Need to catch up with FF14 before Dawntrail? Best start now: there won’t be a free way to skip its story soon

13.03.2024 - 18:51 / rockpapershotgun.com / Square Enix / Be A

Fallen behind on Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn’s story? Whether you’re still yet to finish Endwalker or are looking to pick up the MMO for the first time in anticipation of enjoying a lovely summer holiday with your fellow Scions of the Seventh Dawn, you’re going to have to work before your Warrior of Light can kick back in next expansion Dawntrail; there won’t be a free way to simply jump to the latest chapter of the story for free anytime soon.

That comes from FF14’s director-producer Naoki ‘Yoshi-P’ Yoshida, who spoke to PC Gamer about the idea of being able to leap past the dozens-to-hundreds of hours of cutscenes and conversations across A Realm Reborn and its four expansions to date: Heavensward, Stormblood, Shadowbringers and Endwalker.

It’s an understandably difficult thing to balance, with brand new players facing an ever-higher barrier to enjoying the latest content added in each new patch and expansion, with this summer’s Dawntrail being the latest. At the same time, FF14’s sweeping story, character development and genuinely emotional moments - which land with extra impact after spending such a long time with your companions - have undoubtedly played a big part in the game’s rapturous critical acclaim and enduring popularity. For many players - but certainly not all - seeing the story unfold as its writers intended is a major part of The FF14 Experience.

Yoshida himself admitted that the idea of skipping the story leaves him “constantly torn”, referencing the introduction of Endwalker’s in-game lore bible, the Unending Codex, and cutscene library Unending Journey as ways that the developers have looked to make it easier for players to recap what happened hours ago (or see what they missed if they blasted through the first time).

Even so, Yoshida seems unconvinced that making it easy to whizz past the story would do A Realm Reborn and its expansions justice, and goes against the team’s efforts at putting its narrative front-and-centre - something they intend to keep doing.

"I'm concerned that if the globally acclaimed storyline can be skipped through a function, the value of the FF14 game itself will be diminished," he said. "So far, FF14 has been able to continue to grow while keeping the story as the main focus."

Of course, there is an existing way to skip past Final Fantasy XIV’s story, but not for free. The game’s real-money shop sells Tales of Adventure items for A Realm Reborn, Heavensward, Stormblood and Shadowbringers, giving players a way to automatically complete all of the main scenario quests up to the end of the respective story arc. (The items don’t increase a character’s level accordingly, but there are separate Tales of Adventure items for job groups that will boost them