aotopmha

[aotopmha]

In light of the recent mod incident, I thought up my top 10 for QoL/accessibility features I want in FFXIV:

1) Better friend list.

It's slow to load and clunky to parse. It in general feels like it is lifted from a 90s or 00s game (or rather, it even feels like poorly implemented online components from that era).

2) Portable Orchestrion.

The ability to listen to any orchestrion rolls I've collected anywhere. Depending on how you look at it, this might make mount music redundant, but I just view it as more options.

(In fact, give mounts their own arrangements to still keep them unique, some have default expansion specific music that's really boring.)

3) The ability to change AoE colour.

This could help mitigate the Recollection EX or P3 issues of colour overlap and visual clutter while keeping developer vision in tact for those who aren't bothered by it.

(Though the issue often isn't the regular AoE indicator in that case, it is the general colour design, I think this would be helpful on some level.)

I imagine this would help players with visual impairments a bunch (such as colour blind people).

4) More marker design options.

The stylised font can be seen as a fun flavour choice, but I want more simple options with clear-cut visuals. No more 4 that looks like G.

5) A bunch of improvements to the PF interface.

- Sometimes a spot gets locked to a specific job when someone leaves and people don't notice, so a bunch of time is wasted waiting for spots to fill.

- When you make your own PF, the window closes any time someone joins.

- Options for different window layouts or fonts because especially with Recollection EX last patch I noticed how people just don't read.

It always has been an issue, but it is more so when there are a good amount of strats that have slight variations.

I think there should probably be some layout options which place more emphasis on the description.

6) Easily accessible Ping and FPS counter options. Can be very useful when DCs happen.

7) The ability to Data Center travel or World travel from all Aetherytes.

Just much more convinient.

8) Some form of region-wide PF.

I think a global one would be become too much of a mess and would probably lead to the real loss of World/Data Center/region specific communities, but a specific region-wide PF would solve the issue of needing to data center travel to raid.

Everyone could stay on their home worlds while having access to their respective PF (NA/EU/JP), which I feel like would create a similar equilibrium to pre Data Center travel PF.

9) A digital notebook/journal to write down notes for anything you encounter in the game.

I came upon this idea while thinking about how it would be really cool if Pictomancers got a rudimentary drawing tool for leveling the job just like how Bards can play instruments.

I noticed how useful it could be especially with the puzzle section in 7.3 and its multipart (even if easy) memory puzzles.

I think having the in-game tools to solve the puzzles of the game or even the ability to jot down notes for various fights or dungeons or MSQ (which would be especially useful after a longer break) would be really nice, add a level of creativity to the journey and be much more immersive to boot.

Of course, there probably would particularly be issues with any visual tool because people just can't behave themselves regarding adult content, but a purely personal notebook would still be wonderful, I think.

10) If you can't give more inventory space otherwise, I think most of the key item menu could be converted to additional slots. I think just one pane would be enough and if at one point it could fill, a vendor could be added for item recovery.

These are some immediate ones I'd like.

What would any of you guys add to the list?

[aotopmha]

I dusted off my OSRS account yesterday and this is in fact high level chill times.

Just kill a bunch of Hill Giants while number goes up and everything is going to be ok.

I just couldn't do it for hours on end.

[aotopmha]

I have no horse in the mod race (never used them, never will), but seeing how loud people were about using Mare Lametorum in particular, I can't help but feel they brought this upon themselves.

(Doubly so for the potential consequences people could face for review bombing the game on Steam.)

A key bit of information I learned about mods in the context of Japan is that making modifications to software you don't own is simply illegal.

So YoshiP advocates for not using them not because he's a big meanie, but because they're against the law and could get SE into legal trouble.

We also actually don't know if SE is the one responsible for this takedown and I'm more leaning towards this being tied to the credit card provider censorship efforts (or the rumoured Switch 2 version considering its demographic leanings).

The part I am empathetic towards is the desire for more accessibility and costumisation options.

I love elves in fantasy stories, but I really disliked how some of the Elezen options looked like pre graphics update and the general breadth of options especially was fairly limited, especially compared to many other RPGs (and even some older ones, I think).

For a while now, I've been of the opinion that the next expansion (or two) should really focus on adding costumisation options over new races or really focus on making all the jobs we have really unique rather than keep adding new ones.

The real demand directed towards the small indie company Square Enix should actually be for them to do everything they've done so far AND fix the QoL and costumisation options.

It is more complicated than "throw money at it", but I'm also sick of the perspective that keeps trying to excuse and soften the blow for SE (which is actually a million/billion dollar company).

They should find the ways to fix this shit and expand the game appropriately.

[aotopmha]

FFXIV 7.3 spoilers:

I realised Living Memory has kind of been a desolate liminal space for a whole year in real time and that really gives weight to its reactivation and the recontextualisation of its meaning, which is narratively really cool because you can essentially only do it in the context of an MMO.

I also wondered how they could turn the zone back on without undermining its meaning and giving it another underlying thematic pinning is probably the way to go.

Again, 7.3 doing some pretty neat stuff.

[aotopmha]

Since the release, a little bit surprisingly (since I did have a couple of strong issues with it), FFXIV patch 7.3 has been on my brain for quite a bit.

Laptop issues have once again reared their head, so I'll most likely miss this Moonfire Faire and The Rising (sucks), but MSQ was still a great way to celebrate the anniversary.

So, a bit ago, I realised that Dawntrail was essentially a modern One Piece arc.

Modern (or rather "newer", since arcs like Dressrosa are at this point years old) One Piece arcs often have a large amount of characters, most of which tend to never have enough screentime to have their stories be fully fleshed out and as a result it feels like characters are superflous and introduced "for the sake of it", even if they do technically end up having some kind of role.

When comparing Alabasta to Dressrosa, you can see a clear difference in purpose and focus:

Dressrosa has the colloseum fighters, Doflamingo and his henchmen, the secret CP9 agents, the toy plotline and the dwarves, all of which have a number of characters under them. There are so many characters I can't name them all.

In comparison, the supporting cast specific to Alabasta is confined to essentially five characters: Vivi, Kohza, King Cobra, Pell and Carue, with characters with minor roles like Ace, Smoker, old man Toto and the animals like the Dewgongs or crab dotting the way to the villains.

There are far fewer characters, but each of them has a clear purpose and full character arcs/stories that are complete by the end.

When I look at the factions of Dressrosa, despite how long the arc is, the dwarves and colloseum fighters were especially just sort of thrown in there, so the plots related to them never got to sit, so to speak and as a result never gained much weight.

The story just could not sit still when it needed to sit still and could not speed up when it needed to either, making the pacing equally too fast and too slow.

Usually all of the worldbuilding is done in act 1 of the arc, which includes all of the details about the new setting and character foundations for the key players, but newer OP arcs always cut this section of the story short and I think suffer for it.

Equally, modern One Piece doesn't allow female characters to grow on their own terms or even be good at what they're supposed to be good at.

Since Fishman Island Nami is barely allowed to be a navigator and Robin is an archeologist because she was set up to be one for massive plot importance, not because the story cares for it.

Tashigi and Rebecca are probably the worst examples for the section of the story I'm familiar with: both had set up to grow stronger, but are ultimately pushed aside to passive roles.

Both are supposed to be decent swordswomen with their own styles of fighting, but Punk Hazard and Dressrosa basically just deny them even smaller moments of shine.

Rebecca is bad because she becomes a literal extension of her dad, but Tashigi is arguably worse because the setup involving her character has taken place for hundreds of chapters.

For three arcs straight, the main female characters introduced are crying princesses the story doesn't allow to grow or change in any form.

Shirahoshi was the closest to actually have the setup for an arc to grow stronger, but I don't even trust the story to have one of the strongest female characters in it to have their own growth (again, I think I stopped around the start of the Egghead arc around chapter 1066).

Big Mom was a good character, at least, I think? I also like Carrot and Koala, but they're relatively minor characters.

Fine, the story just doesn't care to allow its female cast much competency or more importantly, give any real depth to them.

Then don't. If you only want to write crying princesses, at least be honest about it and don't make narrative promises you don't want to keep.

So, does any of this sound familiar?

Yeah, I think Wuk Lamat has the exact same writing issues. The story is just really resistant to letting her grow and let her be good at what she's supposed to be good at, particularly in 7.0.

And at points, the pacing of Dawntrail equally feels too fast and too slow at once: we spend a solid amount of time in each area, but very little of it is actually truly substantial time spent exploring the new cast as characters.

I didn't fully buy Wuk's character for a long time because the story just doesn't let her learn her lessons and any lessons she does learn are buried by her old flaws.

And because the other candidates are buried by Wuk's screentime, they barely get their stories told, either. I think Zoraal Ja in particular suffered for it.

And guess what changed 7.1-7.3?

Focus. They picked a story thread, stuck with it and properly fleshed it out instead of jumping from small story to small story with unequal substance.

I think 7.2 and 7.3 in particular had great, strong throughlines.

The story finally allowed Wuk to be good at what she is supposed to be good at (empathy) and picked a element related to her character to focus on (her relationship with Sphene).

The story finally seems to be fully honest and focused in terms of what it is trying to be and I think fundamentally that's all I wanted.

I'm frustrated Tural wasn't part of this better writing and that we're back to Ascians and Primals because it's old stuff and we've been here before an endless amount of times, but it is executed well enough that I think I can let it slide.

I didn't think I cared that much on my first time through, but on rewatches via other playthroughs, the return of the memories made me tear up and the new villain group (the Winterers) really does intrigue me.

Goede and Shale also were really well written in the moment despite not having much of a foundation as characters.

Execution really can carry quality, huh.

The more I look at 7.0, the more frustrated I really do get with it because all of the parts were there to make it a really focused story.

Each area of Tural could've specifically focused on one of the Promises while the Scions had a friendly disagreement arc where their differences were explored.

Alternatively, the story could've just focused on the new characters for the first half while the Scions dropped in with the Solution 9 reveal.

I really did enjoy that DT was willing to start a new story with new characters, the simpler, lower stakes exploration of the cultures of Tural and found the WoL's mentor role to be incredibly refreshing because I think the WoL doesn't need to be the special center of attention all of the time (this isn't even true, we often just were being the badass nobody knew was badass).

But all of this was also imperfectly executed and I hate that it was imperfectly executed because it sounds so ballsy and refreshing on paper.

[aotopmha]

Shoutout to all of the people on my dash being hyper-enthusiastic about media I'm not invested in.

It's been an incredible comfort during the rough times I've been having.

[aotopmha]

I've had a bunch of psychic stuff recommended to me recently by Youtube (tarot, horoscope, other similar stuff) and what gets me the most is that it's so non-immersive and manifactured.

In a way that's good so anyone with enough knowledge knows it's all nonsense, but the one niché this nonsense could fill is that of chilling and relaxing to a calm voice and sort of getting into the vibe, but all tarot readings are all cluttered with 10 different wierd self-help decks clearly there to "sell" you the mysticism, but what that instead does is just tell you how desperate these guys are.

Sometimes you've got these really well illustrated decks combined with the most cheap-looking generic self-help notes and it's the ugliest shit to ever exist.

Psychic stuff is fun when everyone knows it's just for fun and maybe some encouraging words for people who are struggling and nobody is trying to extort you out of your money.

Most of the time it clearly is the latter, though and really needs to go because of it.

(Certainly lends for fun fantasy writing, though, speaking as a creative person.)

[aotopmha]

One element I didn't mention in my last post (spoilers) about the 7.3 MSQ are the production values.

The general animation quality was absolutely fantastic.

There were two cutscenes specifically in the latter half of 7.3 I absolutely adored.

The one involving the WoL and a specific summoning and the big action scene after it; awesome action direction, lots of subtle changes in character expression, even the use of blood of all things was really good.

You very rarely get more nuanced expression like this in this game.

I'm still grumpy about the writing, though.

It's just basically the ARR-EW saga condensed into a single patch with much less interesting execution and much less nuance/depth.

The elements that feel like a step backwards frustrate me the most about DT.

We're back to ARR where we don't need to be with some genuinely great steps forward mixed in there.

This game's growth/development absolutely fascinates me, so I've reached the conclusion I'll probably support it even if it gets really bad (I'll see when such a moment arrives), but when looking at the bigger picture of DT, it's been an interplay of archaic and backwards decisions combined with any of the genuinely great innovations.

Take Occult Crescent for instance. The CE design is a really obvious improvement over anything (I saw) in Eureka. So is the accessability of the Phantom Jobs.

But the Forked Tower system is a system from years ago they now determined to be so detrimental they released a quick fix outside of a patch release.

Compare the questing in 7.0 and the minimal combat to the much more compelling puzzle section in 7.3 and it is strange how this can be the same game.

Maybe the puzzles are frustrating to some, but there is such a clear difference in terms of interaction with the environment and how it relates to the storytelling of the game.

There were sparks of it in small moments in 7.0, but most of the actual story progression was the same in its nature regardless of our goal.

The setting was a pretty wallpaper, not a diorama with dimension that added to immersion.

And to be fair, most of FFXIV questing and the zones in general feel like a pretty wallpaper, but you'd think after 10 years, this would be more substantially addressed.

Some of the ShB and EW solo duties did a great job adding story flavour to the questing; there was a clear movement towards adding spice to the questing, but DT just kind of stopped and thus has come across as a step backwards in that sense.

I even think about the hunting solo duty in 6.55, which was actually a great introduction to Wuk Lamat because it involved theming; starting off as a mini exploratory duty and ending with a neat solo boss.

And we never really got anything like it in base DT, as said, a (pretty clear) step backwards.

I think the third example I have of this rift between archaic and fresh game design is the choice of dailies.

Getting the option to cap tomes in OC made me feel like there is no reason everything shouldn't give the highest level tomes. Some activities should probably give less to not completely disincentivise roulettes, but having been burnt out from doing roulettes, it was such a breath of fresh air to just go do OC for a bit every day to get my tomes.

I don't know how many activities give them right now, but you should be able to cap max level tomes via Hunts, PvP, Deep Dungeon, Blue Mage, Field Operation or even Variant/Criterion (etc).

Basically, as said, everything should give tomes.

(Hunts and Occult Crescent obviously already do, not sure about the rest.)

Maybe even increase the amount you get for reclearing EX or Savage.

Right now, I only see the lack of options as an arbitrary restriction on gameplay variety.

[aotopmha]

FFXIV 7.3 MSQ initial thoughts:

The very first thought I want to put out there is that after the recent smaller patches and this main one, my game has been incredibly unstable.

It took me an entire day to get through MSQ because the game kept crashing... and I haven't even been able to finish it yet.

So far, it's been a DirectX/1100002 issue, which only cropped up in the past two weeks or so, and can apparently happen due to a very numerous amount of issues, which is an absolute headache.

Luckily, I do think I'm at the tail end now, so the rest might be an addendum to this post, but at this point the issue has also warped from simple crashes to the game not recognising my laptop's more powerful graphics card to a screen blackout on the Windows boot-up screen, so not running properly at all, so I'm in the process of going through all of my options for the 10th time.

I think I'll never buy this brand of laptop again. Second time an issue crops up within warranty (and a much worse one, though I hope something can be done and it does go under warranty).

All of this wonderful baggage aside, I can say that I think the dungeon and normal trial are awesome.

Dawntrail's fight design (particularly the Normal difficulty fights) continue to really impress me.

I really liked the second boss in the dungeon in particular because it's an add/mob fight, but one of the rare interesting and well done ones because each of the individual enemies has enough mechanical complexity to combine into a complete boss.

It's super cool.

I really like how the first boss screws with the senses, so to speak, with the indicators becoming unpredictable as the fight progresses, as well.

The third boss is just a really cool looking spectacle, with perhaps just a tiny bit quicker AoEs than usual, but all three make for a solid package.

Still not as good as Yuyewata, but better than The Underkeep.

The trial has a really neat section with a smaller round platform and a cute solo add phase when you get hit at points. I'm really curious about the EX version.

As for the MSQ itself, I think what I actually like about it the most is that it ended as "Dawntrail".

The team didn't opt for a 360 course correct, but instead tried to make do with what they had and to bring that to its conclusion.

Again, I'm missing just that small sliver at the end (might just look it up considering I'll probably have to go get my laptop repaired; there'll be an addendum at the end of this if I do end up deciding to do so), but 7.3 was also so thoroughly Dawntrail in its trappings it couldn't Dawntrail any harder.

It was long-winded about fairly thematically simple ideas, cheesy and deeply idealistic.

It put so much effort into trying to make you care about minor characters like Shale and Geode with them having the minimum of foundational character building.

Welcome back A Realm Reborn, asking you to care for characters you barely know.

We already went through Calyx's entire thematic conceit with the Ascians, as well. It's as 'been there, done that' as you can get.

We pave the way for those who come after; the past shouldn't be brought back at the cost of the future.

Where's my new stuff you promised at the end of 7.2, Calyx?

I do really like the horror trappings of the first half or so of the patch: the mystery of the dust and the build-up related to it and the puzzle-like nature of the Preservation research facility made for some cool set pieces, which I think also offered some really nice gameplay variety. It reminded me of some of the puzzle sections in earlier Final Fantasy games.

As little as we knew of him, I think Geode also had a pretty great end.

The latter half was pure cheese, though.

I personally liked Dawntrail, so didn't mind this, but those who didn't probably won't have their minds changed on DT by this, either.

I'm also sort of disappointed Endless Sphene wasn't explored more because she's such an interesting concept, but that's Dawntrail; interesting ideas and concepts explored in the most straight-forward way possible (and also explored in far more interesting ways in the story that came before).

This is true for the cultures it represents, the set pieces it uses and the concepts it explores and I think that's a shame.

I will defend it, still because I think it has its interesting aspects, but the 7.3 MSQ is what made me the grump.

Addendum time:

Especially since the big tease for the future just seems to be Ascians again.

I'm still curious about the key and I do like that Calyx isn't quite gone because he's the new element in all of this, but as said, we've been here before.

I want new stuff.

I'll reserve my judgement for how what coming up is executed, but in all aspects, I'm tired of FFXIV rehashing itself.

[aotopmha]

Anyway, trying to maintain normalcy a bit after a miserable week and I did actually watch part 2 of the live letter for FFXIV 7.3.

Part 2 is always mostly a recap of part 1, but with more details, so we often don't get too much "new" information, but this time around there was a pretty big information dump that actually might just end up concerning the entire game.

This is the Quantum difficulty for the new Deep Dungeon, Pilgrim's Traverse.

At first it seemed like a straightfoward difficulty increase, so there was the question in the air of why another difficulty would be introduced, but by the end we had something quite interesting conceptionally.

Specifically, the Deep Dungeon will end on a "scaleable" duty.

You use the currency you gain from the Deep Dungeon run to alter various parameters of the boss, from health to elemental properties.

Depending on how much currency you use and which parameters you choose to use it on, the encounter can have easier mechanics/more health/certain resistances (I assume).

And you can increase everything from level 1-40, with the highest level having final Savage floor-comparable difficulty.

What I like about this system is that it seems like you can go gradually from 1-40, meaning an incredibly smooth difficulty curve (which probably has difficulty check points, so to speak, we'll see).

And I've always loved "working up the ladder" in games, so to speak, going up incremental step after incremental step until making it to the top.

A skill climb like it could potentially be incredibly rewarding.

I hear comparisons to World of Warcraft's Mythic+ system and everything about that sounds nightmarish, but it'll hopefully done better here?

Other than that, I think it's neat we can now properly use Phoenix Downs.

It's something that both gives more flavour as a Final Fantasy staple and is useful QoL when an healer dies in a dungeon with the health of the boss being at 90% because it cuts out having to wait for the tank/dps to solo the boss.

It's an option to keep the pace going, which is super nice.

I'm decently excited for 7.3, especially for the Deep Dungeon, but 7.2 was a pretty great patch in my opinion, so I'm not sure it'll be better.

[aotopmha]

This past week has basically been hell.

Might be my worst one in years and once again, I can't properly explain it because it would sound insane.

[aotopmha]

Finally got it to work again via reinstall.

Is the Tumblr app down for anyone else?

I haven't been able to access it for a bit now.

[aotopmha]

Is the Tumblr app down for anyone else?

I haven't been able to access it for a bit now.

[aotopmha]

Who knew out of all things Classic Tetris would be a comfort during a bit of a rough time for me.

This year's Classic Tetris World Championship was super comfy because I haven't caught one as it goes up match by match in a while, either.

Something to cheer me up every day for a bit now, might go binge what I've missed.

[aotopmha]

And I decided to delete that post.

I don't think I'm able to explain any of this properly, yet I want some sort of record of it because this is one of the wierdest situations I've ever been in, like one of those deep rabbit hole videos.

And those generally don't have really happy endings, either.

I'm frustrated, confused, scared, doubting myself and yet it all could be nothing.

I hoping it's nothing so bad.

[aotopmha]

There are some really good responses to the post I made about the new dungeon gear that bring up some important nuances I didn't really go into because I was aiming to just make a small post that mentioned the issue.

1) Switching from historic/cultural inspirations to fantasy inspirations can have its own issues.

Corporate sanding is an issue a lot of representation faces these days. Corporations don't want the "controversy" of representation, so they avoid or simplify/soften depiction altogether, which really obviously is also bad for representation.

To bring one example for the sake of illustration, minorities often do factually have an history of oppression as a big part of their identity, so there is a balance to be struck between acknowledging it and making the entire narrative surrounding said minority about it.

Dawntrail itself seems to be aiming to be a tribute to pre-colonial South America, so combining it with the European-inspired FFIX in itself might feel strange. (X feels much more apt even with the Pelu Pelu being featured in one of the DT zones).

But I think there is also good in it.

Considering the history, The Golden City being an horrific mass grave running at the cost of the rest of the world seems like a decent twist.

Although the base game gives it some level of positive framing, the patches have made the integration with Solution 9 much more sinister because it isn't actually necessarily voluntary, but tied to Solution 9's Regulator system.

The citizens have a choice to live outside of the system, but in turn lose the comforts of it, so is it a choice at all? I think we've got some good potential commentary about "passive" (in reality forced) cultural assimilation here and I hope 7.3 brings this and everything else together into a good patch finale.

The incredibly fast resolutions to conflicts in each zone before Solution 9, however, really do feel like an attempt to soften the blow of conflict within these cultures to not stir up controversy and that seems wrong, too.

I feel Bakool Ja Ja's arc in particular would've been truly great if it was given more connective tissue and actual true consequences. I think the village of the Yok Huy probably should've been at least partially destroyed by Valigarmanda for Bakool to have a much more impactful redemption arc, for an example, so this is where avoiding "problematic" elements can become an issue.

2) There is a variety of reactions to the dungeon set even in my small notes section.

Some see it as a coincidence/unfortunate/clumsy FFIX-inspiration (which I lean towards), some don't see it and some just find it fully offensive.

What's important here is leaning on the opinion of the people affected (in this case Latam people) regardless of the variety of opinion. If some find it not that big of a deal, that's valid, but so is the opposite. Minorities aren't represented by one unified perspective either, so it's important to hear nuances out, as well.

3) The QA issues with the game have started to bother me recently, so I decided to look into some older DT interviews/material and see if there is some more clarity to be gleaned from there.

As someone else put it in the notes, I'm really enjoying the game, but there is definitely a shift in philosophy I can't quite explain in there because while the main team clearly seems to still care (they took ownership of the QA issues in particular), it doesn't fully reflect in the game.

So I've been rummaging through old live letter impressions and interviews and these might be some relevant details I found:

- Getting the server space to mitigate the launch rush was apparently more costly than might seem.

- There were a bunch of mentions of how the development was quite stressful at points (this itself seems pretty typical to FFXIV) and the team had difficulty coming up with an exciting evolution/turning point for the story, which might explain just why it took so long to get to the big events.

It might've just been because of the general struggle to find a direction.

- I saw a stray mention about Dawntrail having double the budget of other expansions. I have no clear source for this, though.

- I completely forgot how much of a selling point the graphics update was. The EU fanfest specifically had a whole memed-about section about Lalafell chins. There was so much emphasis on it.

- In a recent interview YoshiP straight-up mentioned that the issues they have can't probably entirely be fixed by more monetary investment.

- Interestingly, Hildibrand costs more to develop than you'd think.

Somebody also brought this up in the reblogs, but based on all of this, rather than lacking investment, I think the game and the team might be in the situation they are in right now because of the areas of the game they chose to invest into and how they play into the schedule.

Of course, I'm not knowledgeable enough to have true informed opinions here, but that's what it feels like based on what I revisited here.

And as a result of it, other areas of the game might've ended up given less love, be it due to money or manpower or whatever other investments are needed to guarantee quality, which is unfortunate.

Based on all of this, DT also feels like a "sacrifice" in a way because once they've got all of this QoL out of the way, you'd assume they don't have to invest in it for a bit.

In fact, both EW and DT had game-spanning QoL projects as a key feature, so maybe 8.0 can finally place full focus on the quality of the present content again and that in itself will make a difference.

(At the very least, I can't think of any other game-spanning QoL projects. I still also forgot the second dye channel was also added this expansion. The QoL really adds up.)

If nothing else, I 100% see some areas of the game getting more love than others.

The gameplay, particularly encounter design itself is awesome. I think the Arcadion normals are the best normal fights. Same for the DT dungeons and the Alliance Raid. All of the EXs also range from really good to okay.

But the questing itself in particularly 7.0 is probably the worst it has ever been. The events have also been pretty unremarkable.

On the other hand, I've felt that the issue with Occult Crescent and Cosmic Exploration isn't that they have no flavour, but that they feel incomplete. It feels like there was an aim to do more (down to really simple polish), but the work was cut short.

So it really feels like a two-sided issue of money and time.

More than anything, I do hope they get whatever problems exist resolved and the QA issues will be minimised.

[aotopmha]

It sure is fun liking flawed stuff.

Looking at Final Fantasy XIV's new dungeon gear set, I'm sure normal people are going to be very normal about this.

But also, you know what, maybe, just maybe the game really should stick to fantasy settings if it keeps being so obviously careless with historical parallels.

The history of the game itself doesn't really help, either. (Again, it basically has versions of Japan where China and Korea should be located.)

As far as impressions go, I actually do see people being torn about the conquistador parallels (it feels like another FFIX inspired set, but perhaps tone deaf regardless).

This is the Native American expansion and one of the promises was to be extra careful about its inspirations.

What is going on here?

At this point I really do feel like something is up in the background.

The base expansion suffered from lower production values and all of the new content has had some sort of obvious polish issues, even if none of it is truly 'catastrophic'.

What's going on in the production pipeline?

I might be mostly enjoying myself, but all of these details do add up and do end up creating questions.

(Yeah, the recent live letter mentioned the lack of polish as an issue, but there seems to be a general kind of disconnect about quality control in all aspects from sound to the gameplay systems to the visuals, like this set.)