endwalker seen as low point?

[Kaurhz]

I would say it's about the middle.

Overall I think SB was the worst for me.

[Sheriyana]

No I thoroughly enjoyed it and the story as did most people.

"I am most people"

[Restonance]

I dislike EW as much as the next guy, but calling it the low point is a stretch. There's definitely been worse before.

[Sheriyana]

I dislike EW as much as the next guy, but calling it the low point is a stretch. There's definitely been worse before.

Like when? The MSQ for EW has been controversial at best and the new content is all one and done, like they're actively trying to make players stop playing the game. Even when there's content with potential for longevity like deep dungeon, they make the weapons obsolete in the same patch by handing out better weapons for practically zero effort.

[WaxSw]

It's basically Shb 1.5 with worse story and doubling down on all the gameplay design and content problems that said expansion brought while introducing some of their own like the 2m meta, so imo, yes its a low point

[Elissar]

I wouldn't call it a low point. More like a mid tier expansion at best. The teams definetely not firing on all cylinders with this expansion. It's not all bad, but there is a lot of wasted potential. The story for me personally is a low point however. I've never felt so annoyed with the narrative than I have in 6.4.

It's a weird change for sure. I liked the story but...in the old days they would "ok, nice party, now you need to rest WOL", using shadowbringers for example. Now each character go to their own thing and you stand there...waiting lol

There is not even a happy music in post Endwalker like happened in lv 86/87 of 6.0 when we decide to travel to the past.
Feels lazy.

[Platinumstorm]

The revisionist history turning positively on Stormblood has been amusing to watch from the sidelines as well.

I hated Stormblood. It was a boring expansion, but the patch content is the best the entire game has seen.

[GaiusDrakon]

EW's large positive reception is likely due to newbies again. They're still honeymooning with XIV, not longtime players. It's hard to hate on a game you only started playing 2 or 3 years ago, and it's hard to know better when you never experienced its previous iterations. Again it's not universal, but that's the crux of why some folks think of EW as a low point. I think it's a low point.

But, hey, if it's printing money for SE, they'll see it as a high point just like 2.0 was a high point, and we'll get more of the same, stale, hackneyed stuff we got in this "epic conclusion."

This is the key issue here. The devs have long since decided to focus on attracting new players rather than improving the game for veterans and letting word of mouth do the job like in ARR/HW.

This game has an eternal newbie problem. Most of the people on these forums are ShB or EW babies who don't know how great the previous expansions have been. Especially Heavensward/Stormblood raids, which even now are far more creative and fun than anything in ShB and EW. Just go into o3s and see how interesting raids were before.

They realized at some point that they literally cannot keep retention up so they decided to bank on attracting new players. With each patch often losing 20%-30% of old players and attracting around equally as many, this game is basically on dialysis.

[GaiusDrakon]

The revisionist history turning positively on Stormblood has been amusing to watch from the sidelines as well.

Mfw revisionist.

The only reason it would be revisionist if you're one of those people who play this game for 20 hours every 2.5 years just for the story and then unsub.

Literally Kotaku take with this comment LOL

It's an MMO people judge expansions by more than the MSQ. Maybe you and all the gaming journalists don't realize that but MMO players do.

[GaiusDrakon]

Its people finally taking the rose tinted goggles off, its quite common amongst the average opinioniated gamer such as ourselves.

Its honestly very annoying and disingenous when people talk about the past tense like "this used to be good" when really its just them trying to twist the narrative to justify their opinions without having a consistent perspective of the product.

They quickly forget the annoyances, the issues, the lack of content and in terms of shadowbringers's plot specifically, the egregious filler and predictability. Really imo I think the only reason people even like Shb is because of two things; Ardbert and Emet-Selch. Theyre arguably the most important characters that carry that narrative very well. But personally I need more than just that in order for the expansion to be a masterpiece.

Frankly as someone who has played numerous jrpgs new and old....I dont think we've had that yet with this game. The only praise I can give is that each expansion has been consistently well, but it doesnt hold a candle to stories like FFX or Chrono Trigger or Dragon Quest VIII or Tales of the Abyss.

My opinions of course but still

Two ShB babies deliberating on whether past expansions were better. Don't make me laugh