Thread: Endwalker is the lowest point of this game since 1.0

I wish they didn't drop the ball so hard with criterion dungeon, i remember when i beat hamtaro the first time and got nothing from it.

It literally sapped my will to continue further, dozens of try with different parties and the reward was a big "F you here's a kick in the nuts ! "

Originally Posted by VentVanitas

I had always struggled to put into words why EW's depiction of Sharlayan bothered me but you hit the nail on the head with this post for me. It comes off more like a college paradise for 20-somethings to me (hell the last stand might as well be a starbucks too) rather than what previous expansions had alluded to.

Hah, well you're certainly not alone! I know quite a few people who feel similarly. For various reasons despite being touted as a 'grand finale' Endwalker in general felt very much at odds with everything that came before it.

Originally Posted by Lunaxia

(Please picture this as a sticky note left on a chair because I am not here.)

I honestly enjoyed the whole experience of going through ARR, meeting the characters, exploring the zones and getting to know the game, and I really liked the Coerthas/ Dreams of Ice content and the build-up with the Crystal Braves a lot. There was an official "rating" thread of sorts for the expansions not too long ago, and I realised for me there's a large chunk of ARR I would actually put up with there with HW and parts of ShB - it just suffered from that post 2.0 come down where the quests surrounding the primals and Domans seemed nigh endless.

I think more than anything, and what ARR encapsulated and what I miss the most, is the sense of an unsteady and uncertain world that actually felt like it necessitated the presence of do-gooder adventurers and a group like the Scions. I'm not saying we should have artificially prolonged the threats that previously existed, and that restoring some sense of peace and stability wasn't a logical outcome, but I miss how each character and community we came across felt more like its own mini cohesive story wherein the cast had their own individually-centered and more natural, grey sense of morality and much more varied degrees of self-interest and motivation that did not simply boil down to "grouchy, racist asshole we have to win over" or "an unconditionally supportive sweetheart." We did not implicitly trust and befriend everyone we met, and corruption and conflict were highlighted as significant problems even within "official" organisations we might have actually been expected to trust. What makes Eorzea especially feel so bland these days is that they've tried to address and smooth out every conceivable wrinkle within its various societies, and there's no sense that existed early on in the game that something could switch or change or become precarious at any time as it is wont to do in the real world. As a result, it just feels... very safe, and ultimately very boring.

And it's why how they dealt with areas like Sharlayan or Garlemald feel even more frustrating, because look! Potential conflict! ...but through a combination of steamrolling over there with our Positive Way of Thinking and taking away any sort of human element from their behaviour by making everything a Wizard Did It (Hydaelyn made the Sharlayans secretive! The Ascian Emperor made the Garleans quasi-evil!) it just makes everything very sweet and inoffensive and dull, again. With Garlemald in particular, I don't see why they couldn't have instated a Quintus-type leader to take over who could have been a point of antagonism and abrasion for the moral purity of the Eorzean Alliance, and allow the Garleans to evolve and rebuild and potentially leave a door open to revisit their story further down the road and offer just a minor feeling of uncertainty to a world that desperately needs it.

Looking back through the older expansions I often find myself questioning how much about the game's nuance was planned as opposed to how much of it was simply an accidental success. There's so many story beats in the previous expansions that had ample depth and yet they're either later retconned or just never mentioned again.

Of the Garlean characters, Regula was always my favourite - and it's a shame that the game just sort of ignores how big a deal it was for a high ranking enemy soldier to not only be shown to have an honourable streak but to die defending an ally of the Scions. Yet it's never mentioned again, even when the opportunity to do so arises. I was waiting for Regula to be brought up during the attempt at peace talks with Varis but...we didn't get an option even if we'd completed the quests involving the man in question.

Another character I really enjoyed was Ilberd. He was someone who had to be stopped but when you dig beneath the surface you can understand why he did what he did even if one doesn't agree with the methods embraced in the pursuit of such goals. It helped that he was first introduced in ARR, played a part in HW and then ultimately carried his legacy through much of StB.

All in all, I completely agree - I enjoyed Eorzea so much more when it was shown to be flawed and imperfect. It made the attempts to do the 'right' thing stand out more but by wrapping everything up in a neat little bow it not only made me less invested in the story but opened my eyes to how often the narrative keeps retreading old ground through increasingly contrived storytelling devices.

With how much of the game world is currently unexplored, I can't say I understand the 'rush' to turn large swathes of territory into singular zones. I'm now left wondering if we'll ever get to see more of Ilsabard. I half expect 7.0 to be another bait and switch where we're led to believe that we're going to Meracydia or the New World only to end up on a different Shard.

Originally Posted by Theodric

and for some strange reason, there's a bunch of male viera running about despite it being established as part of the worldbuilding that they're exceptionally rare.

To be fair, that lore never would've survived making them playable anyway.

Originally Posted by VentVanitas

I had always struggled to put into words why EW's depiction of Sharlayan bothered me but you hit the nail on the head with this post for me. It comes off more like a college paradise for 20-somethings to me (hell the last stand might as well be a starbucks too) rather than what previous expansions had alluded to.

You ever think things were set up that way as a means to keep folks away per the whole isolationist angle? It makes sense to me that they would create a more tense air around themselves to keep the outside world from interfering with their work. And now that their work is complete that facade now longer needs to be kept.
Thancred alone let me know Shar wasn't how some made it seem (to me ofc).

Originally Posted by Mithron

HW was peak. I miss when this game was good. I have no drive to even do Extreme trials and Alliance raids any more, much less Savage. I did 99 of EW Ex trials 1, 2, 3 and 4, but 5 and 6 I'm just drained and can't even be bothered to learn them. I've never felt this before in any expansion.

Heavensward was eight years ago. Maybe you're just getting older. Get a mortgage, take the kids to soccer practice, pay taxes and die. It's what we were born to do.

Originally Posted by IkaraGreydancer

You ever think things were set up that way as a means to keep folks away per the whole isolationist angle? It makes sense to me that they would create a more tense air around themselves to keep the outside world from interfering with their work.

Sending actual goddamn assassins to murk someone teaching astrology isn't a nation trying to keep up a facade, it's a nation trying to bury dangerous intel. I would understand if it was directly related to the Final Days, but how would teaching astrology to Ishgardians put the mission at risk? It's not like Ishgardians at that point even gave Leveva or her grandpa the time of day anyway, and sending people to kill them in secret isn't the answer if you want to just look uninviting. You don't even get a mention of the astro storyline in EW!

At best it made it look that the forum had an internal divide between their members ethics-wise, and at worst made the entirety of Sharlayan look like they had some gigantic skeletons in their closets. Honestly, both potentially way more interesting worldbuilding than just "we were all pretending to be mean to save the world "

Originally Posted by Shinkuno

Square sells you story skips because to them only people populating the latest expansion matters.

Technically speaking, Square Enix sells you a Job Skip because they allow one character to assume every role in-game. These do not affect the story line.

Blizzard sells Story skips in the guise of a level skip. And will be happy to do so for each of the alts you choose to run in the game.

Both companies make money because players are impatient.

If I had to guess (and we have no real numbers to back this up) Square Enix sells more ARR story skips than Endwalker story skips.

Originally Posted by Theodric

Large swathes of the game's established lore seems to be at risk of just being completely retconned out of the blue. Sharlayan, for example, was established as a sinister and shady isolationist nation that sent assassins to kill or threaten anybody who shared knowledge with the outside world without permission.

Please provide some level of in-game dialogue that lead you to this assessment. Or is this yet another 1.0 thing that got changed when all you knew about the world was wiped out with the reboot of the world in 2.0.

Originally Posted by DPZ2

Please provide some level of in-game dialogue that lead you to this assessment. Or is this yet another 1.0 thing that got changed when all you knew about the world was wiped out with the reboot of the world in 2.0.

It's part of the astrologian job quests. Although I always read that as being a specific group, not the entirety of Sharlayan.