Wait.. I actually liked A Realm Reborn?! 

9 year FFXIV player here, and telling people that slowing down and enjoying things at their own pace might make the game more fun is a really hard sell for many who are used to a much faster burn, but it's cool to see when someone "gets" it because there's genuinely a lot to enjoy! Have fun in Heavensward ^^

ARR deserves more love my expectations were rock bottom bc everyone said it was so boring but I had a blast with it

When you finally finish Endwalker, you're gonna want to come back and react to this video. Don't rush it, go at your own pace. When you see and hear the things you did and talked about, you'll really understand why people love this game so much.

I think my mistake going into ff14 years ago was trying to play it like wow and burn through it and then i quit, a few months before heavensward i gave it another shot and decided to try and play it like I would an old school ff game and take my sweet time, it grew on me like nothing else.

If you enjoy the ARR story, then the expansions will blow you away

FINALLY!!! I am so happy about this. I've been following you in GW2 for a long time. Silverdisc was top 3 content creator for me. So seeing you here in my new favorite game is awesome. I genuinely LOVE that you have absolutely NO IDEA how much fun you're about to have. Wishing you all the best.

ARR is only "bad" story wise in the context of the rest of the expansions being released. Its still a great story! just if compared to the rest its not AS good.

I had a similar experience, GW2 is and will always be my main game, gave FFXIV a try ages ago with it's first like free trial. I think I got to like maybe level 15, and thought "meh this isn't for me" the story felt like I was just an deilvery boy, which is an RPG trope I hate, and like you said, the combat is no where as engaging as GW2's upon first impression. Later as I sort of established myself in a group of friends, they were all pretty into it, and one of them asked me to try it again. I did, I went back but played for maybe 2 hours before the same feeling of "meh" overcame me, staring at the same problems I had before. And Around the time stormblood came out, they were all getting super into it, talking about it constantly I thought "You know what I'll give it one last try." And After finally getting past ARR, and seeing that finale, and getting into some of the expac story, it got me invested until I eventually caught up with my friends and played a bunch of the post expac launch content with them. And there I found that how easy it is to raid, and join instanced content, is probably my favorite part. Because i've always wanted to raid in gw2 but getting into groups, and getting past the training phase is just such a big hurdle, I can't get into it despite trying. But with FFXIV, I can easily just queue up for the new fancy raid, and give it a shot knowing my job will simply just be "Hey you're just a DPS, jut do DPS things." And a lot of the time those new attempts go super smooth. Where as with gw2, roles are all mixed and hybrid where everyone is kind of a DPS, but you're also providing a boon uptime, or keeping everyone alive on the side. So in the end I'll always love gw2 and consider it my main game, but I do think FFXIV just does raiding better and more accessibly. Plus FFXIV's story gives itself room for a lot more dialogue, so it feels like more can happen with each story update.

I've had similar experiences to your unsuccessful attempts to get into FF XIV, and upon finishing that part of the video I'm now slightly scared to keep watching for fear that I will be convinced to give it another go and potentially get sucked into another MMO :p

love your analysis! cant wait for your thoughts on the expansions!

I always tell people to enjoy ARR while they can! I loveee coils it's actually the "true end" of Final Fantasy 14 1.0 :). I'm also a huge GW lore nerd (since GW1 even) and FF14 is soo refreshing omg. I enjoy how much I can dig up and pay attention to. Moment when you notice something interesting and it gets brought up 3 expansions later~ Also all the scions are pretty much the equivalent of PHDs and they keep right up with you...except maybe Yda who gets yelled at by Papa 😂. It's his version of tough love 🤣

I just finished the first part of Realm Reborn, just unlocked flying. It clicked the 2nd time i tried. I gotta say im loving FFXIV, it also makes me appreciate the uniqueness of some Guild Wars 2 mechanics. And it makes me think of what an absolute blast would be to have combination of those 2 games. Imagine the quality and quantity of the dungeons, raids, etc... of FFXIV with the exploration and freedom of GW2

You made a lot of comments here that mean I can't wait to see your progress through the coming expansions and what they throw at you - enjoy! I'm jealous you get to experience this, what I'd give to go back and experience it for the first time again >.

Q-Q I'm so happy, the youtuber I watched as a 11 year old kid is now on my fyp again for my new main game!! It's been a while Laranity! Glad you're back on my radar for my first year of college!

@15:22 oooh cant wait for u to start the dark knight story... that story is amazing

Just came across this video, and looking forward to your journey play through. This game holds a special place in my heart. 💜💜

Im happy, you like FF 14! GW2 was my main game for a long time too. My first MMO I invest so manny hours. Like you i try FF14 many times. First with friends and than 2019 alone and than it hook me. Sometimes you need more try´s. A Realm Reborn is a good start to learn the story of FF 14. Sorry, eng is not my native language. Have a nice day!

Safe to say that ffxiv compliments well with gw2 as both have different strengths. I hope to hear more of your ffxiv journey and take your time on this as this is meant to be savoured. Forge ahead little sprout :)

Knowing what's to come makes me so excited to see Lara go through the story.

The story of ARR 2.0 is very Shonen anime with power of friendship winning the day. It's when you get to the Heavensward content that it really turns into an epic for the ages.

I'm glad you're enjoying FFXIV now. I know it isn't for everyone, but it's always nice to see someone take their time to really get to know a game and enjoy it. Some other streamers are willing to help you experience some ultimates and savage fights whenever you get to that point. It is pretty neat to watch.

GLAD TO HAVE YOU WITH US ON THIS JOURNEY LARA! WE'LL BE WAITING ON YOU IN ENDWALKER

Glad you are having fun

What I love about this game is the combat system, sure it isn't as fast paced as WoW or GW2. However, its more tactical and nostalgic ABS feeling I like best. Depending on what class you are, positioning and timing is VERY important in this game when it comes to using your skills. I was playing as a Samurai, it was action enough for me and intense in boss battles.

1.0 Legacy player here. I’m still subscribed and have been since 1.0 early access on September 20, 2010. I have yet to run out of things to do. I am a Ninja main with it being Lv90. I’m just getting the rest of my jobs to Lv90. I’m doing other things like getting my crafting and gathering gear upgraded (all of the crafting and gathering are Lv90). You need to finish Endwalker and you will not regret it.

I've always found that it was not so much that ARR's story was bad, as it was that the way the story is told is bad. If you can tolerate the heavy dialogue boxes with minimal interactions, then you'll probably enjoy it, outside of a few genuinely repetitive and slow points that were mentioned in the video. But I personally had difficulty getting invested in the story they were trying to tell me until the post-HW 3.X content. I think they really struggled with the "Show, don't tell" aspect of their story telling for a while, and once they started getting better at that, the story got much more engaging!

I started playing FFXIV recently too. It's fun enough, but it really makes me miss a lot of things GW2 does and wish that more people would try GW2 as well. I can't get any of my FFXIV-playing friends to try GW2, and it makes me so sad. This review really hits on a lot of my feelings about the game too- I'm currently at the pre-Titan banquet fetch quest part and omg I am struggling to stay motivated haha. I hate playing errand boy!! Don't you know I'm the Commander?? 🤣 But seeing I have better content to look forward to, I'll push through. Also knowing that you're a Braham enjoyer: did you know Alphinaud in ARR is the same voice actor?!

It took me three tries to get into it too. I really wanted to experience Shadowbringers because of the hype. And wow did it exceed expectations. I’ve been playing for the last year now and I don’t see myself stopping anytime soon

I've been playing this game since release and I enjoyed your perspective on it. As such, since it was all brand new to me at the time, everything was pretty exciting and fun. I was burned out with WoW and wanted to try something more casual friendly due to real life changes. Going through the story at your pace is really the way to go. That being said I was wondering if you're planning to post your FFXIV story VODs in youtube as well, I think it'd be entertaining to watch them.

Just found this video and I adored your take on this. I hope you will make more similar videos in the future. ARR is a good story and a good game it's just that the stories that come after are better written there's three reasons for this. 1 is because the story of a realm reborn was created in a short period using assets of the 1.0 game and the focus was on recreating the game in a playable state. 2nd reason is because a lot of the devs were new to the idea of this type of MMO (on the one hand a themepark with quests leading you along to new hubs to dole out more quests. but on the other hand a coherent character driven story.) so they made some weird choices like having an arbitrary number of quests in between story points and each quest needing a certain amount of steps etc. 3rd they do a massive amount of exposition and world building in the first 75ish % of the story and then in the patch story they do more world building. they set up all theese dominoes so they can start tipping them over in the next expoansion or the one after or the one after that etc. the 2nd reason is part of why the banquet phase is in the story quest. It's also there to lead you to new zones for leveling because back when ARR came out you needed to do every single quest available to hit the level requirement to continue the story. So the main story quest lead you to new questhubs and then had a higher level requirement for continueing so you did all the quests in the hub dinged and continued on. it felt less stunted because you did stuff in between.

glad you gave it another chance! its gonna get real from here on :)

the casual shade thrown at FF15 at the beginning hurts my soul a bit lolcries T _T) anyway, i relate to a lot of the things you talked about in this video, except so far i haven't been able to overcome them. i've been playing FF14 on and off every few months/years, I put around 150hrs into the game, played through ARR, paid attention to it and really really tried to get into it, I really wanted to like the story..... but it just...... never happened. The way the story is told bores me to tears, I just couldn't get into it for the most part. But still, every once in a while I can feel that itch to sub to the game again for a bit and continue playing at least for the story because I'm so curious what people love so much about the expacs, and I wanna have the full picture before I place my final judgement. it was really interesting to learn about your journey with FF14 and how your views have changed over time! i'm glad you can finally enjoy the game now :>

I just finally bought a subscription to commit after also picking it up and dropping the game after a few hours each time. I went through the exact same thing and after a couple days im only level 20sm. Taking your time really is the way to go. Cheers to finally "getting" it.

I have come back to xiv after 3 year break. It has become an amazing game. Enjoy your journey warrior of light

I am the opposite. I have almost 1k hours in FFXIV and I found my home there, and while waiting for 6.2 I gave this month a chance to GW2. I might be a strange MMORPG player, but I'm more about enjoying the landscape and story while doing my quests and not going much off the main road. If you tell me "do whatever you want" I'll log off :D at least in game I like when it can lead me and I don't have to think much about what to do next. That's why exploration of big maps without any specific big goal or achievement at the end actually doesn't sound exciting but overwhelming, and I struggle to find motivation. I'm now so used to FF that it's difficult to get used to new mmo. Another thing is that I have health problems and am often too tired to learn all that comes with the new game. I turned GW2 on three times, and turned it off quite quickly, frustrated, and because I still didn't find main motivation to play it. I'm lvl 10 but I'm sill willing to give it a chance. Maybe it's just about figuring basics out and getting a little bit used to it. So, I truly appreciate that you put an effort to learn a new game and gave it another chance. And since I also happen to play on Light data center I might come and say hi to my white Au Ra sister, Laranity, soon :)

I started playing gw2 a long time ago with my friends and you were one of the first gw2 RU-vidrs that I watched. I've since stopped playing because my friends all stopped and I've since switched to ff14 (free trial at least) My personal thoughts are that if there were a way to get a full version of ff14 without paying the subscription I would, the story is really interesting, and the music is also a banger. Compared to gw2 I don't like the combat as much as it definitely feels clunky, and I have the same gripes that you had about the animations and invisible walls. I also think that the ff14 free trial, while generous, is not as good as gw2, being level capped at 60 feels a little bad, especially since the first ultimate is at 70. In the end, I still prefer gw2, the open world feels a lot better to me, I like the quest and heart system and the fates in ff14 just aren't the same. But the biggest draw of an MMO for me is definitely playing with friends, and while I still ask my ff14 friends to try our gw2, I'm still happy to play ff14 with them and help them clear the top tier content.

As per FFXIV tradition, I must respond to all of your story hopes and predictions with a non-judgmental, non-indicative :)

What a wonderful video... ❤️

I'm opposite, I'm an FFXIV player trying to get into GW2, but your videos have always been fun to watch. Any GW2 players got tips for enjoying the new player experience fully?

The music scene in 14 is impressive. I started listening to a cover band in Limsa once a week lmao

Welcome!

Yes - the really good stuff is still coming. Enjoy the deepness of the story. (BTW: Also, I still live GW2)

Dont get me wrong, I too played GW1 and GW2, and though I still harbor love for the former... the latter just... I dont know... always burned me out. I dont know what it is. I suppose I'm not the kind of player who in for the flashy action gameplay GW2 provides: I felt like a firefigher constantly running from one emergency to the next. FF14, with the story starting slower and even in hectic phases is always followed by a calm, was just more up my alley... There was enough action and tension to keep me occupied, but also enough relaxation that I wouldnt burn myself out again. Needless to say, I started FF14, got hooked immediately - because of all the "flaws" :D And yes, if you have a larger community to call upon, its way easier to get all ex trials and raids done... I need to find myself a proper CWL for my alt ^^°

LMAO this was great vid!Yes ff14 is not for everyone but if the game manage to hook you up you will be in a treat, good luck and Welcome to Eorzea

:) Glad to see more people joining the game. -- Fun stuff, I heard "not sure if it's accurate" that Urianger in Japanese is written and voiced to be overly polite in his speech patterns, and for English localization it was decided to have him speak in Old English Shakespearian as there is no direct translation to how he speaks in Japanese. All I can suggest is... take your time, enjoy the game at your own pace and play style, and thwack anyone who tells you how you "have to play"

okay so i started playing FFXIV last month and my sister was like just get through ARR and i was like i am really enjoying the story don't rush me! It's good and Guild Wars 2 really has my heart because it was my first MMORPG that really clicked for me and i played it like 8 years or something (really like my first love), but i do see FFXIV as a great game as long as you overlook the ever repeating go-here-then-there quests. wich i don't really like, but the story overall is enjoyable and get to me like GW2 could. so i really see a lot of potential, even though i still am storywise in heavensward. And if you've got the time just listen to the music, it's so great. FFXIV took me like 3 attempts to keep playing, but in the end? I am happy that i kept going

this game took over my life after only 3 months..a game where you feel a connection with your character and the world..great story and characters and the best community I've met...

I had the same issue, where I /should/ have liked ffxiv on the merit of it being a FF game and I love FF, but I also struggled for ages to actually get into it. When I started up in December, it just suddenly clicked for me and I've been hooked ever since. I think Endwalker's release was the perfect time for me to get into it, too, because my favorite class to play is Summoner and it had a massive rework for 6.0, condensing it down a LOT. Looking back at what pre-EW Summoner looked like, I wouldn't have enjoyed it at all. The simpler rotation gives me the opportunity to focus on the story of the game and learning fight mechanics, and it's given me the chance to actually get good at the game. I joined a raid static and everything, something I never thought I'd do simply because I thought raids wouldn't appeal to me, but some of the most fun I've had in this game has been doing the raids with friends. I loved the ARR story, but it definitely felt to me like it dragged on unnecessarily in some places, though I was more than willing to accept that and let it go once I knew about the fall of 1.0 and how Yoshi-P turned things around. A clunky story is understandable once you know they completely rebuilt the game from scratch in under a year. All in all, I'm glad I was finally able to get into this game, it's one of my all time favorites and I've made some genuinely amazing friends! I'm really glad you were able to give it another go and it clicked for you as well, it's truly a wonderful experience.

A Realm Reborn was made really fast, so those quest lines before Titan and to get the crystal were made (I'm pretty sure) as extra padding since they made the game in about a year and a half. I imagine the team was scrambling to make sure the game was long enough. I mean, they were scrambling in many areas, so that's my guess at why those two quest lines are Like That. The team has only gotten better and better at making the game as the years have gone on, so if you had a good time in ARR, it should only go up from here for you.

:') a new sprout, one of us.

You will have a good time reacting to this video after finish later expansions.

If you liked ARR then you are in for a treat. It only gets better across the board. Story, characters, PvE and music only get better. I hope you enjoy the ride it's worth it

Enjoy Heavensward, it's so worth it, especially after taking your time in ARR.

Wait until you go on some hunt trains with like 100 other people flying in the open world from monster to monster. Super fun

I have tried to play the game a few times, and definitely it has its good points. But I cannot enjoy the combat. It feels too stiff, specially coming from GW2. I was pushing through it to continue the story. The story gets better and better the further you are into it. I realized the game is just not for me. I still intend to finish endwalker. Since I bought the expansion and want to see how it ends. However, I noticed that I had payed a good bunch of months of subscriptions and played only very little. I think I will go back to the game next year, pay for 1 or two months and finish it all. I only stayed longer inFF14 on my third attempt. First time I played for a couple weeks, second time I played for a month or so, but I tried to level all the jobs at the same time. It was only on my third attempt that I tackled the main quest and found a way to enjoy that aspect of the game. It is a cool game.

I Initially didn't like FFXIV but I got hooked on my second attempt (late 2016, early 2017 late Heavensward era) because I was still looking for a good MMO on PS4 and at the time Warframe, TERA (RIP), and Neverwinter couldn't hook me either. While not having been my first Final Fantasy, game I think having played a few others since my first attempt at FFXIV peaked my interest once more. I made a new, similar looking character and chose a different starting class, that time a healer because I would later learn about myself that I personally prefer support roles over pure damage dealers (although I play those too sometimes now as I've become more comfortable with this game over the years) took my time with the story (I also think ARR is much better than what most people say) and I've been a seasonal player ever since. I've also recently migrated to playing from PS4 to PC when I built my first rig late last year. I really appreciate the cross play and cross save features of this game.

I quit wow for GW2 and i was blown away from GW2. After that i start ff14 and gw2 become my side game and ff14 main game. The same amount of time i put in wow now i can play 2 games and have a great time. Both games are nice but ff14 story click for me way too hard.

A Realm Reborn really is underrated. It suffers from pacing issues, even after an attempt to fix it, and the lack of voiced scenes throughout can make it even rougher at times. I will say that Urianger was kind of hard to like for me early on. I didn't really appreciate his character until Shadowbringers. Also didn't like Yda until Stormblood and Alphinaud until the very end of ARR.

i have yet to hit the "i get it" phase of my play through and I just finished stormblood. The questing, the lvling, the gearing..... all of it just feels like WoW and in some ways, worse.

glad you are enjoying the game though you are going in the opposite direction i did... i main ff 14 and play gw2 as my secondary. Have fun with heavensward!

I liked the buffet quests. It was like npc making fun of u for doing random stuff without asking why🤣

Gw2's respecting your time is a classic double edge sword. For someone like me who loves trying all types of different games and can easily burn out from a game, or someone who likes MMOs in general, it's a great back and forth game. For someone however who wants his MMO to be an 8 hour game investment like Asmongold or StaysafeTV, they might find it a bit lacking.

Hehe. Keep playing. React to this after endwalker c:

a lot would have to happen... *cough* shadowbringers *cough* endwalker

I'll reinforce that player sentiment I'm sure you've heard. You're definitely not the only one who says "I actually liked ARR". Vet here, I liked it too. But when everyone says "it gets better" it actually honestly does, and it's not even close. XIV became MMO king when Shadowbringers came out and Endwalker was the king securing its throne. Player sentiment for Stormblood is pretty low, but I liked it more than Heavensward personally. Please look forward to it!

Based video

ARR story is "the worst" because it has to be. Not everything can be 1st, 2nd, 3rd, or 4th. Something has to be last and that's ARR. It's a lot of world building but its fundamentally important. The other expansions won't be as impactful if you don't know what happened in ARR.

I find it funny how everyone is like "ARR sucks" when 10+ years ago ARR was all I had and I enjoyed the heck out of it. Imagine liking ARR and waiting for Heavensward to be released. I can still remember how that feels today 7 years later

ARR felt slow because a big chunk of the early portion of the story was structured like a monster-of-the-week scenario that gets sidetracked with filler every couple of episodes and the low level combat only served to magnify that experience. I found that it was only around the lv45+ quests that the story started gaining a better focus and it just kept going faster until the first credits screen. While the post-ARR story felt like it was ramping things down again, every little sideplot always left you with an ominuous feeling that eventually culminated into the string of events leading to the start of heavensward. Best of luck with your journey through heavensward. I hope the changes in voice actors don't bother you too much lol.

All that world building that happens in ARR to make it slow, but has a big pay off as the story progresses.

FFXIV has a lot going for it, but I can't get past the agonizingly slow combat. If they cut the GCD in half it might be more tolerable. I did enjoy the story and the extensive list of emotes is something I wish GW2 had.

Only 2 problems I have with FF14 is, lack of build diversity in classes, even if it was WoWs current talents, but 2 option per row I'd be happy. And second, is PvP is just meh.

The fact that early FFXIV content is designed explicitly for people who never played an MMO before is half the reason so many veterans of other MMOs will never give the game a chance. Kind of sad when you think about it, but it is what it is.

I tried FF14, and I HATED it. I was bored inside of 10 minutes. I did NOT skip the dialogue.

ARR sucks initially but once you get past that into Heavensward, that's when the game kicks in! Pretty much on long term break from GW2 and enjoying FF14 for the last 7ish months.

I've also tried FF14 several times. Even when reading all dialogue and paying attention to the story I was very bored and nothing made me care. I'm not sure why. Maybe partly because of the lack of voice acting but I'm not sure. The biggest problem is that I felt like I was wasting time. And now I would have to pay for game time to try again. I have tried the game 3 times now and although I want to experience what people love about the game, I just don't see how the experience can be any different than my previous attempts. :/ Sorry for being a downer. The game seems great. x)

I just recently discovered Star Wars: The Old Republic after Josh Strife Hayes did a deep dive into it on his channel. I wound up neglecting GW2 for the entire month of July as I really got into it. In fact, it was the Festival of the Four Winds that brought me back to GW2 yesterday.

To be fair to Urianger, he speaks like that because he grew up reading old books. He's not so much pretentious as he is just an awkward nerd.

🥰🥰

Tidus laugh is life

Hard agree that harder contents really bring out the fun in FF14 combat! I also struggled to enjoy the combat, being too used to GW2's. But once I had to deal with gazillion mechanics, it really pushed me to my limits and kept me engaged. Looking forward to your HW journey!

Wow, Laranity is becoming a Final Fantasy content creator now?

as it turns out the trick is to play final fantasy xiv like its a final fantasy game 😂

Coming from GW2 the main thing I dislike about FFXIV is the ton of reading u have to do. To a certain extent also the clunkiness of the map, but all in all it's a good game and a welcome change from time to time.

ARR is the worst part of ff xiv. So if you liked it, you sure will like more the rest of the game :D

I tried FF14 many times since release. And yes, i was at Gamescom when they give a first look at FF14. I Love the FF-Universe. But FF14 never gets me. Its so linear and the Story don't catch me. And i was an WoW-Player at this time. Now I'm playing GW2 and FF14 is such a great downgrade to Gw2. Friends tell me that the Story will be great when i play 100 hours. Because the story has nothing at the beginning. But playing 100 hours a game i don't like, because it could get better? And than they closed the Free-Accounts. perhaps i give it the 30th chance to get me if it will be Free to play again.

So its more a combat orientated game then exploration orientated game and its a sub and is it a pvp world? hhmmm no ty.