FFXIV is just FFTA from the other perspective

[Brightamethyst]

And the only reason we're not rooting for the Ascians is because we're not playing as one.

Final Fantasy Tactics Advance is about a group of people who watched the entire world magically change around them. The main character had to fight against everyone else, including some other people from the 'old world' who like the new one better, in order to make it all go back to normal. He had to become the villain in order to do what he knew was right.

FFXIV is basically just FFTA told from Mewt/Ritz/Cid's perspective. The only difference between Marche and Emet Selch is that we're not playing as an Ascian.

[Elladie]

I completely agree with this.

But prepare yourself to be harangued by a number of people who remain convinced that 'good' and 'evil' are absolutes and that we represent the former whilst the Ascians are entirely the latter. Similarly Zodiark is entirely evil, according to them, whilst Hydaelyn is entirely good.

I wonder how much the writers regret using the darkness metaphor for the Ascians initially since it plays so much into the hands of the absolutists. I guess they did their best to show us 'Light as evil' in ShB but an age-old trope is still an age-old trope.

[Theodric]

I completely agree with this.

But prepare yourself to be harangued by a number of people who remain convinced that 'good' and 'evil' are absolutes and that we represent the former whilst the Ascians are entirely the latter. Similarly Zodiark is entirely evil, according to them, whilst Hydaelyn is entirely good.

I wonder how much the writers regret using the darkness metaphor for the Ascians initially since it plays so much into the hands of the absolutists. I guess they did their best to show us 'Light as evil' in ShB but an age-old trope is still an age-old trope.

I think a lot of those posters are often led astray by bias towards certain characters but also often due to allowing head-canon for their Warrior of Light to bleed with reality.

The writers have thankfully confirmed on multiple fronts - both in-game and out - that nuance exists and beyond a few straight up evil characters such as Zenos many battles are merely a matter of perspective, moral relativism and politics.

Luckily Emet-Selch has proven to be a very popular character so I'm fairly confident in saying that the writers will very likely take that on board moving forward.

[Falar]

I completely agree with this.

But prepare yourself to be harangued by a number of people who remain convinced that 'good' and 'evil' are absolutes and that we represent the former whilst the Ascians are entirely the latter. Similarly Zodiark is entirely evil, according to them, whilst Hydaelyn is entirely good.

I wonder how much the writers regret using the darkness metaphor for the Ascians initially since it plays so much into the hands of the absolutists. I guess they did their best to show us 'Light as evil' in ShB but an age-old trope is still an age-old trope.

After finishing the Shadowbrigners MSQ if this was a game where the player had branching choices like a lot of aRPGs I'd be joining the Ascians.

[Lauront]

I completely agree with this.

But prepare yourself to be harangued by a number of people who remain convinced that 'good' and 'evil' are absolutes and that we represent the former whilst the Ascians are entirely the latter. Similarly Zodiark is entirely evil, according to them, whilst Hydaelyn is entirely good.

I wonder how much the writers regret using the darkness metaphor for the Ascians initially since it plays so much into the hands of the absolutists. I guess they did their best to show us 'Light as evil' in ShB but an age-old trope is still an age-old trope.

Indeed, that's how I see it too. Even with so much unknown, people are still grasping at ways for Zodiark to fit their definition of "evil" (and my take is that I don't think absolutist views make much sense in this respect). Although at this point I am still concerned they'll just reduce it to tempering, which is just another flavour of "zodiark bad", which would be a pity and require overly convenient excuses for Hydaelyn... assuming she did not temper.

To get more to the point, the theme of XIV thus far has not been one of accepting a harsh reality / truth over comfortable lies. It's mostly been about letting go of the past and moving forward, despite the pain that can bring; every antagonist is driven, on some level, by a past slight they refuse to let go of or forgive, while the main motivation of the protagonists is to create a better future for everyone.

One need look no further than Emet-Selch / Hades to see this; he is the culmination and (to a degree) final boss of the Hydaelyn / Zodiark conflict arc, driven entirely by his desire to recreate the past. He is called out on this by the protagonists at the climax of Shadowbringers and doesn't offer a rebuttal.

A rebuttal would be pointless, because it's true - it's more of a "so what?". His plan is explicitly to re-create the world of the past because they consider it so superior - someone brought up they seem to have no attachment to the ruins; well, yes, it's the world itself they want back. They clearly have no urge to just give up in favour of beings which are not equivalent to lives before the Sundering - his short story even shows a parallel in how he pitied the phoenix he snuffed out, and the mortal lives he's made an attempt to co-exist with but finds fragile and lacking. Up to the point Hythlodaeus recounts, you have the disagreement over whether the sacrificed should have been brought back (because it's only due to them the world even still exists), or should the new life be allowed to continue; that in turn led to the world being shattered. Perfectly understandable disagreement where you can have two sides take a different stance without the other necessarily being "evil". Certainly, from the perspective of the protagonists, the Ascians are an existential threat, and to the latter, the protagonists an obstacle in restoring their world.

Whatever the main point or theme of the story, they wrote it knowing that people would sympathise with one or another character, and that this would vary by personal perspective, as per Oda's comments during the JP fanfest. Possibly because they know it is in the nature of the beast (RPGs) that they will often offer up a choice between sides and perspectives, that their players will be accustomed to such an approach, even if it is not on offer here and whatever main theme there is.

The only real question is how does tempering affect them at this point, because if it strips them of their own motivations, it will all reduce to Zodiark's will/the usual Primal imperative... I still hope SE avoid that route as I'd find it rather lame.

I also wonder if they're going to pick up on the sundered state of the world being a threat to it in and of itself - Oda mentioned this makes it unstable, and it's clear it does even based on what we know, not to mention that it means the Source and its inhabitants are potentially weaker relative to all the other worlds which were not sundered (depending on what base level it started at.) There may be aspects to this we don't yet know, e.g. how it affects the Lifestream, the effect on these worlds of being seemingly hermetically sealed off from the rest of the universe and experiencing different passage of time, Hydaelyn's apparent inability to monitor what's going on within them, and so on.

After finishing the Shadowbrigners MSQ if this was a game where the player had branching choices like a lot of aRPGs I'd be joining the Ascians.

Same here.

That said, if it's all just down to tempering, I'll lose interest in the whole thing and wait for them to move onto something else. Of course, if they were writing it for such the type of game you mention, they would likely take a different approach, and who knows, maybe the current plotline will ultimately entail the end of not just one but both of the eldest of Primals...

[RicaRuin]

Well, only that FFTA didn't include the main characters causing a genocide. The world does vanish, yes, but it's heavily hinted at that it's still there somehow. And it most likely didn't kill anyone, as every inhabitant of the 'other' Ivalice was just one of the townsfolk of the 'true' Ivalice with twisted memories and race. (For example, you encounter the names of the students from the snowball fight Prologue on different enemies.)

[Enkidoh]

Also, the new world wasn't a fantasy story conjured up by a magical tome like FFTA's one was - in FFXIV the Source and the Shards were just the original Star of the Ancients split into fourteen copies with new life created in the aftermath of the Terminus that virtually ruined to the point of destruction the old world - FFTA on the other hand was basically the old trope of 'kids from the real world end up in a fantasy land and have adventures', with the 'real world' (with a very reconizably contemporary Earth setting for the 'real world' with things such as modern cars, TVs, protagonists wearing Japanese sailorfuku and even the FF series itself refered to as an actual video game in-universe!) turned into an FF world, so the juxtapostion of it's narrative with FFXIV doesn't quite work.

There are certain similar thematic ideas (after all, FFXIV features an entire Ivalice-themed set of raids), but FFXIV's narrative really isn't the same as FFTA's told from the 'villain's perspective'.

[Alleo]

I never played FFTA but did their decision in that game also include killing billions of real people and later sacrifcing their souls to a false god? I honestly read a summary and it sounds nothing like FF14. The biggest difference: FFTA was playing in a dream world, while FF14 is in the real world. Of course its easier to destroy something which is truly not real which in turn seemingly also saved those that got pulled into it. In FF14 the Ascians simply cant accept that their time is over and that the world has gone on.

The funny thing is: We once were an Ancient too and probably the 14th member. And yet even though we lived in that world and were part of the leaders of Amaurotine we still did not want to be part of the Zodiark plan. And other Ancient ones also were against the future plans of the Ascians..so much that they call this the first true conflict that their race had and that they called Hydaelyn to go against them.

So sorry "we" once were looking at it from their side and "we" even lived through that and still decided to go against them. Maybe because killing who knows how many new lifes to maybe get old life back (who sacrificed themselves on their own free will) is just bad? At that time they simply could have stopped and those that survived it all could have rebuilt their homes. The planet would be whole and the souls not shattered. But no the Ascians needed more. Could not accept the sacrifice either thanks to their tempering or maybe because of their inability to go on. And thus in the end the planet was split and their race gone.

I wonder how much the writers regret using the darkness metaphor for the Ascians initially since it plays so much into the hands of the absolutists. I guess they did their best to show us 'Light as evil' in ShB but an age-old trope is still an age-old trope.

Its not even the darkness metaphor. Its them being people that are laughing at destruction and death they have created. Building whole empires for the sole reason of causing another rejoining and thus genocide. Its Emet saying how he sees us as not alive (yet makes children with us..)..its not just a metaphor, its their whole actions. If they showed regret in doing it...but no Lahabrea loves it. He laughs when Bahamut is free to slaughter the world.

Its also kinda funny since Yoshida stated in an interview after the release of the expansion that people should not forget that the Ascians and Emet killed millions of people. He also pointed out that some are way too fast to fully believe Emets side of the story and thus see Hydealyn as bad and that we should wait until we get her view on it. I could be wrong but that does sound like we will get more reasons on why this is the right and good thing.

[Brightamethyst]

Of course its easier to destroy something which is truly not real which in turn seemingly also saved those that got pulled into it. In FF14 the Ascians simply cant accept that their time is over and that the world has gone on.

Which is exactly how the Ascians see the situation. To them the current world and the people in it aren't real, and destroying it will bring the real world and all the real people back.

[SannaR]

Which is exactly how the Ascians see the situation. To them the current world and the people in it aren't real, and destroying it will bring the real world and all the real people back.

Sure if you ignore the whole fact they're tempered. For all we know they got instantly tempered right after they summoned Zodiark. If they were then how would they know that the want of bringing back those who willingly gave up their lives plan isn't actually their idea, but Zodiark goin heeey I can get them to give me more stuff if i tell em I can totes bring their friends back. Like they seriously come off as a bunch of people who went yay our world is saved, but we don't know how to grieve properly so we felt it'd be fine to kill even more of the survivors and the new life. All because they just wanted their friends back cause I guess they mean more to them than those who were still alive.? So sure this world doesn't seem like the "real" world to those who couldn't even accept the one they were given presundering.