Why are people settling for an "ARR Tier" story?

[Katt_Felista]

Fight me but, ARR's story was much better.

[DreadCrow]

Because A Realm Reborn is good, actually. It wasn't as strong as what followed but it was essential to world building and I wouldn't have enjoyed what came after as much as I did, if it wasn't for the groundwork that was 2.0. And I say this as someone who went through it before it was shortened.

ARR is really bad and it's like 80% filler, but at least it builds up the actual world and sets up the story. Dawntrail is just horrific and it does NOT do the same thing at all. It is a net negative and it has done nothing but harm the overarching plot of the game. We would be better off of they said "well oops we'll redo it" and rolled the servers back for a year so they could rework it as opposed to keeping it in.

Dawntrail spoilers for the aftermath of the final trail...

I mean considering we have the key to the Golden City, and what that actually entails... There's a lot of ways the story can progress. We have the way to get into other reflections - and a way to merge realities. This means we could explore other worlds. Or fix the Thirteenth, bring our friends back to the First to see people they care for, or one of the remaining Ascions could get it either to continue the legacy of Emet Selch... Or try to use it to shape the world in their own image, because they have a reality warping device. And that's just what I pulled out of my arse, in my over tired mind.

[Gunz_Zbestest]

Fight me but, ARR's story was much better.

The Allagan technology and learning about the true events of the calamity will always be one of the best kept secrets that they built up.
Now my question is, will the Phoenix come back and will it take a different form?

[KadenLag]

I feel like the OP is a misconception of expecting ARR level story. Isolated the story is good, although it has a painfully slow, long start and the story is a reused hash of previous expansions, those are the main issues (excluding the terrible Wuk character etc)
Story is always gonna be a bit subjective, personally i loved Shadowbringer and Endwalker the most by far but I also see ppl who seem to hate it, cant please everyone at this level.
But fundamentally I think reusing the story and pacing, are not subjective, this is why its a bad piece of content.

[KuroTenshi]

It's the same reason people are terrified of some games ever getting competition. People have invested 10s of 1000s of hours into this game in some cases. Those people are TERRIFIED, that the game might actually lose a bit of ground, cuz what if it spirals and then their investment is all lost? What if competition takes the criticism seriously and releases something amazing? So they have to prop it up no matter what, no matter how bad it gets, they've already invested so much they can't lose it now, nothing else matters.

[Gortys]

I'm not finished with the MSQ, but will be today. When they said this was going to be a "vacation" and they were breaking from the previous story completely, I set my expectations low. As of right now I do have aspects of this story I have enjoyed and aspects I'm not happy about and just hoping they clarify before the end. Let's just say certain characters actions (and voice actors) don't add up so far and neither do certain plot elements. I don't see how this can even become a new story arc as YoshiP also suggested.

I've never been able to get through most FF titles and it's because their beginnings are typically slow, boring, and with a ton of exposition that doesn't give me any connection to the characters. To me this story is just a typical FF beginning for now. ARR was a bit better than the FF titles I had trouble completing and better than this.

My biggest disappointment is having these twins with me. I'm seriously tired of them and if this is a new beginning why am I starting off with them again? And they love to compete so why are they even on the same team?
And the WoL being on a "side" doesn't add up to me either. It would have made more sense for the other Scions to be competing with one another while our character, a traveling observer by nature, would possibly go between both camps or even be working for their father. It feels like they broke some character personality traits with a hand wave. I feel the writers for this expansion don't know the Scions that were created by the previous writer and should maybe stay true to them if they want some players to stay on board.

[AlysanneVrannai]

I am going to perish from cringe if I read another post summarizing all criticism of this expansion as "You just want to be the main character" and defending it with "Its a new story" "Its a vacation". Not every single defense is like this, mind you, but I'm going to try to correct this specific type of misapprehension.

The problem is the writing, the cutscene direction, and the overall direction of the MSQ. It genuinely feels like there is no editorial process for some of this stuff. Cutscenes drag for far too long, the exact same dialogue is repeated constantly for several quests in a row. Flashback sequences for things you did one quest ago. Obvious observations are treated as revelations, some more intriguing implications are never addressed where they would have been in prior works from this studio.
If these things don't bother you, that is fine. Good even, I wouldn't begrudge anyone for enjoying things. What I will begrudge you for is invalidating other peoples experiences by misrepresenting them.

Just engage with what people are saying, it really is not hard.

[Hanayumi]

This is a new start, a new saga, as far as im concerned it sets things up perfectly to venture out just about anywhere and introduce anything now. Hate the characters, hate the region, but we've yet to see where this goes...

[Ratikal]

The only hook in Dawntrail was the promise of a "new adventure." Yet, once we get to the new world, we're on a guided tour through things we haven't had a chance to see or try to care about. I don't know about you guys, but when I tour a country, I look for cool things and then learn the lore later. Instead, this feels like a guided tour through North Korea where I can only see what I'm told to see. This is evident in the MSQ where big areas in zones are not even TOUCHED or mentioned during.

The hook in Shadowbringers was you were transported into a world filled with light. Within 2 minutes, you meet a local talking about how its the dead of night, and he slowly alludes "they" got to you. Even if you did not watch any cutscene prior, instantly you are asking yourself, "what happened? who are 'they'? what could they have done to me?" It did more "world-building" in 5 minutes than Dawntrail can accomplish in its introductory 3 hours. Not only that, it made me care to figure out why by not giving me all the answers right away.

The hook in Endwalker relied more heavily on the trailer and events preceding it. Still, it was enough to keep you going to see what happened next and deal with that pointless Old Sharaylan immigration scene. Seriously, what kind of world-building is that? Do we really need to know those details?

[Gortys]

I am going to perish from cringe if I read another post summarizing all criticism of this expansion as "You just want to be the main character" and defending it with "Its a new story" "Its a vacation". Not every single defense is like this, mind you, but I'm going to try to correct this specific type of misapprehension.


Just engage with what people are saying, it really is not hard.

Not sure if my post was why you posted this, but everyone is going to have a different issue and what bothers one will not bother someone else. Engaging with what others are saying doesn't mean agreeing with them. And some are going to love this as a "new adventure". That's fine. But this doesn't really feel like a vacation to me since I'm still babysitting these twins and I'm working for this person who wants to be a ruler.

As for the "a vacation" line? I genuinely took that from YoshiP as saying this expansion will be much lighter than previous which is why I lowered my expectations to like ARR level. I took it to mean a major departure which is why the twins being with me is disappointing. Unfortunately this doesn't seem quite ARR level - it feels like the stories that lead up to alliance raids. All of my other story issues were posted previously.