Sincere Question...No Troll...Has SE Gone Full Regress?!?!

[TheRealMadruck]

I know I’m a few months late to the party. I just returned in November from a two-year hiatus, and after a random conversation with someone while FATE farming, I discovered something truly baffling: The geniuses at Square Enix actually brought back the Atma grind.

If this is the direction they are taking, then by every metric, I firmly believe Square Enix wants their game to fail. I cannot wrap my head around this design philosophy. Why would you take an incredibly unpopular system—one that is hated to this day—and reintroduce it as the core of a new expansion's content?

The "Z" Title is Rare for a Reason
There’s a reason you don’t see everyone rocking the "Z" title or carrying Zodiac Brave weapons. They are some of the rarest glams in the game because nobody wants to do the work. Outside of an exceptionally rare few who enjoy slamming their heads against a wall for the most monotonous, poorly designed grind in Final Fantasy XIV history, the community has always loathed Atma.

I have respect for the "mad lads" who do it, but I’m in complete awe that Yoshi-P and the devs thought this was the "right mind" for the game in 2026.

The Regression: From Bozja to This?
How do we go from Shadowbringers, which gave us amazing content like Bozja and Zadnor, back to 2.0-era mechanics? Bozja has a purpose even today. You can gain experience, level alternate jobs, and engage in a unique ecosystem.
Occult Crescent has zero purpose once you finish your glam weapon. After 7.5 and the launch of 8.0, it will be a almost a ghost town because the leveling system is restricted only to that zone. Why create content that has no viability outside of the current expansion? It’s a massive, uninspired waste of resources.

The "Shadowlands" of FFXIV
There is plenty of criticism regarding the story and voice acting this expansion, but from a purely design perspective, this is the FFXIV equivalent of WoW’s Shadowlands. If you’re in denial, go play Shadowlands for a week. You’ll see exactly why that expansion failed Blizzard, and how Dawntrail is following that same path of bad design. Square Enix needs to wake up and remember what made them popular. They had the largest player count in history by giving us content that worked during Shadowbringers for a reason!

So SE, stop wasting our time with archaic systems and dead-on-arrival zones. I welcome anyone to compare the player counts who still do Bozja/Zadnor versus this new content in when 8.0 drops. The results won't be pretty.

[Ankhira]

I'll agree Occult Crescent is a major step backwards after Bozja, I spent days in Bozja just doing fates, farming Dalriada and such, it was genuinely fun, but regarding the atma grind, people were so up in arms about Endwalker relics being just "Get tomes" they were very vocal that relics SHOULD be a grind, and SE now made the first step a grind and subsequent relics after the first one just tomes.

Is it the right path for relics? Not my place to say, there will always be those who are unhappy with any path, I just hope if we get a new field exploration in 8.0 it'll be better than Occult Crescent. But, I do not think they want their game to fail. I think as always with an MMO, it's just really hard to please everyone.

[TheRealMadruck]

I'll agree Occult Crescent is a major step backwards after Bozja, I spent days in Bozja just doing fates, farming Dalriada and such, it was genuinely fun, but regarding the atma grind, people were so up in arms about Endwalker relics being just "Get tomes" they were very vocal that relics SHOULD be a grind, and SE now made the first step a grind and subsequent relics after the first one just tomes.

Is it the right path for relics? Not my place to say, there will always be those who are unhappy with any path, I just hope if we get a new field exploration in 8.0 it'll be better than Occult Crescent. But, I do not think they want their game to fail. I think as always with an MMO, it's just really hard to please everyone.

I can appreciate your perspective...buts lets take a step back and look at this from a logic of game design...they know when they had the biggest numbers...they know what kept people playing. I agree that EDW relic was to much of a cake walk...yet seeing this going from a cake walk to a brick wall based on pure RNG is pure poison. I remember playing this game for over 13 years now, and the Heavensward and Shadowbringers were both not a cakewalk nor pure gambling. Even if you didn't get the items from Bojza as a example, at least you earned XP, boxes, mounts and things that had utility even to this day. Occult Crescent is the polar opposite of all that. But thank you for the reply and be well!

[Ankhira]

I can appreciate your perspective...buts lets take a step back and look at this from a logic of game design...they know when they had the biggest numbers...they know what kept people playing. I agree that EDW relic was to much of a cake walk...yet seeing this going from a cake walk to a brick wall based on pure RNG is pure poison. I remember playing this game for over 13 years now, and the Heavensward and Shadowbringers were both not a cakewalk nor pure gambling. Even if you didn't get the items from Bojza as a example, at least you earned XP, boxes, mounts and things that had utility even to this day. Occult Crescent is the polar opposite of all that. But thank you for the reply and be well!

I think (purely speculation, though) that the graphical overhaul ended up taking far more resources than the team expected. That’s probably why so much of Dawntrail’s content leans toward battle content like raids and such. And while the battle content has actually been really good even if visually a bit too overwhelming at times, it is the easiest type of content for them to produce. Everything else feels a bit more barebones.

When you look at Occult Crescent, it’s missing all the special systems that Eureka or Bozja have. All it really has is Phantom Jobs which don't really do much. My guess is that the team simply didn’t have the time to build something on the scale of Bozja while also juggling everything else. Like, the engine updates, the new dye system, hat compatibility for two races, fixing the issues introduced by the character overhaul, redoing the entire coding for housing, plus a deep dungeon with new systems on top of it all. Bozja didn’t have to compete with any of that. I think it probably had a less busy team that could focus PURELY on Bozja which is probably why it turned out as well as it did.

As for the RNG in the Atma step, I didn't like it either. RNG never feels good personally. But I can kind of see why they did it. Maybe to stretch out the novelty of the new exploratory zone and make the content feel fuller than it actually is. That’s just speculation on my part though. I will say that Square Enix has a habit of taking feedback and swinging too far in one direction or the other. So I'm not sure what to say about that without knowing where they gather their feedback.

But yeah, that's just how I see it. I hope you stay well too!

[Avenheit]

I'll agree Occult Crescent is a major step backwards after Bozja, I spent days in Bozja just doing fates, farming Dalriada and such, it was genuinely fun, but regarding the atma grind, people were so up in arms about Endwalker relics being just "Get tomes" they were very vocal that relics SHOULD be a grind, and SE now made the first step a grind and subsequent relics after the first one just tomes.

Is it the right path for relics? Not my place to say, there will always be those who are unhappy with any path, I just hope if we get a new field exploration in 8.0 it'll be better than Occult Crescent. But, I do not think they want their game to fail. I think as always with an MMO, it's just really hard to please everyone.

Bozja was a side step of Eureka, and OC was a backstep of the both of em.

I was promised the best of both, and recieved neither.

[Daralii]

Bozja was a side step of Eureka, and OC was a backstep of the both of em.

I was promised the best of both, and recieved neither.

The players in Yoshida's head longed for a return to BA's entry system.

[MayuAmakura]

But, I do not think they want their game to fail. I think as always with an MMO, it's just really hard to please everyone.

Saying "It's really hard to please everyone" is a typical excuse that anyone can make to justify their bad game design. Notoriously more bad when players start defending bad actions altogether. Everyone can be satisfied if only devs were willing to step out of their formula and do something else but no let's put fate grinding system once again because that's the best we can do!

As for the game fall (which is certainly happening)... most companies don't really care. They don't give a flying sardine if you or 1000 others will leave as long as they have whales that will support the game big as a number of 500k users. A few whales are enough to make this game thrive without the need of others. They most certainly won't leave due to: "i spent enough, so i must stay and justify this" mentality.

There is a reason why many games are falling down massively but still get enough money that they simply wonder: "why even try, when low effort is working?" Yeah Exactly this. Devs don't even have to bother fixing anything when a slop is enough to make people stay.

[VeyaAkemi]

The only flaw of the Demi-Atma step is that it devolves into tome grind after the initial quest.

[Underscore]

Nah, relic weapons are supposed to be grindy and hard to get. Zodiac Weapons, at least in the current nerfed state of the grind, are the best relic weapons in the game. Maybe it was bad on release, but now? It's a model that should be emulated.

I was disappointed with Occult Crescent and think the acquisition of demi-Atma there could've been handled better, but there's nothing inherently wrong with Atma itself.

[TheRealMadruck]

Nah, relic weapons are supposed to be grindy and hard to get. Zodiac Weapons, at least in the current nerfed state of the grind, are the best relic weapons in the game. Maybe it was bad on release, but now? It's a model that should be emulated.

I was disappointed with Occult Crescent and think the acquisition of demi-Atma there could've been handled better, but there's nothing inherently wrong with Atma itself.

Then we will have to respectfully disagree. I own every Shadowbringers weapon as I know fully the grind to get these weapons. If I had to chose doing Shadowbringers Relic grind again or the Zodiac Brave, I will chose SHB any day of the week. Both required a grind and commitment, yet I am sorry, the Zodiac Brave weapons should never be emulated again...your opinion I promise is a extreme exception to the general rule! Thank you for the reply.