I been playing FFXIV for 10 years and I can say this expansion is a beautiful one. The new areas, the dungeons and cutscenes all benefit greatly from the graphics update. The characters can be divisive but are memorable and thoroughly written. The expansion’s narrative does start pretty slow and has some flaws, but it’s still a decent narrative with a lot of thought given to it. The biggest detractor for me personally was the occasional feeling of our main character presenting as more a side character in this expansion’s narrative rather than as a main character.
The expansions clear shining quality is the boss fights and zones. These are engaging and surprising, the best the game has put out in quite some time. The dungeons are also beautiful and fairly immersive.
This expansion will not go down as FFXIV’s greatest expansion (a feat that might be next to impossible to achieve if we’re being honest with ourselves). But it is certainly a very good one with a lot of improvements. Not all the games issues have been fixed, but a good amount for an expansion. I recommend it.