Positives:
- visuals/animation
(e.g. Collie‘s crying, cutscenes)
- the lore dumps
were fine
- bringing back many
WQ NPC‘s and giving some of them a conclusion
- Toth and his
friends were a nice surprise (I like Goati the most)
- the character
dynamics were good
- character‘s like
Cyno had a chance to be serious again instead of being the comic
relief in events (so less puns)
- every conversation
with Dott and Pant
- Dott‘s flashback
cutscene (even if the manga version was missing for some reason)
- character grow
from Paimon (her convo with Scara)
- quality of life:
saving points and the notebook
Negatives:
- some cameo‘s
(like Sorush) didn‘t contribute to the grand scheme
- the knowledge of
an event quest is kind of necessary (not good for new players or the
ones who took breaks)
- Toth and his
friends had more screentime than Nicole despite being it her patch
(in short her SQ isn‘t included in the main quest like Lauma,
nefer, ect. in the past)
But the elephant in
the room is Dottore and Irmensul
They [the writers]
had everything layed out as a foundation. „Burning the old world“,
Dott and his goal to change the fate system and in the end it was
Nahida who did the burning. Moreover the Tsaritsa didn‘t know any
of his plans?? Moon takeover and entering Irmensul wasn‘t
greenlight? It would have been such a good movement alongside taking
the gnosis to fuck up the HP.
Also the man with
back up plans, calculating about every possibility just died? Not
only that, they were no big consequences regarding the data transfer
from Irmensul to Aaru (throwback to our conversation about genshin
with no impact). Yes the fates are more loosely than before, but like
above mentioned that wasn‘t Dott‘s original plan as it should be.
It just happened accidentally.
Dott with his moon
marrows felt more dangerous and powerful to the world than this
version.
I also want to be
honest I firstly didn‘t catch while playing that this Dott was the
last version. But the truth is: They are no other (known) souls or
segments. I needed other people comments to understand that he split
his soul into two; one physical as the Nod Krai version and one data
version which was stored in the Northern Bank and got uploaded to
Irmensul from Pant. So the chance to make him playable is almost zero
unless they do an uno reverse card in Snez(?). It‘s so frustrating
to give the best written villain (in my opinion) also the very first
villain from 8 years ago this kind of end. They also sealed Pant‘s
fate because he needs Dott and the elexir of immortality to survive
longer. So his playability is low as well.
Another topic: The
quest suffered a bit of „show don‘t tell“. Even in the former
arcs this was a problem. We had much talking and exposition esp. the
preparation for the final fight, but short cutscenes or flashback
images would have helped.
Unanswered
questions:
a) What was the
„truth“ among the pages of Purana? It must have been so
significant it even changed the chapter title.
b) Dott‘s plan to
recruit the Trav (Luna 4) is still unknown
c) The pyro gnosis.
I was expecting till the end we see someone (Pant?) pick up the
gnosis from the ashes, but nothing happened regarding it. This must
be addressed in Snez since that‘s the last gnosis the Tsaritsa
wants/needs.
d) if the burning
wasn‘t the end goal what was Dott trying to accomplish? Playing
admin? For the sake of experimenting?
The future: I now
know how Capitanomains must feel. Until the recent quest there was
still a big hope of him coming back with a playable segment in Snez.
It‘s frustrating how they treat the (male) Harbingers. Scara got
one of the best treatments at least. It‘s like the ycare more about
the playability of female Harbingers than the male ones (except
Signora, rip Signoramains). Two of the dead ones (Columbina and
Sandrone) are given a second chance.
Maybe it‘s coping
and I‘m catching straws, but I still have a bit of hope for a
playable Snez version and I‘m waiting for the playable IDs once the
Snez beta rolls out until I give up (and spending my stack of primos
for someone else). I‘ll main his boyfriend Pantalone in case
only he becomes playable.
The lizard theory is
a bit farfatched (but funny) or the Escher theory however I take
everything right now. They did mention in the Snez preview about the
„memory preserving“ function of the Cryo element. Dott could have
indeed a back up plan even Pant didn‘t know about. The chances are
low but not zero.