A Realm Reborn (Base Game) Release on PS3, PS4 and PC: August 27, 2013

Heavensward (First Expansion) Release on PS4 and PC: June 23, 2015

Stormblood (Second Expansion) Release on PS4 and PC: June 20, 2017

Shadowbringers (Third Expansion) Release for PC and PS4: July 2, 2019

Developer and Publisher: Square Enix

Genre: MMO JRPG,

~possible spoilers in this section~

Square Enix as a company has always excelled at narrative storytelling. This is especially evident in the Final Fantasy franchise. Its fourteenth installment has quickly become one of the top massively multiplayer online games on the market, and this is largely due to the fact that it boasts a thoroughly engaging narrative and succeeds at making the players both care about the world and feel important within it. 

In past expansions, the story seemed to shift away from the player character and focus more on regional leaders such as Lyse and Hien. In this expansion the player character becomes (arguably) the most important person in the game. As the “Warrior of Darkness” only we can save the First, a world that is not our own. We were summoned by one of the expansion’s new regional leaders, the Crystal Exarch. Throughout the story, he becomes one of the most interesting characters in the game, but at no point does he take the spotlight away from the Warrior of Darkness.

Our new moniker comes with the change in setting. The original game and all the previous expansions occurred in a place  known as “the Source”. In Shadowbringers, we travel to one of its shards, “the First” shard to be exact. Many players were hesitant to be excited for an expansion taking place in an alternate reality. We remember all too well the poor execution of World of Warcraft’s Warlords of Draenor expansion. However, Square Enix seems to have done the impossible, because this alternate reality expansion was, hands down, the best expansion to date. We were even given “meanwhile in the Source” cutscenes every now and then that were filtered though fan favorite character, Estinien. Though, the change I was most relieved by was shift in focus away from Alphinaud and Alise. There  were whole sections of the game where they were sent off to do something on their own. In my opinion, these two characters are some of the most annoying in the game, and I was glad for their absence. They were heavily focused on in previous expansions, but not enough was revealed about their background and travel to Eorzea to continue making them interesting. Not only are they twins, but their personalities are so similar they might as well be the same person. Its seem Square Enix has tried to differentiate between by having them approach problems in their own specific ways, but that’s not enough.

While for the most part the story was utter perfection, there were some nit picky things that stood out. The biggest issue was the fact that every zone had the same basic storyline: seek and destroy the Lightwarden. Granted, every zone was different, but the themes were much the same not only in this regard but also in its reliance on Talos. These large golem-like magical machines were the backbone of the player’s success in two different zones, and in both it was a matter of how to get them operational. Lastly a small issue that bugged me was the fact that the player had to take an elevator to Top Rung, one of the areas in Kholusia. It was easily big enough to hold at least fifty people. Why then, did only Alphinaud, Alise, and the Player take the first trip to the top? And why did it take a large chunk of quests for everyone else to finally make their way up? Don’t get me wrong though, the fact that these are the biggest story complaints I could make means that the story as a whole was one of the best I’ve ever seen in an MMO. 

The other area in which Square Enix excels is its aesthetic. This expansion has some of the most beautiful zones in the game thus far. Il Mheg and Lakeland boasted pastel palettes filled with bright pinks and purples, while the Tempest featured giant bioluminescent plant life that served as precarious walkways. However, not all the new zones were perfect. It became evident quickly that this new world was supposed to reflect the source, with most zones having an equivalent. Il Mheg harkened to Coerthas, the Rak’tika Greatwood to the Black Shroud, Kholusia to La Noscea, and Amh Araeng to Thanalan. While Il Mheg and Rak’Tika were unique masterpieces, Amh Araeng and Kholusia felt more like a copy and paste. In a Realm Reborn we became intimately familiar with the desert zone of Thanalan. In Stormblood we helped liberate the desert zone of Gyr Abania. So why, Square Enix, did it seem like a good idea to put another desert zone in the game? Coerthas is a snow-covered hellscape, but Il Mheg was a beautiful flower covered pixieland. Amh Araeng didn’t need to be a literal mirror of Thanalan. It could have been a subterranean underdark-inspired zone, or a volcanic wasteland. I can only say that I sincerely hope we don’t have to step foot in another desert for the next three expansion. 

The other feature that helped set the tone in each zone was the ambient music. No matter where you went, it was beautiful and relaxing, except Northern Kholusia. The music for that area was so intense it sounded like you were eternally in combat. Though the combat music wasn’t much better. Similar to the title screen, the combat music was some kind of rock/metal hybrid, but not in a good way. It was jarring and loud and filled me with way more anxiety than it should have. Calm down Square Enix. Maybe give each zone its own combat music so that it fits into the setting better, or just keep using that one from A Realm Reborn. Every expansion doesn’t need new combat music. 

The thing every expansion actually needs, is new cosmetic options for the player character, but Shadownbringers failed to deliver. Final Fantasy XIV has always had a player base that cares about their appearance, and most of the time, Square Enix caters to this. We have gotten new class armors, new primal themed weapons, new primal mount drops, new hairstyles, new classes, and new races every expansion. This time around, however, most of these things were huge disappointments, the biggest being the new race options. Long before the expansion release, developers announced the new race of bunny-humanoids known as the Viera. Audiences were shown a video of exclusively female Viera prancing around on what appeared to be the beastial rabbit feet players would expect, as that is a familiar trait from previous iterations of the Viera. This turned out to be a cleverly disguised lie. Instead of having the extremely arched rabbit feet that require them to wear stilettos, the Viera have normal human feet. The racial armor they were shown in just so happened to feature stiletto heels. It appears the race’s physical differences from other races have been reduced to a simple fashion choice.   

This wasn’t the only upset regarding the Viera. It is a well known fact that male Viera do exist in Final Fantasy lore. They are simply a very reclusive pocket of the Viera population that live separately from the females. For this reason, and a statement about the cost and commitment of developing new races, developers decided not to include male Viera as a playable race. They opted instead to add the beastly Hrothgar as a the male exclusive equivalent. This obviously upset a lot of fans, as it was an unexpected and, in many cases, unwelcome addition. It meant no male Viera in the foreseeable future, or ever.  They claim they added the Hrothgar because the Lupin race from Stormblood received a warm reception, and they felt the player base needed a wider variety of racial options. Thus, instead of making male and female Viera, or male and female Hrothgar, they split them into two gender locked races. 

There are arguments for both, and while I am personally biased, because I was very much looking forward to the male Viera, I can see the opposing argument’s points. However, that isn’t going to stop me from presenting the other side of the facts. Final Fantasy XI was learning experience for Square Enix, and fans alike. In many ways Final Fantasy XIV was a re-do for the company, and a chance to redeem themselves in the eyes of the players. Its early success led it to quickly become one of World of Warcraft’s top competitors. One of the things fans begged the developers for in XI was a male Miqo’te (known as Mithra in FFXI), so one of the first things XIV addressed was adding them, as well as the female Roegadyn (then known as Galka), into the game. Now, faced with the exact same decision, the developers chose to repeat the mistakes of the past. There is a reason the Miqo’te make up the majority of active players in the game, and the Roegadyn are the least played  according to the FFXIV census. The players don’t want super masculinized beast races, they want hot animal people with six packs and ears. Lets not forget that this is a Japanese RPG. Why give the players something they didn’t ask for and in so doing deprive them of what they were literally begging for. It would have taken the exact same amount of time, money, and effort to make the male Viera instead of the Hrothgar. Perhaps later on down the line, coming out with the male and female Hrothgar as the final playable race. Lets not forget that the number one MMO on the market, World of Warcraft, has thirteen playable races to FFXIV’s  eight, and that isn’t even including WoW’s eight “allied races” with more on the way. Maybe they can make a trade of information and Blizzard can teach Square Enix how to pump out the races in exchange for help with writing an actual storyline. 

Now that that is out of the way, we can talk about the other ways Square Enix dropped the ball on customization. For one thing, there is no Aesthetician in the Crystarium, the expansion’s new main city. Why? I know there is the whole alternate reality thing, but surely people get haircuts in the First. It should have been handled similarly to how the retainers were. They are replaced by a pixie, and the aesthetician could have been replaced by someone from the First. 

The developers also chose not to give the two new classes, Dancer and Gunbreaker, primal weapons from previous expansions. Since the first expansion we have gotten five new classes, and all have access to weapons from all the previous primals. For example, the Red Mage released with the Stormblood expansion, but there are Ifrit, Garuda, and Titan rapiers even though those primals are from A Realm Reborn. This time around, the new classes only have access to weapons from current content. While this may seem trivial, it was something the players were expecting, as it had been done for every other class. If it was going to be done away with, it should have been replaced by something. As it stands, the only weapons the Dancer and Gunbreaker have access to are the ones received while questing, and the underwhelming class set weapons.

Speaking of the class sets, they were not an improvement on their Heavensward or Stormblood counterparts. While all the classes received new outfits, they were just slightly altered copies of previous outfits. The Dancer outfit was new, but it was gender specific which is unusual for FFXIV’s normal androgynous approach to outfits. The female version is red, while the male version is black. As a male Miqo’te player, I would much rather wear the red version. 

The story of any FFXIV expansion makes the leveling process quite enjoyable. There are also a plethora of ways to get to max level. Other than the main scenario quests, you can do side quests, FATEs, or Dungeons. With the new Trust system, you can even do dungeons solo. Which has its pros and cons. For me, I liked the new system because, as a DPS, it allowed for instant cues, and as an inexperienced healer and tank, I can learn the fights without holding up other players. The only concern this presents is a watering down of the MMO experience which centers around playing with other players, but it is ultimately up to each individual to decide. The Trust system itself worked surprisingly well. The NPC tanks and healers do their part and they all follow the mechanics to the letter. 

Another feature that made leveling easier was the fact that aether currents were not gated behind story content like they were in Stormblood. You could access all the attuneable currents the moment you set foot in the zone, other than the ones that were quest rewards. This allowed players to fly quite early on. The downside to this was that the currents weren’t placed in very “fun” spots. In Stormblood there were at the top of tall towers that player had to hop from ledge to ledge to get too, or across a narrow beam. At the very least they were very high up. In Shadowbringers, they were generally just thrown in random places and were not hard to get to or a challenge in any way. 

The worst parts of the leveling process, however, were the side quests. If you are a player like me and you do the side quests to level because that makes the most sense from a role playing standpoint, you might have run into similar problems. Firstly, there were way too many quests in some places. You would turn in one main story quests and suddenly there are fifteen side quests to pick up. Only about six can be tracked at once, so you end up doing a few, turning them in, and then going back out to the same places to do other quests. This becomes pretty monotonous after a while. Not to mention the fact that most of the quests send you back and forth all over the map, and this is all before you can fly. One quest in particular, “And Then There Were None”, in Il Mheg had me go back and forth between the pixies and a beaver family no less than five times. And many of the other quests required me to type specific phrases into the chat. As a PC player, this wasn’t a huge deal, but my partner plays on the PS4 without a keyboard and those quests were painstaking to complete.

Technical difficulties are to be expected with the launch of any MMO content, especially with the rush of players trying to play it. As a whole, Shadowbringers did an excellent job managing this influx. After sitting through the Warlords of Draenor launch disaster, it takes a lot to upset me. The only thing that frustrated me was frequently being disconnected (through no fault of my internet) and then being told my “Character is logged in on another instance.” This was especially frustrating when I was in a dungeon because I would come back to find myself kicked from the group, or if I was in a Trust I would have to start all over. 

Most of the technical issues seemed to stem from a lack of forethought on the developers part and had nothing to do with the launch. For example, if you die in a Trust dungeon, your entire party dies, even if you were not the healer. For some reason, the NPC healers are incapable of resurrecting you. The new classes also have far too many abilities. As a Dancer, I don’t need six AOEs, two of which are basically the exact same thing. It seems all the classes received additional AOEs. At this point, we should be simplifying rotations, not making them more clunky. 

Lastly, while the new Primal fights were spectacular, there are a few issues that need to be addressed. Firstly, the DPS check in Titania is almost impossible to accomplish without a melee DPS limit break. When I completed it, we had only caster DPS plus myself as a Dancer. This meant that all of us had AOE limit breaks, not single target. We wiped four times before completing the fight. There need to be safeguards in the que to ensure there is at least one melee DPS in that fight. Second, in the final Hades fight, his wings cover most of the battlefield. They hug so tight it became very difficult to see what was happening at times, thus making an already difficult fight needlessly harder and no longer fun to play.

Overall this expansion was the best one yet. It had an amazing story and beautiful new zones, as well as the new classes, which were brilliantly executed. So much so that I might switch my main class to a Dancer. I think the best thing Square Enix can do is listen to its existing player base and give them what they ask for, not appeal to an audience they haven’t yet captured with races like the Hrothgar. Despite these missteps, this truly was a masterfully executed expansion and I grant it the rank of: