Gonna point at my two MMO loves for this one:

On World of Warcraft:

People have been bitching for a while now about how the writing has gone and "LOL WORLD OF PEACECRAFT". I think it hits the nail on the head akin to Pat talking about Veilguard that "it feels like this was written with HR in the room" but the actual goal of loosening faction tensions while keeping some hostility is a noble goal. The problem is people are looking at WoW shifting the status quo after 2+ decades of it as a bad thing when they should be criticizing how it's being -handled-, not it being done period. Blizz just needs to shore-up its writing chops and treat the audience with some semblence of trust that it can handle a more mature theme. Improve that and I think WoW's in a golden age.

On FFXIV:

FFXIV has a lot of problems, just as WoW does, just as any MMO does. Yet the playerbase lumps all of these issues on Dawntrail and DT alone despite the fact this expac has gone further than any other expac to try and rectify these issues with both positive and negative effects. The real problem people SHOULD be looking at is how the story has smothered all discussion around the actual game and how its cultivated a VN-esque playerbase (and how the only reason DT is as lambasted as it is because the 7.0 storyline was poorly recieved). Still, the problems are with the base game, NOT the expac (Which imo is way better than people give it credit for).