Image: © Square Enix
Square Enix’s popular MMO Final Fantasy 14 is taking its first baby steps for a new saga. Dawntrail offers great gameplay but a forgettable story.
Publication date: 2 July 2024
Developer: Square Enix Creative Studio III
Publisher: Square Enix
Available: PC (tested), PlayStation 5, PS4, Xbox Series
Players: 1
Age limit: K16
Game played for evaluation: 72 hours
Final Fantasy 14, one of the most popular MMO games of the moment, has had a tremendous growth over the past 11 years. After a reboot that turned a disastrous flop into a win, the game’s popularity has grown steadily as one stronger expansion after another brought the epic story to an epic conclusion with Endwalker, released in 2021.
At that time, the warriors of the light prevented the end that threatened all the worlds in a stunning climax that neatly and emotionally tied together all the story and character patterns of the previous eight years. However, it was not the end of the massive multiplayer game, but the beginning of a new chapter.
Three years later, Dawntrail is the next chapter that tries to lure players back into the huge world. However, the promise is not a new epic story, but on the contrary, a release, a direct summer vacation, after the intensity of the previous two expansions. A gentler start certainly sounds like just the right medicine, but at the same time, you’re heading into the holiday in a state of dread. On the one hand, Dawntrail should start the whole saga from scratch, and on the other hand, it should qualitatively continue in the footsteps of the two expansions that preceded this one – and, in many people’s opinion, by far the best of FF14.
Summer holidays have rarely felt so stressful.
Image: © Square Enix
The paradise behind Rapako
Dawntrail takes the warriors of light across the ocean west to the continent of Tural, where they are lured in the name of a new adventure. The beloved ruler of the city of Tuliyollali is looking for a suitable heir, who will be chosen through a competitive succession rite. The goal of the followers is to pass seven challenges and find a fairy-tale golden city, which appropriately takes the players around the new continent and its many cultures.
Unfortunately, the solution also leads to the fact that the plot is practically just world building. Each of the seven challenges introduces the player to one of Tural’s many cultures and their characteristic, which feels more like reading an encyclopedia than plot transport. Of course, the characters and the relationships between them are developed in the course of these, but the balance mostly tilts towards emphasizing the world building.
The solution is actually very similar to the one in Shadowbringers, where a completely new world had to be introduced to the player in some places underlining at the expense of the plot. However, the biggest difference between Dawntrail and Shadowbringers is that the player’s journey in the latter involved one of the best villains in the game.
In fact, Dawntrail’s entire new cast of characters is pretty bland, which negatively affects the overall interest of the story. Wuk Lamat, who is only on the player’s journey, is charmingly endearing and memorable, even if a small part of the fan community is hot for the two-headed school bully, Bakool Ja Jahan. Wuk Lamat’s benevolence still beats as the heart of the entire expansion, which can be felt right from the themes.
Image: © Square Enix
Those who miss the plot should remind themselves repeatedly of the expansion’s purpose as a light summer vacation, because otherwise there is likely to be sheer disappointment. Dawntrail was actually the first expansion of Final Fantasy 14, where the plot didn’t even manage to follow, but the interest in doing literally everything else grew bigger.
The story eventually exhausts both the attractive purpose and the meaningful stakes, which is why it doesn’t really engage you at any point. It’s still impossible to be mad at, because the plot is intentionally good-natured and sincere nonsense. However, as the start of a brand new chapter, it doesn’t inspire any interest in the next ten years, and a small part of me was left wishing I’d left the experience to Endwalkers – a bit like the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
A new more wonderful world
Fortunately, to counterbalance the disappointing story, Dawntrail does a lot right on the gameplay front. For years, Final Fantasy 14 has been besting expansion after expansion, and the latest one does not abandon this trend.
The new caves and boss resistances are mainly excellent revelations, where they have begun to make even more use of mechanics previously known only from raid caves. This makes the runs meaningful and challenging, and you can no longer run them (completely) with your eyes closed. In addition, as usual, they are tied even more tightly to a wider plot and have their own internal storytelling, which makes the caves feel even more like experiences than pure grind. This is facilitated by the familiar Trust system, which allows you to jump into battles with partners guided by artificial intelligence and thus get more background information.
As in previous expansions, the level ceiling is raised again by ten as usual, so there is something to develop and new abilities for each character class and craft. Alternatively, the old profession can be replaced with two new ones, viper and pictomancer, both of which represent the dps class. This time, the focus of both is purely on damage production, and the viper, for example, has no abilities to help the rest of the party, and the pictomancer only has one.
The duo is still quite an interesting addition to the already huge line-up and offers nice finger tricks to maximize combos and optimal damage output. Visually, the viper is not particularly memorable, but the pictomancer, who brings his painting to life, brings a nice color to the battles, even if, like other spellcasters, he threatens to cover important visibility, especially in larger raid and Alliance raid caves.
Image: © Square Enix
However, Dawntrail’s most significant change can be seen in its first facelift since its 2013 relaunch. Among other things, more accurate textures, improved shadows, real-time lighting and denser vegetation do wonders for the appearance and breathe new life into a game that is more than a decade old.
Final Fantasy 14’s aesthetics, art design, and style have always been top-notch, but with the latest update, they’re also getting the treatment they deserve. This time, inspiration has been sought from the landscapes of South and Central America and the cultures of the native inhabitants, so there will be deep jungles, mountain views rising into the clouds, and surprises familiar to the game series.
It’s still a game that’s more than a decade old, so you shouldn’t expect miracles from improvements. For example, the costumes of the characters are still designed to be worn from afar, so in the intermediate animations you can see a really pixelated hat in some places. Still, the difference to the former is mostly large, and previous criticisms of the outdated appearance can now be put aside for the time being. However, Dawntrail would have been an excellent moment to switch to a completely new engine, so hopefully we don’t have to wait another ten years for the next bigger update.
Image: © Square Enix
A light but forgettable adventure
Final Fantasy 14: Dawntrail opens a brave new chapter in the world of the long-running MMO game. The newcomer, one of the most popular games in the genre, just ended a long historical saga with masterful threads, so a clean start from a new table will almost inevitably be lacking.
Unfortunately, Dawntrail is not only lacking, but also quite forgettable. The light story has its moments and you can’t avoid the benevolence, but the lack of real stakes doesn’t make you grasp the journey, and the hints of a new saga don’t tempt you to wait for what’s to come.
The new expansion is literally like a summer vacation, the only function of which is to reset the brain from the previous job. However, this time we have gone on vacation after finishing the former dunes, and there is nothing but a dark and endless emptiness ahead of us.
FINAL FANTASY 14: DAWNTRAIL
“The beginning of Final Fantasy 14’s new saga is still finding itself.”
Source: muropaketti.com
