Request: Let us play the FFXIV1.0 storyline (Potential spoilers to Shadowbringers)

[Sililos]

Its a key part of the worlds history, all the events leading up to Dalamund and Bahamut.
I think its well past time that the original story be reintegrated for modern players.

Now as a 1.0 player, im not saying bring back the systems, god no, Im glad to see the back end of them (Crafting and combat was a nightmare).
What im suggesting is something like:

Hydaelyn breaks her silence once more to inform the Warrior of light that the talk by the Ascians about you having a shattered soul like everyone else is not entirely correct.
In the past before Bahamut you had a whole soul like the Ascians.
She believes that in order to proceed you need to be whole once more.
With that she enhances your Echo to allow you to travel back to where you were first created in Eorzia and suggests you talk to the Scions, then she falls silent again.

Talking to the scions about what you were told brings up a couple of issues.
First they realize, while they knew you were there before, their memories of you are gone, Traveling around to visit some key characters from your past confirms that nobody remembers anything more than you were there.
The second thing that concerns them is Hydaelyn's words "you were created."
Unable to decipher what that means they decide going back into your past is the best way to resolve things and create a White Auracite to store your memories and return them to those in the current period of time.

In your Inn room or home the White Auracite is placed and using it sends you back into the past using the Echo.
Immediately you find yourself floating in Darkness with Hydaelyn saying its time for the Warrior of Light to be born and from her Aether materializes you, In the case of those who are part of the Immortal Flames, they awaken in the cart right at the start of the game, materializing exactly like a Primal giving the driver a surprise as he enters Uldar.

From there players can jump between the past and present at any inn (Or their home to jump into the past only) and relive the main story and certain important side quests from 1.0 but in the 2.0/ARR gameplay style, right up too Carteneau where you play through the events of the cinematic. After Louisoix saves you, His spell shatters your soul though.
Unlike in the past, instead of ending up wherever, the fragments of your soul are absorbed into the white Auracite and then you return to the present.

When you speak to the Scions the White Auracite reacts, exploding into nothingness returning both the memories of you to everyone you met, But also restoring your soul from the fragments.
Telling the Scions how you were summoned into the world and didn't exist beforehand brings up a number of unanswered questions that could be interesting content in future. (Like a class that allows you take on smaller Primal forms, different Primal forms have different ability's etc).

So thats my idea on how it could be played out.
Thoughts anyone?

[Vahlnir]

I'd love to experience the 1.0 story but I doubt it'll ever happen.

[Sililos]

Yeah its a shame, i really enjoyed 1.0's story but found the game a total nightmare to play, the battle system just didnt make sense too me.

[Sililos]

Cont Depending on your Grand company, you will have a different city starting location, Gridania etc.

After these events a Battle field investigator approaches you saying all this time they have been working to reunite belongings of the dead at Carteneau with their family.
They are surprised to find you alive despite all your belongings having been left on the battlefield.
With that you recover your armor and items plus Gil from the past (I.E bringing them into the present)

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Well, only 1.0 characters would be the ones they remembered, thats covered in 2.0s storyline.

The rest are just new adventurers who take up the mantle of the lost WoL.

Plus, much of the story has been briefly covered already. There wasn't really much to it. There were only story qeusts every 5 ranks (character levels back then) and then the grand company story that led up to carteneau. Which we have coverage of.

[Knot_D]

There's SB Alchemist's quest that's related to 1.0, good thing it's covered on that quest.

[van_arn]

You play the 1.0 storyline on youtube. It works well enough.

[SilverObi]

Not an awful idea on its face, I'd love to revisit the 1.0 versions of the zones (yeah even the Black Shroud, fight me).

But the rest of your storyline for it reeks of fanfiction fresh out of some of the more half-baked headcanon threads in the Lore forums as well as not matching up with the actual lore.

[Sotaris]

Won't happen. Close you get is youtube.

[Packetdancer]

Now as a 1.0 player, im not saying bring back the systems, god no, Im glad to see the back end of them (Crafting and combat was a nightmare).

The original 8-man Aurum Vale. The nightmare that was the original Black Shroud map. Anima budgeting preventing you from using aetherytes. Market wards.

*shudder*

More seriously, though, I feel like there are a lot of things that would make the 1.x storyline difficult to integrate. Not leastwise that while they managed to yoink in a lot of 1.x assets (maps, mobs, music, etc.), Realm Reborn is built on a wholly different engine; 1.x was on an engine called Crystal Tools, while we're on a weird fork of Luminous Engine 1.x with a bunch of MMO code carved out of Crystal Tools glued onto the side. I don't think most of the quest data and logic from 1.x could be imported across into the new engine; they'd have to recreate all the quests, which would be quite a bit of work.

Additionally, how do you handle instanced duties? I'd argue the trial vs. Nael towards the end is pretty freakin' key to the story, but you'd need to basically create the same fight over again (or something equivalent) set up for the way the current game plays. And that's not getting into any other instances. Or other story elements—like anything involving your Path Companion, which would require the Path Companion system to be reimplemented. (To be fair, that is one of the few 1.x features I kind of wish had carried on into Realm Reborn.) Do you just sort of handwave and skip over it?

Then there's the fact that you'd have to restore the old zone maps in order to have some of the various locations you'd need to go to. We're missing giant chunks of the Shroud and the southern half of Mor Dhona, the remnants of the Coerthas Eastern Lowlands are now just a PvP map, etc. And what we do still have of Coerthas looks like northern Alaska instead of the Cascades, Camp Riversmeet is a frozen wasteland, Owl's Nest is gone and only Falcon's Nest remains, etc. And even the other zones we do still have (and which didn't get abruptly frozen solid in the course of like two hours due to aetheric disruption) have significant changes. Sometimes geographical due to Dalamud's impact, sometimes due to development; 1.x Vesper Bay was basically a ferry dock and nothing else; 2.x Vesper Bay is the site of a thriving young town. Plus the starting cities had different layouts than now, some of which had some fairly important locations to the storyline (the Waking Sands being in Ul'dah, for instance).

And even if you did away with the need for the old zones by just skipping over any going-from-place-to-place and just replaced trials and such with cutscenes themselves so you could just focused on the story, let's consider the existing 1.x cutscenes. You only need to look back at the opening sequences to see how the cutscene animation system worked very differently in 1.x; I don't think the 2.x cutscene system can handle stuff like Yda and Papalymo's panicked flight from the hungry treant in the Shroud, or the Very Unfortunate Goobbue Incident at the parade in Ul'dah. So you'd probably need to recreate all the cutscenes from scratch, figuring out how best to represent the same things using the Realm Reborn 'scripted series of emotes and movements' cutscene system.

I feel like it would be a massive undertaking, potentially on the scale of an entire expansion itself. And while I think it would be neat to revisit those quests—and for folks who missed out to get to play that part of the story, especially things like learning more of Minfilia's backstory and whatnot—I admit, I also think their time is probably better spent making content that moves us forward rather than backwards.

Not an awful idea on its face, I'd love to revisit the 1.0 versions of the zones (yeah even the Black Shroud, fight me).

I mean... you're entitled to your opinion. Even if it's objectively wrong.

(I will admit I miss some of the original regional music, even if you can find them in limited spots in-game and as orchestrion rolls. Ironically, especially the Black Shroud's; the music was one of the only things I did not grow to loathe in that zone.)