Welcome back! The Durmin adventure continues!
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Heavensward series playlist! ► https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLvFQJa1XAXzzXrfl_cbsGvEl4AbTt5SMG
FULL FFXIV STORY MODE series playlist! ► https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLvFQJa1XAXzzXrfl_cbsGvEl4AbTt5SMG
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0:00 – Introduction
1:55 – HEAVENSWARD cinematic trailer
6:37 – GAME START
7:55 – QUEST: “Coming to Ishgard”
25:41 – QUEST: “Taking in the Sights”
33:34 – QUEST: “The Better Half”
44:52 – QUEST: “Over the Wall”
52:45 – QUEST: “Work in Progress”
56:03 – QUEST: “The First and Foremost”
59:48 – QUEST: “From on High”
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Edited by Daniel Floyd
♫ “Pray Return” by Chris Logsdon
https://lnkfi.re/pray-return
#PlayFrame #FFXIV #FinalFantasyXIV #Heavensward
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My girlfriend plays FF14 and wants me to play it too but I don't really do MMOs (the closest I really get is Destiny) so I've just been sending her my live reaction to this series instead….and I'm half tempted to not say a word about Heavensward to her, because it has some of her favorite characters, and I also lowkey think it'd be hilarious to just suddenly start talking about Shadowbringers (if/when Dan gets there) without mentioning it. But also I probably won't be able to stop myself making snarky comments about Ishgard because I have opinions. Strong opinions.
On a different note, I don't even really know if Urianger is in this expansion/has voice acted parts, but I already miss Gideon Emery.
Edit: broke my "not going to mention Heavensward" temptation immediately because for some reason Haurchefaunt opened his mouth and I started laughing hysterically. I swear only like, 1/8 characters sounds like I expect them to.
Related to voice acting, Dan, when talking about it you mentioned that Aymeric's VA is Hawkwood in DS3, but not that he's Navlaan in DS2! I'm sure Dan Fan Navlaan is quite disappointed wherever they are.
@PlayFrame The increased focus on detail and incidental dialogue is a strict improvement in my book! In fact, if it's not too onerous a request, would it be possible for us to get a good look at, like, the local iconography and suchlike? (Stuff like differing crests on shields (presuming they vary across the four great houses) and other such potentially-informative incidental detail.)
Obviously, even if the answer is yes, I figure it wouldn't happen for several episodes yet (since presumably you've got a large batch prerecorded, as before) – but given the greater level of visual flourish, I think it'd be interesting to try and see what parts of it the devs have chosen to 'encode' infotmation into.
Listening to Edmond's narration feels really bittersweet, man…
You say that the voices will be different, and I honestly braced myself for a hilarious contrast from Serious Teddie Sam Riegal as Alphinaud, but it honestly isn't that bad. It's just like they took his original voice and scraped off the last remnants of that upper pitch range.
"Use of alcohol"
Why yes, yes I am… oh you mean the game, right.
For some reason that trailer feels slightly 40k, and I can't place why.
Also, RE: Voice Actor changes; I'm probly gonna be a stick in the mud. It wasn't "American actors trying to do a British accent and not getting it" before. For me it's just "this is how people talk here", so Alphinaud just sounds like a completely different person, from a completely different place.
This is very different than how I remember Heavenly Sword.
Based on your remarks at the end of ARR, I thought this series would start again last week. I'm really glad to see it return but, honestly, even more glad that you took an extra week for yourself. Or that I misunderstood the timetable 😛
I can really feel Alphinaud's hesitation here at the very beginning. I know from personal experience that it's difficult to let go of the reins and trust yourself to the care of others when you've been used to fighting through on your own. It's not that there's no trust for the other person, but it's more of a "… but I've always done it this way."
Dan. When playing Mass Effect 2, you recruit a character called Mordin Solus, who has a habit of frequent and rapid-fire monologues of a highly entertaining variety. When you meet him, the game continuously gives you chances to interrupt him and cut him short, at first rudely, and then more politely.
But why would you do that. What kind of monster would not want to hear it all?
That's how I feel about you stopping to read everyone's dialogue. Put in all the timestamps you want! I shall ignore them forever!!!!!
When I saw this episode had gone live I dropped everything. ARR was so fun, and the way it ended made me SO excited to see this. Aaaaah!!
It's nice to have the brief break between ARR and Heavensward here. When I played through this part I had two voiced Alphinaud cutscenes back to back and the voice change nearly gave me whiplash.
Welcome to Ishgard, Durmin, it's so exciting to have you back!
Yay! So happy to have this continue. Also, and I know this was intentional on Square Enix's part, those Accept Quest/Completed Quest jingles are giving me major traditional-church-music vibes.
I like the pacing for the opening of Heavensward. It's nice to have things slow down after how hectic ARR ended. It gives us a chance to catch our bearings and get a feel for the new place. 😀
While Ishgard is the only city to have two different themes between its two areas, pointing out its different day and night themes is a bit misleading. The 3 starting cities of ARR also had different themes for the time of day, just not their two areas.
YESSS HW!!! When i was playing for the first time i was soooo engrossed into the story that i didnt even realize the new voice cast till Tataru started talking
Lord of Snack Durmin Durami has returned!
Alphinaud's new voice is a good switch. Both emphasize our boy's youth, but while Sam Riegel leaned a bit more into his arrogance, thinking he knew more than he did, this new voice leans more into his naiveté, which fits given how badly things just went for him. It's an interesting switch in characterization, and I look forward to everyone else.
It's out, it's out, it's out!! The next story mode of FF14 is OUT!!!! I'm so happy and excited and literally gasped aloud when I saw this!! Ahhh, time to strap in for more FF14 story!!!!!!
Honestly it's a little jarring hearing Alphinaud in this cutscene and I've finished Endwalker. It really takes a bit for the voice actors to find their footing with these new roles thrust upon them.
Except Count Edmont de Fortemps who is just perfect from the getgo. Rest in peace, Stephen Critchlow.
wow not even episode 1 & Durmin's real quest is already completed! Alphanaud got propper winter clothing!
Whos your favorite character kingdom hearts character
Ahhh, the snowy streets of fair Ishgard! It is good to see Durmin tread those cobbled streets! Not to mention the wonderful music of Heavensward. Honestly, the music is the one thing that IMO has only gotten better with each subsequent expansion.
Oh, a small pronunciation note for Dan: a Crozier is the term for the staff of office of a bishop, and as such is actually a word that has an English, not French, pronunciation. It's pronounced something like KROH-zher, the IPA for it is /ˈkroʊ ʒər/. The first syllable is like the bird crow, the second syllable is like the -zure in azure.
It's hard to overstate how big the initial release of Heavensward was for people who had been playing ARR at the time. Partly because as others had said, going to Ishgard was a thing that had been there for a long time, but it was a lot more than just that.
It was the first expansion, so there was no sense of what it would be or, indeed, if ARR had been a fluke and it'd crash and burn. There had been a lot of promise, 2.55 had primed people for narrative excitement and the trailers and previews of gear looked really impressive. 2.55 had also brought new shaders that allowed for brighter colors during well lit scenes. But at the same time, 1.0 had been a disaster and Square Enix is kind of a rollercoaster of a developer, so there were a lot of questions.
It was also just really new. None of us had heard the advertising memes, they didn't exist after all, and none of the stuff from Heavensward onward existed for us to have seen screenshots or clips of. So going in there and seeing this step up in presentation from the word go was such a positive shock. It was beyond anything any MMO had ever done at that point and it delivered the final reassurance that, yes, the game was safe and would go on to remain good.
Yay Durmin is back! I'm so happy to see this on Twitter and know what I'll be watching next day 🤩
I like how you stop to speak to NPCs I haven't talked to them all while playing HW through so I'm happy I can watch this again and see what they say and for my accord don't worry about rambling, I like to listen to you rambling 😄🤗
Aaaaah, Durmin is BACK, yet again!! And going into my (thus far) favorite expansion no less! I can't wait to see this story again 😀
Admittedly, this is just me being petty, but i would have loved it if they could do those introduction cinematics like this one here where they used your character, or at least race and class. Seeing what looked like a hyur marauder as our warrior of light instead of a lalafel felt a bit wrong after being with durmin for this long…
Ah… Home~
I was not expecting the return to Eorzea so soon…
But I am beyond excited to see the start of Heavensward! Having played through the main story all the way through, I am incredibly fond of the Heavansward's story and pacing. To this day I make use of the Forgotten Knight as my primary place where I go to adjust my glamour and store my various unique gear. Ishgard in many ways is my WoL's home. I would change my Grand Companion allegiance in a heartbeat if the Temple Knights where ever added.
Just caught up yesterday, looking forward to being in-tow with the adventures now
"This is an expansion that expanded the game and added stuff, future expansions will do too. This new thing we encounter is actually new and we will keep finding new things, it was added on top of the base game, because this is the new content that is not actually new because this is not the latest expansion. I'm also butchering names."
You can tell Dan is not a Storyteller.
Ishgard reminds me a lot of Gilneas
Who's that guy in the movie who travels to a huge castle and then becomes a dragoon?
39:40 Love how our way of getting to know the locals is standing in front of them loudly discussing if one of our associates will get assaulted in their bar.
Props to the owner for being cool about it and basically just going “I’m right here and I don’t let my patrons get assaulted thanks..,”
You can pronounce the y in "wyvern" as a y or an i as far as I can tell, as I hear as either a lot. I'm an i person myself.
Hurrah, welcome to heavensward! I admit, I fell off in post ARR a bit but I'm excited to return for this!
That being said, the number of buttons on your hotbar scares me a bit. Have you hidden all your other abilities somehow? Or am I just wildly misremembering how many buttons jobs have at this level?
I remember starting HW not knowing the voice cast was going to change…like dang Alphinaud, puberty hit different XD
I love the voices everyone gets going forward.
Dan, I am so happy to see this back sooner than I expected. The Snack Mage now begins the tale of the Dragonsnack War
Every time I would hear the quest accepted jingle in HW my mind immediately goes to "Fiiiive golden riiiiings"
80% cute and 20% eyeball
Heck yes! I've been looking forward to this so much!
As soon as I saw Alphinaud's coat I thought, "Durmin's going to be so proud!"
Oh man, the HW’s Home Screen brings back some feels. It’s still by far my favourite of all the home screens.
So happy to see this series back, it’s one of my favourite subscriptions. 🙂
I think i legitimately yelled or shrieked from excitement when I saw this upload ahhhHHH. I AM SO EXCITED. i only just finished heavensward last month (and just finished stormblood this WEEK) but I AM EXCITED TO EXPERIENCE IT AGAIN WITH YOU AND DURMIN! Y'all are in for a TREAT.
So what happens if you try to go back to the ARR areas now, given you're technically a wanted criminal?
So, fun fact for those who may not have noticed: aethernet shards will glow once you’ve attuned to them. It’s a handy way to see if you’ve attuned to the shard you’re looking at at a glance (this is not true of the large aetherytes. They always glow)
The Ysaudore package could have been cute, but this is Ishgard and the classism and xenophobia are off the charts ¯_(ツ)_/¯