I mean there are ways around that issue, which WoW already makes use of; either by just assuming you’ve done it anyway or change some quest dialogue a bit if you did.
You’re not wrong tho, as they’ve spent so long with our characters not being characters they couldn’t just insert us into the plot like a WoL in XIV. And they really don’t need to to be perfectly honest.
They just need to keep the narrative focused. Mystery is fine. Random tangents that have no foreseeable conclusion and are just designed to sit there for half a decade however…stop lol.
EDIT: And I’m not gonna lie, I much prefer the occasional uncanny valley of expressive models to the weird jank of WoW’s models in certain situations. I remember a while back I was wondering what was up with Tyrande’s Night Warrior model, and someone mentioned she had a default face.
Well sure enough I got to her portion on my Horde mage’s Night Fae campaign, and there is nothing weirder than having the voiced dialogue expressing her contempt for me and her hatred for Sylvanas, but having her face plastered with a smile and the night elf hop. Smacked me back to Earth it did lol.
I think the biggest thing with it is that the FFXIV is as gigantic as World of Warcrafts, but World of Warcraft was initially crafted as a setting in which stories take place within, while FFXIV is a story which takes place within the world. Two very similar, but ultimately dichotomous concepts in narrative.
Blizzard has originally tried to jump from the former to the latter, but they’re failing in that their story writers aren’t up to the quality of the FFXIV’s who have their story planned out for multiple years before they’re even designed (expansion packs). It shows when the over-arching narrative fumbles and fails but players laud small characters and stories within that showcase how wild World of Warcraft can be which is one of its biggest strengths.
Which again, is why it’s so frustrating. Blizzard is very good at telling short, complete stories that are satisfying , and with characters that make you actually care. I’ve waxed on and on about how much I love the Warcraft Legends manga. I think (taken in isolation) the War Campaigns were good. The Order Hall Campaigns, were good. It’s when Blizzard tries to connect everything into an over-arching narrative does the very obvious holes show up and now we’ve gone cross-eyed.
And unless I’m missremembering some live lettters, I don’t think the XIV team actually plans whole story beats years ahead of time. Like I think their decision to look back towards 2.0 Crystal Tower and use that as a foundation for Shadowbringers was made during development for example. But what they do well, is wrap up stories and then put them on the backburner to use later.
Amusingly enough, Illidans fate in Legion is Blizzard’s most recent (and I’d argue successfully) version of this. Illidan is now keeping watch over Sargeras, wrapping up their story. They aren’t dead though, so their story can be picked up and continued for new stories.
Then you have things like Sylvanas. Her new arc started in Cataclysm, but they never gave it a conclusion. They just kept winking and nodding that they will do something later.
Comparing the stories of WoW and FFXIV is comparing a running comic book to a series of novels.
Each is good for their specific medium, targeted towards a specific audience. If you want a power fantasy, you come to WoW. If you want a story with political intrigue, emotional investment, etc… you want FFXIV.
14 has the advantage of having a self contained story. The developers built their world from scratch. WoW has the burden of tying in over a decade’s worth of story. A lot of which comes from outside the game. It’s not feasible to put it all in a mmo.
WoW remains a better game than both FFXIV and ESO.
FFXIV features horrible noodle-armed anime people with zero muscle. All the environments I’ve seen look like someone went through all the stages from Sonic 06 and just updated the textures.
I would explain why ESO isn’t as good comparatively either, but that portion of my post costs 600 Forum Cookies! Luckily, with an easy one-time purchase of $5 for 500 Cookies, $10 for 1000, or our BEST VALUE $100 for 11,000 Forum Cookies, or through your monthly Premium Membership Superstash Gift of 1000 Cookies a month, then I’ll personally send the rest of my post to you!
I’d agree, it’s a poor excuse at this point especially since it’s a bit self defeating now.
They are at a point where they have decade spanning stories because they never concluded any since WoW began. Like I think as far as overarching narratives are concerned, starting with WoD, they’ve only resolved 3 storylines. Deathwing’s, Velen’s, and Pandaria’s.
Everything else really was left open ended with a wink wink, nudge nudge, what can happen in the future, sort of deal.
Hmmm this makes me wonder how popular and profitable could be a event crossover with Shadowbringers and Shadowlands could be if the 2 games, stop competing with one another?
FF14 and WoW get cosmetics to look like WoW races and classes… I made my Elezan into a Blood Elf, Roegadyn into an Orc…or Draenei into an Au Ra or vise versa, in a heart beat anyway just for Fun!
Oooo can you imagine a summoner in FF14 getting Demons instead of Primals and Warlocks summoning Primals instead of Demons!
Hunters becoming Bards or Mechanist, DK becoming cosmetically like Dark Knights, DH looks like Dragoons or Red Mages (Maybe?) and viseversa for WoW classes too! etc etc…
Aaah the posibilities!
Oh well, nothing is lost when you dream… it be nice though.
