@SquareEnix: Kickstarter campaign to get a graphic upgrade?

Even though I might agree with the whole thing being hard and unlikely to happen, I still believe that some kind of crowdfunding to check out the interest from the playerbase would be interesting, and could not do any harm. Hell even a survey would do, just to know how much players are willing to pay / if they are.

I just want them to update the damn controller support so I can use my xbox 360 controllers triggers on PC :/ but to be honest this game could really could do with a makeover, they should just take a year off of releasing content updates to improve graphics, work on controller support and untangle the web of coding that's causing all these limitations lately. I think the game would benefit from it.

I don't honestly care to have the graphics redone, but an HD texture pack would be sweet, even if it just affected characters.

I don't get the whole change the graphics engine thing, why should they do that, when you can do this? There's probably better write-ups out there on oversampling your graphics but it's something you can do at the local level.

People complain about the graphics, but my ffxi looks just as good as any game out there, without all the extra lag that comes with newer games

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Originally Posted by Castanica

They won't do this for many reasons.

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All of what you just took the time to say is a load of crap and excuses. If other MMORPGs that are equal to the support FFXI has with subscribers, namely EQ for example, can do a graphical upgrade, so can SE.

You and SE both can stop making excuses to yourselves why it's "not viable". You make the time and effort to facelift your aging MMOs to prolong their lifespan with the current population. Period. The age of adding new subs on a regular basis is gone. It's done been time for what I call "maintain the sub base" mode. If you skip out on that you're just milking the cow until it is dry, and frankly you deserve to have your MMO die off sooner than later if that's your take on it's existence, and ten years later you're answering interview questions about what you regret about letting FFXI die and not letting those mistakes happen again with 'FFwhatever Online' you start talking about "if only we cared more and did a graphical upgrade sooner than not at all..."

But as far as not doing it because of FFXIV, that's silly. A subscriber is a subscriber. They don't care what game you are paying for to play. And don't even get me started on the BS that is charging us the same price they did over a decade ago but with about 30 times less support for the game which is a load of crap. The least they can do is give us a graphical upgrade.

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Originally Posted by Vold

And don't even get me started on the BS that is charging us the same price they did over a decade ago but with about 30 times less support for the game which is a load of crap. The least they can do is give us a graphical upgrade.

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Was with ya 100% til that. idk about others, but I'm happier paying now than I was in the past. QoL improvements, content, missions, fixes, etc. We're getting a lot of it every month now, where as in the past, we got a decent amount of it....every three months. In Between those updates, even more so if an update didn't really add anything that you were interested in or any content, it was hell. If it wasn't for the long grind that exping/meriting made you go through, I'd imagine we all would of been bored and angry back then. Rose tinted glasses are cool if you find those to be the heydays, but compare it to today, and much less was being added on a much slower schedule.

Maybe not having Tanaka saying "we'll look into it" to..every..single..question/suggestion imaginable helps out too.

OT: I don't think the game is extremely dire need of a graphical update, but it really couldn't hurt, specially if it's just HDing the models and textures, rather than a full graphical update to models and such, like WoW is currently doing. I'm indifferent, but I'd be interested in seeing the results of such a Kickstarter, and seeing what bonus goals they'd add.

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Originally Posted by predatory

I don't get the whole change the graphics engine thing, why should they do that, when you can do this? There's probably better write-ups out there on oversampling your graphics but it's something you can do at the local level.

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And how do you know they aren't already doing that?

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People complain about the graphics, but my ffxi looks just as good as any game out there, without all the extra lag that comes with newer games

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With all the tweaks in place it looks good for what it is, but no it doesn't look just as good as any game out there. Older zones especially look extremely dated in many ways even by PS2 standards.

I'm curious to see how the Japanese XI crowd would react to this, but I do not know any Japanese. Is there anyone that is able to post this on their forums to see how they react to this idea?

Looking at threads like this it seems Japanese players would also like at the very least a client upgrade to DX9 or higher. Edit > Now, whether or not they would be willing to Kickstarter it is another issue altogether.

And to repeat myself yet again, for a starting point this is what I would personally like to see in the Kickstarter:

- Main goals :
1) DX11 client with proper PC optimization and features (AA, AF, V-sync, longer drawing distances, better performance on modern hardware, better audio processing, snappier UI, etc.)

2) HD textures for all items, characters, monsters and areas. There's no need for a model rework, it would take even longer and be more expensive for little gains. The HD textures alone would make all the difference.

And if you doubt that would be more than enough just look at all the models they pretty much lifted straight out of XI and put in XIV just with higher resolution textures.

- Additional goals :

1) OpenGL/Mantle support

2) HD Rework of environmental and gameplay FX (particle effects in abilities, spells, etc., water effects, weather effects, etc.)

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And that's about it. In my opinion the game doesn't really need much else from a Kickstarter like this.

Kickstarters should never be made by corporations. Ever. They have the money, you are giving them money every month, suggesting a kickstarter is just a ridiculous idea. Even worse than a big company like SE doing a kickstarter is doing a kickstarter for an already made and released and decade+ old game. I would never back any such kickstarter no matter how much I love the game. I would only back a kickstarter for a new product. If a company has a well made, successful product that is already out and making money, they should not ever need or consider a kickstarter.