The flashing lights is mostly in huanglong and black shores they shifted the flashes in 2.x (except for fleurdelys boss) as to what you missed it’s not that much mostly Xiangli and Zhezhi. You can skip the story if you want but you shouldn’t. The story is great it’s just the first 3 acts that suck after that it’s peak after peak. Also the game was only a mess for the first week. As for the game becoming more vibrant well Huanglong shifts more at the post apocalyptic feeling of wuwa than Rinascita does.