The slow decline of FFXIV, a summary.

[Doki]

It's just playing it super safe and not doing anything really new. Of course it's going to get stale. There's only so many times you can reskin the same enemy model taken from older games. Only so many times you can reskin map dungeons, reskin Eureka\Bozja same-but-different, and reskin Diadem\Ishguard Restoration. If\When Criterion makes a return, there will be 12 reskined paths.

[Mikey_R]

It's just playing it super safe and not doing anything really new. Of course it's going to get stale.

The problem is, when they do try something new, people complain that it isn't what they wanted. Take island Sanctuary for example. Whether it was because people had higher hopes for it, or it was marketed as something it wasn't, doesn't matter as much as the fact it just didn't hit. Even if it wasn't exactly what was marketed, if it was still fun, it would have been a success.

However, if something doesn't land, what do people ask for? The old stuff back. We should have got an Exploration zone rather than Island sanctuary. Relics were just glorified tome weapons, etc. Can you really blame the devs for going back to older ideas and changing them, knowing that, chances are, it will be successful.