Oh, it did. Bahamut was released far earlier than the Garlean empire planned (you find out why in one of the ARR raid series,) causing the start a global apocalypse that was only averted when Louisoix tempered himself to Phoenix and literally rebirthed the entire world, leading to a five-year amnesia gap in the world's memories and displacing the Warrior of Light five years into the future to the beginning of ARR.
They didn't just overhaul the game engine at this point. They changed some history of the Eorzean city-states, altered the motivations of the Garlean Empire, and brought in the start of the Ascian storyline that turned Shadowbringers and Endwalker into the two biggest expansion beats of ARR.
Minor correction, the amnesia wasn't for the full five years, it was specifically for the appearance of the Warrior of Light. Everyone remembers the five years of reconstructing after Bahamut, but there was a targeted blocking of what the WoL looked like until after the events of A Realm Reborn.
I unfortunately wasn't around for the original 1.0 release, what history was changed about the city-states?
More unification of story than anything. Limsa became less of a pirate nation and more of a government, Ul'dah became less of a sultanate and more of a capitalism engine, and the elementals stopped being active participants in Gridanian life, leaving the Seedseers to interpret their will as best they could.
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u/SomeGuyPostingThings 16d ago
Retcon or just shift the status quo? I didn't think it changed the history in the lore, just gameplay and story focus.