Hello,
the Dawntrail expansion has certainly received a mixed reception, and I felt like offering my own feedback. I could have waited for 7.5 or 7.55, but I figured it'd be best to deliver my opinion a bit earlier.
STUFF THAT WAS GOOD:
1) The Raids: The Arcadion surprised me. I entered with low expectations, but enjoyed my time there. I still prefer the Eden Raids from a story perspective, but the plot here was still quite fun, and the fights were great!
2) Deep Dungeon: Pilgrim’s Traverse was brilliant! I loved this new version of this style of content. I hadn’t dared to try Quantum, but I still deem this to have been a successful experiment. This isn’t to say that all future Deep Dungeons must copy+paste this formula, but they certainly should look at this one for some inspiration!
3) Variant Dungeon: The content is still not exactly my favorite activity in the game, but I will list it in this section regardless, because of the vast improvements made since Endwalker. Advanced Mode is a great idea, and works very nicely, plus the exploration achievement is finally not tied to doing content of the really hard variety. Yeah, yeah, yeah, people complain about the loot, but I personally wish to complement the Variant/Criterion content formula itself for getting some much needed improvements.
STUFF THAT I FEEL MIXED ON (things that I liked, but took issue with some parts):
1) The MSQ (spoilers in case people reading are not caught up): I did not hate the storyline, I certainly saw value in it, and enjoyed it as a whole, but I can't deny that I found some parts of it to be "off"
- Already before launch, it was announced that DT would have a storyline made up of 2 halves, just like Stormblood, something that did not fill me with confidence, and I feel like this aspect was handled even worse this time around, as the Shaaloani portion of the story completely destroyed the pacing in my opinion. I was left bored for a while, which took up time that could have been dedicated to iron out some story arcs and plotpoints in the second half...
- Speaking of that story split: Wuk Lamat's story arc should have carried on from the first half. Her competition was gone, but she should have still needed to venture into Xak Tural or something, while not feeling confident enough to rule over Tural, so that Sphene could impress her, Wuk Lamat would look up to her as an example to follow, but the two eventually would having a falling out, resulting in Wuk Lamat maturing, taking on her own path, and only then becoming the true ruler she earned the right to be (alongside her brother). That would make things feel more earned
- The Post Launch MSQ felt a bit samey with the visual department, but I can understand how with the environment of the 9th, this might have been almost impossible to avoid
Continue reading...
the Dawntrail expansion has certainly received a mixed reception, and I felt like offering my own feedback. I could have waited for 7.5 or 7.55, but I figured it'd be best to deliver my opinion a bit earlier.
STUFF THAT WAS GOOD:
1) The Raids: The Arcadion surprised me. I entered with low expectations, but enjoyed my time there. I still prefer the Eden Raids from a story perspective, but the plot here was still quite fun, and the fights were great!
2) Deep Dungeon: Pilgrim’s Traverse was brilliant! I loved this new version of this style of content. I hadn’t dared to try Quantum, but I still deem this to have been a successful experiment. This isn’t to say that all future Deep Dungeons must copy+paste this formula, but they certainly should look at this one for some inspiration!
3) Variant Dungeon: The content is still not exactly my favorite activity in the game, but I will list it in this section regardless, because of the vast improvements made since Endwalker. Advanced Mode is a great idea, and works very nicely, plus the exploration achievement is finally not tied to doing content of the really hard variety. Yeah, yeah, yeah, people complain about the loot, but I personally wish to complement the Variant/Criterion content formula itself for getting some much needed improvements.
STUFF THAT I FEEL MIXED ON (things that I liked, but took issue with some parts):
1) The MSQ (spoilers in case people reading are not caught up): I did not hate the storyline, I certainly saw value in it, and enjoyed it as a whole, but I can't deny that I found some parts of it to be "off"
- Already before launch, it was announced that DT would have a storyline made up of 2 halves, just like Stormblood, something that did not fill me with confidence, and I feel like this aspect was handled even worse this time around, as the Shaaloani portion of the story completely destroyed the pacing in my opinion. I was left bored for a while, which took up time that could have been dedicated to iron out some story arcs and plotpoints in the second half...
- Speaking of that story split: Wuk Lamat's story arc should have carried on from the first half. Her competition was gone, but she should have still needed to venture into Xak Tural or something, while not feeling confident enough to rule over Tural, so that Sphene could impress her, Wuk Lamat would look up to her as an example to follow, but the two eventually would having a falling out, resulting in Wuk Lamat maturing, taking on her own path, and only then becoming the true ruler she earned the right to be (alongside her brother). That would make things feel more earned
- The Post Launch MSQ felt a bit samey with the visual department, but I can understand how with the environment of the 9th, this might have been almost impossible to avoid
Continue reading...