Thank you for returning to "original stories" for Raids in Endwalker

[Vyrerus]

The usual issue with nostalgia fanservice is that it tends to do nothing for anyone who doesn't have that nostalgia

It does something, if the fanservice is appealing in a way that makes people who don't have nostalgia go look up the source. Some people even find a new favorite entry to the series or a new favorite game.

Also I'd argue that Yorha can't be nostalgic, as it's not really old enough to give anybody nostalgia.

As far as Omega goes, the source of the fights are explained as being from data within Omega, both fictional and not. As for why those bosses, well, if they'd left the final forms in the normal mode instead of just relegating them to Savage it'd be more apparent. Each tier follows the pattern of Monster that controls positioning > Monster with gimmick powers > Strong Monster with both of those > A literal planet destroying God. As with a lot of Stormblood they hoped to tell part of the story within the gameplay, and yes, they failed at this attempt, mostly. It's mainly because Alphascape has to buck the trend and goes God of Elements > Father of Dragons > Omega > Omega. Of course, it also all serves to get us amped up and believe Omega is wildly more powerful than all of these things, since it can emulate their powers in holodeck simulations.

As for why Ultros appears in Sigmascape 3.0, it is because The Guardian in FFVI uses the attack patterns of all prior bosses in that game, and they decided to select him as one of the boss patterns to emulate in XIV, since they already had his model and mechanics made up from other trials. They also made it emulate an FFXIV boss, The Everliving Bibliotaph so, there's that. As far as a lore reason, I don't think one was given. But I mean, his initial appearance in FFXIV is pretty much on the same level, "Oh he's some sorta voidsent accidentally summoned here." So he's just there in XIV, too, with no real backstory extrapolated on, because Ultros is nostalgic fanservice content in the first place.

[Borril]

To me its interesting, I don't mind crossovers if they are integrated well, and the lore behind Omega was justified enough, thoigh definitely very blatant. Iviace I was OK with to some extent especially since it's tied into our world as well, but it still felt a bit more off than Omega, Nier, though I loved the series, and enjoy parts of the story, its still...the worse off to me, maybe the final part will help but besides that, I agree with the dresser, ir will be cool to see sine more directly original.

[elioaiko]

I'm 50/50 on the subject of fanservice. While I do prefer more original things it's nice that the devs put in the effort of bringing in older/current SE franchises into the world of Eoreza.

On the Ivalice raids, I disagree to a degree. I played nearly all of the final fantasy titles as it's one of my favorite series. So seeing them add Ivalice was great because that universe is one of the best Squaresoft/SE has created.

For Omega, I felt that it was a good mix of nostalgia and originality. I liked seeing all of the bosses from other games while having a decent reason for them showing up. Also the story of Omega is original plot-wise. It's one of my favorite raid series tbh.

Overall, I think there's a hard balance for them to deal with. I think it's nice for them to bring in other games to bring hype and give fanservice to the fans that have enjoyed it. I do understand more original content is good Ofc. Nier was pretty hype tbh but so far the writing of the Nier universe is far too complicated to be out into a 3-part alliance raid, it would have been as a long term event/side quest chain.