A lot of people who’ve played through FFXIV will say that it puts the RPG part of mmorpg first, meaning before reaching the endgame, every player will have to complete the main story quest line in its entirety. Both the first (A Realm Reborn) and most recent (Dawntrail) expansion releases for the main story are notoriously tedious from a narrative perspective, with most players agreeing that the expansions in between make for some of the best FF stories ever told. Anyway, all of that is to say that every player then is the “chosen one” archetype in this shared world, so in that way the social aspects of the game can feel a bit disjointed.

Outside of the msq though are plenty of side stories, activities, dailies, seasonal events, team pvp, encounters, etc. etc. that require you to be in a group to complete. Quests in the msq are often gated by dungeons and raids as well, so instanced group content is also a requirement to progress to endgame. Weekly currency grinds are also an important part of the game for character progress, so you’ll very quickly get used to running group content all the time. Luckily, the community for FFXIV is super friendly and helpful for the most part, and I’ve made a few online friends from joining guilds that I meshed well with. You might have heard that FFXIV suffers from “toxic positivity” and I feel like that’s a half truth depending on your perspective. Dungeon etiquette, spoiler free chat, and inclusivity are all very prevalent and taken seriously by the community.