Since no one has mentioned it yet, did you notice the particularly in-depth actions of the Trust AI during the dungeon? Hythlodaeus and Emet-Selch dodge the boss mechanics by teleporting. Venat does not. During the boss that hides underground, Hyth and Emet thinks it's silly because they can see aether, but instead of doing the same, Venat instead talks to you when the mechanics are happening, asking if you instead saw its behavioural patterns, its footprints in the snow, and learning to dodge it from those tell-tale signs. That's because unlike the others, Venat doesn't rely on the strength of her powers, but rather her experiences. She also knows you can't see aether, so instead she gently wonders if you can keep up, and if you ever needed a bit of help, teach you how to do the mechanics even without the powers of an Amaurotian. Because even in a Trust dungeon, Crystal Mom is watching over you.
Now, after all this time we've come to understand. Zodiark is the Darkness that was to keep us blind and ignorant to the truth, and Hydaelyn/Venat is the Light that showed us that suffering exists and that we must accept it as our ever present companion. Her 'Walk' was to show that she was with us all along, even though we didn't know it at the time. Step by Step, Struggle by Struggle. 'Answers' is an Explanation, and an Apology. 'Flow' is a Thank You, and Goodbye
I love that first report scene. It's THERE that you go "oh no..." and it's so beautifully timed, they're all like "then that means the villain has to be somewhere outside of Etheirys, right?" and then BAM, that happens like... immediately lol. As soon as she says "Greetings... can you hear me?" you know you're about to learn who the real villain has been all this time.
All this time you were pushing forward for Hydaelyn's sake...she was doing the same for yours. She knew you from even before the Sundering, she remembered you...but it would be eons before she would know you again. :( God I love FF14
And even when she first saw the spark of your soul drift in the Lifestream, she had to keep sending you back to be reborn, rejoined, to die and reborn again... all until the RIGHT you finally showed up. And even THEN she couldn't tell you all about it until it was time.
Well, to be fair... what Emet would later do to the people of the future happened _after_ the Sundering (and thus would forget what his opinions on the topic were before Kairos wiped the memories), and after his memory was wiped. And when he spoke that line in Ktisis, he either didn't remember what the WoL had told him, or maybe the WoL never mentioned _that_ part of the Amaurot arc, the argument they had just before going into Recreated Amaurot. It's a bit of a grey area, and I certainly don't blame a bit of hypocrisy. It's a nice touch of the storywriters, though, which rewards observant players who notice it.
@Dhalin I mean, he *is* being hypocritical there. He says "Who are you to decide our fate", yet who are the ancients to decide what creations should and shouldn't exist? In Hermes' mind, the ancients don't have that authority either, which is why he fetters everyone immediately after that line from Emet.
I guess that what people seems to forget here is that ascians where technicaly tempered, sure on much smaller scale, but still tempered, akin to how tiamat was, this emet-selch still has his full bearings around him, hell, he even says to the wol he takes offence to being called an megalomaniac lunatic, wich means that, IF emet wasnt tempered after the summoning, then maybe, things would have played diferently due to how diferent this emet-selch seems to be in contrast to his ascian self.
The big mind-blowing part of this to me was realizing the Sundering was intentional. When you visit the Antitower in Heavensward, The Word of the Mother implies that sundering the star into the Source and Reflections was an unintentional result of the fight with Zodiark. In Shadowbringers, Emet-Selch explains that the sundering was the basic nature of her power, but I still figured it was a byproduct of the fight. Before Endwalker, I'd figured summoning Zodiark had tempered the Convocation into sacrificing ever more lives, but I couldn't figure out to what end, aside from "being a primal". Instead it was the misguided desire for a perfect paradise: an impossible dream that would have driven the Ancients and Ascians to sacrifice everyone and everything to Zodiark, resulting in the same fate of every other doomed civilization.
Remember also that there is technically 2 timelines, one where she does it without us because of necessity, and then a convergence takes place that results in us going back to the past and then back to our time again. It did not technically "always" happen, but ultimately the way everything played out would be the same. That's why she tells us a convergence has taken place when we see her on the boat, and why she mentions something about it later in you know, that one moment ;p
@@Disconnected66 I don't think there are two timelines here, although I admit I may be wrong. It seems to me as if an alternate timeline is only created when a time traveler changes events enough to cause an irreconcilable paradox; if not then there's only one timeline that creates a stable loop (as with the events in the Alexander Raid). Venat met someone from the future that witnessed and influenced the events in Elpis, but didn't realize it was specifically _you_ until your actions matched the story you told her in the past.
@@RothAnim It's explicitly stated a dozen times that the rivers of time converged, and that there was a conjuction. Not only that, but we already have existing time travel happening in this story, written into stormblood MSQ Once the convergence happens, the events of elpis are canon, that's why argos recognizes us. But it is not currently canon that Venat was aware of us until the function even was able to exist for us to travel back. Which only happened due to another time travel that happened resulting in the tower being in the first and preventing the black calamity from taking place. It's not really an opinion at this point that there is more than one timeline.
That final cutscene hits so hard. All this time, they play Zodiark up as an evil God, then they make us feel like "maybe Hydaelyn actually is the bad guy", but this cutscene... Hydaelyn sundered the world to save us from ourselves. Had Venat just let things go on, man would have perished, not just to Meteion, but to their own self-sacrifice to Zodiark. She sundered the planet as a mercy, that we, her children, might one day live on and find a way to survive. I still tear up and cry every time I watch that scene.
I feel the same way. They would have continued to sacrifice themselves until they were extinct and the world was dead again, without Meteion's help. Only Zodiark would have remained.
It broke my heart when I saw Venat walking, bleeding, taking every hit for us and with us, she was and will always be my mommy :D, I never doubted her, even when I found out Hydaelyn is a primal, the story telling in this game is out of this world, how with each expansion we learn more about certain characters and we learn to understand and love them.
In a fucked up way hermes saved the world. If he didnt set the events into motion etherys was on the path to doom, they wanted a perfect paradise as well and thought themselves basically gods. Forcing the sundering saved the world, just not in the way the ancients would ever want.
It's funny seeing Emet-Selch asking "Who are you to decide our fate?".... when thousands of years later, Alisae will ask the same question of him. "Choose your enemies carefully, for you will become them."
I dunno, maybe being tempered by zodiark, having suffered for milenia after milenia of despair and anguish, and all those silly things, you know, maybe these little detail do things to a man... if you actually look DEEPER than just this statement alone, you will see that emet loathes the notion that he would be like that, wich means that, had he not suffered like he did and wasnt under the tempering effect to make he act on all that grief and suffering out of blind praise to zodiark, he would be more like THIS emet-selch, you know, the one that was said to be humble to a fault and that would always help other people, even to the very end he says he refuses to believe us, because HE would not allow the ancients to do what they did if he had any say on things, because yes, he agrees that it is wrong to do that.
Hythlodaeus said that their memories would probably return when it's their time to return to the star.. that makes me wonder if Emet had his memories return when he was on the verge of dying, when he told us to "Remember us".
Spoiler for last zone in EndWalker It does not. It is explicitly stated that he was made to "look the fool" by saying those exact words when you summon him in the last zone.
@@Elidan1012 Adding to the spoilers in the last zone of endwalker Yep it's not simply "dying" that does it, it's entering the lifestream. Once they had actually been dead, both Emet when we got him and then eventually hyth too once we got zodi. That caused them to be scrubbed of the aether blot and regained their memories. I think sometimes people conflate the whole "if you were tempered, your last moments before death are of your own mind" thing with this, but we know now that the elder primals did not temper their followers, so the only thing that happened when Emet told us to Remember, is he genuinely accepted that we were strong enough to carry on protection of the star, and to remember his people. We won that respect in ShB, and then earned it in EW
I do think, however, that getting his memories back is the reason he answers the call of the Crystal of Azem during the events of 5.3: Reflections in Crystal.
Elpis was such a wonderful choice for the story that I would never, in a million years, have predicted. Venat is such a treasure and our connection with Hydaelyn truly became something personal because of her.
I'm super, super glad I didn't pick the "Can't trust you anymore Hydaelyn" dialogue choices early on in EW. I think people were misled by some of the Shadowbringer story beats that she was going to end up being the secret villain or something.
@@manwiththemachinegun yup pretty sure it was an intentional bait. Emet doing his thing making you doubt her by selectively telling half truths back in Shadowbringers. I knew she would still be big good all along.
@@manwiththemachinegun I feel that when Emet told you that Hydaelyn is a primal, a lot of people forgot about Shiva, the girl who turned herself INTO a primal. I kept thinking the whole time "But what about Iceheart and Shiva?"
@@TenaciousBree True, but then that smile emet gives at the end is just that much more painful because he remembered what Hermes did to us. And that at some point, we Actually we're friends.
@@bbeckford90 I’m not sure how I just saw this lol, but someone brought up the point that Emet doesn’t remember all of that until he actually enters the life stream.
The deepest meaning of Answers is exactly what you brought up at the end there. But there is more than that. It doesn't stop at the Final Days in the time of Amaurot; it also has meaning beyond that. Venat sundered them so everyone would be able to live in a world with suffering as a companion. She knew no matter what they did, it would always be there around the corner and there was nothing they could do to achieve a paradise where there is no suffering. So while the lyrics speak of the Ancients themselves, it is also a song meant for all of the imperfect beings she had brought about. They would be forced to "live, die, and know" the meaning of this song, over and over again. Their plight would be repeated. Answers has not changed since it was released but the meaning behind the song has only grown since then. Just another way of saying that this game and it's music are masterpieces.
When you consider that Answers is canonically sung by Hydelan, it always made me wonder who the deep-voiced chorus singers were. At this point I figure it's the Ancients / Ascians lamenting everything. The -ENTIRE TIME- we have had the answer, only for us at the end, to understand the question.
When I returned to Krile at the end of this part, here's how it played out in my head-canon: Krile: Ah, Warrior of Light! You were gone longer than expected. Did you discover anything of import? WoL/Me: Well Krile, I had quite the day. I talked with the...ghost? Shade? Something of someone I killed. He was surprisingly cordial, considering I killed him. And all his friends. And basically his entire race. And made their millennia of work all for nothing. One thing lead to another, I ended up 13,000 years in the past, befriended an OG god before they were cool. Then I encountered, or mayhap created, a Grandfather Paradox, and now I must needs travel to the literal edge of the universe and chase down a monochromatic little girl with cute little wings on her head. Krile:...nani!?!?!?!
That scene was like... imagine one day as a kid, you go to school, and you learn EVERYTHING. Literally every bit of knowledge that has ever existed and will ever exist. You are now omniscient. Then you go home, and one of your parents asks you "Hey, did you learn anything at school today?"
My WoL: [places a hand on his shoulder] "G'raha... remember how you left a working time machine on the First?" G'raha: "...there are a lot of implications in that sentence, and I don't like _any_ of them."
I always wonder if Venat checked every newly born reflection of Azem, hoping its the one she met all those centuries ago. Until we came into being, finally.
When Venat turns black, I think it is a symbol. The wounds that the player suffers during the adventure with the loss of companions or tragedies that happen before their eyes are impacted in Hydaelyn. Because Hydaelyn is with the player from the beginning. "Think, hear, feel" is the first sentence we hear when we create our character.
The transition back to the present feels soooo jarring; from emotional damage back to normal and it hardly seems like our scion friends are even kinda moved by it. Elpis was so damn good, didnt want to leave. Also, Venat is so badass.
Well to me that is not that surprising, that tale would be something they would have a hard time fully wrapping their heads around, plus you were the one who interacted the most and were the closest to Emet, and only one who met "Hytlo" with all that them focusing on the issue of averting the end of the world and not getting to meotionaly involved in the tail does make sense
Recalling back to Emet saving us in our fight with the warrior of light/elidibus and now understanding why :( we beat emet and when he returned to the star he remembered us, and came back to save us from Elidibus :(
"I’m really sorry about all of the singing" Don't be! You have a lovely voice! It still blows me away that we've had the "Answers" all along, we were simply missing the question! (cue Douglas Adams and the Hitchhiker's Guide)
57:56 - Wow... You're taking this really hard, and you haven't even gotten to the real tearjerker yet. 😭 (Watching with worry) Edit: Okay, I guess I didn't have to worry. You took the rest of this well enough it seems.
@@TenaciousBree - Hm. Fair enough. Given what had happened, one would be stunned as well (Seriously, I was frozen for a good minute plus before continuing the game).
Aw poor babies...Meteion and Hermes...It makes me so sad to see them so innocent and then see what they become... But, another note, this section and the lvl 89 stuff really made me feel validated for never doubting Hydaelyn.
@@TenaciousBree Don't mention it, it's my pleasure!!! I hope we cross paths in the Duty Finder someday! Looking forward as always to more of your adventures. 🥕
God, Emet-Selch (Hades) is such a BOSS in Elpis and is the best character in FFXIV!! I really love what they did with his character design and development. Especially the times when he's in his clear three distinctive moods/personalities. The first mood is his usual lazy, sassy, sarcastic, laissez-faire self who can't be bothered to do anything because it's a chore. One where he portrays himself as superior to everyone and is far above menial/trivial tasks. This is basically his outer defensive wall and the standard persona he always shows everyone at first when he's not serious or acting in any sort of official capacity (a lot of it which, he doesn't actually mean as shown by Hythlodaeus always giggling in response or commenting that he knows Emet-Selch (Hades) doesn't really mean that). The second mood, is his professional persona. He becomes very serious and straight to the point, but he's also incredibly impartial and fair. When he's in this mood, titles, roles, and ranks do not really matter to him. He will speak to and work with anyone or anything -- doing whatever it is and whatever is necessary, for good or Ilm, to carry out his duties; to obtain the truth; to maintain order and balance; and to protect his world, his home, his people, and his friends. The third mood, which we rarely see and only catch glimpses of here and there, is his soft and vulnerable side. The side that genuinely loves and deeply cares about his friends. This side is the one that often caves into the whims of his friends. It's this side that willingly tags along and puts up with his friend's shenanigans because: 1) it's amusing/entertaining, and 2) because he doesn't want anything bad to happen to them. As such, Emet-Selch (Hades) is generally the first to jump in and help his friends when in trouble or in need. It's also the side of him that genuinely can't stand to see his friends and loved ones ever sad or in pain. *** WARNING: Late Endwalker Spoilers to follow *** This is why you learn the following: FIRST --- Emet-Selch's (Hade's) two classes/jobs are Dark Knight (DRK) and Black Mage (BLM). When he's with his friends and assisting in their shenanigans, he's always in his Tank stance (to protect/shield them). When he's acting as a Convocation of 14 Members in an official capacity, he's always in his Caster stance (as it was seen/viewed as more powerful and respected). SECOND --- Emet-Selch (Hades) learned to recall a soul adrift on the aetherial sea back to his side and remake their physical bodies using Aether and Creation Magick from his best friend, Azem (you/the player), which was Azem's specialty magick based on his Convocation of 14 role, "The Traveler and Counselor to the People." This is how Emert-Selch (Hades) was able to find Y'shtola's soul adrift in the aetherial sea and bring her physically back to you (any fully clothed!) in the Rak'tika Great Wood after your conflict with Ran'jit in the Shadowbringers expansion. If you paid attention to the in-game cutscene, despite at first glance it appearing to the other Scions that Emet-Selch (Hades) was trying to manipulate the WoL by doing some "charity" work to win favor; in truth, Emert-Selch (hades) just couldn't stand to see how sad and upset you (Azem/the player character) were from the sidelines over losing Y'shtola. So, like usual, he caved in and decided to do something of great magnitude for you (reviving, remaking, and redressing Y'shtola). Despite it normally being forbidden by the Convocation of 14, something not normally allowed by his role as Keeper of the Aetherial Realm/Underworld, and something that requires a great deal of effort/aether to perform. This shows you exactly how much Emet-Selch (Hades) truly loves and cares about you. And yes, at this point in time, Emet-selch already knew who you were (albeit a single shard/fragment of your former self). He does have Soul Sight after all. THIRD --- Lastly, if you didn't pick up on it at the end of the Endwalker expansion in Ultima Thule, Emet-Selch (Hades) found and had been carrying around your/the player's (Azem's) Convocation of 14 Soul Stone. He thought he had lost his best friend forever in the great sundering. In part as a show of respect, and in part due to his sorrow and longing, he took your Soul Stone and carried it close with him everywhere for the last millennium. He took it upon himself to carry on your mission. He explored and visited countless places and assisted countless people in your stead while he was heartbroken over the loss of you until he simply couldn't take it anymore (he gives a nod to this while also giving you hope and a goal/mission to carry on and expand your horizons before he releases his and Hythlodaeus's should back into the Aetherial Sea). In Shadowbringers, Emet-Selch (Hades) attempted to revive and recreate Hythlodaeus in his shade of Amaurot, but couldn't because his soul was actually still trapped and bound by Zodiark on the moon. So, he made the next best thing, a memory/shade of the highest caliber, and entrusted it with guiding you/the player (Azem) and giving you your Soul Stone back should he/Emet-Selch (Hades) be defeated by you.
I love all of this, but I wonder where it is all stated, is this headcanon stuff or is it in the lore books, or did I really miss all this in the MSQ? If this is all true its fucking even more tragic good lord.
Answers. a song that Kept it's secrets for a decade. To think, when Yoshi P took over during 1.0 and this was debuted as the server shutdown song, they already knew the direction of the story. This game was a masterpiece in regards to its story and music.
they had no idea. thats why the intentions of hydaelyn and zodiark were rewritten several times. they just got better writers with time who tied these threads and references into it well.
More singing! Also I love everything going quiet just for the last of the lyrics to reach out it's so haunting. I was keeping it together when I this scene was happening but when I heard, "Thou must live, die, and know." I teared up
There are many little moments in Endwalker that have made me emotional, but the events in Elpis were by far the first to get to me personally. The following cutscenes with the final days hit hard, I definitely didn't make it any better rewatching the scene with the glam I finished 5.0 with on lol, absolutely moved to tears. 😭 💜 P.S. All the lil WoL x Emet quips strewn throughout this ep made my day lol, good stuff. Your reactions bring me so much joy 😂
(About Venat's flashback) I'm not sure I could do it, honestly, if I were in Emet's place: knowing that my dear friend Hythlodaeus was among the number who would be sacrificed to save the star and summon Zodiark, could I still go through with it? It's no surprise, then, that by the time we encounter him on the First that he's bitter and jaded, slumped over by the weight of it all - millennia of anguish and loss.
Emet-Selch realizing that it's not just the WoL coming for him in that scene, but Venat, the one person in all existence that 100% will not tolerate his BS.
It's always very imposing when Emet flexes that runic mask thing he does. Hard watching Venat take all the hits for us. Every rejoining. Every time she had to bail us out from something ridiculously OP like Ultima, or Emet's big move. I really love the parallel to WoL marching toward Emet - because it's the exact circumstance she's describing, the time the WoL had a purpose (to save the First, the Source, and all) and knew our end was assured (the warden's light would eventually consume us no matter what we did). To find the strength to continue when all strength has left you, when Ardbert gives up his aether to rejoin with us. To find joy even as darkness descends, like the comraderie of G'raha emerging to help us. It's actually on point, is my point, it's not just YoshiP + Ishikawa going with "flashback to 5.0 that made them emotional before"
This was one of, if not my favorite parts of the expansion so far. First we learn they were primals, so we get a bis of distrust, then at the end you see how much hydealin struggle for aeons, alone, always waiting for us, hits you like a truck. Her decisions and the burden carried alone, we see what it did to emet, hers was even heavier.
fun fact, when venat was stumbling forward and getting hurt and covered in black stuff, that was supposed to be blood, but it would have increased the game's rating, so they changed the color to black, i guess to show the influence of dark aether increasing as zodiark became more powerful with each rejoining?
Pretty sure it's just implied blood still. On top of that, I find it to represent all the blood on her hands for sundering the the world and forcing them to live in an imperfect world as imperfect beings. Perhaps it's also supposed to symbolize the amount of guilt she feels for making them suffer but her decision to sunder the world was made with the determination and conviction that you see in her eyes as she continues to walk. That said, I feel like Zodiark's strength getting stronger is another layer there. Needless to say, the entire scene was insanely deep and very masterfully portrayed.
"After speaking with Venat several cutscenes will play in sequence" Translation: "Hey, we know you just got done with a very emotional part, so we prepared this extra helping of trauma for you to wash it down with."
@@TenaciousBree Before you go into Elpis before he fades away he'll make a comment like , " Wait. I know you." Or something along those lines . Because You was the " Falling star" he was waiting for to deal with Pandaemonium (assumedly some time BEFORE the sundering of the ancient world where you learn Ilidibus' true name )
Ahh Thanks! First time watching your reacts and gotta say you're really cute with how you go about it... like a real life Lala... hopefully you're not actually 2.5 feet tall 😅
I was lucky I started playing ff 14 six months before Endwalker so I got to experience the story from start to finish. I love the FF games but this story line took the cake. I did not fall in love with the other scions till SHB and Endwalker. Had to take a break for 2 weeks after I finished Endwalker in search of more games with good story's.
I have watched so many streamers go through this cutscene and they all say it's the best cutscene and such, but you're the first one I've seen who visibly had to struggle to hear both the cutscene and Answers at the same time because the lyrics we've memorized were hitting in a completely different way and we couldn't just ignore that! I interpreted "our plight is repeated" to allude to the Final Days being repeated, something she knew would eventually happen which is why she caused so much suffering. That we might be better equipped to handle it the second time. Mind you, my interpretation only makes sense if Venat saw the second Final Days as something "already happening in the future" to fit the present tense phrasing. Timeline junctions are weird.
One thing came to mind with Meteion's speech at 39:33 "We have seen enough. The children of Sol cry out for salvation. You promised them life, but deliver only death, as you have for so many before. Enough. Enough death. Enough life. You have no pieces left to place. The game is over. Do not be afraid. Your pale heart holds the key. This time... There is no escape." -The Witness
She's vaguely following the rate at which I played through it... If that continues to be the case, right after Elpis, we can expect a short break and then everything else in one night despite how late it gets by the end of it.
Wrapping up Elpis: "Well that was great, but I'm emotionally drained. At least we're back to fighting for the future and done with the heavy feels for a bit!" When the Final Days cutscene kicks in: 👁👄👁
27:30 Yeah, so this was the only dungeon I did as a Trust in the entire game, aside from the very first one in Shadowbringers where it was available, I think. I just love how they just automatically know all the mechanics. It's so dumb. 1:10:48 Yeah, I love that those voices in the trailer that everyone thought were Fandaniel or someone else important were just some unnamed ancient dudes.
Hermes's choice to accept what Meteion says was a childish will of accepting what bs 'truth' his 'child' spoke to him just because there was evidence of truth brought by endless failures in finding another answer, even when that answer was found countless times before but overlooked because no single person is different. His blinding love for her turned him as nihilistic as his edgy "everyone dies eventually" daughter who hasn't lived nearly as long as most yet chose that life do to the heavy burden placed on her by Hermes's desire for answers to questions that shouldn't be answered for there is no single universal answer for everyone.
A friend pointed out something subtle in elpis. Everyone in elpis has a close friend, a group of peers or a lover if you look. Everyone. Everyone has connections except Hermes who created his closest companion but kept her emotionally immature. He is solitary, alone and unsocial, even losing out on more than one oppurtunity to connect with people like the woman who adored his work and wanted to be closer to him. His feelings of alienation lead to this, being able to see an ugly aspect of his society everyone else overlooked but unable to open others eyes to it. In the end it rendered him unable to realize rhe flaws of his work with metoien and address them when establishing her network by having a group of peers to support him.
Gotta say, after seeing you sobbing over Emet and Hythlo losing their memories, I was totally expecting you to just break down all over again at "Answers", 'cause I know I tear up every single time I watch that final sequence. Totally stunned gaping silence was pretty funny tho😂
Upon finishing up for the night with Ktisis Hyerboreia, and her reaction to "her boyfriends" forgetting her, I imagine her husband/boyfriend/partner seeing her as she left the game room and being like, "So, babe...did you...enjoy your game session?" and the next half hour is just her blubbering the events without giving any context, and him awkwardly trying to be a patient, empathetic listener.
I’m kinda surprised that so many of you seemed to think that any of the Scions would actually die. It was ridiculously obvious that their Plot Armor made them nigh invincible. It’s ridiculous to think that our characters face such world-ending issues and yet very few characters ever die. Moen, sure, Papa, and Breastfillia, but the rest keep surviving. Heck, Cat Girl has technically died like, what, four times and gets brought back again and again? Use Flow and GO AWAY FOR AN EXPANSION. Honestly I’m tired of the Scions and I don’t want to see any of them for at least one expansion. Give us not only a new story but a fresh start; bring the Scions back in two or three expansions.
@@TenaciousBree I’m literally not speaking about only you, youngster. I’m referring to the XIV fandom as a whole, including my own 21 year old daughter who wept a lot during Ultima Thule.
@@EatTheMarxists she probably cried because the “deaths” in ultima Thule pretty clearly weren’t actual deaths. Thancred and Estinien could be called death fakeouts but the rest aren’t. It’s a big defining moment in all of their character arcs, of course it’s emotional. And while we, the players, know they’re alive, the scions go to their sacrifice as if it’s their death. And yeah, that means something
Idm the singing it was cute, but i still despise the whole theme of "suffering is needed or life looses its worth" moral.... And im sad you cut out so much of the dungeon, gotta look that up^^
I don't think the theme was that suffering is needed, but that suffering is inevitable. The ancients did not have a utopia. It's very much emphasized in the story that suffering and sorrow is undesirable. I mean, all the Scions strive to reduce suffering. That's like the whole point of the Tesleen arc and the idealistic twins. However, despite the Scion's efforts, we are led to believe that they will never truly eliminate suffering. Given this fact, it is better to accept it but try anyways rather than yield to despair and fatalism. We must strive to reduce suffering with the full knowledge that it is an impossible task. Eventually, the Scions learn that the universe WILL end and all their efforts ARE FUTILE. Still, they press on in full knowledge and acceptance of the inevitable. The hope described in the game is not one where there is a happy ending in the end. It is one where despite the burdens it is hope to keep going forward regardless for the happiness that may yet be found along the way. As cliché as it may sound, this really is a story about the journey, not the destination.
It's not the moral though. The moral is "the world sucks cock, it's full of pain and suffering, but there are reasons to love it and live despite that"
![Thou Must Live, Die, and Know | FFXIV Endwalker Reactions [Part 14]](/img/logo.svg){kind=logo}
