Personally not enjoying the story currently but everyone keeps saying it gets better

[Renalt]

If you aren't enjoying the story as of that point I don't see it "clicking" for you later. You can either skip the story bits if you just like the gameplay but of you also don't enjoy that then it's perfectly ok to quit.

The game just might not be for you.

[Atelier-Bagur]

The funny thing is that to a lot of people Heavensward was supposed to be the hook that catches you after going through ARR. Me personally I thought ARR was fine with the story scaling upwards starting from post-ARR.

But if you somehow didnt find the meme worthy critically acclaimed story of Heavensward, then youll most likely not enjoy Shadowbringers at all. It heavily relies on your attention to whats come before in terms of conflict and parallels, by itself its just an average story without 1.0, ARR, HW and SB to back it up.

Its honestly fine to just story skip and focus on the gameplay if thats what you prefer. Theres quite a few people that have done so while still enjoying what they like to engage with this game.

[hagare]

if you haven't been liking the stuff up to stormblood, this game might just not be for you sadly.
But, the story does improve in shadowbringers. Whether that'd be to your liking or not though, no one knows

[Atelier-Bagur]

if you haven't been liking the stuff up to stormblood, this game might just not be for you sadly.
But, the story does improve in shadowbringers. Whether that'd be to your liking or not though, no one knows

Well the thing is, the story is constantly improving on itself. Sure it has its snags here and there within every expansion, but I think its kinda detrimental on trying to sell a new player that the game's story only gets important in Shadowbringers. Thats stupidly disingenous and its another reason why I feel that expansion is too overrated.

The point of FFXIV' story is that you find something that you found interesting or engaging even if its little right from the beginning in ARR. Whether its the world, the lore, the characters and the conflicts you go through. Its honestly why HW sells hard for people because it makes all those smaller moments previously matter and pay off.

Anyway obviously this take of mine is one of many for a lot of people and understandably not everyone feels the same way with this games story. Just wanted to give my 2 cents on the matter

[Necrotica]

Disregard the story. Acquire glamour.

[Poporito_Popoto]

Liked ARR, didn't like HW with pervy elves and emo dragons, liked Stormblood, Shadowbringers was best, Endwalker was fine.

[DiaDeem]

Did you enjoy Heavensward? Legit curious.

Stormblood is... ok for what it is, but I have a lot of issues with it. In trying to split the story between Doma and Ala Mhigo, both feel rushed. Lyse was meant to be the focus, but she gets buried beneath other characters. The whole Ala Mhigo section of the story never did anything for me, and Hien bothers me. Stormblood has a lot of World Building, but its characters suffer imho. If you enjoyed Heavensward, you'll really enjoy ShB/EW. If you thought HW was ok, then you should at least still enjoy ShB and EW.

[Skivvy]

If you aren't enjoying the story as of that point I don't see it "clicking" for you later. You can either skip the story bits if you just like the gameplay but of you also don't enjoy that then it's perfectly ok to quit.

The game story just might not be for you.

Slight correction. They said they were having fun with the gameplay so I wouldn't be so quick to show them the door. It's perfectly fine to not like the story but still enjoy the game as a whole.

I can't say I'm a huge fan of MSQ for many, many reasons, but I'm still here all these years later still spending money on a game whose story I generally dislike.

Now if story IS a massive deal to someone and they've not liked it up to the half-way point in the game, and they also dislike the actual gameplay, they may need to sit down with themselves to decide if they want to continue XIV. But that doesn't sound like the boat OP is in at this point.

[R041]

if you haven't been liking the stuff up to stormblood, this game might just not be for you sadly.
But, the story does improve in shadowbringers. Whether that'd be to your liking or not though, no one knows

To me, ARR-SB Story were all pretty bad outside of maybe 1-2 hours for each expac. Also not counting the Trials themselves. I did typically enjoy the story for Alliance/Raid though.

It wasn't until Shadowbringers that I actually started to enjoy base MSQ, and I've been playing since 1.0.

[Deveryn]

The pacing probably feels slow because this is a rather lengthy story that's been told over the past 10 years. Take some breaks if you need to. Worry less about other people's opinions of the story because they really don't matter. Tune people out as much as you need to and just play through it. There are payoffs at different points and especially towards the end.