can't believe estinien yeeted annuum's body at his boyfriend like do something about this i guess lmao

now that i've finished it, i have Thoughts.

i still think lyse's role as the central ala mhigan protagonist was bullshit. i am glad raubahn has a seat at the table for ala mhigo now but lyse has no real place there tbh. there was no need to have her narrative be the central one and it's super problematic.

she wasn't raised there, she didn't experience the oppression that the others have, and from a super diverse country, having White Girl Lead Resistance was just. stupid. lmao

yeah it's not great

as a result i liked the doman narrative way more.

I think liking the doman narrative more is pretty common because it also got the bulk of the expacs run time

YEP. lmao

also it happens in one chunk as opposed to being split in two

it also just felt better written, more natural, higher stakes.

yeah it also has some of the better characters

the characters had everything to lose and also everything to gain. whereas ala mhigo it just felt like. there? there was no emotional stake in it for me because the game put lyse as the narrator for the struggle which she

didn't experience any

but yugiri and gosetsu and hien and them like. fucking lived it.

yotsuyu was also an incredibly well-written antagonist.

yeah and the game did completely fail to set any of that up for her in advance

yeah yotsuyu was great

overall the parts that were good were REALLY good and the parts that were bad were just. really fucking bad.

ala mhigo has such an important history, which makes it a shame that it falls so flat.

yeah I feel like ala mhigo got done dirty

when the final battle happened in ala mhigo i was like oh wait we're already doing this? bc it felt so fucking rushed.

its very much a learning arc for them with the story telling. a tad Two Towers

it's also HMMMM @ square enix that the country full of non-white ppl got a shit narrative whereas doma got this beautiful compelling story

ala mhigo got lyse telling them they weren't trying hard enough whereas doma got this beautiful narrative of resistance and harm reduction and collective action and shit

I really don't think they did it on purpose but they kind of got themselves into a no win situation

and i was honestly very disappointed that lyse was still doing that shit HOURS and HOURS into the plot.

quixocalypse: idk i think making lyse the central narrative was absolutely a calculated choice on their part, but by doing that, they robbed themselves of any opportunity to actually tell the story of ala mhigo, you know.

I would argue that its because lyse is supposed to be experiencing character development but yeah it's not the best

yeah it was bad.

the parts that were good were good, tho.

i love hien a lot and the azim steppe plot was so good.

i agree. What they wanted - lyse getting her shit called on, and Learning she dun known nothing - was not done well. you can see sprinklings of it. but the person handling that thread either lacked experience or rushed to get it done

honestly I feel it was also so they could remove her from the main cast which lmfao

literally when lyse was like i have to quit the scions i was like oh no

a tragedy LMFAO

like i don't know WHAT HAPPENED

to her character after she revealed her story

it's like they took all the parts that were great about her and just put it in a blender and said here's lyse i guess

farlichu: yeah it was just not well done at all

even the doman narrative is like yikes to me bc lol @ japan positioning themselves as the ones who suffered colonization and oppression

it was better written for sure but there are so many issues in context

thankfully none of this stuff matters much to the ongoing plot

discontinued: ALSO TRUE

it's just. whew.

a lot happened.

SB was really just trying to tie up two loose ends, neither of which went super well

i also agree lyse is very calculated like. the white saviour vibes were off the chart

im glad she's mostly out of the picture LOL

there was literally no reason for lyse to be the narrator of that story when you had m'naago, kemp, raubahn, all right there. lmao

they absolutely chose her for a reason.

but yeah i wasn't sad when she quit the scions

here is a character you know! except you dont because lol

i was annoyed actually bc i was like oh good i have to see her at alliance meetings now but then raubahn stepped up lmfao

you still do have to see her at alliance meetings but its somewhat balnced by raubahn being htere

100% like raubahn is a character everyone knew and loved since ARR there was no reason for lyse to even exist

lyse kicking the namazu is one of her few redeeming moments lol

raubahn is my dad and i am proud of him

I LOVE HIM SO MUCH

also if they wanted someone a bit different PIPPIN IS ALSO RIGHT THERE

Lyse also suffers from the "we tried to give a female character flaws but not too many flaws" and as a result she's just bland

Raubahn would have been my first choice for leading SB but like M'NAAGO IS RIGHT THERE TOO

yeah m'naago would have been a better option

yeah!!!!

but yeah anyways

She was actually out there experiencing the bullshit

time to bring some shadows i guess LMFAO

i am just glad you exist bc i have seen so many ppl completely miss how problematic lyse is or excuse it and im like. they literally gave her blond hair and blue eyes. they didn't even try!!

yeah, agreed that SB felt a lot like they were trying to tie up two loose ends and the story suffered for it

Lyse is so contrasted by Fordola who is her mirror and done 1947933739 times better

discontinued: LMFAOOO TRULY THEY DID NOT EVEN TRY

SIGHS DEEPLY

throwback to when i was accused of internalized misogyny bc i didn't like lyse

nah i shit all over alphinaud in arr i'm equal opportunity ok

I've seen the argument for lyse in that she's the stand in for players who....really needed to hear what she stood to learn

But also. Yikes

idk i don't think she actually learned anything tho

there was no actual moment where she was like

"i was wrong and here is what i learned"

right. it's also like that makes it WORSE. bc why did she need to be White. for players to identify with her

there was maybe one or two sentences in a cutscene but no actual thought process lmao

Yeah she never develops which is like oh no.......

part of the problem is that the current team didn't design the characters

she literally continues to lecture people in doma for not rising up and fighting and i'm just like

did we not fucking do this already

so its not like they designed her like that FOR SB

Me halfway through sb: Barbie SHUT UP

its more just they had this character with blonde hair and blue eyes and decided to go ahead with it

i honestly don't know at what stage in the game they decided she was ala mhigan

If she remained pretending to be Yda she might have been salvageable because at least we know Yda was a himbo

but like minfilia is also ala mhigan and... /gestures

so its wild that they managed to do that twice

i don't know about you but given the care of the team for details i think it says a lot they looked at this chick made her ala mhigan halfway thru and went "nah we'll keep her model white and not change some colours"

I... want to say it get mentions that she's from ala mhigo somewhere in ARR?

i honestly don't remember

but tbh even having replayed that on an alt relatively recently I can't remember

i honestly didn't get that she was from ala mhigo until she and papalymo were found again post arr.

when she was still masked up.

me neither

but at the time i was like oh ok w/e because i associated ala mhigo mostly with raubahn and ilberd bc they made that like.

central parts of their character.

i replayed ARR semirecently and was looking out for this in particular because it annoyed me and I dn't RECALL ever seeing it mentioned in ARR

whereas with yda it seemed more likea n afterthought.

100%

I think she mentions it when you're going through little Ala Mhigo somewhere

hmm maybe

which is why i was so shocked to have lyse like. the central part of the story because it was so fucking random that it meant SO MUCH TO HER etc etc but she never fucking mentioned it in arr aside from i guess a throwaway bit

that part was just unforgivably poorly set up

and i get that ARR writing was like

gestures at it

and it sort of screwed up most of the SB experience

yeah.

it was just poor decisions all around and anything that might excuse it is. extremely weak LOL

there was no pathos to her being ala mhigan at all

none whatsoever.

sighs.

ah well.

she quit my team now so w/e LMAO

LOL

i was. very glad to see her gone at the end

Enormous sigh of relief when she left

Enjoy bringing shadows tho

but like lyse aside even in doma i was like "bruh" when they showed that meeting of several other doman countries but they were wearing SE asian clothing (like the vietnamese ao dai) and. being there to support/unite the japan/east asian stand in country. JUST. big sigh

It's definitely the strong expac when you compare the two

discontinued: the one thing that made me balk at doma was the whole "let's win this thing and push these tribes into supporting us" and while i get the narrative reason of like

the empire is gonna fuckin kill us all

i was like hmmmmmmmMMM i don't like that

AGREED

feels weird man

a hot mess lmao

a lot of ffxiv falters when they try to touch on empire/colonization themes.

it is my least favourite part of any of their narratives

it just doesn't work in context

i spent most of sb like bring me back to my gay elf husbands please

ngl lmao

Imo they redeem themselves a bit with EW but no spoilers

yeah, ShB is definitely a lot stronger in terms of like. story quality/story beats

They really honed in one what makes their story tick in SHB

i love she