Final Fantasy XIV doesn't actually have that good of a story

[Almagnus1]

in my experience tlou2 haters are usually bigoted. Just sayin

What, because they can't possibly have the opinion that a game is just bad and must be called a bigot so their opinion is invalidated?

[Caitlyn]

in my experience tlou2 haters are usually bigoted. Just sayin

And in my experience, TLOU2 lovers only loving the game just because of their 2 "diverse" protagonists and ignoring the fact that the whole story doesnt makes any sense. I bet they never played the prequel(s). Just sayin.

[Drakonic]

And in my experience, TLOU2 lovers only loving the game just because of their 2 "diverse" protagonists and ignoring the fact that the whole story doesnt makes any sense. I bet they never played the prequel(s). Just sayin.

Careful there I almost thought I was on 4chan.

[SmashingQuasar]

Now all of that needs to be put into context. Veterans, remember: You did that at a super slow pace because you did it when it first got released. New players are being force fed several hundreds of hours of non-voiced walls of text before being able to engage into the current content.

"The game does not start at level 80!". Theoretically it doesn't. However how many of the people who tell you that would be willing to do synced MIL no echo content from ARR, HW or SB? I doubt this would be a majority. People are upset when sprouts queue for EX in DF because they are slowed into their Astrope farm.
Many, many players play MMORPGs for high-end PvE among other things. I would gladly progress into Coils synced MIL no echo as much as I can with no rush doing MSQ, but that's simply not really possible, at least on a regular basis. So what's left? Crafting? Yes, crafting is great. It's not going to compensate the lack of challenging PvE though. So we have to go through MSQ... and we start resenting the story because of that.

This brings my third and last problem with the storytelling: Everything is gated behind MSQ. Everything.
Now that may be great when you are here on patch day, but when you just started and you have all of ARR, HW, SB and ShB to do, it's not. Really not.
Even if you want to level your gathering, you have to do MSQ, because the next areas are gated behind MSQ. Even if you are level 80 doing roulettes and have 2000 tomestone, you won't be able to purchase any gear, because you have to do MSQ.

A large part of the MMO crowd plays for gameplay, challenge and completion. Those people do not play mainly for the story. If you want to attract those people, you can't throw the MSQ mountain in front of them and force them to climb.

"We don't want those people in the game" - Then don't complain the game does not have a budget high enough to give you 3 ultimates per expansion, or an infrastructure rework for housing, or a glamour log. More players will give the game a higher budget, which will benefit everyone. Gatekeeping the game will simply prevent it from progressing.

[Lunalepsy]

I played a lot of other Final Fantasy's and a lot of gaming sites say that FF14 has one of the best stories in the franchise so I tried it out. This is an issue of the hype killing the game. FF14 has a good story but it's not as good as the hype makes it out to be so in the end I was disappointed. I can give you 50 games that had a better story than FF14.

The first issue is that there is too much filler in the story that adds next to nothing to the lore or the story. Having to play hide and seek with children is not interesting. Having to harvest vegetables as the freaking Warrior of Light is stupid. The game suffers from being an MMO by having to give you way too much filler.

The second issue is that the game can't be as immersive as modern story-driven games. The Last of Us 2 is capable of making you feel sad, angry, and horrified because the game is designed in a very immersive manner. FF14 makes you read the dialogues which isn't as immersive as modern story games.

The third issue is that even in world-ending, cataclysmic events, there is no sense of urgency. This is partially because FF14 isn't as immersive as single player games. It's also because there are way too many Mary Sue moments in the game where you expect someone to die but they miraculously survive. After a few Mary Sue moments you just don't expect anyone to die anymore. Because of that there is not much tension to be felt in the story.

I'm not saying the story is bad, but it's definitely not one of the best stories in a video game nor is it really even one of the better stories among the Final Fantasy franchise. I enjoyed FF14 and it does have a better story than WoW but I don't think it matches up to actual single player games at all. So I really don't get the hype and IMO people have just not played enough thought-provoking story games outside of FF14. Saying it has one of the best stories in video gaming history is an exaggeration at best.

Compared to other MMOs, the story is solid. If we analyze the story without comparing it to other works of literature/classic games, it's very mediocre and generic.

[SILVERx]

Having to read is the saddest excuse to blaming FFXIV’s “lack of story”. Clearly no one reads books, text, messages, and other threads online. But apparently that’s the main issue.

“Oh, I skip the cutscenes unless they’re actually talking.”
Lazy. And I don’t think some people even know what a good story even is, especially when it has to be built up and even have a way of explaining the world and it’s workings. Yes, it’ll start off slow, but the payoff is always worth it. If you’re just here to get to the action and expect that that’s all there is, whew, prepare to be very disappointed.

I bet those same people think Star Wars sequel trilogy or Captain Marvel was the best when it lacked character development, proper worldbuilding, continuity, and only had focus on action scenes, and there were a lot of them, even for no reason other than spilling visuals that basically made no sense. But that’s what they skip here, the storytelling that has character development, proper worldbuilding, etc. and say the story was bad or lacking.

[ZedxKayn]

Having to read is the saddest excuse to blaming FFXIV’s “lack of story”. Clearly no one reads books, text, messages, and other threads online. But apparently that’s the main issue.

“Oh, I skip the cutscenes unless they’re actually talking.”
Lazy. And I don’t think some people even know what a good story even is, especially when it has to be built up and even have a way of explaining the world and it’s workings. Yes, it’ll start off slow, but the payoff is always worth it. If you’re just here to get to the action and expect that that’s all there is, whew, prepare to be very disappointed.

I bet those same people think Star Wars sequel trilogy or Captain Marvel was the best when it lacked character development, proper worldbuilding, continuity, and only had focus on action scenes, and there were a lot of them, even for no reason other than spilling visuals that basically made no sense. But that’s what they skip here, the storytelling that has character development, proper worldbuilding, etc. and say the story was bad or lacking.

The problem isn't with the story by itself, at least not for me- I don't know much of it, I can't pass judgment to what I haven't experienced, but I've read most of HW and it was... very generic, not much worth the "critical acclaim".

My problem with XIV is it's storytelling: I'm not reading a novel, I'm playing a video game, yet the cutscenes and the quite pointlessly obscene amount of text. XIV is not a visual novel, it's not a novel, it's a video game, and the way the story is presented, not only completely interrupting the gameplay but writing in 3 paragraphs what could be said in one or cutscenes with awkward animations, is criminally irritating in my opinion.

[Naraka]

100% agree. I enjoyed Stormblood much, then I read how great Shadowbringers Story was, but it was a big let down. Very average.

[Lauren]

I played a lot of other Final Fantasy's and a lot of gaming sites say that FF14 has one of the best stories in the franchise so I tried it out. This is an issue of the hype killing the game. FF14 has a good story but it's not as good as the hype makes it out to be so in the end I was disappointed. I can give you 50 games that had a better story than FF14.

The first issue is that there is too much filler in the story that adds next to nothing to the lore or the story. Having to play hide and seek with children is not interesting. Having to harvest vegetables as the freaking Warrior of Light is stupid. The game suffers from being an MMO by having to give you way too much filler.

I think a lot of people are talking about it in terms of "For an MMORPG" or "For a Final Fantasy". Normal FF games also have filler (obviously not as MUCH as FF but a lot of the filler is from patch cycles) but this is an MMO after all.

The second issue is that the game can't be as immersive as modern story-driven games. The Last of Us 2 is capable of making you feel sad, angry, and horrified because the game is designed in a very immersive manner. FF14 makes you read the dialogues which isn't as immersive as modern story games.

I'll be honest, it's hard to compare a game made only for the purpose of story to an MMO that contains story and other things. Last of Us 1 & 2 are a fully motion captured monsters that can invoke a ton of story telling without a word spoken at points due to the technology, a script where it knows you're most likely going to keep following route A to B without interuptions (because there isn't side content to really partake in that massively distracts from the story).

FFXIV is also an MMO that needs to run of a good range of low-end PC/Consoles to make it viable for the market, meaning you won't get character models on the same level. I think it's massively unfair to compare the two and almost suggests you have little understanding of how development works and restrictions with genres. It's just not possible to have a massive online world with characters all motion caputured to perfection without it being a absolutely HUGE game size that would become unreasonable to download every 3 months. Plus the manpower that's just not cost efficient.

The third issue is that even in world-ending, cataclysmic events, there is no sense of urgency. This is partially because FF14 isn't as immersive as single player games. It's also because there are way too many Mary Sue moments in the game where you expect someone to die but they miraculously survive. After a few Mary Sue moments you just don't expect anyone to die anymore. Because of that there is not much tension to be felt in the story.

There's nothing to disagree/agree with here. I think playing the game from patch to patch add a sense of mystery. For example at the end of 2.x series (when playing the game during that time), not knowing the fate of the scions and of the sultana was particuarly a hot talking point for the community.

I'm not saying the story is bad, but it's definitely not one of the best stories in a video game nor is it really even one of the better stories among the Final Fantasy franchise. I enjoyed FF14 and it does have a better story than WoW but I don't think it matches up to actual single player games at all. So I really don't get the hype and IMO people have just not played enough thought-provoking story games outside of FF14. Saying it has one of the best stories in video gaming history is an exaggeration at best.

That's just how things are for everyone. For some, the last of us was this incredibly rollercoaster of emotions. It had me crying in the first 15 minutes. For others, The last of us is massively overhyped and is a pretty average third-person action game with alright cut-scenes.

[Endariel]

Comparing FFXIV story to tlou2 story.
The bar was set too low, try better next time