Going to give this a rating for the amount of time I've spent on it (about 30 or so hours) since I'm unsure if I'll be finishing it.

Edit: Entered Act 3 proper, and yeah exactly what I thought would happened, happened. I actually ended up enjoying Act 2 a lot, but Act 3 is just... not doing it for me. The stuff I came for (companion dialogue, cute romances, the occasional neat fight) is gone, and has been replaced with walking around Baldur's Gate, a city that is super windy and complicated. The fun choices and back and forth have felt more like Bethesda style "do it or nothing happens" choices, and it's just not fun.

Maybe the next patch will fix it. Also justice for Karlach, having gone through Shadowheart and the other's questlines you can really feel like all of her stuff was cut.

What a fantastic start to whatever the new story is going to be.

While I do think there are some parts that drag (like every FF expansion to be fair), I found myself surprisingly immersed in Tural and its myriad of people, the writers clearly wanting to do more than just have it be Eorzea with flavour.

Loved Wuk Lamat and her surrounding cast as well, if she's going to join the cast I am here with open arms.

Gameplay wise the new dungeons and trials are a blast, and while I haven't tried Viper yet, Pictomancer is maybe the most fun and accessible Magic DPS currently available.

Played through this again at the behest of my housemate to prepare for the DLC and I do not think I will be finishing this or playing the game's DLC. Whatever joy my friend gets out of this (Co-Op play, difficulty, the story ((Somehow???))) I cannot possibly hope to find.

I think my warm feelings towards this initially were a combination of enthusiasm from my housemate and enjoying the version of this game that I built in my head, which consists of the opening area and the fight against Horah Loux and that's it.

Hearing Shadow is just this but more is not the sell that a lot of people telling me to play it think it is, unfortunately.