of the zones and the dungeons/raids are far more my style. I'm sure approaching the expansion with no expectations helped with that. The breaks probably didn't hurt either :3

[Vahlnir]

Heavensward had an excellent start. The story was decent and the dungeons and trials were great. All the zones were beautiful as well. Then...there came the long wait for 3.1. It was delayed mostly because the devs were given a bit of a vacation. There wasn't much to do after awhile, and usually there's at least enough to keep oneself busy till at least a month before the next major patch if you pace yourself. So...an extra month or 2 with nothing to do. Normally relics would have helped to filled that void, but they were delayed till...you guessed it, 3.1. Then they unleashed 2 patches worth of relic quests and grind on the player base when 3.1 went live.

Gordias wasn't the greatest tbh, nor was Void Ark imo. I really didn't care for the 24 man raids in Heavensward at all. There was also Diadem and Lords of Verminion, both of which were basically dead on arrival and Diadem was taken down to "fix" it. The Yokai Watch event was also terrible. It just seemed like things stagnated for way too long, and by that point Heavensward was really turning me off to the game. It had its moments. I liked the Warring Triad story line and the trials a lot. And I actually liked the last wings of Alexander. Then they tried to re-release Diadem which was basically in the same state except they made it all about Fates.

So overall, I guess I didn't care for Heavensward. I only took an extended break in Stormblood because I was genuinely angry over how they handled Eureka because it was basically Diadem 3.0 with some gimmicks added. I came back though and haven't stopped playing ever since since it's not all about Eureka, even if I hate its existence.

[Macleod]

I liked the HW stuff more than SB, but SB was just fine, too. Shadowbringers...we'll see...