Some pacing issues aside, Shadowbringers boasts what's probably this game's best storytelling to date. In Norvrandt, Final Fantasy XIV has an incredible post-apocalypse and what's at least facially an interesting subversion of Final Fantasy XIV's centerpiece conflict between "light" and "dark." A handful of story beats are some of this long-running MMO's best, many of them mulled over the course of the last two expansions only to suddenly deliver at Shadowbringers' heights. A few of Final Fantasy XIV's newer characters – as well as a couple of returning faces – are fun and nuanced additions to a game that often struggles with developing its cast. Even the core cast members here find room to grow into something feeling more akin to actual characters.

That's all on top of the usual trappings that make Final Fantasy XIV so special. Aesthetically, this game remains a delight, though Final Fantasy XIV's cozier notes find a little more contrast in the handful of moments where Shadowbringers openly flirts with horror. The boss fighting and raiding at Final Fantasy XIV's core continue to dazzle, and I've yet to find a better communal experience in online gaming.

I know the folks behind Final Fantasy XIV have disowned interpretations of Shadowbringers as a metaphor, but I can't shake the analogs to environmental collapse, and the bureaucratic failure presented in both Amaurot and Sharlayan's response to their worlds' supposed end. I'm not the first person to point this out, but those connections felt more familiar than I'd like as I began Shadowbringers on the tail end of a mismanaged pandemic, during a summer of intense floods and wildfire smoke, and then finished this expansion amid one of my home state's warmest winter seasons on record.

Finally, I'm nervous as this game heads into Endwalker. Chasing Shadowbringers' Emet-Selch with a nihilistic brat and an obsessed rival seems poised to let down, and even at their most theatrical, the set piece battles wrapping up Shadowbringers haven't quite delivered. I'm hoping a few of the narrative seeds planted in Shadowbringers, however, maybe bloom into something more as Endwalker begins in earnest.

People championing the first Xenoblade Chronicles maybe undersell just how much capital-V videogame happens over its dozens of hours. The grand scale is admirable, but there are still secret platforming challenges and dungeon mini-bosses breaking up an epic tale that seemingly wants its players more interested in human nature, free will and Xenoblade's cast's thoughts about both.

A secret about me, though, is that I like platforming challenges and dungeon mini-bosses. Slot that into a game that, despite never really maintaining a logical through line, keeps up an emotional through line told over days of game time blending high fantasy and science fiction with found families, actual hippies and a landscape that is, quite literally, two giant fighting robots, and I think you've got something special.