The Dead Ends

Here, at the edge of the universe, await as many stories as there are stars in its sea. Of rises and falls, of beginnings and ends…of a little bird who left home with hope, yet nested in sorrow. Hearken unto these tales to be told…
Final Fantasy XIV: Endwalker

In the final dungeon for Endwalker main story, we are entering three of the seventeen places that were discovered and explored and witness the downfall of those civilisations. It is interesting to see how the ones that came before are mirroring the many things that could happen to our Earth at any time although the lesson from this is to never give hope and to always push forward.

Environment

Nothing about this dungeon looks pretty and it isn’t meant to be. The three different worlds you visit are on the edge of their end and it shows what happens to those cultures when they have given up as a society. The visual layout of each world does look nice and the final world you see within the dungeon is such an amazing bitter paradise it is interesting to see it.

The mobs you find during the dungeon are sadly recoloured stuff you have seen before and for a place that isn’t our star it does feel a bit lazy but once again I have to say it all does look amazing and for a final dungeon of the first story arc it does an amazing job at knowing what you are fighting for. I was hoping to see our star and the fate it could have but I suppose we saw that already.

With that said it is time to talk about the bosses and what you can expect.

Caustic Grebuloff

The first boss of the Dead Ends have all of your classic attacks such as a tank buster and raid-wide AoEs but it also adds one of the few things I do like to encounter and that is things moving across the field where you have to mentally work out where things will move. You will also find the stack with a buddy attack returns in a dungeon which has been missing in dungeons for a very long while.

For this boss, you have to pay attention to where the wind is blowing and then ensure you are out of the way when the AoEs move. Overall this boss is a bit tricky if you find it hard at noticing the little details but in expert roulette, this will become a non-factor as people gain new gear.

Peacekeeper

The second boss of the Dead Ends once again have all your common stuff such as tank busters and raid-wide AoEs but if I had to sum up this boss I can only say this – rings of death. This boss loves placing down AoEs in such a way you only have a tiny amount of free space and then have to move from old safe places to new ones. To do this you have to pay attention to much more than just what the boss is doing.

Overall this boss is simple but there is a lot visually going on for your first time.

Ra-la

The final boss of the Dead Ends is a creature that was created by a society to bring them the release they wanted which was death. This boss has your standard tank busters and raid-wide AoEs but it also has line AoEs that will only attack a certain direction. It also has an attack where giant circles will appear one by one and kill you just like trine in Deletascape 4 Extreme and I have to say it is quite tough to see the AoE at the start – even caused a wipe on the first run due to it!

Overall this boss is simple but a lot is going on and it was a pleasure to see doom again in a dungeon that wasn’t just a one-shot you failed attack.

Music

Spot on, and fit the dungeon amazingly. I can’t say much more.

Screenshots