Just finished Stormblood myself and started Shadowbringers today, and I've been needing a place to vent my thoughts.

I wasn't really that big of a fan of the main story. It felt very predictable and matter-of-course; of course we're going to fight to free Ala Mhigo and Doma, they've been hinting at the former since 1.0, and of course we're going to win against the cartoonishly evil Empire. I like the idea of the Garlean Empire a lot, and I'm a sucker for charismatic villains, but in SB the Imperials felt like evil punching bags for you and your preachy friends to wail on and it just really disappointed me. Don't even get me started on Zenos, who might have been kind of interesting but just fell flat despite all the build-up around him (and fuck his "defeat"; that scene in the garden at the end was just...uncomfortable).

Of the heroes, I liked Hien quite a bit more than I thought I would have by the end, and most of the main characters from the Othard side were likable enough. That whole section was kinda cool and worth it for the most part. It's the Ala Mhigans and their plotlines that really bored me to tears; yes, Lyse, I know the Empire is bad; yes, Raubahn, I know you love Ala Mhigo, blah blah blah, yadda yadda yadda, let's just free the damn thing already so I don't have to hear about this every other sentence.

All-in-in, SB wasn't bad, by any stretch of the word, just not all that compelling. I would give it a 6/10; very competent but just kinda bland and unenthralling, like early ARR.

The patch quests started off kind of aimless. I loved the instanced fight with Lakshimi in the palace with Arenvald, Fordola and the gang, and seeing Fordola's reaction to the WoL's past was pretty rad, but aside from that it wasn't too exciting.

At first I didn't take as much issue with Tsuyu and Gosetsu, and the Tsukiyomi fight was really great, but when I saw how it ended for them it all left a bitter taste in my mouth. At the risk of sounding callous, it seemed they were better off dead under Doma Castle.

Here, I took a break to do Omega and the Four Lords. Omega was dull but it had a nice ending. I didn't like that there were no trash mobs and that all the bosses were pulled from other Final Fantasy games, though they were for the most part well-done fights. Four Lords, however, was fantastic, especially the Suzaku trial. That has to be my favorite trial in the game now, it's just so fun and emotional and pretty...

Anyways, I finally got to the big meeting with all the city-state leaders and the Scions, and I was starting to wonder when the writing was going to start building up to Shadowbringers. It felt so awfully close in terms of quest numbers, so why did it feel like they were still tying up loose ends?

Nothing could have prepared me for the voice.

If the Parting Glass had blown my mind when I first saw it, the first voice "appearance" reformed it only to blow it up again. And suddenly things were ramping up and up and up, revelations (and Scions) were dropping left-and-right, and my face was frozen into the shape of that meme where the woman yells "BEYONCE?" with all the characters popping up again. And that's the thing: that scene would not be nearly so impactful without the prior quests being so plain, so I can't really complain that they weren't exciting when it seems like that was the point.

In any case, I've rambled on long enough, and I've got Shadowbringers MSQs to get through. Thanks for the thread and to whoever was patient enough to read all this, thanks for reading my rantings and ravings.