#and msq doesn't really allow you to be anything other than ''heroic and steadfast warrior'' with MAYBE a bit of flavor-text mixed in. | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

racke7 · 6 months ago

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So, last night I was thinking about FF14 and Skyrim again.

Specifically, my feelings of "I played this game all day - do I feel like I actually did anything today, or not".

If I manage to play Skyrim for basically a full day (instead of some random burst of an hour), I usually feel like I've "advanced the story" of that character, gotten better gear, established the character's personality a little bit (doing X instead of Y, prioritizing this quest over that, commentary through regular gameplay, etc).

So I don't necessarily feel like I "did a lot of things today", but it does feel like there's an "accomplished" feeling, kind of.

If I play FF14 a full day, I feel like-... It feels a bit as if I've watched a really long movie (especially if I played MSQ)? It's a sometimes-good movie, so I don't necessarily regret it, but... that's it. Between the queues for dungeon-diving and travel-time, a lot of the gameplay really amounts to "watch a cutscene".

So, I learn new stuff about FF14-lore, I might get inspired into creating a fancy new outfit for a class, and... a few numbers go up? The aftermath of playing FF14 really does feel as if I've spent the day watching a weirdly prolonged movie.

#a part of me keeps making annoyed noises and saying ''just buy the fucking game already''#bcs then i'll have bigger caps available. more outfits. etc. but then i remember that it's a subscription.#a subscription that will lock this character forever if i stop paying the fee. and suddenly i REALLY don't wanna.#and the fact that i keep feeling as if ''this is a movie - not a chance to create new and interesting characters''?#it definitely pushes ff14 closer towards something like no-character-creation The Witcher and actual-railroading Divinity 2 #and... yeah. mmos aren't exactly famous for letting you develop ''interesting characters'' in the story or whatever #but that's usually bcs there isn't a LOT of story. and it's usually very ''start a new character''-friendly #which ff14 is very much designed AGAINST (you can do all the classes as one character. msq is really fucking long. etc)#so despite how deeply invested ff14 is in its own story. it almost feels like the player isn't allowed to INTERACT with it.#skyrim has many faults (many many faults) in its story. but usually there's an ability to pick and choose what parts to interact with.#i could play as a thief and NOT join the thieves guild. i could ignore the civil war. or alduin. or miraak.#i can even make a choice sometimes to pick a side (dawnguard/vampires. empire/stormcloaks.)#there are even some daedric quests that allow for ''murder the innocents or get cool new item''-choices.#do those choices matter a lot as far as gameplay is concerned? not really. but for a character-story? it's incredible.#so ff14 has this whole world of amazing things. and you HAVE to play through msq to see it.#and msq doesn't really allow you to be anything other than ''heroic and steadfast warrior'' with MAYBE a bit of flavor-text mixed in.#which would be fine in most mmos. bcs the story is such a small part of the game. but ff14 has a FUCKTON of story.#so... you get to choose what your character looks like. and then you get to see them in lots of cutscenes.#bcs you don't really have any control over WHO this character of yours really is. just what they're wearing.#so yeah. it ends up feeling a lot like i've just watched a movie. not done something ''creative'' for character-building.#ff14 #skyrim #personal stuff #video games #rants

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