I prefer when FF14 creates its own stories. I like seeing inspiration pulled from past games, but I more prefer seeing it in the form of random enemies or bosses from past games being utilized or subtle references. I think Eden did things fine with it mostly just utilizing FF8's music but doing its own thing. Having Eden summon random characters to fight runs into similar issues I had with Omega.

Post-Endwalker's story relied too hard on FF4 references in my opinion. While it did try to make its own story out of it, it felt like they were trying to just shove in too many references in towards the end so it didn't stand well on its own. At the end it was all "You defeated Golbez and won the day but here's Zeromus because there has to be Zeromus because he was the final fight of FF4."

The Omega raid series also felt like it was trying too hard to reference old games, especially with it using Exdeath, Kefka, and Chaos without much context to who they're supposed to be.

Crystal Tower and Ivalice content were incorporated into the game's lore much better in my opinion, especially since they branched out into their own things without relying too heavily on the games they're based on. The Crystal Tower itself is a huge part of the story and past events with the Allagans, and Bozja built upon Ivalice.

Also, Nier just felt completely out of place and seemed to only exist so that 2B and friends can fill the quota of being a cameo in every single SE game, except instead of being a short event similar to Lightning's or Noctis', it took up an entire Alliance Raid series.