Thread by @seaniccus

Let's do a Final Fantasy XIV thread. This is Pfil Buckwheat. We're going to go on an adventure to discover what a Final Fantasy MMO story is like. Because I heard it's actually pretty good.

But know what? I'm old. I don't have time for MMOs. We're gonna cheat! #FFXIV [THREAD]

That's right. I bought a level boost. I paid Square-Enix $17 to grind FOR me. Because I'm an adult. I don't have time to grind.

But I do want to experience the Final Fantasy XIV story.

I'm not ashamed of this decision. I'm proud of it. Let's do this. @FF_XIV_EN

I have to admit, though -- I don't really know what Job Quests are, but I am a little worried I'm missing out on something fun there.

BOOM. It is done. Also I have to say this splash artwork is rad.

From chump, to MONK.

...and now I have no idea what any of these abilities do.

...

TO ADVENTURE!

Uh oh. Things just got real.

Is this a boss battle?

♪ I like to ride my chocobo all-day... ♪

This meeting requires me to wear some low-stat ugly dress shoes. So the dress shoes are ALL THEY ARE GETTING.

Yes. Extraordinary.

This lore building is cool, but everything the characters are saying in this flashback is completely incomprehensible to me

For a MMO I'm playing alone, XIV is doing a decent job of making it feel like I'm part of a story.

Did the big bad just show up?! With Magitek?!

...

Neat!

Inconspicuous Switch.

The more I solo this game the more I'm sure I'm missing the point.. but there's some dang cool stuff to see.

I mean, this is probably a lot more fun with friends.

I apparently have 150 more FF XIV Quests to finish before I can do the Final Fantasy XV story I signed up and bought the level boost to do. If my level boos lets me complete them quickly, and I can do each in 20 minutes (best case scenario but unlikely) it'll take 50 hours.

That sounds really unlikely to complete in the next ten days, particularly considering how busy the rest of my life is this month. I'm kinda bummed about that, but not sure what to do about it.

Uh-oh.

Surely this will go well for me.

I found Biggs and Wedge. It's officially a @SquareEnixUSA game now.

I came here to be the first person to make contact with the Sylphs, but someone beat me to it.

Am... Am I not the main character?!

Are you kidding me, green fairy? I have to dance for you?!

You little brat.

MORE?!

A Chocobo. It's about time!

Now i just need a Banjo.

Because I bought the game at launch, I guess I have a "Legacy" Chocobo too. He looks cooler, hands-down.

Dance break!

Okay, after I spent a few hours throwing a party for a bunch of weirdos, they showed me a magic portal underground where I angered a bunch of cultists.

...which led me to Titan. Time to beat him up.

That was easy.

You know, Titan was kind of those weirdo cultists god. Am I... just going around the world beating up other people's gods? Is... is that okay?

Uh oh. Things just turned dark.

See?! I knew people wouldn't like me killing their gods!

She beat up my flying plant!

I mean I don't mind that much but still. That was my flying plant!

The next few missions were pretty depressing. Go pick up your friends corpses, go bury your friends...

Mourn for your friends..

...but at least Cid was hanging out at the church! See! CID! It's a Final Fantasy game! You know because it's Cid!

Yes, Cid. That's like, the entire point of you.

Now that Cid looks cool, he wants me to help find his airship.

....but nobody wants to help me find it.

Yes, YES, that's why I spent several hours doing your chores for you!

I still haven't found that dang airship, but at least I'm on the right path.

I have to fight all these dragons all by myself.

Everybody can relax! I found the airship.

This was easily one of the most fun fights in the game so far.

Yes, Cid. I told you earlier. Airships is like the entire point of you. Why didn't you listen?

You don't name your ship the Enterprise without making a Star Trek joke. You just don't.

I gotta say though, it all feels kinda epic

#animeIRL

All jokes aside, this is where the story of #FFXIV really picked up for me. Cid is the character that really brings everything together. I loved seeing his backstory unfold here.

That said, I can't say I remember traveling through time to give him his goggles, or whatever it's suggesting happened here.

Anyway, back to killing other people's gods for some reason

I have collected the Dragon Balls. I mean Chaos Emeralds. I mean, uh Crystals. Look, I just want to make a wish. Help me out.

Okay I did not wish for Ifrit to come back not cool.

No, I didn't want Titan either. Now there's three of them. I don't want this. Stop, Crystal DragonBall Emeralds. Quit it.

Now the Empire is here with a giant robot and he's punching all the gods i previously killed so hard that he's absorbing their power!

Except for this one, which the robot just straight up ate. Like in one bite.

I tease, but I have to be honest. This is a pretty badass origin for the Ultima Weapon.

Just to make sure the player knows what a big deal this is, the really giant crystal that has a name gives you a vision to ask you really nicely to please destroy the bad guys. I was on it, crystal.

BIGGS AND WEDGE BREAK.

I love these guys.

"Notorious Biggs."

Have I mentioned how great some of these quest names are?

The big bad Empire doesn't seem the least bit bothered that I'm casually riding a chocobo through their base.

I don't need to infiltrate them, Cid. They just let me walk through the base 5 minutes ago.

Dude. I told you. I just did that.

I love these guys, seriously.

Okay so... my Magitek armor has a soul. I guess that's cool.

Same energy.

Rescuing friends!

Being rescued BY friends!

This whole moment was really cool. It was the part of the game that really felt like a traditional Final Fantasy to me. When this group felt like that "main character's party" of the regular games.

The story hasn't been working for me on every level, though. Who is this guy? The game seems to think I should know who he is and I should be shocked. But I don't? I've played the entire story in the last couple weeks and I have no idea who this guy is.

I don't know if I wasn't paying enough attention, if the game didn't explain it well enough, or if it just got lost among the massive amount of extra story and missions there are. Telling a narrative during MMO busywork is legitimately hard.

Anyway, back in the war room, the leaders of the nations have an important announcement:

Really, they're trying to decide if it's time to give up, or go to war. The leader of the forest pacifists says war is the right move. The tiny queen thinks this is hilarious for some reason. I think they're all insane.

Either way, we're going to war -- and this battle plan scene, while hard to follow, was pretty exciting and rad.

The Imperials are still cool with me just hanging out in their secret base.

Don't think that just because we're almost to the end that this isn't an MMO, though. After fighting a big boss, the of the land was called upon to... deliver soup to this guy on a hill.

...and to cheer up some sad soldiers!

This was the point in the game when I learned I could no longer solo it at level 60. My plan to buy a level boost and treat this like a single player RPG fell apart right here.

It took me like an hour to find a party to run the level with.

And the experience of fighting with a group was wildly different. Mostly because I can't tell what's going on at all anymore!

But Cid was still cool!

Running through the dungeon with a party though? It felt really good. This is definitely the way this game was meant to be played. I wish it was a little more social -- nobody was in any kind of chat -- but it was still really fun to run with a group like this.

I have no idea if this is part of the level or if another player wrote "CID" in giant glowing letters somehow.

Either wayed, the badass armored lady has her own custom Magitek armor! And I get to fight it!

With all of my friends, it really doesn't seem like a fair fight.

I only have one mission left, but it'll have to wait. I've been trying to start it for 40 minutes, and it's late. Hopefully, there will be more players to help me in the morning.

It took some waiting, but I finally got a party the next morning. Let's do this. Final Fantasy XIV Main Story Quest: The last mission.

It wouldn't be an epic story if the bad guy didn't ask the good guys to turn evil at the last minute.

I don't feel bad for having skipped out on all the hours of gameplay doing FFXIV properly would have entailed, but these big raid-like missions really drive home how these games are designed to be played.

Oh yeah -- Magitek time.

Same mood.

The entire Magitek sequence was done really well. Lumbering around in the big heavy machine with multiple attacks was a really fun break from the normal action. I can't think of another Final Fantasy experience quite like it.

Oh hey it's the number XIV

Rheinhardt?!

I gotta say, this doesn't really feel like a fair fight.

Sir, this is an elevator.

I swear this guy just monologued for 100 floors of elevator ride. Then he turned his armor gold for some reason. Cool.

Yeah, it hurts my eyes too, buddy.

Final boss battle phase two: Get in the mech.

I'll be honest, I didn't actually notice his armor went gold until this point.

You can't end a boss battle without an epic explosion!

Just kidding -- the real, REAL final boss wasn't the giant killer robot mech with the power of the gods. It's this dude.

Turns out wailing on him with the might of a ton of heroes wasn't enough. We're going to need crystal light to win this battle.

No jokes. This was just awesome.

This was how our party attacked the big bad, but it felt like...

DRAMATIC FINISH!

I guess he's cured now? Good job Goku.

THE MAGITEK ARMOR IS COMING TO RESCUE ME!

I changed my mind. Giving this thing a soul was a GOOD IDEA.

Officially a Warrior of Light.

Just a reminder that among all the crazy hero stuff the player has been doing, a regular old war was going on in the background.

"By your powers combined," I stole this joke from @dear_internets

"Don't forget to keep playing this game forever, kids!"

The post-mission ending where you talk to all your friends is a nice touch. I always appreciated RPGs that let you see a little of the world you saved after the final boss. As an MMO, XIV naturally has to do that, and this is a nice transition.

And with that, I've done it. I've finished the "story mode" of Final Fantasy XIV, as if it was a single player game. The entire, no-grind campaign clocked in at about 42 hours. Not too far off a standard RPG playtime.

...I also finished it just in time to play the Final Fantasy XV content!

...which itself is full of really nice touches, including music from @FFXVEN and custom quest accepted / FATE joined text!

If Noct wasn't a moody brat I think I'd be disappointed.

The story hook? His car broke down. Again. Of crouse.

This is it. This is what I'm here for. I played 40 hours of @FinalFantasy XIV just so I could go camping with Noct.

Sigh... I miss Iggy.

Road trip? Camping? Fishing? Yes. It really is playing all the FFXV hits!

This battle was really tough with a MNK, but once I got the hang of it, easily one of the most fun battles I've had in the game yet. Giving the player Noct's warp-strike power was awesome.

The way it actually ties the entire story into Noct's trials from Final Fantasy XV is a nice touch too!

It was a really fun tie in story. I loved it.

Too bad I can't afford to buy the Regalia for myself -- but I'm just not going to grind 250,000 Golden Saucer points. It should have just been a reward for completing the missions.

That's it for the adventures of Pfil Buckweat!

...for now.