FFXIV population decline continues

[Shurrikhan]

Dragonflying seems fun, but the story is the same. Just because its better than Shadowlands doesnt mean its quality. Buttonbloat is probably still a thing no doubt.

The lore, worldbuilding and story was destroyed though. So I have no reason to go back. FFXIV is doing its best to nuke all of those too in their end.

I mean, has WoW ever had anything particularly approaching an MSQ outside of the expansion- and zone-introduction quests? Even in the few cases they've existed, they've only ever really been a way to give bonus exp for familiarizing yourself with the open world that quickly becomes irrelevant. Sidequests simply take the place of FATEs since each job is on a separate character and therefore has the full bank of sidequests available again.

Meanwhile, button-bloat there is nothing compared to here (see our rigid "combos"). It's limited mostly to 1-hr buffs that, yes, may as well be auras (persisting for 1 hr)... if not for how much some like buffing every stranger they come across for that bit of extra social element. Apart from that, they just have more for-fun utility actions that you don't need to put on your hotbars at all if you don't want to bother with the open world (Eyes of the Beast, Eagle Eye, etc.).

Lore and worldbuilding are likewise the same as ever. Each expansion quickly devalued the one before it as the ultimate big bad then became a steppingstone for something new but not necessarily any more threatening per lore than the one before. As per... virtually every MMO, so I'm not sure why that'd be uniquely "destroyed".

/shrug

[Hallarem]

I mean, has WoW ever had anything particularly approaching an MSQ outside of the expansion- and zone-introduction quests? Even in the few cases they've existed, they've only ever really been a way to give bonus exp for familiarizing yourself with the open world that quickly becomes irrelevant. Sidequests simply take the place of FATEs since each job is on a separate character and therefore has the full bank of sidequests available again.

Meanwhile, button-bloat there is nothing compared to here (see our rigid "combos"). It's limited mostly to 1-hr buffs that, yes, may as well be auras (persisting for 1 hr)... if not for how much some like buffing every stranger they come across for that bit of extra social element. Apart from that, they just have more for-fun utility actions that you don't need to put on your hotbars at all if you don't want to bother with the open world (Eyes of the Beast, Eagle Eye, etc.).

Lore and worldbuilding are likewise the same as ever. Each expansion quickly devalued the one before it as the ultimate big bad then became a steppingstone for something new but not necessarily any more threatening per lore than the one before. As per... virtually every MMO, so I'm not sure why that'd be uniquely "destroyed".

/shrug

In WoW I mean in a sense of the less they touched it, the better it was. Aside from emotional cutscenes they mastered, much like all the Overwatch stuff, but like those they never really lead into anything. I think in terms of cinematics I was most offended by the Dawntrail one. It was like this weird unearned victory lap with their boomer band playing on the backround. They should keep the primals as a memeband in game and out of game in events, not IN THE GAME. I mean hot take, but I mean it devalues the whole story, it's like inserting Hildibrand in MSQ it robs all seriousness out of it.
WoW will always have superior gameplay until FFXIV gets some class identity, opens up their world and dungeons. But I doubt it will happen.

WoW still is the reigning champion of retcons, lore inconsistency and worldbuilding destruction compared to FFXIV, but it's going towards the end of happy happy joy joy and insert whatever the devs feel like is cool instead of respecting their older worldbuilding and storyline in FFXIV.