Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail Review

Reviewing an MMO expansion is difficult under the best of circumstances, and now as I sit down to give my final thoughts on the state of the game at launch, Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail is no exception. I’ve put hundreds of hours into the expansion since its release last month, even delaying my review so I could try out the new Savage raid tier. Still, I can’t deny that I’m still a little torn about sharing my thoughts here and now, since so much of what sets Dawntrail apart from what came before won’t be released for months and years.

Let’s back up for a moment. Dawntrail is the 5th expansion for the current version of Final Fantasy XIV – the 6th if you count the original version 1.0, which was itself a very different game. Last time, Endwalker concluded the story arc that Creative Studio 3 had been working on for the last decade; and with Dawntrail, Creative Studio 3 had to meet the challenge of both respecting what came before and laying the foundation for the next 10 years of Final Fantasy XIV. This includes not only the story, which I’ve already shared my thoughts on, but also core gameplay systems that can continue to engage players well into the future.

Similar to the last two expansions before it, Dawntrail will include 8 dungeons (5 leveling dungeons, 3 of which are endgame dungeons), 3 Normal Mode Trials, 2 Extreme Trials, and a number of role quests for combat and crafting/gathering tasks at launch. The biggest upgrade this time around is of course the graphics update, which significantly improves material quality, lighting, shadows, and textures across the board. In particular, the viewing distances for detailed environmental objects have also increased significantly as a result of the graphics update – and although I was initially a little disappointed with the presentation during the media tour, I found the results on my home systems to be much better.

All of Dawntrail’s new zones make great use of the graphical improvements, and while they’re not a revamp, they add a depth to the game’s visuals that was sorely lacking before 7.0. The landscapes of Tural all offer something different from what came before. Unlike Stormblood, where many of the zones look too similar to the region, areas like Kozama’uka, Urqopacha, and Yak T’el remind me of the way the different regions blended together in the city-states of the base game A Realm Reborn, while still having their own unique identity. Even the few areas that are very visually different from the rest of the expansion are much appreciated; my only real complaint with Solution Nine is that they really need to allow players to use their mounts in the zone when it’s so sprawling.

The other major addition at launch is the long-awaited arrival of female Hrothgar as playable characters. My opinion on their inclusion is somewhat mixed; while I love the work the team put into their designs and I would absolutely turn my character into one, we are now 5 years later and the development team still refuses to consistently include Hrothgar and Viera when designing new outfits. There are cosmetic elements from Dawntrail that either don’t show up at all or don’t show up properly for players playing those characters with the new race option; not to mention the existing Hrothgar and Viera populations. It feels like a frustrating limitation on the status quo, especially when the graphical update feels like it would have been a great excuse for the development team to rework previous gear to make it more compatible for those races; and yet everything feels the same as it always has.

Combat jobs are even worse. While most jobs in the game have seen minimal changes since Endwalker, a few have been reworked. Astrologian has been reworked again, and tanks like Gunbreaker and Dark Knight have been adjusted to account for the removal of all damage on their gap closer. While these are mostly minor changes, there has already been some turmoil in terms of both job balance and job identity. One of the new jobs, Viper, has already been reworked quite extensively, and many – myself included – feel that it takes away a lot of its identity. Pictomancer, on the other hand, has been completely broken – and may have contributed to the expansion’s first Savage tier being so easy, as the rest of the combat jobs weren’t nerfed to catch up. There was even a fairly quick reversal of a controversial change to the Black Mage, which seems out of character given the way the development team has responded to such feedback in the past.

With Dawntrail feeling like a very safe expansion at launch and some of these odd changes to workstations, you definitely get the feeling that the development team may be struggling to decide which direction to take the game next. Maybe I’m reading too much into things, but for anyone who’s been playing XIV for any length of time, it’s undeniable how oddly identical Dawntrail’s overall gameplay loop is compared to Endwalker and, to a lesser extent, Shadowbringers. The same could have been said about Endwalker, of course, but there was the promise of exciting new gameplay systems in upcoming patches. The PvP overhaul, Variant and Criterion dungeons, Island Sanctuary, and the like. While new gameplay systems are planned for the future, many of these aren’t so much new features as they are content added to existing systems in the game. Combine that with some of the statements from Creative Studio 3 emphasizing how much more excitement the next expansion will bring after Dawntrail, while simultaneously describing 7.x as a “summer vacation” for players, and it’s not far-fetched to assume that the upcoming patch cycle won’t have much excitement in store for players.

So what does this mean for Dawntrail? Honestly, I don’t know yet. One bright spot is that the combat content has been pretty good so far. The dungeons are some of the best we’ve ever gotten, and the same goes for the Trials. The first Savage Raid tier, while not easier than expected, was still very tightly designed – with combat that’s just plain fun. The next patch brings the Alliance Raid series – this time a crossover with Final Fantasy XI – and the next Ultimate Raid. Beyond that, though, it’s hard to say what players looking for something truly new can look forward to. That’s not to say Dawntrail is bad or boring, but it’s shaping up to be more of an expansion that won’t make much of a splash, if any. Beastmaster is promising, but beyond that? This is all stuff we’ve seen before.

I’m OK with that, and I bet most active players will feel the same way. However, if you’re tired of the current formula, there’s little reason to stick around for long. Dawntrail is less of a sprint into the game’s future and more of a leisurely pit stop while we all figure out where it goes from here.

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