Synodic Scribe's "The Steady Change in Writing..." Video

[Red-thunder]

Well then I hope we return to the WoL moving the world, because he certainly felt like a brainless blunt instrument in much of DT.

He has been a brainless blunt instrument since ARR let's be real.

It wouldn't be so bad if the world didn't revolve around the WoL. But they simultaneously try to make everything depend on the WoL while making him a mute vessel. It's atrocious writing.

[Gwenkatsu]

you are on a boat, you fight two head man and everyone else has a much better vacation than you because you have to babysit an idiot.

This made me laugh out lout, in fact it's the best DT summary I've seen so far.

[JohnLakeside]

Here's my controversial take as someone midway through EW. ARR (despite its weak main narrative) through Stormblood felt like playing inside an amazing fantasy novel. I genuinely think Stormblood gave us a bona fide masterclass in handling themes of imperialism and nationhood.

I also believe ARR through Stormblood is the real 'trilogy' of the Hydaelyn saga, despite most people considering it to be Stormblood through EW. But to be fair, I haven’t finished EW yet.

Anyway, starting with Shadowbringers, the writing became so focused on plotplotplot and big reveals that it just started to feel like… well, a video game (whoa). But seriously, somewhere along the line, the writers stopped caring about giving the people and world of FFXIV sociological depth.

[Valence]

He has been a brainless blunt instrument since ARR let's be real.

It wouldn't be so bad if the world didn't revolve around the WoL. But they simultaneously try to make everything depend on the WoL while making him a mute vessel. It's atrocious writing.

Adding to this, a lot of people do not remember how the story felt until ShB showed up because they started playing after.
Before SHB happened, the WoL was the blandest, derplandest character ever made. It was so much designed so that and I quote "every player could insert themselves in its skin and identify as the main protagonist" that it was literally a blank cardboard that was just doing chores for the scions. The WoL had no story, no personality, no voice, nothing. It was just there, as Yoko Taro said, exercising its neck muscles toned by a lifetime of nodding. ShB has been the first time where they put the spotlight over the actual story of the WoL and started inserting it into the overarching plot, but before this? There was no Azem, there was nothing. The spotlight has never been on the WoL before except when a primal needed be killed, let's be real.

[Mondschnee]

Thanks for highlighting this topic here as well. It's a very good video. The only thing I personally disagree with him is that imo the SHB marketing was still fine, not too far fetched since you could still argue you bring the shadow back to a land that has been flooded with light, but it might have introduced the trend, yeah...

[JohnLakeside]

Adding to this, a lot of people do not remember how the story felt until ShB showed up because they started playing after.
Before SHB happened, the WoL was the blandest, derplandest character ever made. It was so much designed so that and I quote "every player could insert themselves in its skin and identify as the main protagonist" that it was literally a blank cardboard that was just doing chores for the scions. The WoL had no story, no personality, no voice, nothing. It was just there, as Yoko Taro said, exercising its neck muscles toned by a lifetime of nodding. ShB has been the first time where they put the spotlight over the actual story of the WoL and started inserting it into the overarching plot, but before this? There was no Azem, there was nothing. The spotlight has never been on the WoL before except when a primal needed be killed, let's be real.

I preferred it when the WoL wasn’t such a focal point. I think of it like a book because, in a book, you—the reader—aren’t the main character. In fact, you’re not a character at all. That’s one of the reasons ARR through SB felt so much like a novel—except instead of reading it, we were playing it. I had never experienced anything as immersive as that in all my years of media consumption. Great times.

[Valence]

I preferred it when the WoL wasn’t such a focal point. I think of it like a book because, in a book, you—the reader—aren’t the main character. In fact, you’re not a character at all. That’s one of the reasons ARR through SB felt so much like a novel—except instead of reading it, we were playing it. I had never experienced anything as immersive as that in all my years of media consumption. Great times.

I do not mind this necessarily, but the main problem I had was that the only side that had actual development tended to be the side of the villains, where the scions especially weren't much better off than the WoL for the simple reason that 1) they're walking tropes and line in animes everything they do is informed by their primary trope and 2) the character never or rarely actually focuses on anything more personal than "laser focus on the main story threat of the moment". The world building has been stellar and that's what turned me into a huge loremonger back in the day when I started playing, but the narration and writing? The language mastery is great, but the writing is dry and feels detached from portraying actual human beings instead of poster heroes.

[CuteBucket]

I'm not familiar with this youtuber, but I mostly agree with what he had to say here. Full disclosure, I absolutely loved Shadowbringers and it remains my favorite expansion and story. However, I can agree with Synodic Scribe in that because it was so well received, they just keep trying to recreate elements of of that expansion over and over in this very clumsy way that fails to understand *why* ShB worked in the first place.

One of the most magical moments in this game for me was getting to The Tempest and seeing the reveal of Amaurot. It's one of those moments that has stuck with me all these years in a way no other part of the game had. Watching recordings of people playing through the game online shows that this is a pretty common experience. But you don't see that same reaction from people for seeing Ultima Thule or Living Memory. Why?

The reveal of who the Ascians really are, the tragedy they faced, and why they did what they did to try and right that wrong and bring justice to their people, had three previous expansions of slow build-up. Even in Stormblood, a relatively low Ascian expansion, you still get the feeling that they are somehow involved in what is happening, working in the shadows, for reasons we then could not fathom. We didn't need each of the previous expansions to focus on them--it was enough that we saw fleeting glimpses of them here and there, building that tension, setting the stage, so when we finally, after hundreds of hours of gameplay, get to Amaurot, we're hit like Frank Reynolds crying in the theater and saying "Oh my God. I get it."

As much as I thought the story of Hermes and Meteion was an interesting one, it doesn't get this time or build-up barely at all. I wanted to be so much more invested in those characters and their story, but I just can't be, because Endwalker was so clearly supposed to be two expansion that got squashed into one and barely has any room to breath, and its patches have nothing to do with it and just go do their own copy-paste FFIV references. Which would have been fine as a side story like the Sorrows of Werlyt, but apparently we don't get stand alone trial series stories anymore.

Do I even have to go into why Living Memory and Sphene completely failed to hit emotionally for many players again? Just look in any story discussion area on these forums or elsewhere. That was even less build up than Hermes and Meteion! At least those two were tied to the Final Days, which had been talked about in ShB. Living Memory and Sphene *come crashing into the story out of nowhere in the most literal sense possible.* No foreshadowing, no years of hints and rumors, just another Villain of the Week with no ties to anything or anyone to show up and cause trouble and then get whooped with the Power of Friendship until they're not a problem anymore and they say sorry. Ugh. People say to judge DT more like ARR as they are both setting up new stories, but at least ARR had fun and interesting world building and mystery it set up, whereas DT made some of the most boring characters and shallow lore I've had the displeasure of interacting with in a video game.

[Valence]

Perhaps tangentially only, but if one takes a look at the first 2 areas of each expansion, there is a clear pattern of struggle and a consistent failure into makign those actually valuable to the story as a whole, and only in ShB do they fully work out. For instance:

- HW: The Sea of Clouds is literally filler content and could be completely removed from the msq that it wouldn't change anything, you just go there to save abducted knight templars by the vundu, and later goes back there to just checkmark the second required primal/trial for the story. The peak you get of Varis and the new garlean dreadnought could have been placed anywhere else. Meanwhile the Western Coerthas arc is extremely sparse and just has the WoL go investigate an abandoned barn and find iceheart cultists. The only moment that actually brings to the story is the long talk with iceheart later about going on a journey to learn more of the dragonsong story. Those two areas as such a chore after the huge hype the player goes through when first stepping into Ishgard...

- SB: this expansion does it a little better in that regard, and probably is one of the least egregious ones. The initial hype being built leading to that expansion culminates with the start of a potentially terrifying war and the WoL ends up in castrum oriens past the wall to continue right where we left. The Fringes area does the job by making the player go through war skirmishes, but kinda drops the ball because nothing of real story value actually happens, which makes me think they had the right idea but a poor execution. The Peaks however is one of the best first areas they've done and I'll stand by my words here. This area alone literally defines what SB would be about (or should have been about in a clearer way), which is how things aren't black and white when it comes to foreign occupation, how an oppressed people will not just rise against their oppressors at the snap of a finger, what are the stakes, and also how some of the local population can be literally made into awful collaborators (like the crania lupi, cf the tribute collector scene which condenses everything this area has to bring in themes and exposition).

- SHB: the two first areas of this expansion are actually a masterpiece of what the first areas should be doing: each of them clearly defines and exposes the outlines and fundamentals of this new world the player is exploring. ShB has the peculiarity of sending the player into a whole, brand new and unknown world and as a result has to set the basis very fast and efficiently to catch the player's attention and make them want to get more of it. Amh Araeng literally sets the tone with what the flood of light does to the First's inhabitants and societies, with a shock factor: the whole area has purpose and builds up in a very gloomy tone until the player is uneasy enough that dropping that bomb on them leads to the desired result. As for Eulmore, unease just slowly creeps in the same manner as the player discovers more and more about the politics and how a society comes to live in a world that's about to end. Those two areas have purpose, and very little filler if not at all.

- EW: EW goes back to the failings of previous expansions in my opinion there. The first area is Thavnair and its only purpose of being here is because we have always wanted to see Thavnair, that's about it (and I appreciate it), but it doesn't serve the story much. Sure, it introduces Vltra to us, but that's about it. The whole story in Thavnair is a lot of filler that could be cut and not much would be lost (until the second part later with Vanaspaghetti that DOES serve a purpose). And then you have Labyrinthos that again, serves literally no purpose by having the player see that Sharlayan is having deep secrets to cover, but the only moment it actually starts serving the story is the second part. Just mentioning or hinting at sharlayan having a secret area 51 didn't exactly need a full half first area dedicated to it where the only peak ends up being alitoad and alphitoad...

- DT: this expansion is a bit peculiar since... The whole first part of the msq (first 3 areas) all work very differently here, so... I guess it goes out of the mold by necessity. DT's first areas aren't problematic for the same reasons, they're just part of a problematic whole.

I wish they could really go back to ensure that those first 2 areas of each expansion actually are there to catch the player's interest and keep them engaged for the actual meat of the story to come, like shb managed to do so well.

[Mondschnee]

I preferred it when the WoL wasn’t such a focal point. I think of it like a book because, in a book, you—the reader—aren’t the main character. In fact, you’re not a character at all. That’s one of the reasons ARR through SB felt so much like a novel—except instead of reading it, we were playing it. I had never experienced anything as immersive as that in all my years of media consumption. Great times.

That's interesting. For me it was the opposite. I only really started being truly invested in the game in SHB.
Now mind you, I don't think the WoL has to be the focus all the time (in fact I'd argue in EW we weren't the focus most of the time), but I want the WoL to feel like a part of the story. Ishikawa always did this really well imo. Making the player feel included in a way, something that was lacking for me until SHB and EW. Since I made my WoL an OC with backstory and all, I prefer it that way, and the Azem lore is one of the most interesting parts for me.

In DT I was often wondering why my WoL is even there, but that's a sentiment a lot of people share.