The reason it reflects America.... is because the entire expansion/continent is based around north and south america. The first couple zones are based on Peru and neighbouring countries. While the later zones are based on the USA. It has nothing to do with the influx of players, just the location on the map.
My understanding at the time was that if there was anything to be done with the gate to the golden city, Gulool Ja Ja would have done it when he was rocking around with Galuf. Gulool Ja Ja had known about the gate for decades and even had a Sharlayan expert looking at it at some point in the past, so if he felt it could have been opened he would have done so long ago.
The key object was being kept in the palace vault. If Sareel Ja knew where it was and what it was, I don't see how Gulool Ja Ja didn't know about it himself. It should just have been stated that it is kept safe and the Wuk Lamat will be handed over everything after the ascension. That would necessitate going back and makes this all sensible.
Well Gulool Ja Ja plainly said he'd tell Wuk Lamat everything he knows about the gate because it'll be her to decide what to do with it after. As for the key, I don't think anyone should know it was one, at most suspect it. And they said they never found how to activate it's Sareel Ja is for sure an odd one here. But the couldn't use the key either. It reacted only when Zoraal Ja took hold of it which was the missing element they could never find. As for what that element is, I guess it's a little spoilers for now so it'll have to be talked about in a future video. Still, I don't really think we saw the last of Sareel Ja.
I'm pretty sure you're talking about literally the same cringe song that he was talking about at that part of the video. They use it 3 times, and this was the first.
@@insertcognomenis a sex reference lol, if you are couple with kids and both try to do their thing because the kids are not there and the kids walks in, you both can’t obviously do it for the rest of the day. He is referencing that as finding the city of gold door as that same moment (blue balls moment): “here is the door but you can’t open it and the climax for finding this door is for another day, now lets go back and talk about the door in the main city…”
He did. He also over exaggerated the similar nature of the early zones (two were, different, jungles). Sometimes he realizes he's got it wrong, sometimes he doesn't. I think that gives us the right to ruthlessly heckle the old man, but he might disagree.
*places tiny soap box down* Its Arizona/Sonoran Desert for Shaaloani. Texas is a fair guess, but with how in love I am with the adaptation of where I live, I do feel compelled to share that. *steps down from the soap box and runs back into where the AC is*
As someone who lived in Texas for over a decade, I was actually questioning if the accents were non-Americans imitating southern/western accents. Turns out, most of the voice actors were American, but apparently from places on the east coast like Kentucky, which sort of explains why they sounded so fake to me.
As much as it was good hype at the time, I do think in retrospect it should not have been revealed. We can see from Preach that the question of what it is is always in the back of his mind (and sometimes the forefront) that it can be very distracting. I purposefully tried not to think about it much during the MSQ until after Shaaloani but it's difficult not to keep wondering where it fits in.
I do thin this is gonna be a base msq which will be loved way more by people playing later and casual players whole didn't follow the marketing. If you didn't know about anything beyond the cinematic trailer, this whole expansion would be way more mind blowing.
Its so weird that you reach the entrance of the fabled City of Gold and hes like "You cant look right now lets head back to town" and nobody even questions why.
True like he couldn’t tell us about it then and their or post guards since we just cleared the way to it etc…. A lot of funky things in the first half, I enjoyed the second half of MSQ way more!
I had the impression that "Here's the door.. we don't know how to open it" and was more annoyed on how easy it was for Zovaal Ja to get the key and get in to apparently an incredibly guarded secret.
There are a few ghost enemies in that dungeon with multiple faces and limbs. So i'm not sure the thing worked to keep them from coming back as vengeful spirits.
I really hate how they gave away Solution 9 so intensely in Live Letters and stuff. I predicted the moment I saw that in promotional stuff that it was the Golden City they said we would be looking for, as if the devs were giggling to themselves "they don't even know they're looking right at it, we've hidden it in plain sight!" No, you haven't. All you did was ruin a reveal that would've been awesome to hit naturally in that third dungeon. The only people who will ever have that reveal naturally, presumably as the creators of it intended, are those who ignore all news of the game for months leading up to the next expansion, all social media, the Live Letters, etc., and I think that sucks badly.
@@Beredaman08 Posting spoilers from beyond the scope of the video's content? Really? Gulool Ja Ja confirmed that (at least from his perspective) this was indeed the Golden City. Him being a potentially unreliable narrator doesn't mean you should come in and post spoilers in response to people wanting to discuss the content covered in the video. I'm neck-and-neck with Preach here, and God forbid I express some disappointment without you coming in and going "um akshually, it's a false flag anyway." If you know so then keep it to yourself while it's still new content.
@@FishSkeleton- If people don't like spoilers they should get off the comment sections. They can't police the entire online discourse just to preserve their experience, it's their responsibility, not ours.
@@unixtreme This series is being done in chapter-to-chapter video diary format. I wanted to take part in discussing the content of the video. I already avoid all of the discourse on Twitter and imageboards and such. It's not at all unreasonable to want to discuss the video's content and nothing beyond it.
In the moment I kinda took Galool Ja Ja's secrecy as a national security thing, wants to wait until Wuk is officially Dawnservant before revealing everything etc., and the sojourn with Erenville was to kill time
If that's the case it still doesn't track very well. Wuk Lamat becomes Dawn Servant before we leave. And then later we find out she's told relevant stuff without us and Krile is allowed to sit in but not us.
The MSQ blue balling us from the City of Gold for more of Wuk Lamat's shenanigans was the point where I started to wish Wuk and her crown story would go away.
I really wish I did not know about solution 9 and definitely should not have watched the launch trailer. I enjoyed the 7.0 patch overall but agree that the story could have been better structured and arranged so that things didn't feel so frustrating. All the good parts and components were there just did not fit seamlessly together. They did leave enough lose threads that I am excited to see which ones they will chose to pull on next. But more importantly, really excited for the raid content.
Dude, since we first saw the door of the crystal tower, we’ve gone to other reflections, seen time travel, actually time traveled, went to the core of the planet, been to the moon and the literal edge of existence. Been to the home of the gods, and killed them all XD This door is like the Tuesday of doors to us at this point. LOL
I think the break after the Golden city discovery is supposed to show that Galool Ja Ja has always known about the city and that it is locked for a reason. A reason that he will discuss to Wuk Lemat and Koana. That part definitely could have been accelerated but if it's been sealed for years there's no real reason to worry for the scions. The WOL following Erenville makes sense to me as it's a part of the world they haven't seen yet which always seems to be a driving force for the reflections of Azem. I imagine that would drive them towards the city also but they wouldn't want to step on the toes of the Tural Government.
But that was established since you meet with him the first time, feels contrived just because the plot needs to move a certain way. My biggest problem is that no one questions him beyond “is this the city of gold?”
Who cares if it makes sense that it's not a reason to worry, you just discovered the entrance to a mythical place, that even emet selch told you about, that they've been building up this entire expansion but we go with Erenville to go explore the lamest iteration of the wild west with the most side-quest feeling quests imaginable, with not even an explanation? Amazing, I think they took that straight out of Lord of the Rings actually
At no point during the MSQ did I have a problem with the storytelling. I don't understand the criticism. The change of heart in B-JJ was the most wholesome part of the MSQ
I have a lot of issues with the MSQ from writing, quest design, etc. but I don’t find it mega offensive as others or hate it. Funny enough it’s better structured than 4.0 but the execution feels worse because the writing is not strong. I just hope there’s room for discussion for improvement without going to extremes.
@@Plasmacat1 I agree, it's unproductive to just label the expansion as being bad or saying that it's worse than ARR and Stormblood! Each expansion has its pros and cons, and it's unreasonable to only talk about the bad things and ignore any of the good points!
@@Eisenight I wish all that effort put into fortifying that train was also put into fortifying Tuliyollal, and given Koana's technological expertise, that was what I was hoping would happen once we cut back to see a fortified Tuliyollal. But when we eventually did, nothing changed. All Koana did was sign a defense pact with Radz-at-han and called it a day. Wuk Lamat could have just as easily done that herself. Koana got shoved off so hard in the second half of the MSQ. He would have been so much more useful than Wuk Lamat to make sense out of all the technology in Solution Nine and possibly stealing those ideas for Tuliyollal.
‘ I hope Wuk Lamat finally realises that not everything can be solved with peace and happiness.’ Oh Preach, honey, god help you get through that final zone.
In not a single moment she learned that. Last one who tried that was the Sultana. Then she got poisoned, puppeteered and lectured in economics by a semi naked Highlander. Aymeric got shanked trying to do what was right. Hien had to deal with Yotsuyu and the push back for vengeance. Garlemald had a character suicide. It's all so jarring, this writing. I can't believe that they were the same team (not the same writers) that wrote all this before and they cooked up a carebear leader. Literally feels like it was written for 10 year olds.
Definitely agree Wuk Lamat didn't learn that lesson. The last zone and final trial shows it. Yes her resolve to do what needs to actually be done is stronger than before, but she still insists on wasting time talking to everyone because......well because she's Wuk Lamat.
I trusted that they wouldn't show too much and it would be fine like with Endwalker but i felt like they really did show a LOT from the launch trailer.
@@StormierNik Even without the launch trailer, the character descriptions in the LiveLetter already let me predict, that Wuk and Koana will be the leaders together.. And the launch trailer: Yeah, saw that coming with the attack, the parents, that it would be another reflection. Had my guess on some time travel shenanigans, because they loved those since Alexander. Wasnt technically time travel, but a nice twist on it. Even tho we already had a similar concept in shadowbringers with the scions been in the first for 1-5 years. Speaking of shadowbringers. In general there were a lot of similarities to shadowbringer. At least I interpreted them as such: The ruler with the secret, both tika forests with ronkan ruins(or similar visual styles), trolly and train, second city which is ruled by the "cool" dudes, with the working class hanging around outside the city. Both leaders of the cities "waiting" on top of it for us. Some kind of "mindcontrol". Eulmore people were addicted to moel and the constant feeding of light/sin eater aether through it. S9 people are kinda "addicted" to happiness and there are no memories of sorrow and despair. No questions being asked what moel/regulators could do to you. The last zone. But that is just my opinion. Its feels very similar, with the difference, that shadowbringers was written A LOT better.
Thats Japanese knowhow 101. They always spoil stuff in the trailers. Its why you skip them in most japanese games or anime. IMO the worst thing they did this time was spoil Solution 9, because people just keep wondering when that is coming and dont enjoy the content they got right infront of them... because its not Solution 9.
@@Chavelo88 yea. Also why you doont watch anime openings. But i think preachs audience is not the usual japaniac kind. I stopped watching interviews and trailer besides announcment trailers of japanese media years ago xD
Yeah the "let's leave the city of gold behind" moment was what told me this wasn't, in fact, the Adventure MSQ like we were told. It's the Second Fiddle to Wuk Lamat MSQ.
The Crawlers made this zone a lot better than it is. I was so bored there, felt so empty. I'm glad the rp element brought some of the enjoyment back though.
The main way I found to come to terms with the decision to leave it alone was that it was under the jurisdiction of the old boss and he said to leave. We'd get our chance when the new boss got settled and could let us do our thing. Sort of like how things were when we broke into Vrtra's treasure horde and he was like 'hey, this stuff is spoken for, alright?' and we had to just nod and move on to something else.
That's not why at all. Does he not remember when they've specifically said that they closed up North America Because the entire dawn servant quest Was only gonna be in the south.
That wild west zone was a total whiplash moment for me. Going into the wild wild west of Texas after all this time where we were messing with Mesoamerican cultures, primitive technologies and themes completely staggered me. I checked out from the MSQ at this point, but I'm glad the crawler's presence spiced it up for ya.
I also found this to be a whiplash moment, but in the opposite direction. For the first half of the MSQ, I felt like I was just going through the motions and was fairly disengaged. The 95 dungeon, the events in the city, and the 4th zone and beyond was when I felt like things started to pick up, and I "checked in," so to speak.
One of the first Dungeons in ARR has human trafficing and child slaves in it. I was amazed by the storytelling they did in their dungeons. And feld exactly the same at lvl 95. Where's the demonic entities? Where is Bakool Ja Ja, being haunted by them? Would have been a stellar opportunity to show him that we're not just an empty promise. Maybe even fighting side by side out of necessity.
12:22 The zone music gives off so much Ufo:Aftershock soundtrack vibes, its uncanny. as for english voice acting... Apparently ARR was USA studio. Heavensward onwards was London studio and this expansion (certainly weaker on english part) is USA again.
"We found the Golden City! Welp, let's leave now, our protagonist needs to become the new ruler and all that". Honestly the biggest let-down. Like yeah we won the contest with only 1 contestant remaining, yaayyy, NOW LET ME GO TO THE SHINY GOLDEN SCI-FI PLACE! The wild west distraction didn't really make me forget about it, though it certainly had a cool zone theme.
Shaalonai is my favorite zone in this expantion, because as someone who has grown up and has been to places that look like it, it felt like they did a pretty good job representing that aspect and getting into the nitty gritty of that world (which as an American, its rare for me to feel that way because most representations of US culture is absurdly surface level and generic, but I feel like SE definitely did their homework on the general vibe of the 1800's American Boomtown). Like the msq just felt like I waltz into a spaghetti western and I got to essentually be that cowboy without a name. It was great. Also the zone music is top notch
Tbh when i got to this point in the story and there was the cutscene where Kona thought Wuk Lamat wasn’t going to have him doing anything important i had the thought of “what if Wuk Lamat’s tenure on the throne ends up revealing something about her that wasn’t apparent before or she just ends up being a terrible ruler who is too attached to her desire to be Dawnservant to step down and we end up fighting her?”. This thought mostly came out of the feeling i get that her character’s unbelievably nice and positive attitude is a little too good to be true which often foreshadows the revelation of a serious flaw lurking beneath a carefully maintained mask. Also when I first saw the xpac trailers that feature both the mythos surrounding the city of gold as a place of blissful paradise and Wuk Lamat saying she wanted a Tuliolal where everyone can live in happiness it made me wonder if there might be some kind of terrible power behind the city of gold and if Wuk Lamat might be tempted to use it for the benefit of her people.
I did not like that sudden turn of events at all. From finding the mysterious gate to suddenly go to the wild west. I genuinely have no interest in a wild west setting, so that whole turn of events from finally reaching the highest peak point of finding the mysterious gate to having to go through another slog of a zone together with Erenville was extremely tiring mentally. It was just one giant side quest, and it was not interesting.
Shaaloani is pretty much the best part of the story. It's the only time you're not getting dragged around by Wuk Lamat, and you get to spend time with Estinien.
12:35 - ??? Urqopacha is literally nothing like Kozama'uka or Yak T'el, and even those two have some clear differences. I honestly have no idea what you mean here.
I'm glad to hear you liked the western zone as well. It was feeling weird how a lot of people seemed to hate on it. Its probably my favorite zone in the game.
@@IKIGAIofficialThank you for saying this. I'm surprised more people haven't noticed that the cheesy writing started in the Endwalker patches, not in Dawntrail.
Locked in a vault with only dead babies/eggs to eat. They've grown a taste for humanoid flesh xD I suppose the door has been known about for 20-odd years, so if they didn't think it was worth checking out back then, maybe there's just nothing to discover? The wild-west was great. Appreciate that it's the first fully open zone we've gotten this expansion. Was very tired of always having half the place locked off to the MSQ. Wonderful to just mount up and ride around for a bit.
The wild West bit gave me some good ol Gunsmoke(ask your grandparents XD ) vibes. Had a lot fun there. That being said...the story feels a lil oddly paced...like we keep restarting? Idk. I'm in about the same spot and wondering when the other shoe is going to drop 💧
@@arkstok Spoilers but I was referring to not being able to open the gate at this point in the story. One key is in a vault, and nobody knows it's a key in the first place. And with the other key, again, no one knows it's a key until towards the end.
When the ruler of the continent says "Hey, awesome, you found the City of Gold as part of the test, now be patient and I will explain all about it after you're initiated", it is crystal-clear that: a) It is strictly need to know basis only information; b) It is suspected to be potential danger, but nothing imminent - so all the more reason to not approach unless you know what it's all about. I simply cannot understand why this was such a big deal that, no, we cannot just immediately barge in and start rummaging about or take measurements, or research the tech, ESPECIALLY after we see a giant padlock put in front of it by a Sharlayan Archon. Even with the voidgate at the bottom of Alzhadaal's legacy, we first had to get express permission from Vrtra to do so, and he was not at all thrilled of us tampering with it. Hell, it was exactly BECAUSE we barged through it anyway that the entire Golbez plot kicked into high gear in the first place. Had we left it as it was, they'd remain in the Void as they were for ten thousand years.
I think that you’re right. It should be explicitly stated that’s the case though. BJJ should have come in, stepped between the party and portal and told us that now is not the time, with a warning.
@@anyroad5455 But HE DID! Literally in the cutscene that Preach yells over! Gulool Ja Ja comes in and says that he will explain EVERYTHING he knows after the coronation. How much more explicit can it possibly be? I'm seriously baffled, does nobody bloody pay attention to this story they're moaning about? The further these videos go, the more this just sounds like the university seminars where someone sleeps through most of one, wakes up, then tries to make up for it by saying things that already have been said and asking questions about things that had already been discussed, to the great annoyance of everyone present.
As a plot checklist? Yeah it shouldn't be a big deal. As a story? This could've been done a lot better, hence the reaction. This felt like I have to force it make sense of it to barely make sense.
@@Eisenight What are you even talking about? Your comment makes no sense. We were just told by the ruler of the continent that we're not going through the gate and he will explain later. The previous gate we barged through caused a disaster that nearly had the Voidsent pour into the Source. We can leave the sleeping dogs lie for a bloody moment, can't we? How can this be "done better" when the SAME GAME plays through a similar scenario just a short while back, and people completely forget about it? This is just criticism for criticism's sake.
@@thesunthronei think its another case of what would i do as a player vs what would the characters do in this situation type of expectation. I notice thats where most of the story criticisms this expansion also come from. Im with you as Archons they would make the sound decision to wait after being told by the leader of the country since there really was no urgency yet anyway and they thought their friend Wuk Lamat’s ceremony comes first. But, nah the “player” is not invested at that point because they dont like her.
That cringe song reminded me of the old half time shows of the Super Bowl. I think the group they brought in back then was called "Up With People". Or the old "I''d like to teach the world to sing" Coca-cola commercials.
Yeah no, I didn't have that reaction at all. We knew that Gulool Ja Ja knew things and I trusted we were going to learn it all in time. I didn't have any problem with "we can't open it". I figured they were going to call people (I was surprised you seemed to think they weren't). Also, your frustration about the situation made you totally misread some things. Alphi and Alisae never said they were leaving to go back to Garlemald. They specifically said they were going to stay in Tural to try to learn things that could help Garlemald. Honestly, this is the reason that I firmly believe that revealing Solution Nine was a mistake. Maybe they felt they had to because of The Arcadion? And maybe they typically reveal both cities before the expansions launch? I don't know. But whatever the reason, it was a mistake. The constant "where Solution Nine!?" just made people's not caring about the rite of succession worse... And honestly, to me it's like if they revealed Amaurot before ShB launched. It just ruined people's ability to be in the moment with the MSQ. Also, opinions are what they are, but it's wild to me that you like Shaaloani so much. The music is great, but I find everything else about Shaaloani to be *godawful*. Absolutely by far the worst part of the MSQ for me, and everyone I've talked to at least felt the same. Only part of the story that I was struggling to get through
are you murrican? cuz me as european who played on NA for years and years definitely felt the cringe. but still i thought that the cringe has to be 10 000% more intense for the murricans :D in the end i embraced that cringe though and liked it. especially because it afforded me a breather from wuk. (i hate her with a passion and would rather replay 1.0 again than to put up with her for even just another minute.)
@@ALeafOnTheWind42 I dunno, for me Shaaloani was the best part of the MSQ. Travelling with Wuk made me want to quit on the game, so getting away from her unwanted presence and exploring somewhat was a godsent.
95 MSQ is literally the start of where I was actually enjoying the expansion and it took me way too long to get to it. The first half of the MSQ needs to be like, the first third or the first fourth.
To me the first half felt like the same amount of time it took me to reach the end of lv 83 in EW and the second half felt like the same amount of time I spent in the rest of Endwalker, for some reason lv 90-95 speeds really fast and then the rest of the story takes its time
I feel like with the amount of filler that is usually present in msq, it *needs* a strong general plot. People rightly point out that ShB also had a lot of filler, but it felt much better because it was compensated with anticipation of something cool.
@@Keira_Blackstonei can see how the first part of the MSQ might resonate with an Eastern or younger crowd because I too enjoyed pre-shippuden Naruto when I was 13/14/15. The first part of the MSQ feels like every Shonen anime before the timeskip and I suppose it's FINE but just not the type of story I care about anymore nor the type of main character that I enjoy following.
I'll be honest Preach. The story telling was very weird. I won't spoil beyond where you are, but personally after playing through the whole story, the entirity of 'yee-haw' land could have been cut and nothing was lost.
How in the world did we not call in everyone, everywhere to open that door. It just goes against everything established with the characters. Krile was begging for information to the City of Gold from the beginning and she's just going to walk away satisfied? She would have called up Cid with an aetheric battering ram to take that thing out. Graha? Yshtola? They opened up portals in Endwalker, and Graha called us from a different shard, but bypassing a door is too hard? We got a good zone with MagiTexas, but the whole 'gate to the gold city end of dungeon cutscenes' were incredibly sour notes.
@@DoctorPlato And the reason is really dumb because the reason is that there is no reason. Literally. They explain that the door opened back then, then *Spoilers* and that's it. They know absolutely nothing about what's on the other side of the door. They never tried to open it again, and investigating only the door told them jack all. So the whole "There's a reason, but I'll tell you later" is literally "Actually, we just don't know". Gulool Ja hints at this super important reason as to why he can't tell you and at the end it was a nothing burger.
Opening the door wasn't the bloody point of the Dawnservant trial, and as someone else already said, Gulool Ja Ja tells you that it's remained closed for a reason but for one he can't reveal now (because it's, you know, a well guarded secret). People are doing exactly what Mike said in the beginning of the video with the dungeon. They're making their own narrative and getting upset when that's not the direction it takes.
I mean the whole point of the king's trial was to succeed, and in the end, find the gateway to the city of gold...you did it. He never said you could just waltz in. It makes sense that the king would entrust the secrets to the next dawn servant only after they ascended the throne. Am I the only who felt fine with this? Like I knew we were going back there later or even at another expansion. I honestly wish they had saved it for another expansion you come back to later.
As painful as it was not to see, it does make sense. The goal for the main characters was for Wuk Lamat to become Dawnservant, not to find out what's inside. But I did find it odd how quick the WoL is to move on, though I can forgive that.
The reason the gate was sealed was more because of all the earthquakes, and they we not sure the bridge was ok and needed inspection, and so closed to the general populous.
I had the opposite experience after the ceremony. The quests in Shaloaani, with the Bangle and all, are so slow and so bad and so incredibly boring lvl-15-esque trash that it almost made me quit then and there. It takes another couple of hours until something of note finally happens. MSQ 90 - 95 is one big pile of "how dare you make us pay for this?".
There is one problem I have with Dawntrail, it's the many "Let's show the bad guys doing bad guy things in a cutscene, while the Warrior of Light and others just stand there and do nothing."-moments. It's been mildly frustrating before, but the story and characters managed to be more than good enough to make this acceptible, but not once I hit level 96 an hour ago... I was ready to take some bites out of my tabletop. "KOANA! You have a clear line of fire and you have a gun! SHOOT!!" "THEY'RE RIGHT THERE, just a couple of steps from me! LET ME AT 'EM!" But nope, we just watch as the bad guys do their bad guy thing and walk off... Good thing you have the freakin' killer of Niddhog, Hades and the Endsinger with you, only for them to just twiddle their thumbs. Speaking of which, having defeated the being that nearly wiped out all life in the universe, does take the threat out of the enemies you meet to quite some degree. How are we to feel threatened by a simple two-headed bully, or a mutated bird, when we bested beings that could alter reality to their will, millennia old dragons, gods - both fake and literal - and the amalgamation of hundreds of bird-girls, powered up by the negative emotions of untold billions upon billions of beings from wiped out species? Speaking of which, do we ever learn how Tural fared during the final days? Considering how large their landmass is, I would find it really odd, if not a single person there turned into a blasphemy. And yet there has been not a single mention of it so far.
They never mention the end of days, which I also noticed and was annoyed by. I feel the perfect way to tie it in would have been the source of the people's woes being as a result of it instead of just a big storm the blew over some days prior, but what do I know? The way Tural is presented, it definitely does seem like the end of days never happened there. Someone mentioned in another comment I saw few days ago that Mamook should have been wiped out in the end of days. With how oppressed and depressed everyone is there, the place is ripe for blasphemies to form and overrun in the end of days, and yet, there they all are as if nothing had happened.
@@Gofr5 With how aether blocks the dynamis used by the Endsinger, I can easily see how the aether-rich meteors in and around Mamook could protect the area, no matter the emotional state of the inhabitants. But that should be a very local affair. It makes no sense for the entirety of two whole continents to be unaffected by the Final Days.
I've largely been ok with the msq up to where I'm at (just about to go to Solution Nine), but there have definitely been multiple instances where I've sat there watching shit go down and just thinking "I've killed gods. I've killed worse than gods. Why am I not being allowed to actually do anything? Why is this something no one thinks my WoL can handle?"
Wuk Lamat has a point though. What can one do alone? in life in games, you are nothing alone, you've not been alone since your birth. even the WoL can't do it alone. the Duty finder is cannon now. And what of the weapons you use, the gift you've been given, you aren't Even as an omni crafter/gather, you didn't start those alone, you needed a guild, others, so I've realized, Others may sometimes be problematic, but also Others are the solution.
There's not. They bring people in and shuffle them out from time to time, but it's largely the same crew - case in point, for Endwalker Natsuko Ishikawa and Banri Oda were the Lead Story Designers. Dawntrail? Both are still listed, as Senior Story Designers, with Daichi Hiroi in the Lead Story Designer spot and Tomohiro Kawasaki and Megumi Onozuka as Main Scenario Writers. All three of them have experience on the team as Quest Writers. They've even talked about it interviews, how Ishikawa basically moved into a sort of guiding/supervisor/mentorship role on the writing team. So while it's not the exact same people writing the entire story across every expansion, it also isn't a "Here's our good writing team and here's our not so good writing team, let's have them do alternating expansions" like some of ya'll think.
I'm gald you enjoyed this part. I very much didn't. This and the next section was where the MSQ switched from mid, but enjoyable, to... annoying. Once you are sent to Shaolani, the story just hard stops, as if you needed a break from all the excitement. Like going to hang out with the loporits after Zodiark in EW, except nothing really interesting happened before, so there was no need for an intermission. I also don't particularly enjoy the Wild West zones/ares/etc. in general, so that didn't help either.
It seems strange to me that people think they're so important that they can go to a completely unknown country and feel entitled to defy the leader and ruling family at every opportunity. He tells you, "Circumstances prevent us from opening the gate." but he'll tell you about it and the story behind it after the Rite of Succession ceremony, which is literally the reason you're there for. When the Ruler says he can't open the gate at the moment, do you really think the solution is to defy him to satisfy your own desires? Similarly, in the next part, you want to interrupt a father and son even though you're told to stay out of it.
I started wondering about the First Source with the LaHee 2.0 music, and then the Trolley (May its little wheels roll on to infinity) reinforced that maybe the first merges into the source or something that completely flies in the face of Y'sh's goal of traveling between the shards.
A thing that is super common in Dawntrail and why the writing feels very amateurish or give a Sunday morning cartoon vibe is because characters act dumb for the sake of the plot. An example right here is how does no one especially Krile and Erenville question “ok wtf is the Golden City?” Ok it’s closed for reasons and even if Gulool Ja Ja tells them off, it’s frustrating to see characters behave like robots or lack agency because the plot demands it. This isn’t new to FF14 like how WOL stands there drooling multiple times through the game but I expect more from the NPCs and a game that has been going for this long. I also loved the Western zone! I feel a lot of people are extra harsh because of the blue ball Solution 9 and that the voices are not British, I found them perfectly fine with the exception of the catboy sherif. I also agree the song that plays when they get new Danwservants is kinda cringe and adds to the cartoon vibe, that and the main theme are the only OST I dislike.
He's always been open about using them, and has even spoken with Yoshi-P personally about adding them in officially - and Yoshi confirmed to him some plans to work it in, somewhere down the lone
At this point, I’m bored. Also agreed the writing here is weird af. It doesn’t make sense why we wouldn’t want to further explore the golden city right away. And everyone is talking about how we “discovered” it.. like no we didn’t we just found a gate. How is everyones curiosity satisfied by that?? I truly just find the writing here to be bad. I’d be shocked if it was the same team as endwalker / shadowbringers because it really just all feels phoned in. And it’s also really annoying me how few cutscenes are voice acted. It feels like the voice acting budget got slashed in half and a lot of times there’s cutscenes you’d expect to voice acted which aren’t. The quality of the MSQ feels like a huge downgrade.
Wild, I thought Shaaloani was the worst, most boring zone in the entire game. It was the first time I ever considered skipping cutscenes or just abandoning the story completely and I've played this game since ARR.
That's hilarious, because I loved it so much I leveled my MCH just so I could ride around the zone on the Island Sanctuary chopper in a gun-toting Native American glam.😂 I loved that zone.❤
Here it is, the story finally got interesting. Now, let's kill all the momentum by making you do a 2+ hours side quest followed by a literally copy/pasting the Trolley section from ShB, you know, the section that was soooo beloved and not at all the only part of ShB story everyone complained about. And they do this, every, single, time. Every time DT gets finally interesting, makes you actually hype, it sabotages itself by making the player do the most boring stuff imaginable for the next couples of hours, killing any and all momentum.
@@taigaaisaka6305I didn’t mind the trolley part at all in ShB. And I dont remember hearing many complaints at all. Sounds like more vocal minority crying really loud.
Yes . Have to read alot of filler writing that repeat itself , tell you two time then show character impression exactly that is boring . This story can trim down alot more and telling story in more interesting way.
Preach is now almost completely done with all of the expansion that I enjoyed. though in retrospect, I think I was giving it a huge pass because I thought the story was going somewhere.
maybe this will help ..... if you told the king charles that that rock with the metal nails in it that they use during his corination when he become king is actualy a key to another reality do you think hes going to let you use it in the middle of his corination and tell you any famaly secrets about it right away. its a royal tresure just like the gate
I'll be honest, I completely checked out of the story at this point and actually started skipping cutscenes... I could not believe we weren't all over this door, that was by far the coolest thing we'd seen up to this point and I was getting bored until we saw the cool design.
Dawntrail has been hit or miss with people. For those that couldn't enjoy it were the knit pickers. Wanting every moves in the chess was proper. But this MSQ wasn't like that. It's one of those stories that you have to take in as a whole. Yes, the whole concept of benevolent ruler wanting to solve everything with a smile is farfetched and cringe. But that is the point. After meeting the people of Golden City tells you the story of what happened to the society that were very much like them. It was a cautionary tale to what benevolent ruler obsessed with happiness could do and become.
![Today was A Bad Day: Dawntrail MSQ - Day 6 [LEVEL 96 SPOILERS]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/hno7t6TTgKw/mqdefault.jpg)
![Today was A Bad Day: Dawntrail MSQ - Day 6 [LEVEL 96 SPOILERS]](/img/tr.png)
Estinien stole the vacation i was promised. The lalafell guild will hear about this - they owe me favors.
"Dead Baby Dungeon" - new garage band name
RP venue incoming
The reason it reflects America.... is because the entire expansion/continent is based around north and south america. The first couple zones are based on Peru and neighbouring countries. While the later zones are based on the USA. It has nothing to do with the influx of players, just the location on the map.
My understanding at the time was that if there was anything to be done with the gate to the golden city, Gulool Ja Ja would have done it when he was rocking around with Galuf. Gulool Ja Ja had known about the gate for decades and even had a Sharlayan expert looking at it at some point in the past, so if he felt it could have been opened he would have done so long ago.
The key object was being kept in the palace vault. If Sareel Ja knew where it was and what it was, I don't see how Gulool Ja Ja didn't know about it himself.
It should just have been stated that it is kept safe and the Wuk Lamat will be handed over everything after the ascension. That would necessitate going back and makes this all sensible.
Well Gulool Ja Ja plainly said he'd tell Wuk Lamat everything he knows about the gate because it'll be her to decide what to do with it after. As for the key, I don't think anyone should know it was one, at most suspect it. And they said they never found how to activate it's Sareel Ja is for sure an odd one here. But the couldn't use the key either. It reacted only when Zoraal Ja took hold of it which was the missing element they could never find. As for what that element is, I guess it's a little spoilers for now so it'll have to be talked about in a future video.
Still, I don't really think we saw the last of Sareel Ja.
"I hope they don't do a cringe singalong at the end like in Stormblood."
Oh boy, I can't wait for Preach's reaction later.
I'm pretty sure you're talking about literally the same cringe song that he was talking about at that part of the video. They use it 3 times, and this was the first.
Preach just searching around for all the dead babies and smiling like a maniac when he sees all the jars.
🔵🔵 "I feel like my kids just walked in" 😂
what was that supposed to mean?
@@insertcognomenis a sex reference lol, if you are couple with kids and both try to do their thing because the kids are not there and the kids walks in, you both can’t obviously do it for the rest of the day.
He is referencing that as finding the city of gold door as that same moment (blue balls moment): “here is the door but you can’t open it and the climax for finding this door is for another day, now lets go back and talk about the door in the main city…”
I am 99% sure Alphi and Alisai never said they were going back to Garlemald? I think you just read that scene wrong Mike
He did. He also over exaggerated the similar nature of the early zones (two were, different, jungles). Sometimes he realizes he's got it wrong, sometimes he doesn't. I think that gives us the right to ruthlessly heckle the old man, but he might disagree.
They wanted to stay longer to learn more before going back to Garlemald, as they still felt they had more to get from Tural.
Honestly, the level 95 dungeon has my favorite dungeon theme or piece of music in general so far.
It's so peak
Same I reran it several times, so fun.
It's super good.
My favorite dungeon theme this expac
*places tiny soap box down*
Its Arizona/Sonoran Desert for Shaaloani. Texas is a fair guess, but with how in love I am with the adaptation of where I live, I do feel compelled to share that.
*steps down from the soap box and runs back into where the AC is*
The moment i heard the daytime of cowboy zone i was immediately in love, have it on loop when i want to chill now
Yes I love this one, I need to get it for my house
As someone who lived in Texas for over a decade, I was actually questioning if the accents were non-Americans imitating southern/western accents.
Turns out, most of the voice actors were American, but apparently from places on the east coast like Kentucky, which sort of explains why they sounded so fake to me.
kentucky is not east coast lol. But yeah, they don't have southern accents so much as generic tv american (midwestern) accents
I'm wondering what your expectations and interpretations would be, had you not been aware that Solution 9 existed.
As much as it was good hype at the time, I do think in retrospect it should not have been revealed.
We can see from Preach that the question of what it is is always in the back of his mind (and sometimes the forefront) that it can be very distracting.
I purposefully tried not to think about it much during the MSQ until after Shaaloani but it's difficult not to keep wondering where it fits in.
I do thin this is gonna be a base msq which will be loved way more by people playing later and casual players whole didn't follow the marketing.
If you didn't know about anything beyond the cinematic trailer, this whole expansion would be way more mind blowing.
Its so weird that you reach the entrance of the fabled City of Gold and hes like "You cant look right now lets head back to town" and nobody even questions why.
I'm like "what type of deranged people am I adventuring with 😭?"
True like he couldn’t tell us about it then and their or post guards since we just cleared the way to it etc…. A lot of funky things in the first half, I enjoyed the second half of MSQ way more!
well i mean, he's the leader of the country youre in. if he says wait, you gotta wait.
He do say that circumstances prevent the opening. It's not much but it's there
I had the impression that "Here's the door.. we don't know how to open it" and was more annoyed on how easy it was for Zovaal Ja to get the key and get in to apparently an incredibly guarded secret.
There are a few ghost enemies in that dungeon with multiple faces and limbs. So i'm not sure the thing worked to keep them from coming back as vengeful spirits.
I believe it meant that the spirits wouldn't escape and haunt/terrorise the village, not that spirits just wouldn't be.
Next video gonna interesting
Hell yeah, a fellow Shaaloani liker. I really appreciated the falling action that Shaaloani represents. I love a good little bait-and-switch.
I really hate how they gave away Solution 9 so intensely in Live Letters and stuff. I predicted the moment I saw that in promotional stuff that it was the Golden City they said we would be looking for, as if the devs were giggling to themselves "they don't even know they're looking right at it, we've hidden it in plain sight!" No, you haven't. All you did was ruin a reveal that would've been awesome to hit naturally in that third dungeon. The only people who will ever have that reveal naturally, presumably as the creators of it intended, are those who ignore all news of the game for months leading up to the next expansion, all social media, the Live Letters, etc., and I think that sucks badly.
They'd probably still be laughing because - spoilers - Solution 9 still isn't the Golden City.
@@Beredaman08 Posting spoilers from beyond the scope of the video's content? Really? Gulool Ja Ja confirmed that (at least from his perspective) this was indeed the Golden City. Him being a potentially unreliable narrator doesn't mean you should come in and post spoilers in response to people wanting to discuss the content covered in the video. I'm neck-and-neck with Preach here, and God forbid I express some disappointment without you coming in and going "um akshually, it's a false flag anyway." If you know so then keep it to yourself while it's still new content.
@@FishSkeleton- If people don't like spoilers they should get off the comment sections.
They can't police the entire online discourse just to preserve their experience, it's their responsibility, not ours.
@@unixtreme This series is being done in chapter-to-chapter video diary format. I wanted to take part in discussing the content of the video. I already avoid all of the discourse on Twitter and imageboards and such. It's not at all unreasonable to want to discuss the video's content and nothing beyond it.
"presumably as the creators of it intended" - You mean yoship right? The guy showing off solution 9?
In the moment I kinda took Galool Ja Ja's secrecy as a national security thing, wants to wait until Wuk is officially Dawnservant before revealing everything etc., and the sojourn with Erenville was to kill time
If that's the case it still doesn't track very well. Wuk Lamat becomes Dawn Servant before we leave. And then later we find out she's told relevant stuff without us and Krile is allowed to sit in but not us.
The MSQ blue balling us from the City of Gold for more of Wuk Lamat's shenanigans was the point where I started to wish Wuk and her crown story would go away.
I really wish I did not know about solution 9 and definitely should not have watched the launch trailer. I enjoyed the 7.0 patch overall but agree that the story could have been better structured and arranged so that things didn't feel so frustrating. All the good parts and components were there just did not fit seamlessly together. They did leave enough lose threads that I am excited to see which ones they will chose to pull on next. But more importantly, really excited for the raid content.
Dude, since we first saw the door of the crystal tower, we’ve gone to other reflections, seen time travel, actually time traveled, went to the core of the planet, been to the moon and the literal edge of existence. Been to the home of the gods, and killed them all XD
This door is like the Tuesday of doors to us at this point. LOL
Werent you saying in the Grinding Gear podcast that the WoL should not open doors since they lead to trouble LOL.
Just like every plot point before this video, Mike forgot.
@thesunthrone it must be because of his advanced old age lol. Must be tough to keep forgetting things lol
I think the break after the Golden city discovery is supposed to show that Galool Ja Ja has always known about the city and that it is locked for a reason. A reason that he will discuss to Wuk Lemat and Koana. That part definitely could have been accelerated but if it's been sealed for years there's no real reason to worry for the scions. The WOL following Erenville makes sense to me as it's a part of the world they haven't seen yet which always seems to be a driving force for the reflections of Azem. I imagine that would drive them towards the city also but they wouldn't want to step on the toes of the Tural Government.
But that was established since you meet with him the first time, feels contrived just because the plot needs to move a certain way. My biggest problem is that no one questions him beyond “is this the city of gold?”
What government lol. They got clapped 😂
Who cares if it makes sense that it's not a reason to worry, you just discovered the entrance to a mythical place, that even emet selch told you about, that they've been building up this entire expansion but we go with Erenville to go explore the lamest iteration of the wild west with the most side-quest feeling quests imaginable, with not even an explanation? Amazing, I think they took that straight out of Lord of the Rings actually
talking about reflection the skydeep cenote is basically ronka and it give you the same gear
Whoa no way really wow
Its because the giant culture is a reflection of Ronkan Culture or vice versa one could say.
But without the bunny mommies :(
"A lot of people had a problem with this - I didn't." is a sentiment I share.
I agree, I'm not one to be bothered by small things!
At no point during the MSQ did I have a problem with the storytelling. I don't understand the criticism. The change of heart in B-JJ was the most wholesome part of the MSQ
Lmao it wasn't a small thing. It was krials entire reason for coming lol
I have a lot of issues with the MSQ from writing, quest design, etc. but I don’t find it mega offensive as others or hate it. Funny enough it’s better structured than 4.0 but the execution feels worse because the writing is not strong. I just hope there’s room for discussion for improvement without going to extremes.
@@Plasmacat1 I agree, it's unproductive to just label the expansion as being bad or saying that it's worse than ARR and Stormblood! Each expansion has its pros and cons, and it's unreasonable to only talk about the bad things and ignore any of the good points!
Shaaloni is apparently very divisive, but I'm happy you enjoyed it as much as I did!
It has the most immaculate vibes as music themes for the zone, i cannot put it less than S tier just with that
From what I remember, people were annoyed by the bracelet questline that takes over the whole zone experience and he stopped just before it begins.
imo Shaaloani has S-tier vibes, F-tier MSQ
@@NekoBatyx agreed. Especially during the montage. I'm like, okay I geddit but this is a bit tone deaf ya know... impending doom and all.
@@Eisenight I wish all that effort put into fortifying that train was also put into fortifying Tuliyollal, and given Koana's technological expertise, that was what I was hoping would happen once we cut back to see a fortified Tuliyollal. But when we eventually did, nothing changed. All Koana did was sign a defense pact with Radz-at-han and called it a day. Wuk Lamat could have just as easily done that herself. Koana got shoved off so hard in the second half of the MSQ. He would have been so much more useful than Wuk Lamat to make sense out of all the technology in Solution Nine and possibly stealing those ideas for Tuliyollal.
‘ I hope Wuk Lamat finally realises that not everything can be solved with peace and happiness.’ Oh Preach, honey, god help you get through that final zone.
It's still not as bad as FF13's Ending.
But she did learn that...
In not a single moment she learned that. Last one who tried that was the Sultana. Then she got poisoned, puppeteered and lectured in economics by a semi naked Highlander. Aymeric got shanked trying to do what was right. Hien had to deal with Yotsuyu and the push back for vengeance. Garlemald had a character suicide.
It's all so jarring, this writing. I can't believe that they were the same team (not the same writers) that wrote all this before and they cooked up a carebear leader. Literally feels like it was written for 10 year olds.
Definitely agree Wuk Lamat didn't learn that lesson. The last zone and final trial shows it. Yes her resolve to do what needs to actually be done is stronger than before, but she still insists on wasting time talking to everyone because......well because she's Wuk Lamat.
He did half of the holla ballers, but where is my bro fist?
This, I feel violated
Mental Note: - Don't watch the Launch Trailer next time
why? :O
I trusted that they wouldn't show too much and it would be fine like with Endwalker but i felt like they really did show a LOT from the launch trailer.
@@StormierNik Even without the launch trailer, the character descriptions in the LiveLetter already let me predict, that Wuk and Koana will be the leaders together.. And the launch trailer: Yeah, saw that coming with the attack, the parents, that it would be another reflection. Had my guess on some time travel shenanigans, because they loved those since Alexander. Wasnt technically time travel, but a nice twist on it. Even tho we already had a similar concept in shadowbringers with the scions been in the first for 1-5 years. Speaking of shadowbringers. In general there were a lot of similarities to shadowbringer. At least I interpreted them as such: The ruler with the secret, both tika forests with ronkan ruins(or similar visual styles), trolly and train, second city which is ruled by the "cool" dudes, with the working class hanging around outside the city. Both leaders of the cities "waiting" on top of it for us. Some kind of "mindcontrol". Eulmore people were addicted to moel and the constant feeding of light/sin eater aether through it. S9 people are kinda "addicted" to happiness and there are no memories of sorrow and despair. No questions being asked what moel/regulators could do to you. The last zone. But that is just my opinion. Its feels very similar, with the difference, that shadowbringers was written A LOT better.
Thats Japanese knowhow 101. They always spoil stuff in the trailers. Its why you skip them in most japanese games or anime. IMO the worst thing they did this time was spoil Solution 9, because people just keep wondering when that is coming and dont enjoy the content they got right infront of them... because its not Solution 9.
@@Chavelo88 yea. Also why you doont watch anime openings. But i think preachs audience is not the usual japaniac kind. I stopped watching interviews and trailer besides announcment trailers of japanese media years ago xD
Yeah the "let's leave the city of gold behind" moment was what told me this wasn't, in fact, the Adventure MSQ like we were told. It's the Second Fiddle to Wuk Lamat MSQ.
The Crawlers made this zone a lot better than it is. I was so bored there, felt so empty. I'm glad the rp element brought some of the enjoyment back though.
Yah I was going to say the same. I found the whole msq here felt like a side quest and an obvious time waster before the real msq resumed
The main way I found to come to terms with the decision to leave it alone was that it was under the jurisdiction of the old boss and he said to leave. We'd get our chance when the new boss got settled and could let us do our thing. Sort of like how things were when we broke into Vrtra's treasure horde and he was like 'hey, this stuff is spoken for, alright?' and we had to just nod and move on to something else.
That's not why at all. Does he not remember when they've specifically said that they closed up North America
Because the entire dawn servant quest Was only gonna be in the south.
The meme of him being blind do unfortunately go for remembering quest text as well.
glad preach also calls it the dead baby dungeon
Like it or hate it is fine, but you cannot deny that 7.0’s story is massively divisive.
Think the wild west zone was probably the best, specially since it doesn't contain any stupid orange cats.
It's nice to see what Magnus' wife looked like. :)
That wild west zone was a total whiplash moment for me. Going into the wild wild west of Texas after all this time where we were messing with Mesoamerican cultures, primitive technologies and themes completely staggered me. I checked out from the MSQ at this point, but I'm glad the crawler's presence spiced it up for ya.
i loved it solely for the absence of the furry. it finally gave me some ME TIME over being demoted to some random retainer for some random furry
@@MrGnuhL take
@@Spiritchuckpvp Wrong. Wuk Lamat has been the biggest reason why this expansion was so poorly received by FFXIV standards.
I also found this to be a whiplash moment, but in the opposite direction. For the first half of the MSQ, I felt like I was just going through the motions and was fairly disengaged. The 95 dungeon, the events in the city, and the 4th zone and beyond was when I felt like things started to pick up, and I "checked in," so to speak.
One of the first Dungeons in ARR has human trafficing and child slaves in it. I was amazed by the storytelling they did in their dungeons. And feld exactly the same at lvl 95. Where's the demonic entities? Where is Bakool Ja Ja, being haunted by them? Would have been a stellar opportunity to show him that we're not just an empty promise. Maybe even fighting side by side out of necessity.
12:22
The zone music gives off so much Ufo:Aftershock soundtrack vibes, its uncanny.
as for english voice acting...
Apparently ARR was USA studio. Heavensward onwards was London studio and this expansion (certainly weaker on english part) is USA again.
"We found the Golden City! Welp, let's leave now, our protagonist needs to become the new ruler and all that". Honestly the biggest let-down. Like yeah we won the contest with only 1 contestant remaining, yaayyy, NOW LET ME GO TO THE SHINY GOLDEN SCI-FI PLACE! The wild west distraction didn't really make me forget about it, though it certainly had a cool zone theme.
Shaalonai is my favorite zone in this expantion, because as someone who has grown up and has been to places that look like it, it felt like they did a pretty good job representing that aspect and getting into the nitty gritty of that world (which as an American, its rare for me to feel that way because most representations of US culture is absurdly surface level and generic, but I feel like SE definitely did their homework on the general vibe of the 1800's American Boomtown). Like the msq just felt like I waltz into a spaghetti western and I got to essentually be that cowboy without a name. It was great.
Also the zone music is top notch
Tbh when i got to this point in the story and there was the cutscene where Kona thought Wuk Lamat wasn’t going to have him doing anything important i had the thought of “what if Wuk Lamat’s tenure on the throne ends up revealing something about her that wasn’t apparent before or she just ends up being a terrible ruler who is too attached to her desire to be Dawnservant to step down and we end up fighting her?”. This thought mostly came out of the feeling i get that her character’s unbelievably nice and positive attitude is a little too good to be true which often foreshadows the revelation of a serious flaw lurking beneath a carefully maintained mask.
Also when I first saw the xpac trailers that feature both the mythos surrounding the city of gold as a place of blissful paradise and Wuk Lamat saying she wanted a Tuliolal where everyone can live in happiness it made me wonder if there might be some kind of terrible power behind the city of gold and if Wuk Lamat might be tempted to use it for the benefit of her people.
I did not like that sudden turn of events at all. From finding the mysterious gate to suddenly go to the wild west. I genuinely have no interest in a wild west setting, so that whole turn of events from finally reaching the highest peak point of finding the mysterious gate to having to go through another slog of a zone together with Erenville was extremely tiring mentally. It was just one giant side quest, and it was not interesting.
Shaaloani is pretty much the best part of the story.
It's the only time you're not getting dragged around by Wuk Lamat, and you get to spend time with Estinien.
Level 95 dungeon with also what’s going on there is just so good! Very emotional
13:02 --- Thats because the first four zones are actually TWO zones...
Finally finishing Dawntrail a couple days ago and now I can safely watch other people play through
Unbiased thoughts ?
@@skdeathxlife I liked it well enough, it's got flaws in the writing, and some of the dialogue could have used another draft
12:35 - ??? Urqopacha is literally nothing like Kozama'uka or Yak T'el, and even those two have some clear differences. I honestly have no idea what you mean here.
Preach has many weird complaints, but this one definitely takes the cake. Mountains are the same as jungle because there's green grass, I guess?
Bad writing is kriel having searched most her life for answers and was just ok getting to the door and happily walking away. Soooo stupid
Na nananahh bad writing is us WoL as a character. Some options and responses we have are baadd. They make my character stupid T.T
The problem is, you went in looking for Final Fantasy but they only gave us Wuk Lamat.
Final Wuk Lamat
@@DoppelgangerTH Don't give me hope.
I love how the first time they go to North America aaaaaaaaaand........ Crime.
Remember rubber bullets. No surprise with the dungeon
I'm glad to hear you liked the western zone as well. It was feeling weird how a lot of people seemed to hate on it. Its probably my favorite zone in the game.
My groans at the MSQ increased exponentially around this time.
My groans started I first saw Wuk Lamat in 6.55
Cool.
@@omensoffatemy groans started when I first noticed how Zero just kept saying “what is this…. Friendship?” In every single scene in the 6.x patches.
@@IKIGAIofficialare the writers for the Zero patches the same as Dawntrail MSQ? I know they’re 2.
@@IKIGAIofficialThank you for saying this. I'm surprised more people haven't noticed that the cheesy writing started in the Endwalker patches, not in Dawntrail.
Locked in a vault with only dead babies/eggs to eat. They've grown a taste for humanoid flesh xD
I suppose the door has been known about for 20-odd years, so if they didn't think it was worth checking out back then, maybe there's just nothing to discover?
The wild-west was great. Appreciate that it's the first fully open zone we've gotten this expansion. Was very tired of always having half the place locked off to the MSQ. Wonderful to just mount up and ride around for a bit.
The wild West bit gave me some good ol Gunsmoke(ask your grandparents XD ) vibes. Had a lot fun there. That being said...the story feels a lil oddly paced...like we keep restarting? Idk. I'm in about the same spot and wondering when the other shoe is going to drop 💧
You forgot to include the clip of Preach saying No No no no no no no no no no no no.... etc etc.
Didn’t bother me at all but story wise we couldn’t open the door anyways.
we totally could story wise, also you can also change the story if we didnt, but at that moment we had it all
@@arkstokNo we didn’t. We didn’t know about Krile’s earring secret and we didn’t have Gulool Ja yet.
@@arkstok Spoilers but I was referring to not being able to open the gate at this point in the story. One key is in a vault, and nobody knows it's a key in the first place. And with the other key, again, no one knows it's a key until towards the end.
Of course Mike hated the puppet dungeon cuz of his doll phobia 😂
The baby jars are an homage to Jar Bairn?
I choose to believe that.
Glancing up to see Blaggart RP walk around a corner and then Chris walk by behind Preach was funny.
When the ruler of the continent says "Hey, awesome, you found the City of Gold as part of the test, now be patient and I will explain all about it after you're initiated", it is crystal-clear that:
a) It is strictly need to know basis only information;
b) It is suspected to be potential danger, but nothing imminent - so all the more reason to not approach unless you know what it's all about.
I simply cannot understand why this was such a big deal that, no, we cannot just immediately barge in and start rummaging about or take measurements, or research the tech, ESPECIALLY after we see a giant padlock put in front of it by a Sharlayan Archon. Even with the voidgate at the bottom of Alzhadaal's legacy, we first had to get express permission from Vrtra to do so, and he was not at all thrilled of us tampering with it. Hell, it was exactly BECAUSE we barged through it anyway that the entire Golbez plot kicked into high gear in the first place. Had we left it as it was, they'd remain in the Void as they were for ten thousand years.
I think that you’re right. It should be explicitly stated that’s the case though. BJJ should have come in, stepped between the party and portal and told us that now is not the time, with a warning.
@@anyroad5455 But HE DID!
Literally in the cutscene that Preach yells over! Gulool Ja Ja comes in and says that he will explain EVERYTHING he knows after the coronation. How much more explicit can it possibly be?
I'm seriously baffled, does nobody bloody pay attention to this story they're moaning about? The further these videos go, the more this just sounds like the university seminars where someone sleeps through most of one, wakes up, then tries to make up for it by saying things that already have been said and asking questions about things that had already been discussed, to the great annoyance of everyone present.
As a plot checklist? Yeah it shouldn't be a big deal. As a story? This could've been done a lot better, hence the reaction.
This felt like I have to force it make sense of it to barely make sense.
@@Eisenight What are you even talking about? Your comment makes no sense.
We were just told by the ruler of the continent that we're not going through the gate and he will explain later. The previous gate we barged through caused a disaster that nearly had the Voidsent pour into the Source. We can leave the sleeping dogs lie for a bloody moment, can't we?
How can this be "done better" when the SAME GAME plays through a similar scenario just a short while back, and people completely forget about it? This is just criticism for criticism's sake.
@@thesunthronei think its another case of what would i do as a player vs what would the characters do in this situation type of expectation. I notice thats where most of the story criticisms this expansion also come from. Im with you as Archons they would make the sound decision to wait after being told by the leader of the country since there really was no urgency yet anyway and they thought their friend Wuk Lamat’s ceremony comes first. But, nah the “player” is not invested at that point because they dont like her.
You can always count on Braggart for the memes.
That cringe song reminded me of the old half time shows of the Super Bowl. I think the group they brought in back then was called "Up With People". Or the old "I''d like to teach the world to sing" Coca-cola commercials.
It really doesn't fit the vibe at all. Immersion breaking if not cringe
I loved it and it's perfect for Wuk Lamat
Haha I think we asked for it with that 100 ff14 content creator Endwalker sing-a-long from last year 😂
I swear people cry cringe about the weirdest things.
Lmaoo I happened to travel in that group and you're so right, it's the first thing i thought it sounded like. Even I found the song hella weird in FF.
Yeah no, I didn't have that reaction at all. We knew that Gulool Ja Ja knew things and I trusted we were going to learn it all in time. I didn't have any problem with "we can't open it". I figured they were going to call people (I was surprised you seemed to think they weren't). Also, your frustration about the situation made you totally misread some things. Alphi and Alisae never said they were leaving to go back to Garlemald. They specifically said they were going to stay in Tural to try to learn things that could help Garlemald.
Honestly, this is the reason that I firmly believe that revealing Solution Nine was a mistake. Maybe they felt they had to because of The Arcadion? And maybe they typically reveal both cities before the expansions launch? I don't know. But whatever the reason, it was a mistake. The constant "where Solution Nine!?" just made people's not caring about the rite of succession worse... And honestly, to me it's like if they revealed Amaurot before ShB launched. It just ruined people's ability to be in the moment with the MSQ.
Also, opinions are what they are, but it's wild to me that you like Shaaloani so much. The music is great, but I find everything else about Shaaloani to be *godawful*. Absolutely by far the worst part of the MSQ for me, and everyone I've talked to at least felt the same. Only part of the story that I was struggling to get through
are you murrican? cuz me as european who played on NA for years and years definitely felt the cringe. but still i thought that the cringe has to be 10 000% more intense for the murricans :D in the end i embraced that cringe though and liked it. especially because it afforded me a breather from wuk. (i hate her with a passion and would rather replay 1.0 again than to put up with her for even just another minute.)
@@MrGnuh I didn't cringe. I was just bored out of my mind.
And to each their own. I love Wuk Lamat
@@ALeafOnTheWind42 I dunno, for me Shaaloani was the best part of the MSQ. Travelling with Wuk made me want to quit on the game, so getting away from her unwanted presence and exploring somewhat was a godsent.
I'm beginning to see a correlation between people liking Shaaloani and not liking Wuk Lamat. I wonder why 🤔😆
Glad you liked the Wild West theme - I found it ridiculously boring *especially* since we didn't get to go through that portal.
I found it rather tedious there, i caught myself thinking about skipping cutscenes several times.
I was totally vibing the moment i heard the day theme,
Really enjoyed the zone and i know many others have too
95 MSQ is literally the start of where I was actually enjoying the expansion and it took me way too long to get to it. The first half of the MSQ needs to be like, the first third or the first fourth.
To me the first half felt like the same amount of time it took me to reach the end of lv 83 in EW and the second half felt like the same amount of time I spent in the rest of Endwalker, for some reason lv 90-95 speeds really fast and then the rest of the story takes its time
I feel like with the amount of filler that is usually present in msq, it *needs* a strong general plot. People rightly point out that ShB also had a lot of filler, but it felt much better because it was compensated with anticipation of something cool.
I am of the exact opposite opinion. this point is essentially the end of me enjoying the MSQ.
@@Keira_Blackstonei can see how the first part of the MSQ might resonate with an Eastern or younger crowd because I too enjoyed pre-shippuden Naruto when I was 13/14/15. The first part of the MSQ feels like every Shonen anime before the timeskip and I suppose it's FINE but just not the type of story I care about anymore nor the type of main character that I enjoy following.
why is solution 9 such a focus? i knew that some sort of future zone existed, but i was not looking for it behind every cornor
I'll be honest Preach. The story telling was very weird. I won't spoil beyond where you are, but personally after playing through the whole story, the entirity of 'yee-haw' land could have been cut and nothing was lost.
Hell ya, he's about to catch a train! :3
How in the world did we not call in everyone, everywhere to open that door. It just goes against everything established with the characters. Krile was begging for information to the City of Gold from the beginning and she's just going to walk away satisfied? She would have called up Cid with an aetheric battering ram to take that thing out. Graha? Yshtola? They opened up portals in Endwalker, and Graha called us from a different shard, but bypassing a door is too hard?
We got a good zone with MagiTexas, but the whole 'gate to the gold city end of dungeon cutscenes' were incredibly sour notes.
Why would they break in? It's not stuck shut, it's locked for a reason. They literally have the key in the vault and it's left closed for a reason...
You're in a foreign country and the Leader told you that there are reasons for the gate to remain closed for the time being.
@@DoctorPlato And the reason is really dumb because the reason is that there is no reason. Literally. They explain that the door opened back then, then *Spoilers* and that's it. They know absolutely nothing about what's on the other side of the door. They never tried to open it again, and investigating only the door told them jack all. So the whole "There's a reason, but I'll tell you later" is literally "Actually, we just don't know". Gulool Ja hints at this super important reason as to why he can't tell you and at the end it was a nothing burger.
Opening the door wasn't the bloody point of the Dawnservant trial, and as someone else already said, Gulool Ja Ja tells you that it's remained closed for a reason but for one he can't reveal now (because it's, you know, a well guarded secret).
People are doing exactly what Mike said in the beginning of the video with the dungeon. They're making their own narrative and getting upset when that's not the direction it takes.
Random thought, I think your femroe looks amazing with the graphic update. Also, I loved Shaaloni (everyone in my FC just calls it Texas.)
I mean the whole point of the king's trial was to succeed, and in the end, find the gateway to the city of gold...you did it. He never said you could just waltz in. It makes sense that the king would entrust the secrets to the next dawn servant only after they ascended the throne. Am I the only who felt fine with this? Like I knew we were going back there later or even at another expansion. I honestly wish they had saved it for another expansion you come back to later.
As painful as it was not to see, it does make sense. The goal for the main characters was for Wuk Lamat to become Dawnservant, not to find out what's inside. But I did find it odd how quick the WoL is to move on, though I can forgive that.
Yeah I felt the same. At that point we’re only level 95 so I’m like yeah there’s a whole lot of story to go lol. I don’t get the complaints.
The reason the gate was sealed was more because of all the earthquakes, and they we not sure the bridge was ok and needed inspection, and so closed to the general populous.
I had the opposite experience after the ceremony. The quests in Shaloaani, with the Bangle and all, are so slow and so bad and so incredibly boring lvl-15-esque trash that it almost made me quit then and there. It takes another couple of hours until something of note finally happens.
MSQ 90 - 95 is one big pile of "how dare you make us pay for this?".
fuck that puppet dungeon
Looking forward to day 6!
There is one problem I have with Dawntrail, it's the many "Let's show the bad guys doing bad guy things in a cutscene, while the Warrior of Light and others just stand there and do nothing."-moments. It's been mildly frustrating before, but the story and characters managed to be more than good enough to make this acceptible, but not once I hit level 96 an hour ago... I was ready to take some bites out of my tabletop.
"KOANA! You have a clear line of fire and you have a gun! SHOOT!!"
"THEY'RE RIGHT THERE, just a couple of steps from me! LET ME AT 'EM!"
But nope, we just watch as the bad guys do their bad guy thing and walk off... Good thing you have the freakin' killer of Niddhog, Hades and the Endsinger with you, only for them to just twiddle their thumbs.
Speaking of which, having defeated the being that nearly wiped out all life in the universe, does take the threat out of the enemies you meet to quite some degree. How are we to feel threatened by a simple two-headed bully, or a mutated bird, when we bested beings that could alter reality to their will, millennia old dragons, gods - both fake and literal - and the amalgamation of hundreds of bird-girls, powered up by the negative emotions of untold billions upon billions of beings from wiped out species?
Speaking of which, do we ever learn how Tural fared during the final days? Considering how large their landmass is, I would find it really odd, if not a single person there turned into a blasphemy. And yet there has been not a single mention of it so far.
They never mention the end of days, which I also noticed and was annoyed by. I feel the perfect way to tie it in would have been the source of the people's woes being as a result of it instead of just a big storm the blew over some days prior, but what do I know? The way Tural is presented, it definitely does seem like the end of days never happened there.
Someone mentioned in another comment I saw few days ago that Mamook should have been wiped out in the end of days. With how oppressed and depressed everyone is there, the place is ripe for blasphemies to form and overrun in the end of days, and yet, there they all are as if nothing had happened.
@@Gofr5 With how aether blocks the dynamis used by the Endsinger, I can easily see how the aether-rich meteors in and around Mamook could protect the area, no matter the emotional state of the inhabitants. But that should be a very local affair.
It makes no sense for the entirety of two whole continents to be unaffected by the Final Days.
I've largely been ok with the msq up to where I'm at (just about to go to Solution Nine), but there have definitely been multiple instances where I've sat there watching shit go down and just thinking "I've killed gods. I've killed worse than gods. Why am I not being allowed to actually do anything? Why is this something no one thinks my WoL can handle?"
Wuk Lamat has a point though. What can one do alone? in life in games, you are nothing alone, you've not been alone since your birth. even the WoL can't do it alone. the Duty finder is cannon now. And what of the weapons you use, the gift you've been given, you aren't Even as an omni crafter/gather, you didn't start those alone, you needed a guild, others, so I've realized, Others may sometimes be problematic, but also Others are the solution.
I have a feeling the writers let their 10 year old kid write this expansion
At this point in time where you are on stream now, do you think there are 2 wrintig teams on the .0 expansion?
There's not. They bring people in and shuffle them out from time to time, but it's largely the same crew - case in point, for Endwalker Natsuko Ishikawa and Banri Oda were the Lead Story Designers. Dawntrail? Both are still listed, as Senior Story Designers, with Daichi Hiroi in the Lead Story Designer spot and Tomohiro Kawasaki and Megumi Onozuka as Main Scenario Writers. All three of them have experience on the team as Quest Writers.
They've even talked about it interviews, how Ishikawa basically moved into a sort of guiding/supervisor/mentorship role on the writing team.
So while it's not the exact same people writing the entire story across every expansion, it also isn't a "Here's our good writing team and here's our not so good writing team, let's have them do alternating expansions" like some of ya'll think.
I'm gald you enjoyed this part. I very much didn't. This and the next section was where the MSQ switched from mid, but enjoyable, to... annoying. Once you are sent to Shaolani, the story just hard stops, as if you needed a break from all the excitement. Like going to hang out with the loporits after Zodiark in EW, except nothing really interesting happened before, so there was no need for an intermission.
I also don't particularly enjoy the Wild West zones/ares/etc. in general, so that didn't help either.
It seems strange to me that people think they're so important that they can go to a completely unknown country and feel entitled to defy the leader and ruling family at every opportunity.
He tells you, "Circumstances prevent us from opening the gate." but he'll tell you about it and the story behind it after the Rite of Succession ceremony, which is literally the reason you're there for. When the Ruler says he can't open the gate at the moment, do you really think the solution is to defy him to satisfy your own desires?
Similarly, in the next part, you want to interrupt a father and son even though you're told to stay out of it.
Main character syndrome.
Why does koana have such a low res pixelated outfit? I thought the graphic update was for all of 7.0?
I started wondering about the First Source with the LaHee 2.0 music, and then the Trolley (May its little wheels roll on to infinity) reinforced that maybe the first merges into the source or something that completely flies in the face of Y'sh's goal of traveling between the shards.
well i mean, they are "reflections" for a reason. thats the whole reason ardbert looks like meteor, he is the WoL's reflection on the first.
A thing that is super common in Dawntrail and why the writing feels very amateurish or give a Sunday morning cartoon vibe is because characters act dumb for the sake of the plot. An example right here is how does no one especially Krile and Erenville question “ok wtf is the Golden City?” Ok it’s closed for reasons and even if Gulool Ja Ja tells them off, it’s frustrating to see characters behave like robots or lack agency because the plot demands it. This isn’t new to FF14 like how WOL stands there drooling multiple times through the game but I expect more from the NPCs and a game that has been going for this long.
I also loved the Western zone! I feel a lot of people are extra harsh because of the blue ball Solution 9 and that the voices are not British, I found them perfectly fine with the exception of the catboy sherif. I also agree the song that plays when they get new Danwservants is kinda cringe and adds to the cartoon vibe, that and the main theme are the only OST I dislike.
wait...speech bubbles...can he get banned for streaming with mods or did they actually add speech bubbles??? honestly because i want
They said speech bubbles are in the works officially
But the one he's using atm is a plugin
He's always been open about using them, and has even spoken with Yoshi-P personally about adding them in officially - and Yoshi confirmed to him some plans to work it in, somewhere down the lone
At this point, I’m bored. Also agreed the writing here is weird af. It doesn’t make sense why we wouldn’t want to further explore the golden city right away. And everyone is talking about how we “discovered” it.. like no we didn’t we just found a gate. How is everyones curiosity satisfied by that?? I truly just find the writing here to be bad. I’d be shocked if it was the same team as endwalker / shadowbringers because it really just all feels phoned in. And it’s also really annoying me how few cutscenes are voice acted. It feels like the voice acting budget got slashed in half and a lot of times there’s cutscenes you’d expect to voice acted which aren’t. The quality of the MSQ feels like a huge downgrade.
hello folks
The American VA work was horrific
I love the English dub!
As an American Texan it was horrific in a good way. It was the most stereotypical thing ever and I loved it. It was cheesy in a good way.
It was over-the-top cowboy which was definitely 100% intentional.
My only critique of it was nobody said “it’s high noon, partner, and I’m calling you out.”
As an non-native english speaking European, it sounded like english
No bro fist?.....bruh
Wild, I thought Shaaloani was the worst, most boring zone in the entire game. It was the first time I ever considered skipping cutscenes or just abandoning the story completely and I've played this game since ARR.
That's hilarious, because I loved it so much I leveled my MCH just so I could ride around the zone on the Island Sanctuary chopper in a gun-toting Native American glam.😂 I loved that zone.❤
The moment i heard the day theme, i slipped into the vibe and was just chilling, idk about you
Here it is, the story finally got interesting. Now, let's kill all the momentum by making you do a 2+ hours side quest followed by a literally copy/pasting the Trolley section from ShB, you know, the section that was soooo beloved and not at all the only part of ShB story everyone complained about. And they do this, every, single, time. Every time DT gets finally interesting, makes you actually hype, it sabotages itself by making the player do the most boring stuff imaginable for the next couples of hours, killing any and all momentum.
@@taigaaisaka6305I didn’t mind the trolley part at all in ShB. And I dont remember hearing many complaints at all. Sounds like more vocal minority crying really loud.
Yes . Have to read alot of filler writing that repeat itself , tell you two time then show character impression exactly that is boring . This story can trim down alot more and telling story in more interesting way.
Preach is now almost completely done with all of the expansion that I enjoyed. though in retrospect, I think I was giving it a huge pass because I thought the story was going somewhere.
🙂
This is the most unhinged preach video yet
⚫⚫🔵⚫⚫
maybe this will help ..... if you told the king charles that that rock with the metal nails in it that they use during his corination when he become king is actualy a key to another reality do you think hes going to let you use it in the middle of his corination and tell you any famaly secrets about it right away. its a royal tresure just like the gate
I'll be honest, I completely checked out of the story at this point and actually started skipping cutscenes... I could not believe we weren't all over this door, that was by far the coolest thing we'd seen up to this point and I was getting bored until we saw the cool design.
Dawntrail has been hit or miss with people. For those that couldn't enjoy it were the knit pickers. Wanting every moves in the chess was proper. But this MSQ wasn't like that. It's one of those stories that you have to take in as a whole. Yes, the whole concept of benevolent ruler wanting to solve everything with a smile is farfetched and cringe. But that is the point. After meeting the people of Golden City tells you the story of what happened to the society that were very much like them. It was a cautionary tale to what benevolent ruler obsessed with happiness could do and become.