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

[Lunaxia]

If this thread makes you sad...

Just ignore them. They feel the need to express themselves in the face of criticism, and they're more than at liberty to do so, but it's just a waste of energy engaging with it at this point. Let them say their piece and move on.

I think so...

Perfectly valid interpretation and reaction, really. It's an odd thing to say, and I'm being pretty generous in light of how much they tried to hammer home what a good guy he was at heart in Elpis. He does call himself a megalomaniacal madman, and the story more or less admits he has infiltrated, raised up and crushed what we can only assume to be countless civilisations - Allag and Garlemald simply being the mightiest - which there's something a little more... sinister about than the other, more simplistic wanton destructive methods employed by the Ascians. Honestly, I don't know if I actually agree with the game's implied message that any good-hearted person would be driven to such acts by what he went through, but none of us could even imagine the reality of living that long, so who knows?

I believe the "ideals" quote was just so they could make a clumsy reference to his battle theme ("Invincible"), just like the entire ten years saga was jeopardized by the probably late decision to make it fit Answers's lyrics.
This is after all, the same scene where Emet-Selch was blatantly used as a living advertisement for future content, their focus wasn't on writing a compelling closure for his character.

Oh, absolutely, with all the subtlety of a brick through the window, but I still find it interesting to dissect the meaning behind... and what they were hoping to gain from it.

[SpectrePhantasia]

Been a while since I've posted so I thought I'd give renewed input on the topic of Emet's revised characterization between expansions.

Just looking at Emet-selch's writing in Shadowbringers compared to Endwalker tells me that the devs didn't know what they had when they created him. The Emet-selch of Shadowbringers was an incredibly complex villain, whose inner turmoil between his moral compass and duty have resulted in a hollow bitter shell of a man, who has absolutely nothing left, but his dream of yesterday. He's watched society crumble from the greatest of heights through violence and death on a scale he'd have scarcely thought possible, and every time small inklings of hope crawl into his heart, smidgens of sympathy for the remnants of his people, like in his son, they betray him with their frailty, and in his mind, prove him right all over again. At the core of it all though, he was tired. Tired of hurting people and tired of his burden's weight. He was a wonderfully contradictory man who in the end, deserved condemnation as a result of the terrible tragedies he was responsible for, but also respect in knowing that he was only ever doing it for the people that he loved.

And then Endwalker proceeded to do a fine job of butchering this conflict so completely and utterly that even almost a full year later I'm not over it. For the record, I absolutely love Emet-selch, and enjoyed Endwalkers fanservice of him for what it was, but the fact of the matter is, everything about him that made him compelling and complex was cast aside in favor of making him a grumbly tsundere. If it were simply in the past, it would be one thing, but not only is the severity of his actions largely handwaved with the Warrior of Light's clear reverence of him, (though compared to what Venat got imo it was paltry) he is never given the room to be the character he used to be and was little more than a dev mouthpiece to tease new areas.

Perhaps in a misguided attempt to convey a feeling of 'unity' the plot tries its absolute hardest to make you forget about the inevitable conflict between the Ascians and Hydaelyn. They were broadly wrong and she was broadly right, but you're never going to see this conflict from the past in full, that would be impossible; because then you would have to confront the numerous layers of grey in the whole situation, and that was simply unthinkable for the sterile portrayals of morality here. That's why the disparities in Emet-selch were so noticeable. His whole character hinges on that bent morality. Never in Endwalker does Emet-selch oppose Venat or her methods directly, despite her being the person responsible for his thousands of years of misery. In the end it becomes a simple, dumbed-down tale of general hope vs general despair and anything deeper than that doesn't matter.

Very unfortunate conclusion to what was extremely well written build-up.

[MagiusNecros]

I think they fucked over Emet Selch and Hydaelyn in the writing department. The OG Hydaelyn and ShB Emet Selch were amazing. The plot took a nosedive in Endwalker.

[Lelila38]

They should have allowed Hydaelyn to act as a well-meaning antagonist. All it would have taken was for the scions to call her out on her crimes and the disparity between what was shown and what was perceived by many would have been resolved.

She would have made a great antagonist on par, if not better than Yunalesca from X.

[Brinne]

For what it's worth, Emet's 'ideals' line made perfect sense to me in his last scene and I was extremely happy it was there after deeply mixed feelings regarding the rest of the sequence, which was otherwise felt like a full concession to Venat and the Sundered that left a pretty horrible taste in my mouth. No, Emet doesn't have any regrets about doing everything in his power to save the Ancients, and he shouldn't, because they deserved to be saved, deserved to be loved and remembered, and deserved have someone fighting to save them. If he had to choose between our world and the Ancient world, he would still choose the Ancient world, would always choose the Ancient world, and that is a completely valid choice. IIRC, my impression of the JP line felt less like he was implying that our victory was the 'correct' outcome and more simply the 'outcome' that happened, the way the coin wound up dropping - and he simply didn't intend to attempt to overturn it after you and he had settled it, was all. We've always known that Emet found what he's "had" to do to save the Ancients regrettable in many ways, and if he thought a less cruel option was viable would have been happy to take it - but that doesn't mean he regrets the principle of going above and beyond everything he could do for their sake, if that makes any sense.

So I personally really didn't feel any dissonance there, or connected it to the specific atrocities he committed in service to those ideals and goals - rather more like a "oh thank god, they didn't COMPLETELY forget why Shadowbringers's conflict was compelling and heartbreaking. Well, maybe they're trying to, but at least they threw in that piece of lip service to it, I guess."

(I will also point out that in Elpis, while, yes, Emet called his future self a megalomaniacal madman, what truly horrified and disgusted him was the notion that he gave up at the end. His tantrum wasn't actually about horror at the methods he resorted to - it was about him putting together the pieces of how ShB Emet in some ways lost, or at least created the possibility of his loss, because he'd simply gotten too tired and worn down from it all - and no! he would never give up trying to save his people, no matter what, no matter how much it hurt him, never!)

I've said it before, but I think in terms of his personality in a vacuum, just who he is and what kind of person he is in and of himself, Emet's characterization in EW was actually fantastic and endearing - it's easy for me to see the links between how he acts there and how he acts in ShB, after millennia of heartbreak and disillusionment. I even found it validating in that it was clear to me that Emet in ShB was written as a fundamentally deeply kind-hearted, but emotionally uncomfortable and insecure person in expression - he's practically flailing when he's attempting to connect with the Scions, and once you realize it was in many ways an actually earnest but deeply awkward attempt, yep, there's the cutesy EW Emet, easily, just in a far more dire context with far more dire stakes. I think not having the understanding that Emet is very much a fundamentally kind person who hates seeing others in pain robs you of a lot of appreciation for his Shadowbringers arc and everything that was happening with him there, so in some ways I liked how they hammered in that aspect of who he is. But I will also say I definitely noticed the hilarious sidestepping of Solus in the Garlemald section or where its history was concerned, and objectively, the choice to focus on Varis as the Big Nationalist Emperor Symbol is very funny and transparent considering that in-universe Varis led the Empire for all of, what, a year, as opposed to the Founding Father?

And, yes, Emet being used as a mouthpiece to boost up Venat and the EW narrative and themes. Everyone was a victim of that, of course, but with Emet it feels even more egregious because he was such an incredibly written character (and the Fan Favorite) otherwise.

[MagiusNecros]

They should have allowed Hydaelyn to act as a well-meaning antagonist. All it would have taken was for the scions to call her out on her crimes and the disparity between what was shown and what was perceived by many would have been resolved.

She would have made a great antagonist on par, if not better than Yunalesca from X.

Hydaelyn should of never been written as an antagonist to begin with. It would have been better if the villains were trying to flip the script and appear sympathetic only to reveal they were the big bad all along and misled the heroes.

All this build up of Zodiark as this big evil and the xpac was rushed out the door with Zodiark being a weak Primal with an Entelechy being given powercreep and routinely defeated shortly after.

Weak anime finale IMO.

[Striker44]

The fact that this thread is still going after all these months makes me real sad for the writers. Endwalker wasn’t perfect but this thread feels like a contrarian circlejerk. Oh well. I loved it. I’ll always have fond memories of playing through it for the first time. I’ll never forget the final solo duty. Completey unexpected, it blew my mind. What a rush that was. I loved endwalker

Remember that it goes this long because EW is also one of the most popular and loved expansions. Every single expansion in the game's history has had the echo chamber of negativity on this forum trash it. Usually the conversation peters out because there aren't many people defending it. This xpac is the exception. Many people in this thread also post about how much they enjoyed EW.

Good for you if you enjoyed it. Genuinely, I'm happy for people who can still enjoy the game in some way. But just because you enjoyed it doesn't mean it is free of severe problems, nor does it negate the disappointment and frustration many felt when playing through it or thinking on it after the 'magic' wore off.

Actually, it can mean that, just like you personally not enjoying it doesn't mean it has any "severe problems" either. That is likewise a purely personal opinion which others can completely disagree with. The "many" you speak of by the way, are quite simply non-existent. This forum contains the most absurdly minuscule few compared to the hundreds of thousands of players. Please don't claim to speak for any of them.

[KageTokage]

I'm disinclined to call it a "purely personal opinion" when people are generally mirroring discontent with the same elements of the story.

Though I won't deny that the people who dislike it are also an extreme minority...which beggars the question of why others feel the need to constantly defend their positive takes/opinions like we're somehow endangering them just by existing.

[Midareyukki]

I'm disinclined to call it a "purely personal opinion" when people are generally mirroring discontent with the same elements of the story.

Though I won't deny that the people who dislike it are also an extreme minority...which beggars the question of why others feel the need to constantly defend their positive takes/opinions like we're somehow endangering them just by existing.

It's not people's faults that others happen to agree, is it? Hell, almost no one I know in-game interacts with the forums whatsoever, and they too share my concerns and complains sometimes. Obviously not all of them, and never to the same extent. Often they're more understanding, sometimes less. Speaking for myself... well... I speak for myself, not what other people want to hear. It's easy to assume that everything is an echo chamber when sentiments happen to be so similar. Not everyone liked the Loporrits, but others did, for example. And that's okay. But saying that criticisms are mirrored? Well... what do you want to hear?

I don't think Hydaelyn is a problem. At all.
The burger scene is overfocused, it's really not a big deal, nor does it say anything about G'raha.
Hermes is an intresting character. I split him from Amon, and consider the two characters separate as much as I consider Gaia and Ascian Gaia to be separate.
Meteion is adorable and tragic.

And odds are you'll find people with a similar mindset as well. People who might think that the stuff I "excuse" are problematic, and the stuff I find poorly executed to not be so. I just find that to be natural.

[Kaoru_Nagisa]

Actually, it can mean that, just like you personally not enjoying it doesn't mean it has any "severe problems" either. That is likewise a purely personal opinion which others can completely disagree with. The "many" you speak of by the way, are quite simply non-existent. This forum contains the most absurdly minuscule few compared to the hundreds of thousands of players. Please don't claim to speak for any of them.

Oh look. You're still here.

Yawn.