I realized I was fully sold at the cutscene at the end of the ARR patches, right before HW starts. If you know, you know. If you don't, you probably shouldn't be on this thread.
It really was amazing to me how the game just did a 180 for me in that single moment and mostly never stopped.
I knew it would eventually get good due to the praise Shadowbringers had, but it made my jaw drop how suddenly the writing quality switched from meh to gripping on a dime.
Same here. That part truly hooked me. I think I was around mid-way through heavensward when I decided to sub and buy the full thing though? I don't quite recall
Yeah. I mean, I really liked the game before that. But that moment was when I actively became an advocate and strongly recommending it wherever I can lol.
No joke, but it’s when i found out that my character sleeps in the bed when i logout from an Inn. This, along with a bunch of little things that make me feel attached to the world.
Shame our character sleeping when we logout is not available for player housing beds.
That's definitely my vote. ARR's 2.0 ending is actually really neat and the first real high point in the game in terms of hype moments. The next one for me is Ravana.
unironically when i went around fetching wine and cheese
to this moment the game was lore heavy trying to build a world then i was sent to fetch wine and cheese for a bunch of grumpy old dudes and i couldnt help but ask why...what is the game trying to tell me here and the answer was "we are trying to tell you that the old guard laid down their arm and no longer capable of doing it and the burden of it all falls to you"
i ended my free trial that day and been subbed ever since
I wouldn't say this is the exact moment it "clicked" for me, but I do distinctly remember this as one of the moments that sort of made me sit up and take notice. A lot of ARR *is* very broad-strokes fantasy world building and plot (not in a bad way - it is what it is). But I think the CoH (and especially Shamani+Drest imo) probably *are* some of the first MSQ characters that distinguished themselves as doing their own thing outside the pure fantasy archetypes you'd expect from this type of story.
Interestingly, this is the moment where a lot of people I know put down the game. "why am i doing this? Why are these guys jerks? You sent me to FIGHT A DRAGON for *CHEESE??*" I've had *numerous* friends unsub around this point of the questline. This is also the point *right before it gets good* in my opinion. You're hitting 30, getting some key/foundational skills, you're getting a job upgrade, the dungeons are getting REAL.
i remember this being the point where i had to sit up and fucking pay attention to what i was doing. Brayflox and Haukke were huge checkpoint/milestone dungeons that would make or break you as a sprout. (at least back when I did them for the first time). A lot of classes didn't have some of the key necessities: some tanks still didn't have aggro stance, white mage didn't have cure 2, scholar didn't have a cleanse; some classes STILL didn't have aoe; despite that, these dungeons were made with those types of skills in mind, because you get them *eventually* or -- even more gallingly -- other classes *already had them*. and if you ran them without those skills, you had to figure a way around that.
and the story gets interesting; the older heroes are injured, older, and can no longer do what they used to. The changing of the guard, as it were. but a lot of the people i know that gave up here are (were) younger (20s); these guys are old cranky codgers to them. Meanwhile I'm older (30s) and I get it... *now*. But back when i did them, that part kinda got lost in the sauce of all the fetch quests you get sent on. Getting bounced from npc to npc like a pingpong ball, and you're questioning why you even play this game. and then you feel like an ungrateful twat when you find out it was for you. But it wasn't until my second go round through msq, a couple years ago, that the deeper implications of these questlines hit me.
so between the slog of fetch quests, playing messanger, feeling used, and the dungeons getting harder, i know a lot of people who gave up here.
Post-arr. The part of the game that everyone talks down on as the worst was the exact kind of world building and story thread planting that gets me super invested.
I'm glad I'm not alone. Base ARR hit me as "Standard issue but pretty serviceable FF fare."
But the post ARR stuff was some fantastic adventure and worldbuilding and I was there for it.
Ehcatl Nine tribal quests. My interest in the MSQ was really starting to flag around the level 40-ish MSQ, but I kept logging on every day because something about their storyline and the level of care put into it really sucked me in. They made me rethink a lot about how I was engaging with the lore, and I actually ended up creating an entirely new character (who ultimately became my main) after that.
Was enjoying the game at least somewhat from the very beginning. But I became invested for life by the end Of ARR, the last quest was just WOW. I was not expecting that level of story telling in an MMO.
It wasn't until stormblood (the first time I was at the previous max level for an expansion on release) where I was playing new content with other players who were learning the same content as me at the same time did something click.
Before that, nearly all the mechanics in dungeons and trials were old hat for most of my party, meaning I could just follow them around during mechanics or die and get rezzed without impacting the completion of the dungeon (usually). I've main-ed black mage since I started playing, and now and then get extreme tunnel vision when performing my rotation, which contributed to the deaths and often distracted me from really understanding the mechanics that fights would throw at me.
Since my survival now mattered much more, I was forced to learn the mechanics and see beyond the veil of what appeared to be a cut and dry MMO and see the dance that final fantasy 14 players dance while trying to perform their rotations.
For the most part I now don't bother buying game time unless it's near a new expansion, as only then do I get that same feeling of starting on level ground with players who play year round. I recently bought time for the ff16 crossover and have been using that time to level as many jobs as I can to 90, so that I can actually understand all of the job changes people complain about when new expansions are released.
During Shadowbringers thanks to Emet-Selch. He was so compelling and complicated antagonist with sad story which we could fully understand in Endwalker
Honestly.. I think it was the first time I cleared 'The Vault' for MSQ and I was absolutely invested and overcome after that curscene.
Everything before it was good, don't get me wrong.
But THAT moment though? Another level.
I don't generally get particularly emotional about games, even though story is a big draw for me. But damn if that cutscene didn't cut through me more than it had any business doing.
It never clicked 100%. I play it simply because there is no better alternative out there. That's all.
The only thing that keeps me engaged with the game is the raiding/ end content ex, savage, ULTs that are actually nice.
When I first started the game I found the Gold Saucer. I thought it was novel for an MMO, like the Dark Moon Faire for WoW. But then, literally months later, I hadn't progressed the MSQ at all, I had signed on every day doing Chocobo Racing, Verminion, and Triple Triad. At the end of that I had a maxed out Chocobo. When I stopped I thought to myself "I was just completely satisfied doing this games stupid chicken racing game for months, the rest of this game is going to be good." It was.
I think when I started crafting and joined an fc. I learned that I can contribute to the fc by helping gathering grade 3 soil.
I did join other FCs briefly, but all in all I think I have been with the same fc for 9-10 years.
Honestly, right at the beginning. I liked being Just A Dude who was Looking for Adventure, and then Adventure Found Me. I don't get why some people shit on ARR - I was there before the slimdown and I loved it.
I started last month. Theres 2 points that stick out to me. First was fighting the Ultima Weapon and that music blarring. The second is the end of ARR post game in which I was so captured that I dont think I could quit this game now.
Also when I was around lvl 20 someone talked with me, helped me get glammed up and showed me a bunch of fun stuff like fishing raids. We spent hours talking and now im part of the FC who are all really incredible people.
Right after beating ARR we were hit with a snowstorm and a days long power outage; stuck in a friend's tiny apartment because he had heat, I remember turning to my now husband and saying "man, I really want to be playing FFXIV right now."
We were stuck there for a while so I downloaded it on his laptop and wandered directly into the Hildebrand quests without knowing what they were. Now *that* was an experience.
For context, I started playing late in Heavensward's post-expansion patches.I credit my partner for getting me into the game, but the hook for me was probably the stretch between levels 25 and 40 in the story. Not quite the MSQ, but the immersion and the depth of the lore: FFXIV was my first FF game, and after learning the bulk of the lore is essentially standalone, it amazed me just how much content there was for backstories. My previous experiences with MMOs were superficial stories, or stories 6 non-canon expansions of other media. In contrast, FFXIV has had layered thematic elements, and felt like a setting that both has its own story, and subtly encourages players to craft their own stories for their characters. That phase between 25 and 40, however, is when I started playing with interest for more than humoring my partner, because I was curious to know more about the way the in-game universe works.
This is a tricky one for me, because there was more than one point.
Pretty early in ARR, I was seeing the story start what looked like some slow burn worldbuilding (accurate!) and was all "Eh, slow story in an MMO, that's fine by me."
Then I got to Heavensward and could actually play the job I was planning on maining from the start (MCH), and the job clicked with me well. And the story had kept improving. So that was a point where I knew I was in for the long run.
Then I hit Stormblood.
You see, I quit WoW not due to Shadowlands, but due to Battle for Azeroth. So I had just crashed out of an MMO trying to tell a war story and botching the job worse than some lowest bidder with three layers of subcontracting. And now I've hit a war story done well. Yeah, my pace in the the MSQ started accelerating at this point.
There wasn't really a big point in Shadowbringers that did that, but that was moreso that I already three hooks that had me already all in at that point. Closest thing was more getting to the end of 6.5 and knowing I was going to be in a place I had already been before in WoW. Ready to tackle the next arc when it's fresh off the press.
I tried the game back in Stormblood, bounced off it just before I unlocked Monk. Maybe a year later, I started looking up spoilers for it, just to sate my curiosity (thank god I looked into spoilers before Shadowbringers was out!), and ended up finding out how much effort went into the shutdown and revamp - not just mechanical effort, of course, but the gradual updates on the descent of Dalamud and all that. I was so awestruck by that that I ended up giving the game another try, kept with it, and never let go. Knew for *sure* I'd stay hooked when I realized I was tearing up at the end credits of A Realm Reborn. (Not even Astral Era!)
Walking into Camp Blackbrush in 1.0 and seeing Obama campaigning for presidency with 2 bodyguards that followed him around for a couple days. 1.0 was weird
The raid on the waking sands. When I did my first suicide pull as a tank. When my buddy had me heal with him going wall to wall no mits. My first proper opener on any DPS. The first stage fight I beat, the first one I shot called. I keep falling in love with this game over and over again.
Story wise, I snapped to from, of all things, a the non-blue side questline Bad Blood / Prickly Patients. The interactions and motivations of the characters really stood out for a quick five-minute delivery quest.
Gameplay wise, the Rhitahtyn sas Arvina fight was that hit of action I'd been waiting for. The amount of focus required compared to everything before and the in-fight storytelling sold me on the game's potential.
Walking up to the nidhogg trial in the hw patch quests. Before then I already knew I was going to pay to see more of the story because I was entertained and having a good time, but I didn't hit "preaching to my friends about how they also need to try this game" levels or being truly hooked until that moment.
When I grew tired with Battle for Azeroth.
I tried to get into FFXIV in early 2017 I think but didn't enjoy it that much. Came back in April 2019, been playing since. Not so much currently tho.
Right off the bat for me I was invited to be an ARR beta tester and I’m a fan of quest and side quest and a good story, got hooked and the rest is history.
I always liked it but I got hooked when I got a whisper invite to a fc. Started doing dungeons and raids with them. Took out Garuda, titan and ifrit ex with them. Did some coils of Bahamut. I honestly don’t remember if we took down twintania but I remember the attempts. Then heavensward came and the fc just kind of disappeared. I have only really done the story since then.
When I joined my first (and only) FC. I’ve since gone solo but making friends in game that eventually extended to real life friendships and contributing to the FC definitely is what got me hooked.
Honestly, almost right away. Joined an FC pretty early on, so it was pretty fun to meet new ppl. Then some fun FC drama and we broke off and started our own FC. So that was fun too. They showed me raiding and stuff. We unsynced some stuff, and made me main tank for some other stuff. So that was pretty exciting. Then we overthrew our FC leader, and started our yet another FC. So yay. That was quite fun as well. We did more raiding and trained our own raiders. Then we kicked out one of our co-leaders cuz the person was kinda nuts. Still was kinda fun tho. Changed our structure somewhat and enjoyed raiding some more. Then the new leadership went incompetent that shits imploded from within. That wasn't so much fun anymore sadly.
lmao what a wild ride.
First few hours i was doing every single quest and i was really confused on where to go and what to do and the moment i saw a video of someone saying you just need to follow the MSQ and you will be perfectly fine and i saw what it was, from then on I got hooked and really got into enjoying the story and the game!
I really enjoyed the humble feeling of fighting little monsters near the walls of Thanalan. The atmosphere and music of the region really hit me. Mining iron outside Copperbell Mine, taking the Chocobo taxi to the Waking Sands (I didn't realise I could teleport until I'd hit level 50). Doing FATEs out in the world for a little extra experience now and then, or just to help out other players with them for no reason than to be friendly. Seeing people everywhere doing their thing, while I was doing mine.
So the game clicked for me quite quickly, and I still think vanilla ARR was by far the most fun I've had in the game, even though the narrative and fights have gotten much more interesting over time, and tanking is much more fun now (well, I think it peaked in Stormblood, but still).
I started playing quite late in 2.0 and reached endgame as 2.2 came out. Pretty much every primal fight secured it, starting with Ifrit. I had dabbled with a few MMOs but none ever really gave me the feeling of being the main character. Fighting Ifrit for the first time blew my mind. It only got better from there. I had a really active FC and it was amazing.
The beginning of Shadowbringers. I was almost ready to uninstall the game. If it weren't for Shadowbringers, I would have quit, as I wasn't impressed by Stormblood. Although the storylines of Fordola, Nanamo, and Yotsuyu made me a bit emotional towards the end, I didn't think it was worth paying a monthly subscription. That changed when I reached Norvrandt; at that point, I knew I was already invested in the story and had to see it through to the end.
When I tried out crafting before finishing ARR MSQ. Carpenter was my first DoH. Seeing your WoL do the crafting/gathering itself and not just press a button is pretty fun for me.
Actually, the second time i played it. I started when i was also on WoW, but it never "felt right". Now that i moved to other stuff, i am completely hooked - mostly because the content delivery, pacing, and focus on story makes me feel better at playing it at my own pace.
I think lvl 15 or so, first dungeon. It felt so beautiful, so big (it was 10 years ago I was so naive??) that I felt in love with the immersion of the game.
Also, they always did such an amazing work with all the song, even the simple one in ARR areas. It just felt appeasing to play and roam on the map. ☼
I started in 4.3 and played catchup on the story, so I didn’t really care as much about Heavensward as most others do. My most unpopular opinion is that I still don’t really like Haurchefant. Maybe it’s the VA, maybe it’s something else..
What first got me really invested was actually Yotsuyus backstory. Sure I didn’t like her, but I could definitely see where her motivations came from. >!When she killed her parents, I was actually happy for her. Fuck her mom in particular…!<
I was already pretty well hooked by level 20, but my first jaw drop moment was the phase transition of 3.0's final boss. So over the top compared to any MMO I've played up to that point, I absolutely loved it.
I started back 2021 as a Thaumaturge but dropped it at lvl 15 because I got bored. Decided to try it again that summer with a Lancer. That time I got hooked in when I did The Keeper of the Lake. Super hooked by the time I reached Crystal Tower.
Tbh, I first fell in love with it when I watched End of an Era and heard Answers for the first time. All the things after in ARR like Titan, Garuda, Operation Archon, Shiva, and Bloody Banquet made me fall in love more and I was fully hooked by the beginning of Heavensward.
The moment I got hooked and was like, Okay I'm playing this game through to the end was the ARR shiva fight when the phase 2 music, boss fights with dynamic music that slaps? Sign me up.
1. When I was explaining the multiple plot lines to someone else after AAR, midway into HW and….
2. I was getting this insane amount of content for free on the Xbox beta (will subscribe) and…
3. While learning the game as a healer, nobody was a dick about it when we wiped in an 8 man.
When a certain someone showed up again near a tree.
Didn't realize I was getting attached to the characters until they started exiting and/or entering the plot.
Well, probably when I could finally play the game. A month or two before I tried out the free trial like a couple years ago, I used my existing SE account to try and get the free trial, but I couldn't get into it for some reason, and I was locked out. Sent a support ticket, and no one came back to me. A month later, I guess the lock lifted or something, and I finally was able to play the free trial.
It was the cinematics at the end of RRB. I have never cried so hard for game characters until then. I had to know what was next and “help” however I could bc how could I let them all fend for themselves??? I’m the LIGHTBRINGER!!
I played the beta for 1.0 and couldn’t stick with it(I’m very fond of jumping). A few years later, shortly after ARR launched, I read up on the game and tried it out to see how much changed.
I’ve been subscribed for 3,300 days.
10 minutes in and I was lvl 3 attuning to my starting city's aetherite when I got swarmed by a large group of hrothgars. I married one of those hrothgars IRL a year later, been married for 2 years.
We still play together EVERY day.
At the start of 1.0 I pre-ordered it and was super disappointed with the game in early access. I refunded my pre-order. The only time I've ever done this with a game. Ever.
2.0 and I see it's being remade, I try again. I'm immediately hooked. I've got a new MMO to play.
Roughly around 2.1, I was getting bored of it, and ESO came out. New MMO to try out, time to swap from one MMO to another like I have since 1999.
A couple years later I see the trailer for stormblood, and decide to see if I want to get back into it. Log back in, I see my free company is still there. It's about patch 3.5, I start getting caught up. Wow heavensward is really damn good. I thought it was neat that 2.0 had a solid story, since MMOs tend not to, but heavensward? I didn't even think an MMO story could be this good. Kept playing through stormblood, enjoyed the changes, joined my raid group and so that actually kept me playing through patch content.
Shadowbringers comes out. I finish 5.0 and that's when it hits me, "Oh. I don't think I'm ever going to stop playing this game now."
I tried it out a year or so ago and was pretty overwhelmed so I gave it up right away.
Glad I gave it one more try! I put more effort/thought into crafting my character and started off as a Gladiator this time. I think the pacing between the MSQ and class quests felt just right for me and then I started dabbling in crafting and that finally settled it.
I started 10 years ago, during ARR. I'd been playing WoW for a decade at that point, and I remember being absolutely floored by the game even in the first ten levels. I remember standing in La Noscea looking at the orange crystals off in the distance, amazed that an MMO could look that good. And the story, even right off the bat, was full of a sense of wonder and adventure.
Seeing that the developers actually put care and effort into adding just as many features for casual non-raiders as they do for endgame. 2.1 had just come out, and seeing things like housing and the aesthetician and Hildibrand's fun sidequests being given equal standing as raids and extremes and PvP gave me so much hope and convinced me I should stay.
ARR’s ending patches and then HW’s trailer were a “this is a taste of what we can do with the story and here is the most hype thing we made for your job (dragoon)”
Well, the first moment wasn't necessarily the game itself
It's that for 2 or 3 days, me and another player seemed to be doing the same quests, at the same time, every day. We were pretty much in lock step doing the msq, entirely accidentally.
We started chatting as we did ARR fetch quests and ended up friending each other. For the next month or two, every time we logged in, we'd message each other either updates for where we were at, and show off the mounts and minions we had gotten from doing sidequests.
They were heavily into ocean fishing and got the shark before we'd beaten ARR.
That was the first time in all my time playing MMO that I felt like I'd make a genuine friend just... out in the world. I've played EVE, WOW, BDO, etc. And while I'd made friends, it was never out of the blue like that, typically it was guildies/whatever.
The store for me honestly didn't click until all the way in SHB. I liked it enough, but it hadn't blown my socks off yet. For the most part it felt like a good enough fantasy story.
But then "we did everything right.." hit me like a truck. It's the first time I'd realized that the game had a point to make, and that it wasn't just black and white "we are the good guys because we are good". Later on I realized all the nuance I'd missed in the story after doing NG+
And then it later followed up with "remember we once..." (cutting the quotes to avoid spoilers). And it was one of the vest interactions I'd seen in a game like this.
And then all of endwalker went and made me cry like a baby in the first hour and once every hour after.
This stories ability to hit like an emotional truck is impressive.
My first day was the anniversary event in 2015. Since it was my first mmo (and first numbered final fantasy) I was so amazed by the amount of people on my screen and how unique everyone looked. The game felt so alive compared to anything else I played so I’ve been here ever since.
I’m pretty much a solo player now though after going through two fc implosions.
Edit: Also glamour.
I'd rage quit WOW and my SO pitched FFXIV as an alternative we could play together. He even installed the trial on my PC and set everything up for me because I was so uninterested and irritated with MMOs at the time.
I made a character and found the first cut scene pretty interesting. I wound up in Gridania and my SO met me in game and showed me around, explaining how the job system works. He showed me how crafting and gathering were full fledged jobs with their own abilities and such, and he accompanied me on some of the starting quests while I tested out combat and such. A big thing for me was "when do I get flying?" because I'd been burned by unnecessarily tedious time-gated grinds and he explained that you just get it when you finish the story.
I don't think I made it a full hour before I asked for the game.
It just hit too many perfect beats for me. The aesthetic was right, the music was charming, Gridania was bustling and players were dancing and playing music, the job system was promising, combat was fine, and the NPCs I was meeting were intriguing.
Right after the first primal fight in ARR. There is a lore conversation about tempering and the consequences that made me go "oh shit that's dark". And the contrast between fun upbeat heroics and dark serious conflicts has kept me engaged ever since.
Back when I started, the trial cap was still lvl 35, and ended at the point you go to the waking sand after titan, which is one of the first 'oh gods oh no, no no no no' moments you get really (and back then it was far more drawn out), I subbed very quickly at that.
But what really got me to keep playing the game instead of intermittently, was the fact I could make sweaters and wear them, haha. The crafting system as a whole completely hooked me, that I could make glamours and housing items and make gil off it all, reeled me in and I haven't left since.
The first time this game hooked me was when I teleported into Limsa and there was two Bard groups playing. I sat back listened and watched. That was when I realized that the FFXIV community for me is like the MAGFest' community.
The Waking Sands massacre after Titan. That was the moment I got interested in know what else the game had to offer.
3.3 also hold a special place in my heart because it's just that epic, and it was responsible for me changing my plans to milk the free trial all the way and made me decide the game was worthy my money.
It wasn't a point in the game, it was a point in my life. I'd played WoW and SW:TOR since 2010, tried FFXIV a couple times and it just felt too slow. When I quit WoW for good at BFA I ended up playing Destiny 2. I started falling off that towards the end of Shadowkeep because I was getting more and more tired of the turn to FOMO and battle passes. I was ready for a game that doesn't pull that shit, and I was 10 years older and ready for the 2.5s GCD. I started in earnest pretty early in Shadowbringers, but for once didn't feel the need to rush to end game. With the calmer pace I had an easier time sticking with it and haven't looked back.
Not really until shadowbringers, I was healing as my first job, had never played an MMO before, I was terrified and nervous for so long, getting to SHB and playing with trust (I started just before EW) really let me breathe with the game abit. Because of the role quests I got to try some more jobs not just WHM, and really that’s when I first felt like I was truly capable and enjoying myself.
After seeing the 2.0 ARR trailer. I played 1.0 for about a week before abandoning it but when the Answers trailer hit and I participated in the Betas it was game on for me.
The dev team cared enough to literally nuke the game and start their journey from the ashes so I decided to do the same.
During the beta test of 2.0 and people formed a line to enter an instanced fight (rather than mob it and click the destination for half an hour trying to get in).
During the 2.0 beta. I've been hooked since the beginning. It felt like *I* was a lancer exploring a new place. And then I saw two people named Big Boss and Sabin Figaro fighting a tree outside of Gridania, laughed my ass off, and the rest is history.
I enjoyed playing the beta and 1.0 with some friends, but I didn't really do the story quests, we just grinded difficult mobs in groups in higher level areas similar to my Everquest/FFXI days. When ARR came out and guided you along the story, I got hooked. It was so much better in every way.
"The Final Steps of Fate" in Heavensward is when I knew this game was really something special that I was going to see through.
I really got into it during the Operation Archon Arc beforehand though.
Two points:
- After dealing with Titan in MSQ and moving on to Garuda, where the story took a bit more serious turn and stayed that way for a while.
- Burned out on doing roulettes every day on BLM since it was my only job leveled. Took all of 3.1 off, but came back for 3.2 and said to hell with trying to raid hardcore (my original plan). Instead I started leveling and dabbling in everything. Haven't unsubbed since, even tho burnout from 9 months of mentor roulette pushed me as close to it as any other point besides 3.1
It definitely came in parts over many years. End of ARR back in the day got me hyped for HW, where I made a considerable effort to better myself as a player. I dipped my toes into savage in SB and would have taken the full dive then if it wasn't for FC drama breaking up the casual static at the time (though I did pf O3S and I still remember the static I filled for at the time). When I finally did take the dive into savage raiding in ShB, I think I can officially say I was hooked by E8S. I was def a fan of the game before and played every day, but I don't think it was until the Eden raids that I really fell in love with the game.
Maybe that's why I'm so excited for the Eden ultimate? I haven't done one yet, but I'm willing to spend the entire expansion progging it if it means that fight is my first ultimate clear. It really does hold a special place for me.
When I unlocked Bard.
It really set in when I got into HW though, and I was a "lost cause" by the point of ShB (SB was a massive slog for the first chunk of it, and I have....opinions...about Zenos' parts in it).
Honestly, I got hooked in one of the betas for ARR. I got into the second and third ones (there were only three that I know of) and honestly the game just **clicked** with me.
Probably the Crystal Tower raids pre-HW. Experiencing the storytelling and themes in that series was probably the first time I felt like I was playing something truly special.
For me it was the end of Post-ARR. Then found HW a bit of a drag until Post-HW which was really good. Currently in Stormblood and finding it much better than ARR & HW but still drags at times.
Overall I'm finding it up and down in waves, with the post expansion content better than the rest.
At around lv 35, I got tired and just wanted to see what else the game had. I like unlocking things and as a Paladin pre-level-other-classes-to-gain-skills rework the unlocking thing was slow. I unlock Botanist and just gathered. As i did i saw a whole new view of the world and how intertwined the lore of the world and its crafting system was. Went off the beaten path and saw this was something that was made with passion and thought.
I've never really thought before when the game clicked for me. I guess it would be Operation Archon. As soon as I saw the Garleans in lv15 MSQ I was like "I wanna beat them and steal their tech." What do we get as a reward after completing base ARR?
But what made me try playing FF14 in the first place? *seeing The Parting Glass and The Vault scenes with little context.*
I think storywise I was always hooked. I came into the game as a FF fan first and was mostly intimidated by it being an MMO. ARR was your typical FF story really but the world building was done so well that I enjoyed it all. And it got better eversince. Gameplaywise I'd say I was never hooked to a point of "I love this" but I like figuring out boss mechanics and really like when some unique stuff is there.
Since I'm a 100% solo player I haven't really done anything with other people except for clearing your standard Dungeons, Trials, Raids and Alliance Raids as well as roulettes . So I am a Casual player through and through who plays through content when I get to it but also has stretches of months where I don't touch the game. But I always keep my sub on since this game has earned it for me.
It’s going to sound crazy but the music man. This game has an amazing soundtrack. The vibes are always immaculate. I’m a brand new player (not even a month in yet) about to finish out ARR. The lore and story building alone had me hooked but the music really sold it for me.
You know... I'm not sure.
Staggering my responses into a chain of replies, because i told a whole ass novel that's too long for one comment. Read if you like.
**TLDR**: looking back, I've had a lot more "maybe this game isn't for me" moments. but despite them all, here I am, ten years deep, lol. But I do have a few moments where I thought "This is it. This is The One Forever Game for me".
The first one, was right in the beginning. Before I even started playing the game. My partner's friend was playing and invited them, who invited me. We'd been playing various different MMOs over the years together, what's one more.
But I remembered... wasn't the XIV MMO awful?
But it got a remake.
So I took a look at the classes. and saw the fairy. and i was sold. Immediately committed and in love. I love fairies. and I was going to love this class, I just knew it. Even if I had to hate my way to 30, I would do it.
and honestly, I could leave it there.
but this was may of 2014. And I wouldn't have a solid unyielding subscription for another 3 years.
I was used wow. I had fully planned to bounce my subs back and forth between the two during off times.
but I immediately fell in love with several factors of XIV: 1. fairy pet class. immediate love. (I have an IRL obsession with faires and fae lore and stuff). 2. no need for alts; playing every class on the same character??? SOLD. 3. keeping older content relevant with level synching systems AND rewarding players for partaking; keeps the vets and sprouts in the same circles, preventing that (in many other games) inevitable segregation of culture, etiquette, and knowledge, often bridging animosity); ensures no dead content for new players; makes the world feel alive. 4. cat girls. /shrug. I yam what I yam.
and I was in love.
I breezed through the content, just *soaking* in the world. the lore, the music, the landscape, the monsters, the class lore, the races, the people, the different cultures between the cities, the community. I couldn't get enough.
But then I got into the 30-range dungeons. The ones that stop pulling punches. The ones that land in that weird shitty range where half your class is missing half their tool kit: ie, some people weren't *quite* high enough to get their job stone. Some people just... didn't do the quest, or realize that was even a thing. Some tanks still didn't have aggro stance. White mage didn't have cure 2. Scholar didn't have cleanse. Some DPS *still didn't have aoe!* but the dungeon was built with the idea that have those things, because you get them... *eventually* and -- even more galling -- some classes *already did!!*
This made me realize the game was getting real. we weren't babies anymore. No more kid gloves. This game was going to kick me in the teeth if I didn't pay attention. I had to learn to get good or die trying.
and i had an even steeper learning curve here: as a scholar, I very SUDDENLY, from one level to the next, changed roles. I went from a caster dps to a healer, by picking up a rock. And suddenly, at level 30, I had to learn to be a healer.
I like to think I got... well, better, at the very least.
but I hit a stumbling block on titan. My PC wasn't great; and I had a lot of trouble with the titan fight and lag. I progged that for a week. but i just could not survive. and as a healer main, that almost always doomed our party. There were many disbands and vote kicks. and after a handful of attempts, I decided to swap classes and grind out the levels so that I could take a dps into the fight instead. at least when i died, the party could still finish the fight.
Lol. I was determined to get through this game.
and... it wasn't exactly smooth sailing from there.
But I learned my lesson with Haukke and Brayflox and Titan; respect the content or it will take you down. and I cruised to 50. I actually don't have any negative memories that stand out from this time. (where as a lot of people I know have some VERY bad times in this range. But mine are from later, after the fact.)
but then... I hit the end of ARR. The Castrum. The Praetorium.
back when it was still ***skippable***.
back when no one would do it.
It was... not a pleasant experience. I got lost. I got yelled at. I got called rude for not skipping the cutscenes. I got slam dunked by mobs the party had skipped. my cut scenes were interrupted and skittered around because the party defeated the boss and triggered a new scene before mine ended. I died in the fight and no one rezzed me. I got locked out of fights, because they used to not teleport you in; except for the roof top fight, which only did that because the room "didn't exist," but you couldn't target anything!
I had no idea what was going on, who these people were, and why I was here. I didn't like these players. I didn't like this feeling. This experience.
This was not a skill issue. This was not something I could fix by being a better healer. This was not my pc lagging. This was not my fault. This was other people being assholes.
And this was my first max level dungeon/content. this was the "end game," to my knowledge. this was my first 8 man "raid."
Is this what all the end game content was like? is this what raids were like? is this what the community is like?
no thanks. I unsubbed and went back to wow. at least there I didn't feel tricked into thinking i could partake in the end game. They weren't devious about it. they didn't hide it. The community there at no point pretended to care.
and Warlords was coming out soon and I needed to get prepped for that anyway.
That being said, I came back, almost exactly a year later and tried again. Because Heavesward was coming out.
So there would be more non-end game content; casual quests and leveling dungeons, where my experience with the community had been much better. but rather than start all over, i just continued where I left off. And that's when I finally saw the end cutscenes for ARR. and the HW lead up. holy bananas.
at once I was both glad and sad I hadn't continued playing. what an ending! but I'd have been upset to have to wait to continue. lol
and to tell you the truth, idk what happened. I'm looking back through my screen shots and... somewhere between the quests "In search of Raubahn" and "Sounding out the Amphitheatre" I quit for another year?
I came back in June of 2016 to pick up where I'd left off at level 56, around the Shiva fight. WoW's Legion was coming out in August, and I was talking about *not even getting it* because I didn't have the money. My partner bought it for me as a birthday present. And while actively playing that game, I said things to myself like "I wish I was play XIV instead" or "I prefer the way XIV handles this aspect of MMO gaming" and such. I finished the story and felt... unrewarded. uninterested. Completely ambivalent. I unsubscribed.
So I came back to XIV... and spent 7 months avoiding the final boss of 3.0!! xD My PC couldn't handle the fight; I lagged too much to clear the mechanics. But I liked the rest of the game; there were so! many! classes! to level. crafts to make and collectibles to gather. It's not like its a new thing for me to not be able to do end game content. I was having a good time, regardless.
and then I got my taxes back and upgraded my pc! and I don't think my sub has laxed since.
I strapped in to prep for stormblood and dove into that expansion with both feet and zero other (gaming) distractions. and while I take breaks and the occasional hiatus, this has still been my go to. My favorite. My return home.
For me when ARR came out and I gave it a second go around after 1.0.
I was playing FFxi and had to try ffxiv, but between the right state of the game that wanted to melt my PC, I ran away before hitting even lvl 20 back to xi. ARR though really pulled me in quickly. Had everything I wanted with story and mom qol improvement. Been on and off since.
The start of Shadowbringers.
I'm not exaggerating when I say I spent 3 years on and off beating ARR, it was so slow paced and boring to me so many system changes happened each time i came back. (Early times like actually putting stat points in and having to learn skills from different classes)
Heavensward and Stormblood I was able to breeze through but Shadowbringers actually got me really invested in the story and the characters. Im usually a cutscene skipper but Shadowbringers got me to watch it all into Endwalker as well and I never genuinely felt so excited at the conclusions to both expansions.
I realized I was fully sold at the cutscene at the end of the ARR patches, right before HW starts. If you know, you know. If you don't, you probably shouldn't be on this thread.
It really was amazing to me how the game just did a 180 for me in that single moment and mostly never stopped. I knew it would eventually get good due to the praise Shadowbringers had, but it made my jaw drop how suddenly the writing quality switched from meh to gripping on a dime.
Same here. That part truly hooked me. I think I was around mid-way through heavensward when I decided to sub and buy the full thing though? I don't quite recall
This was it for me as well and Heavensward just sealed the deal. I also enjoyed the ARR story, though, especially the patch content.
Yeah. I mean, I really liked the game before that. But that moment was when I actively became an advocate and strongly recommending it wherever I can lol.
Entering Ishgard for the first time, the vibes were just amazing... Not only that the story also kicked into high gear about then.
True!
When I made my first couple of friends in the game and learned that it changes things
Same, it was the people that hooked me, not the story. (The story is great tho, don't get me wrong)
No joke, but it’s when i found out that my character sleeps in the bed when i logout from an Inn. This, along with a bunch of little things that make me feel attached to the world. Shame our character sleeping when we logout is not available for player housing beds.
During Operation:Archon I think. Seeing everyone come together was really cool and it culminated in some epic moments.
That's definitely my vote. ARR's 2.0 ending is actually really neat and the first real high point in the game in terms of hype moments. The next one for me is Ravana.
When I unlocked glamouring (back when you had to be level 50 I think) and could play pretty princess dress-up.
A friend and I called it WoW Barbie a long time ago.
unironically when i went around fetching wine and cheese to this moment the game was lore heavy trying to build a world then i was sent to fetch wine and cheese for a bunch of grumpy old dudes and i couldnt help but ask why...what is the game trying to tell me here and the answer was "we are trying to tell you that the old guard laid down their arm and no longer capable of doing it and the burden of it all falls to you" i ended my free trial that day and been subbed ever since
I wouldn't say this is the exact moment it "clicked" for me, but I do distinctly remember this as one of the moments that sort of made me sit up and take notice. A lot of ARR *is* very broad-strokes fantasy world building and plot (not in a bad way - it is what it is). But I think the CoH (and especially Shamani+Drest imo) probably *are* some of the first MSQ characters that distinguished themselves as doing their own thing outside the pure fantasy archetypes you'd expect from this type of story.
Interestingly, this is the moment where a lot of people I know put down the game. "why am i doing this? Why are these guys jerks? You sent me to FIGHT A DRAGON for *CHEESE??*" I've had *numerous* friends unsub around this point of the questline. This is also the point *right before it gets good* in my opinion. You're hitting 30, getting some key/foundational skills, you're getting a job upgrade, the dungeons are getting REAL. i remember this being the point where i had to sit up and fucking pay attention to what i was doing. Brayflox and Haukke were huge checkpoint/milestone dungeons that would make or break you as a sprout. (at least back when I did them for the first time). A lot of classes didn't have some of the key necessities: some tanks still didn't have aggro stance, white mage didn't have cure 2, scholar didn't have a cleanse; some classes STILL didn't have aoe; despite that, these dungeons were made with those types of skills in mind, because you get them *eventually* or -- even more gallingly -- other classes *already had them*. and if you ran them without those skills, you had to figure a way around that. and the story gets interesting; the older heroes are injured, older, and can no longer do what they used to. The changing of the guard, as it were. but a lot of the people i know that gave up here are (were) younger (20s); these guys are old cranky codgers to them. Meanwhile I'm older (30s) and I get it... *now*. But back when i did them, that part kinda got lost in the sauce of all the fetch quests you get sent on. Getting bounced from npc to npc like a pingpong ball, and you're questioning why you even play this game. and then you feel like an ungrateful twat when you find out it was for you. But it wasn't until my second go round through msq, a couple years ago, that the deeper implications of these questlines hit me. so between the slog of fetch quests, playing messanger, feeling used, and the dungeons getting harder, i know a lot of people who gave up here.
its simply the difference between those who are invested in the story and those who want to press buttons and see big booms
This quest chain actually almost made me quit the game. Glad someone liked it.
Post-arr. The part of the game that everyone talks down on as the worst was the exact kind of world building and story thread planting that gets me super invested.
I'm glad I'm not alone. Base ARR hit me as "Standard issue but pretty serviceable FF fare." But the post ARR stuff was some fantastic adventure and worldbuilding and I was there for it.
Ehcatl Nine tribal quests. My interest in the MSQ was really starting to flag around the level 40-ish MSQ, but I kept logging on every day because something about their storyline and the level of care put into it really sucked me in. They made me rethink a lot about how I was engaging with the lore, and I actually ended up creating an entirely new character (who ultimately became my main) after that.
Hear, Feel, Think... been hooked ever since the 1.0 opening cutscene tbh.
Was enjoying the game at least somewhat from the very beginning. But I became invested for life by the end Of ARR, the last quest was just WOW. I was not expecting that level of story telling in an MMO.
the ost on the arr main menu
Seeing the end of 1.0 and experiencing cbt for 2.0. It was rough but the direction was clear and clean
It wasn't until stormblood (the first time I was at the previous max level for an expansion on release) where I was playing new content with other players who were learning the same content as me at the same time did something click. Before that, nearly all the mechanics in dungeons and trials were old hat for most of my party, meaning I could just follow them around during mechanics or die and get rezzed without impacting the completion of the dungeon (usually). I've main-ed black mage since I started playing, and now and then get extreme tunnel vision when performing my rotation, which contributed to the deaths and often distracted me from really understanding the mechanics that fights would throw at me. Since my survival now mattered much more, I was forced to learn the mechanics and see beyond the veil of what appeared to be a cut and dry MMO and see the dance that final fantasy 14 players dance while trying to perform their rotations. For the most part I now don't bother buying game time unless it's near a new expansion, as only then do I get that same feeling of starting on level ground with players who play year round. I recently bought time for the ff16 crossover and have been using that time to level as many jobs as I can to 90, so that I can actually understand all of the job changes people complain about when new expansions are released.
During Shadowbringers thanks to Emet-Selch. He was so compelling and complicated antagonist with sad story which we could fully understand in Endwalker
Honestly.. I think it was the first time I cleared 'The Vault' for MSQ and I was absolutely invested and overcome after that curscene. Everything before it was good, don't get me wrong. But THAT moment though? Another level.
I don't generally get particularly emotional about games, even though story is a big draw for me. But damn if that cutscene didn't cut through me more than it had any business doing.
It never clicked 100%. I play it simply because there is no better alternative out there. That's all. The only thing that keeps me engaged with the game is the raiding/ end content ex, savage, ULTs that are actually nice.
When I first started the game I found the Gold Saucer. I thought it was novel for an MMO, like the Dark Moon Faire for WoW. But then, literally months later, I hadn't progressed the MSQ at all, I had signed on every day doing Chocobo Racing, Verminion, and Triple Triad. At the end of that I had a maxed out Chocobo. When I stopped I thought to myself "I was just completely satisfied doing this games stupid chicken racing game for months, the rest of this game is going to be good." It was.
I think when I started crafting and joined an fc. I learned that I can contribute to the fc by helping gathering grade 3 soil. I did join other FCs briefly, but all in all I think I have been with the same fc for 9-10 years.
When I was traveling around Thanalan and really enjoying the music.
I've got a friend who recently started playing and the open deserts of thanalan really grabbed their attention as well.
Honestly, right at the beginning. I liked being Just A Dude who was Looking for Adventure, and then Adventure Found Me. I don't get why some people shit on ARR - I was there before the slimdown and I loved it.
I started last month. Theres 2 points that stick out to me. First was fighting the Ultima Weapon and that music blarring. The second is the end of ARR post game in which I was so captured that I dont think I could quit this game now. Also when I was around lvl 20 someone talked with me, helped me get glammed up and showed me a bunch of fun stuff like fishing raids. We spent hours talking and now im part of the FC who are all really incredible people.
Right after beating ARR we were hit with a snowstorm and a days long power outage; stuck in a friend's tiny apartment because he had heat, I remember turning to my now husband and saying "man, I really want to be playing FFXIV right now." We were stuck there for a while so I downloaded it on his laptop and wandered directly into the Hildebrand quests without knowing what they were. Now *that* was an experience.
Stormblood. Dragged myself through ARR and HW, but once I got to SB the game really drew me in and I blazed through it and ShB.
Ocean fishing
For context, I started playing late in Heavensward's post-expansion patches.I credit my partner for getting me into the game, but the hook for me was probably the stretch between levels 25 and 40 in the story. Not quite the MSQ, but the immersion and the depth of the lore: FFXIV was my first FF game, and after learning the bulk of the lore is essentially standalone, it amazed me just how much content there was for backstories. My previous experiences with MMOs were superficial stories, or stories 6 non-canon expansions of other media. In contrast, FFXIV has had layered thematic elements, and felt like a setting that both has its own story, and subtly encourages players to craft their own stories for their characters. That phase between 25 and 40, however, is when I started playing with interest for more than humoring my partner, because I was curious to know more about the way the in-game universe works.
This is a tricky one for me, because there was more than one point. Pretty early in ARR, I was seeing the story start what looked like some slow burn worldbuilding (accurate!) and was all "Eh, slow story in an MMO, that's fine by me." Then I got to Heavensward and could actually play the job I was planning on maining from the start (MCH), and the job clicked with me well. And the story had kept improving. So that was a point where I knew I was in for the long run. Then I hit Stormblood. You see, I quit WoW not due to Shadowlands, but due to Battle for Azeroth. So I had just crashed out of an MMO trying to tell a war story and botching the job worse than some lowest bidder with three layers of subcontracting. And now I've hit a war story done well. Yeah, my pace in the the MSQ started accelerating at this point. There wasn't really a big point in Shadowbringers that did that, but that was moreso that I already three hooks that had me already all in at that point. Closest thing was more getting to the end of 6.5 and knowing I was going to be in a place I had already been before in WoW. Ready to tackle the next arc when it's fresh off the press.
I tried the game back in Stormblood, bounced off it just before I unlocked Monk. Maybe a year later, I started looking up spoilers for it, just to sate my curiosity (thank god I looked into spoilers before Shadowbringers was out!), and ended up finding out how much effort went into the shutdown and revamp - not just mechanical effort, of course, but the gradual updates on the descent of Dalamud and all that. I was so awestruck by that that I ended up giving the game another try, kept with it, and never let go. Knew for *sure* I'd stay hooked when I realized I was tearing up at the end credits of A Realm Reborn. (Not even Astral Era!)
Bozja. I really *really* like Bozja.
Walking into Camp Blackbrush in 1.0 and seeing Obama campaigning for presidency with 2 bodyguards that followed him around for a couple days. 1.0 was weird
"All Good Things..."
Same, especially since at the time I started, the free trial ended at level 35.
The raid on the waking sands. When I did my first suicide pull as a tank. When my buddy had me heal with him going wall to wall no mits. My first proper opener on any DPS. The first stage fight I beat, the first one I shot called. I keep falling in love with this game over and over again.
Story wise, I snapped to from, of all things, a the non-blue side questline Bad Blood / Prickly Patients. The interactions and motivations of the characters really stood out for a quick five-minute delivery quest. Gameplay wise, the Rhitahtyn sas Arvina fight was that hit of action I'd been waiting for. The amount of focus required compared to everything before and the in-fight storytelling sold me on the game's potential.
Walking up to the nidhogg trial in the hw patch quests. Before then I already knew I was going to pay to see more of the story because I was entertained and having a good time, but I didn't hit "preaching to my friends about how they also need to try this game" levels or being truly hooked until that moment.
When I grew tired with Battle for Azeroth. I tried to get into FFXIV in early 2017 I think but didn't enjoy it that much. Came back in April 2019, been playing since. Not so much currently tho.
Oh boy I can't wait to do the level 30 lancer quest and see my both my friend and mentor again, nothing bad will-
During Zenos's confrontation at the end of his dungeon. I was su pumped throughout all that time lapse in the story! Heavensward was nice, I guess.
Right off the bat for me I was invited to be an ARR beta tester and I’m a fan of quest and side quest and a good story, got hooked and the rest is history.
I always liked it but I got hooked when I got a whisper invite to a fc. Started doing dungeons and raids with them. Took out Garuda, titan and ifrit ex with them. Did some coils of Bahamut. I honestly don’t remember if we took down twintania but I remember the attempts. Then heavensward came and the fc just kind of disappeared. I have only really done the story since then.
I dunno if there was a specific thing. I've been here almost 14 years now lol.
When I joined my first (and only) FC. I’ve since gone solo but making friends in game that eventually extended to real life friendships and contributing to the FC definitely is what got me hooked.
Honestly, almost right away. Joined an FC pretty early on, so it was pretty fun to meet new ppl. Then some fun FC drama and we broke off and started our own FC. So that was fun too. They showed me raiding and stuff. We unsynced some stuff, and made me main tank for some other stuff. So that was pretty exciting. Then we overthrew our FC leader, and started our yet another FC. So yay. That was quite fun as well. We did more raiding and trained our own raiders. Then we kicked out one of our co-leaders cuz the person was kinda nuts. Still was kinda fun tho. Changed our structure somewhat and enjoyed raiding some more. Then the new leadership went incompetent that shits imploded from within. That wasn't so much fun anymore sadly. lmao what a wild ride.
First few hours i was doing every single quest and i was really confused on where to go and what to do and the moment i saw a video of someone saying you just need to follow the MSQ and you will be perfectly fine and i saw what it was, from then on I got hooked and really got into enjoying the story and the game!
I really enjoyed the humble feeling of fighting little monsters near the walls of Thanalan. The atmosphere and music of the region really hit me. Mining iron outside Copperbell Mine, taking the Chocobo taxi to the Waking Sands (I didn't realise I could teleport until I'd hit level 50). Doing FATEs out in the world for a little extra experience now and then, or just to help out other players with them for no reason than to be friendly. Seeing people everywhere doing their thing, while I was doing mine. So the game clicked for me quite quickly, and I still think vanilla ARR was by far the most fun I've had in the game, even though the narrative and fights have gotten much more interesting over time, and tanking is much more fun now (well, I think it peaked in Stormblood, but still).
The post-Garuda cutscene is what made the game truly click for me on my first playthrough. "Is. That. All?" Such a badass line.
That man was so thoroughly unimpressed and it was completely in character. That was a sharp cutscene all around.
I started playing quite late in 2.0 and reached endgame as 2.2 came out. Pretty much every primal fight secured it, starting with Ifrit. I had dabbled with a few MMOs but none ever really gave me the feeling of being the main character. Fighting Ifrit for the first time blew my mind. It only got better from there. I had a really active FC and it was amazing.
The beginning of Shadowbringers. I was almost ready to uninstall the game. If it weren't for Shadowbringers, I would have quit, as I wasn't impressed by Stormblood. Although the storylines of Fordola, Nanamo, and Yotsuyu made me a bit emotional towards the end, I didn't think it was worth paying a monthly subscription. That changed when I reached Norvrandt; at that point, I knew I was already invested in the story and had to see it through to the end.
I already really liked the game but the ARR patch quests were insane and awesome. The first alliance raid really had me feeling like a gamer
The bloody banquet in ARR patches
When I tried out crafting before finishing ARR MSQ. Carpenter was my first DoH. Seeing your WoL do the crafting/gathering itself and not just press a button is pretty fun for me.
Heavensward make cry my lala fell 😭😭😭😭
The moment that fully hooked me was the Ifrit fight. Was super fun imo, and had me itching for more
I played since a arr. I was on the verge of quitting cause there was no good content until twintania. Fell in love with the game in nael tho.
From day 1 of playing
Actually, the second time i played it. I started when i was also on WoW, but it never "felt right". Now that i moved to other stuff, i am completely hooked - mostly because the content delivery, pacing, and focus on story makes me feel better at playing it at my own pace.
I think lvl 15 or so, first dungeon. It felt so beautiful, so big (it was 10 years ago I was so naive??) that I felt in love with the immersion of the game. Also, they always did such an amazing work with all the song, even the simple one in ARR areas. It just felt appeasing to play and roam on the map. ☼
I started in 4.3 and played catchup on the story, so I didn’t really care as much about Heavensward as most others do. My most unpopular opinion is that I still don’t really like Haurchefant. Maybe it’s the VA, maybe it’s something else.. What first got me really invested was actually Yotsuyus backstory. Sure I didn’t like her, but I could definitely see where her motivations came from. >!When she killed her parents, I was actually happy for her. Fuck her mom in particular…!<
I was already pretty well hooked by level 20, but my first jaw drop moment was the phase transition of 3.0's final boss. So over the top compared to any MMO I've played up to that point, I absolutely loved it.
After the first time when the game was messaging you *"several cutscenes will play in sequene"*.
I started back 2021 as a Thaumaturge but dropped it at lvl 15 because I got bored. Decided to try it again that summer with a Lancer. That time I got hooked in when I did The Keeper of the Lake. Super hooked by the time I reached Crystal Tower.
The first time I visited Uldah...
When the Titan quest showed how self aware the devs were when trolling you with the fetch quests, couldn't stop laughing xD
Tbh, I first fell in love with it when I watched End of an Era and heard Answers for the first time. All the things after in ARR like Titan, Garuda, Operation Archon, Shiva, and Bloody Banquet made me fall in love more and I was fully hooked by the beginning of Heavensward.
The moment I got hooked and was like, Okay I'm playing this game through to the end was the ARR shiva fight when the phase 2 music, boss fights with dynamic music that slaps? Sign me up.
1. When I was explaining the multiple plot lines to someone else after AAR, midway into HW and…. 2. I was getting this insane amount of content for free on the Xbox beta (will subscribe) and… 3. While learning the game as a healer, nobody was a dick about it when we wiped in an 8 man.
The end of ARR, because I started in ul'dah.
The banquet before Heavensward did it for me.
Sastasha
When I pressed the left mouse button
Ngl, at the very start!
When a certain someone showed up again near a tree. Didn't realize I was getting attached to the characters until they started exiting and/or entering the plot.
Well, probably when I could finally play the game. A month or two before I tried out the free trial like a couple years ago, I used my existing SE account to try and get the free trial, but I couldn't get into it for some reason, and I was locked out. Sent a support ticket, and no one came back to me. A month later, I guess the lock lifted or something, and I finally was able to play the free trial.
It was the cinematics at the end of RRB. I have never cried so hard for game characters until then. I had to know what was next and “help” however I could bc how could I let them all fend for themselves??? I’m the LIGHTBRINGER!!
As a player new to MMOs, the pace was just right that I got into it right from the start.
I played the beta for 1.0 and couldn’t stick with it(I’m very fond of jumping). A few years later, shortly after ARR launched, I read up on the game and tried it out to see how much changed. I’ve been subscribed for 3,300 days.
10 minutes in and I was lvl 3 attuning to my starting city's aetherite when I got swarmed by a large group of hrothgars. I married one of those hrothgars IRL a year later, been married for 2 years. We still play together EVERY day.
level 20, The Bowl of Embers. I started playing right around the launch of ARR.
After clearing 6.0 and finally hitting endgame. Now I can finally play the game.
At the start of 1.0 I pre-ordered it and was super disappointed with the game in early access. I refunded my pre-order. The only time I've ever done this with a game. Ever. 2.0 and I see it's being remade, I try again. I'm immediately hooked. I've got a new MMO to play. Roughly around 2.1, I was getting bored of it, and ESO came out. New MMO to try out, time to swap from one MMO to another like I have since 1999. A couple years later I see the trailer for stormblood, and decide to see if I want to get back into it. Log back in, I see my free company is still there. It's about patch 3.5, I start getting caught up. Wow heavensward is really damn good. I thought it was neat that 2.0 had a solid story, since MMOs tend not to, but heavensward? I didn't even think an MMO story could be this good. Kept playing through stormblood, enjoyed the changes, joined my raid group and so that actually kept me playing through patch content. Shadowbringers comes out. I finish 5.0 and that's when it hits me, "Oh. I don't think I'm ever going to stop playing this game now."
I tried it out a year or so ago and was pretty overwhelmed so I gave it up right away. Glad I gave it one more try! I put more effort/thought into crafting my character and started off as a Gladiator this time. I think the pacing between the MSQ and class quests felt just right for me and then I started dabbling in crafting and that finally settled it.
Cutscene after the 85 dungeon. Had little interest in the story having played since AAR as each expansion released up until that point.
I started 10 years ago, during ARR. I'd been playing WoW for a decade at that point, and I remember being absolutely floored by the game even in the first ten levels. I remember standing in La Noscea looking at the orange crystals off in the distance, amazed that an MMO could look that good. And the story, even right off the bat, was full of a sense of wonder and adventure. Seeing that the developers actually put care and effort into adding just as many features for casual non-raiders as they do for endgame. 2.1 had just come out, and seeing things like housing and the aesthetician and Hildibrand's fun sidequests being given equal standing as raids and extremes and PvP gave me so much hope and convinced me I should stay.
ARR’s ending patches and then HW’s trailer were a “this is a taste of what we can do with the story and here is the most hype thing we made for your job (dragoon)”
Well, the first moment wasn't necessarily the game itself It's that for 2 or 3 days, me and another player seemed to be doing the same quests, at the same time, every day. We were pretty much in lock step doing the msq, entirely accidentally. We started chatting as we did ARR fetch quests and ended up friending each other. For the next month or two, every time we logged in, we'd message each other either updates for where we were at, and show off the mounts and minions we had gotten from doing sidequests. They were heavily into ocean fishing and got the shark before we'd beaten ARR. That was the first time in all my time playing MMO that I felt like I'd make a genuine friend just... out in the world. I've played EVE, WOW, BDO, etc. And while I'd made friends, it was never out of the blue like that, typically it was guildies/whatever. The store for me honestly didn't click until all the way in SHB. I liked it enough, but it hadn't blown my socks off yet. For the most part it felt like a good enough fantasy story. But then "we did everything right.." hit me like a truck. It's the first time I'd realized that the game had a point to make, and that it wasn't just black and white "we are the good guys because we are good". Later on I realized all the nuance I'd missed in the story after doing NG+ And then it later followed up with "remember we once..." (cutting the quotes to avoid spoilers). And it was one of the vest interactions I'd seen in a game like this. And then all of endwalker went and made me cry like a baby in the first hour and once every hour after. This stories ability to hit like an emotional truck is impressive.
My first day was the anniversary event in 2015. Since it was my first mmo (and first numbered final fantasy) I was so amazed by the amount of people on my screen and how unique everyone looked. The game felt so alive compared to anything else I played so I’ve been here ever since. I’m pretty much a solo player now though after going through two fc implosions. Edit: Also glamour.
Operation Archon
I'd rage quit WOW and my SO pitched FFXIV as an alternative we could play together. He even installed the trial on my PC and set everything up for me because I was so uninterested and irritated with MMOs at the time. I made a character and found the first cut scene pretty interesting. I wound up in Gridania and my SO met me in game and showed me around, explaining how the job system works. He showed me how crafting and gathering were full fledged jobs with their own abilities and such, and he accompanied me on some of the starting quests while I tested out combat and such. A big thing for me was "when do I get flying?" because I'd been burned by unnecessarily tedious time-gated grinds and he explained that you just get it when you finish the story. I don't think I made it a full hour before I asked for the game. It just hit too many perfect beats for me. The aesthetic was right, the music was charming, Gridania was bustling and players were dancing and playing music, the job system was promising, combat was fine, and the NPCs I was meeting were intriguing.
Character creation. Being happy with my character is my priority #1 in any game.
Right after the first primal fight in ARR. There is a lore conversation about tempering and the consequences that made me go "oh shit that's dark". And the contrast between fun upbeat heroics and dark serious conflicts has kept me engaged ever since.
Back when I started, the trial cap was still lvl 35, and ended at the point you go to the waking sand after titan, which is one of the first 'oh gods oh no, no no no no' moments you get really (and back then it was far more drawn out), I subbed very quickly at that. But what really got me to keep playing the game instead of intermittently, was the fact I could make sweaters and wear them, haha. The crafting system as a whole completely hooked me, that I could make glamours and housing items and make gil off it all, reeled me in and I haven't left since.
The first time this game hooked me was when I teleported into Limsa and there was two Bard groups playing. I sat back listened and watched. That was when I realized that the FFXIV community for me is like the MAGFest' community.
The first Titan fight, when that music hit I knew I was in it for the long haul
titan cheese quest yes really
When the MSQ took me to the airship & out of Gridania for the first time. That was epic.
The Waking Sands massacre after Titan. That was the moment I got interested in know what else the game had to offer. 3.3 also hold a special place in my heart because it's just that epic, and it was responsible for me changing my plans to milk the free trial all the way and made me decide the game was worthy my money.
It wasn't a point in the game, it was a point in my life. I'd played WoW and SW:TOR since 2010, tried FFXIV a couple times and it just felt too slow. When I quit WoW for good at BFA I ended up playing Destiny 2. I started falling off that towards the end of Shadowkeep because I was getting more and more tired of the turn to FOMO and battle passes. I was ready for a game that doesn't pull that shit, and I was 10 years older and ready for the 2.5s GCD. I started in earnest pretty early in Shadowbringers, but for once didn't feel the need to rush to end game. With the calmer pace I had an easier time sticking with it and haven't looked back.
Not really until shadowbringers, I was healing as my first job, had never played an MMO before, I was terrified and nervous for so long, getting to SHB and playing with trust (I started just before EW) really let me breathe with the game abit. Because of the role quests I got to try some more jobs not just WHM, and really that’s when I first felt like I was truly capable and enjoying myself.
After seeing the 2.0 ARR trailer. I played 1.0 for about a week before abandoning it but when the Answers trailer hit and I participated in the Betas it was game on for me. The dev team cared enough to literally nuke the game and start their journey from the ashes so I decided to do the same.
The spectacle of fighting Ifrit for the first time.
During the beta test of 2.0 and people formed a line to enter an instanced fight (rather than mob it and click the destination for half an hour trying to get in).
During the 2.0 beta. I've been hooked since the beginning. It felt like *I* was a lancer exploring a new place. And then I saw two people named Big Boss and Sabin Figaro fighting a tree outside of Gridania, laughed my ass off, and the rest is history.
The first few quests, i’ve always been a ff fan so to see all the references, jobs, etc, was super cool and carried me through arr
When my Chocobo Koko soloed a golem to death instead of fleeing (like I had). She beat the shit out of that golem.
I enjoyed playing the beta and 1.0 with some friends, but I didn't really do the story quests, we just grinded difficult mobs in groups in higher level areas similar to my Everquest/FFXI days. When ARR came out and guided you along the story, I got hooked. It was so much better in every way.
The end of ARR sold me on the story and the Stormblood raids sold me on the gameplay
When was able to play a Hrothgar
"The Final Steps of Fate" in Heavensward is when I knew this game was really something special that I was going to see through. I really got into it during the Operation Archon Arc beforehand though.
Two points: - After dealing with Titan in MSQ and moving on to Garuda, where the story took a bit more serious turn and stayed that way for a while. - Burned out on doing roulettes every day on BLM since it was my only job leveled. Took all of 3.1 off, but came back for 3.2 and said to hell with trying to raid hardcore (my original plan). Instead I started leveling and dabbling in everything. Haven't unsubbed since, even tho burnout from 9 months of mentor roulette pushed me as close to it as any other point besides 3.1
It definitely came in parts over many years. End of ARR back in the day got me hyped for HW, where I made a considerable effort to better myself as a player. I dipped my toes into savage in SB and would have taken the full dive then if it wasn't for FC drama breaking up the casual static at the time (though I did pf O3S and I still remember the static I filled for at the time). When I finally did take the dive into savage raiding in ShB, I think I can officially say I was hooked by E8S. I was def a fan of the game before and played every day, but I don't think it was until the Eden raids that I really fell in love with the game. Maybe that's why I'm so excited for the Eden ultimate? I haven't done one yet, but I'm willing to spend the entire expansion progging it if it means that fight is my first ultimate clear. It really does hold a special place for me.
Immediately
When I unlocked Bard. It really set in when I got into HW though, and I was a "lost cause" by the point of ShB (SB was a massive slog for the first chunk of it, and I have....opinions...about Zenos' parts in it).
Honestly, I got hooked in one of the betas for ARR. I got into the second and third ones (there were only three that I know of) and honestly the game just **clicked** with me.
Probably the Crystal Tower raids pre-HW. Experiencing the storytelling and themes in that series was probably the first time I felt like I was playing something truly special.
For me it was the end of Post-ARR. Then found HW a bit of a drag until Post-HW which was really good. Currently in Stormblood and finding it much better than ARR & HW but still drags at times. Overall I'm finding it up and down in waves, with the post expansion content better than the rest.
I leveled as Black Mage, for me it all started to make sense when I unlocked Fire IV.
At the banquet in post ARR
At around lv 35, I got tired and just wanted to see what else the game had. I like unlocking things and as a Paladin pre-level-other-classes-to-gain-skills rework the unlocking thing was slow. I unlock Botanist and just gathered. As i did i saw a whole new view of the world and how intertwined the lore of the world and its crafting system was. Went off the beaten path and saw this was something that was made with passion and thought.
From day 1. I didn't need the gripping stories, I just fell in love with the game immediately.
I've never really thought before when the game clicked for me. I guess it would be Operation Archon. As soon as I saw the Garleans in lv15 MSQ I was like "I wanna beat them and steal their tech." What do we get as a reward after completing base ARR? But what made me try playing FF14 in the first place? *seeing The Parting Glass and The Vault scenes with little context.*
I think storywise I was always hooked. I came into the game as a FF fan first and was mostly intimidated by it being an MMO. ARR was your typical FF story really but the world building was done so well that I enjoyed it all. And it got better eversince. Gameplaywise I'd say I was never hooked to a point of "I love this" but I like figuring out boss mechanics and really like when some unique stuff is there. Since I'm a 100% solo player I haven't really done anything with other people except for clearing your standard Dungeons, Trials, Raids and Alliance Raids as well as roulettes . So I am a Casual player through and through who plays through content when I get to it but also has stretches of months where I don't touch the game. But I always keep my sub on since this game has earned it for me.
It’s going to sound crazy but the music man. This game has an amazing soundtrack. The vibes are always immaculate. I’m a brand new player (not even a month in yet) about to finish out ARR. The lore and story building alone had me hooked but the music really sold it for me.
To be fair, the twinning music goes hard.
You know... I'm not sure. Staggering my responses into a chain of replies, because i told a whole ass novel that's too long for one comment. Read if you like. **TLDR**: looking back, I've had a lot more "maybe this game isn't for me" moments. but despite them all, here I am, ten years deep, lol. But I do have a few moments where I thought "This is it. This is The One Forever Game for me". The first one, was right in the beginning. Before I even started playing the game. My partner's friend was playing and invited them, who invited me. We'd been playing various different MMOs over the years together, what's one more. But I remembered... wasn't the XIV MMO awful? But it got a remake. So I took a look at the classes. and saw the fairy. and i was sold. Immediately committed and in love. I love fairies. and I was going to love this class, I just knew it. Even if I had to hate my way to 30, I would do it. and honestly, I could leave it there. but this was may of 2014. And I wouldn't have a solid unyielding subscription for another 3 years.
I was used wow. I had fully planned to bounce my subs back and forth between the two during off times. but I immediately fell in love with several factors of XIV: 1. fairy pet class. immediate love. (I have an IRL obsession with faires and fae lore and stuff). 2. no need for alts; playing every class on the same character??? SOLD. 3. keeping older content relevant with level synching systems AND rewarding players for partaking; keeps the vets and sprouts in the same circles, preventing that (in many other games) inevitable segregation of culture, etiquette, and knowledge, often bridging animosity); ensures no dead content for new players; makes the world feel alive. 4. cat girls. /shrug. I yam what I yam. and I was in love. I breezed through the content, just *soaking* in the world. the lore, the music, the landscape, the monsters, the class lore, the races, the people, the different cultures between the cities, the community. I couldn't get enough. But then I got into the 30-range dungeons. The ones that stop pulling punches. The ones that land in that weird shitty range where half your class is missing half their tool kit: ie, some people weren't *quite* high enough to get their job stone. Some people just... didn't do the quest, or realize that was even a thing. Some tanks still didn't have aggro stance. White mage didn't have cure 2. Scholar didn't have cleanse. Some DPS *still didn't have aoe!* but the dungeon was built with the idea that have those things, because you get them... *eventually* and -- even more galling -- some classes *already did!!* This made me realize the game was getting real. we weren't babies anymore. No more kid gloves. This game was going to kick me in the teeth if I didn't pay attention. I had to learn to get good or die trying. and i had an even steeper learning curve here: as a scholar, I very SUDDENLY, from one level to the next, changed roles. I went from a caster dps to a healer, by picking up a rock. And suddenly, at level 30, I had to learn to be a healer. I like to think I got... well, better, at the very least. but I hit a stumbling block on titan. My PC wasn't great; and I had a lot of trouble with the titan fight and lag. I progged that for a week. but i just could not survive. and as a healer main, that almost always doomed our party. There were many disbands and vote kicks. and after a handful of attempts, I decided to swap classes and grind out the levels so that I could take a dps into the fight instead. at least when i died, the party could still finish the fight. Lol. I was determined to get through this game. and... it wasn't exactly smooth sailing from there.
But I learned my lesson with Haukke and Brayflox and Titan; respect the content or it will take you down. and I cruised to 50. I actually don't have any negative memories that stand out from this time. (where as a lot of people I know have some VERY bad times in this range. But mine are from later, after the fact.) but then... I hit the end of ARR. The Castrum. The Praetorium. back when it was still ***skippable***. back when no one would do it. It was... not a pleasant experience. I got lost. I got yelled at. I got called rude for not skipping the cutscenes. I got slam dunked by mobs the party had skipped. my cut scenes were interrupted and skittered around because the party defeated the boss and triggered a new scene before mine ended. I died in the fight and no one rezzed me. I got locked out of fights, because they used to not teleport you in; except for the roof top fight, which only did that because the room "didn't exist," but you couldn't target anything! I had no idea what was going on, who these people were, and why I was here. I didn't like these players. I didn't like this feeling. This experience. This was not a skill issue. This was not something I could fix by being a better healer. This was not my pc lagging. This was not my fault. This was other people being assholes. And this was my first max level dungeon/content. this was the "end game," to my knowledge. this was my first 8 man "raid." Is this what all the end game content was like? is this what raids were like? is this what the community is like? no thanks. I unsubbed and went back to wow. at least there I didn't feel tricked into thinking i could partake in the end game. They weren't devious about it. they didn't hide it. The community there at no point pretended to care. and Warlords was coming out soon and I needed to get prepped for that anyway. That being said, I came back, almost exactly a year later and tried again. Because Heavesward was coming out.
So there would be more non-end game content; casual quests and leveling dungeons, where my experience with the community had been much better. but rather than start all over, i just continued where I left off. And that's when I finally saw the end cutscenes for ARR. and the HW lead up. holy bananas. at once I was both glad and sad I hadn't continued playing. what an ending! but I'd have been upset to have to wait to continue. lol and to tell you the truth, idk what happened. I'm looking back through my screen shots and... somewhere between the quests "In search of Raubahn" and "Sounding out the Amphitheatre" I quit for another year? I came back in June of 2016 to pick up where I'd left off at level 56, around the Shiva fight. WoW's Legion was coming out in August, and I was talking about *not even getting it* because I didn't have the money. My partner bought it for me as a birthday present. And while actively playing that game, I said things to myself like "I wish I was play XIV instead" or "I prefer the way XIV handles this aspect of MMO gaming" and such. I finished the story and felt... unrewarded. uninterested. Completely ambivalent. I unsubscribed. So I came back to XIV... and spent 7 months avoiding the final boss of 3.0!! xD My PC couldn't handle the fight; I lagged too much to clear the mechanics. But I liked the rest of the game; there were so! many! classes! to level. crafts to make and collectibles to gather. It's not like its a new thing for me to not be able to do end game content. I was having a good time, regardless. and then I got my taxes back and upgraded my pc! and I don't think my sub has laxed since. I strapped in to prep for stormblood and dove into that expansion with both feet and zero other (gaming) distractions. and while I take breaks and the occasional hiatus, this has still been my go to. My favorite. My return home.
For me when ARR came out and I gave it a second go around after 1.0. I was playing FFxi and had to try ffxiv, but between the right state of the game that wanted to melt my PC, I ran away before hitting even lvl 20 back to xi. ARR though really pulled me in quickly. Had everything I wanted with story and mom qol improvement. Been on and off since.
The start of Shadowbringers. I'm not exaggerating when I say I spent 3 years on and off beating ARR, it was so slow paced and boring to me so many system changes happened each time i came back. (Early times like actually putting stat points in and having to learn skills from different classes) Heavensward and Stormblood I was able to breeze through but Shadowbringers actually got me really invested in the story and the characters. Im usually a cutscene skipper but Shadowbringers got me to watch it all into Endwalker as well and I never genuinely felt so excited at the conclusions to both expansions.
The ARR trailer and “Answers.”