On the eve of Final Fantasy XIV’s next expansion announcement, the MMO finds itself in its most precarious situation yet. While Dawntrail was far from a terrible expansion, its stumbling put emphasis on all the other issues that XIV players have been grumbling about for years. Most jobs haven’t changed radically since Shadowbringers, with Dawntrail specifically barely touching jobs at all; even when the story has been good, players have begun to feel tired about the rigid state of the game. It’s time for a radical change, but can we expect one at all?
A week ago, I wasn’t so sure. While Creative Studio 3 had committed to 8.0 being a more radical departure for the game even prior to Dawntrail’s release, we lacked concrete examples of exactly what changes the team was targeting. With the most recent Live Letter, however, we’ve begun to get an idea of exactly what sort of scope we may be looking at. Both the glamour and dye systems for armor are set to receive a major rework next patch, and the team has begun to trickle out information about how this is just the first step, as the team has begun to actively target elements of the game that had been untouched for over a decade.
Next expansion, players won’t have the same “totem farms” for Extreme Trials. Nor will Relic Weapons exist in the same form as previous versions; the stinger for the most recent patch trailer revealed that Dawntrail’s second Ultimate raid will break pattern and tradition by centering around Kefka, rather than the expected Stormblood or Shadowbringers Main Scenario-themed fight.
Taken on their own, these are all very minor changes – and we still know very little about the grander scope of them. Yet, taken in the context of the previously disclosed claim that 7.0 would be a “safe” expansion before the team could target more broader changes in 8.0, it’s our first example of the team following through on that promise. Considering that the promised focus on battle content for Dawntrail has mostly lived up to the team’s expectations, it does leave me hopeful that there is much to be hopeful about with the next expansion.
That being said, while I am hopeful, there still remains much to be concerned about. While I believe the team is targeting larger changes, Dawntrail’s content cadence has been messy to say the least. While the game has seen the most “new” content added to the game with Dawntrail, the team has struggled in some baffling ways to make the content interesting and accessible to everyone. Occult Crescent is the poster child of the issue, but even content that I loved – like Chaotic and Quantum – has been just as much of a miss as a hit. Both fights saw the team experimenting heavily with reward structures, and while I appreciate the attempts, I doubt much of the playerbase has anything positive to say about how things shook out.
The question remains if these struggles are emblematic of deeper issues with the development of Final Fantasy XIV, or were expected while the team actively experimented before solidifying a plan for the game’s future from 8.0 onward. I would like to hope it’s the latter, yet at the same time admissions from the team that Occult Crescent’s Forked Tower turned out the way it did due to a lack of resources makes it seem more likely that it was the former; maybe it’s still possible that the team has had a larger than usual emphasis on developing the next expansion, and we won’t run into the same issues in 8.0 and its patch cycle, but I wouldn’t feel comfortable betting on that outcome. We can only hope that the team has learned from the experience, regardless.
As far as the story is concerned, it’s a bit too early to say how things will turn out. I think there’s promise here, now that we’re deep into the Dawntrail patch quests – but until we’ve seen 7.5, and where the next expansion is truly taking us, I can’t exactly say how things will turn out in the end. I generally liked Dawntrail’s story well enough despite some rather egregious writing stumbles; it’s not like prior expansions have had perfect writing either, so as long as the course correction sticks the landing, and the next story arc that we’re ramping into is interesting, I’ll be happy. I’m sure the rest of the playerbase feels the same.
Final Fantasy XIV has undeniably gotten stale. Yet, while there’s plenty to be concerned about – it feels like there’s just as much to be excited for the state of the game going forward. The team clearly understands the playerbase’s concerns; the only question that remains is if they’re up to the task to deliver on answering them. Only time will tell, but I’m feeling hopeful. We’ll know more in the coming weeks, and I can’t wait to find out what the team has in store for us.
