Was Endwalker a FAILURE? - Expansion Retrospective

[@Preachgaming]

Now that all of the patches are done and Dawntrail is on the horizon, we felt it was time to take a long look back at Endwalker as a whole - the good, the bad, the progress, the mistakes - and where it sits at the end of this 10 year journey which started in A Realm Reborn. As we look ahead, will Square Enix embrace change, or play it safe? P.S. Yes that footstep scene was as much of a pain in the butt as you think it is.

[@christopherstoner2059]

Keep that footstep scene for your FFXIV openings!

[@ASpaceOstrich]

Excellent job whoever on the PG team put that together.

[@reyk1665]

Great video! 6.0 was great in my opinion. It had it's flaws and I didn't really like the ending. Personlly I think they wasted Zenos' potential. They could have done so much more with him after the final battle. I was really disappointed, but apart from that a really solid story. The post patches however... yeah... not a fan. 😅

[@crowevil4658]

Nope. YoshiP was only the director of 14. He was only the producer of 16 BECAUSE he couldn’t take the same responsibilities. BU3 could’ve shared resources, but also don’t know if they hired or expanded their respective efforts - it’s only speculation and not public. It is also highly possible that developing for 14 is relatively less difficult than back in 2.0. The only fairness I would say is EW lacked any INNOVATION - though party follow and dialogue sections was new (but irrelevant here). The content cycle has been the same since 2.0, with a few sprinkles. We got a deep dungeon and criterion’s in lieu of Bozja-like content, it’s not hard to understand. The game is getting a facelift, it would be nice to see more innovative mechanics and quests, but I don’t the content pattern will change much. The relic grind complaint is boring and lacks effort as feedback. Is it immersive right now? No. But relics were always artificial FOMO, and always nerfed at the end of the expansion to the point that makes the grind a waste of time. No one like Fate grinds and suddenly we miss them? Aetheric light (dungeon/raid spam) is the same as tomes, change my mind. The real complaint is that instead creating a new log or relic “lore” they expanded and deepened the Manderville quests. People just need to call it what it is. FFS.

[@magamisic5924]

@@reyk1665I personally disagree. The fact they brought back Zenos after the end before was a little questionable gamble to say they least, but they did deliver. I think it was a fine send off

[@aznhomig]

The intro is really high effort and appreciated.

[@GimmeTOKYO]

So is the outro!

[@Siul_987]

@@GimmeTOKYOlol the outro got me good, it made me laugh.

[@OldManInternet]

I was here to essentially type this haha. Loved it.

[@lordpoundcake2317]

Agreed

[@rpglover101]

I love when Preach gets all filmmaker.

[@Baromunk]

When I saw that graph of 2 minute burst DPS, I... motherf... 🤣

[@NibelungJ]

So that's why they call it big deeps.

[@MrKnaives-e6h]

@@NibelungJ big dick damage.

[@jackicurtis3611]

He draws it all with such a straight face, too.

[@Kate-ms2mn]

@@jackicurtis3611 he does not

[@jgcapers3860]

I hate how impactful and funny the 2 minute cooldown is at the same time.

[@Reinshark]

A fair and balanced take on the expansion. It was wonderful seeing you get to enjoy your time with Endwalker, and I'm looking forward to enjoying your Dawntrail coverage too!

[@sophomorehat]

I stopped playing after the 6.0 MSQ. I first started back in Heavensward and played pretty much nonstop for the best part of 6 years. Endwalker wrapped up the story so well that it just felt like a natural stopping point for me, a great place to hang up my bard bow and retire from saving the world. It was really fulfilling to walk away from a live service MMO with nothing but fond memories, not feeling burned out, not feeling like the game overstayed its welcome. Now I'm enjoying following your journey through the new story!

[@Lctl10]

What an intro! What a review - production was off the scale . WELL DONE EVERYONE!

[@0Fyrebrand0]

One thing that shouldn't be overlooked is, in addition to FFXVI, there were other behind-the-scenes strains on development resources like: finally integrating Duty Support for all MSQ dungeons (a much bigger task than they expected it to be), the graphics engine update, and the port to Xbox. The good news for Dawntrail is: FFXVI is out, Duty Support is completed, the Xbox port is live, and the graphics engine update will be finished upon the expansion's release. A lot of huge strains on CBU3's workload will be off their plate, and I think that's reason enough to look forward to what's to come.

[@grygaming5519]

Dont forget all the support for Remote Work. That alone took tons of manhours to set a server system up to handle connections of CBU3's development team to remote in without issues.

[@mosley3485]

One thing that shouldn't be overlooked is that it was their choice to do all of this. You can't force your playerbase to endure 2 years of dead af content and expect to be absolved because "woopsy, we sunk too many resources on a completely different game and the duty support feature that most of the playerbase doesn't engage with at all". Endwalker was the result of many poor decisions.

[@DawnAfternoon]

@@mosley3485 Some futureproofing needed to happen one day or another especially in a game over ten years old. I come from a game where the devs don't care about their early games at all. No new players were trying the game because of how incredibly messy and inpenetrable the first hours were. The old creative director head sincerely believes working on their early game is a waste of time and doesn't bring in new players. It only took until new creative director to step in until they finally start to unclog the clot in the early game and we actually experience an upsurge of new players.

[@ThePunkers20]

@@mosley3485if you want see the dead content then play SWTOR xD

[@goldenarmorpikachu]

​@@mosley3485 It wasnt just their choice though. They HAVE to think about new players. if you cant get new players into a game, it will stagnate. You want a Game to GROW, not just stay at the level its at. New players are a core part of any game. And this game was over ten years old. it needed a revamp. And they have done a LOT to make the game easier on new players. And I would gladly give up something i like for a single xpac if it means this game can grow to completely new heights. Just because a change they made isnt for you, doesnt mean its not needed for the game in general. Now i will agree that some of the things they gave us this xpac arent the best. But to act like they dont care/didnt do anything is imo absolutely false. frankly, even though a lot of the things were mid, im glad they tried to give us new things. I WANT to see new things. Not always the same content xpac after xpac. And you know, sometimes those new things just wont be for me. and thats not a bad thing like some people act.

[@TheSteveSchulz]

Actually, the story element of the trial series was spread across more than just Tataru's, there was some also in that side quest that went into the fiends' backstory, *and* there was more story in the patch MSQ than is typical.

[@siyrean]

except that the full storyline within the Ishgardian restorations dwarfs them both.

[@ryguy7932]

Also consider that the other Post MSQs were split into two parts, the follow up to the main MSQ of that expansion and the setup for the next one, where Endwalkers was... actually neither? Not much to follow up on and seemed to set up some other distant story and only giving us a simple dawntrail intro. So they could have a singular quest line for one trial series in the Post MSQ. Makes sense to me. I really enjoyed the EW post-MSQ.

[@MrKnaives-e6h]

it also went into Island sanctuary. every cap rank have some people visit your island. important npcs to boot.

[@TheSteveSchulz]

@@MrKnaives-e6h Ehhhh.... I mean 5.x had Bozja and Ishgardian Restoration that arguably was spread out between IS and Variant, so I think the equivalent is not the quests wedged between the dungeon and trial of each 6.x MSQ, while the final trial was shifted to Mandeville.

[@TheSteveSchulz]

@@MrKnaives-e6h subtract the not in my other reply

[@tetrahedron_in_space]

I think there are definitely things to criticize EW for that previous expansions handled better with story & systems, but I’m also very confident that 5-10 years from now, people who played EW will look back on it fondly for being an expansion that did a lot of boring busy work to update FFXIV into a “modern MMO” standard, and I believe a lot of the systems introduced here will pay off in the future as they are iterated upon. I think EW has been a great jumping-off point for Dawntrail to continue upping the ante for FFXIV - a fitting end to one story and the beginning of a new one.

[@bosinclaire7670]

Agreed. I get the feeling it'll get the heavensward treatment.. You never hear in modern discourse how terrible a lot of the content was in heavensward from diadem 1.0 and 2.0 IIRC as well as alexander nearly killing the raid scene..

[@cyanmage1]

considering how people treat heavensward now and are starting to talk about stormblood both of which were lambasted by the playerbase when it was current, endwalker is just getting the same treatment as every other expansion before it only reason no shadowbringers didn't get this was the mass influx of new players and the people that were dunking on it had to quickly change their tunes when the new players were being overwhelmingly positive about the current state of the game

[@MCG55SS]

As someone who start FFXIV in Nov of 2022 after playing WoW since 2005 I LOVED EW the story and everything is so amazing and having a story that is actual cohesive and building and not retconned every 2 expansions felt amazing. I know some veterans dislike parts of it but for me it is a great expansion and i cannot wait to venture into Dawntrail day 1.

[@qamarqammar7629]

"Veteran" here. I also LOVED Endwalker! I'm a "story player" myself. They know how precious what they've created is, they value it, and it shows. Welcome to the game and enjoy your adventures.

[@Demonis198666]

As a former WoW player, I really found myself getting sucked into ffxivs story...so damn good!

[@deltawolf]

Its like im reading my own experience when i read yours! Im however wondering what is commonly disliked by veterans you mean? I wasnt aware!

[@playlist233]

Its so funny how the vocal content creators like Zepla seem to be the main reference on the opinions of Endwalker, as if its the majority opinion. EW is trash because it lacks a bozja zone? EW Post-MSQ is bad because its taking 5 patches instead of 3? I'm glad shes quit because her takes were getting so unhinged

[@FF-tp7qs]

The funny thing about the lack of a Bozja zone is that people complained about Bozja back in Shadowbringers and wanted Deep Dungeon which we didn't get because of Bozja. So CBU3 made Eureka Orthos instead of a exploration zone​@@playlist233

[@Dschonathan]

I really think lots of players feel the "Endwalker got no reason to log on" specifically because they joined during Shadowbringers. After 2 or so years of playing through all of content that has piled up over 10 years of mmo development these players now reached the point where there is no more old/new-for-them content to go back to during a lull. And FF14 does get new content slowly, at least if you consider that there is no new timegated system to grind each patch. It's like reading a book series that has been going on for decades with an almost endless catalogue you can read through. Even if it feels like you will never catch up with all of the content, if you keep being interested it will happen eventually and then you are suddenly confronted with the drip feed that has been filling up an ocean.

[@RokkitGrrl]

Somehow, I'm still getting login queues in spite of the droves of people that supposedly quit the game. lol

[@VideogamesPang]

I've been subbed since the start of Heavensward, mid 2015. Mid-late Endwalker was the first time where I genuinely felt that the game was starving for content. And it's not that there was less content, it's that the content they did make had absolutely no staying power. Variant/Criterion is fun but it's like 1 day of content. Relic steps could be completed in half a day before the patch even launched. Normally I would spend at least a couple of months playing each patch before taking a break. As someone who doesn't do organized raiding, In Endwalker each patch felt like maybe 2 days worth of content except for a couple of rote daily tasks like PvP series, island sanctuary, and beast tribes. Legitimately PvP is the only thing that kept the game fun for me for more than a couple of days after patch launch. I've always advocated for the game not being a big grind that forces you to keep logging in and that it's okay to take breaks. But imo what they delivered in Endwalker just isn't good enough for a subscription game unless you are the type of person who is happy just to play house or spend months reclearing raids for gear you don't need.

[@Incensement]

@@RokkitGrrl That's due to how the login servers work. They work in bulk so when you try to log in it shows you a queue but actually it's just waiting a while to log multiple people in at once.

[@bathersbestie8986]

No fucking way people did all the content there is to do. There is no content draught, its just people didn't resonate with the content available. Now that ocean fishing is rewarded with mogtomes its full queues all day even 7am. Mark my words, people will revisit criterion dungeons once they get easier...

[@Lydeck]

​@@bathersbestie8986they'll revisit the newest one since it has shiny weapon skins, but neither of the other two have any reason to do them unless you're wanting to make gil to sell mounts. Which actually was very profitable for me during the Subterrane but I can't get my friends to want to do the newer ones lol. And Savage is too punishing relative to the nothingburger 2/3 provide in rewards.

[@tciddados]

I don't think there's really a reason that the number of jobs has to influence the relic grind due to completionists. It would be fairly simple for SE to make a system that made the first jobs you do take a long time, but as you have more jobs completed, the speed you finish the grind at increases. It could be a level/buff thing similar to Bozja resistance levels / the buffs you get from that that just makes killing things quicker, or just a drop rate increase, or whatever. That way, the average player still gets a long relic grind, but the completionists don't have an unrealistic grind for the rest.

[@italian504]

they did just that in bozja funnily enough. First time through there were 2 lengthy quests to get through (First was the 17 crystals from HW 24 and SHB 24 mans and second was the Two types of crystals, Gear parts and books) but once you did it on one character, they were non-repeatable. The other steps were and barring ONE step, the majority can be easily grinded out compared to those 2 steps.

[@RisqueBisquetz]

technically the "long grind" was already done, through the Hildibrand questline. That's not exactly a short journey to go through and not everyone can even stand the type of humor it has.

[@tciddados]

@@RisqueBisquetz The hildi questline isn't a long grind at all, in the sense that this video was talking about a long grind being a reason to play each day. If you're not a new player who needs to do all the hildi quests from previous expacs, the EW hildi quests are around an hour or two each patch that has a new relic, and the tomes are something you don't even need to do new content for (like eureka/bozja), you'll just naturally accumulate them regardless. And to the bozja comment: That's a bit fair, though idr how much faster the one-time parts being removed made it, since I don't ever really do more than one relic an expac, typically.

[@grygaming5519]

@@italian504 I still stand by the fact that had Covid not hit....people would have bemoaned another 'Bozja/Eureka' in Endwalker. Both zones were lukewarm in reception to say they werent and beloved is kind of rewriting the past. People were pissed at the relic lock behind Eureka, and more were even angry that Yoshida removed the ability to progress the relic outside the Zone. Bozja...that it forced you to do a dungeon in a zone you didnt want to do. Its primarily that I honestly felt that the Endwalker relics was pretty much Yoshida apologizing to the people who didnt want to do that kind of content but had to fill the void of a content drought somehow.

[@whisperingshadowXI]

​@@grygaming5519You're assuming it's the same crowd complaining on both cases. There are people that still hate Eureka and Bozja but can't say shit because they know they'll get ragged on despite any valid criticisms they might have for the zones. Similarly if the seeming majority of people praised the Hildi relic progression, the OG relic grind people would look like masochists wasting people's time demanding more tedium to get the relic. Fact of the matter is, YoshiP was damned if he did and damned if he didn't change the relic grind. The only difference is we're used to the complainers about relic grinding from past expansions. We're not used to the other group bitching so it makes it look like a "new" problem. But those people were always there, ready to blow a gasket they just didn't say anything until now. Tl;dr people will always complain no matter what the fuck you do, just do your best to make sure the game is enjoyable enough the bitchers get drowned out (which is harder each day when social media is continually optimized to promote bullshit drama over literally anything else, it's legit the first thing people get shown on EVERY social media platform by default, wish they could be sued/punished to oblivion for such insidious influencing).

[@TheDavid0408]

12:50, you knew what you were doing

[@Kiwicrack]

big dick damage, amirite?

[@patyos2]

Big ingame D checks

[@tylorhobbs8920]

It's the only way to depict big dick damage.

[@joserobertotrevinosalinas9910]

Is this the famous big dick dps?

[@SporeTres]

"and this one got shorter"

[@Charanari3]

OH MY GOD I loved this video so damn much. Not only did Preach offer his own fair take on Endwalker, on which most things I agree with, but the attention to details, the intro and the outro were AMAZING. ESPECIALLY the outro, I just LOVED it. Great job team! This was one of the best you've ever done, REALLY can't wait where you guys go next!

[@Gonarc15468879855]

Everyone keeps ignoring the main issue I have with field operations like Eureka or Bozja. When you're arriving late to that content by an order of a few years - it is a lonely god damn ghost town. Those places are pure misery for new players and I did not enjoy grinding Eureka with like 5 people on the whole map or Bozja with maybe 8 people in the entirety of Zadnor. And don't get me started on how joining for Baldesion Archive or Delubrum Reginae Savage requires you to go get a group through specific discords. The content might be great for when it's fresh and new, but for people arriving late is pure dread. I'd like maybe something a little more interresting than what we got for relics this time around, but I'm for sure glad theres not a third god damn instanced zone a new player will have to slog through at some point in time.

[@ridleyroid9060]

Huh, I thought Bozja was still active, but yes, I agree with you. After the expansion is over and new stuff comes out community focused content like Bozja gets somewhat left behind. I guess if you really want to get ti done it would be best to do it at DT launch, because people will want to level PCT and VPR to 90 as some people want to go through MSQ and Bozja is awesome for 80 - 90 as well, since no dungeon ques. But I guess at that point you'll want to actually do DT. Hey, I guess it is more reason for you to want a Bozja/Eureka next expac, so you can be there when it is fresh.

[@epicspacecow1779]

Man it really was a journey now wasnt it? I dont know if i would have tried 14 if it wasnt for you tbh but so glad i did. Thank you so much.

[@siyrean]

it's a shame the Alliance Raids are so under tuned that you have to be a streamer doing minimum item level just to see Nald'thals scales and many other of the bosses full mechanics.

[@cyanmage1]

and what is wrong with that I hate being stuck in raid for 40mins Im there for the rewards not to see the mechanics the faster they end the better

[@siyrean]

@@cyanmage1 people who enjoy raids for the raids and not the rewards oO

[@cyanmage1]

@@siyreanso the same people that love Criterion dungeons since those are popular with the no rewards ...... said no one ever

[@siyrean]

@@cyanmage1 they fixed the crystal tower gear loop hole due to community feedback. explain

[@cyanmage1]

@siyrean explain what exactly that loophole further backs my claim that players want rewards not mechanics in 24 man's they went so far as to no equip gear to avoid any but the fastest 2 raids just to get through them which was an issue for new players trying to get through the stormblood ones since bozja was locked behind that so really the only reason that was "fixed" was because it was unintentionally gating another piece of major content

[@TajinQ]

I wasn't a fan of the last zone of the Endwalker MSQ. It had some very good moments but right after that section with Estinien, it became obvious how the story in that zone would unfold. It was obvious as well that none of the sacrifices actually mattered, so the story lost a lot of weight. Also felt like they didn't know what to do with Zenos so they jammed him in at the very end. There's so many great moments during EW's msq, even more than in Shadowbringer, but it was more inconsistent.

[@VideogamesPang]

I think some of the other issues with the 2 minute window (besides dictating raid planning) are: - It means all jobs have the same basic gameplan: stock resources/sync cooldowns to line up with 2 minutes. That makes jobs feel more similar and like there is less gameplay variety across the game as a whole. Paladin had to have a rework mid-expansion because it had a more sustained DPS playstyle that didn't play well into burst windows, so they changed it to be another sync-and-burst job like all the others, actively reducing job variety. - It HEAVILY punishes falling out of sync with your raid. The idea of the 2 minute window was so players don't have to worry about having bad synergy, but now since all jobs synergize by default, they are balanced around that synergy, meaning if you fail to sync your rotation with your raid (which can happen quite easily), you are losing HUGE damage. Particularly because jobs have also been designed so that all their biggest attacks also fall inside these buff windows.

[@temonokelumono1584]

The problem wasn’t necessarily a lack of content. It was the fact that the content they released was catered to solo players or small groups. At the end of the day, this is an MMO, and I want to experience content with large groups of other players. Shadowbringers did better in this regard, with Bozja and Firmament bringing the community together

[@anteprs7908]

this may be a mmorpg but the solo players and causal are far bigger then the midcore who do midcore content liek bozja and eureka also it a mmorpg you ignoring the rpg part some ppl play for that .

[@FolsomC]

@@anteprs7908 Yeah. People grossly overestimate the value of large-player-count content. Some people really like it, but it's a very small number.

[@anteprs7908]

@@FolsomC fact my freind fact

[@temonokelumono1584]

@@anteprs7908 Content like Eureka, Bozja, and Firmament wasn't just for "midcore" players. What was so great about those pieces of content was that you had different levels of challenges built in to them. It brought the casual, midcore, hardcore, and crafter communities (in the case of Firmament) together. Let's take Bozja for example. A very "casual" type player could do every relic step at a slower pace and even do a great majority of the steps outside of the instance. A midcore type player would probably grind more than one relic and possibly try getting them all. Hardcore players had the duels and Delubrum Reginae Savage as a challenge for them. This brought all three types of players into one instance and acted as common ground to interact with each other that the game wouldn't normally have provided.

[@anteprs7908]

@@temonokelumono1584The problem is bozja and eureka have to many anti solo and anti causal sistem and us causal being stuck with jack shlt to do after msq is the issue but at it came at the prize of true causal content i am sorry about the midcore player crying now for lack of midcore content now can see how it feel to be a casual for the left 3 expantion i get you want your content but the causal dont want to be force to unsub or do content NOT MADE FOR THEM OR CONTENT THEY DONT ENJOY. a casual player isnt a casual player anymore the sec he start doing that content same way you not longer a vegan if you eat meat you can return to be casual player but at that time your mindset isnt causal and you arent playing to relax and have fun but to have fun at best. it honestly tiring how egoistic the midcore and hardcore players are we dont want to do your content you dont want ot do our content we jsut want no challanging and sol ofreindly cotnent and a nice gearing path that doesnt take ages to do + easy to grind like ew relic as optional path you can keep all your content but it honest sad that causals who are over 80% of the playerbase have to ask for content made and catered to US ,thankfully se listened and made islands and ew relics and hunt train are gear for quick gearing up .also crafting is for all content not erueka and bozja crafint can be both casual,midcore and pro hardcore with mid max left and right it all about how far you wanna reach but bozja and eureka have ACTIVE PUNISHMENTS and ANTI CAUSAL sistems and diffculty.

[@Varichan]

Eh, i absolutly loved endwalker and how it did things. But im also not one who looks for a forever game anymore. I get my fill and then move on, come back later when there is something new and go away again.

[@Icycrits]

I would do the same but the problem is that the way they designed their housing system, you're either stuck paying your sub permanently to keep it or you lose it and on some servers, getting a medium or large back is just not feasible. And when you're forced to pay a monthly sub for something, you try to find something to get value for your money. The problem with EW is that there is no repeatable, worthwhile content outside of raiding.

[@nebula8851]

@@Icycrits And this is why you're not supposed to have housing if you're a casual player. Apartments exist for this reason.

[@Varichan]

@@Icycrits He? You have to resub like once every three months to keep your house you don't even need to think about it until you get the Email, which you get early enough to react. And as theother guy said, you can also just get an appartment. or a room in your FCs house. And frankly if you are playing with this cadence, the old content around is more than sufficient. Unless during those periods you play literally every day all day, you most certainly wont hae all the other relics and collectables

[@deucewildegaming]

The issue is the Post Shadowbringers MSQ was a slight lull in the action but still had us all on the edge of our seats because Endwalker was a direct continuation of that story. Shadowbringers hit so hard and was so much better than what we were used to in a game that it had use stunned and on the ropes. After Endwalker MSQ was completed, it felt like a big sigh. The story was over. We hit a reasonable and well-done conclusion to everything. The Meteion thing was kinda telegraphed but the early Zodiark kill and some of the other elements still very surprising and emotional. Just like the Lead-up to Stormblood was slow and kind of a yawn-fest I was expecting the same from Endwalker post MSQ. I think that the MSQ in Dawntrail can redeem it or make it feel better, but we won't have that perspective until we play Dawntrail. I agree with your thoughts on the relic "grind" the reality is you can never win. People who want shiny items complain it's too hard, and people complain it's too easy when you make it more accessible. Yoshi-P has always said he wants you to enjoy FFXIV but doesn't see a need for you to invest all your free time into one game. That doesn't resonate with a certain section of the gaming audience, but we should accept that any development is going to be done with those lenses. Finally, thank you for doing it justice in your retrospection. I think it's hard to be everything to everyone, but they do a fairly good job adding a lot of content to try to appeal to many folks. I'm glad to see that you can say you still enjoy the game for what it is, because we have enough whiny voices complaining about what it isn't.

[@RNLee]

I'm surprised it wasn't touched on, but Deep Dungeons were dead on arrival because they offered little incentive to do as well, with very small exp gains.

[@kiearawagner7901]

Yeah. Like, people STILL run Palace of the Dead even now, and to some extent Heaven on High, but Eureka Orthos? Honestly, outside of getting past the first ten or so levels to finish the questline I haven't stepped into that place in sometime.

[@TheMeGuy1]

For me, the issue with the post game MSQ is that they didn't take the Realm Reborn approach. ARR's post-game presented us with diverse adventures building up the world as a whole and introducing a ton of characters and ideas that would be elaborated on all the way into Endwalker. In the ARR post-game, we had our dealings with Ishgard, Ysayle, and the Scions Disappearing which led us to Heavensward, and many other plot threads. We had Yugiri and the Doman Refugees arrive, as well as the Ilberd's introduction and Ala Mhigan motivated betrayal, which were both halves making up Stormblood. While it wasn't originally MSQ, we had the Crystal Tower and G'Raha which were insanely important to Shadowbringers. We met Elidibus who would play a huge role in Shadowbringers' post game, and in Endwalker. We met Krile and Moenbryda, both of whom would be important some way or another for the next few expansions (Krile seems to be finally getting her big moment all the way into Dawntrail). And we learned about the additional powers of the echo in the Leviathan quest, and we learned how to kill ascians, things which became very important in general. Because the EW postgame focused solely on the void, with a final hour leading into Dawntrail, the scope that they built their world up was WAY smaller. We've only met 4 characters, Zero, Golbez, Azdaja, and Wuk Lamat, and we have pretty much 4 story threads: Fixing the Void, Azaja's return possibly leading us to Meracydia, Y'Shtola still exploring inter-shard travel, and the final bits and bobs leading us to Dawntrail. However, the focus is primarily on the void and we know next to nothing about the other things, whereas we got a lot more meat and setup for ARR.

[@hotarukin]

I'm going to put myself out there and say: Relics being 'easy' to get is relative in a lot of ways. Something people seem to forget is that most of the relic questlines send you back to old content to gather things. Heavensward relics saw you doing nearly everything 50-59. So the new folks had people in their areas doing the thing. Bozja went in the opposite direction. There are bits and pieces that send you back to old content, but for the most part... it's a new area that no one goes to anymore, making Bozjan relics a real pain to work on for a new player. Enter 'gather 6k tomes'. Which you get from doing old content. Any old content. Every new player has people to play with for as long as we're hunting those relics. And when 7.0 comes out, we're going to have other things we want to spend those tomes on. But the weapons will still be there. Easily attainable for new players, just by clicking to do old content that's new to them, joining new players yet to experience all the story that they've seen. It's honestly *really* effective, and a great design choice looking towards the future.

[@mana-azir6808]

considering how i still see people loathing having to grind for the bozja relic still with its one time steps and drop rates that are better outside of the content zone (blu fates in hw zones etc etc), i agree with you

[@ValbrandrLeonhardt]

​@@mana-azir6808I'm glad I was never much of a hardcore player to want to get relics. Only relic I have is the HW? paladin one I think, the one that has blue flames on the sword and shield. Only did it for fashion, it's simple yet effective.

[@mana-azir6808]

@@ValbrandrLeonhardt did you get it back when HW was current or like later on?

[@Kiobao]

pretty much how I feel. People complain about how easy the relics are to obtain, but I personally like this approach. At the very least, they could do this AFTER we do some lengthy grind for our first relic and then make it sort of this easy for alts jobs. This video sort of lays out as relics being easy is what feels like it is making the game worse, but what really is going on is a preference and just a lack of reason to grind the other content. They did a lot of features and added new things that are rather niche and short form content, not amazing for a Sub Based MMO, so people weren't so happy with it all.

[@Teo_stra]

They're not relic weapon's, they're just glorified tome weapons

[@HankJ666]

People who hate post MSQ will pretend they loved it all along when Lightbringers comes out

[@Dsingis]

13:00 Oh come on Preach, you knew what you were doing there.

[@TheSteveSchulz]

What, it's just the phallic part of his subconscious poking out.

[@johnsnow1749]

Even added the scrotum hair.

[@meriwidget3474]

Such a good video! You really covered the points. There is plenty of room for improvement, but they did take risks, and that is commendable! There's room for the game to keep growing and I hope they can do so. I'm looking forward to Dawntrail and whatever it brings :)

[@ComradeNexus]

"XIV is stale! We want change!" *CBU3 changes things* "Wait! Not like that!" My only real axe to grind this expansion was Criterion. I wanted it as a 4-man Savage option, but it was more for those who had completed Savage already, not for those who wanted to start playing Savage with a light party. I do still miss Exploratory content, though.

[@mosley3485]

Criterion is the best thing that came out of Endwalker. It just needs better rewards.

[@TheMexRAGE]

preach forgor the biggest game changer new feauture on endwalker... adventure plate/portrait

[@kimaclaret]

Oh shit, you're right!

[@bighatastrea]

I'm dreaming of the day when they'll finally remove that stupid thing where the portrait resets as soon as you dare to equip different shoes

[@tinybee7780]

I will forever be grateful for this expansion to have been released at the perfect time. No doubt when this was released everybody in the world in one way or another was dealing with hardship in one form or another, and the pandemic certainly did not help. Endwalker most definitely exceeded my expectations with how the FFXIV team wanted to end the Hydaelyn and Zodiark Saga. I'm glad that they managed to stick the landing. To quote of my favorite NPCs in this expansion, "It's been a gripping tale. Unbreakable bonds and noble sacrifice, sprinkled with moments of levity to counterbalance the pathos."

[@Kniraven]

This was well done. I hope the effort put in is reflected by the engagement. I'd love to see a behind the scenes view of your green screen setup.

[@CeresAzalia]

First can I just say: absolutely incredible editing, graphics, and production values. This video in and of itself is so well-made, and it deserves to be talked about on its own merit. The opening and end sequence tie-ins to the Endwalker trailers was stunning. The bit with the Mothercrystal was excellent, as well. S tier work, fellas. As for the topic at hand, I can only say that I have nothing to say because I 100% totally and unequivocally agree with ALL of your takes. You might as well have taken all of my thoughts, feelings, and overall opinions on the entire expansion straight out of my head. So I can't comment except to say that I agree with you all across the board. Not every piece of new content introduced was a smash hit, but I'm glad they took some risks and tried some new things, and I'm hopeful they will perfect these types of content in the future if they continue to listen to feedback, which they typically do. And while change is scary, so is the thought of having things go stale and become too predictable, so this shake up... trying all the new pieces of content. Things like criterion and such...I'm quite glad they did it in the end.

[@devxved]

People forget covid messed with production all the time

[@lotus_rouge]

Can always count on Preach to put a lot of effort into the hows and whys and sprinkle in his own personal opinion, rather than simply regurgitating the same tired old lines everyone's throwing around ad nauseam without elaborating. Great video.

[@ObscenumLoL]

Holy f*ck... Just the intro, when the music rolls in, gave me the chills. I freaking loved the whole journey it was and, even before watching the video, thanks for making a part of it not just for me but to soo many players out there.

[@troll5262]

My biggest gripe with Endwalker-base is that it felt rushed and stalled. Like it was supposed to be two expansions but they had to make it one. So some areas were flushed out and others were super rushed. Garlemald being a single zone still irks me. Yet we spent almost 5 times more time on the dang moon with the lopporits doing menial tasks. Such a whiplash in vibe, feeling and pacing all over.

[@Scionofgreyhaven]

Endwalker was everything i wanted it to be as a casual player, Love the story, the zones, the music, the gameplay I will say though, I can understand people who do higher tier content not quite being satisfied, I think they introduced some decent new content as well but it still needs a lot of work. I am hoping for future expansions, they are willing to keep trying new things, breaking the mold a bit more, You won't see massive changes to the already established structure of the game but I would personally like to see more variety, I think they could take a few things from other MMOs as well like WoW does, Dragonflying for example etc.

[@danielj6897]

That was awesome! I can tell you guys put a lot of work into it. The outtakes at the end were great xD

[@ArdynSol]

I’ve been casually playing off and on since 2013. Laptop couldn’t handle the game very well without overheating in those years. Never got past the initial beginning of Stormblood until Shadowbringers came out. Beat the MSQ, quit until Endwalker, beat the MSQ, quit again. I don’t seem to enjoy the endgame of FF14 and that’s okay. Hopefully they add some type of activities I enjoy in Dawntrail.

[@kimaclaret]

Great video. You can tell there's a lot of effort put it, and it really pays off imo. 🎉 I think this arc was a near perfect gaming experience for me personally, and it's something I'll remember for the rest of my life. I never had the expectation that the patch content would meet that level of story telling, though I enjoyed it enough. I'm looking forward to how it comes into play later, for sure. I thoroughly enjoyed both raids and the variant dungeons, and I'm very much looking forward to how the latter progresses in DT. Island Sanctuary was a nice idea, and although mine is fully maxed out and self sustaining at this point, I don't feel like it hit the mark for me overall. I don't always agree with Mike, but I certainly agree with his EW sentiments overall. EW definitely stuck the landing.

[@indieramus]

"Nothing meaningful to do daily but the raids are there." My brothers know exactly which wow xpac this was.

[@lindthechaoticheretic8708]

"It was good, and then it wasn't." That basically sums up my entire expirience with all parts of endwalker.

[@GUkraine]

I thought you were talking about preaches hairline for a sec.

[@lindthechaoticheretic8708]

@@GUkraine Savage

[@anteprs7908]

"It was good for casual snd raiders but the midcore didnt get bozja and started cry "their i fixed it for you .

[@m16dude967]

the story in endwalker was really good but there wasn't much to do outside raiding.

[@anteprs7908]

@@m16dude967 well you had island then crit ,vari deep dungs...

[@Jade-nn3bn]

The thing with farming old relics is that it doesn't really become untenable because earlier relics become easier with each new expansion and even each patch. Getting a Zeta relic takes less than a day now on most jobs if you farm the right content, and the same goes for the Lux relics. Tying the relic to criterion/variant dungeons, island sanctuary, or even eureka orthos would've given players more of a reason to do the content in Endwalker that lacks a substantial reward.

[@simfilesymlink4593]

I ran variant for glam and mount and I'm fine. I have no idea why is it that important to have a dungeon you need to do more than that, imagine having to run tam tara 500 times for some reward. Having a roulette at some point once there's a lot of variants would be nice though

[@qamarqammar7629]

@@simfilesymlink4593 Same. I ran Variant for glams and mount and am MORE than fine. I loved Variant. I thought the stories, the views, the fights were just incredible. I'm super casual and for me and the people who spent days in there taking screenshots it was a memorable experience. I appreciated the fact that even if they did this in response to people who may have wanted something else, they made it with the rest of us in mind as well.

[@oleub23]

in the mind of cbu3 though, things like variant dungeons or shb/ew fates or the island don't need an extra reward track attached to them because they already made systems that actively reward doing that content, unlike the old relics that funneled people into content that there wasn't any real reward for, like arr-sb fates, or relic stages that expect you to run roulettes released at the point where most players have hit cap on all their jobs And while people will gripe about criterion rewards, we all know there's zero chance of them locking casuals out of the relic by making them do savage level content

[@Jade-nn3bn]

@@simfilesymlink4593 A lot of people didn't do any of that content specifically because it only unlocks glams and mounts. If they don't like those glams or mounts then its likely not content that they want to do. In turn, they deprive themselves of content they want to do, and end up feeling like endwalker is devoid of content, which is the situation that we're in right now.

[@Jade-nn3bn]

@@fredy2041 A lot of people also loved the grind and were happy when they actually finished a relic step, myself included. But now its not much to celebrate because its just 1500 tomes each step.

[@Igarcia86]

I gotta admit, i'm new to your content Preach, You just never really came up on my radar, but my GOD, this video was incredible. So detaled, so deep, and just yeah. I love the breakdown and I'll certainly share this with my FC and friends!

[@4204PTSD]

This is one of the best reviews I have seen. Thank you. I have no problem with people not liking the game or content but at least give it a try before judging it. I hear so many people dump on content they have not even tried and treat their feelings as facts. I say this is a gold standard of reviews. Well thought out and really fair. You made me rethink somethings with your facts and good pints.

[@patyos2]

Endwalker made me buy more and more boxes of tissues. There was a big increase in tissue economy during Endwalker

[@Tonsofcraft]

My tissue consumption was already high, due to Y'shtola

[@herrquh]

Further issue with the relic grind is that it's exclusionary to levelling alt jobs. Doing the daily roulette is is a fast way to get XP but now you lose out on your relic progress if you do them with a job that isn't at level cap.

[@mosley3485]

Just do hunts. Most people who join hunt trains regularly have the relics completed for all jobs within a few weeks of a new step being added.

[@DameonStarflame]

Seeing such an optimistic take from Preach is a heartwarming thing. Looking forward to DT with everyone.

[@zeroblade9800]

1.0 player here, its been a ride. I actually haven't been playing though since 6.2 patch and have been catching up. I haven't completed alliance/raid yet. I've enjoyed MSQ and in the EW waiting room there. Honestly I got a lot to do and don't really get the "dry post game" spell. This is basically my secret, I've been playing since 1.0 cause of repeated "take breaks". Some are just too good to ignore, like 5.3. Others can, like 5.4, 5.5, 6.1+, Even then though its all good and its a period of chill out. Just plain gaming - need to chill out from the world ending stuff. Its a path of burn out if you just want this to give give give.

[@Desu-Desu-Chan-San]

Same here, I am also a fellow 1.0 enjoyer and i regularly take breaks. I usually hit the xpac hard for 6-9mo then I wander off for 3-7mo and repeat. I like coming back to chunks of content instead of being drip fed things while I AFK in Limsa.

[@Geist1337]

Endwalker was good (I wouldn't say 'great,' Shadowbringers is what great looks like) until the most recent 3 or 4 post-MSQ story patches. Then the writing fell off hard; and I hope it was just because they were trying to fill it out with what is basically an elongated intern-written trial series, while the real team worked on Dawntrail. It was the closest I ever came to wanting to skip dialogue just because of how poorly parts of it were written, the stupid decisions, the tell-don't-show they HEAVILY relied upon in the latest additions, and the literal coin-flip of Golbez from bad to good over the course of a 3 line conversation.

[@Havic1137]

For me it was the alliance raid. The final patch killed it for me with the writing.

[@VideogamesPang]

I think taking Meteion as the antagonist of Endwalker is the wrong way to look at it, because it sets up expectations of characterization that she is not intended to have. The "antagonist" of Endwalker is despair. Meteion is simply the representative, a way to give form to the idea. She's not meant to be an Emet-Selch or an Ilberd. She is quite literally just a conduit for the destructive power of an emotion that dwells within all of humanity.

[@andysaelind401]

I'd like to add a point regarding the trial series. I don't believe it's not only because people weren't doing them. I think that because the Four Fiends and Golbez are so iconic within the FF community, that there was an expectation that they should have been trials and given their flair. Since they were tied to the MSQ, that's what they decided to go with. It's always important to remember that FFXIV also works on the basis of the expectations that it IS a Final Fantasy theme park before being an MMO

[@redcpt3791]

People like to ignore content they don't personally fuck with. Saying Endwalker has no content is hilarious. It basically boils down to 'Endwalker didn't have some brown WW1 map I could dick around in all day grinding tomest- sorry MEMORIES for relics I probably won't glam'. Yeah, so sad I don't have that.

[@cheesemuffin8129]

Endwalker has no meaningful content

[@anteprs7908]

​@@cheesemuffin8129no you life doesnt but ew does

[@TheWickedMessenger3]

My issue is value. The game, once you are caught up and playing it patch to patch, just does not offer enough of the content I enjoy for me to pay 15 a month for it.

[@siyrean]

one of the biggest problems with the 2 minute meta is that if you even slightly drift your cooldowns, you're completely screwed. there's no smaller buff window to use them in instead. they unintentionally made the the raids harder

[@sadmiqoxiv]

Ive said it before. Endwalker had the same, if not more, content than any other expansion. What it didn't have was MEANINGFUL content. Nothing felt like it was worth doing more than once. There was no replayability in any of the content added, where as in other Expansions, things like the Relic Grind actually gave you a reason to go back into older content and keep it active. No exploratory zone and no relic grind made the current content dull, and extremely boring. We have been doing current (6.4) content for 23 weeks now, i have zero incentive to step into a normal raid, trial or even roulettes. I have played more Eureka and Bozja in the last 2 months than current content... Why? Because the content is replayable. PvP is basically all that keeps me subbed to the game right now, because its the only meaningful content that the game actually has right now.

[@anteprs7908]

relpace meaningful with midcore focused content . the ew content wasnt meaningless it was causal focused as it should be casual make up 85% of the playersbase of most modern mmorpg ,eureka and bozja are not causal content they are midcore one .

[@kaleiohulee6693]

My theory has always been that post patch is the palette cleanser after that big conclusion. We're wrapping up loose ends using a separate story that I enjoyed as an old school FF series fan. Once the Zodiark arc ended I really just wanted to be able to hang out and have time to relax in the world I saved. I'm from the casual end of the spectrum and have been enjoying the game daily so content has never been a problem for me.

[@Lctl10]

Same feeling

[@FuyuYuki92]

This was a really enjoyable review! And I agree with you, the post MSQ storyline has to be a setup for something that comes later. I myself found the (current) conclusion of this ark refreshing, since Zero and Golbez are the ones fighting for *their* world, it's not us intervening... for now. I belong to the camp of people who missed the relic grind a lot - but more than just the relic grind, it was the open field and grindy aspect oft it. I'm curious to see what comes in dawntrail.

[@-L1K-]

I loved it as a whole. Made me cry and the way it ended was super satisfying. The only dip was def Zero’s story in post-MSQ which dragged a bit but I still enjoyed certain moments. We didn’t really get that vacation we wanted. Also, we got some of the best Hildy moments in EW. I was happy with it overall.

[@Moriahari]

The team just gets better and better with every project. Absolutely amazing production from start to finish! And I really appreciate the discussion and perspective given in this video. You guys are one of the few creators whose opinion I trust currently, and for good reason.

[@TwoTwig]

Regarding the relics and there being too many jobs to realistically expect people to grind out weapons for, I heard a good suggestion of making the FIRST weapon a real grind and any subsequent weapon much easier to obtain.

[@solangesimondsen]

LOVED this piece of content, Preach! Fun to watch and spot on analysis.

[@kingdomheartsguy44]

dawntrails exploration zone is gonna add so much value to the expansion

[@Siul_987]

Lol the intro goes so hard, extremely well done editing.

[@ToastedBread68]

I wouldn't call the expansion a failure by any means. It was a good expansion. Speaking for myself, I enjoyed it. The problem is that the game got so much attention during Shadowbringers. The playerbase grew and grew because everyone was trying it out. Big streamers picked up the game and their viewers followed. Shadowbringers' numbers were inflated so much that everyone thought ff14 was the mmo titan that everyone was gonna switch to. But that's not how it works. Not everyone that tries the game is gonna continue playing it. The audience thinned out when the hype died down and now we're just back to the players who truly enjoy the game. Not to mention the fact that Endwalker actually had a conclusion to the original story. People that were invested in the game for the story got their closure, and now they don't feel that pull back to the game because now there's another story to follow that's just beginning. The audience will continue to rise and fall as the new story progresses. The latter half of Endwalker is just the "filler arc". I have a feeling dawntrail is gonna deliver on the new story, but we'll just have to wait and see. I think it'll all work out fine.

[@Azeur]

I have a lot of gripes with EW, which primarily boiled down to the game becoming boring, and too easy. It's a trend that's been going on for a while, but it really peaked in EW. Expert dungeons are some of the worst content in the game, because it's something you are expected to repeated a lot if you want weekly tomestones, yet they are so incredibly boring and unintesting. Nothing is a threat in the expert dungeons, the fact that it is meta to run expert dungeons without a healer speaks volumes to how much of a joke they are. I stopped doing expert roulette because it was ruining my enjoyment in the game. The EW levelling dungeons are more interesting by a large margin. The EW Alliance Raids while initially cool, showed their flaws quickly. Within week 1 or 2, people were doing meme runs like all healers or all tanks, and frequently bosses are killed so ridiculously fast that they haven't even done half their mechanics. When content is that easy, there's no reason for me to pay attention to what's happening - and it becomes boring. I rarely did EW alliance raids after while, though if I got it in roulette I would still complete it - unlike Crystal Tower raids, which I started abandoning because of how much of a joke those raids have become. Several of the Savage raids were underwhelming, or even annoying/boring. Most of the Extreme trials were a disappointment, and boring to run through - even if there was slight room for failure. I still hold that Storm's Crown is the best trial in EW - even as a black mage, because it's an exciting and lively fight that doesn't feel static. I play FFXIV to be engaged, and have fun - but unless you are doing Savage, Extreme or deep dungeons - there is no need to pay attention or be focused. The gear/power scaling in this game is way off-balanced for both older and newer content, and there's a ton of fights that either need to be reworked - or the power scaling needs to be reworked, for them to be fun again. Even other content suffers from this issue. Treasure maps? Forget about being a black mage or similarly slow jobs, the mobs are dead before you are halfway into your Fire 4. Bozja? You blinked and the train have already completed the skirmish. They really need to rework how the scaling of fates work. A and S rank hunting targets? They really should scale according to player count, because when the trains start- most of the time you have to be lucky to finish a full combo before they whimper and die. There is no risk, and when there's no risk - things are boring. To this day, Odin is still one of the most exciting fates/"hunting targets", because he can still mess you up despite being ARR content. When I finally got around to doing Eureka with friends, and saw how everyone was working together and communicating in the overworld, it felt like I was finally playing an MMO again. But then I completed all of Eureka (even the raid), and didn't find any motivation or reason to return beyond "earn gil/get fashion" - in a game where gil becomes pointless.

[@lucasvallet4487]

Alliance raids have always been meme you could complete with full healer or tanks groups week 1 nothing has changed there. I do agree that the last 2 EW AR are too easy however. Same for expert dungeons, at least since ShB

[@anteprs7908]

sound liek you are the minority raider aka hardcore to midcore player ew was for the first time a real expantion catering to the 85% casual players

[@Azeur]

@@lucasvallet4487 If alliance raids were always a meme, why did the devs end up giving the Ivalice raid(s) echo? People struggled and wiped so much there. Something akin to current-day Ivalice was what the EW alliance raids were promised to be. I lost all hope when I experienced the final EW alliance raid.

[@Azeur]

@@anteprs7908 Not really. Despite playing since ARR, I've not done much raiding when it is current content. But I have experienced how much the game has gotten simplified over the years, and how it feels like the devs are terrified of even remotely challenging the players to do more than press attack once per 5 second. I honestly think that at the bare minimum, the game should require you to know how to play your job, even in casual content. Dungeons used to have mechanics, and you used to actually have to think a tiny bit. Now it's just "pull everything, dodge aoe and kill boss", and if you're lucky one of the new dungeons has 1 interesting boss. Even the jobs are getting streamlined and becoming more the same as each other, so the only real difference between jobs start to become what flavour of battle effects you want.

[@anteprs7908]

@@Azeur ppl learn there skill in time casual content cant have any difficult that make it no longer casual.

[@Seawalkerlive]

I've been a vigilant fan for a long time, and I can't help but feel nostalgia when looking back at your "History of the Rogue, Paladin, etc.". You've seemed to keep that same energy of how much love and thought you put into your videos. But this time around, you've got a backpack full of experience to give a real treat of a presentation.

[@Battler624]

The relic issue could've easily been fixed if they made each role require a grind but the rest of the jobs in that role dont require the grind. For example you play as a warrior but want the relic on both drk and war? just finish the warrior grind (get the items required from fates/dungeons/quests/whatever) and then the items you require will be available for purchase on other tank jobs for just tomestones

[@Rogsnutle]

I actually really like this idea. Make the 1st relic a chore, then just tome the rest. I highly doubt I will ever get any of the previous Relics aside from Paladin's. Shadowbringers may be the only relics I get all of.

[@WalkerRileyMC]

Basically what they did with job quests....got rid of them and rolled them into role quests. Which I'm sad about since I've not seen my boy X'rhun for awhile.

[@mc2010925]

I love this. GOOD JOB. Well Researched and informed. Looking forward to more FF videos!

[@velho6298]

banger of a video. great editing!

[@MythrilShotgun]

I've never felt as utterly bamboozled in an MMO as fighting Zodiark at 83. 83!! But as high as some of the highs were in Endwalker, there were a lot of missed opportunities imo. That Zenos had our body and not a single scion was injured or killed? I don't *want* them to die, but THE DRAMA!!! I want the DRAMA! Really undercut the stakes that nobody even had a scratch. I'd have even taken a light coma (And narratively I think a coma would have worked better. Maybe have the incapacitated scion wake up to give their blessing for Zenos to go into space to be our dragon taxi.)

[@hub1986]

Bravo this is one of the best immersive vid ever hot damn well done PG team

[@mattirish6199]

12:00 mark. I've done the post MSQ grind 5 times already. This is normal my guy.. you just gotta back track and get all your relic gear/mounts/side quests/beast tribes finished up. There's a metric ton of content to run while you wait for more succor.

[@violetbliss4399]

About relics specifically, i think it's fine if it's easier to get them, but the key thing is it should be fun to get them. Roulettes aren't that bad to do now and then, but when tomestones also can be used for other things... imagine if instead it was tied to some fun content set on the island archipelago or something. It doesn't have to be an advanced Bozja zone.

[@cablefeed3738]

Yep, Endwalker truly is better than Shadowbringers.

[@TheSteveSchulz]

I made a long post seemingly critical, but want to maker it crystal clear I really appreciate your fair take on the xpac. It felt like most streamers have knee-jerked their takes, whereas you (and your team) took the time to really analyze things!

[@poatrykdas]

endwalker is my fav expansion just because of the story. even shadowbringers doesnt come close to it for me

[@Gameboy082017]

Dude this video was 10 out of 10! The information, conveyance and OMG the effects with the intro and ending, so GOOD!

[@JP11999]

Not having a bozja endgame grind element in the game completely killed my willingness to keep playing. I need a long term project in 14 if I'm gonna keep playing. I'll be back for dawntrail for the new one and the story of course, however if there's no long term goals the game gives me then dawntrail will be my last expansion

[@katy9291]

They mentioned they would bring back something like Bozja, they are listening to feedback 😊

[@JP11999]

@@katy9291 yeah I know I look forward to seeing how it operates. Hopefully they don't neuter it for the sake of "letting people play other games" like they did with the current relic weapons. It's a joke

[@metalmilitia89]

I have been away since 6.1 and I don’t intend on coming back.

[@filipkikoa9141]

IMO the story of Endwalker was comparable to Pirates of the Carribean: At World's End. Absolutely bombastic and at a much bigger scale than the previous movies... but kind of a flop storywise. Dynamis was straight up the power of friendship and the ultimate plot convenience that made many parts of the story look pretty damn cheap. Bunnies were cute, but the entire moon part murdered the pace. The End Times were shown in a laughably bad way and all the tension was basically gone after Vanaspati. Elpis was a giant pile of ancient wank that only harmed the entire plot with a weird time loop inclusion. It completely robbed Hydaelyn of all impact she may have had on the story as she was basically following WoL's dummy guide to avoiding birdpocalypse. Meteion had very little build-up, basically a friendship speedrun with a hillariously extreme heel turn, but it's not a wrestling game and it made her a very unsatisfying final boss. Zenos saved the ending with a cool scene and boss fight. There were some great parts in the story, notably the entirety of Garlemald, but there's enough low points that personally I wouldn't give Endwalker more than 6/10.

[@MediArgentum]

This is what a good review looks like. Not those "eNwaLkEr iS wOrSt exPAnSiOn" clickbait videos.

[@ShintarsVideos]

Cue the video title changing to "Was Endwalker a FAILURE?" 😂

[@lushdontu4015]

who cares ffxiv fans are so sensitive liek grow up

[@chrisanderson7820]

The main design conundrum they had with the post MSQ was that previous post-MSQs were all BUILDING towards the next expansion whereas this time they were sort of cornered into using the post-MSQ to rule a line under the previous expansions so they could cut those ties that held them on a specific course over the existing expansions. Its why the Void and The Twelve got such a limited unpacking, they were trying to tie up the existing environment of Eitherys into a neat bow and some of those items were long unresolved elements from pre-ARR. This naturally results in a lessening of mystery and a lessening of tension because you're answering long held questions. I'm not super disappointed, it's not good storytelling to just have permanently unresolved mystery, that's what destroyed the X-Files, Lost and other TV series.

[@masterplusmargarita]

I do think you could've held on to some of those mysteries a bit longer. The Twelve in particular is something that didn't really need answering - I think leaving it ambiguous as to where exactly it is on the Primal/real God/Ancient scale would've been fine. It's never been a critical plot point (at least since 2.0, I think it may have been a bigger deal in 1.x), and not knowing doesn't impede the enjoyment of the story, while working to give the world some depth. Not knowing makes it feel more like a real religion, and it might be preferable to how a lot of the fanbase (myself not included) seems to see it as "oh... It's just Ancients again. That's lame" - no answer is better than a bad answer. Then again, Myths of the Realm is my favourite story to come out of 6.x, and I love the raid series, so I can't personally complain.

[@gateauxq4604]

They said in PLLs leading up to EW’s release that post 6.0 would be a fully contained story whereas other expansions left a good bit of story to play out through x.4. 6.1-6.4 then was a completely different story-dealing with the 13th-and the results were mixed. I think if the story was played straight through it would improve the quality quite a bit more than just playing it piecemeal.

[@yanipheonu]

​​@@masterplusmargaritaI can definitely agree there was a push to end things a little too conclusively. It's like how we really didn't need to kill off the Twelve, since that basically destroyed any story possibilities for them. That could have been an expansion's worth of lore. The Empire didn't need to be so conclusively destroyed, because it removed a major overarching world threat that has no clear replacement on the horizon. It mostly just puts a lot of weight on the followup story, weight that could have been made lighter by writing things a bit differently. Personally I simply was less interested in Zero and Golbez than the outcome of 6.0. the Alliance Raids were a better follow up to the story imo, showing more direct consequences of what happened in the main MSQ. My concern is if DT isn't a good jumpstart for a new overarching plot, XIV would be left in an awkward position of not really having much to build on narratively.

[@masterplusmargarita]

@@yanipheonu I do wonder how "ARR-ish" Dawntrail is going to be. It's obviously going to set the new pieces into place for the new saga but I wonder about the possibility of them going balls-to-the-wall with it and making Tural our new main base of operations, the sort of home turf area in the same way Eorzea was for the entirety of the Ascian saga. I think the chances of them doing that are pretty low - if just because Eorzea is so iconic and beloved at this point - but I honestly think it'd solve a lot of the issues facing them setting up new threats pretty elegantly. Why did we never hear about the Solution 9 Empire, which is just as scary as the Garlean Empire and which we're going to fight for five expansions? Well, because the New World is super-isolated from the Three Great Continents. Of course, if they just do what I did there and make very obvious reskins of the Empire and Ascians the villains for the new saga it'd be ultra disappointing, I'm no creative genius, but you get my drift - if the new saga is all about the New World (and adjacent lands) they can simply spend Dawntrail doing for the New World what ARR did for the Three Great Continents and just... introduce all the cool new things that are going to matter for the next decade. Of course, this is all basically me theorycrafting. Realistically, I think Eorzea is still going to be the home base, and Tural is going to basically represent all of the New World in terms of game zones the same way Doma basically represents all of the Far East.

[@clumsyturtle8544]

Ask any FF14 player who has been around since ARR and they will tell you hell no, endwalker was not a failure, heavensward was.

[@mosley3485]

"It isn't as bad as Heavensward" doesn't make an expansion good, lmao.

[@clumsyturtle8544]

@@mosley3485 Heavensward almost killed the raiding scene. Endwalker had nothing close to that, it was a good expansion.

[@mosley3485]

@@clumsyturtle8544 Endwalker killed a lot of interest in the game across the board. It was just an incredibly boring, mid expansion that was severely lacking in content for the average player.

[@cattysplat]

Heavensward was hardcore beyond belief in all aspects but for those who liked old school MMOs it was a enjoyably masochistic experience.

[@ridleyroid9060]

I've admittedly been playing StB so I don't know if I can relate, but Endwalker is the worst out of the expansions I was there for 1st hand. QOL it is probl'y the best, I am so glad for all of the QOL changes, but seeing how so many people just got bored (bored, not burnt, bored) of the game and seeing interest drop off a cliff and for people to devolve into shitty drama to have any buzz around it was heartrendering.

[@tyrokyu]

Preach, as always, your videos are very clear and well-made. You're amazing. I'm glad to see someone so talented explaining to everyone in a detailed manner the issues with the Endwalker Expansion. You don't sound angry. You don't sound frustrated. You put your opinions in a cohesive manner, unlike most of the community. Cheers to you and your family!

[@TheSteveSchulz]

"Boring." Honestly, farming Bozja relics is more boring than farming tomestones. Skirmishes are fucking boring, except maybe half a dozen of them that only show up once every now and then. The rest are on the level of FATEs. And the critical engagements are just worse alliance raids than all of them except maybe CT and (IMO, though most disagree with me) two of the three YoRHa raids (oooo, slow bullet time, oooooooo, so exciting /s). The thing with tomes is variety... more than you get from either Bozja or Eureka. You can even do PvP to farm tomes if you really want to. The people complaining are just under the illusion that tomes offer less, and that Bozja content was some sort of monumental addition, when the story wasn't all that large, skirmishes are moooostly glorified FATEs, and critical engagements are watered down alliance raids. The only thing that really felt missing was Delubrum, which is fantastic. But it's so hard to get a group for that organically even at peak hours on Aether. You have to LFG of Discord. The story element of Bozja was basically shifted to IS and variant dungeons. Are they as good as Bozja's story? Absolutely not, but I did like IS's and variant stories have potential with refinement in the future. I think the only valid complaint content-wise is that patches came slower and it's a very long time between 6.5 and 7.0. But I kinda get it with the focus adding duty support and on graphical overhauls that CBU3 has been working on.

[@cyanmage1]

Thank you!!!! this is what I have been shouting for so long this relic grind is really the same as its always been just not tied to a certain piece of content there was always tomes grinds to be had or dungeon grinds why do people get so hung up on the lack of hiding what it really is this time, I would rather farm whatever content I want then do 200 As1 runs for light or 160 Garuda ex's

[@lushdontu4015]

This is such a lie. I have literally met so many people in bozja which makes things more fun.

[@TheSteveSchulz]

@@lushdontu4015 When I tried to do Delubrum for the first time (DURING the tail end of Shadowbringers), I had to queue 5 times to get more than a couple people. Eventually I queued into a group of 4 and we decided to give it a go. One of our party members died just a couple mechanics into every fight, so it was really just 3 of us. If the remaining 3 of us weren't doing the mechanics well enough, it would not have been successful. I queued during peak hours on JENOVA, which is quite populated. When I started farming relics, it was common for like 12-15 people organically doing CLL and only after a lot of them showed up because I or someone told them it's up, after only a handful of us would be out farming the, again, FATEs. And, yeah, my opinion is somehow a "lie," but I'm not surprised you're throwing that out there about an OPINION given your shitty attitude towards other people in the comments, lol.

[@cyanmage1]

@@lushdontu4015 how is having a different experience then a lie

[@lushdontu4015]

@@cyanmage1 quening for the same dungeons over and over again is worse and such a lazy design. They then made a horrible excuse to cover up their lazy coding

[@Mooinator3000]

On the first topic about joking around about how harsh the community can be about criticism... I got kicked from a guild because I didn't like Endwalker. I didn't even really say anything about it being wrong that others liked it, just that I was very very unsatisfied with the the Endwalker story and so I got kicked for making people uncomfortable with a negative attitude because I said I didn't like it during a conversation with some people about the story...

[@TheRealJonster]

As it stands right now, I have no idea when I will be returning. I stopped playing some 8 months ago, my first ever break from the game, and now I'm always so wrapped up in other games I haven't played, that I don't see much appeal in Dawntrail. I pretty much raid log for SoD in WoW currently (which is great fun), and now I'm going through the massive backlog I've amassed after starting FF14 in 2020 during the lockdown. While I adored the FF14 MSQ, having spent time away from the game after Endwalker, I don't really.. Miss it. And it pains me to say that for how much joy it brought me. I feel like I'm in a weird spot

[@HMNNO]

Not towards preach, thats why its call the climax of a story, its always going to have its up and downs. You can never appreciate the ups unless theres some downs in there. The intermission between each expansion is usually the down. For me it was fun seeing the new shard and seeing zero's character development. It doesn't always have to be deep or amazing, just fun enough that is enjoyable

[@SauceAppleEater_2885]

Wow amazing editing done in this video. Well done guys!

[@beefyboi64]

Ok I've been away for a while, I admit. But I missed AN ENTIRE FITNESS JOURNEY???? Major props to Preach! Hope he's feeling great.

[@greyknight627]

I find it a tad odd people still go after Criterion Dungeons for the replay ability aspect. Given that the Devs already acknowledged people’s concerns with rewards that keep them coming back, and iterating on this with advanced Tomestone Weapons that add a glow effect not previously there. We don’t know if they will stop there with better rewards, but it does seem like they will try other rewards given that they will put in more criterion dungeons and they know what annoys players.

[@Galbergoth]

Beautifully done, Preach and crew. Thank you.

[@StriderMKz]

The expansion was great. It delivered to me in every way it mattered to me. But i'm a casual player. I get it may not have been the best for everyone, but for me it was amazing.

[@drac_kanroji]

I’ve enjoyed Endwalker but I’ve really missed not having a new exploration zone. Partially for how the relic has been this expansion but also the lack of new content like CLL DRN/S and Dalriada. I feel like they explored a bit more with the essences and lost actions that could switch up how your class plays in bojza. I appreciate how balanced the main game is but it’s fun to be able to cook up some load outs for different situations, tank as a dps or do crazy dps as a healer.

[@anteprs7908]

ew cater to casuals this tiem the 85 of the playerbae over the midcore that why the relics are causal freindly and we had causal content for the first time(eureka and bozja arent casual content they are pure midcore content)

[@lushdontu4015]

@@anteprs7908 Its you again. When will you ever shut up

[@lushdontu4015]

@@anteprs7908 You are so horrible that I can still remember how ignorant you are even after a year

[@aznhomig]

I really missed the pack of a Eureka/Bozja style endgame content in EW. Adventuring Forays really are the best content in the game and the lack of it in EW was sorely felt.

[@Druidlover]

While I didn't spend as much time playing Endwalker as I did previous expansions, a lot of it has to do with the fact that the core weekly loop has stayed the exact same for so many years so I was going to feel diminishing returns sooner or later regardless of the quality of the content.

[@Ziegeri]

Dunno, best expansion so far imo. Only negative I can really find is that playerbase has gotten even more useless than it used to be. In almost every duty finder thing you queue, you can out dps most dps as an tank or even as a healer by a mile and you don't even have to try. And I know, if you want to speedrun stuff, do it with pre-made, but c'mon - if you bother queueing into a duty, at least carry your own weight and pause that netflix on the second monitor. I also find it amusing that people are crying because no Eureka/Bozja, while when that content was originally released, people were crying that it sucks and that why there has to be a mindless grind for a relic, just let us buy them with tomes. Well now we can and we are still sad.

[@skeliskull]

EW has my favourite zones out of all the xpacs. Except for garlemald which I found kind of generic. Ultima thule was haunting and a perfect end zone for the end of this long 400+ hour journey. The music there was perfect for capturing that feeling that the end is nigh. I just think the set pieces in EW were incredible and a bit grander than what we’d seen before which was cool. Meteion was a pretty cool and scary villain and I liked the concept that this ancient creature was driven mad by the void which was threatening eorzea. The way the put a bow on wrapping up the ascian story interwoven with our grand story made things feel very satisfying for me. It all came together.