As someone who loved it, why I think Dawntrail didn't work for everyone [Spoilers]

[Cilia]

And I'm curious, how do you feel about the Garlean Empire? Especially in relation to Archadia from XII, but also Vector in VI to a degree. Because I actually think they're even more derivative than Alexandria; Alexandria took a half-dozen pieces from IX and remixed them to the point where even you're saying they combined the secondary hero and secondary villain into one character. Meanwhile, the Garlean Empire is just... another 'Rome but with mechs' evil empire, that goes down the same story those always do.

Totes truthsies? I never finished VI or XII, so I don't have the necessary nostalgia needed to properly appreciate the Garlean Empire. That said, I never really cared for them beyond as a starter villain in A Realm Reborn; they're very clichéd imperialistic villains, outside of supposed concern for the environment (that they despoil by way of ceruleum extraction and refinement, in addition to exacerbating the primal problem).

For the record, I've never been fond of importing characters or grafting locations from previous games into XIV. The standout example is the Return to Ivalice raids and accompanying characters, which I emphatically did not like. Also I do like IX (even if it has some serious flaws), but that doesn't mean the second half of Dawntrail isn't derivative of it (though not necessarily bad) and by extension predictable.

[Lyth]

I think Garlemald was wasted potential. The concept of an 'corrupt empire' isn't really unique to any specific Final Fantasy game. But it does generate a bit of mystique. Your starter cities are designed around classical medieval fantasy settings, but you're fighting against a technologically superior foe with steampunk airships and mecha. It makes you wonder what life is like on the other side, much like the closed gate at the Steps of Faith did for Ishgard. I remember one of the biggest reactions during the Stormblood trailer reveals at the Frankfurt FanFest was seeing Garlemald on the map as the camera panned across to Doma.

The lead in from late Stormblood to Shadowbringers is partially to blame for Garlemald's lack of utilization, because Varis was revealed to be a puppet and then the focus shifted entirely on to Amaurot's super-empire. It's not really surprising that Garlemald didn't play a significant part afterwards, but the visual shorthand that we got of the place was fairly anticlimactic. You have a city that takes up more space on the world map than S9, and yet it's a single motorway, a single tube station, and a semi-circle of collapsed buildings occupying a quarter of a single zone. It makes you wonder why the Eorzeans were having so much trouble with them in the first place.

I really love S9 visually (and want all of their stuff as housing items). I'm not really sold on the Alexandria references, though. FFIX was intended as a return to 'classical Final Fantasy' after the more futuristic elements of FFVII and FFVIII, so it's a weird reference for the setting from the outset, compared to the likes of say, Esthar. I know they threw in some destroyed and flooded buildings out in Heritage Found, but it still feels a bit jarring. Likewise, the character expys don't seem like they have any association with their counterparts on a personality level. The word 'homage' implies paying reverence, but these references are so divested from the originals that you lose their associated values. It ends up feeling like desecration rather than reverence.

I also think that a big difference between Garlemald and Alexandria is that we weren't really given time to fear the latter. One cutscene the Alexandrians show up with futuristic technology and it's a one-sided slaughter. The next cutscene everyone is oneshotting them to a musical number. But that's also a consequence of introducing a supposedly unstoppable enemy and then resolving the conflict in half of a MSQ.

As an aside, the reason why Vector and Arcadia were memorable was because you actually get to see what it's like inside of the enemy city and snoop around. It's actually such a compelling concept that I think they could do an entire expansion involving a single city and its environs, if they gave it adequate scale and give players the sense that they're not really allowed to be in there (Eulmore somewhat did this, but I'm talking on a bigger scale). At the very least, give me two zones for the city, an Arcadian passcard system to unlock more areas as the MSQ progresses, and explorable sewers as a combat zone. I'm hoping that they do something fun like this whenever they get around to Corvos. I think a properly developed Corvosi expansion, complete with intrigue and with appropriate tie-ins to Ivalician lore, will probably be the ace in Yoshi-p's sleeve for when they need to make a big impact on an expansion release.

[Cleretic]

Totes truthsies? I never finished VI or XII, so I don't have the necessary nostalgia needed to properly appreciate the Garlean Empire. That said, I never really cared for them beyond as a starter villain in A Realm Reborn; they're very clichéd imperialistic villains, outside of supposed concern for the environment (that they despoil by way of ceruleum extraction and refinement, in addition to exacerbating the primal problem).

For the record, I've never been fond of importing characters or grafting locations from previous games into XIV. The standout example is the Return to Ivalice raids and accompanying characters, which I emphatically did not like. Also I do like IX (even if it has some serious flaws), but that doesn't mean the second half of Dawntrail isn't derivative of it (though not necessarily bad) and by extension predictable.

Then honestly, I think what's letting you down here isn't that they were more blatant about the references and homages: it's that this time you recognized the references and homages, and you prefer when you can't.

[Cilia]

Then honestly, I think what's letting you down here isn't that they were more blatant about the references and homages: it's that this time you recognized the references and homages, and you prefer when you can't.

What's letting me down is lifting the plot of IX with a few elements shuffled around and replaying it. IX Terra and XIV Alexandra are almost point for point the same thing with the same story and similar themes.

It's the same problem I have with the Endwalker patch storyline, it takes so many elements from what it's referencing and paying homage to it's (almost) not its own story.

[royox]

MSQ from lvl90 to 96 being just walking around areas talking 1000 times with Wuk Lamat and just being dropped tons of lore and traditions of uninteresting tribes is what killed it for me. The competition part sounded fun at first, lets do this 8 tasks before the others with some healthy or unhealthy competition. That sounds fun.

This competition being just 70 quests one after the other of "speak with Wuk Lamat, see how she gets all the info, go next spot and speak again with Wuk Lamat to see how she gets all the info" was an absolute borefest.

Then we leave Wuk Lamat in her city, go to an adventure with Erenville and OH BOY the MSQ skyrokets. Yeah...but after BORING me for +20 hours like no game in my life bored me.

[Carin-Eri]

But this seemed to take a step back once again in Dawntrail unfortuantely... way too often it felt like my character should step in and help, and didn't. The game constantly suggested that I could step in, and trivialize things, but I just don't. There's times we literally let people just walk away when we could attack them immediately and potentially solve a lot of issues.

This actually ended up being my biggest bugbear in the story.

Because the ONE time we did step into the limelight and were presented as the only one able to stand against the threat - the 'Queen Eternal' fight - and that was taken away from us too!

As said in another thread, it was pretty hypocritical for the dialogue at the start of said trial to identify us as "the single greatest threat" only to contradict that by having Wuk Lamat appear midway and present us with a completely unnecessary 'here I come to save the day!' moment. It was redundant - we were winning the fight, her talk with Sphene didn't actually achieve anything, and shoehorning her into the fight killed the atmosphere of it.
This was the one moment where we were the Warrior of Light (rather than Adventurer) again - but the way it played out left a bad taste in my mouth.

[Nothv13]

MSQ from lvl90 to 96 being just walking around areas talking 1000 times with Wuk Lamat and just being dropped tons of lore and traditions of uninteresting tribes is what killed it for me. The competition part sounded fun at first, lets do this 8 tasks before the others with some healthy or unhealthy competition. That sounds fun.

This competition being just 70 quests one after the other of "speak with Wuk Lamat, see how she gets all the info, go next spot and speak again with Wuk Lamat to see how she gets all the info" was an absolute borefest.

Then we leave Wuk Lamat in her city, go to an adventure with Erenville and OH BOY the MSQ skyrokets. Yeah...but after BORING me for +20 hours like no game in my life bored me.

Don't forget, that "adventure" without Wuk, still ends up focusing on Wuk instead of the character you are adventuring with and then after a brief non Wuk less than half a zone, Wuk is immediately back as the focus. and the "Talk to Wuk Lamat" quests resume.

[thegreatonemal]

What's letting me down is lifting the plot of IX with a few elements shuffled around and replaying it. IX Terra and XIV Alexandra are almost point for point the same thing with the same story and similar themes.

It's the same problem I have with the Endwalker patch storyline, it takes so many elements from what it's referencing and paying homage to it's (almost) not its own story.

Were you like this for shadowbringers? Emet and the gang are just Garland's angels of death all working towards the goal of reviving Terra. Endwalker makes it even more blatant by giving us Necron in the form of Metetion.

[Raoul9753]

They were really betting ALOT of the expansion on us loving their new Character Wuk Lamat. And I dont mean like, I mean fall madly in love with her right away.
I cant explain the decisions they made any other way. They must have thought "Everyone will fall head over heels for her, and they will love her so much, that they cant bare to be appart from her for even a moment!"

We didnt even get the final Trial for ourself, I guess those 10 Minutes were all they though we could bare without our precious Wuk Lamat... That was honestly my breaking point. If there werent other people relying on me in the Trial, I would have turned of the game right there.

I want to make it clear: I have a problem with the Character, not the VA. I like Wuk Lamats concept, but they really destroyed most goodwill to her pretty fast. She is annyoing, there is no way around it. And I actually agree with the points she is making in the Story, I love how her goal is to learn more about the people and make sure they can all live in peace, but holy hell did they have to make her repeat it EVERY TEN SECONDS?
And no moment in the Story was allowed to sit and take effect, before they made Wuk Lamat go "well, lets make it about MY feelings!"

On Paper, I loved the Story. But that one Character can ruin it so hard is amazing.

Going away from Wuk Lamat, I would have liked some more gameplay thats not just talk to people. There were so many Cutscenes where I was almost begging for a Solo Duty to start, so that I could do SOMETHING in the story thats not just looking angry at someone whos just killing people right in front of me.
I hope Square realises this with how negativly this expansion was taken, and tries to improve, but I honestly doubt it.

[Cleretic]

They were really betting ALOT of the expansion on us loving their new Character Wuk Lamat. And I dont mean like, I mean fall madly in love with her right away.
I cant explain the decisions they made any other way. They must have thought "Everyone will fall head over heels for her, and they will love her so much, that they cant bare to be appart from her for even a moment!"

Replace 'Wuk Lamat' with 'Emet-Selch' and this is just Shadowbringers. Replace her with Lyse (for a certain value of 'new') and it's Stormblood. Replace her with Estinien and it's Heavensward.

They actually base expansions on a central character's journey and story most of the time; Endwalker was the exception, and Shadowbringers only wavered in what that character's role was. And yeah, as someone who didn't like that central character for one of those expansions, it does suck to be left out of that party! It doesn't make it a bad story, it just makes it a story you don't like.