I'll just say this, I was not annoyed by the escort quests in this game at all. In fact, I went out of my way to find all the blue circles so I could make sure I got all the dialogue options. I really enjoyed that. What I did _not_ enjoy were the stalking quests, where I had to follow someone. Those were supremely annoying. Fortunately they were few.
Stalking Urianger as he walks all of 20 feet up a straight path was really terrible, but getting caught by him ended up making it seem like he knew you were still there and was just humouring you, and that was kind of amazing
I wrote basically a whole essay, but oh boy it wasn't worth it so some pared down points: -In the common vernacular of video games (and *especially* MMOs) "escort quest" means something specific, and the quests where scions follow us are are not it. If you did not like them, that's totally fine, but you cannot place the general distaste that gaming communities have for "escort quests" on them, because they are not those. -Tempering has been de-fanged as a supreme threat since Shadowbringers 5.4 when we confirmed we have a cure for it. The anti-temper scales are an extension of this. -The loporrit stuff post-Zodiark was obviously a narrative breather. It gives the audience time to catch their breath after the grim and dark of the Garlemald story and before we jump into more heavy stuff again with the Final Days in Thavnair. -It's weird to hear you say that writers should never, ever use time travel as a plot point in story that is not based on it because it is never handled well and creates a plethora of plot holes in the same video where you talk about how you loved Shadowbringers... which had a time travel plot point in a story that otherwise had nothing to do with it. The Exarch traveled through time to change history. -If you felt the spaceship came out of nowhere, fine, but I would issue a reminder that the Sharlayans have not only been working on facilitating the exodus to the moon for 270 years, but that they are also known for their accumulation of knowledge in a world where the insanely advanced technologies of the Allagans exist *and* have been in contact with the loporrits (who themselves have been preparing for interstellar travel for thousands of years with their own technology). -I was also not the hugest fan of Meteion, but I acknowledge that, as a villain, she was less an *actual* villain and more a face and voice for the concept of despair until we get the reveal of the Endsinger, who then immediately became the new face/voice of the true villain, despair.
Controversial, but that's exactly how I felt bout the story. Plot points that were set up to only to be wasted in one quest etc. I wish they did more with Zenos taking over your body, like what he took a long ass walk just to scare your buddies for a little. The end days only appearing in the new areas, with no real stakes involved except for maybe that elephant guy you saved almost turning into a blasphemy. End area where everyone "sacrifices" themselves only to pop back at the press of a button. Like I expected better storytelling from square but they have this record of making things odd in the final chapter from their other games so.. That's that I suppose
Alright a very long one, But I would like to first say Thank you for the video, I appreciate your critical take on the story, but I reckon you are marking the story way past what an MMO story can afford to do. Escort Quests: You are looking it from an MMO Player POV, RPG games have plenty of it, FFXIV is RPG first MMO second. Furthermore the escort quests aren't mainly battle and protect escorts, it gives more lore. At the same time, you states that you like lore but lament the fact that the escort system doesn't allow easy story skip? I would say most FFXIV players who did not boost, and played all the way to Endwalker would welcome more time spent with their fav characters and more lore. Shdowbrings was a world dying, whereas in Endwalker we barely even left (time flows different in the first), makes sense that it felt like any other day, most of its inhabitans are still in the dark with what is about to transpire. The towers, Garleans, Tempered People wreaking havoc, and what not is LITERALLY part of everyday life in Eorzea the live in constant danger knowing that their End is certain, one new tower on the corner of the eye just means one new threat, whats next? The towers are Aether wells and thats all. I can agree that those massive towers are only really used as plot devices and thrown away once we went past Anima. Well ...... I don't think this is really that big of a deal, not like there are anything unresolved there. Short it may be, but the towers did their job. In regards to the part where Alphinaud's interaction with the Garleans, I can agree that it isn't the best. But it is not like they can do it any other way, not like they have an open link shell or pearl channel with the Garleans, it is a "we must go now, I am sure they are happy to receive help" mindset. Anima and Magus Sisters, can agree, wish they were trials or raids, who knows maybe they will be a hard mode later. Zodiark being the first Trial, there are only 3 Trials, you gotta fit him in somewhere. Also I assume that they did it like this to make you go "WTF Zodiark is the FIRST TRIAL? WHOS THE OTHER TWO?" Loporrits, its the downtime for the story, you literally just fought Zodiark. Also if you keep pushing the Zodiark Story back you aren't going to fight a Trial until like 15 hours in. The story is about 6~8 hours in at this point. Yes you want Anime to be a Trial, but from what I can see, the trial bosses in each Expansion has a theme, this one seems to be the First and Oldest Primal Forces, Anima would stick out like a sore thumb along side here, or its going to be a massive re shuffle of the story. I am with you on the time travel and Memory device, I especially hated that McGuffin memory erasure hack. But we get to see Emet Selch and Hydelyn so I forgive them. Also the fact that you are viewing the story as a story piece that needs to be more than an MMO story shows that you already see it as not an MMO story. Please take a step back and see that this is in the end an MMO so it needs to produce enough content to allow the players to "BE" in, so of course they need to shoehorn something in from time to time. Ixall Air ship to Intergalactic Space Ship. The truth about space travel is that Energy is the biggest and only problem, the Ixall don't have the mother crystal. Also the Sharlyans Hoarded all the tech and are isolationists. Another analogy is, we have in America space ships that can carry ppl to the moon, but in Africa, some part of Indonesia and Amazon, some tribes still thought that Airplanes are dragons and white people are demons. Atomos/Meteion, We caused the End of Days? I think you compartmentalized the story too much here on your critic, you wish that WE where the caused for the end of days, but that doesn't work well with the Ascians plotline which means a full rewrite. I can agree with Meteion being introduced a bit late and abrupt, but the very concept of "Hear Feel Think" was already hinted from ARR with the song "Answers" which becomes a "Revelation" to the meaning of the lyrics of those song.
> I am with you on the time travel and Memory device [ Spoilerish ] . . . . . Well, the player needed to learn of the source of the conflict. It wasn't the greatest thing in the world, but using the characters they already had for moving the plot along, the Memory Erasure was the only way to ensure the timeline. Why Emet wouldn't have recognized you on the First. Before I got to the end of Elpis, my mind initially went to the Elevator and Emet saying "But you wouldn't remember that" .... My initial thoughts upon starting Elpis was that he *did* remember, but knew we hadn't been there yet in our timeline and not that we were a soul he once knew. Right up until I heard mention of Kairos anyway. Time Travel should have been an expected possibility since ShB and it being a core plot device to even start the ShB story. And again, we the player needed to learn the source of the Final Days, and when better than when it came to be. Us being dropped off in the past at exactly the right moment, well ... yeah. But the concept was we needed to learn the source of the final days and there was no one in our current age that could tell us. I personally would have liked it if we were dropped of in Amourot between the Final Days starting and the summoning of Zodiark. I mean, they already have the dungeon to be used as a set, but I guess they wanted another full area. And the side quests in Elpis are excellent. Props to the writers fleshing the area out. > with Meteion being introduced a bit late In ARR, they talk about fighting against despair (beast tribes despairing so summoning the primals, the refuges despairing, ...), and the WoL being hope, and all that. A full on embodiment of the concept of despair, okay... but the idea was planted from the start. But again, we had no idea of the *source* of the Final Days until Endwalker, so have no need to know of Meteion before this point.
Don't think you deserve any vitriol for honest opinions and I actually kinda agree with regards to Garlemald, the city/region felt scaled down and underwhelming to what I had envisioned in my head. But that's just critique, I wasn't gonna let that subjective blemish ruin the rest of the experience for me. Endwalker for me is a masterpiece, I've even spent hours watching streamers go through my favourite story parts
Fair assessment of your thoughts and opinions on the expansion. The primals being dungeon bosses: personally I take it as a show of just how strong we've become but I can understand your frustration. I will say that their designation as such is not set in stone ala the changes to Praetorium. As a side note, someone please explain lower Anima to me. Seriously, what's up with it? Even in X I was confused by it. Okay we got a demonic looking Virgin Mary and then... Punchy goblin Since this video is from three months ago and the most recently uploaded I feel I should ask if you're doing alright?
My biggest gripe with this expansion was that I never felt like I was in the end of times, the unraveling of the star etc. ShB did give me a sense of dread and urgency after Emet took the exarch with him. The other thing that bothered me was how there was no real threat against the scions. The only time where it feels like they were in danger was the Garlemald scene with Zenos and the one with Endsinger. I knew they wouldn't kill any of them for the closing chapter, but that definitely left me disappointed. Overall ShB and HW remain at the top for me.
It sure is refreshing listening to a more critical take on Endwalker. I think some of your points are fair (like pretty much everything about the Loporits). But most of them are just "i would have prefered this, not that" or just having your personal expectations betrayed. In the time travel part you say that its bad and should not have been done but gives no reasons why that is apart from "its a disservice and create questions". Why is it a disservice and what questions? Emet-Selc and Hydaelin were made to look bad, according to you, but again, this is just your expectation about those characters being betrayed, not having your wishful thinking about what the characters and the story should be satisfied. About Meteion i think (im really not sure, since you dont talk about this) you totally missed how they pretty much fit exactly on FFXIV themes since 1.0. That life is worth living (in short). If you take the story merely by its mechanical functionalities lore wise youll always have hollow and obsolete fantasies, the realisation and explorations of themes is what really matters about any story as im sure the writers that hate time travel would agree about. And this is what makes this story so powerfull and meaninfull for so many that went through it. Well, thats all that my english writing skills allow me to say for now. Thanks for doing this video. Again, more critical takes are always welcome. Universal praise sure is boring.
I am unsure whether i liked Shadowbringers more. Really hard to tell, the story in both expansions was really good. I do agree with you that they went a bit more anime with Endwalker, but whether that was a mistake or not it's subjective. Another subjective opinion is that the FFXIV story is the best story i've seen in any video games and i might go even further and say in any type of media. I'll end with a fact, if you were to compare other games within the MMORPG genre you won't find any other game that comes even close to the level of storytelling that ffxiv has and it will probably remain this way for a very long time.
Hmm, I really loved those quests where you could join a NPC. Especially Radz-at-Han with Estinien, so much I didn't want to turn in the quest even after an hour ;-) The Loporrits, yes... too many quests in their base instead of the actual cool moon area. That part could have been different, although I liked the Urianger part there. The Elpis travel was one of my favorite parts of Endwalker, so I disagree with you on that. What disturbed me the most was definitely the Zenos/Dragon thing in the very end. It felt like pressed into the story at any costs.
I didn't like the story for the Endwalker physical-ranged role quest. For one there was nothing 'ranged' about it and the role quest story itself was ground already covered extensively in the ShB MSQ, so was boring and predictable (to me). It felt like a throw-away storyline devised at the last minute that didn't add anything. The previous physical dps role quest (from the Crystarium) was original and made a lot more sense (as a bard anyway) because you were paired up with a hunter investigating what happened to other hunters (more or less). Plus you were given more information about the other warriors of light/darkness from that world. It added to the story. The escorting didn't bug me *that* much. It just didn't seem necessary and slowed everything down. Again, it didn't add anything. You're right about the towers. I forgot about them completely, aside from the first EW dungeon, and the only important thing about that dungeon was to get the elephant lady back. "Towers have appeared everywhere. Ack!"..."Nevermind". With "In From the Cold", I simply despise every time they make me play as another character where every fricking ability is unfamiliar to me and I can't play in a way I feel remotely comfortable. Some people love the variety but it makes me want to pull my hair out. "What do you want from meeeee?" :'( I personally don't want any more of that, especially being forced to do it or stop advancing the MSQ. I don't feel accomplishment when I finally get through one of those duties, I am usually pissed that I had to do it at all. As for the Endwalker story, sure it could have been done better with less confusion, plot holes, leaps in logic and last minute characters, but as someone who's only been playing half a year, I find the whole storyline for FFXIV pretty befuddling anyhow. "The story is so good!" will never come out of my mouth. Without playing previous FF's and without a wiki, most of it's a mess for me. The dragon expansion made sense, but the rest didn't really. But being mad that they didn't make the end plot so everything is our fault...really? It would have had to be our fault they made Zodiark, and without the time travel you also don't like, how would that have happened? Hydaelyn IS our fault. So they at least went that far. But again, without time travel, that wouldn't be our fault either. Making it fit all together would be difficult for a group of writers. They've thrown so much sh*t in there over the years that tying it up had to be a nightmare. That's the problem with Endwalker really, working it out so there is some sort of answer for everything that was stuck in before. Either they didn't have the plot worked out all along, or they added in a lot that didn't fit saying "we'll figure it out later" and then really couldn't. I'm sure they did their best to work within their set parameters. For them to do it better, they would have had to close down the story over several expansions which would have caused even more loose ends, and it seems like Yoshi P. just wanted to move on ASAP, that he has a new story in mind. Endwalker is not as good as it could have been but it's definitely not as bad as it could have been either.
> You're right about the towers. I forgot about them completely, [...] You were meant to forget about them. The post Shadowbringers patches tied up the major "Oh shit" from the towers, so for you the player they were no longer relevant: -) WTF?!?? Towers.... -) Can't get close, get tempered without Blessing of Light -) Shit, "Lunar" primals are being summoned by the captives if we get to close -) Okay, we know to stay away. The Grand Company of Eorzea can handle the monsters from towers, you Scions handle the shit we can't. The towers didn't need to exist after Tower of Babil was done as they were just an extension of that, and a plot device to show the tempering to Garlemald. So when you defeat the core of Babil, the extensions die away.
Good for you for making this...cause it's gonna get a whole lot of hate from the MSQ hardcores. However, if I could challenge you on a few of your points, cause while I love ffxiv as a super fun theme park, I have a lot of issues with the story and its general design. Overall, I have WAY more fun than annoyances, but I still have beef. I should also mention, I think ShB is WAY overrated. IMO, the first 2/3 of ShB is filler with a really interesting ending 1/3 (comically, while paced hilariously poorly, I prefered the first 2/3 of EW and could not stand the last 1/3). As a thesis, I would say a lot of your complaints are kinda baked right into the product....i.e. it's not an issue, it's a feature. First, your comment on epilogue, while the point stands that it could be epilogued to death in 6.1 and onwards, this game does not do denouement well AT ALL. I mean, ShB is probably the worst offender here. You play through a whole expansion learning about zodiark and emet-selch only to go - yeah, kill him....there, story done. He gets a sad end cutscene, but there is no dealing with the choices he made and our relationship to him. Don't even get me started on Elidibus....we basically kill a child who was turned to the spirit of salvation and the end point is Alisae lol so random jumping off a building after the scions jojo pose. Like....are you fucking kidding me? This especially drives me nuts as a fan of the doman restoration and all the repatriation work you do in post SB; they actually showed that there was fallout and there's more to a story than punching a villain in the face. Second, the lack of threat the towers posed...basically cutting them off at the knee pretty much from the get go. Let's be honest, that's a good point....but, sorry, this game has consequencexiety. When it comes to tackling bigger themes/issues or handling fan favourite characters....yeah, the game is gonna kowtow to the fans. Eorzea is massively racist....what? NOOOOOOO, it's cause they're tempered, so we'll just slap a cure on that and look how good they are (despite this being the racist argument of - i'm not racist, they're just crackheads). Y'shtola dying....HA! Any kind of ramifications for G'raha lying in ShB (which I still don't get why)....nah, NOT FOR MY CUTE CATBOI....LOOK, HE'S EATING A CHEESEBURGER. There's no way they're gonna put an actual threat with any kind of consequences in front of fan favorite characters in a world they know their fans have adopted as their personality. It's a crying shame, but that's the reality. Third - Loporrits are filler....I mean.....again, using ShB....the mine cart (they did ranjit so dirty imo...I'm interested AF about his time with the previous Minfilia's), pretty much all of raktika (coulda just been a cutscene....especially when so much of the lore of the area is done via beast tribe). Sorry, but this is a feature. And, to my understanding, is fairly common in jrpg's and anime in general....lots of filler and downtime (the classic example being dragonball z....50 episodes of yelling and screaming to prepare for a fight, then a 10 minute fight....obviously sarcasm, but memes start somewhere). In addition, some of this is gonna be for the sake of MMO....to keep people subbed and to provide gear, sidequests, eventually beast tribes, etc. From there, I could not agree with you more. Basically you get to Elpis and find out that vegan hot topic made an emotion bomb that's gonna end the universe cause she's sadge due to vegan hot topic asking a stupid question; I actually laughed out loud when that came about. But to wrap up my point - you say that any writing guide would tell you time travel is bad unless it's a central premise....the same could go with memory manipulation....but I'm gonna take a step further: I don't think anyone who deals with story in any serious way (guide, academic, successful author) is gonna hold up MSQ as a gold standard. It's poorly paced, rarely creates any kind of real tension or stakes, is VERY trope/cliche heavy, and loves its character archetypes just a bit too much (I would also add that, personally, I think the fandom does a lot of the heavy lifting with respect to the story with very complex interpretations of what occurs and using headcanons without realizing it). That's not to say it's all bad....I think there's loads to love in the game...personally, my favourite story beats are outside of MSQ, but that's just me. In addition, who says it has to judged as gold standard but some academic....I love loads of hot garbage B movies and trash book series...that being written, I also take them for what they are. But ffxiv falls into that type of game that is the reason people like Brian David Gilbert can make hilarious youtube content ripping apart games like Kingdom Hearts for its story structure and Fire Emblem for its characters.....it's not really written to be a masterclass in storytelling, it's written for people who are looking for that kind of stuff. Like John Wick....story, garbage....action, amazing....and wouldn't you know it - it's written for people looking for the action. Final point - you mentioned the escort quests. Yeah, I agree....but you know what gamers hate just about as much escort quests? Fetch quests. I mean, come on, if you're being honest, the quest design in ffxiv has always been kinda ass. Jocat made an....interesting?.....video on getting into ffxiv and he absolutely nails the comically bad quest design of the game. Me personally, I kinda like it...but I like easy tasks that make numbers go up.....heck, that's probably why I like the game so much. But if you're gonna have a go at escort quests, there is A LOT more to unpack there. Honestly, I'm glad you made this video. I think too much of the ffxiv online community has smeared a bit too much toxic positivity over MSQ and is a touch too aggressive in defending it. We'd probably all be better off if we just admitted the game is a theme park to be enjoyed, not an artifact for study.... P.S. massive personal opinion, so don't take it personally - I could not disagree with you more about Alphinaud. Master diplomat? Really? I mean other than the story constantly dumping exposition on me about how super smart he is, I can't recall many instances of him demonstrating any kind of higher level intellect (hell, the first 2 expansions kinda turn around his screw ups). And his personality, I can't abide. Ultimately, he's a child and everything that comes with that (selfish, immature, etc.)...and while ShB did a lot to make him much more likeable IMO, I absolutely cannot forgive his last scene with Arenvald. Having worked with injured soldiers, the first rule is you do not make it about yourself....you try to help them. Hell, nurses in WW2 would beat the shit out of other nurses that would cry in front injured soldiers reasoning that they were just adding to the burden. Yet there Alphinaud was crying in front of someone who may never walk again being consoled by the VICTIM. Unacceptable. I get it, as a plot device he's a child who's there to move the plot forward and cause jrpg's are always about the underaged. As a character....if he were real.....I'd knock his teeth in.
Just putting this here as I watch the video so if you answer this question in the video apologies. Did you hate the Garlemald stuff? And if you did what did you hate?
When we went to elpis I thought it was going to be a long cutscene, I was not expecting a zone and dungeon. I understood the reason they needed to fill in some gaps. But I also felt it could have been done differently.
Same! I was really surprised and almost disappointed when they went from half-noticing me to just making me real, which immediately complicated the narrative so much that I wasn't surprised it ended in a memory wipe (and therefore didn't dislike it to be honest - they did it in a fun way with what they had.)
Oh man, I thought I was the only one. Thanks for making this. Its a brave move considering the amount of vitriol that will be aimed at you because of it.
My problem with Endwalker is it doesn't feel like an ending to anything. I feels like an excuse to wrap up some side stories... Shadowbringers felt like the actual story's ending!
> Shadowbringers felt like the actual story's ending! The Ascian story maybe (and honestly, I'd call it the true Ascian introduction as well :/ ). But not the Zodiark/Hydaelyn story.
@@siresorb1419 Which the entire Zodiark/Hydaelyn plot encompassed. Eorzea vs. Garlamald was just a part of Zodiark vs. Hydaelyn. . . . . I mean .... Emet-Selch created the Garlean empire to further the rejoining of Zodiark. The Allagans were also guided by Selch, which was still causing problems for us. The overall plot you can't escape from was that the Ascian's were fighting against the Final Days. That caused the summoning of Zodiark and in turn Hydaelyn which lead to our current position. The Zodiark/Hydaelyn arc was the backdrop to all Eorzea vs. Garlamald / "Ascian beef" ... etc... It's not something you can just say "Oh, you aren't important."
@@jmstover Right, but that wasn't really anything we were currently involved with... The Ascian backstory is a nice touch, but was never the original story's objective. It would be like if the true final harry potter book after the defeat of voldermort was to track down the reaper and give back the Deathly Hallows and say that was the whole point of the past seven books, that's what everything was setting up. Not the Harry vs Voldermort final confrontation.
@@siresorb1419 > that wasn't really anything we were currently involved with [...] never the original story's objective. Errr.... The very first thing you get when you start a new game: "Hear... Feel... Think..." and the mother crystal. Of course that has nothing to do with the story. And the Ascians are intrinsically tied to Hydaelyn. *Edit:* Never read the HP books so I'll have to take your word on the setup. . . . . [ spoilerish ] *Edit:* I will readily admit that in ARR the direction was most likely different on release (if they actually had a concrete one when 2.0 was released... they didn't really have any budget past 2.0 release as that was a sink or swim moment for the game). But the story they've told over the years has led us to where we are and it is honestly a damn good conclusion. Eorzea vs. Garleans has *always* been more of a side story overall, even in base ARR. The Primals were more front and center and how the Empire ended up causing more primal summonings, to give more reason for their conquest into savage lands... to cause more summonings, and repeat. The Garleans was an important side story, but still a side story to the Primals, Ascians, etc... *Especially* post Stormblood patches and finding out who Solus zos Galvus was. They could have given it a better ending, but honestly I see Quintus van Cinna as the writers trying to clean the Garlean arc up. They've done what they could with what was left to them ("Ours was a beautiful dream" [paraphrase]). Eorzea vs. Garlamald is handled in EW, and pretty much fully tied up (conquered regions still somewhat open). The Garlean citizenry being afraid of magic users, and all of them fearing being subjugated again. Getting with the remnants of the 1st and protecting Garleans from the Final Days after Zodiark is removed from play. Lucia and Maxima going to Garlemald as Eorzean envoys... After Babil is gone, it's mostly clean up/protection on the Garlean front in Ilsabard. We may get more from the other regions... Corvos (Locus Amoenus), etc... in patches/further expansions. But the Eorzea vs. Garlemald conflict was finished as soon as the populace started getting tempered (patch 5.5??). It was just clean up after that point as far as *Garleans* were concerned. The Telophoroi faction was a different beast, but again, once Babil was taken out they were a non-issue (Honestly... just Zenos, Fandaniel and the tempered garleans?? Was that the whole "faction"?).
Agree with everything, I would just add the unecessary "sacrifices" at the end and Zenos ex-machina, with an extremally boring scripted fight were you can't lose.
So many of the locations felt like part one of a story that we were meant to go back to, and didn't. And it seemed like it was all in the wrong order, like the End Times presumably were meant to feel like a nightmare that covered the entire back half of the game, but we were off doing other things under no pressure at all for most of it. We got Big Unearned Closure when we should've been getting Self-contained Expansion, and vice versa. Meteion at 85, Zodiark at 90, work from there. It's crazy how unplanned this felt, for a story that was so focused on giving closure. I actually hated how much Epiloguing they were doing by the end, all the past characters coming up in scene after scene to say "We're feeling vaguely benevolent about all this!" Couldn't they spend some of that time giving Ahewann a sendoff? Maybe check in properly with Nidhana and Matsya? Have any sort of connection with that Viera dude who just seemed to be there? Being able to travel to the literal end of the universe was so funny, I know they wanted to make it seem like we had done A Big Thing but all it does is make the universe seem tiny and trivial. And now I'm worried that we were going to be part of a larger World of Final Fantasy multiverse lore explosion.
> Meteion at 85, Zodiark at 90, work from there. That makes no fucking sense. Meteion is the reason for Zodiarks existence. Why would you fight the reason for the end days, before the one that forestalled it? Without taking out Zodiark before hand ( "Played your part to perfection" ), there is no need to even know who Meteion is because Zodiarks existence was keeping the Aether shield protecting the planet in place (i.e. Aether limiting the effect of Dynamis). Without Zodiark being out of the picture, Meteion can't affect the planet and commence the "Final Days." So Zodiark *must* be removed before hand. There's no reason to even give a fuck about the cause of the Final Days when you have Zodiarks protection from it by their existence.
@@jmstover Yeah but she was boring, silly and trite and the plot wasn't great, it would've been no great shame to fully rewrite everything. I have absolutely no respect for anything that they did with her, she was a forgettable midboss and Zodiark mattered.
@@storageheater > and Zodiark mattered Again... that makes no literary sense. Zodiark really didn't matter since 5.3 and Elidibus (the heart) being removed from play. At that moment Zodiark became a husk with no direction and honestly irrelevant to the main plot. No unsundered Ascians existed that could actually do anything. His existence was the only thing preventing another Final Days from happening (again, the Aether shield), and Fandaniel used the WoL to remove him from play and actually start the Final Days up again. So, in that singular regard Zodiark actually mattered, but that had to happen early enough on in 6.0 to have any meaning. Zodiark didn't *cause* the Final Days which initially destroyed the world. Zodiark at 90 still means that the original cause of the Final Days is out there, and this is supposed to be the end of that Arc, which means that Final Days cause needs to be cleaned up at the end of 6.0 since 6.1 is supposed to start up new story threads this time. That you didn't like it is one thing, but this whole thing with fighting despair, and hope lighting the way, and yadda yadda has been in play since 2.0 in one form or another. It wasn't the greatest of original plots overall, but it fit perfectly into the story as they've left the plot threads hanging over the years. But honestly, Zodiark really didn't matter after 5.3, and if we we're supposedly to end the Zodiark/Hydaelyn arc this expansion we were going to need to take out the source of the Final Days which Zodiark was not. Zodiarks only importance was in preventing the Final Days from happening again and to move on to the source of the Final Days Zodiark needed to be removed early on.
@@storageheater No, it's not that it was a waste of a players time. You were wanting a story to unfold that they weren't telling. The weren't going to retcon past expansion world building/lore in this one just to tell a different story. So great... you wanted a different story and didn't get what you wanted. That doesn't make the story being told bad, it makes it one that you didn't want. The story told fits perfectly into the world building/lore as they've presented it thus far. Zodiark from the start wasn't the big evil (maybe at one time they were thinking that direction). As soon as they presented that Zodiark was summoned to stop the Final Days, Zodiark stopped being the Big Evil we'd have a final show down with. Whatever was outside the star causing the Final Days was the Big Evil. That's just expected. I was personally was expecting Zodiark as the 2nd trial and Hydaelyn as the first, but I do like how they played the story out. Going outside of that is just retcon'ing the history you've already presented to tell a different story altogether.
I too was disappointed that our arch nemesis Zodiark died so easily. I remember playing and thinking, really, that's it? That part felt like a huge letdown. The coolest part of the whole thing for me was fist fighting Zenos.
Zodiark was never the arch nemesis though. The source of the Final Days that Zodiark forestalled was the arch nemesis. Zodiark at 83 makes perfect sense considering he was never the big bad of the story.
Endwalker main story was complete dog water, how could they go from the well thought story on ShadowBringers to this complete train wreck of a story is beyond me
I'll just say this, I was not annoyed by the escort quests in this game at all. In fact, I went out of my way to find all the blue circles so I could make sure I got all the dialogue options. I really enjoyed that.
What I did _not_ enjoy were the stalking quests, where I had to follow someone. Those were supremely annoying. Fortunately they were few.
I have to agree, the stalking quests were annoying as hell.
Stalking Urianger as he walks all of 20 feet up a straight path was really terrible, but getting caught by him ended up making it seem like he knew you were still there and was just humouring you, and that was kind of amazing
Imo the MSQ ones were fine because i like walking with the Scions, however the sidequests ones were very bad
@@manifesting7671 omg yes, the Thanced mission, I definitely had to start over and adjust the difficulty 😅.
I wrote basically a whole essay, but oh boy it wasn't worth it so some pared down points:
-In the common vernacular of video games (and *especially* MMOs) "escort quest" means something specific, and the quests where scions follow us are are not it. If you did not like them, that's totally fine, but you cannot place the general distaste that gaming communities have for "escort quests" on them, because they are not those.
-Tempering has been de-fanged as a supreme threat since Shadowbringers 5.4 when we confirmed we have a cure for it. The anti-temper scales are an extension of this.
-The loporrit stuff post-Zodiark was obviously a narrative breather. It gives the audience time to catch their breath after the grim and dark of the Garlemald story and before we jump into more heavy stuff again with the Final Days in Thavnair.
-It's weird to hear you say that writers should never, ever use time travel as a plot point in story that is not based on it because it is never handled well and creates a plethora of plot holes in the same video where you talk about how you loved Shadowbringers... which had a time travel plot point in a story that otherwise had nothing to do with it. The Exarch traveled through time to change history.
-If you felt the spaceship came out of nowhere, fine, but I would issue a reminder that the Sharlayans have not only been working on facilitating the exodus to the moon for 270 years, but that they are also known for their accumulation of knowledge in a world where the insanely advanced technologies of the Allagans exist *and* have been in contact with the loporrits (who themselves have been preparing for interstellar travel for thousands of years with their own technology).
-I was also not the hugest fan of Meteion, but I acknowledge that, as a villain, she was less an *actual* villain and more a face and voice for the concept of despair until we get the reveal of the Endsinger, who then immediately became the new face/voice of the true villain, despair.
Controversial, but that's exactly how I felt bout the story. Plot points that were set up to only to be wasted in one quest etc. I wish they did more with Zenos taking over your body, like what he took a long ass walk just to scare your buddies for a little. The end days only appearing in the new areas, with no real stakes involved except for maybe that elephant guy you saved almost turning into a blasphemy. End area where everyone "sacrifices" themselves only to pop back at the press of a button. Like I expected better storytelling from square but they have this record of making things odd in the final chapter from their other games so.. That's that I suppose
Alright a very long one, But I would like to first say Thank you for the video, I appreciate your critical take on the story, but I reckon you are marking the story way past what an MMO story can afford to do.
Escort Quests: You are looking it from an MMO Player POV, RPG games have plenty of it, FFXIV is RPG first MMO second. Furthermore the escort quests aren't mainly battle and protect escorts, it gives more lore. At the same time, you states that you like lore but lament the fact that the escort system doesn't allow easy story skip? I would say most FFXIV players who did not boost, and played all the way to Endwalker would welcome more time spent with their fav characters and more lore.
Shdowbrings was a world dying, whereas in Endwalker we barely even left (time flows different in the first), makes sense that it felt like any other day, most of its inhabitans are still in the dark with what is about to transpire. The towers, Garleans, Tempered People wreaking havoc, and what not is LITERALLY part of everyday life in Eorzea the live in constant danger knowing that their End is certain, one new tower on the corner of the eye just means one new threat, whats next?
The towers are Aether wells and thats all. I can agree that those massive towers are only really used as plot devices and thrown away once we went past Anima. Well ...... I don't think this is really that big of a deal, not like there are anything unresolved there. Short it may be, but the towers did their job.
In regards to the part where Alphinaud's interaction with the Garleans, I can agree that it isn't the best. But it is not like they can do it any other way, not like they have an open link shell or pearl channel with the Garleans, it is a "we must go now, I am sure they are happy to receive help" mindset.
Anima and Magus Sisters, can agree, wish they were trials or raids, who knows maybe they will be a hard mode later.
Zodiark being the first Trial, there are only 3 Trials, you gotta fit him in somewhere. Also I assume that they did it like this to make you go "WTF Zodiark is the FIRST TRIAL? WHOS THE OTHER TWO?"
Loporrits, its the downtime for the story, you literally just fought Zodiark. Also if you keep pushing the Zodiark Story back you aren't going to fight a Trial until like 15 hours in. The story is about 6~8 hours in at this point. Yes you want Anime to be a Trial, but from what I can see, the trial bosses in each Expansion has a theme, this one seems to be the First and Oldest Primal Forces, Anima would stick out like a sore thumb along side here, or its going to be a massive re shuffle of the story.
I am with you on the time travel and Memory device, I especially hated that McGuffin memory erasure hack. But we get to see Emet Selch and Hydelyn so I forgive them. Also the fact that you are viewing the story as a story piece that needs to be more than an MMO story shows that you already see it as not an MMO story. Please take a step back and see that this is in the end an MMO so it needs to produce enough content to allow the players to "BE" in, so of course they need to shoehorn something in from time to time.
Ixall Air ship to Intergalactic Space Ship. The truth about space travel is that Energy is the biggest and only problem, the Ixall don't have the mother crystal. Also the Sharlyans Hoarded all the tech and are isolationists. Another analogy is, we have in America space ships that can carry ppl to the moon, but in Africa, some part of Indonesia and Amazon, some tribes still thought that Airplanes are dragons and white people are demons.
Atomos/Meteion, We caused the End of Days? I think you compartmentalized the story too much here on your critic, you wish that WE where the caused for the end of days, but that doesn't work well with the Ascians plotline which means a full rewrite. I can agree with Meteion being introduced a bit late and abrupt, but the very concept of "Hear Feel Think" was already hinted from ARR with the song "Answers" which becomes a "Revelation" to the meaning of the lyrics of those song.
> I am with you on the time travel and Memory device
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Well, the player needed to learn of the source of the conflict. It wasn't the greatest thing in the world, but using the characters they already had for moving the plot along, the Memory Erasure was the only way to ensure the timeline. Why Emet wouldn't have recognized you on the First.
Before I got to the end of Elpis, my mind initially went to the Elevator and Emet saying "But you wouldn't remember that" .... My initial thoughts upon starting Elpis was that he *did* remember, but knew we hadn't been there yet in our timeline and not that we were a soul he once knew. Right up until I heard mention of Kairos anyway.
Time Travel should have been an expected possibility since ShB and it being a core plot device to even start the ShB story. And again, we the player needed to learn the source of the Final Days, and when better than when it came to be. Us being dropped off in the past at exactly the right moment, well ... yeah. But the concept was we needed to learn the source of the final days and there was no one in our current age that could tell us.
I personally would have liked it if we were dropped of in Amourot between the Final Days starting and the summoning of Zodiark. I mean, they already have the dungeon to be used as a set, but I guess they wanted another full area. And the side quests in Elpis are excellent. Props to the writers fleshing the area out.
> with Meteion being introduced a bit late
In ARR, they talk about fighting against despair (beast tribes despairing so summoning the primals, the refuges despairing, ...), and the WoL being hope, and all that. A full on embodiment of the concept of despair, okay... but the idea was planted from the start. But again, we had no idea of the *source* of the Final Days until Endwalker, so have no need to know of Meteion before this point.
Don't think you deserve any vitriol for honest opinions and I actually kinda agree with regards to Garlemald, the city/region felt scaled down and underwhelming to what I had envisioned in my head.
But that's just critique, I wasn't gonna let that subjective blemish ruin the rest of the experience for me. Endwalker for me is a masterpiece, I've even spent hours watching streamers go through my favourite story parts
Fair assessment of your thoughts and opinions on the expansion. The primals being dungeon bosses: personally I take it as a show of just how strong we've become but I can understand your frustration. I will say that their designation as such is not set in stone ala the changes to Praetorium. As a side note, someone please explain lower Anima to me. Seriously, what's up with it? Even in X I was confused by it. Okay we got a demonic looking Virgin Mary and then... Punchy goblin
Since this video is from three months ago and the most recently uploaded I feel I should ask if you're doing alright?
My biggest gripe with this expansion was that I never felt like I was in the end of times, the unraveling of the star etc. ShB did give me a sense of dread and urgency after Emet took the exarch with him. The other thing that bothered me was how there was no real threat against the scions. The only time where it feels like they were in danger was the Garlemald scene with Zenos and the one with Endsinger. I knew they wouldn't kill any of them for the closing chapter, but that definitely left me disappointed. Overall ShB and HW remain at the top for me.
It sure is refreshing listening to a more critical take on Endwalker.
I think some of your points are fair (like pretty much everything about the Loporits). But most of them are just "i would have prefered this, not that" or just having your personal expectations betrayed.
In the time travel part you say that its bad and should not have been done but gives no reasons why that is apart from "its a disservice and create questions". Why is it a disservice and what questions? Emet-Selc and Hydaelin were made to look bad, according to you, but again, this is just your expectation about those characters being betrayed, not having your wishful thinking about what the characters and the story should be satisfied.
About Meteion i think (im really not sure, since you dont talk about this) you totally missed how they pretty much fit exactly on FFXIV themes since 1.0. That life is worth living (in short). If you take the story merely by its mechanical functionalities lore wise youll always have hollow and obsolete fantasies, the realisation and explorations of themes is what really matters about any story as im sure the writers that hate time travel would agree about. And this is what makes this story so powerfull and meaninfull for so many that went through it.
Well, thats all that my english writing skills allow me to say for now. Thanks for doing this video. Again, more critical takes are always welcome. Universal praise sure is boring.
I am unsure whether i liked Shadowbringers more. Really hard to tell, the story in both expansions was really good.
I do agree with you that they went a bit more anime with Endwalker, but whether that was a mistake or not it's subjective.
Another subjective opinion is that the FFXIV story is the best story i've seen in any video games and i might go even further and say in any type of media.
I'll end with a fact, if you were to compare other games within the MMORPG genre you won't find any other game that comes even close to the level of storytelling that ffxiv has and it will probably remain this way for a very long time.
Hmm, I really loved those quests where you could join a NPC. Especially Radz-at-Han with Estinien, so much I didn't want to turn in the quest even after an hour ;-)
The Loporrits, yes... too many quests in their base instead of the actual cool moon area. That part could have been different, although I liked the Urianger part there.
The Elpis travel was one of my favorite parts of Endwalker, so I disagree with you on that.
What disturbed me the most was definitely the Zenos/Dragon thing in the very end. It felt like pressed into the story at any costs.
I really like your guide videos. I hope you continue those
Garla-Mald was the biggest letdown
I didn't like the story for the Endwalker physical-ranged role quest. For one there was nothing 'ranged' about it and the role quest story itself was ground already covered extensively in the ShB MSQ, so was boring and predictable (to me). It felt like a throw-away storyline devised at the last minute that didn't add anything. The previous physical dps role quest (from the Crystarium) was original and made a lot more sense (as a bard anyway) because you were paired up with a hunter investigating what happened to other hunters (more or less). Plus you were given more information about the other warriors of light/darkness from that world. It added to the story.
The escorting didn't bug me *that* much. It just didn't seem necessary and slowed everything down. Again, it didn't add anything.
You're right about the towers. I forgot about them completely, aside from the first EW dungeon, and the only important thing about that dungeon was to get the elephant lady back. "Towers have appeared everywhere. Ack!"..."Nevermind".
With "In From the Cold", I simply despise every time they make me play as another character where every fricking ability is unfamiliar to me and I can't play in a way I feel remotely comfortable. Some people love the variety but it makes me want to pull my hair out. "What do you want from meeeee?" :'( I personally don't want any more of that, especially being forced to do it or stop advancing the MSQ. I don't feel accomplishment when I finally get through one of those duties, I am usually pissed that I had to do it at all.
As for the Endwalker story, sure it could have been done better with less confusion, plot holes, leaps in logic and last minute characters, but as someone who's only been playing half a year, I find the whole storyline for FFXIV pretty befuddling anyhow. "The story is so good!" will never come out of my mouth. Without playing previous FF's and without a wiki, most of it's a mess for me. The dragon expansion made sense, but the rest didn't really.
But being mad that they didn't make the end plot so everything is our fault...really? It would have had to be our fault they made Zodiark, and without the time travel you also don't like, how would that have happened? Hydaelyn IS our fault. So they at least went that far. But again, without time travel, that wouldn't be our fault either. Making it fit all together would be difficult for a group of writers. They've thrown so much sh*t in there over the years that tying it up had to be a nightmare. That's the problem with Endwalker really, working it out so there is some sort of answer for everything that was stuck in before. Either they didn't have the plot worked out all along, or they added in a lot that didn't fit saying "we'll figure it out later" and then really couldn't. I'm sure they did their best to work within their set parameters. For them to do it better, they would have had to close down the story over several expansions which would have caused even more loose ends, and it seems like Yoshi P. just wanted to move on ASAP, that he has a new story in mind. Endwalker is not as good as it could have been but it's definitely not as bad as it could have been either.
> You're right about the towers. I forgot about them completely, [...]
You were meant to forget about them. The post Shadowbringers patches tied up the major "Oh shit" from the towers, so for you the player they were no longer relevant:
-) WTF?!?? Towers....
-) Can't get close, get tempered without Blessing of Light
-) Shit, "Lunar" primals are being summoned by the captives if we get to close
-) Okay, we know to stay away. The Grand Company of Eorzea can handle the monsters from towers, you Scions handle the shit we can't.
The towers didn't need to exist after Tower of Babil was done as they were just an extension of that, and a plot device to show the tempering to Garlemald. So when you defeat the core of Babil, the extensions die away.
Good for you for making this...cause it's gonna get a whole lot of hate from the MSQ hardcores.
However, if I could challenge you on a few of your points, cause while I love ffxiv as a super fun theme park, I have a lot of issues with the story and its general design. Overall, I have WAY more fun than annoyances, but I still have beef. I should also mention, I think ShB is WAY overrated. IMO, the first 2/3 of ShB is filler with a really interesting ending 1/3 (comically, while paced hilariously poorly, I prefered the first 2/3 of EW and could not stand the last 1/3). As a thesis, I would say a lot of your complaints are kinda baked right into the product....i.e. it's not an issue, it's a feature.
First, your comment on epilogue, while the point stands that it could be epilogued to death in 6.1 and onwards, this game does not do denouement well AT ALL. I mean, ShB is probably the worst offender here. You play through a whole expansion learning about zodiark and emet-selch only to go - yeah, kill him....there, story done. He gets a sad end cutscene, but there is no dealing with the choices he made and our relationship to him. Don't even get me started on Elidibus....we basically kill a child who was turned to the spirit of salvation and the end point is Alisae lol so random jumping off a building after the scions jojo pose. Like....are you fucking kidding me? This especially drives me nuts as a fan of the doman restoration and all the repatriation work you do in post SB; they actually showed that there was fallout and there's more to a story than punching a villain in the face.
Second, the lack of threat the towers posed...basically cutting them off at the knee pretty much from the get go. Let's be honest, that's a good point....but, sorry, this game has consequencexiety. When it comes to tackling bigger themes/issues or handling fan favourite characters....yeah, the game is gonna kowtow to the fans. Eorzea is massively racist....what? NOOOOOOO, it's cause they're tempered, so we'll just slap a cure on that and look how good they are (despite this being the racist argument of - i'm not racist, they're just crackheads). Y'shtola dying....HA! Any kind of ramifications for G'raha lying in ShB (which I still don't get why)....nah, NOT FOR MY CUTE CATBOI....LOOK, HE'S EATING A CHEESEBURGER. There's no way they're gonna put an actual threat with any kind of consequences in front of fan favorite characters in a world they know their fans have adopted as their personality. It's a crying shame, but that's the reality.
Third - Loporrits are filler....I mean.....again, using ShB....the mine cart (they did ranjit so dirty imo...I'm interested AF about his time with the previous Minfilia's), pretty much all of raktika (coulda just been a cutscene....especially when so much of the lore of the area is done via beast tribe). Sorry, but this is a feature. And, to my understanding, is fairly common in jrpg's and anime in general....lots of filler and downtime (the classic example being dragonball z....50 episodes of yelling and screaming to prepare for a fight, then a 10 minute fight....obviously sarcasm, but memes start somewhere). In addition, some of this is gonna be for the sake of MMO....to keep people subbed and to provide gear, sidequests, eventually beast tribes, etc.
From there, I could not agree with you more. Basically you get to Elpis and find out that vegan hot topic made an emotion bomb that's gonna end the universe cause she's sadge due to vegan hot topic asking a stupid question; I actually laughed out loud when that came about. But to wrap up my point - you say that any writing guide would tell you time travel is bad unless it's a central premise....the same could go with memory manipulation....but I'm gonna take a step further: I don't think anyone who deals with story in any serious way (guide, academic, successful author) is gonna hold up MSQ as a gold standard. It's poorly paced, rarely creates any kind of real tension or stakes, is VERY trope/cliche heavy, and loves its character archetypes just a bit too much (I would also add that, personally, I think the fandom does a lot of the heavy lifting with respect to the story with very complex interpretations of what occurs and using headcanons without realizing it). That's not to say it's all bad....I think there's loads to love in the game...personally, my favourite story beats are outside of MSQ, but that's just me. In addition, who says it has to judged as gold standard but some academic....I love loads of hot garbage B movies and trash book series...that being written, I also take them for what they are. But ffxiv falls into that type of game that is the reason people like Brian David Gilbert can make hilarious youtube content ripping apart games like Kingdom Hearts for its story structure and Fire Emblem for its characters.....it's not really written to be a masterclass in storytelling, it's written for people who are looking for that kind of stuff. Like John Wick....story, garbage....action, amazing....and wouldn't you know it - it's written for people looking for the action.
Final point - you mentioned the escort quests. Yeah, I agree....but you know what gamers hate just about as much escort quests? Fetch quests. I mean, come on, if you're being honest, the quest design in ffxiv has always been kinda ass. Jocat made an....interesting?.....video on getting into ffxiv and he absolutely nails the comically bad quest design of the game. Me personally, I kinda like it...but I like easy tasks that make numbers go up.....heck, that's probably why I like the game so much. But if you're gonna have a go at escort quests, there is A LOT more to unpack there.
Honestly, I'm glad you made this video. I think too much of the ffxiv online community has smeared a bit too much toxic positivity over MSQ and is a touch too aggressive in defending it. We'd probably all be better off if we just admitted the game is a theme park to be enjoyed, not an artifact for study....
P.S. massive personal opinion, so don't take it personally - I could not disagree with you more about Alphinaud. Master diplomat? Really? I mean other than the story constantly dumping exposition on me about how super smart he is, I can't recall many instances of him demonstrating any kind of higher level intellect (hell, the first 2 expansions kinda turn around his screw ups). And his personality, I can't abide. Ultimately, he's a child and everything that comes with that (selfish, immature, etc.)...and while ShB did a lot to make him much more likeable IMO, I absolutely cannot forgive his last scene with Arenvald. Having worked with injured soldiers, the first rule is you do not make it about yourself....you try to help them. Hell, nurses in WW2 would beat the shit out of other nurses that would cry in front injured soldiers reasoning that they were just adding to the burden. Yet there Alphinaud was crying in front of someone who may never walk again being consoled by the VICTIM. Unacceptable. I get it, as a plot device he's a child who's there to move the plot forward and cause jrpg's are always about the underaged. As a character....if he were real.....I'd knock his teeth in.
Just putting this here as I watch the video so if you answer this question in the video apologies. Did you hate the Garlemald stuff? And if you did what did you hate?
When we went to elpis I thought it was going to be a long cutscene, I was not expecting a zone and dungeon. I understood the reason they needed to fill in some gaps. But I also felt it could have been done differently.
Same! I was really surprised and almost disappointed when they went from half-noticing me to just making me real, which immediately complicated the narrative so much that I wasn't surprised it ended in a memory wipe (and therefore didn't dislike it to be honest - they did it in a fun way with what they had.)
Oh man, I thought I was the only one. Thanks for making this. Its a brave move considering the amount of vitriol that will be aimed at you because of it.
My problem with Endwalker is it doesn't feel like an ending to anything. I feels like an excuse to wrap up some side stories...
Shadowbringers felt like the actual story's ending!
> Shadowbringers felt like the actual story's ending!
The Ascian story maybe (and honestly, I'd call it the true Ascian introduction as well :/ ). But not the Zodiark/Hydaelyn story.
@@jmstover Yeah but that was just Ascian beef. Our primary story was Eorzea vs Garlamald.
And stopping the Ascian's from destroying the source.
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Which the entire Zodiark/Hydaelyn plot encompassed. Eorzea vs. Garlamald was just a part of Zodiark vs. Hydaelyn.
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I mean .... Emet-Selch created the Garlean empire to further the rejoining of Zodiark. The Allagans were also guided by Selch, which was still causing problems for us. The overall plot you can't escape from was that the Ascian's were fighting against the Final Days. That caused the summoning of Zodiark and in turn Hydaelyn which lead to our current position. The Zodiark/Hydaelyn arc was the backdrop to all Eorzea vs. Garlamald / "Ascian beef" ... etc... It's not something you can just say "Oh, you aren't important."
@@jmstover Right, but that wasn't really anything we were currently involved with... The Ascian backstory is a nice touch, but was never the original story's objective.
It would be like if the true final harry potter book after the defeat of voldermort was to track down the reaper and give back the Deathly Hallows and say that was the whole point of the past seven books, that's what everything was setting up. Not the Harry vs Voldermort final confrontation.
@@siresorb1419
> that wasn't really anything we were currently involved with [...] never the original story's objective.
Errr.... The very first thing you get when you start a new game: "Hear... Feel... Think..." and the mother crystal. Of course that has nothing to do with the story. And the Ascians are intrinsically tied to Hydaelyn.
*Edit:* Never read the HP books so I'll have to take your word on the setup.
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I will readily admit that in ARR the direction was most likely different on release (if they actually had a concrete one when 2.0 was released... they didn't really have any budget past 2.0 release as that was a sink or swim moment for the game). But the story they've told over the years has led us to where we are and it is honestly a damn good conclusion. Eorzea vs. Garleans has *always* been more of a side story overall, even in base ARR. The Primals were more front and center and how the Empire ended up causing more primal summonings, to give more reason for their conquest into savage lands... to cause more summonings, and repeat.
The Garleans was an important side story, but still a side story to the Primals, Ascians, etc... *Especially* post Stormblood patches and finding out who Solus zos Galvus was. They could have given it a better ending, but honestly I see Quintus van Cinna as the writers trying to clean the Garlean arc up. They've done what they could with what was left to them ("Ours was a beautiful dream" [paraphrase]).
Eorzea vs. Garlamald is handled in EW, and pretty much fully tied up (conquered regions still somewhat open). The Garlean citizenry being afraid of magic users, and all of them fearing being subjugated again. Getting with the remnants of the 1st and protecting Garleans from the Final Days after Zodiark is removed from play. Lucia and Maxima going to Garlemald as Eorzean envoys... After Babil is gone, it's mostly clean up/protection on the Garlean front in Ilsabard. We may get more from the other regions... Corvos (Locus Amoenus), etc... in patches/further expansions.
But the Eorzea vs. Garlemald conflict was finished as soon as the populace started getting tempered (patch 5.5??). It was just clean up after that point as far as *Garleans* were concerned. The Telophoroi faction was a different beast, but again, once Babil was taken out they were a non-issue (Honestly... just Zenos, Fandaniel and the tempered garleans?? Was that the whole "faction"?).
Agree with everything, I would just add the unecessary "sacrifices" at the end and Zenos ex-machina, with an extremally boring scripted fight were you can't lose.
So many of the locations felt like part one of a story that we were meant to go back to, and didn't. And it seemed like it was all in the wrong order, like the End Times presumably were meant to feel like a nightmare that covered the entire back half of the game, but we were off doing other things under no pressure at all for most of it. We got Big Unearned Closure when we should've been getting Self-contained Expansion, and vice versa. Meteion at 85, Zodiark at 90, work from there. It's crazy how unplanned this felt, for a story that was so focused on giving closure.
I actually hated how much Epiloguing they were doing by the end, all the past characters coming up in scene after scene to say "We're feeling vaguely benevolent about all this!" Couldn't they spend some of that time giving Ahewann a sendoff? Maybe check in properly with Nidhana and Matsya? Have any sort of connection with that Viera dude who just seemed to be there?
Being able to travel to the literal end of the universe was so funny, I know they wanted to make it seem like we had done A Big Thing but all it does is make the universe seem tiny and trivial. And now I'm worried that we were going to be part of a larger World of Final Fantasy multiverse lore explosion.
> Meteion at 85, Zodiark at 90, work from there.
That makes no fucking sense. Meteion is the reason for Zodiarks existence. Why would you fight the reason for the end days, before the one that forestalled it? Without taking out Zodiark before hand ( "Played your part to perfection" ), there is no need to even know who Meteion is because Zodiarks existence was keeping the Aether shield protecting the planet in place (i.e. Aether limiting the effect of Dynamis).
Without Zodiark being out of the picture, Meteion can't affect the planet and commence the "Final Days." So Zodiark *must* be removed before hand. There's no reason to even give a fuck about the cause of the Final Days when you have Zodiarks protection from it by their existence.
@@jmstover Yeah but she was boring, silly and trite and the plot wasn't great, it would've been no great shame to fully rewrite everything. I have absolutely no respect for anything that they did with her, she was a forgettable midboss and Zodiark mattered.
@@storageheater
> and Zodiark mattered
Again... that makes no literary sense. Zodiark really didn't matter since 5.3 and Elidibus (the heart) being removed from play. At that moment Zodiark became a husk with no direction and honestly irrelevant to the main plot. No unsundered Ascians existed that could actually do anything. His existence was the only thing preventing another Final Days from happening (again, the Aether shield), and Fandaniel used the WoL to remove him from play and actually start the Final Days up again. So, in that singular regard Zodiark actually mattered, but that had to happen early enough on in 6.0 to have any meaning.
Zodiark didn't *cause* the Final Days which initially destroyed the world. Zodiark at 90 still means that the original cause of the Final Days is out there, and this is supposed to be the end of that Arc, which means that Final Days cause needs to be cleaned up at the end of 6.0 since 6.1 is supposed to start up new story threads this time.
That you didn't like it is one thing, but this whole thing with fighting despair, and hope lighting the way, and yadda yadda has been in play since 2.0 in one form or another. It wasn't the greatest of original plots overall, but it fit perfectly into the story as they've left the plot threads hanging over the years.
But honestly, Zodiark really didn't matter after 5.3, and if we we're supposedly to end the Zodiark/Hydaelyn arc this expansion we were going to need to take out the source of the Final Days which Zodiark was not. Zodiarks only importance was in preventing the Final Days from happening again and to move on to the source of the Final Days Zodiark needed to be removed early on.
@@jmstover don't worry, you've more than convinced me that Zodiark was also a huge waste of my time, lol
@@storageheater
No, it's not that it was a waste of a players time. You were wanting a story to unfold that they weren't telling.
The weren't going to retcon past expansion world building/lore in this one just to tell a different story. So great... you wanted a different story and didn't get what you wanted. That doesn't make the story being told bad, it makes it one that you didn't want.
The story told fits perfectly into the world building/lore as they've presented it thus far. Zodiark from the start wasn't the big evil (maybe at one time they were thinking that direction). As soon as they presented that Zodiark was summoned to stop the Final Days, Zodiark stopped being the Big Evil we'd have a final show down with. Whatever was outside the star causing the Final Days was the Big Evil. That's just expected. I was personally was expecting Zodiark as the 2nd trial and Hydaelyn as the first, but I do like how they played the story out.
Going outside of that is just retcon'ing the history you've already presented to tell a different story altogether.
I too was disappointed that our arch nemesis Zodiark died so easily. I remember playing and thinking, really, that's it? That part felt like a huge letdown. The coolest part of the whole thing for me was fist fighting Zenos.
Zodiark was never the arch nemesis though. The source of the Final Days that Zodiark forestalled was the arch nemesis. Zodiark at 83 makes perfect sense considering he was never the big bad of the story.
also you technically did the deal with Zodiark before end Walker, in the form of the heart, as Eldipus.
Endwalker main story was complete dog water, how could they go from the well thought story on ShadowBringers to this complete train wreck of a story is beyond me
Same girl wrote both stories
Disagreed, Endwalker was better.
Weird drugs you suck thinking its dogwater
@@SkyExplosion I know that's why I can't believe the the story turned out the way it did
@@ArchieGamez Endwalker story is a cluster fuck but we will agree to disagree
Never said SHB was a master piece but it was a lot better than EW.