Final Fantasy XIV

Play it on: PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, Windows (Steam Deck: YMMV)
Current goal: Keep inching ever closer to the game’s expansions

The other day I saw this meme image on Twitter (or, if you must, X) and had to laugh. It’s a variation of the well-known image in which a man with a pickaxe turns back in the tunnel he’s been digging juuuuuuuust before getting to the good stuff that awaits on the other side of a rock wall. In this case, Final Fantasy XIV’s lengthy opening story arc, A Realm Reborn, is what he’s been tediously digging through, and he’s ever-so-close to the good stuff, the game’s expansions: Heavensward, Stormblood, Shadowbringers, and Endwalker. (Soon these expansions will be joined by Dawntrail, of course, but it’s too early yet to say whether the player base will consider it on par with these highly esteemed experiences.) That’s me right now, plugging away at A Realm Reborn because I’ve just heard so much good stuff about what lies beyond, and at times, it does feel like a bit of a slog.

Still, even if the narrative isn’t sweeping me away, I can see it all serving as necessary set-up for things that might pay off in big ways in the expansions that await me. And I’m enjoying the lovely and varied world, maybe the game’s greatest asset. I hope the talented and hardworking artists and visual designers who created the architecture, the objects, and the environments that give each region such a rich and distinctive feel were paid very well for their work, because that, more than anything else, is what’s keeping me playing right now. I particularly love being in the forests of Gridania when dusk falls; the vibes, as they say, are immaculate. Also, I just ran a dungeon set in a haunted manor, which made for a wonderful change of pace from the more “dungeon-y” dungeons I’d done up to this point. So I don’t intend to be like the man in the meme and turn back any time soon, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t really eager to get to the better stuff (or so everyone says) that awaits. — Carolyn Petit