I've played since A Realm Reborn closed beta in 2013, I fell in love with the game, I started savage raiding in Heavens Ward and loved it more, I loved everything but the story ins Stormblood and I believe that is the best expansion. I love Shadowbringers story, but I do not agree or like the combat or content decisions for a vast majority of it, the problems were compounded and made worse in Endwalker, and Dawntrail broke the camels back narrativey, and contentwise. The design of fights are the best they've ever been but content it to far apart, the story is boring and even worse than Endwalker which is astonishing as that was 2 expansion stories smashed together. There is a lot of promise witht this expansion but I do not see any fruits being dropped any time soon.

There is promise of the next expansion bringing class identity back and maybe fixing this games combat, the problem is not only that but it went from being an MMO to being a instanced based game where no one talks to each other unless you have an FC or static or join a party at a house.

There needs to be a return of some kind of open world content where people can mingle and chat at their own leisure, if they really want to stay with faster paced overly and artificially difficult fights with body checks, they need to fix their servers and the 1 second delay, add dodges like white mage and dancers dashes with charges and gap closer's to ever melee, rework their character creator as its was behind every other single player and MMO character creator when it came out 12 years ago, have a real casual to mid-core goal and grind to reach with an ACTUAL relic grind and not a spare tomestone dump, make it so people don't just sit at the endgame vendor town, Limsa and their houses and have reason to interact with other people and make it a better MMO, and not be a single player game with MMO features.

I do NOT hate the game, i love it and that's why I will criticize it, give my thoughts as it is not in a good state and it is no longer engaging for me, I love all kinds of content from comfy farming on my island, to savage and ultimate raiding, and everything in-between like extremes, deep dungeons and exploration content which is my favorite thing to do BTW.

(This is going to be a rather personal review. I'm not going to touch on gameplay or graphics cuz you can get reviews of those from people who are better at talking about them than I am. I'm posting this on the off chance that it will reach someone who needs to hear it as much as I needed to experience this game; to carry my song of hope that its chorus may ring for all.)

Don't let my 430 hour playtime fool you. I have a license for PlayStation, as well, and my total playtime is about to hit 1200 hours. Never before have I put NEARLY this much time into a single game, and that was true before I even hit the 400 hour mark. And I can confidently say, without even an onze of hyperbole, that this game saved my life and my relationships.

This game did WONDERS for helping me socialize and break out of my years-long, crippling depression. I went into the game this time with the goal of ending my isolation, and wow did it ever break me out of that cycle of self-pity and resentment. I started talking to friends again (and it gave me something to talk ABOUT with them), it forced me to talk to strangers again, and the thought of making it to the current content gave me a tangible goal to work on again (the game was still in Endwalker's post-release patches when I started). This game helped me make new friends, talk to my existing ones more, and even helped me rekindle an estranged relationship that has since blossomed into one of the people I love more than anything else in the world.

As someone who's been struggling with helplessness and despair my entire life, the themes of Shadowbringers and Endwalker hit me particularly hard. I cried harder at the end of Endwalker than I have at any other single piece of art in existence. I had just crossed the 900 hour mark in the penultimate Trial, and this was after my months-long journey of self-improvement. So at the end of Endwalker (no spoilers), when your character is reflecting on their journey up to that point, so too was I reflecting on my own. I thought about how much more fun I have in my life. How much more interesting my life is. How much more HAPPY I am to be alive. And as my character confronted the end, carrying her song of hope, I had to set my controller down and let years of depression and self-hatred flow down my face as I cried rivers.

I legit wouldn't be at this point if I hadn't made the impulsive decision to give A Realm Reborn another chance at 3:00 am out of a depression-fueled bout of insomnia. My depression will be something I have to battle for my entire life, but Final Fantasy XIV gave me the tools I need to stand tall in the dark and forge ahead 'til the end. And as of right now, I'm glad I'm still alive. If you're in a similar boat to the one I was in, then maybe this game could help you, too. I promise it's worth sticking it through A Realm Reborn, Shadowbringers and Endwalker have since become the most impactful, life-changing stories I've ever had the privilege of experiencing. I wanna give Yoshi-P and the entire team behind this game my utmost, sincerest thanks.

This is legit one of my favourite game in the series and im really happy i could experience the story without spoilers.

Shadowbringers and endwalker are one of my favourite stories ever and i wish i could play them for the first time again

Gameplay, its an mmo, everyone is friendly and it slowly feeds you info and dosent feel overwhelming.

Unlike destiny, i dont feel presured or fomo to play the game too, i know that the content will stay even if i dont play it for some time