Charakter

Part 3:

So now we are back in the real world and off to Garlemald, where the End days are rearing their ugly heads.

This was pretty much the same as Thavnair, using the new lands as the stage to show off the effects of Bad Stuff happening. It was done slightly better, but as before, over all too soon. Honestly I thought it was more to give us an update of what happened to the people there after we went to the moon. See, place is still kicking, now on with the story! The various Scion fights were not bad and thankfully not too hard to do. I think they had learned their lesson from SHB and those confusing fights.

Ok, I know we probably all thought it, so I will mention it here. WHY did we not get to see the End Days devastation happen in Eorzea anywhere? Was it just too disruptive? Ok, we KNOW the reason and it is simply, 'game stages'. You can't make trouble in places where there are people who have not gotten to that section of the story yet. Bullshit, you CAN too! It's called Instancing! MMORPG's have used this in the past with towns and such, putting people who have not done something in one instance, and those who have in another, thus cutting off access and showing changes.

But of course THAT would have necessitated resources and you know, actual work on the developers part. So NOPE, keep the mess confined to the NEW places only, which new players CAN'T access yet! Easy-peasy and LESS work to do, yay!!!! Sigh... Well it is what it is so that is that.

Ok, now we come to the BIG part of the expansion, FINALLY learning the BIG secret of the Sharlayans, (which of course was ALREADY spilled by the Watcher and space bunnies!) In fact, because of this, the Sharlayans just drop the whole mystery and outright TELL you in great detail. Hell, they even make a whole big crowd AND forum event about it.

Um.....yeah, boy, they SURE have a habit of just outright jettisoning plots in FF14, don't they? They spend a fourth of the expansion on this and then just outright dump it when it had served its purpose of misdirection. Ok then.....but WAIT, we are NOT done yet with this!

Not ONLY do they drop the whole 'secret' plot, they drop the WHOLE 'End of the world, need to save what we can' crisis TOO! That's RIGHT, they dump the MAJOR thing that has tied and driven the WHOLE expansion so far!

Seriously, they dumped the WHOLE thing by pulling a MASSIVE Deus Ex Machina out of their lazy creative writing asses JUST to make an excuse find a way to keep the world the way it is and never, EVER CHANGE it! AGGGGGH!

People, people, PEOPLE! This could have been GOOD! INTERSTERING! GREAT DRAMA! But NOOOO!!! It CAN'T be because it is NOT a single player FF14 game; it is a MMORPG and thus must never EVER change!!!!

So WHY give us a bullshit plot that was a complete lie? Because they could, and sure enough they faked the whole thing through their teeth.

So what was this 180 degree change? Well you know it, The Voyage to the outer reaches of the Unknown and zoom away into space to save all! Yeah, this thing that TOTALLY belongs in another game. Never mind that the world still uses horses, carts, sailing ships, magic, and wind power for most things; we gots us a SPACESHIP now to do COOL stuff! Way to jump the technological track people! And don't even ask me HOW the hell they actually BUILT that thing with no advanced technology; that gets filed under, 'reasons', and 'Yada Yada Yada'.

So, things happen to get this ship ready; in fact, interesting things! One good thing about this is that they brought a while lot of people from previous expansions back to help get the ship ready. This was a GOOD thing people! It showed the people of the world coming together to help save it, plus it was good seeing old familiar faces again. One really cool thing was seeing the beast tribes helping too. I LOVED the primal banter during the takeoff, it was pretty funny. In fact that whole takeoff cut scene was good. Sadly, it was the last good thing about the expansion cause it all went down hill from there.

Well, we are off into space! Land on Ultima Thule and.....WTF! WHY is it so...dark?

Seriously, this place was sooo dark, I could barely see a thing while questing. It was AWFUL! I don't know if it was because I was playing on an OLED tv with its true blacks or what, but I really struggled to find my way to things. Worst area EVER!!!!

Ok, now the quests, plot, and general what you had to do here. Sigh.... Very HEAVY sigh...

With the exception of Garlemald, THIS is the part of Endwalker that upset me the most and really, REALLY wished it did not have the hamstring of being a MMORPG. Why? Well let me tell you!

The situation the Scions found themselves in, phantom realities of events long past on distant worlds, was actually a great setting. Put in a different game, a game where choices, decisions, and consequences were allowed to stay for good or bad; this could have made for really good horror. That's RIGHT, I said HORROR!

I mean look what was happening during the events of Ultima Thule. The journey to the heart of Despair, the place where Meteion's power base was at. A place full of shattered hopes and dreams, where phantoms of the past shared their failure trying to fight Meteion and the aftermath of their loss. It was all around you and they did very little with it! UGH!!!! All we really got were history lessons and either joy or angst. "Woe is us, we messed up and failed", or joy because "yay, we managed to kill ourselves like we wanted to."

Look at what the Scions had to do to press on, 'sacrifice' themselves, give in to the Despair to open the way. Think of this! Think of the ramifications of this in a different storyline, a horror one! Having your companions, your friends dying one by one, giving their lives just so you could press on to try to save your world from extinction. Think of the sadness, the angst, the despair the Scions are facing at having to do this over and over again at each manifestation. Think of the terror as the group has less people to face the challenges before them, wondering, "when is it my time to die?" Think if there was ACTUAL sacrifice of the heroes as they dwindled one by one till it was just the Warrior of Light against Meteion herself and they would have to make the ultimate sacrifice to save Etherys.

But it didn't happen....It couldn't happen....Instead we got one of the most lamest things that COULD happen. Everyone......lived...

It was all a lie, all of it. the 'sacrifices' of the Scions, the danger, all the character building and bravery each of them went through. It was all a lie.

I would say this was a Deus Ex Machina, but no it was not. It was a combination of Vanat's crystal and the Elpis flowers that allowed the Heroes to get out of this one. AKA: Mcguffin, foreshadowing and Chekov's gun. Yes people, it FINALLY went off and in a BIG way!

Ok, it would be a lie if I said having Emet and Hythlodaeus come save us was not cool, I admit it was. Also, the use of the Elpis flowers to stop Meteion was actually well done. But it sucks that it happened! It sucks that ALL the Scions were bought back, their self sacrifice totally made irrelevant. All that talking, all that development, gone, just like that. Way to GO FF14 writers! Make it all meaningless! And man, if you read the ff14 forums, people REALLY bitched about this.

And Honey, it ain't OVER yet! Believe it or not it gets even lamer!

And here we are, at one of the most bullshit Deus Ex Machina I have ever SEEN!

The main Meteion entity finally has us in its grasp, their full power trained on us. It seems hopeless, we have lost, Despair has won.

But NO! Here comes Zenos, as a DRAGON, come to disrupt Meteion's hold and save the hour, allowing us to go into the trial to fight her.

OMG! Could this BE any lamer? Look, I know they had to think of something to save us, but wow, just WOW!

Sigh, I guess this is what one gets playing a 'animeish' game. DEAL with it, right? Bleh!

Well, it is what it is. We do the trial, defeat the baddy, world saved, will we FINALLY die? Nope, not yet.

Once again, here comes Dragon Zenos to save our bacon and do the final resolution with him, the BIG fight he has been wanting to prove who is best of all.

I will say it was an interesting fight, and I managed to get him to zero health twice before it ended. Some of those attacks were total stun locking bullshit though. Casuals must have had a bitch time with it. ;p

And of course we still did NOT die, yay teleporting technology! Oh, by the way, HOW exactly are we breathing in space? I know, I know, 'magic reasons'. Typical....

And the end.....it just.....ends.....No fanfare, no party, no great celebration for saving the WHOLE world; it just.....ENDS!

Total complete BULLSHIT!

I wanted a PARTY praising me for saving all their ASSES! Booooo!!!!!!

But what to you expect, the lamest expansion of FF14 ends in the lamest way!

Sadly people, except for Gaelemald and Elpis, Endwalker was a dismal disappointment. Too much busywork bullshit made irrelevant by a total crap solution which had ZERO payoff other than getting out from under the End TImes quandary and freeing the game to continue.

It was a very sad and lackluster ending to an underlying plot lasting 5 expansions, and I feel cheated.

What could they have done differently? Well, for starters, kill major people OFF! Make the end of the world MEAN something, make sacrifices COUNT! The Scions's tale was done, they are NOT needed anymore. They did NOT need 'happy endings'.

So where do they go from here? Well, Emet did mention all those other places in the world. But here is the thing. We just killed a planet killing God-like being. HOW exactly are we going to be challenged in the future? HA! Good luck with THAT one FF14 writers. Glad it ain't me. ;-p

Thank you if you ACTUALLY read all this. Till the next one;

Annabel