We need to talk about this main story The Search for a Reborn Land

My journey through Final Fantasy XIV continues quickly. My bard and black mage are now at level 46, and I’m currently searching through the ice of Coerthas, which seems strangely French, with all the names ending in -x and -eau. When I started playing, my circle of FF14-my fellow players told me to be patient. A reborn realm it would be slow, but the story will come back until we get to the first expansion, heaven. I was expecting a slow burn, a gradual construction for a big confrontation with the bad guys I’ve been watching for the last 30 levels. What happened to me this weekend was not slow, nor gradual, but rather Square Enix, taking a gloved fist through my chest, rooting myself in my rib cage before taking out my still beaten heart and eating it. in front of my eyes, while I thanked them for their pleasure.

Final Fantasy XIV enthusiasts will probably recognize the quest I’m talking about – Bringing the Dead. Those who do not, correct warning, here are spoilers.

This story starts 20 levels earlier. I was instructed to visit a village of sylphs – small creatures resembling flying insects that appear to be made of plant leaves. The Sylphs had long been allies of the local government, but that relationship had deteriorated over the years. It was my job to fix it and bring it back into amicable harmony. Once finished, the sylphs thanked me for my efforts and sent with me an ambassador to help me and my comrades – the Scenes of the Seventh Dawn – in our fight against the shadowy powers that threatened war. I leave the ambassador named Noraxia in the care of my friends at our headquarters and take care of my business.

Levels later, I returned to headquarters to provide my latest report. When I first teleported into town, I noticed that there was a new group of “Worried Citizen” NPCs standing in front of the door. I realized it was weird, but I thought, “Oh, this must be my next search. The scions operate with little supervision and must alert the local population. It will be my job to calm them down. “I entered the headquarters and nothing was wrong. I went downstairs and through the door to my superior’s office, and I remember the visceral physical reaction I had when I saw the ground. sprinkled with the bodies of my comrades. “Oh no!” I screamed.

It’s not the first time I’ve faced senseless death in an MMO. It happens frequently. A place I visited once was full of life, and later it is full of corpses. What pushed me about this experience was that the game went to great lengths to remind me of this. I met these people. In games, it is common for bodies to be indescribable and indistinguishable from other NPCs. They are usually a random assortment of races and genders of the game, all wearing the same three sets of generic NPC clothing. But these were distinct models, wearing distinct armor. The people in the bar imagined that my character would sit and drink something after a long day of Scion work. It’s really devastating to be able to pick someone from a mass of bodies and think, “that person sold me potions” or “that person repaired my armor” or “that sylph came here with me.” . See, Noraxia, the little syl ambassador, has also died. Her death was uniquely disturbing, she was entrusted to me by her people, sent to help save the world. I imagined they had no idea they were going to send one of their sisters to their deaths.

But Final Fantasy XIV I was not content to be left there with my grief. They planned to add insult to my injury. After a few intermediate searches, I was sent back to the place of the massacre, tasked with carrying the bodies of my comrades in a cart to take them to the funeral. When I arrived, I was greeted by an extremely tough worker, who basically says, “Oh, you look like a strong bastard, carry those bodies over and be quick, they start to smell.” You accept the search and you are suddenly aware of the pile of bodies thrown into an alley behind you.

The mission makes you lift them like any other mission object, but with a devastating twist: the bigger the body, the more it takes you – the action bar fills up faster or slower, depending on the size of the body on which you ‘reinteract with. Roegadyns Beefy takes longer to “lift” over Miqo’tes. But none go as fast as the tiny sylph, her small, leafy body contrasting sharply with the rest. Then, like any other mission, the bodies go into your inventory of key items and you have to hand them over to the funeral home. In most MMOs, if you pick up several items of the same type, they are stored in your inventory. In another raw twist of the knife, Noraxia’s body doesn’t add up to the rest. She gets her own inventory space with her own flavor text.

Whenever you complete a collection search in FF14, you must “hand over” the key to the mission NPC. When it came time to “teach” the bodies (represented by a white flower icon with some totally inappropriate flavor text), I didn’t want to do it. For a moment, my cursor hovered over the “hand over” command and I couldn’t click on it. I started to break. And my reluctance was well-founded. Whenever you “teach” something normal, you never see the article in question. Your character goes through the move to choose something out of pocket, the search the NPC accepts, but nothing ever materializes. When I handed over the body to the undertaker, they appeared behind the hearse, their mouths weak in mourning, their eyes open and their eyes fixed.

Damn it, man.

I like it when the mechanics of a game strengthen its story. In the Final Fantasy XIV, the commands you foolishly used throughout the game to complete missions – pick up, use, teach – have now become so heavily invested. The game forces you to think about exactly what you are doing, while the unpleasant reactions of the funerals teach you a meta-lesson of compassion.

In most MMOs, you are a death merchant. So far, I’ve probably completed dozens of searches asking me to shoot through dead bodies for one trinket or another. I did this normally and mindlessly, the dead are nothing more than a search box that needs to be checked.

The way the funeral home speaks to you, urging you to hurry, noticing that the dead will not care a little about the harsh manipulation, the scenario is reversed. It is the mindless seekers eager to tick that box while you are the one left behind by the devastation. How many times have I clicked carelessly through the text boxes of a widow mourning the fate of her husband? And now, when this was done to me, I am furious that I can’t somehow immolate these people with a Fire III spell.

This search is something that will stay with me for a long time. It became one of my moments of “this video game made me cry”, recorded with the pacifist end of Undertale and menu time in Final Fantasy XV. For all the pain and suffering this game has done to me, from the way you say it, this is just the beginning. I can’t imagine how the future storytelling moments of the game can overcome this, but I’m excited to see it try. As I went through this search, I thought of writing a strong letter to Square Enix detailing my suffering. There it is:

Dear Square Enix,

How dare you. What the hell? How dare you!

I like this. Please hurt me soon.

Love,
Me

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