Nah, for real. I have no idea why we were here… Let’s take a closer look.
Final Fantasy XIV: Online is property of Square Enix. I have no claim to it.
Dawntrail Rite of Succession Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cr_GQ_xgpLk&t=861s
Does Blizzard have Alzheimer’s Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zNoKvR8Lyo&t=28s
Time Stamps
0:00 Intro
1:13 The Terminals Serve no Purpose
3:21 Cahciau is Very Questionable
7:05 Our Motivation has been Depleted
9:48 How Can we Fix This?
16:49 How to Make a Villain Villainous
19:14 How to Improve Living Memory
23:56 Let the NPCs Assist
27:38 To the Finale
31:54 Conclusion
source
Yea. Honestly the entire expansion should have been about Alexandria merging with tural with things worsening overtime as the story goes. The succession should have been the patches that lead to 8.0
here for the Wuk hate,
living memory is the greatest zone ever created especially if you have friends to farm fates with its literally twilight town from kh and you get to pretend to be a nobody like roxas xion and axel its so genius
I honestly believe Sweet Baby inc. had their creepy little claws in this expansion.
I have an even bigger problem with Erenville. He was really popular with the fanbase as part of the bunboi craze in EW, being the first male viera NPC introduced in the game. He was clever, witty, had an exotic accent and kinda dunked on the scions during the whole frog questline in labyrinthos. But most importantly, he had that air of mystery and intrigue about him that made him interesting. I can clearly see how such a character can go on many people's husbando list. And I feel they should've kept it like that. To me personally, I never felt that he adds anything of value to the WoL's entourage. We didnt need to know his backstory nor did we need to be on his journey of giving him a closure. Now they have completely removed the intrigue and mystery behind erenville. Imagine if we didnt have erenville with us in Shaaloani, it would've actually felt like a vacation/adventure where we were just exploring the wild west zone all by ourselves and continue the story by talking to new people and learning from them without having an NPC to tag along with us. As a friend of the new dawnservant, that should've given us enough privilege to meet the important people in different settlements in Shaaloani. But now, with showing his story (which wasnt even good or compelling) he is just a tour guide with no combat skills, and the skills or information that he does have to offer could've easily been sourced from the local NPCs all by ourselves.. like we did till now from ARR to EW.
I genuinely hated Dawntrail. The writing we had in Shadowbringers, and for most of Endwalker, was incredible. Setting up finales with enemies that were so well-written. Then this shit. I loathe Wuk Lamat in every facet. Everything about her character was horrible. I've been selling off everything I have, giving me more reason to quit.
Erenville is my favorite side character this expansion. I love how his character development happened far away from Wuk Lamat, either ruminating thoughts in his head or off-screen where he finds out about his mother.
He and Krile were done so dirty…
The more I hear of Dawntrail, the more I can't help but wonder what they were thinking.
"This is the vacation expansion!"
>Get dragged into a battle for a throne by a character we don't know or have a reason to trust beyond "cute"
>help prevent a people from being destroyed
>genocide another people
>save the world again from annihilation
So what part was the vacation again? oh right tacos or something…. I might completely skip this expansion and just wait for the next one before even considering a subscription again.
dawntrial was a SBI bullshit storyline
I guess we went there so that ragebait channels like this one can make their 20th video shitting on the game. Doesn’t seem to get old. The expansion has been out for months, and a lot of people liked most of the story, especially living memory. If you’re still here crying about it it’s time to stop playing
Wasn't the whole reason for shutting the terminals down specifically to make it so Sphene would have less reasons to put up a bigger fight? Could have sworn that was literal dialogue said in that portion of the msq
I hope this video gets more views since it has super harsh criticism for DT but also some damn good alternative ideas of how the story should have been made and as much as i liked the story i wish it would have been more EDGY and not so tame, so yeah we need more critics like Mr. Durantes to really show the devs that we want more action and violence like the old world of warcraft had or even the early FF14 ARR with its NPC´s using harsh language towards us or making sexual advances towards us depending on what gender our warrior of light is, but those kind of interactions are nowhere to be seen in EW or DT
(Also Durantes your Warrior of light would have fitted perfectly to the way you wanted DT story to go, since he looks like a action hero :D)
I thought that they were going with the manipulative choice, and at first it seemed like that is what they will do. But i guess halfway the gave up, or were not convincing enough and were asked to change it, or they just did not care
I personally disliked the whole Living memory affair for their "oh no Sphene wants to merge our worlds and kill millions of ppl! So we need to hurry and stop her! "-scheme only to get told a few moments later after arriving in the area "take your time, her uploading everything will take a while, go play with the undead you will kill later"
I mean wtf?! WHY?!
When we finally get to the "Golden City" halfway through.
Whatever the Ja Ja Binks name was (leader with two heads, all their names sound the same and end in Ja)- "Congrats, this is the golden city."
WoL- "This glowy room with an obvious gate of some kind?"
"Yes, the Golden City!"
"… A single room. And a gate. Did anyone try to, idk, reopen it after Krile's parents came through?"
"No, why would we do that? Instead we sealed it off with special Sharlayan technology and left it as it is all these years."
WoL- "Does anyone in Old Sharlayan know that their wet dream of research material is potentially this gate and/ or what is behind it? "
"Nope. Just sealed off this glowy room with an ominous gate and perpetuated the rumour that the Golden City exists, though we have never actually seen it with our eyes."
Later in the plot development with Solution Nine.
"Hey dumbasses… WHY DIDN'T YOU RESEARCH THIS INSTEAD OF SEALING IT OFF?"
Anyway, does anyone actually want to find something we can actually call the "City of Gold"? Something that is actually a city? Perhaps made of gold? And not a room with a gate leading to an alternate shard of reality? Cause I do!
I turned off the terminal and felt nothing lol this whole place tried to get an emotion out of me but I just didn't care for these people.
Honestly for Wuk voice acting? They should hired someone who had a Brazilian accent.
Sorry, but I have to disagree with the scene of Krile and her parents.
The writers want to tell me that they didn't have ANYTHING to talk about?
Krile had no stories to tell about Galuf? How he raised her with 'so much love' etc etc?
And her parents had no stories to tell what they did after leaving her kid behind? Nothing about their hometown? Nothing about how they were pursued from the other scientist because they had ethical objections?
This scene needs to be shit on like everything esle in Dawntrails writing.
There was no good reason for any awkward silence to occur in the first place.
Didn’t like Wuk Lamat, felt like they put more effort into Krile’s backstory pre-Dawntrail than they did in the actual expansion (and tbh, I didn’t care about Krile anyway. She’s one of the least interesting Scions to me but whatever), it was just… it was like they took all of the feedback from ARR to Endwalker and decided to do the opposite of what the players enjoyed.
As someone who plays FFXIV for the story, I was so shocked when I actually found the trials, raids and dungeons for Dawntrail more enjoyable than the actual content and story itself.
And I’m about as filthy casual as they come. This rewrite is much better than what we actually got. I’ve been so disappointed that I don’t even care about the new patch because I’m sure it will be more Wuk Lamat 2.0.
Least the ff11 raid is cool
We missed a chance for more Turali to be Endless. Imagine how horrified they would be at Sphene harvesting their families to keep the Endless running. What if Namikka had a daughter, and learned that this daughter died in the attack on Tuliyollal. The anger and heartbreak would be so enormously powerful. What if Otis spoke with Namikka and turned on his queen because this isn't the ruler he loved and vowed to serve.
Dawntrail – Speak to Three NPCS: The Expansion
As a 2.0 player, I try very hard to be optimistic of DT… But holy shit, I never took this long to clear MSQ within the first week… It took me 2 months cause how boring as shit this story was.
You hit the nails of area that should of improved.
Wuk was a story killer and u have to be a 7 year old or less to kiss up this dumbed down story. If I didn't know any better, DEI had their dirty claws on it. And nobody can change my mind.
This was a weakest story in the entirely of FFXIV, even ARR was better
Video is a bit too ascerbic and its essay maker too cynical to miss some subtle undertones but it's got valid points. I'm writing this comment mostly as I go through your vid.
Addressing points mentioned but wasn't the focus of the video:
-Wuk Lamat is a sad case of having too much screentime and also not enough character development. For all the content done in the first half of the game, it wasted too much time on filler and didn't do enough efficient story-telling. Vacation stories can be engaging but the amount of times I melted in my chair was too much compared to certain EW segments.
– Do NOT confuse VAs with voice direction. Sena Bryer has the chops to do it and the final trial being revoiced is proof enough (she actually lost her voice for days after she was done recording all the bits for base DT). The voice director never sat down with any of the VAs for a table read. Even 7.1 voice direction STILL has some atrocious bits.
In the video, now:
-Gulool Ja Ja did set us aside that the political race wasn't supposed to be a real race, more like a very fashionable education tour. He did support us being a sidekick to her naive daughter which influenced the WoL (which the writer's are very hardpressed on balancing being their own char vs our control) to be sidelined willingly. Of course, it does very easily open up to a slippery slope of an unengaging story which the writers did slip on but food for thought. P.S. Saw you shill about your writeup of the rite of succession. Haven't seen that, woooops.
-Living Memory did make me feel like I would burst into tears at any moment but valid points. More philosphy and in-character discussion should've been had. It progressed way too fast, we couldn't even stop to ask what anyone felt which would've improved the segment tenfold.
-Sphene's motives starting from when we met her feels like we need more perspectives. Her counterpart is FF9s Princess Garnet whom would've been much like Sphene if she hadn't met Zidane. The story is trying to reflect that (memewise, doomed yuri) between Sphene and Lamat'yi. She's a bleeding heart that loves all her citizens but above all else, her Endless. So it makes sense that at first she thought having a relationship with these interlopers whom happened to be The Dawnservant would net her some leverage against her psycho shotgun marriage husband Zoraal Ja that sacrificed her own citizens to get back at Tuliyollal and *only thinks about that*. Now that he's gone, she can continue harvesting souls for her citizens like in the original story. I do like your version better with making her more manipulative.
-I like your rewrites better! More efficient storytelling with the same amount of resources.
-Your Final trial version is also the better way but I have to make my stance on Wuk Lamat being cut out. I am between a Wuk Lamat Lover and Hater. I am a Wuk Lamat Okayer. I thought she was annoying in 6.55 but she (very, very) slowly grew on me. This scene was fine. It was only bad because of shitty voice direction. (AGAIN, NOT VOICE ACTOR. DIRECTION.)
-A final hurrah and goodbye from the endless from your version definitely would've made me cry.
Good video, if I felt like I might have the wrong read and assumption that you might have disliked Wuk Lamat.
Dawntrail is the Warlords of Darenor of WoW. The game is going to go down hill from here, and never get back to what it was. Watched it happened before.
Clock it. ⏰
You clearly missed the whole point of Living Memory, didn't you?…
a number of things: I don't feel that it deepens things to turn matters like krile's reunion with her parents into a tactical advantage. it's certainly realistic to find allies and advantages where you can, but I don't think it would improve the texture of the scene.
Also, Krile is the only one that stands to get closure from meeting her parents there. Those aren't actually her parents, it's not the aether/soul energy that comprised their souls and is just blank aether with their memories imprinted on them. it's performative therapy for the living, as grieving always is. This is ultimately my biggest issue with Living Memory. Outside of the chance of closure for the living, everything that happens there is empty, just empty or explorative.
Oh boy, Living Memory, Ultima Thule 2.0 but it is far the worst and the most pointless zone in the entire damn game. The only "worth" I had going for during my time with Dawntrail is over cutscenes about Krile's parents and Erenville due to a friend mentioning about it but soon enough, it became pointless as if there was ANYTHING GOOD at that point. Watching my WoL commit another genocide on the people of Living Memory with any no real purpose than to "unlock" the final dungeon and trial and then watch Wuk Lamat stealing the moment became my final straw of this game.
I'm just glad that I have ended my subscription and focus other things elsewhere.
I generally hate the direction they’re going with FFXIV, so much so in fact that I’m considering cancelling my subscription after 10 years. Plus the new content is too hard for me. Literally. My eyes and hands can’t react fast enough. And it’s not fun. I know some people like it. Good for you.
I usually call Living Memory just Golden Ultima Thule because it’s essentially a cheap grab at emotions in the final zone. While I love absolutely adore the ost for this area, it’s adds to the cheapness of what the writing is attempting to do. While I have my take on Ultima Thule (mostly with the Scions not dying), it actually was a culmination of a very long journey since ARR, characters from every expansion talking to us in that final stretch before we confront Meteion was a good sight and it felt genuine because it has proper build up for it to be utilized. Add the score on top of it where the music is quite literally singing about the journey we’ve taken in XIV is what encapsulated the situation perfectly. EW is far from perfect and at times was significantly lacking or didn’t conclude things properly, but they still managed for the most part to make things emotionally impactful when in regards to our journey and Meteion being out ultimate enemy (I’m ignoring Hermes on purpose). Also also to the people who deflect the criticism of the WoL not being a prominent character in DT need to understand a major difference between The Most Important Character and *The Main Character*, the two can very well be the same thing in many stories but it most certainly isn’t an absolute. The WoL pretty much HAS to be the main character otherwise what’s the point. If we’re not the most important, this is completely fine, but we don’t even take a backseat, we’re basically in the trunk for like 85% of Dawntrail. Anyways keep up the great videos, I’m loving the critical analysis of a game I so desperately love
Sorry dude I really liked your older videos but if you're just going to go down the route of ranting about and calling every woman character names, while implying "dei" for everything then I'm probably going to unsub and stop watching. You can do better and it's not like Emet is all that better of a character than Venat or Cachuia, also the "I can't pronounce names" has been overused now, let it go
can someone write this guy idea of fix the story in ao3 i would kiss the ground they are walking to
everything in DT (except the dungeons and raids because they are outsourced and created outside) was just blatantly stupid executed, virtually no braincell was active during development, a literal insult not only to the franchise, to one of my all time favorites FF9 and the game itself but even more so to us players… if i ever get the chance i will hold them accountable for their atrocities… should be illegal to fuck up a franchise that was once so legendary this bad…
I really do wish Dawntrail was just a vacation to find a mythical treasure, it didn't need world-end catastrophe and the fable that was hinted so long ago was a disappointment. The fact the the the WoL, you the player turn the "golden city" into a dead husk feels like a slap in the face. It really does emphasize modern gaming as something that is so hyped up, but turn into a miserable experience.
I understand the endless likely wouldn't have wanted to be kept alive if it meant the slaughtering of nations to entire world, but more thought into that would have helped instead of just blinking them out of existence. The idea of Living memory should have a means of people to see their loved once off, to get a proper good-bye, but because of Sphene, it was twisted into a non-existence. No one knew they were there because she "spared" them the grief of loss by removing the memories of them. If anything, she should go down as the most hated queen for robbing people of their loved ones and keeping them as pets in a gilded cage.
Living (now what I call Dead) Memory, is just the most bitter icing on this cake that was just there to celebrate their new star, Their New Lightning/Rey Palpatine to be shoved in everywhere. If Dissidia was still on-going, I imagine she would not only be a character, but take up a good portion of the story as the lead in that. I'm convinced they not only rushed the script, but kept making rewrites only to make her more awesome and the Story feels like it was written by a modern western writer, the biggest insult I can give.
Cahciua sound like Kaf-KEE-Wa. C'mon, it's no harder than Wuk Lamat.
Great, now I am reminded again how it could've done better. If it was I probably would be still subbing especially for 7.1
Man, I thought I was down on the Dawntrail story, but you take it to the next level. Very interesting take on things. This MSQ sucked ass!