Kill the PS2 limitations end of the Dark Ages Era

[hordecore]

Transfer all their accounts into PC accounts come on people go buy new PCs and stop draggin us down




Imagine FFXI with FFXIV graphics it will become EPIC GAME with PS2 we cant have better graphics

[rog]

There are no pc accounts. Any account can be played on any system.

[Zumi]

That's correct a FFXI account can be played on any of the 3 platforms. Its just that people still choose to play on PS2.

[Karbuncle]

While i heartily Believe that sooner or later If we don't drop the PS2, Or updates will cease or just become very dull. I don't think SE is ready or Willing to drop Support for it yet.

[Kanjitai]

Transfer all their accounts into PC accounts come on people go buy new PCs and stop draggin us down

I think SE has seen how the PS2 is limiting them. I'm sure some want to pull support while others don't. I think once they hit the absolute limit of what PS2 can do they may start to seriously think about it.

[rog]

I think SE has seen how the PS2 is limiting them. I'm sure some want to pull support while others don't. I think once they hit the absolute limit of what PS2 can do they may start to seriously think about it.
They will never hit that point. The ps2 makes absolutely no limitations on content, whatsoever. Full auto translate dictionaries, >80 inventory slots, etc, would be very nice, but i'm pretty sure the game will survive without such features.

[Khajit]

I'm sure SE would be glad to piss off the large JP ps2 playerbase and lose revenue.

[Juri_Licious]

Instead of limiting the PC/360 players, limit the PS2 players and add stuff because those systems have the power to run it.
Or just stop PS2 support as it's pretty much dead everywhere except Japan and to get the PS2 version here it would cost over 50 dollars on amazon.

[Snaplin]

I'm sure SE would be glad to piss off the large JP ps2 playerbase and lose revenue.

Psh its all about keeping the JP's happy bro!

[Tsukino_Kaji]

Transfer all their accounts into PC accounts come on people go buy new PCs and stop draggin us downAccounts are not limited intersystemly. You can log into any other version with the one account.

But I do agree, eliminate PS2 which is the smallest minority of the market so thatthe rest of us can have new content. It doesn't have to be immediate. You can easily work with a phase out period.

[rog]

Accounts are not limited intersystemly. You can log into any other version with the one account.

But I do agree, eliminate PS2 which is the smallest minority of the market so thatthe rest of us can have new content. It doesn't have to be immediate. You can easily work with a phase out period.You can have all the new content SE is willing to make. The ps2 can hold another 30gb+ of content.

[Tsukino_Kaji]

You can have all the new content SE is willing to make. The ps2 can hold another 30gb+ of content.It's not a spece limitation, it's the ram that's holding it back. It can no longer keep up with the content of the game.

[rog]

It's not a spece limitation, it's the ram that's holding it back. It can no longer keep up with the content of the game.
Adding content requires absolutely no additional ram.

[Juri_Licious]

You can have all the new content SE is willing to make. The ps2 can hold another 30gb+ of content.

It doesn't have the RAM to process all that data though.

[rog]

It doesn't have the RAM to process all that data though.
Obviously it does, or it would not be able to run the game now.

Not sure why you think things like loading a zone, new gear, etc require more ram. Only one zone is loaded at a time, only so many gear sets can be loaded at once, etc. They can add an infinite amount of them, and the only additional ram requirements would be to allow more than 65535 zones/whatever.

[Snaplin]

Instead of all these PS2 limitation threads poping up It would be nice to have a Dev or SE offical make an official post on their thoughts about PS2 and if they would ever consider dropping PS2 support. A SGM(and GM's I believe) can tell what client you are playing on, the last time I read something about the JP having a large PS2 player base was years ago, would be nice to see how that has changed over the years and maybe current numbers?

Depending on how many players (World wide there are still NA's/EU's who play on PS2) it might actually be beneficial for them to drop PS2 support. What some people fail to realize is that some of the things players want isn't just a simple "Drop the ps2" fix and is actually in the base code since the game was orig. made for PS2, PC/360 are just an emulated version and a lot of "changes" people are asking for would require an entire remake of the game. Which I don't see happening since they are trying to keep lolFF14 afloat.

Edit: Should ask SE to drop FF14 support and focus on 11 tbh. :/

[Tsukino_Kaji]

Adding content requires absolutely no additional ram.You'd be surprised. lol

[Tsukino_Kaji]

Instead of all these PS2 limitation threads poping up It would be nice to have a Dev or SE make an official post on there thoughts about PS2 and if they would ever consider dropping PS2 support.They, officialy, cannot takes side in this matter.

[Juri_Licious]

Obviously it does, or it would not be able to run the game now.

You're not understanding the issues, loading a map is fine but stuff that's always on you like, tab translate speak entries, inventory spaces, etc that requires more processing.

Also with Square-Enix already saying the reason you can't change your hairstyle is due to PS2 limitations.

[rog]

You're not understanding the issues, loading a map is fine but stuff that's always on you like, tab translate speak entries, inventory spaces, etc that requires more processing.
None of that is content. Auto translate phrases are not part of actually playing the game.

[Tsukino_Kaji]

I'm lost on Rog's reasoning. ; ;

[rog]

I'm lost on Rog's reasoning. ; ;
"content" is considered things like quests, gear, zones, mobs, etc. Amount of inventory, auto translate phrases, and other such things, are not content.

[Tsukino_Kaji]

"content" is considered things like quests, gear, zones, mobs, etc. Amount of inventory, auto translate phrases, and other such things, are not content.I suppose. I would concider auto-translate content, but not inventory.

[Atomic_Skull]

They don't have to drop PS2 support to update the PC version. EVE Online ran with an old and a new enhanced client for a while before they finally dropped the old client.

80 items per inventory isn't really a problem if if they speed up transfer of items between inventories. All MMOs have maximum bag sizes. An enhanced PC client would have more memory available so item transfers could be cached rather than having to wait for the server when transferring each item.

An enhanced PC client would have higher detail models and zones but otherwise it would be the same content with more detail. There's no reason PC and PS2 couldn't run on the same server.

[Tsukino_Kaji]

They don't have to drop PS2 support to update the PC version. EVE Online ran with an old and a new enhanced client for a while before they finally dropped the old client.The 6% of players still on PS2 would complain and SE doesn't know the difference between complainers and real issues.

[rog]

An enhanced PC client would have higher detail models and zones
It already does.

[Kanjitai]

SE has stated that it's limited because of the PS2. I'm sure they haven't told us everything about the limitations. I just want the game to grow and have fun with it. if dropping PS2 support helps that it should be done.

[rog]

SE has stated that it's limited because of the PS2. I'm sure they haven't told us everything about the limitations. I just want the game to grow and have fun with it. if dropping PS2 support helps that it should be done.
Ok, but it really won't. There are absolutely NO significant changes that could be made only by dropping ps2 support. Sorry, but getting more AT phrases, more than 80 inventory, etc does not count as significant. Though they are the most significant consequences of the ps2.

[RAIST]

This isn't exactly accurate, but the easiest way I can think to explain it The engine is designed to load the entire zone's data at once, and then clips what is displayed due to the limitations of the PS2 graphics engine. This exists in all version, but the cut off isn't as drastic on the 360 and PC version, but it still does it. You can see it in action simply by walking around whitegate--watch how the barrels and building features and stuff suddenly jump in/out of view or change models completely at times to show more detail. If you are on a PC and have the way to put it in wireframe mode--you can see almost the entire zone's wireframe and see almost every NPC in some zones.

This is all done because of the RAM limitations available on the PS2. Likewise, the limits on inventory, auto-translate and such are truncated because of the hard limit on the PS2's memory. Some things like the texture and mip map quality and draw distance are better on the PC and 360 because they have more hardware resources to throw at it, so they lifted some of the limits in the engine when it comes to graphics, as that is something that will never need to change once set. The libraries for auto translate is something that continually changes. In order to avoid the hassle of making custom libraries for each version, they just elected to keep them the same.

This simply streamlines development. Beyond the client and wrapper on each platform being more platform specific--the rest of the game can be consistently the same for the most part. So, if the PS2 needs a truncated library of terms--all platforms get the same truncated library. Thus, if the PS2 were phased out, these truncations could begin to phase out as well, up to the point where things need to be restricted again based on one platform.

Ultimately, they need to do away with consoles all-together for both MMO's. XIV has already had to put off the PS3 release because of the memory restriction on the console--they have to redo textures and UI so it can run worth a flip on it. You would think they would have learned their lesson by now.....

[Swords]

The main limitation I think is the PS2's maximum HDD size is limited to 40GB. The good news about this is 40GB HDD's are getting a lot harder to find, so sooner or later PS2 supporters would be out of luck. SE might be just waiting for this to happen where they could safely drop support without hurting their playerbase.

[Kagato]

It wouldn't be terrible if either of these situations happen:

1) SE themselves release a new PS2 HD that can hold more content.

2) Warn people 6 months to a year in advance that PS2 support will end and to recommend preparing to continue with a PC, 360, or even a possible PS3 version.

[RAIST]

The main limitation I think is the PS2's maximum HDD size is limited to 40GB. The good news about this is 40GB HDD's are getting a lot harder to find, so sooner or later PS2 supporters would be out of luck. SE might be just waiting for this to happen where they could safely drop support without hurting their playerbase.

that was an issue with the size of the partition the installer made on the PS2. FFXI doesn't have full access to the entire hard drive. They expanded it once (forget if they said it was in ZM, or CoP, one of them). That is why people got the disk space errors--they weren't deleting unused files after an update and that partition ran out of room--even though the drives still had 20GB free space. Their work around (for now) is to delete the files as the update takes place, but it is going to make the updates a lot longer on PS2 because of it. Once the drives get cleaned up, they should have a little elbow room again in the partition--but may need another expansion if they do another major expansion to the game (provided the engine doesn't have an LBA limitation limiting the size of the partition).

[Atomic_Skull]

An enhanced PC client would have higher detail models and zones but otherwise it would be the same content with more detail. There's no reason PC and PS2 couldn't run on the same server.

It already does.

The models and zone geometry as well as the textures are the same ones used in the PS2 version actually.

[Tsukino_Kaji]

The models and zone geometry as well as the textures are the same ones used in the PS2 version actually.I've played both. PS2 has drastically reduced graphics already.

[rog]

The models and zone geometry as well as the textures are the same ones used in the PS2 version actually.
No it doesn't. Why do you think the ps2 files are like 8 gb, and pc uses around 13?

[rog]

This isn't exactly accurate, but the easiest way I can think to explain it The engine is designed to load the entire zone's data at once, and then clips what is displayed due to the limitations of the PS2 graphics engine. This exists in all version, but the cut off isn't as drastic on the 360 and PC version, but it still does it. You can see it in action simply by walking around whitegate--watch how the barrels and building features and stuff suddenly jump in/out of view or change models completely at times to show more detail. If you are on a PC and have the way to put it in wireframe mode--you can see almost the entire zone's wireframe and see almost every NPC in some zones.
There is absolutely nothing stopping them from removing that limit for pcs. If they wanted to do so, they could do so right now.

[RAIST]

Yeah.. but unfortunately, they are hung up on the whole keeping things consistent for some stupid reason. If they would just give us the freaking tweaks and quality upgrades, a lot of people would just naturally migrate to the better versions and the PS2 would die out on it's own and everyon would be happy.

...'tis nice to dream......

[Alhanelem]

You can have all the new content SE is willing to make. The ps2 can hold another 30gb+ of content.The game cannot utilize that other 30GB, because the PS2 only allocates 10GB to it.

[rog]

Yeah.. but unfortunately, they are hung up on the whole keeping things consistent for some stupid reason. If they would just give us the freaking tweaks and quality upgrades, a lot of people would just naturally migrate to the better versions and the PS2 would die out on it's own and everyon would be happy.

...'tis nice to dream......
No, they are just too lazy to change it.

[rog]

The game cannot utilize that other 30GB, because the PS2 only allocates 10GB to it.
Because it is sooooo hard to change the size of a partition.

[PizzaTheHut]

Also with Square-Enix already saying the reason you can't change your hairstyle is due to PS2 limitations.

They say that about a lot of things and it usually just translates to: "we're lazy..."

[Alhanelem]

They say that about a lot of things and it usually just translates to: "we're lazy..."
Actually it translates more accurately to "Some monkey porgrammed the game in our basement and threw away all the comments and debug code, so we have no idea how to change it without screwing everything up."

[Atomic_Skull]

No it doesn't. Why do you think the ps2 files are like 8 gb, and pc uses around 13?

Because the PC version uses DXT texture compression and the PS2 version uses whatever texture compression method that PS2 games use. The resolution of the textures is the same on both versions but they use different compression methods so file size doesn't tell you anything.

[Starcade]

People (and Prishe):

When the bulk of Japanese players don't use PS2s, we can talk about removing PS2 limitations.

Until then, not gonna happen!

[rog]

Because the PC version uses DXT texture compression and the PS2 version uses whatever texture compression method that PS2 games use. The resolution of the textures is the same on both versions but they use different compression methods so file size doesn't tell you anything.
File size might not mean anything if the difference was small, but it is not. The pc version uses around 60% more space. Sorry, but that cannot be accounted for by the different types of compression, unless the ps2 uses much lower quality compression.

[Andylynn]

Transfer all their accounts into PC accounts come on people go buy new PCs and stop draggin us down




Imagine FFXI with FFXIV graphics it will become EPIC GAME with PS2 we cant have better graphics

Not going to happen, stop making awful threads.
#1 no one wants to fork out hundreds of $ on a new graphics engine, or a new gaming PC.
#2 alienating a customer base just to kiss the butts of a few forum complaints aint going to change a thing.
Stop making threads.

[sc4500]

They don't need stop the ps2 support all they got to do is phase it out. slowly.

1st. Start to add content and stuff only a pc/xbox users can get. Have paid downloads that will increase there power. and ps2 players will not be able come to those zones or get those items. but they can still play like normal.

2nd. Dropped dial up connection on both the ps2 and pc users. Give them 6 month warning or just force those wish play on dial - up to another server.

3rd. Allow game on ps3 version of the game, unless there contract from microsoft preventing ffxi from coming on to the Ps3. The legal way of playing on ps3 version, not the hacked way get game to work on ps3.

4th. Since this going be the only mmorpg on xbox live service, Which got over 25 million users , might be good idea have the game on demand. And take advantage of those users. Since ff14 is ps3 exlusive anyway most those ps2 users will be going over there if ff14 gets fixed right.

So they really should look at is worth keeping ps2 players on the game , and create this game to be a true final fantasy game that will never end!!

[Atomic_Skull]

File size might not mean anything if the difference was small, but it is not. The pc version uses around 60% more space. Sorry, but that cannot be accounted for by the different types of compression, unless the ps2 uses much lower quality compression.

As an example, DXT texture compression is 4 bits per pixel. VQ texture compression is 2 bits per pixel. VQ texture compression doesn't degrade the image much more than DXT, it's just more efficient.

PS2 games compress textures in memory and then decompress them on the fly for rendering as they are sent to the GPU. They usually use JPEG-like compression rather than fixed ratio compression like DXT (which is a fixed 4-1 ratio) so the textures are more highly compressed because of this (and they need to be with the PS2's limited RAM). The PS2 does NOT have hardware based texture compression, so using DXT or similar methods wouldn't make sense anyway because DXT compression is designed to be decompressed by a GPU in realtime. So instead they compress the textures using JPEG-like compression methods and decompress it only when it's needed by the GPU.

[rog]

They don't need stop the ps2 support all they got to do is phase it out. slowly.

1st. Start to add content and stuff only a pc/xbox users can get. Have paid downloads that will increase there power. and ps2 players will not be able come to those zones or get those items. but they can still play like normal.
This makes absolutely no sense at all. There is NO limit to zones or items imposed by the ps2. None. At all.

[RAIST]

Well, it was a problem because the updates weren't cleaning up after themselves and it was filing up the partition--ut they've fixed that now. Depending on how much crud they need to cram in their it could become an issue if their is a limit to how much more they can expand the partition (like the old 8GB limitation you used to have in older Windows OS). But, as it is now, there should be enough room for a big chunk of new content.

[Atomic_Skull]

This makes absolutely no sense at all. There is NO limit to zones or items imposed by the ps2. None. At all.

There is by the client though, the zone identifier is 8 bits. And it may be that the PS2 doesn't have enough memory to expand the zone lookup table to accommodate increasing this value to 16 bits.

And there has to be a limit to possible items because you can only have so many items existing within range of your character before the PS2 would run out of memory to display them.

[rog]

There is by the client though, the zone identifier is 8 bits. And it may be that the PS2 doesn't have enough memory to expand the zone lookup table to accommodate increasing this value to 16 bits.

And there has to be a limit to possible items because you can only have so many items existing within range of your character before the PS2 would run out of memory to display them.
Actually it can. In fact, it was already done a few updates ago. I'm pretty sure we are never geting 65535 zones.

ok? This is already taken care of by limiting you to 50 characters/npcs/mobs displaying at once. Adding more choices does not change anything.

[Ravenmore]

They won't do anything to ps2 surrport. Why it will send the wrong message to those who might buy FF14 on ps3. That message would be that when the ps3 reaches its limits they will drop surrport. Now this would mean that 14 will get to the point it doesn't suck and it will draw enough people to make a profit. Seeing as I take that PS3 launch for 14 is SEs ace in the hole they wouldn't take that risk.

[Atomic_Skull]

Actually it can. In fact, it was already done a few updates ago. I'm pretty sure we are never geting 65535 zones.

You will need to provide proof of this.

[Atomic_Skull]

They won't do anything to ps2 surrport. Why it will send the wrong message to those who might buy FF14 on ps3. That message would be that when the ps3 reaches its limits they will drop surrport.

I would hope that they would instead of allowing it to be dragged down by a the boat anchor of an obsolete system like they are doing with FFXI.

[rog]

You will need to provide proof of this.
Ask someone else, i don't play anymore.

[Ravenmore]

They are really using ps2 to hide behind, Droping the ps2 wouldn't mean we get new content cause of it or any upgrades to the game that they say are limited by the ps2. All it would do is show how lazy and cheap they are with 11. Hey the game is going into it's 9th year with updates planned for it so I don't see it as a problem. Now what might get us more content is if FF14 flops hard enough for them to pull a Vista.

[Atomic_Skull]

Ask someone else, i don't play anymore.

In other words you are just making it up. Got it.

[RAIST]

You will need to provide proof of this.

I just did a quick count and came up with 239 zones--not including the isolated areas like the standalone islands in Cadearva Mire and Batallia Downs, which might load with a different zone ID. There may be more that I missed. Their system may not even be as straight forward as 1 ID per zone either. They may have ID's per zone line for all we know.

Point is, they may indeed have already exceeded the 256 units provided by 8 bits. It's also a big stretch to think they would go to 65536 zones... that is 256 x 256 after all. If we are sitting right around 256 now, that means they would be squaring the current size.

[Karbuncle]

Raist i'm stealing your sig.

Also, While i think we should move away from the PS2, I think another solution would to simply improve the amount of memory PS2 can allocate from the HDD as someone suggested earlier.

IF it can so be done.

[Rambus]

They will never hit that point. The ps2 makes absolutely no limitations on content, whatsoever. Full auto translate dictionaries, >80 inventory slots, etc, would be very nice, but i'm pretty sure the game will survive without such features.

HDD is full, so yes it does


Edit: Should ask SE to drop FF14 support and focus on 11 tbh. :/

I like this idea

[rog]

HDD is full, so yes it does
The HDD is 40gb, the game takes up, what? 8?

[Rambus]

The HDD is 40gb, the game takes up, what? 8?

Dont use backspace to deleate information to only see it backspaced the website then you loose your post -.-

anyways I been reading the thread more and I am starting to see my logic in what I posted is wrong.

Bascially I was thinking since they had those "not enough space errors" when doing that update they where running out of room.

if it is just a partition why not make it bigger? is sony stoping them or something? I don't get it

[rog]

if it is just a partition why not make it bigger? is sony stoping them or something? I don't get it
Not sure.

My guess is either red tape from sony, and/or they are waiting until they actually need to increase the size.

Either way, 40 gb is far more than could ever possibly be used by the ps2, for all games, let alone just ffxi.

[Tsukino_Kaji]

Because it is sooooo hard to change the size of a partition.Which they did already, it used to be smaller. lol

[Swords]

It may not be entirely possible to expand the partition size limit if its hard-coded in the system itself. A computer has something called a BIOS chip which contains all the neccessary minimal instructions to start your computer, but ultimately your computer runs off the Hard Drive. The PS2 and most game systems have something similar to a BIOS chip, however it's version contains everything it needs to work and acts independantly without the need of hardware like a Hard Drive. If the data to expand the partition is hard-coded into the chip, there is likely little that can be done to change it's parimiters.

But before anyone says it, the newest generation of consoles have worked around this issue with improved hardware such as flash data storage programmers can update the consoles OS as needed allowing greater flexability to adjust these limits.

[Rambus]

Which they did already, it used to be smaller. lol

yeah i saw that said I ment do it again for the times.

what sword said maybe, i wish SE make more statments on this issue vs player thoeries

[rog]

It may not be entirely possible to expand the partition size limit if its hard-coded in the system itself. A computer has something called a BIOS chip which contains all the neccessary minimal instructions to start your computer, but ultimately your computer runs off the Hard Drive. The PS2 and most game systems have something similar to a BIOS chip, however it's version contains everything it needs to work and acts independantly without the need of hardware like a Hard Drive. If the data to expand the partition is hard-coded into the chip, there is likely little that can be done to change it's parimiters.

But before anyone says it, the newest generation of consoles have worked around this issue with improved hardware such as flash data storage programmers can update the consoles OS as needed allowing greater flexability to adjust these limits.wat

0987654321

[Sasukeuchiha]

yeah i saw that said I ment do it again for the times.

what sword said maybe, i wish SE make more statments on this issue vs player thoeries

That would be nice other wise we will see these threads constantly come up till ps2 is dropped. People just want content ad hate hearing how ps2 is limiting this game is some way as square enix them self have said.

[rog]

That would be nice other wise we will see these threads constantly come up till ps2 is dropped. People just want content ad hate hearing how ps2 is limiting this game is some way as square enix them self have said.
If only those people had even the slightest clue what limitations are imposed by the ps2.

[RAIST]

Think I remember reading somewhere back with all the homebrew stuff that the PS2 uses a 28 bit LBA system in the firmware (in other words, can only read up to 128GB of a hard drive partition at a time). In order to get it to work with larger drives there had to be a sort of BIOS extension to allow it to read 48bit partitions on larger drives to run more advanced homebrew stuff. So, it is pretty advanced, even though it is outdated.

I think the bigger problem stems from how it puts games on the drive. It doesn't copy flat files to the drive--it puts an image of the game's disc on it. Sort of like an ISO image you make when ripping a disc to burn to CD/DVD. I don't know the exact size of the partition, so I may be wrong on this thinking--but that image size may have a hardcoded size limit of around 8.5 to 9GB--the standard size of a DVD9. This would make sense as it is more or less making an ISO style image of your game that it mounts and runs as if it was loading a DVD-9 game. There could be some trickery with an encoding method that allows for compression to squeeze more data in that image, but the physical limitation on the disk would still be the 8.5-9GB as it is determined by the number of sectors used.

If this is indeed how it is setup to run, then that cannot be changed without a firmware update to the PS2 itself, which would be something Sony would indeed need to fix first--so that would also mean there is a hard limit on how much they can store in the FFXI partition (ie, image). The only way to get around it without Sony changing the firware would be to somehow set up a Disc 2 image. To access that content, you would probably have to use a menu option to create a save file, exit the game, and boot the FFXI-2 game and load that save file--like when you switched discs in a multi-disc game.

[rog]

The ps2's bios is read only, and so can't be updated.

[RAIST]

The ps2's bios is read only, and so can't be updated.

Yeah, knowing Sony they went the cheap route and didn't use flashable chips. A very boneheaded move on their part.

[thefinalrune]

If this is indeed how it is setup to run, then that cannot be changed without a firmware update to the PS2 itself, which would be something Sony would indeed need to fix first...

Raist is spot on with this point. Yes, the PS2 HDD has a capacity of 40GBs, however the firmware designed by Sony only allows a set amount of space a game can utilize on the disk. This being proprietary of Sony is not something SE can adjust, thus PS2 users are forever stuck with the preset limits on the system. And, since Sony has officially dropped all support for the PS2HDD they actively refuse to even address the issue leaving us all with the tag line of "PS2 Limitations".

This is the main reason new content is so incredibly hard to work into the game. Despite the size of the HDD the partition FFXI uses can and will never be increased. The only solution to allow increased content is for SE to follow Sony's lead and drop all support for the PS2HDD.

[Juri_Licious]

Well, it looks like it's finally out there.

Thanks to Raist and others all the evidence of the PS2 Limitations is finally had.
I suggest remembering these posts so we don't have to have duplicate threads on this subject again.

[Swords]

Yeah, knowing Sony they went the cheap route and didn't use flashable chips. A very boneheaded move on their part.

I don't think any console until this generation of consoles utilized flash memory, well maybe the original Xbox but I never owned one to really find out.

[rog]

Yeah, knowing Sony they went the cheap route and didn't use flashable chips. A very boneheaded move on their part.Or maybe they chose to use a read only bios because they did not intend to update firmware, and being able to write to it brings issues, such as corruption, hackers being able to modify it, etc.

[Pofo]

I'm not very savvy at this sort of stuff so this might be a stupid question, but is it possible for a program to be made that would allow a PS2 to recognize an external Hard drive once the program is on the HD?

[rog]

I'm not very savvy at this sort of stuff so this might be a stupid question, but is it possible for a program to be made that would allow a PS2 to recognize an external Hard drive once the program is on the HD?
Yes, i play games off an external hdd on my ps2 all the time.

[Pofo]

That being said, then why can't SE just host a download on playonline that you place into an external HD allowing PS2 consoles to recognize it; to expand their space availability.. Or is it easier said then done?

[rog]

They could.

[Flunklesnarkin]

Release PC / xbox / ps3 only expansions from this point on ;o

[Olor]

They could.

Then they should. I don't want to drop PS2 support unless it is the only way to get more continents into the game.

[Therin]

No one here actually knows the percentage of players who use the PS2 therefore no one can make a statement about whether or not this would be a financially reasonable choice.

[Atomic_Skull]

Even if they don't drop PS2 support there's a lot they could do to improve the PC version without too much difficulty. I made a thread about it here:

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/5131-FFXI-client-tweaks.-FFXI-updates-that-might-realisticly-happen.

[RAIST]

The problem is, from a development standpoint, they've opted to keep as much as they can consistent across the platforms. The core assets of the game are essentially the same--PS2 DAT files and such. This way, the only thing they have to worry about being platform specific is more in dealing with the wrapper that runs the PS2 portion of it. IDK just where the line is drawn, but it will be a limiting factor on just how much they would be willing to tweak things for one platform further then they already have.

And thus, we have the good old patent answer of "PS2 limitations...can't do that for the PS2, so no one gets it".

[Kailea_Nagisa]

Transfer all their accounts into PC accounts come on people go buy new PCs and stop draggin us down

Imagine FFXI with FFXIV graphics it will become EPIC GAME with PS2 we cant have better graphics

It is not that simple

[CrystalWeapon]

I find it funny that when this arguement is brought up, it always comes up that we're not moving over due to the mass amount of japanese players on the PS2. If you look on the jp boards there has been a thread titled PS2 -> PS3 on the 1st page of their general discussion for quite a while now with a lot of people in favor of the jump over.

I think it's more about the amount of work it would take to swap to a higher quality version over alienating people.

[RAIST]

I find it funny that when this arguement is brought up, it always comes up that we're not moving over due to the mass amount of japanese players on the PS2. If you look on the jp boards there has been a thread titled PS2 -> PS3 on the 1st page of their general discussion for quite a while now with a lot of people in favor of the jump over.

I think it's more about the amount of work it would take to swap to a higher quality version over alienating people.

Exactly. It's not JUST that the PS2 is supported, it's that the game was designed for the PS2--PC support was more like a tweak where they integrated a wrapper to play the PS2 content on a PC. The 360 got more of a makeover, so it's a bit of a different animal--but it still has a lot of the legacy PS2 crap in it. They would have to FIRST get people off the PS2, and then remake the wrappers for PC and 360.

This infact is why we didn't get the full DirectX upgrade we were promised what... 2 years ago? Forget when they proposed it--but they found it entailed too much and wasn't worth the resources to complete it. More or less all we got was a little restructuring that allowed windowed mode and some shader/texture tweaking. That eventually allowed people with nextgen cards to force FSAA in hardware (but it bogs worse than the old supersampling trick)--so it was an improvement, but a half-assed one at that.

[Zumi]

Release PC / xbox / ps3 only expansions from this point on ;o

You do realize the PS3 just emulates the PS2 version so all the PS2 limitations are in place on that version. SE would actually have to recode the game to be an actual PS3 game for it to not have the PS2 limitations. They said many times they didn't want to do that because they thought it would cost them too much.

[Karbuncle]

You do realize the PS3 just emulates the PS2 version so all the PS2 limitations are in place on that version. SE would actually have to recode the game to be an actual PS3 game for it to not have the PS2 limitations. They said many times they didn't want to do that because they thought it would cost them too much.

I thought the PS2 Limitation was because of the amount of memory allocated to FFXI From the PS2-Hardrive(something like that?), not the Game/Disk itself?

and since PS3 Doesn't have the PS2 HD... PS2 Limitations doesn't apply.

I could be wrong...(hurf lookie there)

[rog]

Uh, no. The hdd has nothing to do with it. The ps2 has 32 mb ram.

[Karbuncle]

Uh, no. The hdd has nothing to do with it. The ps2 has 32 mb ram.

Then does that problem persist when you switch to the PS3?

[sruon]

The PS3 only emulates PS2 software, that is planned around 32mb so yeah it does.

[rog]

The PS3 only emulates PS2 software, that is planned around 32mb so yeah it does.
afaik, the rest of the ram is not disabled when playing a ps2 game.

[Karbuncle]

Mixed Responses :X Crap.

[Swords]

Then does that problem persist when you switch to the PS3?

It would because the emulator and game software would be fixed to utilizing the PS2's specs. All emulation does is mimic the settings of the console it's trying to replicate, now if you were to tweak the limit of the emulator software to utilize the expanded ram capacity of the PS3 it might improve performance pending how the drivers for FFXI are utilized and setup. The drawback to emulation however is the emulator itself is a program and can take considerable resources to run, so you may or may not experience worse gameplay than if you were to just play on the PS2 itself.

[Karbuncle]

I See. Interesting.

[rog]

It would because the emulator and game software would be fixed to utilizing the PS2's specs. All emulation does is mimic the settings of the console it's trying to replicate, now if you were to tweak the limit of the emulator software to utilize the expanded ram capacity of the PS3 it might improve performance pending how the drivers for FFXI are utilized and setup. The drawback to emulation however is the emulator itself is a program and can take considerable resources to run, so you may or may not experience worse gameplay than if you were to just play on the PS2 itself.
Yes, it mimics the settings, however it is not exactly the same. It still has access to all the ps3's hardware, including the extra ram. Some of those resources are used in the emulation, but there is still plenty left over.

[RAIST]

Early PS3's actually had a PS2 daughterboard in them. Later models that had them removed relied on software emulation. Emulation typically relies on the console's BIOS/FW, so the games are run sort of in a Virtual machine--with all the restrictions native to that emulated console's environment. That's why component video sometimes tanks on a PS game in a PS2. If you want to run a Saturn, PSX, Nintendo, etc emulator on your PC--that program HAS to have the console's BIOS/FW to function. There are ways to hook into the OS of the actual platform you are on (like creating files on your hard drive to simulate memory cards and custom API's that hook the PSx/PS2 drivers into the Windows CDROM and DirectX API's)--but it is still subject to the limitations of the original console. Just like the PS2 homebrew community had to create a hook to a 48bit LBA extension to access the full capacity of their hard drives. Their developement tools were on a PC, but could not access the resources of that PC without the hooks.

[rog]

Yes, but ram is still available, regardless of what type of game is being played, unless sony specifically disabled it (such as the wii, or ds does when playing gamecube/gba games)

[Alhanelem]

Additional RAM is NOT available when you're emulating. The program expects a very specific environment (in the case of consoles) and attempting to change that will result in either 1) the program simply not utilizing it (because it doesn't know it's there) or 2) unpredictable errors/crashing.

[rog]

It definitely would not result in crashing. The first problem is easily solved.

[Swords]

Yes, but ram is still available, regardless of what type of game is being played, unless sony specifically disabled it (such as the wii, or ds does when playing gamecube/gba games)

Even the earliest consoles and computers like the Sega Genesis and Comodore 64 had a small amount of ram incorporated in it's system, so it cannot be fully disabled. But games and hardware are specifcally modeled to the specifications they were built with and designed on. The only way to truely utilize the specs from a more powerful system when emulating, is to go in and adjust FFXI's drivers and the emulating software itself to use them.

[Atomic_Skull]

This infact is why we didn't get the full DirectX upgrade we were promised what... 2 years ago? Forget when they proposed it--but they found it entailed too much and wasn't worth the resources to complete it.


Yeah, I didn't believe that excuse then and I still don't. The real reason was they just didn't want to bother or were thinking about FFXIV at the time (remember they started working on FFXIV around COP) and didn't want to "waste" development time on a game which at that time they thought would last 5 years at the most. DirectX 9 isn't that much different than DirectX 8, it's really just a refinement and extension of it. They are close enough that you can pretty much just convert the D3D calls in your code and make a few minor adjustments. It's not nearly as different as DirectX 9 vs DirectX 10.

Converting an application from DirectX 8 to DirectX 9 is not some incredibly difficult programming task. If you know anything about D3D you know this is not true.

Even if they don't do a full graphics update there are things they could do to modernize the existing client and make it work better on modern PC's without affecting PS2 support. I'll just copy past from the other thread because apparently not many people actually looked at it.


First of all, change how the resolution select works in the config. We already know that FFXI supports any resolution your graphics card is capable of so restricting the "background" setting to a maximum of 1024x1024 in the config utility doesn't make sense.

Furthermore, the whole "background/overlay" system they use is confusing to new players. They should change the "background" to be a fraction of the overlay and change the name to "Rendering resolution" with a help text that explains what it actually is. So you can select the resolution you want and then choose 1/4 1/2 2/3 and "full resolution" for rendering (this is the way FFXIV does it).

Update FFXI to DirexctX 9 already, DirectX 8 is dying and Nvidia and ATI hardly care about it. This would solve 95% of the problems FFXI has on Windows Vista and Windows 7.

60fps support. FFXI's graphics engine *does* support 60fps, there is a cutscene in COP that runs at 60 fps (the one with the demons) and the FFXI benchmark also runs at 60fps in places. So we know this is possible without having to change any of the animations for the models.

MSAA support, or rather, MSAA support that isn't really slow. At least on ATI cards if you match the overlay and background resolutions (e.g. 1280x720 for both) then forced MSAA actually works with FFXI. The problem though is that it is very slow with shadows enabled. MSAA already works with FFXI, so it's just a matter of fixing FFXI to work better with it.

Adjustable menu size. Add an option to draw the menus larger so that everything doesn't become unreadable at very high resolutions. Even if it's just "draw all menus at 2x size"

An option to restrict the width of the UI. So say if you were running the game at 1920x1080 you could restrict the width at which the UI is drawn to 1440.

Related to the above, user defined aspect ratio, or alternatively just have FFXI assume square pixels. Almost all displays these days use discrete pixels anyway. Combined with the above they would allow FFXI to work with eyefinity three monitor setups. FFXI can already run on three monitors because they simply look like a single very wide display to applications. The only problem is that FFXI is limited to 16:9 and the UI spans all three displays, so while it works it's not very useful.

None of these things would be too hard to implement. Only converting to DirectX 9 and MSAA optimization would be much work and even that might take one person a month or two.

Oh and to the above list I'd like to add "support the shoulder buttons on Xbox 360 controllers on the PC" so we can use the official drivers from Microsoft and not have to hammer the F8 key every time our computer boots.

[Atomic_Skull]

Yes, but ram is still available, regardless of what type of game is being played, unless sony specifically disabled it (such as the wii, or ds does when playing gamecube/gba games)

It's not available to PS2 games because it's emulation. The PS2 software runs inside a virtual PS2, it does not run directly on the PS3 hardware. It doesn't "know" that it's running on a software emulation of the PS2 hardware and not an actual PS2.They could change the emulation to make more RAM available (basically the PS3 would be emulating an "enhanced" PS2), but that would require Sony's cooperation and they aren't likely to do this. It would also require FFXI to support the extra RAM. It also could introduce bugs if other PS2 software tried to write into memory addresses that don't actually exist on a real PS2 but which do on the emulation.

And yes it's very possible that some PS2 games could do that. Either because it's involved in some weird hardware trick or because it doesn't actually do anything on a PS2 and was just overlooked.

[Khajit]

I find it interesting how so many people actually expect ps2 users to automatically transfer to pc. Until the HD on my ps2 died the instant SE got rid of ps2 support I would have quit the game despite the fact that I had a computer with ffxi on it.
Do you guys really think the general reaction of people on a ps2 wouldnt be "screw you" and that the 360 userbase wouldn't find something else to do as they could easily be next on the hitlist within a few more years?
Cutting off and alienating a bunch of steady customers is not a good business practice in a company.

[Karbuncle]

I find it interesting how so many people actually expect ps2 users to automatically transfer to pc. Until the HD on my ps2 died the instant SE got rid of ps2 support I would have quit the game despite the fact that I had a computer with ffxi on it.
Do you guys really think the general reaction of people on a ps2 wouldnt be "screw you" and that the 360 userbase wouldn't find something else to do as they could easily be next on the hitlist within a few more years?
Cutting off and alienating a bunch of steady customers is not a good business practice in a company.

Neither is letting a game slowly die due to an outdated system completely. With a Dead game due to frozen content because of the PS2, The profit is completely gone, Where as Dropping the PS2 would only cut part of their base.

Really look at it this way, You're arm is infected, Its going to spread to your heart and kill you, But you can remove it through surgery. You'll lose your arm, But you save your life. Are you going to lay back and die? or learn to live without your arm.

PS2 Is a diseased arm, Sooner or later it has to come off, or it'll kill the game. Maybe not now, But some day soon a decision will have to be made. It doesn't need to happen right but eventually the best "business choice" will be to lop off that arm, rather than let them die.

Its not that i don't respect your situation, I really do, because i too once played only on the PS2.

But its just a reality its holding the game back, and has been, since day one. Its not the ENTIRE reason, I never implied that, But it is a driving excuse/Reason behind a lot of past issues, and present, and will be in the future.

[Khajit]

And yet here we are in an "age" where nearly everything people hated when playing FFXI is gone. If anything your argument is a reasoning for converting FF14 into FFXI 2.0. We've been hearing screams about how the end is nigh due to limitations for at least half a decade and I'm still hearing that same old BS spouted as if anyone on ps2 or 360 honestly gives much of a crap anymore about apocalyptic prophecies. PSO has been officially dead since forever and there are servers everywhere.
Even with that doom and gloom arm infection analogy you're skipping the part where you're going to have a perfectly functioning arm for months until you reach any sort of critical mass, the idea that one can create a new body for a nominal fee( v2.0) and that SE as a company has been doing very poorly lately financially speaking so you're asking the doctor(SE) to send you to surgery(while expecting future advanced upgrades to your body that the doctor never cared about giving before) for free when the hospital is nearly bankrupt, and the fact that for an unknown( to me , I'm sure there are people employed by SE that can calculate this) amount of time you're going to actually be worse off.


You want ps2 support gone? Then convince SE to make an upgraded version of the game and let the former ps2/xbox players( use the original codes to figure out who started on ps2) have a discount on the box price(or give some sort of incentive/consolation prize to the ps2 users being left out) because the current tack in the argument just sounds like the crazy hobo's ranting about the incoming rapture whom keeps pushing back the expected date for it to happen.

IT's not to say the day wont come, however you're overestimating how many people have, may, and will quit because of ps2 limitations. If they were going to quit because of those they would have done so back when SE's excuse for everything was ps2limitations (which turned out to be lies but back then many people took it at face value). It's safer to think that if people left the game it's because they had that travesty of an expansion ACP(I only bought it because I couldn't believe that it was really as big a waste of money as I'd heard), because of the previous boxed expansion having almost every zone a 99% recycled zone while proclaiming that we had new and exciting areas to discover, stretching it out over several years to the point that people just plain got sick of even bothering to remember where they were mission wise while those that did care probably forgot several months before(and yet we dont see people petitioning to delete wotg zones and replace it with a better expansion), SE blaming the initial RMT account hackings on the players while simultaneously charging them money to get back on their own original server, the endgame linkshells ls that openly paid over $2000 for bots without repercussion, and that nonsense with the PW/AV fiasco.
If ffxi is slowly dying as claimed due to the ps2 factor is negligible and mostly ran its course out long ago.(Until around next year if SE truly hasn't found a way around anything and assuming the content we do get is good)

[Karbuncle]

I'm Don't think i underestimate anything. My Comparison was between "No players" and "No PS2" Players. They are purposefully Vague numbers.

Secondly, I never said the Only Excuse was PS2 Limitations. Which is also why i used the word "Excuse" right here:


But it is a driving excuse/Reason behind a lot of past issues, and present, and will be in the future.

Implying it might not always be the legitimate problem (as with a lot of things the old dev team said, which are now fixed), hence the word, "Excuse" and reason being used. in which case Erasing this "Excuse" might give us more progress. who can say for sure what "Excuse" they would have used if the PS2 was never an issue though? I can't. Right now their excuses are "Limited Development Resources". Which i think in itself is because of FFXIV being a flop, and most of their resources being diverted to making it not suck.

Thirdly, i did say "Eventually" the PS2 Would cause the Decline of Updates. It will. There is a actual, Factual limitation on how much the PS2 can handle, and we're getting dangerously close to it. I never said "Right now".

Fourthly, I don't understand your whole FFXIV Comparison it makes no sense based on my Current argument. Can you please explain that a bit better for me?

Fifthly, Making an "upgraded" Version as shown by you yourself Right here


Until the HD on my ps2 died the instant SE got rid of ps2 support I would have quit the game despite the fact that I had a computer with ffxi on it.

Wouldn't matter, Cause you appear to be saying "If they drop PS2 I'll quit no matter what". Hypocrisy? Or Did you forget to mention in your first post "Unless they give me half-off a new Game" Even though you appear to already have a PC with FFXI?

No one wants to just "pack up and move to FFXIV", they want FFXI to live on a few more years, They want to play and enjoy FFXI, and sooner or later the only way to do this will be to cut your loses and remove the PS2 Support, Or just let the game die and go stagnant. I'm not implying we should just be like "Hey PS2, F*ck you". I would think they would be like "in 1 year We're ending PS2 Support, PS2 Players will have the option to Download it Free on Steam" or something to the matter to move players on.

And truthfully, No one really wants it to ever come to the point where its "No more content for PS2" or "drop PS2 for content". because I'm sure a lot of people even in this thread have friends who play PS2. I know I don't want it to stop right now, But i can also see that some day in the near future its either going to be drop the PS2 (With warning!) or We'll cease any meaningful content.

I don't know which brings me to point six.

SIXTHLY, I don't wanna continue to this much Further, Last time some Ranter went deep-end with me over some quasi-offensive post Both of us got our posts deleted by GM's, Repeat {No Thanks}. I like my Account Un-banned. So respond to this, I'll quote it and make a big Smiley face for you, and we can both move on. Or someone can come and take my place and you can continue to argue with him.

[Khajit]

Eh agree to disagree and ill go skim over the grammar in my post later because it sounds like you're misinterpreting several things i said.

[Karbuncle]

Eh agree to disagree and ill go skim over the grammar in my post later because it sounds like you're misinterpreting several things i said.

Very Well Could be. If you explain it better I'll be happy to respond more.

Edit: also in my last post I promised i'd reply with a Giant Smiley face, So here you go :)

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[RAIST]

Thought just hit me....wonder if the 360 puts games on the drive like a PS2 does (an image file and not the actual files). If so...it could run into a similar space issue there too.

At this point, their only option may very well be a whole new game that is only on PC, maybe PS3 (Blu-Ray support, it should be able to handle up to 25GB partitions). Guess that's what they were hoping 14 was going to be as they made the effort to tie in the familiar faces and such. What they should have done though is just a continuation of Vanadiel, incorporating new story lines exploring more of the left out lore like the Mithra and Galka's and such. Allow you to import your toons somehow--maybe a lot of the gear wouldn't translate, maybe just specific sets (AF's, Relics, etc.--RE stuff) and your gil. That would have been a good way to take us past 75 instead of the abyssea route they took.

But anyway... what's done is done.

[Atomic_Skull]

And yet here we are in an "age" where nearly everything people hated when playing FFXI is gone. If anything your argument is a reasoning for converting FF14 into FFXI 2.0.


Even if FFXIV became FFXI 2.0 Eorzea is still a bland soulless copy of Vana'diel populated by bland less interesting versions of FFXI's races.

Miqo'te are simply human women with cat ears and are less visually interesting than Mithra. Same with Galka vs Roegadyn. Elzen are generic tolkien elves.

The world is boring and nothing about it makes me want to live there.

[rog]

But its just a reality its holding the game back, and has been, since day one. Its not the ENTIRE reason, I never implied that, But it is a driving excuse/Reason behind a lot of past issues, and present, and will be in the future.
The only significant harm to the game came on day one, when they decided to make the game for the ps2, then port it to the pc, instead of having real pc support. Only very minimal things are impossible because of the ps2.

[Karbuncle]

Beginning to feel this argument is getting incredibly redundant. So I think I'll just agree with the keep the PS2 side.

The PS2 is fine, It won't limit or Stop updates now or ever in the future. "PS2 Limitations" was never used as an excuse by the Dev team to not add something in the past, and it won't cause any problems in the future.

I understand this now.

[Runespider]

Stopping support for PS2 won't happen because it would give them no real reason to not upgrade the eingine of FFXI "ps2 limiations" is an amazing excuse to not do things, they never even upgraded to a newer version of DirectX when they said they were going to because "it was too much work". Notice how very many things can't be added because "they are too much work"?

Won't ever happen, better to just accept it. Will be funny to hear PS3 limitations excuse and for this whole thing to be played out again in a few years on their new MMO.

[rog]

The PS2 is fine, It won't limit or Stop updates now or ever in the future. "PS2 Limitations" was never used as an excuse by the Dev team to not add something in the past, and it won't cause any problems in the future.
Not for things that actually matter it was not.

[Karbuncle]

Not for things that actually matter it was not.

I know! I'm agreeing with you no.

[rog]

I know! I'm agreeing with you no.
Sure sounded like sarcasm to me. If not, then you are wrong, because of the statement "'PS2 Limitations' was never used as an excuse by the Dev team to not add something in the past".

[Karbuncle]

Sure sounded like sarcasm to me. If not, then you are wrong, because of the statement "'PS2 Limitations' was never used as an excuse by the Dev team to not add something in the past".

No Sarcasm here. Though i can understand your skepticism. I just had to really look at the argument.

You've made it quite clear, with rational argument, that the PS2 has never been, and will never be, a problem when it comes to this game, and the game will likely close before we ever reach a point where any PS2 Limitations would stop or hinder our content.

[rog]

I am not saying the ps2 does not hinder the game. It does. Just not in any meaningful way. Would i kill for >80 inventory space? Hell yes. Unfortunately that is currently impossible, without either dropping the ps2, or major, major rehaul of the ps2 code to save some memory (and even then, would probably only get us a few extra spaces). The auto translate is another obvious example. There are many small things that the ps2 prevents us from having. However, it absolutely does not ever prevent us from getting new content (ie zones, mobs, gear, quests, etc). Ever.

The game will not suddenly having 100x better graphics, or fully optimized code just because SE dropped support for the ps2. In fact, we would get neither of those. Both would take far too much effort, and would not be done. How do i know they would not be done? Because they could be done right now, while still supporting the ps2. But it has not been done. Because it is not worth doing. If ps2 support was dropped, we would have more inventory, more AT phrases, and some other small things the next update. There would never be a major change.

[Karbuncle]

I know, Which is exactly why I'm now agreeing with you. After attempting to find anything meaningfully left out i could not.

You're preaching to the choir right now.

[Juri_Licious]

Thought just hit me....wonder if the 360 puts games on the drive like a PS2 does (an image file and not the actual files). If so...it could run into a similar space issue there too.

At this point, their only option may very well be a whole new game that is only on PC, maybe PS3 (Blu-Ray support, it should be able to handle up to 25GB partitions). Guess that's what they were hoping 14 was going to be as they made the effort to tie in the familiar faces and such. What they should have done though is just a continuation of Vanadiel, incorporating new story lines exploring more of the left out lore like the Mithra and Galka's and such. Allow you to import your toons somehow--maybe a lot of the gear wouldn't translate, maybe just specific sets (AF's, Relics, etc.--RE stuff) and your gil. That would have been a good way to take us past 75 instead of the abyssea route they took.

But anyway... what's done is done.

I've opened the files myself on the 360. They are in about about 10-13 files including the playonline stuff.
However, they aren't image files they are just basic files for 360 format and if you have the right program you can easily export all there data and it's similar to the PC.

[Xikeroth]

PC users have been having to upgrade their hardware to play games since the beginning of gaming. There is no reason SE couldn't team up with sony and just make a true PS3 version of FFXI then basically say "we need all you PS2 users to upgrade to PS3"(which you can actually upgrade the harddrive) That way they can still play the way they are used to.

We don't need FFXIV graphics to enjoy this game, I just want more content that isn't some lame addon. If the Jps love the game they'll do it without a problem, PC users have been having to get new hard drives, video cards, RAM, sometimes totally new systems which cost a lot more then a PS3.

So i think SE should just make it playable on PS3 that would probably help a lot to start off with.

[rog]

PC users have been having to upgrade their hardware to play games since the beginning of gaming. There is no reason SE couldn't team up with sony and just make a true PS3 version of FFXI then basically say "we need all you PS2 users to upgrade to PS3"(which you can actually upgrade the harddrive) That way they can still play the way they are used to.
Money. Sony will not allow them to simply port it to the ps3, and even if they did, once they drop ps2 support, many would not be able to upgrade to the ps3 (or would not), and they would lose more money.

[Atomic_Skull]

Anyone notice how fast an official reply was posted about future expansions (not this year).

They haven't said anything about not dropping PS2 support, makes you wonder...

[Mirage]

They haven't said anything about dropping it either. Meaningless speculation.

[Miiyo]

It's not just PS2. It's mostly the fact that this thing was coded ages ago. I don't know if anyone else has noticed but there's been alot of "we've asked the dev, but due to the coding..." In short, FFXI would need to be completely remade from the ground up to be able to do a massive upgrade. That would require alot more people than they have and alot more money.

[Anathiel]

I have no idea what ps2 limitations are, and how people are freaking out about it. (can someone please explain it to me, i've been gone for 4 years)

[Rambus]

It's not just PS2. It's mostly the fact that this thing was coded ages ago. I don't know if anyone else has noticed but there's been alot of "we've asked the dev, but due to the coding..." In short, FFXI would need to be completely remade from the ground up to be able to do a massive upgrade. That would require alot more people than they have and alot more money.

I think they would of been a head if they cut the support very early on FFXIV and recode ffxi.

[CrystalWeapon]

It wouldn't really take more money to recode ffxi, it would take time and lots of it. It's not like their staff would increase or they would work more time than they do now. They would however have to devote a large portion of the dev team to reworking the engine over new content. The only real cost to it would be the players who would quit due to the game being stale. Since we'd probably see half a year to a year's worth of gameplay with a lack of major updates.

[Luso]

It's not just PS2. It's mostly the fact that this thing was coded ages ago. I don't know if anyone else has noticed but there's been alot of "we've asked the dev, but due to the coding..." In short, FFXI would need to be completely remade from the ground up to be able to do a massive upgrade. That would require alot more people than they have and alot more money.

They moved most of the people on XI's dev. team to XIV, which made me really upset that they did so. I was thinking that they instead should've hired more hands and scouted for more people experienced in next-gen technology, but it seems as though SE is reusing personnel within the company all of the time. I'm pretty sure this was true in XIII and Versus XIII, as well, though someone correct me if I'm wrong.

Also, when you're running an online MMO, I don't know about anyone else, but "dev system resources" should never be an issue, anywhere, anytime. People pay the company that hosts the game to play it and for newer advanced features. To pay for a game and ask the developers on a forum dedicated for SUGGESTIONS for future content and fixes and such and have the dev. team say it's not possible really makes me wonder why I continue to play XI and XIV, even. IMO, there's not much to expand on XI other than reusing old existing areas and equipment, because, as along as the dev. team is as restricted and apparently small as it is, XI won't ever evolve past what it is, currently.

In the end, I think that XIV failed where XI succeeded, and they want to save their precious numbered title in the series and not have it go to waste. They rely on XI's staff that made the game what it is and leave XI with a minimal amount of manpower.

[bungiefan]

Thought just hit me....wonder if the 360 puts games on the drive like a PS2 does (an image file and not the actual files). If so...it could run into a similar space issue there too.

At this point, their only option may very well be a whole new game that is only on PC, maybe PS3 (Blu-Ray support, it should be able to handle up to 25GB partitions). Guess that's what they were hoping 14 was going to be as they made the effort to tie in the familiar faces and such. What they should have done though is just a continuation of Vanadiel, incorporating new story lines exploring more of the left out lore like the Mithra and Galka's and such. Allow you to import your toons somehow--maybe a lot of the gear wouldn't translate, maybe just specific sets (AF's, Relics, etc.--RE stuff) and your gil. That would have been a good way to take us past 75 instead of the abyssea route they took.

But anyway... what's done is done.

PS2 doesn't put games on as a disc image, they are actually files. It's just that the file system wasn't readable by homebrew until last year. It's the home brew hard drive loaders that copy games as images, and even then it's still the files from the discs.

Problems with the PS2 file system are that partitions must be a multiple of 128 MB in size, and don't seem to be able to be larger than 8 GB or so per partition (the hard drive loaders can install dual-layer 8.5 GB DVDs to a partition, so the limit is likely a little higher), and the system can't see more than 137 GB of drive space (the rest just goes to waste on a larger drive) without homebrew modification. They don't make hard drives that small anymore, and IDE drives are now rare and only in 320, 500, and 750 GB sizes that I can find.

Games on PS2 with official HDD support for installation installed at least partial files to the drive to reduce load times. PSBBN has a bunch of directories, and can store music and picture files for playback in the interface. It even had an option to change the interface language, though the Japanese language pack was all that was ever released for it.

One of the reasons FFXI was developed for PS2 first, it was the first true MMORPG to ever be released for a console (it beat out EQOA's release date when you look at the JP release date of May 16th 2002). The PC version was created to handle the large number of Americans that play such games on PC, Japanese gamers tend to game more on consoles than PC, and thier PC games tend to be visual novels or such. They were actually attempting to have a simultaneous NA and JP release on PS2 before releasing a PC version, but SCEA withheld the HDD required for the release, so they just went on with the JP version. We got a delayed PC version because they wanted PS2 to be the primary platform in both countries, and so they held out for an NA PS2 release until financial incentives required an NA PC release.

There were other console-only MMORPGs, one of which I can think of is Nobunaga's Ambition Online, which is still running last I checked. I wonder if they're running into PS2 limitations. SE also has to account for JP PS2 users playing both, and how much hard drive space each game must take has to leave room for offline HDD-capable games too. Japan had more than 40 GB worth of HDD support, while NA didn't hit that much. PSBBN also takes up 2-3 GB if that is what is running on the system.

[Rambus]

It wouldn't really take more money to recode ffxi, it would take time and lots of it. It's not like their staff would increase or they would work more time than they do now. They would however have to devote a large portion of the dev team to reworking the engine over new content. The only real cost to it would be the players who would quit due to the game being stale. Since we'd probably see half a year to a year's worth of gameplay with a lack of major updates.

sorry for cliche quote ( and made it self to wow at that)

time is money, friend.

[hordecore]

cant they make the game work on PS3 wont that remove the limitations?

[CrystalWeapon]

sorry for cliche quote ( and made it self to wow at that)

time is money, friend.

I said it wouldn't take more money than what they're already paying their staff on a daily basis. It wouldn't be a matter of hiring more workers or paying overtime to recode XI. It would be, as I said in my post, a matter of not pissing off current players. To recode XI would mean they would have to halt a majority of their work on developing new content for XI.

[Luso]

They stated that they cannot move the game to the PS3 because of the architecture of the PS3. Simply porting over the game from the Xbox 360 will not do either, as most games that do so require more work that developers simply do not have the time nor patience for, hence the PS3 version of certain games lacking features/quality when compared to the 360 version.

[Alhanelem]

cant they make the game work on PS3 wont that remove the limitations?
No, it won't, because it would be emulated PS2 code. There is zero chance of totally rebuilding the game to utilize the PS3's capabilities. That's what FFXIV was supposed to be for.

[rog]

No, it won't, because it would be emulated PS2 code. There is zero chance of totally rebuilding the game to utilize the PS3's capabilities. That's what FFXIV was supposed to be for.They do not need to totally rebuild it, a quick port would work.

[RAIST]

They do not need to totally rebuild it, a quick port would work.

This. Unfortuneatley, they are too bogged down in trying to fix XIV and trying to keep XI alive to pay for it. Taking people off of these tasks to build a new wrapper for PS3 and then assigning resources to support it would delay other projects, which would eventually cost them more money in the long run (delayed revenues = lost profits). IF this were to happen, it would be after things settle down and they have resources available to throw at it.

[Tsukino_Kaji]

Se should just do what they always do with flops like FFVI. Eat it, pretend it doesn't exist and move on.

[Joslyn]

Se should just do what they always do with flops like FFVI. Eat it, pretend it doesn't exist and move on.

Did you mean to say FFXIV or really meant FFVI.. I'm confused..

[Tsukino_Kaji]

Did you mean to say FFXIV or really meant FFVI.. I'm confused..Lisdexic fingers. ^^;
Can't have a 16 until PS4. lol

[Atomic_Skull]

They stated that they cannot move the game to the PS3 because of the architecture of the PS3.

Well that's what they said but the real reason is probably Sony's policy regarding PS2 to PS3 ports. Sony requires that PS2 games ported to the PS3 must receive a graphics update. It doesn't have to be state of the art in regards to PS3 games but it has to have increased resolution, improved textures and improved model geometry. Sony judges the requirements on a case by case basis but at the very least it has to have improved resolution and textures. Ico and Shadow of the Collusus have scraped by only with improved textures, shaders and resolution due to the graphics quality of the original games for example. Judging from the PC version Sony would probably want improved zone and model geometry on FFXI.

SE probably didn't want to publicly say they they are unwilling to make an improved PS3 version of FFXI because it would look bad so they said "it would be too hard" instead.

Remember when SE said that they had talked to someone at Sony about porting FFXI but that that person quit (and they didn't talk to anyone else?) I bet what was really going on is that they were trying to negotiate a direct port and Sony wouldn't budge on the issue so talks broke down.

[Dreimar]

I like how my 3k$ PC show 29 period FPS ;)
Btw did you saw how FFXI look on a PS2 ?!
I'm sure the " I like to play it with PS2 instead of PC/Xbox/Ps3, you cheater" community cannot be so big

[Krystal]

Problem is.....about 30-40% of the FFXI community plays on PS2s so by dropping that they potentially lose 30-40% of their profits....and sadly....money speaks louder than players.....

[Luso]

Well that's what they said but the real reason is probably Sony's policy regarding PS2 to PS3 ports. Sony requires that PS2 games ported to the PS3 must receive a graphics update. It doesn't have to be state of the art in regards to PS3 games but it has to have increased resolution, improved textures and improved model geometry. Sony judges the requirements on a case by case basis but at the very least it has to have improved resolution and textures. Ico and Shadow of the Collusus have scraped by only with improved textures, shaders and resolution due to the graphics quality of the original games for example. Judging from the PC version Sony would probably want improved zone and model geometry on FFXI.

SE probably didn't want to publicly say they they are unwilling to make an improved PS3 version of FFXI because it would look bad so they said "it would be too hard" instead.

Remember when SE said that they had talked to someone at Sony about porting FFXI but that that person quit (and they didn't talk to anyone else?) I bet what was really going on is that they were trying to negotiate a direct port and Sony wouldn't budge on the issue so talks broke down.

Yeah, I only stated that they said they couldn't due to the way the PS3 is. But, I don't think it's impossible or, for that matter, even that hard when it comes to ports.

I'm sure SE stated it because they believe XI is really on its last laurels and don't want to waste development time and money on XI. However, I still think XI is doing better than XIV in terms of player base; sure, XI has had many a year to grow, but it's been getting fewer and fewer players joining and the amount of players leaving is probably more than the influx of players coming in. XIV had its chance, and yet, XI was actually not that bad when it launched, IIRC.

[Swords]

Actually if you really had to compare, XI was just as bad as XIV at launch. The thing is though, we halfway expected them to have something decent to sink our teeth into with the previous experience they built up off of FFXI the past 8 years.

[Rambus]

yeah remember we got ffxi refined, it was a year old and on first expansion for NA comp. FFXI before that had a lot of issues (a stack of arrows was 12, whms was OP in nuking lol).

the thing with ffxiv though is simply this, you have the experience and technology not to make a game worse than your first one. ( i drought ffxi even at start had all the huge lag issues ffxiv has with commands.) Like all the stupid excessive menu selection. They took that from FFXI and made it worse, why I have no clue. Saying “we learned from the problems of FFXI” and turn around and not hold that up is a big let down < biggest problem for FFXIV lanuch. that is something they cannot take back or fix, it is also very hard to recover from a bad rep, really should of cut the losses when they could. ( open beta is when i would drop the game)

[Juilan]

i wonder if im not the only that wouldn't mind them delaying some updates/patches to redo the code and upgrade it for ps3 standards, and then allow people who play it on ps3 via emulation download a ps3 version on pol (since we do that on a clean install anyway) and then have a batch update for pc and xbox 360, the only thing i can think of is have a questionnaire on log in or somewhere that everyone can find for a few months and see who plays on ps2 and has a ps3 or has a ps2 and wouldn't mind just switching to xbox or pc and them giving them a voucher or something to change console (a save 10$ goes a long way especially since i think i can buy a new copy on pc for 20 or so dollars already)

while a survey is going on they can develop updates still though, but first focus on what the different structures would be and then implement them as the new structure when they change over...

that fixes some of the issues, and you wouldn't be hiring or paying employees extra and the people who'd be willing to convert and the people already playing on other consoles i'm sure would easily agree with the update delay

[Dreimar]

Actually if you really had to compare, XI was just as bad as XIV at launch. The thing is though, we halfway expected them to have something decent to sink our teeth into with the previous experience they built up off of FFXI the past 8 years.

True but the MMO market its alot different now, many fantasy MMO already failed shortly after launch ( some still open but
with no more support and with just 1-2 servers ). FFXI got lot's of " improvements" along the way.. remember when WoW came out ? first impression, rewiews, adv, community are needed to support more then a year of a "beta-released" game.
FFXI where lucky, but the MMO market was still young, i dont think that can be repeated considering titles like AoC Rift Vanguard and many more already failed :\

[rog]

FFXI where lucky, but the MMO market was still young
Not to mention brand recognition.

I am sure i am not the only one who bought it for no reason other than the final fantasy label.

[Venat]

I will buy a version of FFXI for PC once SE says there gonna destroy PS2 users or start not bringing content to PS2 users anymore. Make new expation pack with 360,ps3,pc only in mind. If you don like it you can ask sony to make a larger drive for the ps2 users lol... goodluck.

[Rambus]

Not to mention brand recognition.

I am sure i am not the only one who bought it for no reason other than the final fantasy label.

yes i bought ffxi because it was FF name, I had no clue about MNOs back then or how they worked.

FFXI was pretty refind for NA release too, it was out for like a year in japan where it had a lot of basic issues.

FFXI at NA release was WAY more refined then FFXIV was for it's time. this age you cannot release games with basic issues (command lag and so on)

even back when ffxi was new it was more tolerated because the market was newer and less competition ( to my knowledge like I said I had no clue on MNOs back then, in my word FFXI was the first MNO out there). So FFXI was a real second life when it came out, and I thought it was normal for a MNO be like that (being my only one so I do not know better)
but now you have more games on the market you have to really show "buy my game over xxx" WoW for example showed NMO can be made for people with less time.SE then steps up and says “we are making a more casual, more action oreanted game in FFXIV. FFXIV failed HARD to live up what SE said. The action is slow, the grind fest is way slower then FFXI. So after failing to live up to it’s word people became a lot less forgiving this time around. SEs only hope in turning that around if people give it a second chance to do so at PS3 release. I think SEs rep is on the line with this so called ps3 release. I would not risk that; I would have scraped the game at beta and failing to fix basic things. Too big issue to risk, should of hold off making it official release. SE rep in how they hold games, like me I am disliking the customer support so i am less willing to buy SE titles. (I only bought ffxiv to meet up with frineds, nothing else, had to do nothing with the game. people do not play it so i have no reason to play it)

[MercenaryX]

sry ill never play on any other console, i've invested too much money into the current setup of my entertainment center to go buy an extra few computers to play this game on. My vote is no. This game started with the idea of putting it on the PS2, thats the way it shall stay. I cant think of a single online game that ever dropped support for a particular console due to its limitations. all mmo's die eventually, its just a matter of deal with it or get the hell out.

[Atomic_Skull]

all mmo's die eventually, its just a matter of deal with it or get the hell out.

EVE Online has gradually *increased* it's subscribers over the years due to CCP periodically updating the game's technology to prevent stagnation.

[hordecore]

i say port the game to PSP version even PSP got better graphics than PS2

[Xellith]

PS2 support will be dropped in a few years - simply because the only available PS2s be slims or the PS2 HDD will become unavailable when people need to replace hardware.

[RAIST]

PS2 support will be dropped in a few years - simply because the only available PS2s be slims or the PS2 HDD will become unavailable when people need to replace hardware.

Unfortunately, I think they are still stamping out the fat bodies for JP only sales......

[Jar]

im not to sure but i think the ps2 limitations are built into parts of the engine like the 30 FPS cap and the limit of each zones content i dont think that they can just drop ps2 support because the core engine wouldn't get any better

also the HDD on the ps2 is full because they are having problems updating the ps2 at all now have to use this new fangled update system

[Laraul]

Converting an application from DirectX 8 to DirectX 9 is not some incredibly difficult programming task. If you know anything about D3D you know this is not true.

How is DX9 better than DX8? Specifics? More importantly, compare DirectX to OpenGL. You think anything would change if they moved to a later version of DirectX? No. You don't want DirectX 9 support. You want the game engine to be overhauled.


Even if they don't do a full graphics update there are things they could do to modernize the existing client and make it work better on modern PC's without affecting PS2 support. I'll just copy past from the other thread because apparently not many people actually looked at it.

How does this youtube video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBWwHYdcnf0) look? Shadows... MSAA... etc etc. I must be doing something right cuz ppl keep asking me how I make the game look as good as it does (PS2 emulation?).

[bungiefan]

im not to sure but i think the ps2 limitations are built into parts of the engine like the 30 FPS cap and the limit of each zones content i dont think that they can just drop ps2 support because the core engine wouldn't get any better

also the HDD on the ps2 is full because they are having problems updating the ps2 at all now have to use this new fangled update system

The HDD is not full. FFXI uses only about 10 GB of the ~38 GB available. The PS2 HDD requires that each program be installed to its own partition, and the largest known partition created by any game is FFXI's 8 GB partition. That partition is getting full, but isn't there yet, it's at about 5 GB at last count. The lack of space error was due to old patch files being retained, and that the install process used to copy files instead of moving them to the new location after download, so you needed twice the free space as the patch you were trying to download and install.

The space issue could be fixed, if the upper size limit of a partition in the PS2 HDD file system is 8 GB, by spreading the expansions across several 8 GB partitions. Programs can access data on other partitions, as shown by being able to save game files to the HDD save partition in some games (like Japanese Xenosaga Episode 1), and PlayOnline Viewer messages being saved to the POL user folder while running FFXI, as well as FFXI screenshots being saved to a POL file folder in the PlayOnline Viewer partition. Making the game use multiple partitions would allow it to use more of the hard drive space. The one limiting factor there could be that new partitions may have to be created from an install disc, which old model PS2s likely can no longer read, and the cost of making and shipping out the discs would be high.

[SHJcules]

lol, I think it will take a little more than dropping the ps2 to make this game look like XIV

but seriously, with a good card and a simple regedit, XI can still look pretty good for its age.

[hordecore]

http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?hl=en&ie=UTF8&prev=_t&rurl=translate.google.com&sl=ja&tl=en&u=http://www.square-enix.com/jpn/ir/library/docs/110513/page06.html&usg=ALkJrhig5_NFq9uSz2NfM7NwDqOjQjbzZA

[Jar]

The HDD is not full. FFXI uses only about 10 GB of the ~38 GB available. The PS2 HDD requires that each program be installed to its own partition, and the largest known partition created by any game is FFXI's 8 GB partition. That partition is getting full, but isn't there yet, it's at about 5 GB at last count. The lack of space error was due to old patch files being retained, and that the install process used to copy files instead of moving them to the new location after download, so you needed twice the free space as the patch you were trying to download and install.

The space issue could be fixed, if the upper size limit of a partition in the PS2 HDD file system is 8 GB, by spreading the expansions across several 8 GB partitions. Programs can access data on other partitions, as shown by being able to save game files to the HDD save partition in some games (like Japanese Xenosaga Episode 1), and PlayOnline Viewer messages being saved to the POL user folder while running FFXI, as well as FFXI screenshots being saved to a POL file folder in the PlayOnline Viewer partition. Making the game use multiple partitions would allow it to use more of the hard drive space. The one limiting factor there could be that new partitions may have to be created from an install disc, which old model PS2s likely can no longer read, and the cost of making and shipping out the discs would be high.

lol the ps2 file system really only hits 8gb max the game is 10 GB on pc atm

also they could make the partition stuff downloadable like an update

[Akujima]

FFXI will die before they drop Ps2 support.

Also that "fun in abyssea=darkages" tag is epic.

[CrAZYVIC]

Just giving a idea and my personal opinion.

(I hate post in troll topics -__-)

Well remake all the game with graphics like Blade & soul will cost a lot of money and that will need a lot of time and for make this a go is necesary stop give service to ps2 users sadly =(.

But there 2 things can be changed, for pc and for xbox360, easy and this dont need a "massive money and time"

Is remake the characters movements, animations, gear textures and character textures. Only the playable characters, mithra, elvan, humes, tarus and fatygalkas. We can have characters like TERA or blade & soul, yes this is posible without a lot of work. (Just the characters, no mobs, no npcs, no areas.)


The second thing can be changed, is the in game effects, like rain, sunny, wind storms, thunder storm, ice storm, fire storm. Even put on the characters, effects like wet skin by the rain.

This can be done in a few months and dont need a lot of man power. They can sell us $6 dolars for fatygalkas $8 ^^ jk, new remaked character and wheater effects.

But remake every area, with every mob and every npc. Can take years and ridicolous amount of money.

Lets say First remaked areas in ffxi. sandy, bastok, windy, gustaberg, ronfaure, saratabaruta, derfland, Norvallen, aragoneu. $ 12 dolars

Second remake areas 3 months after of first ones Rise of zilart areas and Cop areas. $12 dolars

Third remake 3 months after Abbysea and Wings of godess areas. $12 dolars

Four remake 3 months after TAU areas $12 dolars

The remaked areas will have, new mobs/old mobs, a lot of NMS and HNMS like abbysea, gear for high lv jobs, full texture scenario updates, sky, effects, npcs, grounds of valors mobs for low, med and high lvs.

We need give FFXI DEV team the money for they can do this remake.

A example of costs for FFXI DEVS.

For remake 1 area lets say south gustaberg. Mininium will need 8 days of work with 20 programers (Having ready the new engine and the project ready).

If they pay 4000 dolars per month to programers is $ 20 000 dolars just for 1 week counting only the programers and not counting the over time programers necesary for this >_>. i work as programer not as 3D games maker but i know what im talking about in costs and realism projects.

Price for FFXI DEV Team per 3 months of work = $ 400 000 - $ 600,000 dolars, counting 3D graphics designs, and more workers needed, no only programers. (Dont forget they need get the new engine get the Licence can cost a few millions or they can use ff14 engine "No thanks" in my opinion blade & soul destroy in graphics ff14)

They can reduce the cost, giving jobs to university programers, they will work for 1/4 by money of a hardcore programer.

If FFXI have at least 500k of players active we can found a project $ 6 millions per mini remake expansion.

This can be a good deal for DEVS team in ffxi, they will win nice money giving us the remaked areas.

[Atomic_Skull]

How is DX9 better than DX8? Specifics? More importantly, compare DirectX to OpenGL. You think anything would change if they moved to a later version of DirectX? No. You don't want DirectX 9 support. You want the game engine to be overhauled.

Minor tweaks =/= complete overhaul

DirectX 8 is emulated in Vista and Windows 7. A lot of the problems with running it on modern Windows would disappear because it would be running directly on the DirectX 9 HAL instead of indirectly via a D3D8 -> D3D9 wrapper.

Also, DirectX 9 is capable of doing FSAA with offscreen rendering unlike DirectX 8 (this is why FSAA doesn't work with FFXI) It would still require some code changes to make it possible, but it *would* be possible.

[Leonlionheart]

FFXI will die before they drop Ps2 support.

Also that "fun in abyssea=darkages" tag is epic.

You don't get off it do you?

[Akujima]

You don't get off it do you?

I dont understand...?

[Leonlionheart]

I dont understand...?

It's like every post has something against abyssea.

[RAIST]

@ CrazyVIC

The problem is, such a change would not be a one time deal. Any time new content comes out (or rather, they reskin a zone)--they may have to go through the same process to crank out all the updated versions. This could turn into a more complicated issue. As it is now, they can simply replicate the vast majority of the content.

That is the big point most everyone seems to be missing--SE's determined to keep things as similar as possible across all platforms to reduce as many negative aspects of the development/support cycles.

It's like opting to code for Java instead of VB--a Java app can run on any environment capable of running that level of Java or higher, so it doesn't matter if it's Redhat/Debian Linux, or Win2k, XP, Vista, 7, Mac, AS400/i5/i7...., Internet Explorer, Mozilla, Firefox, Navigator......so long as they have the right JDK support, the app runs.

[Mirage]

How does this youtube video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBWwHYdcnf0) look? Shadows... MSAA... etc etc. I must be doing something right cuz ppl keep asking me how I make the game look as good as it does (PS2 emulation?).
It looks nothing special, and it's impossible to even tell that it's got AA when it's (what looks like) capturing in a lower res than what the game runs at, for so to upload it at a higher resolution again to youtube.

And I can see that you have a ton of that texture-flickering glitch that most likely is a DX issue, lol.

[Atomic_Skull]

It looks nothing special, and it's impossible to even tell that it's got AA when it's (what looks like) capturing in a lower res than what the game runs at, for so to upload it at a higher resolution again to youtube.

And I can see that you have a ton of that texture-flickering glitch that most likely is a DX issue, lol.

And that's also supersampling not MSAA

The texture flickering glitch is caused by the D3D8 emulation in Vista/Win7 forcing FFXI to use Shader Model 2.0 instead of Shader Model 1.0 If you have an ATI card and use the PixelShaderVersion and VertextShaderVersion registry keys in ATI's registry settings to restrict the drivers to Shader Model 1.0 then the glitches go away.

FYI this happens on Nvidia cards too so it's not specific to ATI.

[Trumpy]

I didnt get to read the whole thread to check if this was said, but there is definately a difference in graphics. At least for certain things. If you put ps2 and pc versions (even xbox) and cast bar spells you will see a difference in the effects you see. Its one of the first things i ever noticed when i saw my roommate playin on pc and now when i do play on pc and have played on the xbox.

Going back to the ps2 or ps2 version on ps3 It feels like my eyes have been gouged out by how bad the graphics (geometry, ect...) are compared to xbox or pc. I got used to it however but was very happy when my 360 got fixed. But the game had all the same content, it jsut looked ugly.

For a while tho my xbox would freeze for a few seconds everytime i zoned. When i got wotg on xbox this problem stopped but restarted after a while. Im not sure if that was jsut my xbox or something everyone gets on xbox now.

[Catsby]

You guys need to remember how much to this game there actually is and what it would take to start producing for a next generation console. Art assets and technical overall hauls would require a lot of resources that SE probably isn't willing to take a risk on. They probably don't regard FFXI the way they should since it's old and they have like 6 or 7 projects currently in development (that they really shouldn't given the deep shit they have been in lately).

The country has also recently suffered a massive disaster. It's really surprising the way SE bounced back but you still need to stop and think what that costs a company and a significant chunk of the people supporting it. Earthquakes and rolling blackouts probably don't do much good for moral.

What they really need to do is remonetize the game and go to a free to play model. The west has finally(FINALLY!!!) warmed up to the concept of microtransactions and if you look at what it offers both the player and the developer there isn't even a question of whether you should or not.

We also need to support Eidos and Crystal Dynamics so they do well with their games. They blew a lot of people away at E3 and are taking their projects seriously so a success on their part will probably give SE the reality check they need for current and future development projects.

[guts]

anyone that plays on ps2 knows they are taking a hit on graphics. I don't think I fully understand the argument with eliminating ps2. When I play on my ps2, I know I am going to experience ps2 graphics. Why can't we have a situation where people who play on pc or 360 can view their game in hd and ps2's remain unchanged?

[JackDaniels]

I will quit if ffxi becomes f2p

[RAIST]

I will quit if ffxi becomes f2p

eh..if they did that, they'd probly make it so you'd have to pay to play abyssea, seeing as that seems to be the core of FFXI lately.

[Atomic_Skull]

Upgrades could be done to the PC and 360 clients that could be done that would not require them to upgrade the art assets and geometry of the game or drop PS2 support but which would still vastly improve it.

Most texture artists create textures in a higher resolution and then scale it down to whats needed by the project rather that working on 256x256 postage stamps. Geometry is usually created the same way, you make a high poly version of the object first and then bake the surface and transfer those textures to a low poly version of the object. Unless SE has been throwing all of their files out they already have high res textures and models for most of this stuff. You don't just toss files when you are done with a project you archive them for later use in other projects.

[Xerius]

I'm glad that this is 12 pages of people saying "Accounts aren't system-linked." We got it after the first reply. >_>

[Laraul]

You know something... the other 90% of players don't care... as long as it runs...

[bungiefan]

And some of us play on PS2 because it tends to run better with less troubleshooting than a PC does.

[Laraul]

It is definitely less troublesome playing it on a PS2 than using a PC. And in many ways the PS2 version looks better. Weather effects, the blurring of textures in the distance that slowly sharpen as you get closer. Very nice effect... both console versions also have a more responsive UI when not under heavy load. (I.E. on a battlefield, not in Jeuno).

[Laraul]

Minor tweaks =/= complete overhaul

DirectX 8 is emulated in Vista and Windows 7. A lot of the problems with running it on modern Windows would disappear because it would be running directly on the DirectX 9 HAL instead of indirectly via a D3D8 -> D3D9 wrapper.

I don't think so... you better back this up with some good references... D3D9 will work with all prior D3D versions... D3D9Ex (D3D9.1) is a different story.


Also, DirectX 9 is capable of doing FSAA with offscreen rendering unlike DirectX 8 (this is why FSAA doesn't work with FFXI) It would still require some code changes to make it possible, but it *would* be possible.

Again please back this up with some references. FFXI does not draw the 3D rendering to the frame buffer. Obviously if it did you wouldn't have separate settings for the UI/screen resolution and a 3D world resolution setting.

[CrAZYVIC]

It is definitely less troublesome playing it on a PS2 than using a PC. And in many ways the PS2 version looks better.

Not ps2 dont look better. In pc you can play FFXI 1080p, with background textures 2048 x 2048, and MipMaps 6. FFXI looks a lot better in PC than in ps2 and xbox 360. You can set drawdistance to 5.0 with program for make ffxi window mode and you can see almost the entire map



Weather effects, the blurring of textures in the distance that slowly sharpen as you get closer. Very nice effect... both console versions also have a more responsive UI when not under heavy load. (I.E. on a battlefield, not in Jeuno).

What the people dont understand about ffxi is this. If you have a oldd video card lets take as example 8800 gt nvidia. FFXI will use the 30% from it and the other 70% will be charged to the CPU. (FFXI dont need a super video card the game hardly will use it)

For play FFXI is necesary a VERY GOOD cpu, a old cpu Intel® Core™2 Duo Processor E8400
(6M Cache, 3.00 GHz, 1333 MHz FSB. Over clocked to 3.8 ghz. is enough for cap 30 frames even in AH, and crowed areas.

i have the game for xbox360, pc and ps2. I can tell you FFXI in a good pc looks superior to console VER. (Like the 90% from the games console vs gaming pc)

[Malacite]

I run the game in 2048x2048, looks fantastic.

But yeah, how about giving us updates for PC users specifically? I'm sick of all these ridiculous limitations due solely to the low RAM of the PS2.

PS2 users don't like it? Get with the times.

[RAIST]

Upgrades could be done to the PC and 360 clients that could be done that would not require them to upgrade the art assets and geometry of the game or drop PS2 support but which would still vastly improve it.

Most texture artists create textures in a higher resolution and then scale it down to whats needed by the project rather that working on 256x256 postage stamps. Geometry is usually created the same way, you make a high poly version of the object first and then bake the surface and transfer those textures to a low poly version of the object. Unless SE has been throwing all of their files out they already have high res textures and models for most of this stuff. You don't just toss files when you are done with a project you archive them for later use in other projects.

The problem is, the other platforms are still using code designed with the PS2 environment in mind, so their are simply logical limitations to what can be done within that environment. To truly fix it would require a massive overhaul. PC/360 users already get the high quality textures before they are downsampled for the PS2. Granted, they may be able to upscale them higher, but I guess they don't see much point in putting them out there since they are already like 3x the resolution or something (don't know the actual PPI resolution, but they are markedly higher from what I've heard people say who have multiple clients to compare against.).

As for putting it on a next gen console--it isn't just the art assets that have to be redone. You are talking about hosting it in a completely differnt operating environment. Compare it to older software that was released originally for Windows OS. They had to write new versions specifically for Mac and Linux because the operating environment was vastly different. While Linux could be running on the same hardware, the API's were still different--with the older Mac's, there was no Intel support so you had to actually code to different hardware at times. Same goes for consoles--they run on different chips with different command structures, so you would have to create a custom layer to interface with the PS2 encoding (ie, they'd need to write a new "wrapper" for the new console)--you would STILL be fighting the original PS2 design though, as that is the virtual environment the game is actually running under.

Until those specific pieces of legacy coding are scrapped--no matter what you play it on, it is going to have some level of PS2 restrictions. As long as the PS2 is actively supported, we are less likely to see that legacy code go away. Once Ps2 is gone, then they have to make a decsision wether to drop said code and rebuild to newer specs.--but ultimately it will come down to whether they view it as a cost-effective change or not.

[Thebattousai]

I'm sure it been said but, the limitations SE has is not the PS2, its the budget put into the game, they are already stretched thin with all the additions they are working on, overhauling the game would require more artists for the graphics, more devs for the recoding, and more testing for these improvements, all of which add up to more $$$, its been said if it aint broken dont fix it, it's most of you PC users are Nazi "KILL THE PS2s!!! Heil, mein PC!!!". Really if you don't like it why do you still pay to play the game every month, obviously its not for the graphics :P

[JackDaniels]

Are the majority of PS2 users using 12 year old computers?? Can their computers even run microsoft word 2007?? Like.. wtf..

EDIT:
There are refurbished laptops that could run at least three ffxi clients at once that sell for at most 300 dollars. Time to upgrade! Down with ps2!

[RAIST]

I'm sure it been said but, the limitations SE has is not the PS2, its the budget put into the game, they are already stretched thin with all the additions they are working on, overhauling the game would require more artists for the graphics, more devs for the recoding, and more testing for these improvements, all of which add up to more $$$, its been said if it aint broken dont fix it, it's most of you PC users are Nazi "KILL THE PS2s!!! Heil, mein PC!!!". Really if you don't like it why do you still pay to play the game every month, obviously its not for the graphics :P

Actually, yes it IS because of the PS2. As was stated earlier, this game was coded for the PS2 environment. They later (like, 2 years later I think, forget the exact time line) created a wrapper to allow the game to be played on the PC--it was sort of emulated on the PC. Not true emulation, but the PC is more or less running the PS2 logic, while certain aspects are passed off to DirectX and such, so it's kind of 50/50 or maybe 75/25 emulation--but a large part of the core is still restricted by the original PS2 environmental support built into the game engine. They pretty much repeated the same process to stick it on the 360 several years later.

So, again as stated before, dropping PS2 support is just one piece of the puzzle. After that, they have to drop all the legacy code (and the restrictions bound to them) and generate a whole new environment for the game to run in. Wouldn't hold my breath on that happening any time soon for a game this old. Maybe once XP and DX8.1/9.0c emulation is completely dropped by Microsoft it'll happen....if FFXI is still thriving by then.

[DeadlySwordz]

indeed. i first started FFXI on ps2, then got it for XBox360, then PC. same account used on all these platforms

[Atomic_Skull]

I don't think so... you better back this up with some good references... D3D9 will work with all prior D3D versions... D3D9Ex (D3D9.1) is a different story.

DirectX 8 and DirectX 9 are seperate. That's why there is a d3d8.dll and d3d9.dll that applications call depending on whether they're using DirectX 8 or DirectX 9.

In windows 7 and Windows Vista, d3d8.dll is actually a wrapper that translates DirectX 8 functions to DirectX 9.

Application -> d3d8.dll -> d3d9.dll -> HAL -> device driver -> GPU

As opposed to Windows XP where it's:

Application -> d3d8.dll -> HAL -> device driver -> GPU



Again please back this up with some references. FFXI does not draw the 3D rendering to the frame buffer. Obviously if it did you wouldn't have separate settings for the UI/screen resolution and a 3D world resolution setting.

No really? That's exactly what I said. FFXI draws the 3D scene into an offscreen drawing surface (render to texture) which is why driver level FSAA doesn't work with FFXI as DirectX 8 can't perform FSAA on applications that don't render to the framebuffer.

[RAIST]

hehe.. not this debate over the frame buffer and render to texture method... wasn't this settled in like..... 2004?

I actually think the AA was working somewhat last time I tinkered with it ages ago, just not on the actually game components we want--seemed like my chat and such in the overlay was crisper. A lot of good that does us...lol.

[CrAZYVIC]

Check the link and compare the screenshots

http://gameguide.na.aiononline.com/aion/Advanced+Graphics+Engine

In that link is a clear example of what can be done, with a update this elements.

Weather effects
Water Effects
Shaders
Shadows
Lights
Background detail.

All this elements can be introduced, by "Updates". Not is necesary kill the ps2 users, just work on pc/xbox360 users with this graphics update.

I play aion 2.5 and i can say guys there after since this was introduced. The diference is a lot.

Now the main reason for the devs say "Ps2 limitation is this". In japan almost all players "Hate play on pc and xbox360". In japan they love play on jp consoles. Actually the 80% by japan players play ffxi on ps3/ps2. Yes they hate play in PC and xbox360.

The devs can give us our graphic update for pc and xbox360, and keep give service to the jp guys.Kill the 70% from the ffxi population not is cool. (We have to be realistic, the JP comunity is x 2 or almost x 3 more big than America/Europe.)

Now after the graphic update, they can release the new ffxi ver on ps3 so the jp guys will be happy.

[Sudokai]

It may not be entirely possible to expand the partition size limit if its hard-coded in the system itself. A computer has something called a BIOS chip which contains all the neccessary minimal instructions to start your computer, but ultimately your computer runs off the Hard Drive. The PS2 and most game systems have something similar to a BIOS chip, however it's version contains everything it needs to work and acts independantly without the need of hardware like a Hard Drive. If the data to expand the partition is hard-coded into the chip, there is likely little that can be done to change it's parimiters.

But before anyone says it, the newest generation of consoles have worked around this issue with improved hardware such as flash data storage programmers can update the consoles OS as needed allowing greater flexability to adjust these limits.

I cannot believe how far into this i had to read before someone pointed out it's a physical limitation in the PS2 architecture.. not a memory issue. Thank you! PS2 cannot (legitimately) be updated in it's current design and treats the HDD like a mass storage device. Kudos sir, Kudos.

[RAIST]

Check the link and compare the screenshots

http://gameguide.na.aiononline.com/aion/Advanced+Graphics+Engine

In that link is a clear example of what can be done, with a update this elements.

Weather effects
Water Effects
Shaders
Shadows
Lights
Background detail.

All this elements can be introduced, by "Updates". Not is necesary kill the ps2 users, just work on pc/xbox360 users with this graphics update.

I play aion 2.5 and i can say guys there after since this was introduced. The diference is a lot.

Now the main reason for the devs say "Ps2 limitation is this". In japan almost all players "Hate play on pc and xbox360". In japan they love play on jp consoles. Actually the 80% by japan players play ffxi on ps3/ps2. Yes they hate play in PC and xbox360.

The devs can give us our graphic update for pc and xbox360, and keep give service to the jp guys.Kill the 70% from the ffxi population not is cool. (We have to be realistic, the JP comunity is x 2 or almost x 3 more big than America/Europe.)

Now after the graphic update, they can release the new ffxi ver on ps3 so the jp guys will be happy.

Again....missing the key problem. Aion was built to run in a PC environment. Let me state that again--a PC ENVIRONMENT. FFXI was built to run in the PS2 ENVIRONMENT. As such, the engine is "hardcoded" with specific limitations based on the hardware used in the PS2. That SAME code with the SAME RESTRICTIONS exist in the code used on the other platforms because they are run through a WRAPPER (think of the virtual machine in Java). Another way to think of it, running XP Virtual machine in Win7. You are limited to the environment that the program was originally coded to run in. Doesn't matter that you are on a machine that can see and use 8GB of memory--if it is running in an XP 32bit virtual bubble, it will only access and use up to 4GB of memory.

Aion can do a heck of a lot more because it's designed with the more robust enironment of a PC to work with. FFXI was designed with the more restrictive environment in mind, so it has these restrictions built into the code itself. It doesn't matter that your hardware may have access to more resources if the game's engines can't take advantage of those extra resources. The legacy code has "soft" caps on a lot of things that can't be gotten around without dramatically changing those engines for use ONLY on those specific platforms.

So in effect, you would be rolling out a NEW FFXI specific for another platform, and could no longer create certain portions of code that could be ported directly to each platform. You would have to make the same change manually and specifically to each platform's code, instead of changing the code in the specific library once and just dropping it into the package for each platform. It wouldn't be something like the font change either--we are talking about specific limitations built into to specific command lines (like the size limit on the storage containers). You can't necessarily just drop a few lines of code directly into a ROM file, you have to edit the source and recompile. With the font change, they created a complete ROM file and saved it. If they do a big dump of files from an update into the package for PC and that contains the old font files and push that out by mistake--all they have to do is a push out a quick update to copy the updated ROM's over them. If this were to happen and a patched ROM was one that would reset the cap to 80 after they released ones for PC that lifted it to 100...imagine the riot that would spark off. They'd have to go back to the specific PC source containing the 100 cap, edit the source for the new changes, recompile, then push it out.

In short, making a custom environment for each platform (outside of the wrappers designed for each platform's support) is simply more work, and creates a larger margin of error in the update process. By keeping the core portions of the game being emulated consistent across all platforms, it greatly simplifies things, saving SE time and money in the long run. Thus, if it is something in the core of FFXI's code that can't be done on the PS2 or specifically to another platform practically/reliably (like the font change, this was is an easy thing to implement/maintain in comparison)--then SE is less inclined to implement it. That's the way it's been since 2003, and is not likely to change any time soon.

[Spero]

Bottom line is that ffxi is and always will be a ps2 game, get over it.

[hordecore]

PS2 should be recycled all over the world and make something more useful

[Tsukino_Kaji]

PS2 should be recycled all over the world and make something more usefulLike arsenic plants.

[Laraul]

You people really need to go visit the ToAU areas... I mean really... those are some impressive looking environments.

Of course, why AREN'T you drawn to these impressive looking areas? Oh yeah... they'res not much to do there. And just cuz it's pretty doesn't mean it makes it fun.

Someone close this dumb thread... I mean if you have some common sense you'll understand why this just does not matter. And if you don't you'll just do what I did and respond... ugh...

[Paksenarrion]

Thread is tl;dr so my idea was probably stated already.

Many, many years ago, a little MMO called Ultima Online did something to get people out of the "dark ages." People wouldn't buy expansions, and only had the base game. At one point, they decided to make a 3D client. This meant that they had to program for the original client, the client from the first expansion to the 3D client, and the 3D client.

What they ended up doing was sending a copy of the game's "second expansion" (I use the term loosely, because everyone had access to that addition.) and discontinuing support for the base game.

With systems like Steam and D2D, SE wouldn't be losing out on too much if they sent people who had a PS2 registration code to allow them to download the game. Just put out a warning about it, tell people to make sure they update their address and/or email in POL, and let them get a free copy of the newest collection.

They could do this on Xbox as well, but they'd have to put FFXI up on the Marketplace. If they wanted to do that, they'd have to make something that would let players choose which system they wanted to get their free download on. Maybe announce a date they end support, and if someone hasn't chosen by then, they get the option to choose what version they want, but can't get into POL.

And that's my opinion.

[Mordanthos]

If they made this game look like FFxiv, i wouldnt be able to play it, cuz i dont have a super system. Bad idea man. The loss of PS2 support doesnt mean upgrade graphics, besides, transfering this games current graphic to look like FFxiv would cost way too much, and take way tooo much time, u wouldnt play FFxi again for like, a year or more. Remapping and building all these landscapes, man you lost your mind. Better not upgrade the graphics on this game, it already looks great as it is.

[katz]

I have 1 account, I play it on the playstation, xbox or pc depending on where I am. Its the same information, all stored in the same place, doesnt matter which platform I run it from it all works fine. Some people dont understand this and continually refer to PS2 systems or xbox systems. Its the same thing people, all you are doing is talking about FFXI and why its not changing fast enough for you. Smaller populations equals less income equals less desire to change the game equals more pc users complaining

[Harubaru]

either way a minimum graphical update on FFXI for the PC and X360 would be nice, and just do the normal things for the PS2 Ver. of the game. can't improve much on it anyways, i mean aside from adding game content, they can't really polish much more the graphics on the PS2, even with clever programing or techniques or whatever is that they do.
still i like the PS2 graphics of the game, that's how i started playing this game since 2004, on a PS2 and old blurry TV lol . ^^

[wildsprite]

I find it interesting that the excuse is still PS2 limitations when they have explained that the servers basically tell the client your char data and what is going on, your client then changes this into graphics for you to see

the way I see it, the devs could infact give the PC/XB360 and possibly the PS3 a brand new client without ever effecting the PS2 and its limitations, that is why when the devs say PS2 limitations I just shrug it off because I really don't believe that is the truth, they could easily port FFXI to the FFXIV graphics engine for one and still use the same game mechanics

I think it would be nice to see them do something with that new graphics engine besides let it sit on a stale game that I highly doubt will ever truly be "good enough for the players" so why not use it for something that is active and being asked for?

[Paksenarrion]

I have 1 account, I play it on the playstation, xbox or pc depending on where I am. Its the same information, all stored in the same place, doesnt matter which platform I run it from it all works fine.

I understand this point entirely, as a player who registered two accounts using two different PC versions, upgraded one with an Xbox version, and plays each character on PC or Xbox as my needs demand. While I've completely negated my next point based on this knowledge, I'm sure there has to be some data that goes into what type of disc receives a code. I could be wrong though. I know there has to be data transferred between your system and SE's servers, because when an update goes through, it has to know what system to get the data for. I don't think it'd be farfetched for them to add extra code for your account to record what systems you log into.

If anything, maybe they could offer a free PC or Xbox copy of an earlier Vana'diel Collection on a sign-up basis (I'm thinking the 2007 version.).

[Catsby]

Is there actually a recent publication out there that breaks down subscribers by platform? I'm being serious. I want to know if I somehow missed something or if people are just talking out of their asses when they say the majority of (group of players) are on PS2.

[Malacite]

Last time I checked, over 2/3 of the JP player base is on PS2. So, unless SONY puts backwards compatibility back into the PS3 or a PS3 port is launched, we're kind of stuck. It would be economic suicide for SE to simply just drop PS2 support, as much as a lot of us would like to see that happen.

I'm sure it's been said before but the major limiting factor of the PS2 that keeps holding back a lot of stuff the devs could be doing, is the low RAM count of 256 MB. Not to mention the limited HDD space, which is basically why we haven't had a new expansion since WotG.

So unless some kind of compromise is made, we're either just going to continue as is (the likely scenario) or SE might throw us a bone and start making content exclusive to PC/360 users, which would tick off the PS2 base but might also motivate them to get with the times.

[wildsprite]

again, SE needs to create a version for the PS3, they could use the FFXIV engine for it with some sort of playonline wrap around for the messaging system then port it to the PC, the XB360 needs to keep POL viewer due to some agreement with Microsoft

and really this sounds more complicated than it is

[Catsby]

Last time I checked

last time you checked where? I can't seem to find this info anywhere, even in this year's census.

[Atomic_Skull]

again, SE needs to create a version for the PS3, they could use the FFXIV engine for it


Dear Altana NO! Not that.. thing.

They should license the Gamebryo engine (Warhammer and Rift both run on it) or CryEngine (Aion uses it) or maybe even Unreal (Lineage II uses it) and build a new client, not inflict that horrible Crystal Tools abomination on us.

Crystal Tools has a 2006 feature set with 2011 hardware requirements. They'd do much better to license an engine like Gamebryo and build something that's both efficient and current.

Additionally, most licensed engines are very easy to port from PC to Xbox 360 and PS3 because optimized console versions of the core engine have already been created for those platforms by the licensor of the engine. I guarantee that if they had used Gamebryo or CryEngine for FFXIV porting it to the PS3 would have been far easier.

[hordecore]

i still think that if they mixed ffxiv graphic with ffxi gameplay will produce the best MMO in the history

[Kimble]

The problem isnt so much the PS2 system. it isnt as easy as just dropping the PS2, the game was build from the ground up off of it being able to run on the Ps2. They would have to completely re-work the whole game and that just isnt going to happen at this point.

[Catsby]

Dear Altana NO! Not that.. thing.

They should license the Gamebryo engine (Warhammer and Rift both run on it) or CryEngine (Aion uses it) or maybe even Unreal (Lineage II uses it) and build a new client, not inflict that horrible Crystal Tools abomination on us.


or even Unity. There are shit ton of wonderful dev environments out there and it PAINS me to see companies waste time developing their own (shitty) tech.

fuck it atomic skull, let's get some community members with art, engineering, design and production experience then start our own FFXI! (with hookers and no ps2 support).

[Sealdorie]

While I'd love to see enhanced graphics on this game I'd be more in support of dropping the PS2 for other reasons. Time and time again we are told we cannot have other things such as new designs for zones, gear or more/less annoying storage because of PS2 memory issues. From what I understand it is how the PS2's memory is coded? I remember other arguments much like this one having PS2 players come up saying their hard drive wasn't even close to full.

I'd kill for updated graphics, but I'd be happy with the same graphics just newly designed zones, gear and other functionalities that the PS2 currently limits.

[Behemuthxero]

Not to mention brand recognition.

I am sure i am not the only one who bought it for no reason other than the final fantasy label.


100% this...I remember when I first saw it on the shelf. I was just walking down the aisle shoppin' and out of the corner of my eye I saw the RoZ FFXI collection. All I could think was "holy crap theres an online final fantasy!?!"

I put off buying it for a week cause I KNEW if i did id lose the next couple months of my life, lol...never watched a review for it, never looked into how good it was, it said final fantasy on it so i threw down 50$ (FF was srs bzns).

[Tsukino_Kaji]

Last time I checked...Last time I saw any collected data on this, it was less then 6%.

[Coldbrand]

But don't you love suffocating for inventory space? Or having hideously outdated textures? Or never, ever seeing a new zone again?

Also, I just realized my computer has 187.5 times more RAM than your system PS2 users. Stay free. Also, it's a better kind of RAM, too.

[Laraul]

Last time I saw any collected data on this, it was less then 6%.

THANK YOU!

I'm tired of the ignorance around here. I'm tired that people continue to blame EVERYTHING on a console they don't know anything about. And I'm tired of people pulling facts out of their... uh nose... like "2/3rd of Japanese players stand on their head upside down when they play because gravity goes up on the other side of the planet." It amazes me how naive people are sometimes...

[Paksenarrion]

Last time I saw any collected data on this, it was less then 6%.

Not disputing this because I pray to the Goddess that it's true or lower, but I would like to see a source if possible. =x

[Kimble]

Yeah, if you cant provide a source, im calling BS.

And as explained, its not as simple as just dropping the PS2.

[Catsby]

Is there a separate census I didn't see? Is it part of the the SE investor relations reports?

[Harubaru]

Well this is a touchy subject but regardless of graphical update or drop PS2 support, one of the reasons i like FFXI is because it doesn't need a powerful/expensive PC to run it, the xbox360 isn't to bad price wise , and well ps2 consoles(fat) and used HDD's are not that expensive or hard to find, at least the used HDD's, i seen some for 34 bucks or so. either way i rather have more content, and minimal graphical updates on the console/pc or the one that can run it, like the font and icon updates are nice addition, i think they going in the right direction but overall some people are hard to please.

[wildsprite]

the PS2 fat also has an issue, atleast the one in the US does, eventually the heat from the hard drive kills the laser in the DVD drive

they should have stuck with the Japanese PS2 fat design, the drive sits outside the PS2 and it would have just been easier to support in the long run

[Atomic_Skull]

Well this is a touchy subject but regardless of graphical update or drop PS2 support, one of the reasons i like FFXI is because it doesn't need a powerful/expensive PC to run it, the xbox360 isn't to bad price wise


CryEngine or Gambryo can run on PS3 and Xbox 360, and also on older PCs with the detail settings dialed back. It wouldn't matter if you had an older PC you'd still be able to run it. It wouldn't look as pretty but it would run just fine.

[Avalon]

While I realize that this thread is a little dead, recently there was the survey to see what you play on. Hopefully SE will release the stats of it and move on from the PS2. I agree that the PS2 is dead and is limiting this game. I would LOVE to see the game get a major facelift and maybe relaunched since FF14 was such a disappointment. Guess we will see when the results come out.

[Feynman]

I doubt we'll see a major graphics revamp in the game if the ps2 is dropped. In the many posts where people argue for ditching the ps2 the point is made that you can run this game on the cheapest laptop available today. Upgrading the graphics will not only leave the ps2 in the dust but also people playing on these older PCs and maybe the Xbox (I'm not sure what it's graphics capabilities are but reportedly lower than the ps3).

I just switched from ps2 to pc because I think dropping the ps2 is inevitable. Though having just gone through the experience I will say that SE makes the change much more difficult than it needs to be. The playonline website is full of outdated information on how to set up the game. Following the instructions on the website "may be causing more problems than it is fixing" according to a Tech Support GM on these forums. SE also states many times on their website that you must own all game discs to install FFXI on a PC. There is no downloadable version. Really? Also if you buy a new computer forget about any help from SE. I couldn't get the game to run and the response I got on the phone with SE was "the game can't be run on a 64 bit system" followed by "other players have figured out how to make it work. Check with them but we can't help you on this end". SE needs to update their information, educate their support staff, and just drop the PS2!!! It's clear they are going to do it. There are known issues that are getting worse that they refuse to acknowledge. They blame it on PS2 user's internet connection. If that's the case why can my PC on the same connection play cs without black screen and interact with NPC's without freezing. Stop lying to your customers and just drop it already!

Good posts never die!!

[Luso]

I'm running XI on a 64-bit PC. I think it just has to do with either registry errors or the type of OS you're using. Vista and 7 tend to mess up the installation of XI sometimes, more so with Steam.

[Feynman]

I should have been more clear. I did get it working just fine. My point was that SE support saying essentially "we have no idea how to make it work, go ask other players" is absurd.

Sorry if I made no sense. I had surgery this morning and am still on some nice drugs!

[cidbahamut]

Not supporting 64-bit operating systems in this day and age is absolutely absurd. Everything is moving towards 64-bit systems, not supporting them is simply inexcusable.

[Alhanelem]

Not supporting 64-bit operating systems in this day and age is absolutely absurd. Everything is moving towards 64-bit systems, not supporting them is simply inexcusable.
So someone who wrote a windows 98 program 10 years ago should be supporting it now? Because that's what you're asking.

The game doesn't NEED to support 64-bit. It runs just fine on 64-bit windows without being a 64-bit program itself. You won't see the WoW64 layer going away anytime in the next several years, because even windows itself comes with software that isn't 64-bit (And still comes in a 32-bit version)

Only when 32-bit support is in danger of being dropped (and it won't be anytime soon, again) will 64-bit support be important.

As for FFXI itself, 64-bit support would do nothing for the game. It does not need to perform any complex mathematics or any of the other potential benefits. There's no point in recoding any feature of the game to use it as long as the 32-bit version remains supported.

Feynman, the problem you are most likely having is you did not download the updated installer that is compatible with windows Vista/7, which is happily provided by SE on their website. Their support staff told you it's not supported because it isn't. It's not because it won't work- it will. It just means "We don't want to deal with this because we didn't design the game for it. It might work or it might not, but we don't know and we can't help you if you try." However, the reason you are having problems is nothing to do with this- they just couldn't tell you that simply because of your OS. Download the updated playonline viewer from the official site, and you should be able to install it just fine. (Even later collections of the game do not seem to include the updated viewer installer)

[cidbahamut]

I just think it's stupid for customer service to tell customers "no, we won't help you if you have a 64-bit processor". That's all.

You're really reading too much into this.

[FrankReynolds]

they don't make the download real obvious on the ffxi website, but its there and it works on all 7 of the windows 7 boxes I have set up. Turning off UAC seems to be a big help in getting any program to install right too. Stupid as it may seem.

[oliveira]

Okay fellows, there's a lot of interesting information on this thread.
Some are facts, other "artifacts" of misleading information.

One of the people (in my opinion, if that matters at all) who has a good grasp of the problem is RAIST.

A lot of misinformation on the PS2 HDD here though.
What's binding Square-Enix with the partition size for FFXI (currently it's 1024MB for POL Viewer, 128MB for Tetra Master and 10240MB for Final Fantasy XI) is a contract with SONY for the partition size which they can't arbitrarily enlarge without prior authorization from SCEI (Sony Computer Entertainment Incorporated) due to the DNAS (Dynamic Network Authentication System) Digital Right Management/Protection system.

Additionally due to the "wrapper" characteristics of the game engine (already explained by RAIST) the XBOX360 and PC versions of FFXI while on "average" look better than what you get out of a PlayStation 2 console, cosmetically (about minor details like weather effects, lighting on objects and texturing) and on audio what you get out from a PS2 is more accurate to the original design of the game.

Best example is the moghouse window in Jeuno. The PC and XBOX360 one is completely glitched:

https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-WCZQpa5rWDE/TMxBk6kdH3I/AAAAAAAACoA/g38GrjMFMpw/s800/TV2010103013382000.jpg <-PS2 version

https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-MyM4YeHHII8/TMxESAVfg4I/AAAAAAAACoU/Z9aTOQcvDTo/s800/TV2010103013382000_PC.jpg <- PC version of same wall, Geforce GTX-280, 2048x2048 back buffer, 640x480 resolution on window

So I have a very decent pc which runs FFXI smooth yet I prefer playing in my PS2 for the very reasons outlined a few posts ago:

-Perfect weather effects
-No graphical glitches
-Perfect audio (Audio on the PS3 back compatibility to PS2 sucks so don't bother playing with that if you're a audio fanatic like me :P)
-Better response on UI and controls (keep out of crowded zones, easy to achieve)
-PC is 100% free for other tasks or even another game if you're bored waiting for stuff to happen

So distillation of vitriol against PS2 players help no one as it just causes nerdrage and PS2 players will keep playing on their low res boxes until no option is available OR their hardware fail on them.

I am sorry to inform that I have three working PS2 consoles, two being Japanese and one U.S. and I also have two spare harddrives in their respective boxes brand new. :rolleyes:

[Leonlionheart]

Okay fellows, there's a lot of interesting information on this thread.
Some are facts, other "artifacts" of misleading information.

One of the people (in my opinion, if that matters at all) who has a good grasp of the problem is RAIST.

A lot of misinformation on the PS2 HDD here though.
What's binding Square-Enix with the partition size for FFXI (currently it's 1024MB for POL Viewer, 128MB for Tetra Master and 10240MB for Final Fantasy XI) is a contract with SONY for the partition size which they can't arbitrarily enlarge without prior authorization from SCEI (Sony Computer Entertainment Incorporated) due to the DNAS (Dynamic Network Authentication System) Digital Right Management/Protection system.

Additionally due to the "wrapper" characteristics of the game engine (already explained by RAIST) the XBOX360 and PC versions of FFXI while on "average" look better than what you get out of a PlayStation 2 console, cosmetically (about minor details like weather effects, lighting on objects and texturing) and on audio what you get out from a PS2 is more accurate to the original design of the game.

Best example is the moghouse window in Jeuno. The PC and XBOX360 one is completely glitched:

https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-WCZQpa5rWDE/TMxBk6kdH3I/AAAAAAAACoA/g38GrjMFMpw/s800/TV2010103013382000.jpg <-PS2 version

https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-MyM4YeHHII8/TMxESAVfg4I/AAAAAAAACoU/Z9aTOQcvDTo/s800/TV2010103013382000_PC.jpg <- PC version of same wall, Geforce GTX-280, 2048x2048 back buffer, 640x480 resolution on window

So I have a very decent pc which runs FFXI smooth yet I prefer playing in my PS2 for the very reasons outlined a few posts ago:

-Perfect weather effects
-No graphical glitches
-Perfect audio (Audio on the PS3 back compatibility to PS2 sucks so don't bother playing with that if you're a audio fanatic like me :P)
-Better response on UI and controls (keep out of crowded zones, easy to achieve)
-PC is 100% free for other tasks or even another game if you're bored waiting for stuff to happen

So distillation of vitriol against PS2 players help no one as it just causes nerdrage and PS2 players will keep playing on their low res boxes until no option is available OR their hardware fail on them.

I am sorry to inform that I have three working PS2 consoles, two being Japanese and one U.S. and I also have two spare harddrives in their respective boxes brand new. :rolleyes:

So, there's still no real advantages of playing on a PS2, other than audio. K drop it

[Modoru]

-PC is 100% free for other tasks or even another game if you're bored waiting for stuff to happen

Oh, but even then, that's not necessary. I mean, I run TF2, PSO and FFXI altogether. And then I run a media player [music], chrome [browser], skype + msn [messenger, of course] at the same time.

So that's not really a big deal.

[Alhanelem]

As above, and the graphical glitches in the PC version are trivial. The audio argument also doesn't hold much water. It's only more accurate if you're playing it out of the speakers on your TV. Even with the change to Sony's proprietary audio codec, once it's decrypted and output, it's the same audio data playing the same sound waves, unless there's some sort of serious flaw with the PC version of the codec.

The difference in input response time is imperceptible to humans (e.g. a matter of milliseconds). If you have high-end gaming input devices, those can negate that difference.

The stuff about the HDD is accurate, though I'm pretty sure that if they did enlarge the space allocated, you'd have to reinstall, and not everyone on the PS2 might be able to do that.

[oliveira]

The stuff about the HDD is accurate, though I'm pretty sure that if they did enlarge the space allocated, you'd have to reinstall, and not everyone on the PS2 might be able to do that.

As I stated on my post it's a matter of choice. Now about enlarging the partition the only limits are:

Partition is composed of chunks whose size is based on multiples of 128. Which means minimal size is 128MB and maximum size is the the size of the free space (sans SONY reserved areas) of the HDD .

Also they don't need to reinstall anything to enlarge a partition as it's just a matter of adding new "chunks". The FFXI partition in particular is composed of 1024MB chunks for the simple reason of granularity. It could be chunks of 4096MB if they wanted.

Also that partition system is called APA (Aligned Partition Allocation) due to it's characteristic of using "chunks". On top of that they use something called "PlayStation File System" or PFS for short. Linux-esque similar to ReiserFS.

It's easier to hate things you know nothing about, right ? :D

[Alhanelem]

It's not always just a matter of adding new chunks. Extending partitions in the home windows environment, is, relative to history, a fairly new thing. Usually before recent versions of windows, you had to reformat and lose all the data in a partition in order to resize it. Sony has to provide the software/firmware capable of doing this, if it isn't already.


It's easier to hate things you know nothing about, right ?Except I don't know nothing about them. I didn't pull this stuff out of my behind.

Anyway, if for you, it being a matter of choice means "I'll stick with the inferior platform," by all means do so. But I can assure you not too many people will be sad if the ps2 support is ever dropped.

[Feynman]

Feynman, the problem you are most likely having is you did not download the updated installer that is compatible with windows Vista/7, which is happily provided by SE on their website. Their support staff told you it's not supported because it isn't. It's not because it won't work- it will. It just means "We don't want to deal with this because we didn't design the game for it. It might work or it might not, but we don't know and we can't help you if you try." However, the reason you are having problems is nothing to do with this- they just couldn't tell you that simply because of your OS. Download the updated playonline viewer from the official site, and you should be able to install it just fine. (Even later collections of the game do not seem to include the updated viewer installer)

Actually downloading and using the Windows Vista/7 compatible version is what I was told "may be causing more problems than its solving". The recommendation on the tech support forums here from a SE mod was to delete the version from the website and to not use it. The current compatible version is included in the Abyssea version Ultimate Edition. This is why I said they need to update their website. When the information online on longer reflects the correct procedure it needs to be changed.

And you're right, obviously it will work. By SE should support 64 bit machines, I mean if you call SE Support they should know how to make their software work on a 64 bit machine. The official answer from the company that makes the game should not be "go ask other players". The absurdity is that it makes them sound incompetent. "We don't know how to make it work but other players have found a way." I used the wording that it can't be run on a 64 bit machine because that is the wording the SE Support used. I was trying to outline how absurd that statement was.

The point I made on the thread I started asking for help about this problem was that if SE doesn't want to support 64 bit machines they need to include that on the system requirements page. "Square Enix makes no guarantee that FFXI can be run properly on 64 bit machines." Or something similar. To let people look at the available information put forward by SE, make sure they are buying a computer that matches the guidelines that SE says need to be followed, purchase a brand new laptop, and then be told "we won't help you" is absurd.

[oliveira]

It's not always just a matter of adding new chunks. Extending partitions in the home windows environment, is, relative to history, a fairly new thing. Usually before recent versions of windows, you had to reformat and lose all the data in a partition in order to resize it. Sony has to provide the software/firmware capable of doing this, if it isn't already.

Except I don't know nothing about them. I didn't pull this stuff out of my behind.
You're comparing apples to oranges here. The APA system was chosen exactly to get around that problem. And because the stuff from SONY is aways based on UNIX it's like years ahead on file handling and database department. Of course considering proper dimensions, we're talking about a dated, old system (PS2) which managed to hold itself in the market for almost 12 years still being sold. It's impressive considering where we stand today. Also the same could be said about this game.

And I wasn't pulling anything out of your behind. I'm just hanging here with the general hatred feeling that most NA players have towards the PS2. It was definitely not specifically targeted at you. As I consider some of your points pretty reasonable and valid.

But most of the PS2 haters standpoints are based on misinformation.

[Alhanelem]

And you're right, obviously it will work. By SE should support 64 bit machines, I mean if you call SE Support they should know how to make their software work on a 64 bit machine.The reason they don't is on a business/official level, it doesn't make sense to support something your software wasn't designed for, whether or not it will actually work.

I somewhat agree a disclaimer would be appropriate, however I could see why they'd be hesitant to do so as well.


I used the wording that it can't be run on a 64 bit machine because that is the wording the SE Support used.The only way this would be true is if you were running on a 64-bit only OS, with no emulation layer or appropriate libraries for compatability. But 64-bit versions of Windows, the platform the game is designed for, have the WoW64 emulation layer which allows 32-bit software to be compatible. Back when Windows went from 16- to 32-bit, a similar sort of system was in place (But as of windows Vista, the required libraries for that are no longer included with windows and 16-bit applications can't be run)

Whoever was writing the support handbook for the staff that answers the phone/email/chat should be smart enough to know that while it's not supported, that doesn't mean it cannot work. They shouldn't be telling you it won't work, only that they can't guarantee it will work.

[Ash]

I doubt we'll see a major graphics revamp in the game if the ps2 is dropped. In the many posts where people argue for ditching the ps2 the point is made that you can run this game on the cheapest laptop available today. Upgrading the graphics will not only leave the ps2 in the dust but also people playing on these older PCs and maybe the Xbox (I'm not sure what it's graphics capabilities are but reportedly lower than the ps3).

I just switched from ps2 to pc because I think dropping the ps2 is inevitable. Though having just gone through the experience I will say that SE makes the change much more difficult than it needs to be. The playonline website is full of outdated information on how to set up the game. Following the instructions on the website "may be causing more problems than it is fixing" according to a Tech Support GM on these forums. SE also states many times on their website that you must own all game discs to install FFXI on a PC. There is no downloadable version. Really? Also if you buy a new computer forget about any help from SE. I couldn't get the game to run and the response I got on the phone with SE was "the game can't be run on a 64 bit system" followed by "other players have figured out how to make it work. Check with them but we can't help you on this end". SE needs to update their information, educate their support staff, and just drop the PS2!!! It's clear they are going to do it. There are known issues that are getting worse that they refuse to acknowledge. They blame it on PS2 user's internet connection. If that's the case why can my PC on the same connection play cs without black screen and interact with NPC's without freezing. Stop lying to your customers and just drop it already!

Good posts never die!!

This, 100% this! Its funny that PC players QQ over the ps2 version not being dropped when in fact its been dropped for more than a year...Black screen cs lock means you can be stuck forever in the same looping cs with no fix other than logging on an xbox/pc version, or the epic freezing talking to a npc, that also very fun.

I too have switched to the Pc version because the ps2 version isn t playable anymore, but come on ppl open your eyes, the reason ps2 isn t dropped is because its a scape goat and its very convenient to blame it instead of you know investing more money on a 10year old game.

[Babekeke]

I'm fairly sure that if they could be bothered to write the software for the PS3, they would drop the PS2 in an instant. Unfortunately the SE PS3 software writing team is sat waiting for FF14 to be liked so they can finish writing software for that. That's never going to happen though, so the PS3 team will never write FFXI software, so SE won't drop PS2.

Offering Sony lovers an alternative platform to play on would keep 90% of them playing (and probably make over 50% of them happy). Dropping playstation support completely would be shooting themselves in the foot.

My thoughts anyway. With regards to the questionaire, it's possible that SE have given up on FF14 and brought the PS3 team to FFXI instead ^^ Think about it logically, releasing an upgraded graphics version for PS3 means a lot more games sold, so they'd get some money from it.

[Atomic_Skull]

I'm fairly sure that if they could be bothered to write the software for the PS3, they would drop the PS2 in an instant. Unfortunately the SE PS3 software writing team is sat waiting for FF14 to be liked so they can finish writing software for that. That's never going to happen though, so the PS3 team will never write FFXI software, so SE won't drop PS2.

Funny how FFXI is to hard to port to the PS3 and yet FFX which is based on an earlier version of the same graphics engine somehow isn't.

[Mirage]

It is? News to me.

[Atomic_Skull]

It is? News to me.

According to SE FFXI is too difficult to port to the PS3.

[Mirage]

No i meant the part about FFX using an early version of the same engine FFXI use. First time I've heard of that, and it doesn't really seem all that likely, considering how different the games look.