"The Discourse is Dumb and Endwalker is FINE" - Wesk Alber

[Darkobra]

47 minutes? Is the guy hiring a video editor? I promise whatever message he's trying to say can be compressed to AT LEAST half that.

[DiaDeem]

"Criticism is art"

[Oizen]

The reason Endwalker is the worst expansion to me is pretty simple, previously when the game would drop bad or flawed systems, the community would react to it, and it would eventually get fixed in one form or another.
In Endwalker, every piece of content they've dropped has been pretty flawed and poorly received, they haven't even acknowledged their problems, and then they turn around and lie to us in interviews about these pieces of content being "wildly popular".

V&C Dungeons (both) are not popular
Eureka Orthos is the worst DD and its queue died remarkably fast
The less we talk about Island Sanctuary the better

[ChrysOCE]

I tried watching the video. Its ridiculous and screams as some sad attempt to sweep every criticism of the game aside. It's whole argument is "Endwalker is fine, cause if you did Heavenwards on release, THAT was worse!". And?? V/C, EO, IS and (now) Fall Guys, are all EW. All have serious issues. You can't just go, well, it was worse before, so this is FINE and everyone who is complaining is lying!
And it's not just content. Hey, remember when Yoshi came out and said PF DC travel issues was ONLY a thing that was happening in Japan?
Or, when they released housing lottery, but stuffed up the process, which resulted in some people getting their house and others waiting for weeks for the fix? And remember how some people were able to take their gil out and STILL keep their house? And then, as an apology, they released a housing item that was purchasable for the value of the land? Except it was optional, so most ended up just saying "eh, i'd rather keep my gil, thanks", while those of us who did pay for our house, kept the money on the estate, and had to wait, we didn't get anything at all for compensation?

But yea, Endwalker is FINE cause Heavensward was so much worse. Spare me.

[Nestama]

And then for casual content, its just been dumbed down to the point where even (some? most?) casual players aren't really feeling engaged. Level 90 dungeons are somehow easier than levelling dungeons (I do not like the Octomammoth boss. So boring) and the 24man raids after Aglaia have all just been 24man dungeons. There's no alliance raid mechanics, it's just dodge the slow cast AoE's you've already seen in dungeons and trials.

[Sparrowsong]

Posting without further comment:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUKSe0K8IfE
"The Discourse is Dumb and Endwalker is FINE" on YouTube

EDIT: By..."request", I guess?

A video from Wesk Alber about the state of Endwalker, contrasting with the beloved Heavensward, and the overall relatively recent deluge of content creators and people complaining about Endwalker as the worst expansion ever.

My time is far too important to watch a video about a rant and to give somebody views on YouTube

[Turtledeluxe]

I think it's actually close to impossible that anyone who plays the game often and/or makes videos about it doesn't understand what people mean when they complain about job identity or difficulty. I didn't play during Heavensward so I wasn't familiar with how the combat used to be. But by looking into it and discussing it, I've educated myself and I personally don't think it's the end of the world for people to want some combat elements to return or for their rotations to be adjusted. It's not reasonable to assume that any given person hasn't already explained themselves at some point. I would be tired of mentioning every single detail of my view in every comment and every post if I played the game since Heavensward. In the video the content creator mentions "You must say x for me to get it" but at the same time doesn't flesh out their own views AND gives people 0 credit upfront which just betrays their own lack of communication skills imo because it's obvious when someone is parroting vs caring about an issue or their job.

Just saying or believing everyone is "parroting" comes across as lazy and irrelevant like why even make tne video...to be patronizing?

Like actually if you stop and think about it this user's grand theory about Endwalker is that the complaints about it are just people repeating the original complaint of some Adam of Endwalker complaints..

[Sebazy]

IMO Heavensward was akin to Final Fantasy III/VI whilst Endwalker is akin to Octopath Traveller.

Octopath is objectively the superior game. It's visually leagues ahead, it's better tuned, it's better paced, it has far deeper job kits, it has a whopping amount of side content, it offers the player more freedom right from the title screen.

But yet it it'll never be held in anything like the same regard as FF3/6. It feels comparatively soulless, it's predictable, the story is boring and at times it feels like it's been designed by a spreadsheet algorithm, it's just too formulaic. All the stories follow the same flow, all the paths are a similar length and the freedom of choice quickly evaporates unless you want to get your grinding hat on to overcome the missing exp you need to 'skip' a story.

I imported a copy of FF3 from NA via an importer in Tooting market, it cost me nearly £100 back then and it was worth every single penny. I remember the cool Moogle poster, I remember the wild story and gameplay twists, I remember grinding in the Dinosaur woods to build a Celes with Genji Glove, Offering, Drainer and Atma Sword that could solo pretty much anything. I remember loading out my Terra with the Gem Box and Economiser so that she was similarly devastating.

As for Octopath? I remember switching the trader girl to dancer to feed BP to the mage guy who's name I also can't remember and that's about it. *Edit* oh and the collectors edition stage box was cool. Didn't stop me selling it though.

Likewise, I'll carry memories of HW to my grave. By comparison, EW is utterly forgettable and might as well have been patch 5.6 IMHO.

[Turtledeluxe]

IMO Heavensward was akin to Final Fantasy III/VI whilst Endwalker is akin to Octopath Traveller.

Octopath is objectively the superior game. It's visually leagues ahead, it's better tuned, it's better paced, it has far deeper job kits, it has a whopping amount of side content, it offers the player more freedom right from the title screen.

But yet it it'll never be held in anything like the same regard as FF3/6. It feels comparatively soulless, it's predictable, the story is boring and at times it feels like it's been designed by a spreadsheet algorithm, it's just too formulaic. All the stories follow the same flow, all the paths are a similar length and the freedom of choice quickly evaporates unless you want to get your grinding hat on to overcome the missing exp you need to 'skip' a story.

I imported a copy of FF3 from NA via an importer in Tooting market, it cost me nearly £100 back then and it was worth every single penny. I remember the cool Moogle poster, I remember the wild story and gameplay twists, I remember grinding in the Dinosaur woods to build a Celes with Genji Glove, Offering, Drainer and Atma Sword that could solo pretty much anything. I remember loading out my Terra with the Gem Box and Economiser so that she was similarly devastating.

As for Octopath? I remember switching the trader girl to dancer to feed BP to the mage guy who's name I also can't remember and that's about it. *Edit* oh and the collectors edition stage box was cool. Didn't stop me selling it though.

Likewise, I'll carry memories of HW to my grave. By comparison, EW is utterly forgettable and might as well have been patch 5.6 IMHO.

Meanwhile Fornite broke its own record with a whopping 44m concurrent players by going back to its original map. Bungie is imploding because management will not go back on its ever growing monetization policies that players hate and continue vaulting content. Elden Ring and BG3 earn critical accolades for game design by taking risks and innovating on existing formulas.

Meanwhile XIV and MMOs in general opt to stagnate bc...well I'm not even sure why. The latest SE Financials indicate the MMO segment has continued to decline. Players are so used to seeing sprouts and so used to.expansions knocking it out of the park I am unsure if they will even see it coming when Yoshi P' reckless addiction to raider feedback has sufficiently destroyed jobs and combat for the rest of the player base. People seem very confident 7.0 will reverse trends but I wonder if we will see a hard and fast drop off as with EW and XIV will become a game that is only hype for MSQ and then a wasteland of second lifers. 7.0 needs something that will keep people in through the patch cycle.

Also regarding story I'm very not optimistic. The devs can hint a twist all they want but the unrelatable nature of their beast characters is undeniable with the wooden dialogue and dostracting voice acting. While there are some exceptions to this in media (obviously) and even XIV (Dragons weren't so bad) i am very concerned DawnTrail will be missing a "human" element that will leave players wanting for more.

[RitsukoSonoda]

IMO Heavensward was akin to Final Fantasy III/VI whilst Endwalker is akin to Octopath Traveller.

Octopath is objectively the superior game. It's visually leagues ahead, it's better tuned, it's better paced, it has far deeper job kits, it has a whopping amount of side content, it offers the player more freedom right from the title screen.

But yet it it'll never be held in anything like the same regard as FF3/6. It feels comparatively soulless, it's predictable, the story is boring and at times it feels like it's been designed by a spreadsheet algorithm, it's just too formulaic. All the stories follow the same flow, all the paths are a similar length and the freedom of choice quickly evaporates unless you want to get your grinding hat on to overcome the missing exp you need to 'skip' a story.

I imported a copy of FF3 from NA via an importer in Tooting market, it cost me nearly £100 back then and it was worth every single penny. I remember the cool Moogle poster, I remember the wild story and gameplay twists, I remember grinding in the Dinosaur woods to build a Celes with Genji Glove, Offering, Drainer and Atma Sword that could solo pretty much anything. I remember loading out my Terra with the Gem Box and Economiser so that she was similarly devastating.

As for Octopath? I remember switching the trader girl to dancer to feed BP to the mage guy who's name I also can't remember and that's about it. *Edit* oh and the collectors edition stage box was cool. Didn't stop me selling it though.

Likewise, I'll carry memories of HW to my grave. By comparison, EW is utterly forgettable and might as well have been patch 5.6 IMHO.

One of the issues is that JRPG titles back in the 8 bit and 16 bit era had to draw players with story and depth of gameplay. The genre was nowhere near mainstream as people were obsessed with mario, sonic, streetfighter, mortal kombat, Zelda, etc in the west which resulted in mountains of JRPGs that never left Japan. The 8 bit and 16 bit visuals were good at the time, however were not as potent a draw as now where we have had numerous AAA titles that literally felt like they were made with the the mindset of distract with flash similar to someone jingling keys in front of an infant to amuse them.

FFXIV 1.0 kept with the franchise trend of trying to innovate and change the formula. FFXIV from ARR onward started as cloning WoW then proceeded to gut what little was left of normal RPG mechanics dumbing the gameplay down while trying to distract with a spectacle. FFXV made an attempt to change the franchise formula into a more open world action style that sadly showed their inexperience with that type of game style resulting in it having a lot of wasted potential. FFXVI took to being a Devil May Cry/Bayonetta clone with nearly everything RPG related removed while distracting players with a visual spectacle.

The main franchise has had a history of changes. Granted not all were big hits.
FF1. This actually changed things up from it's at the time Competitor Dragon Quest by having a party of more than 1 character and selectable classes
FF2. Here they decided to make actual characters for the story and changed the character development system to not use EXP which wasn't very well recieved
FF3. Back to exp lvl system. First game to introduce the job system.
FF4. Larger cast of rotating playable characters with set jobs.
FF5. Return to job system with added refinements to it. Introduced the concept of optional superbosses.
FF6. Large cast of rotating to eventually roster selection of playable characters including some which were missable. Featured a story line where the villain actually wins initially leading to the second half of the story being the process of cleaning up your failure. Introduced Magicite using it as a means to teach any character magic. Also set stage for what would eventually become Limit Breaks as characters had special hidden powerful attacks that could happen if fight command was chosen while at critical HP.
FF7. Introduced the Materia system to customize abilities
FF8. Draw/Junction system. Enemies always scaled to your level
FF9. Skill acquisition from equipment.
FF10. Sphere Grid
FF10-2. Garment Grid
FF11. First foray into making an MMORPG
FF12. First foray into a more action based play style. Gambit system introduced to automate gameplay.
FF13, 13-2, 13-3. TBH part of these felt like steps backwards but nothing from these titles really stuck with me.