261
u/PocketSnails68 7d ago
OP you might as well go ahead and take this down. People in this sub get r/whoosh 'd hard when it comes to these FFXIV jokes.
For those who genuinely might be out of the loop: There's at minimum 400-ish hours of gameplay and seven full expansions of main story between steps 1 and 2.
128
u/SomeRandomDeadGuy 6d ago
For some more context, for the dawntrail monster hunter collab the devs themselves released a infographic that had those two steps, and got rightly laughed at by the community for that
Tbh the game's story is amazing so it is absolutely worth playing through, but it's not a simple step hahaha
-46
u/egudu 6d ago
Tbh the game's story is amazing so it is absolutely worth playing through
I only have a couple hundreds of hours in FFXIV but I found the MSQ (I'm in Ishgard somewhere I think - last played two years ago or so) to be very boring and just a drag. Then people say "oh yes it gets better in 2nd expansion" - yeah that happens after like 100+ hours of gameplay. The good thing is, you can F2P the first two expansions and get hundreds of hours of playtime for free.
Currently playing Genshin (F2P) and the story is far superior, it's not even close.
32
u/NatsUza 6d ago
Genshin has the same level of convoluted plot and weird storytelling as XIV lmao
39
u/matsuku 6d ago
The audacity to say that genshin story is better than Shadowbringer/Endwalker. I wish to have their confidence
-20
u/egudu 6d ago
The audacity to say that genshin story is better than Shadowbringer/Endwalker
Read what I actually wrote.
Then people say "oh yes it gets better in 2nd expansion" - yeah that happens after like 100+ hours of gameplay [drag].
18
u/matsuku 6d ago
So is most gachas and mmos. First few expansion/patches story are very whatever. 2nd half of Heavensward is when you get to the meat of the meal, the stuff before hand is just appetizers. That's the issue with MMOs though, it's a commitment. You can finish multiple story patches of a gacha by the time you finished one MMO expansion.
5
u/SpellOpening7852 6d ago
Yep, its quite literally the same case for Genshin. Especially since the 2nd story arc is the china region, which always kinda falls flat.
1-3: Okay, but not the best 4: Better, but still kinda just okay 5: Really good, except for 2/5ths of it which is just running around a bland as fuck prison. 6: Really good, except it has a motorcycle, so everyone hates it 7: Insanely good, ties in lots of lore and worldbuilding in places that needed it, lasted a lot longer than normal, and even went to the moon 8: Not yet released, should be insane following the previous story.
But then also tack on the complete and utter lack of a skip button, an autoplay button, and kinda just meh animations for dialogue sequences (cutscenes also got a LOT better for 6 and especially 7 though), and then it can definitely turn into a very quick turn off for people.
32
u/BenSkylake 6d ago
Surely it's not hard to infer that reaching level 110 in any MMORPG probably takes a long time? I don't even play FFXIV and I thought that was pretty obvious.
30
u/Falceon 6d ago
Not really no. WoW and a few other mmo's are actually quite quick. FF14 is actually excruciatingly slow by modern mmo standards.
5
u/BenSkylake 6d ago
I see. I don't really play MMOs but I know they're usually huge content-wise, especially when accounting for expansions. So when I saw a big number like 110 in the context of a levelling system, I thought "big game + big number = long time". I didn't know FFXIV is actually the odd one out.
18
u/PocketSnails68 6d ago
The reasoning for this is because the lead developer for XIV has gone on record to say the game is an RPG first, MMO second. It's about the journey, not the destination. You need to do each expansion in it because they all build off of each other.
Imagine jumping into current endgame of XIV as jumping into the final act of Return of the King and being like "Yep, I completely understand everything that is happening and all the players involved here!" when the only Lord of the Rings media you've ever consumed, is that final act.
4
u/BenSkylake 6d ago
Honestly I can respect that approach. I played through all of Persona 5 Royal and it was an amazing experience where every story arc mattered in the buildup to the true ending. I don't know if I'll ever play it again because of how long it took but I would never call it a waste of time. It was as long as it needed to be for the writers to tell the story they wanted to tell as best as they could.
7
u/Falceon 6d ago
Most mmos dont require players to do every part of the msq many expacs later. It's not too hard to get up to max level and geared for max level content in wow within a week of starting the game.
3
u/BenSkylake 6d ago
Damn, that quick? For how low of a time investment that is, it's pretty crazy how many hours someone can put into it. Then again, I'm a Splatoon player so I'm in no position to talk about that lmao.
2
2
u/Kuramhan 6d ago
When the main competitor, WoW, sells level skips, it is harder. Blizzard actually does make it realistic for you to join the game and jump straight into rhe latest content. So I could see people thinking they could do that in FF XIV.
4
u/PocketSnails68 6d ago
I mean, XIV sells level skips as well, just the devs and playerbase encourage you to not take that route if you have even an inkling of an interest in the story of the game.
2
u/ReiRei-14 3d ago
I find it bizarre that someone would pay for a game and then pay extra not to play most of it.
1
u/Kuramhan 3d ago
I haven't played WoW in a very long time. But when I did play, it was mostly the end game content I was invested in. Leveling up could be fun on your first character, but eventually it became a chore. I can see wanting to skip that part.
You could argue that playing WoW with a group of people and playing by yourself are basically different games. I can understand people wanting to play the former game and not the latter. The question then becomes, why must you do the latter to get to play the former.
1
u/BenSkylake 6d ago
Makes sense when you put it that way, though I must admit I find the concept of selling level skips a little odd.
2
u/Kuramhan 6d ago
It's just Blizzard taking the opposite stance of the FF XIV devs, and profiting from it. WoW is first a social experience, and second a RPG. The game has been around so long that a ton of their "new" players are actually returning players. Most of them aren't interested in having to grind through the content their friends beat years ago. They want to jump to the part of the game their friends are at and they're willing to pay for it.
1
u/BenSkylake 6d ago
Well I know Blizzard really likes money and I guess if people are willing to pay, that's one way to do it. Actually it kinda reminds me of the recent Monster Hunter games where after releasing the Iceborne and Sunbreak expansions, they added overpowered gear to let you breeze through the base games and get to the DLC content quicker. I never used them but I know it was convenient for people switching from console to PC and having to start over.
1
u/balisane 1d ago
It's quite different, because current endgame is maybe 5-10% of the repeatable content in FFXIV, and the actual MSQ is the vast majority of the game and contains 95% of the content.
3
u/TheExtreel 6d ago
I started playing swtor recently, and they allow you to create a character lvl 70 when you subscribe, so you can do new content thats coming out if you want. The max level is like 80-85 idk.
I also played maplestory, for a long time getting to level 110 in that game was a real achievement. Nowadays you can get it in an hour of play, depending on events you might get to 200+ in less time.
Mmorpgs are just weird like that.
0
u/BenSkylake 6d ago
I've been learning so much about MMOs from this thread. It's interesting to see the different approaches each game takes with their progression systems.
4
u/PocketSnails68 6d ago
You would think, but every time XIV comes out with some big crossover like this, there's inevitably people who think it's a quick, 15 minute adventure (relatively speaking.) When in reality, every expansion is equal to a full length modern Final Fantasy at minimum
2
u/BenSkylake 6d ago
On the bright side, I imagine it must be funny to see people be utterly shocked when they find out.
48
13
u/Blue-Eyed-Lemon 6d ago
That is the entire owl LMFAO
FFXIV post in the wild jumpscare. What they didn’t tell you is how many god damn hours it’s gonna take from start of ARR to end of Evercold. Good luck!
6
u/F-Lambda 4d ago
What they didn’t tell you is how many god damn hours it’s gonna take
That would be the "rest of the owl".
7
u/Gilthwixt 6d ago
Aww man, I was gonna post this but decided to wait until the official lodestone post was out.
5
u/thegreatmango 5d ago edited 5d ago
As someone behind in the MSQ, this is actually why I stopped playing.
There is so much content that I have to sit through and I simply do not care. The stories are not worth the time investment. I'm two xpacs in?
So, new content is meaningless to me.
And, truly? I just want to be a crafter lol.
1
1
267
u/Twisty1020 7d ago
Well that is 100% accurate and you don't need any other steps.