Quote Originally Posted by RaideDuku View Post
They used to make events much longer and needed more work to get the rewards. People complained that it took too long. Made it too hard to get everything, especially if they wanted to get the stuff on multiple characters. Some people didn't give a jack about the story, and just wanted to get the stuff and be done.
So they made events shorter. If people are going to complain either way, might as well pick the option that takes less time and resources.

I'm trying to recall what events took noticeably longer than what we have now, all the way back to events like Lightning Strikes and the Dragon Quest X one back in 2014, and I'm drawing a blank. I suppose the FATEs gave them a bit of extra fluff but the story bits themselves were much the same.