Did you like the story?

[Imba.9451]

Rushed storytelling. Basically nonexistant character development. And the characters that had some development got the Lazarus-, i mean Joko treatment: Getting killed of before they did anything with them.

Soo-Won was boring, and I was just annoyed by how brutally the game wanted me to feel sad about her. She just got thrown into the story and then we killed her. Thats all. And the more Aurene talked with or about her with that Freaking. Annoying. Gasping. Voice. (I swear, I am so tired of this VA by now), the more my resentment against Soo-Won, Aurene and the Story grew even further.

 

Icebrood Sagas ending was bad. Like really, really bad. But this whole expansion was underwhelming through and through. It never reached to low points of IBS, but overall just underwhelming.

Edited March 11, 2022 by Imba.9451

[Killer.4360]

Yes. Definitely the best story GW2 has seen so far imho.

[Artemis.8034]

There were a couple of sections I didnt care for, but the overall was good, and the final part was amazing 

[Xerxez.7361]

I don't know what it is about Detective Rama, but he felt genuine. Might be the hat.

 

I did like Mai Trin's redemption Arc, but more from the notes and objects spread around the instances than from the actual verbal story.

 

Overall the story felt short, but it got to the point except for the Mansion Puzzle. Took me way too long to realize one of the rooms had a window that I mistook for a mirror...

[Adah.8371]

I have to say that I was disappointed by the story. It was very short and very fast paced with a lot of dialogs (Taimi... Urgh...).

I preferred by far Path of Fire story and maps. I expected more something linked with GW1 : Shiro, the undead curse etc. But It was just the first part of the expansion so let's wait for the upcoming living world stories ! 🙂

However I love the new characters Rama and Yao but they are unexploited for now. Let's wait a bit more 🙂

Edited March 11, 2022 by Adah.8371

[ZeftheWicked.3076]

It was good/meh at the same time.

It's great for what it did - wrapped up the dragons story and gave us a nice fresh start for whatever is coming.
It's meh for how it did it - rushed (no shocker it's standard for a-net to make their xpacs great after launch), with lots of characters and plot points not getting spotlight they deserve or being plain pointless.

Yao is kinda just there. Nothing about him that makes his presence justified at all.
Empress gets hardly any screentime. You'd think being Joon's sister and ruler of the whole place she's have more screentime.
Luxons and Kurziks barely get any mentions, while our entire base of operations in Cantha is a Kurzick temple and turtles are courtesy of Luxons if I get it right.

..and lastly the Void. The embodiment of my gripes with the story. Story-wise it's awesome. Creepy as hell, makes the hair on your neck stand up, and poses a treat far greater than elder dragons. It creeps up on you from very start in subtle ways and is a great design story-wise.

At the same time it's also the flaw of story telling. It's real threat is made apparent pretty late, so once the "monster" is outta bag, we get very little time to be afraid and see the destruction it brings.

Also ingame implementation is just lame and dissapointing. Recolored (amazingly, props to art team for harvest temple strike bosses) enemies that act standard ways. This is THE VOID. It's supposed to be chaotic, irrational, rule bending and breaking. Instead we got standard fare when it comes to combat. How about Void Primordus minions using Ice or earth instead of fire? Or enemies that heal when you damage them and making heals killl'em - making healers the dpsers for the fight, while actual dps would for example focus on cc? That's how fights with void should feel like.

[PookieDaWombat.6209]

10 hours ago, ZeftheWicked.3076 said:

Also ingame implementation is just lame and dissapointing. Recolored (amazingly, props to art team for harvest temple strike bosses) enemies that act standard ways. This is THE VOID. It's supposed to be chaotic, irrational, rule bending and breaking. Instead we got standard fare when it comes to combat. How about Void Primordus minions using Ice or earth instead of fire? Or enemies that heal when you damage them and making heals killl'em - making healers the dpsers for the fight, while actual dps would for example focus on cc? That's how fights with void should feel like.

 

While in theory that last bit would've been cool, knowing how they implement teaching new mechanics that go against the norm, it would've been an absolute nightmare (not only to code) but to deal with in the game itself.  Especially with how classes are designed in this game.

[Einsof.1457]

It was okay. I didn't like a lot of the SJW shoehorning, and I didn't like the writing being very west-coast American. Seemed very out of place. I felt the story was too rushed, as well. Thankfully, the gameplay element experience was fun and that's all that matters I suppose.

Edited March 11, 2022 by Einsof.1457

[dusanyu.4057]

i think the best part of the story is seeing Mai-trin finally bite it  inspite of the story trying to bludgeon with the fact that we had to forgive the mass murdering scum i for one am glad to see that Bookah trash gone

[MarySueLlama.8136]

I really liked the story when all was said and done, I'd give it probably like an 8/10.  Up there with HoT and LW season 4 as one of the highlights of the series for me.

I think one of the HUGE things that helped me enjoy it so much was that I fully completed each map before finishing the story parts for the map, as much as possible (except for 3 POIs in Dragon's End).  These maps were absolutely beautiful, and while going around exploring, I overheard a ton of ambient dialog that really enhanced the environment and gave some extra bits of lore. Also liked how the hologram news things updated as you progressed the story, that was awesome.  In games, a story not reacting to itself can be a huge immersion breaker.

 

I'll say also as a disclaimer that I've played GW1, but not completed it, so I didn't have any prior knowledge/expectations of Cantha as I haven't gotten to that part yet, and only read bits of the wiki.  So I know that this could be skewing my perspective somewhat in favor of this GW2 interpretation of Cantha, whereas others who have played a ton of GW1 might be disappointed in it, and that's totally valid if it's not what they were hoping for. 
 

Mai Trin coming back in seemed a little weird, but I didn't necessarily dislike it.  What I didn't fully understand, though, was why her eyes flashed red during her final standoff w/ Ankka? I felt like that was Scarlet-related, but then Mai just got shot and died.  Maybe it's supposed to show that she had learned to "subdue" Scarlet, but I just feel like...wouldn't someone like Scarlet have fought tooth and nail to take control at that moment and ensure that her host *didn't* get killed?  Idk, I never would've expected a revenant to use Scarlet, but as soon as that alarming and interesting thought was presented, it was just taken right away again, which was kind of a bummer.

About halfway through the story, I was starting to rage over the fact that Soo-Won was good-natured, because numerous krait, largos, and quaggans in the main Tyria content have been complaining about being chased out of the deep ocean for ages.  But then out of nowhere, in the act when you have to go back to NKC after Echovald, I found Ela Makkay on a rooftop somewhere (I swear she wasn't there in earlier acts), and she voiced EXACTLY the weirdness of this whole situation and I was just like thank god.  So we know now from her, at least, that when Soo-Won DSD *left* the deep ocean to come to Cantha, that was when the krait/largos/quaggans got forced out.  But, I still want some clarification, though, on *what* forced them out.  All we ever got before this was "tentacled horrors."  Were they Void tentacles?  Or were they something else?  There's been allusion to something melting/moving at the bottom of the Jade Sea, that whole "ione" thing...is it related to that? The Void imo has eldritch horror qualities to it, in that NPCs can lose their minds just by looking at it, and so that *would* account for horrors that Krait/Largos/Quaggan think are too terrible to describe.  But, like I said, confirmation sometime? 🤞

I do feel, like some people have said, that the last act was kind of rushed, even though I loved the final story battle and epilogue.  My problem was that after beating Li, we go back to Arborstone for the War Council and suddenly there's all this info about the Speakers and Brotherhood joining forces w/ us, and I feel like I missed something.  But I know I didn't miss any actual story content.  So either that part was rushed, or else the mention of it happened in a meta or something and I missed it while trying to not die, idk.  I also have no idea who Fa is or where he came from.  And where is Yao this whole time - I was so excited about this nonbinary character with a legit jade mech arm, and they seemed tied closely with Joon, but in the final battle they were nowhere to be found, and after the credits if you go and talk to them, they even talk about how they were nowhere to be found during the final battle, almost like Anet was poking a little fun at themselves for this or something?  Idk, that was disappointing how they were underused.  I really liked Ivan though, it's about time we have a dredge in the gang, and I like his outfit.

Didn't like: upon entering Dragon's End map, trying to do the story, I was suddenly bombarded with meta dialog that was explaining stuff I wasn't ready to hear yet, and that sometimes literally interrupted the actual story dialog I was trying to listen to as I placed the extractors.  That map, as pretty as it is, is kind of a playability disaster, and needs tweaking.  They need to put your extractor stuff into a story instance, separate from the meta, so that this chaos doesn't happen, because it was kind of brain-frying.  Also, the actual Void-stricken areas weren't as creepy as I was hoping.  The 5 "Echovald Unmade" achievement spots were stomach-churning, skin-crawling, etc, really kind of digging into a horror aspect, and I didn't feel that nearly as heavily when walking around Dragon's End.  There were a couple of places I couldn't even get to look at long enough because of that Void debuff that kills you in like 5 seconds.  So aside from like, one unnamed laborer dude in the quarry whose ambient dialog mentioned that he "talked to the Void," the atmosphere of Dragon's End definitely felt rushed.  The uneasy music was the only thing that helped with it.

Also didn't like: Canach's new VA.  I know a lot of people like Matthew Mercer, but he just isn't cut out for this one.  Please bring back John DiMaggio, he did Canach a million times better.

 

Anyway, trying not to stray to anything too technical, I guess the one other story point to address is that...idk, it doesn't seem clear to me how Aurene is not exploding from being overloaded with all of the dragon magic, without her having to be stuck in a reactor like Soo-Won.  Is a bunch of the magic stored in the world's ley lines?  Is Aurene going to have to have offspring to manage the overload, like Soo-Won did, and she'll just try harder not to let them get corrupted by the Void?  I've always envisioned dragon magic in Tyria working like energy- neither created nor destroyed, just transferred around, so I just always find myself asking, where is it, where did it go?  But I may be understanding wrong.

Anyway I really ended up being impressed by the story overall, the voice acting other than Canach's was great and there were some really good cinematic scenes.  With all the horrible things Ankka did, she still had a few elements to her character that felt relatable, which makes for a good villain.  The Void, being sort of an eldritch horrory thing, is also a good villain.  Gorrik was easily the Dragon's Watch MVP in this for me, he is just so well-done and his VA shines constantly.  Really good music for the most part too, sometimes the GW2 soundtrack is hit-or-miss for me, but there were a lot of good tracks in this expac.

[muradyn.3875]

I like the atmosphere, I like the environments, I like a certain staging, I like the dubbing, i like some caracter 

 

But the story ? Meh, too boring, the elements introducedare finished too quickly, to gentle, too nice, not credible enough for my taste, even if i like some news characters everything is also sent in a very expeditious way. I can't say why here, juste feelin that the story was rush

 

 

 And the World Building, big joke, I am an animator and I felt like I was participating in a life-size animation of my beginnings for children

[Noko Anon.9154]

I like the idea of Mai Trin being possessed by Scarlet. Could other revenants become possessed by the spirits in the Mist? Could Shiro return to Cantha because a revenant tapped into something they didn't understand? I didn't like that so much effort was put into Mai just to have her killed. That's not a "heroic death". That's insulting. We like good characters. Mai had the potential to be a very good character since she has connections to so many different groups. Severing her thread hurt the potential for more stories.

I like the idea of Ankka losing it because she kept killing iterations of her in the Mists. Can other villains still be within the Mists, and can entities in the Mists escape and become their own person? Could there be another Balthazar or Joko in the Mists? I didn't like how quickly Ankka was gone. Again, killing characters isn't mature storytelling. The idea of a Mistblades faction emerging from the Mists because Ankka kept returning and amassing supplies and people is a fascinating concept that now can't exist, unless there's an iteration of Ankka in the Mists that not only succeeds against the commander, but also escapes into the "real".

I like Detective Rama. He's very grounded. He does the job that he's supposed to do, but both he and his coworker, whose name escapes me, are sarcastic in the sense that they don't see many crimes, and enjoy their peaceful, idyllic lifestyles, and just don't want to be bothered. It's not laziness, nor is he indifferent to the law, it's that appreciation of tranquility that I enjoy. (At least, that's how I gathered it.)

I could have liked Minister Li. The problem I have with Li is directly tied with Joon, so bare with me if I seem disjointed. I want a Minister Li who is distrustful of outsiders. I want us to be purposefully wary of Li because he is reticent towards us, and his dislike of difference and change. I want him to be distrustful of jade technology and the commander because they are different and represent change. But, I do not want him to feel this way because he's secretly a Purist! Were he an old man, whose gut feeling tells him something is wrong, and he trusts his gut with these matters, and makes preparations for these things (such as arresting royalty, or subduing a foreign army), but does not act because he needs evidence first and foremost as the Minister of Security, then we have the foundations for an excellent character. Then, when the fabric of truth and justice are slowly unwoven, and he's proven right, then we can work with the Minister to solve whatever crises arise. Once all's said and done, he can retire, admitting his faults, that he may have been correct on his hunch on one matter, but severely wrong on another, and recognize that Cantha is changing, and it needs a new perspective to lead it. Then he can offer to pass the torch to Rama (who would preferably decline so we can see him in other adventures), and perhaps even Captain Min. As Li is now, he's not a good character, but a shallow caricature of racism and bigotry.

I could have liked Joon. The problem with Joon is that she is always right, all of the time. Even when she's wrong, she's still right. I kept waiting for the reveal that Joon is nefarious, that Joon is plotting something, because her condescending attitude and overwhelming smugness make her appear as the haughtiest of asura in human guise. There was no reveal. There was never a time someone called her out on her single-mindedness. Even now with Soo-Won gone, I'm sure that Joon will, in LWS6, have revealed an "even more efficient" form of energy (which, someone will argue me, is okay since Taimi is definitely going to help her with it). Joon is as shallow as Minister Li. The sheer sarcasm at the start of the story of Canthan bureaucracy means nothing if the writers can't put layers upon layers of deception and lies in this land of mystery and conflict with a rich history of political strife. How much more powerful Joon would be if she felt that Empress Ihn was undeserving of the throne, in light of how many wonders Joon has created. How wonderful it would have been for her to view herself as a Canthan Prometheus, giving fire and light to an insipid, backwater, filthy people who don't deserve her genius and intellect. How many times have our writers given us an extremely intelligent woman who single-handedly changes the world, and yet is considered free from blame? This expansion alone even attempted to redeem Scarlet Briar!

I could have liked Soo-Won. An elder dragon who, in the past, was full of terror and horror that it displaced krait, quaggan, largos, and all other aquatic creatures, a Lovecraftian monster from the depths who is instills fear in us not just because its a force of nature, but because it's a force we don't understand, had great potential. We didn't get that. An elder dragon who has accepted the idea that its death is possible, and is trying to maintain its existence by giving of itself to the mortal races in a bid to just live one more day--a monster that instilled fear now becoming fearful itself--had great potential. We didn't get that. An elder dragon that was actually just and righteous, but so far weaker than its siblings that holding back the tide against both the overloading of ley energy and the Unchained (and, if it had been thought of, Jade Branded and Jade Mordrem emerging from Echovald as shattered Kralkatorik and Mordremoth energies reverberated throughout the world) is causing it to die, and it begs for us preserve the way of life it has fought so hard to protect, had great potential. We didn't get that. Dragonvoid... Something that could have so easily been lifted from the ridiculousness of the current WoW story, is what we got.

I say all these things, things that you will never read, because the issue with EoD is the same issue that has been constant since LWS1. There is no desire to genuinely build up the world, or develop its current "rules system" and mechanics. The writers seem to go for set pieces that look cool, and instead of writing backwards (so there are no loose threads and everything flows properly to a satisfying conclusion), the story is written in pieces. I understand giving everyone a voice on the team, but each voice is singing a different song, so to speak. I understand that the writing team has changed over time, but the writers need to have built a bible that can be consulted and referred to so there is neither contradiction nor overlap. EoD feels like every other story in GW2: A fantastic beginning, destroyed by some silly "tweest" to the plot, and a rushed conclusion that feels neither satisfactory nor earned.

Remember, we proved Joko wrong after he delivered his speech about how awful we are by having our dragon ex machina eat him, and that also gave her magical lich powers to completely ruin the impact of All or Nothing.

[SexyMofo.8923]

The ending was quite entertaining as some people failed to beat the dragon and never got their turtle mount.  Best writing ever. 

[ViolentMuffin.9573]

Yeah, overall I liked it. I'd like to thank developers for letting characters talk about their emotions, letting us know them more, making the cast diverse, and giving us such a beautiful ending after the final battle! I feel really nostalgic after completing the story. 

[PookieDaWombat.6209]

27 minutes ago, SexyMofo.8923 said:

The ending was quite entertaining as some people failed to beat the dragon and never got their turtle mount.  Best writing ever. 

Yeah, i didn't even touch upon that disjointed mess as i did that right after failing the meta event.  smh

[Tarami.9124]

1 hour ago, Noko Anon.9154 said:

 <snipped for brevity>

You mean, like character depth? Seemingly bad people who have qualities and seemingly good people who have faults?

 

Oh no, can't have that, it might confuse the hoopleheads. 

 

In particular I agree about Joon and Li. During that first scene in the throne room and immediately after, I was like "they are going to subvert this, surely? This is clowishly one-sided. Joon is going to try to install some brutal technocracy and Li will see right through her schemes, yeah, that's it" but instead they doubled down on it. Ye gads.

[Peterson.5172]

2 minutes ago, Tarami.9124 said:

You mean, like character depth? Seemingly bad people who have qualities and seemingly good people who have faults?

 

Oh no, can't have that, it might confuse the hoopleheads. 

 

In particular I agree about Joon and Li. During that first scene in the throne room and immediately after, I was like "they are going to subvert this, surely? This is clowishly one-sided. Joon is going to try to install some brutal technocracy and Li will see right through her schemes, yeah, that's it" but instead they doubled down on it. Ye gads.

they introduced too many new people and things in a rush to close off the last 10 years and set the stage for a new era

and regarding the throne room scene, i thought that bit was fair, look what they built with jade tech (thanks to Joon), most powerful nation in the world

[Tarami.9124]

3 minutes ago, Peterson.5172 said:

they introduced too many new people and things in a rush to close off the last 10 years and set the stage for a new era

and regarding the throne room scene, i thought that bit was fair, look what they built with jade tech (thanks to Joon), most powerful nation in the world

 

The problem isn't contained to that specific scene, it's that it's emblematic of them as characters. Li is portrayed like a frustrated teenager from the word "go", not like the experienced statesman capable of running political circles around someone like Joon, which he should be to give him some power in this story. Li has a point but the story just refuses to acknowledge that maybe some caution is warranted and instead telegraphs "yeah, what would that backwards fart know about running an empire, progress at any cost, woo!" It's like Jeff Bezos went to the senate and they agreed to everything he proposed because Amazon Prime is really nice isn't it. At least Bezos has to bribe the senators first.

 

For that scene specifically, their introductory scene, we need to see both at their top of their game, with sincere, logical arguments. It's the scene after which players shouldn't really know whom to side with yet. On the one hand Li seems backwards to a fault, but on the other hand Joon might be a megalomaniac. That kind of thing. If the writers want the conflict to work, the reader (player) must see value in both perspectives, even if we're supposed to increasingly side with one of them as the story develops. 

[Peterson.5172]

10 minutes ago, Tarami.9124 said:

The problem isn't contained to that specific scene, it's that it's emblematic of them as characters. Li is portrayed like a frustrated teenager from the word "go", not like the experienced statesman capable of running political circles around someone like Joon, which he should be to give him some power in this story. Li has a point but the story just refuses to acknowledge that maybe some caution is warranted and instead telegraphs "yeah, what would that backwards fart know about running an empire, progress at any cost, woo!" It's like Jeff Bezos went to the senate and they agreed to everything he proposed because Amazon Prime is really nice isn't it. At least Bezos has to bribe the senators first.

 

For that scene specifically, their introductory scene, we need to see both at their top of their game, with sincere, logical arguments. It's the scene after which players shouldn't really know whom to side with yet. On the one hand Li seems backwards to a fault, but on the other hand Joon might be a megalomaniac. That kind of thing. If the writers want the conflict to work, the reader (player) must see value in both perspectives, even if we're supposed to increasingly side with one of them as the story develops. 

i agree the story had more potential, but given anet's past record, i think you expected too much. Their stories for the last 10 years have been fairly surface level, the biggest conflict i can remember is rytlock unknowingly release balthazar (still not much)

and as Joon (?) pointed out, Li had it pretty easy, there werent many tough enemies in cantha, probably got to where he did through family/politics

as for Joon, i think of her more as einstein + edison (?) + tesla + bill gates + steve jobs + whatever well known figure across ALL fields from medical to civils, all in one. If we had someone like that today it would be world leaders lining up to meet her.

(plus she's the empress' sister and a mother. would be like Jesus alive in our times to a christian)

[Telgum.6071]

Mostly. There are only two things I didn't like.

1. The sudden political stuff in Act IV iirc, we got to see these popular terms such bigot or fascist, used nowadays against everyone who has an opinion. I don't mind if Anet is liberal, seriously, I don't care, but pushing politics into a game is never a good idea. Or this Yao person, just like in western Netflix shows, their main attribute is being gender neutral. Very interesting character Arenanet, great example of peak character development, surely it was worth putting Yao on that cinematic trailer instead Marjory, Kasmeer, Gorrick (who IIRC fights next to Rama in Dragon's End) or even the Commander.

2. Dragonvoid. IMO this is another example of Anet's writing team failing at reinventing the wheel. "Look how cool this character is but you have to kill it for the greater good!". So Kralkatorik was a good boy but he was corrupted by the confluence of different forms of magic (lmao) just like Soo-Won is cool but she's being driven mad by the Void. Couldn't they just make her angry at Aurene for trying to replace her? Or for killing her children? Simple things often work better than these kind of arguments of greater evils corrupting the good people, specially when we are talking about primal destructive foes.

Music team > Writing team > Balance team, if they even have. But overall I like the end of the cycle, I like that the Commander actually becomes a full Champion (for once), or the  conclusion of Kasmeer and Marjory. I'd even say EoD has the best story quests of the three expansions.

Now I just hope the Cycle is truly done and we get to meet something else that isn't another dragon. And please leave Aurene rest for once. This probably surprises you, but having Aurene talking to you and telling you her reasoning over and over is not as cool as you think. I know is your favorite pet, it's ok, but its time to move on, at least temporarily.

Edited March 12, 2022 by Telgum.6071
Typo

[Tarami.9124]

6 minutes ago, Peterson.5172 said:

i agree the story had more potential, but given anet's past record, i think you expected too much. Their stories for the last 10 years have been fairly surface level, the biggest conflict i can remember is rytlock unknowingly release balthazar (still not much)

and as Joon (?) pointed out, Li had it pretty easy, there werent many tough enemies in cantha, probably got to where he did through family/politics

as for Joon, i think of her more as einstein + edison (?) + tesla + bill gates + steve jobs + whatever well known figure across ALL fields from medical to civils, all in one. If we had someone like that today it would be world leaders lining up to meet her.

(plus she's the empress' sister and a mother. would be like Jesus alive in our times to a christian)

You're probably right that I expected too much. It's just that the core idea of being dropped into imperial intrigue as an outsider is incredibly fertile ground and it can go almost anywhere you want without it seeming too outrageous. But it needs to present all participants fairly and with depth; protagonists and antagonists alike.

 

As for Joon, yeah, she's a complete flatline as a character. She's essentially a fan fiction character, "Joon is charming, attractive, highly intelligent, rich and liked by all but she's clumsy and she once shoplifted (because she was hungry)".

[Clockwork Bard.3105]

The GW2 story feels like a comic book, for all the good and bad that implies.

 

The most frustrating aspect of that comicness for me is the use of continuity that references back content which may not be readily available. I know they come from a place of love, but the high-profile callbacks to Season 1 feel really gross at this point, given the sheer time-gap that content has remained unplayable. These were far from nods and references for the old guard to wink at, and it dampens the experience knowing how many players are wading through it with their investment hindered for yet another chapter.

 

But on the whole, I consider EoD a net positive and have been enjoying it. No buyer's remorse.

[Kalocin.5982]

Coming off of finishing Endwalker it definitely felt a lot smaller by comparison. I enjoyed what was given but just like some of the other stories it always feels like they could have done more to make it more than just "good". There's simply just never enough time given to the characters to really feel any impact. The only character I felt they did really well was Rama, pretty fun character and a lot of his story is given room to breathe. I imagine if they put the breaks on world ending destruction for two minutes they could also do the same for the other characters. The other issue in general is that GW2 isn't all that cinematic in it's story delivery. Certainly cinematic in other ways, but the story is mostly told through speech bubbles lol

[Jaunty.6018]

I would write what I thought of the story but last time I did I got silenced by a mod, and had my posts deleted.  So...the story is great.  Wonderful.  Best story ever.

[Obfuscate.6430]

I feel this was one of the best stories they've done so far in that I felt affected by it and thought about it's implications for a few days - what it would mean for the characters going forward. It felt so final to me. I actually felt like there would be no reason to play more so I didn't log in for awhile afterwards. 
I did go back though - lots of collections and exploring to do! But it goes to show that at least for me the story was surprisingly impactful.