Spaghetty: Never let the DT writter cook again
OnaSoto: I find it very strange that Yoshi P is talking about Dawntrail so detached from it. Like he's talking as if he weren't the director of it.
PhyrusEmperor: In the end it felt like a Disney movie written for 10 year old's with ADHD. Where you keep getting beaten over the head with "peace and happiness" in fear that you might forget it and that's the only way the world works. Backed with the Disney music didn't help much either....*smile*.
Using the excuse that it is a new arch on a new continent does not excuse bad writing. Every expansion took you to a new continent with new cultures and new characters. Shadowbringers even took you to a new world with it's own story and lore, yet they didn't spend 2/3's of Shadowbringers on just fleshing out the world. By lvl73 you knew almost all the important bits, with the rest being fed to in small bits during the rest of the game without dragging the story down.
I don't think anyone expected something mind blowing, but even the start of an arch can still be written well.
Daniel-qt5ib: "Damn, I guess we should have made Wuk Lamat fully self-assured and confident in herself from the outset. THEN the player's would have loved her".

Yoshi P needs to go get Ishikawa right fucking now.
PetarBladeStrok: My problem is that he didn't address the main issue. Which is dialogue writing. Dialogue quality is considerably worse than Ishikawa's in ShB and EW. I hope they're aware of that issue and I'm glad at least he acknowledges the pacing and too much Wuk Lamat. (Though the main issue with her is dialogue writing & execution. Not her being unsure & how she develops as he seems to think) DT's story is great in concept, the execution is what the issue is. Yoshida seems to think it's because EW was a climax but it's not. It's that the execution of DT's great story concept wasn't good. Last zone hit the feels, but it could've hit even more if it was all executed properly. And that's coming from me, someone who actually liked DT quite a bit, because of last two zones.
youngimperialistmkii: My takeaway from this i interview. Yoshi-P decided to take a chance on new writers, and a new direction. Even if he wasn't confident in immediate success. However, if this corner of the community is any indication. That gamble did not pay off. While he never quite went there. He got mighty close to throwing shade on himself, and the writing team for the game in this interview. And if this is what is being said publicly. In house, must be a bit of a mess right now. I've never heard Yoshi-P offer anything but praise for this games writing since 2.0. Until now.
hovsep56: but the point is not because it's not as world ending or high stakes as endwalker, it's that the way they started the new story arc is bad. i think yoshi - p misunderstood the critisisms which makes me worried for the future of the story
apomk2: Yoshi P while the house is on fire:

We've received feedback of temperatures being too high in the building. We will take this as a learning opportunity and are confident that placing more fans in the building will ease people's frustration going forward.

Please look forward to it
sharp7467: I get Yoshi-P’s point though. It doesn’t mean that it’s an excuse for a bad script/prioritization of its cast in DT, but ending off from a big climax means that a new story will have to find its footing on its own.
This time unfortunately means that they missed the mark & will do better with future writing as they have proven time and again that they can!
TheDavid0408: Remember when Yoshi delayed EW for 2 weeks caues he didnt like 1 dialogue in the end of the game, where did that director disappeared?
Verpal: I am still willing to believe it is YoshiP trying to give some acknowledgement to the story's issue without pointing fingers and blame anyone in the team directly, writer especially.
However, I also believe action speak louder than word, lets see how the post MSQ is going, will it be the same post-EW to Dawntrail template with us playing with flavor of the year NPC and put sole focus on them, or maybe they will try something else? Currently, I think they will double down, triple down if you counts post-EW even, I hope to be proven wrong.
CarlosHernandez-kn8sl: "The concept was journeying to a new land- we would be going to a new continet were we'd we ll be seeing new cultures, new races and character...." the only thing that we saw was the mision log "Talk to Wuk Lamat" and Wuk Lamat talking about being friends with everybody, It didn't deliver the concept of exploration, and the new cultures was all about how Wuk Lamat learns about them (despite the fact she has living her entire life there) Yeah, Yoshi-p didn't answer the real f*cking question of how he allow this bad story develop like this
slyder109: "players will just like it" is how we got so many bad WoW expansions. Makes me concerned for you FFXIV players
xronoamber9660: Corporate-speak is one thing, of course, but if I remember correctly, they said earlier that such focus on one character (Wuk Lamat) was a deliberate choice in their attempt to bring something new to msq (can be wrong at this particular point)...and if from all the feedback they somehow concluded "we should have made Wuk Lamat more capable and confident from the start"...I have serious doubts about quality of story-telling in the future.

ARR story-wise was better then Dawntrail. I don't know how they managed to stumble so hard. But it's alright to fail or miss the mark at times. What is not alright it's to pretend "everything is going according to plan and we expected mixed reactions", as if they not supposed to work for "good" reactions from the start
25xxfrostxx: Publicly the comments on the mixed reception give me the impression that they either don't understand the reception or aren't willing to say. I hope they are having some clear and realistic internal discussions.
The MSQ had a lot of cool components and good ideas but the connective tissue was the problem. I have no issue with the story taking a slower tempo or having less serious and critical situations. I didn't expect a scene like Quintus's "exit" in 6.0 or a threat with grand and world spanning implications. It didn't need the weight of 5.0 or 6.0. However it needed to be written with the awareness that the people playing DT have experienced everything that came before.

We have been in hundreds of situations that solidify a certain logic on what works in what situation and how those situations not only play out but effect future situations. The Dawntrail story was written like a young adult novel with some very concerning decisions made on the part of CBU3. A lot of the situations we encountered felt out of place and contrived. The player needs to encounter an obstacle so an obstacle appears rather than feeling logical and organic. The interactions and reactions of characters (both central and supporting cast) to communication and problem solving were uncharacteristically simplistic. Wuk Lamat and the Chirwagur (red armored bad guy giants) before the 93 dungeon are a great example of a repeated problem. All we need to solve centuries of animosity is a cure 2 and "get to know you" chat. It felt like it took place in a different universe with different rules than previous content.

The interactions had a believeability on the level with a Hardy Boys or Nancy Drew novel meant for 11 year olds and that will never work for a population that is (very largely) 30 years old and have already dealt with far more realistic outcomes.
lukapitkanen3333: Just bring back Ishikawa or someone who is actually good at writing characters and dialogue lol. I hate how soulless a lot of the characters felt. Alphinaud was literally citing wikipedia articles the whole expansion…
orimu836: Alright. Dawntrail needs a reboot. We need Bahamut to do his job again and rain down hell.
Theorybind: For me, the most insufferable thing has been the toxic positive fans who insist Dawntrail is the Mona Lisa and if you dislike it you're a this or a that.

YoshiP has said he was throwing **
Unpeth: Heavensward- journey to a new land and meet new cultures, races and characters.
Stormblood- journey to a new land and meet new cultures, races and characters.
Shadowbringers- journey to a new land and meet new cultures, races and characters.
Endwalker- journey to a new land and meet new cultures, races and characters.
crashzone6600: It's giving me an upset stomach at the prospect of having to quest with Wuk Lamat again...
NewAnderL: Dude shouldn't never have approved DT with the story in that state...The big issue is not about "people maybe not liked this new aproch" it is,actually, a case of "this story is crap! the writing,pacing and progression of the story drive people to sleep! The new central character have nagative charisma and everything beyond the combat sucks!"...
ezequielalves879: I simply find this disappointing about Yoshi-P, which only proves that he needs to start consuming other types of stories besides shonen anime. You don't have to tell stories about apocalyptic calamities to tell good stories. Good stories have risks, they have losses, they have gains and they have evolution and ascension and we can give examples of this by looking at FFXIV's own lore from Endwalker backwards. Good stories are not predictable, they take viewers by surprise. Good characters are multifaceted, they have mistakes, flaws and variations, but they are unique. You could tell Tural's story by replacing plantations, alpacas and Master Chef with something the trailer suggested, hunting, exploring wild lands, getting involved with new kinds of dangers. What we got instead were poorly used new characters, disdained old characters, unnecessary redemption arcs, villains who are not very engaging, a childish protagonist and a linear, boring and tiresome gameplay divided into two arcs that are not convincing in their connection. Books like The Lies of Lock Lamora, The Child Thief and The Name of the Wind are proof that you can make epic stories without battling world-destroying gods. Anime such as Moshoku Tensei are also good examples of this. Movies? There's the Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves movie itself, which gives a great example of how to tell an exciting, fun adventure that flirts with greater danger without throwing it directly in the viewer's face or without wanting to sound extremely apocalyptic and prophetic. Dawntrail was badly written. Period.
JL-GHK: He's deflecting. I feel YoshiP's creative process has been tampered with and he's trying to be very diplomatic and careful not to expose this.
mismismism: This is when I'm gonna call out Yoshida. Because I think it was too obvious that DT would not land. I already didn't believe they didn't see this reaction coming, at best maybe it was a situation where by the time it was noticeable to them they felt they were too far into it to change course but even that is pushing it when they chose to leave in things like Wuk taking us across the city to say she just now realized she likes peace and smiles. I don't understand what happened, I don't want to believe it's a Pokemon situation where they just believe people will buy it anyway but it is wild that they left DT like that.
ZechsMerquise73: a lot of people who liked it all the way should understand that you can like or like parts of a story, and it's still objectively poorly written. please tell me in all honesty you were on the edge of your seat when krile solved a 200 year old feud by using meteor mana on bananas or whatever.
maxmagnus377: Oof...

I feel like in this interview YoshiP misses the mark almost as badly as the MSQ did...

The issue isn't that this wasn't a triple axel grand finale with fireworks and a cherry on top. Neither were Shadowbringers and Heavensward, and those turned out to be phenomenal stories. The issue also wasn't that "the pacing was bad". That's a gross oversimplification, and I think Zepla here is right on the money that the stakes were too muddy.

- For a people who's crops won't grow the Vanu Vanu sure were fat and not starving a whole lot, and we fixed that in an afternoon by reminding them
OuchXXI: He really needs to elaborate on this, because I can't really draw anything from this article. It honestly just sounds like a dodge to me, like well some people will like it and some won't. There's nothing about Wuk Lamat other than calling her a scapegoat, which is another dodge, she's shoved in your face nonstop, it got ridiculous. I have never felt more drained playing through an msq, like I just wanted to take a nap, because I was bored and the speak to 3 people and then speak to Wuk Lamat beat me down. Dawntrail was just a really bad visual novel for the most part and I am not afraid to say so. Also, the scions had nothing to do, they didn't even act like themselves. Everything was done to elevate Wuk Lamat.

Fire Hiroi and Kate, otherwise we are going to get more of the same going forward.
brandonn161: He did warned us that it was not going to be as good. We just did not expected it to be THIS bad. The writing team and character development team definitely dropped the ball on this one.
Dopafiend88: I'm a long time FFXIV fan. I didn't play Dawntrail. After the disappointment of the Post-EW MSQ, something told me to take a step back and let CBU3 cook on whatever their plans are for the next saga. I feel like I dodged a bullet with Dawntrail. I would love to return to FFXIV someday, but it looks like I'll be taking a long hiatus from the game until I hear they've turned things around. Yes I heard the actual gameplay content is good, but for me, the story was what drew me into FFXIV the most.
Muppemania: The main issue for me is that they turn our characters into npc, some random security detail for Wuk Lamat.
OhSunchips: I hate that people try to use Endwalker as an excuse for Dawntrail. You can tell a new story, a new beginning, a new whatever, a new 10 year setup and do it well, it has nothing to do with Endwalker or the previous story. You can start over, introduce new characters, have a smaller plot, a smaller adventure, etc. and have it work out. But they didn't do that. They know we like the scions and wanted to spend more time with them, but the scions felt like an afterthought that were hastily added to fill dungeon rosters. The way the story is written they might as well not even be in it. They said there wouldn't be a villain of the week world ending threat every expansion and that they'd have smaller stakes for a while, but we got another world ending threat anyways. They said we'd be a mentor for Wuk Lamat, but we might as well have been her pet rock, just there for her to talk to occasionally.

They could've done this exact plot but better, paced it better, had someone proof-read the plot, story board it out and actually make sure its cohesive, write the characters better, and people would've loved it. This exact plot wasn't just doomed to fail from the beginning, it was the execution that made it so rough.

Not to mention the whole trailer for Dawntrail focuses on us and the scions, and yet that couldn't be further from what we got.
honest_psycho7237: Yoshi-P forgot to mention that they're firing all the writers of this MSQ.
falcor2325: Having just finished the MSQ... it was some of the worst told and worst designed questing i have ever experienced. I LOATHED continuing the story, i loathed doing the next quest steps... it was always the same. Endless running back and forth, endless talk to 3 NPC's and listen to exposition, now click on these thing and listen to exposition...

I'm a story STAN but the story wore on me so much that i caved... my skip cutscene button has never been used so much...

Just god awful.
ezequielalves879: One good thing the Dawntrail MSQ did for me was make me pay attention to several other games: Elden Ring, Baldur's Gate 3, World of Warcraft. I even started playing Ragnarok Online again.
honkedoffjohn: Hopefully this will shut up the Dawntrail/Wuk Lamat apologists. Even Yoshi P knew it was bad.
natebroadus8474: I don't think Yoshi-P was saying, "I knew it was going to suck," more like, "We tried something new, and I'm not surprised that it didn't land with everyone, especially since we made some mistakes."

He at least acknowledged that corrections need to be made, instead of saying something stupid like, "players think they know what they want, but they don't." (If you know, you know.)

Dawntrail had the bones of a very good expansion. Fight me. It actually had some great aspects. The music is S-tier. The group content is amazing. Koana? I wish we had more time with him, because his VA nailed it. Bakool Ja Ja? Love him. I want that two-headed son of a bitch to be our first monster Scion. Gulool Ja Ja? Loved him. He was the closest thing Tural had to their own WoL.

I actually like that FFXIV doesn't have a new arc pre-planned. We learned that ARR-to-Endwalker wasn't pre-planned, it developed over time. Planning your ending ahead is a big risk, because it creates a landing you HAVE to stick.

Look at WoW's World Soul Saga. They came out and said this next 6 years is all a part of a story arc. If they stick the landing, it could be amazing, but if they don't -- if 6 years gets invested into an arc that has a lackluster ending -- it could be like Game of Thrones where everything built up to a flubbed ending. People were PISSED.

Calling your shot too soon makes it virtually impossible to pivot. That's what FFXIV did so well from ARR to EW. They pivoted from adventurer, to hero of the Dragonsong War, to revolutionary, to traveler to another world, to savior from an apocalypse.


Go watch Jesse Cox's reaction to the final zone. Dawntrail introduced some very interesting questions to the story -- the biggest one being, what was Azem doing while the Convocation and Venat/her followers were doing their thing? We know Azem didn't side with either faction, and now we know that this relic that can bridge worlds had his symbol on it.

FFXIV is at its best when it doesn't try to pre-plan everything ahead of time.
FuyuYuki92: Honestly, the article itself is based, Yoshi-P‘s response made me more worried than anything else. I feel like he doesn’t understand the key issue which is the execution and the shallow, poor writing. Others have told me that he probably knows this but can’t throw his employees under the bus. And while this might be true, I still have doubts… His response felt out of touch which is worrisome.
palladiamorsdeus: I feel like Yoshida has become the thing he spoke out against back when he revived XIV. He now thinks it's all going to work out because Final Fantasy is on the cover.
pipin90: In the first hour of Shadowbringers we met a woman, the concept of the sineaters, and the same woman transforming into one. That was shocking and good. Here we have nothing for the full first 20 hours. And I bet, more than that. It felt like waiting constantly for something to happen. Also, meeting Sphene that late into the story was bad. She should have been there since level 92, way earlier. Also, Sphene being a multiverse menace felt like Meteon 2.0 out of nowhere. Like copying the homework in the last moment. I thought it was gonna be about maybe some kind of different warlord's and beating them, just for world building, but having Sphene in the last 3 levels, and the WoL saving the multiverse again? The story was rushed too much at the end.
cutejustice: I gotta have to agree with the battle content taking too long because I was nearly tweaking in the beginning. It took wayyyyy too long to unlock the first dungeon
thomascranor2668: I've never seen a dev with such a good track record learn such a wrong lesson from their mistakes.
newphonewhodis2608: They really failed the bare minimum of delivering a "vacation"
crashzone6600: Every expansion, was a journey to a new place, with new characters and new cultures to explore... dawntrail was not the first in the ff14 history to offer anything new in that regard. And that was always an argument I hated when people criticized that aspect. "Oh you just hate it because you hate new cultures." Because I hated radz at Han before that? Or an entirely new planet before that? Or the Asian themed content before that?

Like, I don't think you could've gotten much different of a culture than an alien world with shadowbringers, and it isn't even the first time we dealt with tribal cultures such as Azim Steppes.

He'll we are even space faring now, I was even thinking we will have a chance to explore new planets such as an entire planet full of mandervilles, or a pupu world.

Either way, the people trying to deflect criticism of DT because they say people are just racist need to get lost.
MaximoRaider: Story being divisive is not the only reason for mixed rating. Him saying that he expected it means he released this expack without having faith in his work. It's a self diss if anything.
veselinrankov7322: If they didn't portray Wuk Lamat at all, it would be better
hololiveforever9455: Guys I’m scared please no more Wuk Lamat o god if next story Is nothing but Wuk Lamat I’m going to die inside
Zantetsudex: Wuk Lamat should have had as much spotlight as Gosetsu did in Stormblood, that is enough importance to warrant being a primary character but not so obtrusive he chokes all the attention away from other characters that definitely need it.
antonytomas1: "We knew we had an inferior product but we wanted to blindtest paying customers anyway" lol can you imagine someone without Yoshi P's glowing reputation basically saying some bs like that
vfvs11a: If YoshiP is really that tone deaf to what's wrong with DT, and that interview isn't just empty PR babble, this game is done. DT sucking has nothing to do with the stakes and little to do with the pace. It's literally bad writing and a Black Hole Sue character that ruined it. First half to 2/3 could have been an Indiana Jones type adventure looking for the golden City (no huge stakes). Then the last 1/3 could have been after we find it and the hijinks that ensue. It could have even been us unsealing the gate and opening Pandora's box. That could make for an interesting story arc, us having to fix a problem we created and dealing with a little bit of resentment directed at us.
blodeuynn: I wonder what was happening in production that they allowed the story to come out the way it did. The writing and dialogue was terrible. Was it working on other things that muddled the process until it was too late? I don't get it. I wasn't expecting it to top ShB and EW, but this was bad.

Sep 01 2024

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