What's the point with that quite lackluster story in Endwalker?

[CrownySuccubus]

Aerith dies. Zack was violently murdered. Basch failed the King. Vaan lost his only remaining family. Kefka won and brought about the collapse of the world, and Celes tried to commit suicide. Midgar was destroyed, and the cast were trying to pick themselves up amidst its ashes for years after.

Almost every single one of those happened before the final act of the story, which was my point. Frankly, I have no idea why you think ANY of this has anything to do with what I said.

You're doing the same thing you've done before - picking trivial arguments and resting on them for pages and pages until the discussion becomes nigh on incoherent. Then you try to imply it's the other party desperate to have the last word.

It's more like you guys keep trying to nitpick and then acting like I'm the one being unreasonable, really.

The semantics of when and who according to your own brand of reasoning are irrelevant, enough past FF games have had the protagonists experience some hardship that hits particularly close to home; to have everything they know destroyed, to lose the ones they love, to see their worst fears realised, or go through or have experienced some form of betrayal or loss. The impact revebrates for a long while after, and the ending is often bittersweet.

XIV at the same time tackles something supposedly deeper and darker, whilst completely scaling back on the result. For a story that deals with the very essence of these themes that have been so prevalent in these past titles - overwhelming sorrow, grief, loss, and suffering - as its protagonists undergo the second coming of a universe-spanning apocalypse heralded by the harbinger of all-consuming death and despair, the consequences were ridiculously inadequate, the characters left unrealistically unaffected, and Endwalker was fundamentally affected by this, in terms of plausible writing, storytelling and the impact it had on the message it wasn't so much as trying to convey as beat you to death with. It is impossible for the stakes to have been any higher than what they were, and yet... nothing happened, and nothing continues to happen. Everyone is fine, there are no lasting repercussions, ill feelings, or traumas. It makes the entire experience ring hollow, and it isn't true to XIV itself, let alone the FF franchise. I'm weary of the notion that expecting some sort of fall-out from disaster and chaos on such a scale is somehow equivalent to asking a George RR Martin novel, when SE themselves would never have approved such a light and unrealistically inconsequential ending in any of its other games.

It's one thing to be all right with it, but pretending it didn't affect the weight of the story or deviate from what we've come to know and expect of FF is just flat out denial.

What I specifically said was that Endwalker is the "Disc 4" portion of the Season 1 saga of FFXIV, and that Final Fantasy games typically avoid major party death during this phase of the story or afterward. There are exceptions; FF6, FF9, FF10, and FF15. But they are just that: exceptions, and not the rule. (And FF2 as well, but I couldn't remember specifics until someone else reminded me.)

I also stated that one of the weakest parts of Endwalker's writing was the reliance on fake-out deaths.

Kills Minwu rather late in one of the final dungeons, second or third to last. Kills Ricard Highwind when he sacrifices himself so that the party and Leon can escape Hell Emperor right before he raises Pandemonium.

Yep. Which I already mentioned, but said that I couldn't remember specifics of.

FFV has Galuf die right as the final act starts

So not in the final act, which agrees with my point.

FFVI kills Shadow in two different areas. At the end of Floating Continent if you don't wait for him, and then in Kefka's Tower he chooses to go down with the tower to try and repent for his past. It also kills General Leo right before Floating Continent, and kills Cid at the start of World of Ruin if you don't feed him enough of the healthy fish.

Mentioned Shadow already. Leo dies in the middle act of the story. Cid is a supporting character.

FFVII kills Aeris, what, mid way through? I'm not a big 7 fan.

Yep. Late middle of the story. So pretty much where I said.

FFX killed Tidus and Auron.

Pretty sure I mentioned FFX as one of the exceptions.

I don't remember enough about FFXI to comment.

Anyway, it's not beyond Final Fantasy to kill characters in the final act. Endwalker's problem was trying to have its cake and eat it too. Oh boohoo, all the Scions sacrificed themselves. Oh wait, half way through those necessary sacrifices, the Cat Girl Awooga tells you point blank that you can just bring'em all back with the Azem Stone. Killing all emotional impact that could be had, if you were even inclined to think it was going to be permanent.

All of this is almost word-for-word what I've said in this thread.

Again, look at ShB not just EW where again, the protagonists had 0 consequences despite going against the strongest foes they’ve ever faced and had nothing to show for it. Theyve had more losses from far weaker foes than literal unsundered ancients, yet somehow they triumph with not even a scratch.

Sure. I mean, the FFIX party get their butts kicked by Kuja twice in the story proper, but manage to defeat him, Deathguise, and Necron in succession of another. AFTER being Ultima'ed by Trance Kuja to the brink of death. The FFVIII party need to run from a mechanical spider and lose to Edea, but then manage to defeat the most powerful Sorceress of all time, in her own element.

FF characters get stronger throughout the plot, and often win in the end with some power of love/friendship BS. It's not that strange.

As for people going through things…Alisaie lost a friend whom we knew for about 5 minutes. Yshtola….lost nothing really. Same with Alphinaud. Urianger’s loss was 9-10 years ago(irl obviously), Graha slept through most of the 8UC but sure i guess we can say he struggled on the first

Alisaie was stuck on the first and had known Tesleen for at least months (I think it was actually more like a year) before we arrive, which frankly, is LONGER than most die-hard "nakama" know each other in a Final Fantasy game. G'raha lived a hundred years giving up everything he had (his body, his soul, and with the expectation of his life) to try to save someone he cared about and the world.