Where I come from making a bad joke takes precedents over sharing sincere thoughts, so the actual review is going to be in the comments.

I feel like I had a better experience with Stormblood than most people. That comes after not really feeling the Heavensward hype and weirdly fits in the "steadily getting to be a better game with each major update" trend in FFXIV. I lauged, I (almost) cried, and in the end I actually felt excited about what comes next, which in a way reminded me of my 2.4-2.5 experience.

The most obvious thing that sets Stormblood apart from its predecessors is that it confidently shifts from an MMORPG to a single player JRPG that happens to be set in an MMO playground. HW was already moving in that direction with its more involved cutscene-based storytelling and mostly dungeon-free MSQ, but StB really solidifies it. The cutscenes are more numerous and way longer now, with intermissions to keep track of the grand narrative. The "several cutscenes will play in succession" warning, which was usually reserved for story climaxes, is now a common occurence. And I swear that Return to Ivalice spends more time in cutscenes than actually raiding. With this focus on being a story driven JRPG the important question now is this: "How do you make the game in between all the cutscenes interesting?" And that's a tough one to answer, as MMORPGs aren't really a great framework for this kind of experience. The combat, FFXIV's core gameplay tenet, is, while quite good generally, is never really satisfying when you're on your own. The party synergy is crucial to the game's combat core, and each class individually would just be boring to play. And so, there's less combat now. The quests try to mix things up with navigating the new environments and talking to NPCs. Added minigames provide for a new mode of interaction. The QTEs are admittedly quite basic, but they can set up hype moments during boss fights. The first person scenes are non-intrusive and kind of cute (especially the ones that have you converse with people). Sightseeing vistas genuinely made it fun to explore Kugane's architecture and tapped into my habit of just jumping around in 3D environments that I had since childhood. Swimming provides for a whole new mode of chill exploration. And when the game does call for combat, you're often met with single player duties, and, even if they're still not really challenging, they prove to be a solid way to build a setpiece without resorting to full-fledged dungeons. They kinda spam that one a lot by the end, but overall I find it a welcome change.

There are certain other areas where I find StB iterating on and improving what was introduced previously. Dungeon and raid content is some of the best yet. Bardam's Mettle is a marvel of a dungeon that flips the usual mechanics for a more teamwork-based challenge that is a great change of pace. Susano and Byakko are some of the most hype trials we've seen, and they're greatly aided by the aforementioned QTEs. The Omega raids, while basic in their plot, have an emotional core that had me shaking in the end, and it holds yet another top 3 boss fights contender, as well as offers some great fan service moments.

Another thing the game does well is provide you with a sense of history and just neat lore bits. Ever wondered why catboys are called the way they are? Well the M tribe in The Fringes makes it very clear. The Au'ra get a detailed overview of their social hierarchy. Some of the quests explore the tension between Gridania and Ala Mhigo dating back to a conflict that happened a hundred years ago. A random 4.x dungeon straight up tells you how the Ixal came to be, and it's kind of a shocking resolution. Remember Yugiri? You get to talk to her parents now. Overall, it's just nice to finally see where the domans you met all the way back in ARR came from. And Othard is a great environment. Kugane is probably the coziest of the major cities in the game and is the first to be laid out in a way that doesn't feel annoying to navigate. I'm also a Ruby Sea enjoyer. If you get over the initial bump of swimming back and forth a lot without an aetheryte to teleport to, you get to explore a very beautiful and chill beach environment. Personally, I find it just oozes comfort. Maybe it's Hells' Lid lighting up the skyline at night, or maybe it's the entire underwater turtle town ripped straight from Phantom Menace, but it's cozy. The Azim Steppe may not be that fun to navigate, but it's got immaculate vibes and is clearly paying huge respect to the cultures of Central Asia with the landscapes, the clothes, the food, all these little details.

But that's just half of the areas. The other half of the game is set in Gyr Abania, and I ain't got anything good to say about these maps. Boring aesthetics aside, The Peaks might as well be the single worst area in FFXIV just based on how annoying it is to navigate. And that's including The Sea of Clouds, mind you. And it's a bit frustrating, because there are neat little bits here and there, like the cursed forest in The Fringes or the underwater ruins in The Lochs. But there's little incentive to explore them in any capacity, and they're offset by a lot more of just boring desert all around.

And if we're talking about the negatives, we might as well touch upon the elephant in the room that is the MSQ of StB. I don't mind the focus on the conflict with the Empire. I'd take anything over another Ascian plot. I don't even find the story to be badly paced, which is a sentiment I see expressed a lot. If anything, structurally the story is sound, setting up multiple villains and different outlooks on oppression and the price and meaning of freedom. What I'm having issues with is overall tonal dissonance and the focus on Lyse as the main character.

Lyse is, again, a nice fit for the story in theory. She's a native, she's got family ties, she's just achieved personal freedom for herself and is seeking to empower others to find freedom for themselves, learning along the way that it's not actually all that easy. The problem is that Lyse is just boring herself as a character and, uh, she kind of comes across as a white savior figure, especially considering how she's taking Raubahn's rightful place in this conflict. They fix it first thing in the patches, but it's a weird point nonetheless.

The tone varies wildly not only from the example set by HW's writing, but even throughout StB itself. High fantasy suddenly gives way to shonen anime with its pathos and power-level bullshit, only to then pivot to silly saturday morning cartoon comic relief and to, of all things, B-movie body horror schlock. It's in a way fascinating and can be very entertaining, if you set your expectations right. One of the dungeon bosses is basically a nazi zombie experiment that comes at you with a chainsaw roaring "RIP AND TEAR". Not even exaggerating. At one point I was basically experiencing this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPUPaxgIo98
And truly I had fun. But there's quite some distance between Wolfenstein-level grotesquerie and earnest depiction of the cruel nature of collaborationism that the story also goes for. StB's narrative might be complete structurally and thematically, but it lacks cohesion like nothing else in FFXIV. Thankfully, that is remedied in the patches that once again pick up a unified tone and actually bring some mystery and intrigue into the plot.

And I don't mean to knock on StB too much. While I've had some frustrations with the MSQ, I've had much more fun with new areas and optional and patch content that redeem a lot of 4.0's flaws for me. In many ways StB is a transitional stage that sets up much of the foundation that later expansions would build upon, and I do admire that they got so much of it right from the start.

A small sidenote concerning Yotsuyu's character arc, as I find it not only illustrates the problem of tone, but is also an example of a bigger problem in FFXIV's writing as a whole. So, a spoiler warning for the next paragraph.

Yotsuyu is Othard's mirror to Fordola. Another recruit of the Empire that seeks to gain personal freedom in the system of oppression by way of power and authority. Yotsuyu is using her position to indulge in her sadistic impulses and personal vendetta against the Domans. And herein lies the first issue: Yotsuyu is a flimsy villain. She's got an iron grip on the poor villagers of Isari, but that fear comes from her position of authority and no real power. Zenos has power. Even Fordola has power. Yotsuyu is just a stand-in for the Empire's might. This is exacerbated by the fact that her right hand man, her "muscle" is Grynewaht, a comic relief villain that just keeps taking the L from WoL and the gang every time. And the game is aware of that, leaning into an almost Pinky and the Brain kind of relationship between the two. But if we're going that route, then both characters need to be in this weak position, striving to rise up and take down the heroes again and again. But Yotsuyu is not depicted as weak. In fact, she's presented as a genuinely scary figure, her cruelty depicted in a very realistic and uncomfortable way. This tonal clash actively harms the character throughout 4.0. But then the patches try to fix this and give Yotsuyu a second chance. The writing team tries to explore how memories shape and motivate both Fordola and Yotsuyu. The former gets a magic power that bombards her with traumatic memories of others, provoking her to think outside of the cage of her personal history. The latter just loses all memories altogether and is presented as essentially a different character, no longer bound by the emotional trauma of her distant past. She's finally allowed to gain agency, find personal freedom, yet that is quickly undercut by the revenge subplot with Asahi. Once again Yotsuyu loses all control and is driven by her emotions and others's manipulations. And yes, she's given her place under the spotlight to have her redemption. Her arc culminates in an emotionally touching trial that deftly mixes story and gameplay like no other fight in the game does. She's given proper respect and closure. But I just can't help but feel sorry for this character whose time got cut short by the need to set up the next step in the grand narrative. It's my biggest gripe with the writing going forward: characters are mostly just pawns in service to the ticking mechanism of plot progression.