How to easily improve the story? Spoilers within!

[Carl the Llama]

I think having Luna as a DLC would be more suitable to requirements, like a Luna journey and what she goes through before/during/after Kingsglaive and maybe flesh out Nyx's backstory and add Libertus as well cause... there is no mention of him (that I have found) in XV, it could also include Ravus' motivations and give us a better understanding of the empires motivations.

As for Psy' suggestion about doing more save prisoner x from camp y thing, I don't think this would be possible, I think they pretty much all got converted into Daemons, after all, isn't that what happened in the WoR? As you and Talcott drive towards hammerhead you see thousands of Daemons all over the place, this would explain why A: There are no survivors from Insomnia and B: why people aren't talking about it - because it isn't known where Daemons come from.

When you discover people are being turned into Daemons its supposed to be shocking, it would lessen it so if people escaped from some PoW camp and were all "OMG THEY DUN TURNING PEOPLE INTO DAEMONS" kinda thing. I think this too could be a thing to add into the Luna DLC I mentioned before. They could also very well make an entire FFXV-2 prequel out of the whole fiasco.

As for expanding the world/lore, I think they could probably get away with doing an entire prequel game, where they include King Regis's on his journey to gather his Kingly weapons, his plans for Noctis etc.

The way they have left things now reeks of future DLC and expanded games, I think they have hit the "sweet spot" where they have enough intrigue and likeability in the game so they can milk it for all its worth, which has Squeenix written all over it, and with the season pass included in the collectors edition they have to churn out some serious DLC to make it worth the money.

[Aulayna]

Insomnia kinda gets relegated to radio news bulletins. There's multiple broadcasts about the Empire aiding with relief efforts in Insomnia, but as we know from how deliberately inaccurate those broadcasts are, the reality is probably "the empire is shipping survivors off en masse to somewhere."

That being said, there are ambient dialogues between random cardboard cut-out NPCs that talk about seeing Magitek Troopers etc, but rarely are they in an aggressive tone. By the sounds of things it seems like the Empire goes in, smurfs trout up and takes what it wants, and then just leaves token forces around as "peacekeepers."

[Scruffington]

Probably isn't a good idea to have the fate of three antagonists (Verstael, Iedolas and Ravus) occur off-screen. Especially after two of them had only one cutscene in the entire game, which was 11 chapters ago.

[Psychotic]

What even happened to Verstael? If we were told I can't remember it.

[Sephiroth]

He eventually realized he was not part of the game and left.

[Scruffington]

What even happened to Verstael? If we were told I can't remember it.

We weren't. The dude just shows up for one scene and disappears for the rest of the game.

It seems he was introduced only to have his story told in the Prompto DLC, considering the guide states that he is Prompto's father. Pretty disgusting of SE to cut out his story to sell to us later.

He eventually realized he was not part of the game and left.

Lol.

[Tyson]

considering the guide states that he is Prompto's father. Pretty disgusting of SE to cut out his story to sell to us later.

WAIT WHAT!!! How was that not explained in game?

This game is getting more and more disappointing :/

[Scruffington]

considering the guide states that he is Prompto's father. Pretty disgusting of SE to cut out his story to sell to us later.

WAIT WHAT!!! How was that not explained in game?

This game is getting more and more disappointing :/

I don't personally have the guide, but that's what it says.

The disappointment really only gets worse if you've read anything about the 4chan leak or the NeoGAF thread.

There are a bunch of things that never made it into the game, whether due to time constraints or just simply scrapping parts of the story. King Regis was intended to be killed by his bodyguards in front of Noctis. Noctis was supposed to be responsible for Luna's death (I'm pretty sure it was an accident) causing Ravus to hate him. A bunch of things were left out of the final release, like Ardyn's "monster" form (him being the only villain in the entire FF series to not have one) and a dark Lestallum from the final chapter.

And all of that not even including the parts that we DID see that were cut from the trailer. The E3 2013 trailer, with a few scenes like Regis and Noctis eating dinner together, is almost completely cut from the final release. The Dawn trailer with Regis holding Noctis? Not in the game. And remember that one trailer with Noctis drinking coffee while camping under the moon saying "Almost there." ? Not in the game either. I'm pretty sure the moon was supposed to be a bigger point in the game. It's even the logo that they printed on the special FFXV PS4's. Yet it has absolutely zero significance.

All of these were what I expected the story to consist of. All of them would have made the story better. It's a damn shame what this game turned out to be.

[Fox]

Ugh, stop describing a game I would be more interested in. It's too painful

[Aulayna]

And remember that one trailer with Noctis drinking coffee while camping under the moon saying "Almost there." ? Not in the game either.

While I agree with the rest of what you said, when it comes to this point I'm almost certain I remember Tabata saying during an ATR that this scene was made purposefully for that trailer, to tease fans into expecting more substantial details soon and that the wait for FFXV was nearly over.

I do feel like the moon in general was meant to be more substantial but then got re-worked into the more generic "daemons come out at night" thing. There was a glitch in the Episode Duscae demo which you could use to get out of the bounds of the demo area, and at a certain point the moon would increase in size and turn red.

[Scruffington]

And remember that one trailer with Noctis drinking coffee while camping under the moon saying "Almost there." ? Not in the game either.

While I agree with the rest of what you said, when it comes to this point I'm almost certain I remember Tabata saying during an ATR that this scene was made purposefully for that trailer, to tease fans into expecting more substantial details soon and that the wait for FFXV was nearly over.

I do feel like the moon in general was meant to be more substantial but then got re-worked into the more generic "daemons come out at night" thing. There was a glitch in the Episode Duscae demo which you could use to get out of the bounds of the demo area, and at a certain point the moon would increase in size and turn red.

That specific part of the trailer wasn't really plot heavy, and did seem like more a nod towards fans who had been waiting a long time for the game. Yet it also seemed to display the moon pretty significantly. I guess I just don't really understand the logic behind making a trailer with 0% content from the actual game.

I'm realizing now just how Square Enix seriously misused their resources for this game. Did they really need to produce so many trailers in which none of the content would be used in the game itself? Could they really think of no better way to tell the story than dividing it up into three different forms of media (anime, film, game)? And did they absolutely have to devote so many resources to making ultra-realistic food models in game?

On that last point, I honestly don't want Tabata to ever touch a Final Fantasy game again. His entire "reality" approach drives me insane. Devoting resources towards food models, in-game advertisements and a damn Cup Noodles sidequest is a slap in the face to fans of the series' appreciation for the fantasy aspect of the series.

..I got a little bit off-topic there. Whoops.