Final Fantasy 14 won't let you blast past its story for free anytime soon because Yoshi-P worried 'the value of the game itself will be diminished'

pcgamer.com:

Final Fantasy 14 is getting to be a mighty long game. With one base game, four expansions and a fifth one on the way, I don't think it's too out there to reckon that you'd be spending a good 300 — 400 hours ploughing through the story alone. 

That can be a big roadblock for would-be Warriors of Light and honestly, if I hadn't been playing for almost a decade I don't necessarily know if I'd have the willpower to get through it all. Of course, there is the option to cough up a few bucks for a story skip, but with Dawntrail marking the beginning of a new narrative arc, I was hoping that there'd be an option in-game for an alternative jumping in point.

Thepossibility of a skip to allow people to join the story during the post-Endwalker patches was discussed last year, so in a recent interview with director and producer Naoki Yoshida I thought I would bring the question up again. Sadly, nothing is in the works anytime soon. «For the story we are not currently planning any kind of new skip feature,» Yoshida said. «This is something I'm constantly torn about, and we have already finished implementing a feature that allows players to learn about the story, setting, and characters even when they skip the story.»

Presumably Yoshida is referring to the Unending Codex, a feature that was implemented shortly after Endwalker's release. It has a ton of info around different characters and concepts within the game, providing helpful reminders or catch-ups on the major players within Eorzea and beyond. There's the Unending Journey too, a long-running feature that lets you go back and watch cutscenes for previous quests.

Despite offering in-game access to lore and a cash shop skip, Yoshida appears to be hesitant to make the process of ignoring 10 years of story easily accessible. «I'm concerned that if the globally acclaimed storyline can be skipped through a function, the value of the FF14 game itself will be diminished,» he said. «So far, FF14 has been able to continue to grow