When I was a new player, I remember walking through the South Shroud at a low level, trying to go between the Black Shroud and Thanalan without spending gil on an airship, and trying (mostly failing) to sneak around monsters that were a much higher level than me. It was a formative sprout experience. Having the freedom to choose where I wanted to go and to experience things that may or may not have been "intended" was fun. Being blocked off from every area until the area is required to progress the MSQ is...less fun.

They could stand to make destinations and interesting land features a bit more densely-packed, too. Trying to "explore" anything in expansion zones (especially Endwalker zones) is mostly just auto-running across a featureless plane, in the general direction of your nearest aether current, until you collide with an impassable chasm or rock wall that didn't show up on your map, and you realize that the other half of the zone is still locked by MSQ progress.

I liked ARR-style zone design and exploration.