The first half of this questline was pretty boring not to mention the quality in pre-rendered & in-engine cutscenes were pretty bad compared to their recent work.
Only once you get sucked into the dark tide does it feel like effort was actually put into the presentation.
Man those 1st half cutscenes are still on my mind. The actions cutscenes were just not good. Tons of stock animations all around, weird camera angles and scene transitions/cuts that made it look very amateur compared to the quality since 2.0 launched. The narrative presentation was also pretty weak that 1st half. Can't say I remember if there was any new music in that 1st half to be honest. The gameplay segments were bog standard and comparable to regular overworld fights presentation-wise and gameplay-wise. Just as bad was re-using the boss from last patch as a mid-boss this time. Felt lazy and cheap. Speaking of re-using, while it shouldn't really be a peeve but since we're just retreading old parts of the map I think that added to the tedium I felt. The narrative also feels like it drags on bit too much just because of how little variety it felt there was in HOW they delivered it to you.
Thankfully after you go into the dark tide does it finally feel more in-line with what I was expecting presentation-wise. Varied methods to progress the area(lamp switch to progress flashbacks that each had a CG, flying with lamp switch, fighting down that hallway with waves of enemies with new music, Galbrena 1st person, railroaded walk with voices), new area, better looking cutscenes(except those shitty pre-rendered ones), new music (though I admit I didn't find them as memorable as prior tacks), surprising use of the login screen and music.
The final boss was just okay. It was flashy and had new moves however it recycles a prior boss model with mild changes AND reuses a gameplay gimmick from an event. Not as hype as the fights unlocking Havoc & Aero rover were at the time.
Somewhat disappointing of a patch.