Quote Originally Posted by Lunaxia View Post
The truth is, Shadowbringers was brilliant, but absolutely terrible for the series overall. The popularity it brought and their desire to hold onto it has turned FFXIV away from everything that made it enjoyable in the first place, and it feels as if they now fear doing anything different that departs from what they consider the "safe" formula in case it goes away. The result is that they took what they mistakenly thought worked from ShB, discarded what actually made it so successful, and streamlined and oversimplified most of the game, right down to the plot and characterisation, to avoid anything even remotely controversial that might turn off players and damage said popularity, before padding the empty space with ooh-ahh visuals and inspirational fluff. What we're left with is something that seems bright and flashy on the surface but lacks any real substance, and a paper-thin story that starts to fall apart under the slightest inspection because of their desperate adherence to what they think fans want to hear. The nuances and complexities of ShB never really stood a chance of coming through, because there's too much potential for division and disagreement - the safest route was reverting back to goodly Mother Hydaelyn, blasting Garlemald off the map, and vaguely handwaving away the Ancients (because it never would have worked anyway, so it's fine!) to remove all of that uncomfortable, potential discourse and make it a feel-good story where good and hope (and their review score) wins the day.
All of this. The lightning in a bottle that was shb happened not because Goodly Mother, but because the Ancients were so captivating and fascinating as a culture. It had shadows and nuance, and players are intelligent enough to want more of that.