Endwalker Main Scenario Commentary & Feedback

[Cleretic]

Personally, my theory about why people thought the story would take that turn actually starts outside of the game rather than inside of it.

JRPGs are branded with that 'team up with your friends and kill God' cliche for a reason; it really does happen A LOT. I assume it's because in a game with a grand setting that nonetheless primarily provides violence as a means of interaction, people started wanting to enact violence against the biggest thing in the setting, which tended to be 'the analog for God'. Then eventually developers started indulging that, and things snowballed.

I don't think, deep down, people actually wanted to fight Hydaelyn because they thought she was evil; I think people expected to fight her, because at this point in the genre that's just the done thing, and were looking for a justification. Then Shadowbringers rolls around with a theme of 'light is not always good and sometimes has to be fought', and a pretty genocidal sadboy to say bad things about her, and bam, suddenly the justification has crystallized: that we'll fight Hydaelyn because she's evil. The fact we'll fight her was never really the part in question, it was just a matter of finding the path they had to backtrack down to explain why.

I know I expected we'd throw down with Hydaelyn, I just never bought into the 'because she's bad' explanation, and landed on something closer to what actually happened, that we'd have to fight her as part of some kind of rueful challenge that we'd ultimately feel sad about.

[MirronTulaxia]

Personally, my theory about why people thought the story would take that turn actually starts outside of the game rather than inside of it.

JRPGs are branded with that 'team up with your friends and kill God' cliche for a reason; it really does happen A LOT. I assume it's because in a game with a grand setting that nonetheless primarily provides violence as a means of interaction, people started wanting to enact violence against the biggest thing in the setting, which tended to be 'the analog for God'. Then eventually developers started indulging that, and things snowballed.

I don't think, deep down, people actually wanted to fight Hydaelyn because they thought she was evil; I think people expected to fight her, because at this point in the genre that's just the done thing, and were looking for a justification. Then Shadowbringers rolls around with a theme of 'light is not always good and sometimes has to be fought', and a pretty genocidal sadboy to say bad things about her, and bam, suddenly the justification has crystallized: that we'll fight Hydaelyn because she's evil. The fact we'll fight her was never really the part in question, it was just a matter of finding the path they had to backtrack down to explain why.

I know I expected we'd throw down with Hydaelyn, I just never bought into the 'because she's bad' explanation, and landed on something closer to what actually happened, that we'd have to fight her as part of some kind of rueful challenge that we'd ultimately feel sad about.

Yeah, I didn't expect that we would have to

kill god. And honestly I think far more people were reaching for it rather than just expecting it. Lots of people kept trying to find justifications for how Hydaelyn was really evil, we were really tempered, the Ascians were right, on and on. I don't mind that we fought her, and it was fitting, though I think that is more due to the fact it fits the way they've done the game so far, I could easily conceive of a version of the story where Hydaelyn just accepts us for all she has seen us do. I'm really glad though that they managed to make Hydaelyn good until the end, would have ended XIV badly if they hadn't.

[QT_Melon]

Personally, my theory about why people thought the story would take that turn actually starts outside of the game rather than inside of it.

JRPGs are branded with that 'team up with your friends and kill God' cliche for a reason; it really does happen A LOT. I assume it's because in a game with a grand setting that nonetheless primarily provides violence as a means of interaction, people started wanting to enact violence against the biggest thing in the setting, which tended to be 'the analog for God'. Then eventually developers started indulging that, and things snowballed.

I don't think, deep down, people actually wanted to fight Hydaelyn because they thought she was evil; I think people expected to fight her, because at this point in the genre that's just the done thing, and were looking for a justification. Then Shadowbringers rolls around with a theme of 'light is not always good and sometimes has to be fought', and a pretty genocidal sadboy to say bad things about her, and bam, suddenly the justification has crystallized: that we'll fight Hydaelyn because she's evil. The fact we'll fight her was never really the part in question, it was just a matter of finding the path they had to backtrack down to explain why.

I know I expected we'd throw down with Hydaelyn, I just never bought into the 'because she's bad' explanation, and landed on something closer to what actually happened, that we'd have to fight her as part of some kind of rueful challenge that we'd ultimately feel sad about.

Hmm sorta...

It's not JUST the nature of JRPG and maybe the fact we don't like that a certain Fairy from the same company in another game lies to us.

This is also from the standpoint of the writing problem. This was NOT the original direction of the entire storyline. So they went back to make it work - with most parts being a success. However, certain aspects that were explained away - were heavy handed in trying a bit too hard to make it "good" in terms of good vs evil.


Personally I feel parts with Hydaelyn were a bit too forced/planned to "Mary Sueism" where certain other plot points could have been stressed. This why in many of my posts I say I like Venat, hate Hydaelyn. I feel they were too heavy handed here. I would have honestly enjoyed being misguided about her of possibly being evil if it (being the "strong independent, summon/primal that forethought about everything") was dialed back a bit. But again, I get it they're trying to write in the tying threads...just the methods I question in portraying this - not so much the overall intent.

Some have pointed out the Will of Zodiark. This is a plot point that should have been more hammered in, than the montage. The montage is a time saver for sure, but I feel that direction in terms of story telling was a misstep. But thinking over it, I don't think I have an easy answer to help that wouldn't introduce more pacing problems story wise. (Because I felt like the last part of Sharlayan was something of a slog and could have been cut down just a bit - even if there were some real gems of scenes like Urianger that hit me hard in the feels.)

I felt that seeing Venat being our mentor with her own network of people more featured probably would have helped as well. She may have taken the brunt of the responsibility but like we WoL we have our network of people we acquired in game and would have been nice to see that relationship mirrored to who would be our mentor. - Maybe in Pandemonium or the Myths of the Twelve

I also HATE HATE HATE the "communication problem" trope with the aftermath of Emet, Hythlodaeus and Venat. So it's just already assumed that because Hermes waved his magic time memory eraser 2002 device, that we're put in a plot point that Venat would have never had a discussion (even if she did) and Emet would never investigate when he had LESS reason to investigate when we were around?

I feel more burned out by that trope than "the good was evil all along" "religion is bad" and other tropes because that spawns in way too many genre. So I was literally at that point thinking "really THIS kind of trope AGAIN??"

So yeah these days fandoms, want to be right. But I do like good attempts at subverting expectations - AND for the most part Shadowbringers AND Endwalker did that and that's why I overall enjoyed this final storyline but I'm not singing high praises for certain parts of it especially when it comes to Hydaelyn. But who knows, with the 24 man raid and Pandemonium (which is very likely as Azem to be our first meeting with Elidibus) those issues will be fleshed out in "after story"