At the time of writing, Final Fantasy XIV’s servers are down for maintenance. When they come back up on June 28, players will dive into the new adventures awaiting in Dawntrail. This means that the age of Endwalker is over. On the precipice of a new beginning for the MMO that has been running for over a decade, I wanted to look back on the game’s uneven, tedious, but ultimately emotionally resonant finale.
I completed Endwalker—checks watch—roughly twelve hours ago. I did not finish the most recent expansion until just before Dawntrail, rather than in the weeks and months following its 2021 release, even though I started the expansion with everyone else. And that has to do with one of Endwalker’s major flaws: pacing.
The stakes of Endwalker were incredibly high. It was positioned as the end of the Hydaelan/Zodiark saga that began in A Real Reborn. While it wouldn’t be the end of the MMO, it did signal the end of an era. That means a lot of story threads had to be tied up in Endwalker, and not all of them are done so cleanly. Jumping from Old Sharlayan to Thavnair to Garlemald to the Moon to the past back to Old Sharlayanand then to the end of the universe is a lot of mileage in one expansion. Each of these locations includes its own characters and stories that depict how the world is preparing for the end times, but none of them get the room to breathe they so desperately need. While moments in Elpis with Venat and the other ancients stand out as a high point in the expansion, my time in the other locations is mostly a forgettable blur.
The slog is what held me back from completing Endwalker until only recently. After the high of Elpis, players are forced into an extensive marathon in Sharlyan that amounts to the most mundane fetch quests. Elpis ends with a high-adrenaline cascade of story reveals and emotional moments and the player then has to put that on the shelf to go carry boxes. This back-and-forth between engaging design and tedious mundanity makes Endwalker a rough expansion to get through—even if it is a sort of perfect encapsulation of FF14.
The end of the world as we know it
Endwalker boldly tried to subvert players’ expectations for a grand finale. Within the first third of the expansion players do the impossible: Defeat Zodiark. The big bad is gone. But the end of the world is still coming. The rest of the expansion then slowly reveals Meteion as the true villain, a creation of an ancient that has spent years becoming disillusioned with life due to the never-ending suffering and death she has witnessed across the universe. It becomes a story about resilience in the face of the base evils of existence. Essentially it’s Final Fantasy XIV’s take on The Myth of Sisyphus. Yeah, we know life kind of sucks and everything ends, but we still hope and dream that there are better things.
One moment stands out as the high point in the expansion: The cutscene after players complete The Mothercrystal trial. In it, Hydaelyn reveals that to send players to the end of the universe to face Meteion she will give up her aether, essentially leaving her children alone for the first time. “Long after I have gone, though not even my souls remaineth,” Hydaelyn says in her final goodbye, “My love will be with you forever, my dearest children.” In that goodbye, we can call her by her true name, Venat. We can see her as no longer a god, but a woman finally able to rest at ease knowing we are safe in each other’s hands.
Sadly I find that the Endwalker’s ending is a messier conclusion that fails to reach that same height. After finally facing down Meteion, players have one last battle against another villain, Zenos that leaves the player tired. I genuinely sighed in exasperation when I had completed the final dungeon, then the final trial, and had to face Zenos in an instanced event. It’s a letdown compared to the operatic encounter with Meteion and it undermines the expansion’s last moments.
Endwalker was always going to be a hard expansion to pull off. It was the follow-up to Shadowbringers, generally considered the height of FF14 and one of the best Final Fantasy stories period. In addition, it had to wrap up a decade-long story but not wrap it up so conclusively that the MMO couldn’t continue in later expansions (such as Dawntrail). That’s a lot to accomplish and I’m not sure anything could have lived up to players’ sky-high expectations. And yet within the flawed mess of Endwalker is so much beauty.
Endwalker’s successful moments are owed to the years-long relationship players have built with this world, its characters, and each other. Watching my Warrior of Light face down the end of times with the Scions of the Seventh Dawn pulls at the heartstrings in a way no other game can. The central conflict against Meteion is an extreme test of their (and my) convictions. As heroes of the realm, our mission has always been to find hope even in the darkest of times. Endwalker is the extreme of that. Do I really think going through all these boring quests is worth it to get to the end of the expansion, to save the world, to see these characters earn those happy endings? Yes. I do.
I love Endwalker and all of its flaws because I love Final Fantasy 14 and all of its flaws. In that sense, Endwalker epitomizes the MMO I love. It also sends it out on a beautiful note. When asked what the Warrior of Light will do next, my character gives a wry smile and looks to the sky. She’s clearly looking forward to the next adventure. Even if I never saw her and the Scions again after this, I’m content.
With Dawntrail just around the corner, I’m conflicted. My love for Final Fantasy 14 has been reaffirmed by Endwalker, but the stories of the characters I love were wrapped with such a fine bow that I don’t know what else the game can offer me. I think of Venat’s final words about sending her children out into the world without her. They don’t need her anymore. I don’t know if they need me, or any player anymore.
Dawntrail promises to pave the way for new stories to come, only time will tell if they are still worth telling.
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