No more almost impossible to obtain crap please

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Originally Posted by svengalis

Without the impossible to obtain crap we get the whiners saying content is to easy.

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There's nothing hard about this for the people that are ready for it. It's just a colossal waste of time. After the first 100 pandy warden kills, I'm sure you'll be sick of it. You've proven yourself after the first two or three, the rest are just to make it take a long time.

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Originally Posted by Vivik

I think that time could have been spent developing things for all players instead of a select few.

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This is something I notice about a lot of asian game developers, they do this because it seems to be a mentality they have, to be honest most of us might not like wow very much, but if it were to be released in places like korea and japan thier respective mmo's markets would be decimated by it.

The afterglows are for people on disability that get a check every month and don't do anything all day but get fat and sit in front of the computer.

Its This guy that is going to own one of the 99 stage 2 weapons as he looks right now.

and This is how hes gonna end up.

And its all worth it because its for this.

http://files.sharenator.com/1008_beh...-55590-535.jpg

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Originally Posted by saevel

Are you daft, or just ignorant of business's in general?

It has NOTHING to do with the age of the product. Consumers have a demand, you supply that demand and thus create a revenue stream. You continue to provide that supply for as long as there's enough demand to warrant a profit. Not providing that supply will lead to the demand going elsewhere and thus less profits for you.

They still sell monopoly and risk, those are both much older then 10yrs and they still make money. They sell those games because there is a demand that is profitable to supply. The original Everquest is still going, their still supplying that demand and making and profit off it. It makes no sense not to supply the demand of a 10yr old game.

Now let me school you about product development, cause I actually do some of this for a living.

The highest cost sink isn't in the maintenance of the game, but the initial development to go from concept to design to the actual key pounding of code. MMO's don't make profits in their first year or so due to this fact. It costs tons of money to develop the original game mechanics, design the artwork, assign the various mechanics and so forth. Create all the models and animations, build your server side software, work out the bugs in your backend databases.

Now all of these are sunk costs, their costs you can't immediately pass onto the consumer as it would price your product out of the market and you must accept them as an investment in the future of your product. After the first couple of years you'll end up making the original investment back and then your operating on pure profit from that point on. Any money left over after maintenance and operations expense's can be spent on product development and pocketed as profit.

Starting over again, aka making a new MMO, means you must start back at year one sunk costs all over again. Discontinuing or failing to maintain and develop for a product that is already banking you tons of money is a very very bad business decision. Especially if your doing it to develop a "new" MMO from scratch, which will just cost you more money. This is why Blizzard didn't make "WoW 2" and instead decided to further develop the original WoW. In the long run it costs them less to develop and expand on their original product then it does to sink money into a "new" product and hope people go for their bait. When they made EQ2 they though all the players would jump over, and while some did most did not. This was a very harsh lesson that needed to be learned. Players do not like switching MMO's like they do cars and they do not develop a brand loyalty to MMO's like they do. Each and every MMO is treated like a separate product and has a separate player base. No matter what it's name is or who developed it.

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I'm well aware how business works. All you are doing is trying to justify how you think SE should run their business. And you are missing the point that they are not going to put 100% of the original man power into a 10+ year old product. Do you actually think Blizzard will not make WoW 2? They will, just like every other game has either an entirely new game in a franchise or a sequel of some kind.

What you don't seem to realize is that the next gen gamer will have an interest in future releases of any MMO or any game for that matter. Do you actually think some 16-22 year old is gonna say oh hey let me play this 10+ year old game with outdated graphics and game mechanics. No they aren't interested in it. They want the newest more current technology. That is where the money will be because they can hook that gamer into that more recent product for 5+ years if its an MMO, just like we got hooked into FF11 8-10 years ago. Otherwise we wouldn't even have FF14 cause according to the way you are looking at things you think a business should just put all the manpower they got into a 10 year old product and completely rule out new potential customers. New customers and next gen gamers don't want old products. They want new products.

As for profits, they go into new products. They go into research, development, planning, writing, graphic artists etc. If any business just took profits and did nothing but support old outdated products their business would fail because consumers would move onto better more up to date products. Sorry but if I was 18 again I sure as hell wouldn't even have the slightest interest in a 10+ year old MMO when there are more up to date graphically superior products out there. And if this is what you do for a living I feel sad for the company that hired you. With your logic you would have more overhead in payroll making a ridiculously large employee base for every project you ever work on. That sure makes great business sense... Your employees need to work on more projects to help keep your company in business.

Thanks for the business economics lesson. Back to talking about not adding pointless, irrelevant, impossible things to the game when no one will accomplish them.

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Originally Posted by Economizer

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Originally Posted by Dragoy

I always saw the Relics and the Mythics something that was only designed for those who like to manipulate and use people for their own gains, cheat (buy Gil and bot for Gil and so on), and such.
No, I'm not saying everyone who did it are like that but that's not even the point. I don't understand why make items they do not intend to be obtained by most players.

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Currently, excluding the new 99 trials, Relics are mostly easier for a small group of friends working together. If you can get 100 currency pieces a night between four people for example, you can get one person the currency for a relic in less then two months, or two people's currency in three. Basically even with two days off a week and a bit of cushion for vacations and such, you can get a group their relics in a year. In my opinion, that is obtainable for players who are between "casual" and "hardcore" while still rewarding teamwork, which is incredibly hard to do with a loot system.

The problem I mainly see with the afterglow trails is they are based on loot and not kills - basically, it rewards that greedy manipulation you talk about.

Twenty kills for the 99 weapon stats and two thousand for the afterglow would be a bit more fair for teamwork - the thing this game is supposed to be all about more then any other MMO - then having to fetch some stupid item a thousand times.

Perhaps I may be wrong, but a legendarily hard quest like that would probably be more acceptable to players if it rewarded teamwork rather then greed. Am I right?

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Very true.
I was largely thinking of ye olde Dynamis time basically when writing what I wrote.
They are definitely much more accessible now (level 75 Relics), and I am very much interested to see the renovations on the Aht Urhgan content, and if they will do anything similar to the Mythic stuff.

That said, one might fondle with the thought that these new trials are basically the new level 75 Relic/Mythic content.

And yes, I agree with that too, that it is quite funky how they create content that more or/and less require more players to do, yet they usually don't really reward but one person (at a time), depending a lot of the people doing it of course (how they decide to distribute the rewards which doesn't really work with Voidwatch though I imagine, which might have been an attempt out of this pattern orrr maybe it was just about messing around).

So you are daft, thought so.

This pretty much sums up your ignorance

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Do you actually think Blizzard will not make WoW 2? They will, just like every other game has either an entirely new game in a franchise or a sequel of some kind.

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Blizzard has already said no WoW 2, instead they remade the game in Cataclysm. Soon they are doing another major overhaul that is completely discarding the current talent trees and replacing them with an entirely different system.

Instead of trying to create a ~new~ game, they are instead turning their ~old~ game into something new. That is how you make money in MMO's, as proven by Blizzard's WoW being the biggest MMO in the world despite being "old" by gaming standards and having constant competition.

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As for profits, they go into new products. They go into research, development, planning, writing, graphic artists etc. If any business just took profits and did nothing but support old outdated products their business would fail because consumers would move onto better more up to date products. Sorry but if I was 18 again I sure as hell wouldn't even have the slightest interest in a 10+ year old MMO when there are more up to date graphically superior products out there. And if this is what you do for a living I feel sad for the company that hired you. With your logic you would have more overhead in payroll making a ridiculously large employee base for every project you ever work on. That sure makes great business sense... Your employees need to work on more projects to help keep your company in business.

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You have no idea how a business works, your just pulling stuff out of your fifth point of contact.

As of now this discussion is over. Your no longer capable of actual debate and instead are trying to defend SE's decision to pull R&D money from FFXI and put it into FFXIV even though it's already a failed product. FFXIV is a failed product, it has failed to pay back it's original development and launch cost and was a huge money sink for it's developer and producer. Their having to create a third MMO from FFXIV just to try to make back their original investment.

/add ignore list.

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Blizzard has already said no WoW 2, instead they remade the game in Cataclysm. Soon they are doing another major overhaul that is completely discarding the current talent trees and replacing them with an entirely different system.

Instead of trying to create a ~new~ game, they are instead turning their ~old~ game into something new. That is how you make money in MMO's, as proven by Blizzard's WoW being the biggest MMO in the world despite being "old" by gaming standards and having constant competition.

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This is why Blizzard make so much money, they can refrain from "exciting" things that would be stupid bsuiness ideas. Making WoW 2 would kill WoW and WoW 2 would probably flop too. Square don't get this, they would of made far far more money revitalising FFXI full force than continuing to throw money at a game everyone hates, and one that has a minimal chance to get even half the success FFXI had.

The really stupid part is that FFXIV flopping made a lot of players come back to FFXI, but they aren't capitalising on it at all lol

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Originally Posted by Runespider

This is why Blizzard make so much money, they can refrain from "exciting" things that would be stupid bsuiness ideas. Making WoW 2 would kill WoW and WoW 2 would probably flop too. Square don't get this, they would of made far far more money revitalising FFXI full force than continuing to throw money at a game everyone hates, and one that has a minimal chance to get even half the success FFXI had.

The really stupid part is that FFXIV flopping made a lot of players come back to FFXI, but they aren't capitalising on it at all lol

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I've played tons of MMO's over the years, and honestly I can't think of a single one where the sequel made more then the original. EQ2 didn't make anywhere near the money that the first EQ did, neither did Lineage. Lineage II eventually got to be decent enough, but still wasn't nearly the smash in SK that the first one was. Squaresoft really should of done market research before making a new product. They should of instead put that money in revamping FFXI's game engine to modern standards, creating an entire new continent. Create new quest lines and content, upping level caps and adding more variety of gear. Revamp the augment system, including hunt registry and the Aug weapons. Lots they could of one but instead the bleed the game dry a few years during WoTG while they make FFXIV. Then further bleed it after FFXIV fails as predicted.

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Originally Posted by Unleashhell

What you don't seem to realize is that the next gen gamer will have an interest in future releases of any MMO or any game for that matter. Do you actually think some 16-22 year old is gonna say oh hey let me play this 10+ year old game with outdated graphics and game mechanics. No they aren't interested in it. They want the newest more current technology.

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You forget about the thousands of people still playing this game and expecting somewhat better service for the money than we're getting currently, so no, I don't think you understand how business works. XI is currently long-tailing and SE should be doing their damnedest to keep us interested and continuing to support the game financially.

So what's the best way of doing that? Wasting already scarce resources to design trials and objectives that they only indend to see a minute fraction of the playerbase achieve instead of actually developing worthwhile, fresh new content (...wait, what?).

None of the content currently planned for us is fresh in the slightest. All we have coming is simply either cut and paste work (Legion), or "new" versions of stuff we already did until we were blue in the face 3 years ago (Nyzul, Limbus, possible Salvage revamps).

What would you rather see? Afterglow trials or potential new missions, storylines or unique endgame events? The Dev team apparently wants to see (a very small percentage of) people doing the former, which boggles the bloody mind.

It takes money to make money. Conversely, a lack of money can deprive you of potential profit. The latter is something FFXI has ultimately experienced beginning at some point during the ToAU era, no doubt when work on XIV began on the side. WotG comes grossly incomplete with poorly conceived jobs and hobbles along for a good number of years with shoddy mini-addons slapped on near the end through ACP, ASA, and MKdE.

So, why has content diminished? I highly doubt there are a lack of competent programmers out there. The are plenty of minds out there to pen stories or formulate concepts on new content (Some of this even coming FREE from their players). The unfortunate and obvious solution is one we were recently given privy to in both money and manpower being short.

Figuring most people have their main and 2 mules on average, we're looking at roughly $15 per sub. During the ToAU days, the reported number of players was reportedly around 500k. That's $7,500,000 monthly. While I won't sit here and profess to know how much it cost to power the servers, maintain them, and pay employees to code/fix content, I would be highly surprised if it cost more than one mil a month. Where did the other 6.5m go? It certainly wasn't going into XI.

Upon FFXI's original launch, it fielded about a million subscribers. Back in the day, I'd call that pretty huge. Those numbers declined quickly toward that popular 500k figure, though. Early FFXI wasn't that good, going through the growing pains all new MMOs do. Some probably quit due to bugginess. Some quit due to lack of content. Some may have preferred an old game or found they just didn't have the time for it. Whatever the reason, you can look at 1 million boxes sold at $50 per. Let's halve that for retail purpose, putting 25 mil in SE's pockets on initial box sales alone. At the very least, that put a hefty dent in initial production costs.

Months, then years tick by, the cash rolls in. Profit, profit, profit. Now, SE isn't a one-trick pony. Money for other games has to come from somewhere, and I don't think anyone would be mad knowing part of FFXI's profits went toward the production of such things. However, these games also make their own profits. SE also sponsors manga/anime/music, generating cash from those sources. The problem with FFXI is that the money it generates hasn't gone toward its future first. Of the earlier figure I mentioned, only 13% of FFXI's money would've been returning to it. Imagine if it got 25%, 35%, or even 50%.

That's the difference in expansions being launched largely complete, more frequent updates/fixes, more resources for art in abilities/spells/monsters/areas, more scripts, more cut-scenes, more... everything, including a potential engine overhaul to bring the game up to the times. In kind, when players see their investments being returned to the game for its betterment, they'll notice. They'll tell their friends. Those friends can, in turn, yield more profit, who then go on to tell their friends.

Or you can be minimalistic misers, piss off your customers through various means (like ignoring feedback), watch subscriptions diminish, take back promises, and basically create the current stagnant and socially volatile environment that is today's FFXI. And they'll tell their friends, too. You then get people who want to stay away because of the negative feedback.

I know I've personally been vocal about feedback toward the game over the years, much as some may have come to hate me given my opinions on various matters. Regardless, it's always been because I've had hope of the game's betterment in mind. I still believe FFXI can be better. I can only fantasize about how much better it could've been by now if it got the resources it deserved. Starving the game of cash will do it no good and it's unfortunate some can't grasp that concept, especially hiding behind the logic of "FFXI having had its time in the limelight" or some such drivel.

Frankly, if SE's going to give us 1/4th the effort, I want to pay 1/4th the subscription. The alternative is myself and others who feel similarly just canceling and looking elsewhere. Plenty of other activities out there, and I'm not just talking about MMOs.

Jesus who comes up with these ideas... they are soo bad
you can make a quest hard without it being a boring mindfuck for example click ??? get CS of some shadowy figure "So you wish to truly unlock the power of your -insert weapon here-" kill the Arc boss of each zone 5 times blah blah" at which point your sent to dyna tav to take out some kind of mega Diablos in then which your weapon trial is done and you get a CS of Diablos going "Fool have you realized what you have done!" /insert shadowy figure maniacal laughter.

Anyways I think a quest line with something along this kind of path would be a better fit for 2 reasons, 1 Its long but not super omg kill myself long, 2 it would produce a large amount of different gear VS the static gear drops that come from 1 zone + your not doing the same dam thing over and over

the mythic trials should be something involving the new nyvule isle system NOT the outdated zeni system which no one wants anything from

emp weapons honestly should have had new content fleshed out in abbysea just for the trials that is hard and cant be brewed but i guess manpower is an issue

the trials should be something that you have to ask for help for, but the people helping get something in return. Hence the above ideas. The current set of trials reminds me of AV and PW back in the day... content that only maybe 2% of the playerbase will ever participate on

Sorry if I'm rambling I shoulda been in bed hours ago

I apologize, I haven't read through all the posts so far so forgive me if I am reiterating past responses.

I find it to be a waste of my money to fund a developer that takes my money to design something in a game that they openly admit "Only select few will be able to obtain these trials." With how the trials appear on the test server, and their open admission that this is the strategy they are taking, I am truly clueless as to why they think their playerbase would cheer and be excited about content that SE themselves think so few of us will obtain.

It's a question that deserves answering. Why are you designing content for only a few of us? And realistically the servers could possibly be shut down before any single person accomplishes these trials. Maybe you get five people with truly no lives to pursue these weapons, while the rest of your playerbase falls to the wayside.

I was always someone who liked the challenge of the original game. I advocated for there to be a level cap on Abyssea so that people couldn't Fell Cleave party their way from 30 to whatever. But clearly you favored the casual then and the game has moved on and the old ways aren't coming back. You have to meet the game, and the playerbase where its at. And clearly the FFXI developer team is showing a complete, inability to do so.

If they end up driving XI to die, its going to come back to haunt them. They expect us to naturally move on to FFXIV, just like they expected us to do so a little more than a year ago when they released the game. They were overconfident once, if they are that way again... well, I'm sure their investors won't be too happy.

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As of now this discussion is over. Your no longer capable of actual debate and instead are trying to defend SE's decision to pull R&D money from FFXI and put it into FFXIV even though it's already a failed product. FFXIV is a failed product

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It's not a failed product until the plug is pulled The fact is they've made great strides and when they re-launch with 2.0 and the PS3, they will get a second chance. They wouldn't be the only ones to bounce back to any degree after a re-launch, because other games have pulled it off.

I'm not seeing what this has to do with adding useless things to this game though.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

It's not a failed product until the plug is pulled The fact is they've made great strides and when they re-launch with 2.0 and the PS3, they will get a second chance. They wouldn't be the only ones to bounce back to any degree after a re-launch, because other games have pulled it off.

I'm not seeing what this has to do with adding useless things to this game though.

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Serious question:

What MMO has pulled off a failed launch of XIVs magnitude and re-released to praise and success?

From what I see SE is in uncharted waters here. They have no choice but to continue down the path to XIV's rebirth because XI has been damaged via neglect and to have two failed MMOs would be a monumental embarrassment. XIV must succeed but that doesn't mean that it will succeed.

Diablo III and GW II are going to be strong competition and this is going to be a path fraught with danger.

SE is going to try everything to make XIV work but with the fans in disarray and people generally bashing for poor decisions on the console side, this is one of those moments that the name "Final Fantasy" really applies with regards to the MMO market. Can SE recapture the base they pushed away? Can they shock the market by bringing a phoenix from the ashes? Can they compete with Blizzard and succeed? Can SE become what Squaresoft once was in the market?

Next time on Dragon. Ball. Z.

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Originally Posted by Sparthos

Serious question:

What MMO has pulled off a failed launch of XIVs magnitude and re-released to praise and success?

From what I see SE is in uncharted waters here. They have no choice but to continue down the path to XIV's rebirth because XI has been damaged via neglect and to have two failed MMOs would be a monumental embarrassment. XIV must succeed but that doesn't mean that it will succeed.

Diablo III and GW II are going to be strong competition and this is going to be a path fraught with danger.

SE is going to try everything to make XIV work but with the fans in disarray and people generally bashing for poor decisions on the console side, this is one of those moments that the name "Final Fantasy" really applies with regards to the MMO market. Can SE recapture the base they pushed away? Can they shock the market by bringing a phoenix from the ashes? Can they compete with Blizzard and succeed? Can SE become what Squaresoft once was in the market?

Next time on Dragon. Ball. Z.

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LMAO at the DBZ reference.

Honestly it's best to view FFXIV 2.0 as a different MMO. It's going to take that much of an overhaul to make the game profitable, several of it's fundamental concepts are flawed and won't work with on a Fantasy MMORPG. Their going to borrow the artwork and some game mechanics from FFXIV, but their going to have to redesign several core elements and the associated R&D involved.

And to answer your question, not a single MMO has comeback after a failure that complete. The only one that comes close is Dungeons and Dragons Online. The original team screwed it up pretty badly and it was on it's way down the toilet. Turbine then started managing it as a F2P game and overhauled 90% of the game. Now it's turning a good profit and has become the standard for how to run a F2P game profitably. Their model involved everything being unlockable with in-game earned fame points. Or you can buy turbine points from their store and use those instead. You can also spend points on various potions for boosting XP / Loot for a 3hr period of time. Again you can earn these in-game with time / effort. Subscribers (people who pay months service fee's) get all content unlocked and a small amount of free monthly turbine points. So it rewards those who pay money but also allows those who don't to achieve the same stuff, no loot or accomplishment is restricted.

F2P MMOs, the bane of our era. Can't wait till they hit you with a surcharge for logging in during high server volume periods.

If FFXIV goes F2P that'd be a huge slap to the faces of fans and would probably make things worse than they are at the moment. What's worse is that Wada has considered this in the past.

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Originally Posted by Avina

I apologize, I haven't read through all the posts so far so forgive me if I am reiterating past responses.

I find it to be a waste of my money to fund a developer that takes my money to design something in a game that they openly admit "Only select few will be able to obtain these trials." With how the trials appear on the test server, and their open admission that this is the strategy they are taking, I am truly clueless as to why they think their playerbase would cheer and be excited about content that SE themselves think so few of us will obtain.

It's a question that deserves answering. Why are you designing content for only a few of us? And realistically the servers could possibly be shut down before any single person accomplishes these trials. Maybe you get five people with truly no lives to pursue these weapons, while the rest of your playerbase falls to the wayside.

I was always someone who liked the challenge of the original game. I advocated for there to be a level cap on Abyssea so that people couldn't Fell Cleave party their way from 30 to whatever. But clearly you favored the casual then and the game has moved on and the old ways aren't coming back. You have to meet the game, and the playerbase where its at. And clearly the FFXI developer team is showing a complete, inability to do so.

If they end up driving XI to die, its going to come back to haunt them. They expect us to naturally move on to FFXIV, just like they expected us to do so a little more than a year ago when they released the game. They were overconfident once, if they are that way again... well, I'm sure their investors won't be too happy.

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This and the 95 Empyrean trials is why I won't be resubscribing after this month. I recently restarted in 2010 quit then came back once I realized how easy Abyssea gear was to obtained, tried VW and realized if this the direction the game is going after Abyssea I want no part in it. The bolded part is why I quit in 05. They are going back to the 03-05 game design where only a small player base reaps the high end rewards. It makes absolutely no since to me and I will never understand why they go down this path.

Why am I playing if I can't get the best gear in the game? Back to The Old Republic for me.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

Aren't the high tier magian trials for relics/mythics/etc already exclusive enough as it is? do we really need to make a single trial at the end of these long, tiresome chains even more exclusive?

Really. Fair question.

PS: "Crap" is to be taken literally, as the new trials are both "impossible" and the result is crap.

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http://img521.imageshack.us/img521/9...wwwwwbunny.jpg

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Originally Posted by saevel

So you are daft, thought so.

This pretty much sums up your ignorance



Blizzard has already said no WoW 2, instead they remade the game in Cataclysm. Soon they are doing another major overhaul that is completely discarding the current talent trees and replacing them with an entirely different system.

Instead of trying to create a ~new~ game, they are instead turning their ~old~ game into something new. That is how you make money in MMO's, as proven by Blizzard's WoW being the biggest MMO in the world despite being "old" by gaming standards and having constant competition.



You have no idea how a business works, your just pulling stuff out of your fifth point of contact.

As of now this discussion is over. Your no longer capable of actual debate and instead are trying to defend SE's decision to pull R&D money from FFXI and put it into FFXIV even though it's already a failed product. FFXIV is a failed product, it has failed to pay back it's original development and launch cost and was a huge money sink for it's developer and producer. Their having to create a third MMO from FFXIV just to try to make back their original investment.

/add ignore list.

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OMG not the ignore list. FYI Blizzard said they weren't ever going to make Diablo III and quess what.. they did. I love the fact you add everyone to your "ignore list" when you end a debate on your terms. I find it funny how you can play a game like FFXI and have the nerve to come on here and not even know the mobs have jobs. So your credibility is nil and so are your so called business thoughts.

Just for reference:

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Originally Posted by saevel

Defense on monsters has next to nothing to do with VIT. It's based on whatever their template is defined as. Monsters don't wear gear, eat food and rarely have buffs on them (PLD / WHM / RDM notwithstanding).

Just like they don't have ridiculous attack, neither do they have ridiculous defense nor evasion.
And Kirin is not a SMN, he's a "monster", special stats and all. Player community has defined him as a SMN because he astral flows, otherwise we could just as easily of called him a BLM because he use's Stone V / Stonega IV / Quake. Or a MNK because he attacks with two hands. And so forth.

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This made me laugh.

If you actually had a clue about running a business you would be making a some huge salary somewhere and not care about some video game. I love when people like you say "I do this for a living" to try and make it look like you know what your talking about. Funny how when someone disagrees with you, you decide to take it as an attack and add them to your /lolignorelist

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Originally Posted by Crysten

You forget about the thousands of people still playing this game and expecting somewhat better service for the money than we're getting currently, so no, I don't think you understand how business works. XI is currently long-tailing and SE should be doing their damnedest to keep us interested and continuing to support the game financially.

So what's the best way of doing that? Wasting already scarce resources to design trials and objectives that they only indend to see a minute fraction of the playerbase achieve instead of actually developing worthwhile, fresh new content (...wait, what?).

None of the content currently planned for us is fresh in the slightest. All we have coming is simply either cut and paste work (Legion), or "new" versions of stuff we already did until we were blue in the face 3 years ago (Nyzul, Limbus, possible Salvage revamps).

What would you rather see? Afterglow trials or potential new missions, storylines or unique endgame events? The Dev team apparently wants to see (a very small percentage of) people doing the former, which boggles the bloody mind.

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Funny how nobody complained when abyssea came out about rehashing old zones and just adding new monsters. All everyone cared about was the gear you got from it. Now that everyone has all the gear they want and weapons that do massive damage all of a sudden they are bored.

SE gave us a timeline for what they say is "content". Abyssea was part of that "content" yet everyone seems to forget about that now that they have everything from Abyssea. You seem to misunderstand that fact that SE is moving on. They are creating newer and better things. Not sure why people on here don't see that. There WILL be a day the servers shut down for this game. There WILL be a day that SE says we will not be supporting FF11 anymore.

Now do I want to see that happen? Of course not. Putting 8+ years into this game this is almost like a second job for me. Granted what I say sounds negative, but its reality.

Lets do a quick google search and see what we come up with.

Lets look at this...

http://www.pcworld.com/article/24346...in_a_year.html

Read this article and you tell me how you take it. Then read all the comments at the bottom. WoW still has years to catch up to the length of time FFXI has been out. By that time their subscription numbers will continue to tank. Even the comments at the bottom say they need to revamp the game.

Lets look at this...

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/gaming/...-of-warcraft/1

Funny how you guys say its bad business to release another MMO to compete with your own products. Then turn around and say this is why Blizzard has done things right. Meanwhile they have a new MMO coming out in 2012 (AND IT LOOKS LIKE WoW) go figure....

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What MMO has pulled off a failed launch of XIVs magnitude and re-released to praise and success?

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Most recently, all points bulletin, which was shut down less than 90 days after launching (this was very close to when FFXIV launched). The original developers were mostly unprepared for the kind of attention an MMO needs to survive after launching and it resulted in a lot of problems being ignored and the developers running out of money and folding. Another company later picked it up because they felt the game had potential, and it recently re-launched and seems to be doing fine.

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Diablo III and GW II

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I don't know what GW II is, but Diablo III isn't even in the same genre. It's not an MMO, it's a co-op Roguelike game. It's not a persistent world and you only play with a few people in created games at a time.

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Even the comments at the bottom say they need to revamp the game.

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And WoW is actually doing that. They started with the world itself, which underwent some major changes in Cataclysm, and apparently the Talent system which has been a part of the game since its inception is being completely remade into something new. Blizzard isn't afraid to totally redo something if necessary, and neither is the FFXIV team. It's just FFXI's team that seems to be stuck in the mud, as it were.

What to say hes not making a HUGE salary some where. You know MMOs are a hobby everyone has a hobby. I hate that kind of small minded thinking that you can't be into video games unless you have a low paying mind numbing job.

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Originally Posted by Ravenmore

What to say hes not making a HUGE salary some where. You know MMOs are a hobby everyone has a hobby. I hate that kind of small minded thinking that you can't be into video games unless you have a low paying mind numbing job.

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That is true. I will agree that it is possible, but its an extremely rare case. He just likes to make his point and ignore any other debate cause he always thinks he is right about everything.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

Most recently, all points bulletin, which was shut down less than 90 days after launching (this was very close to when FFXIV launched). The original developers were mostly unprepared for the kind of attention an MMO needs to survive after launching and it resulted in a lot of problems being ignored and the developers running out of money and folding. Another company later picked it up because they felt the game had potential, and it recently re-launched and seems to be doing fine.

I don't know what GW II is, but Diablo III isn't even in the same genre. It's not an MMO, it's a co-op Roguelike game. It's not a persistent world and you only play with a few people in created games at a time.

And WoW is actually doing that. They started with the world itself, which underwent some major changes in Cataclysm, and apparently the Talent system which has been a part of the game since its inception is being completely remade into something new. Blizzard isn't afraid to totally redo something if necessary, and neither is the FFXIV team. It's just FFXI's team that seems to be stuck in the mud, as it were.

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Had to look up APB lol. It looks interesting and a rough lunch to get back 150k for the open beta is something to respect but that far from a smashing success. Then there is the fact it was sold that might draw people back to it like a restaurant
putting a sign up saying under new management/ownership. You can kinda say that with FF14 but the fact that the old team didn't leave the comapny and they were not the main problem to start with just a sysmtom. It took them to long to admit there was a problem and to long to really do something about the core problems.

Then all the damage that the current FF11 team is doing to the brand name and in 5 years they might start making another game drawing resources away from it like they did with FF11. I admit its not outside the realm but its got more agaisnt it then APB has.

SE rushed FF14 out too fast. Maybe to compete with WoW? I forgot the exact years they came out. They put alot of emphasis on how it looks (which is does look good) and not enough into game mechanics. Maybe if it was actually put out a couple years later it wouldn't have failed as bad. There would have been completed quests and actual mob placement that made sense. It is going to be a long hard road for SE to recover in the MMO market after what happened to FF14. If they do make another MMO in the future with as much publicity as 11 and 14 I'm sure they wont have the big rush of people going out to buy it right away. Its a shame being that I love the FF series as a whole.

Don't think it was really to compete with WoW more to deal with presure from within to get the game out the door. It was being worked on for 5 years and most of that was on the graphic engine and it showed. Had they just bit the bullet and lience one and spent the 5 years they had on content, story lines, zones they might not be in this spot. Not to mention FF14 player have all this that the topic is about to look forward to as well.

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Originally Posted by Sparthos

F2P MMOs, the bane of our era. Can't wait till they hit you with a surcharge for logging in during high server volume periods.

If FFXIV goes F2P that'd be a huge slap to the faces of fans and would probably make things worse than they are at the moment. What's worse is that Wada has considered this in the past.

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WTH is your issue with F2P MMO's? They wouldn't be making money unless there was a demand for them, which means customers. Or are you wanting to turn the MMO industry into a authoritarian dictatorship where only Sparthos approved MMO's are allowed to be published.

There is nothing wrong with F2P, it's a different revenue model with P2P and if implemented horribly will result in your MMO shutting down and going out of business. If implemented properly then you'll turn a profit. See Turbine.

hello, i wish to address ur issue OP. tanaka-san has created a vision in which our FFXI players can have weapons that r very rare. this creates a sense of accomplishment and makes players feel unique. plz understand his vision and u will b brought to a good feelings on this matter.

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Originally Posted by Unleashhell

Funny how nobody complained when abyssea came out about rehashing old zones and just adding new monsters. All everyone cared about was the gear you got from it. Now that everyone has all the gear they want and weapons that do massive damage all of a sudden they are bored.

SE gave us a timeline for what they say is "content". Abyssea was part of that "content" yet everyone seems to forget about that now that they have everything from Abyssea. You seem to misunderstand that fact that SE is moving on. They are creating newer and better things. Not sure why people on here don't see that. There WILL be a day the servers shut down for this game. There WILL be a day that SE says we will not be supporting FF11 anymore.

Now do I want to see that happen? Of course not. Putting 8+ years into this game this is almost like a second job for me. Granted what I say sounds negative, but its reality.

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I bolded the main part here, but if you've been paying attention for the past year, but FFXIV was originally supposed to be the "bigger and better thing." We all know how that turned out, and it's potentially going to take them two tries and going vastly overbudget to get it right. Any right-minded company would have pulled the plug and had the original dev team fired, but this is Final Fantasy. The brand is far too important and SE have gone all in to make sure that succeeds.

Abyssea was a cut and paste job in terms of zones, I concede that, but you also had completely fresh elements not ever seen before - the stagger system, cruor buffs and Atma being the main part and the sudden U-turn from grind-filled level 75 content being the other. Arguments for/against Abyssea aside, Abyssea had an intriguing battle system and then they went and abused the idea into the ground by extending it into the other endgame at the time; Dynamis, WoE and Voidwatch.

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Originally Posted by Unleashhell

Lets do a quick google search and see what we come up with.

Lets look at this...

http://www.pcworld.com/article/24346...in_a_year.html

Read this article and you tell me how you take it. Then read all the comments at the bottom. WoW still has years to catch up to the length of time FFXI has been out. By that time their subscription numbers will continue to tank. Even the comments at the bottom say they need to revamp the game.

Lets look at this...

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/gaming/...-of-warcraft/1

Funny how you guys say its bad business to release another MMO to compete with your own products. Then turn around and say this is why Blizzard has done things right. Meanwhile they have a new MMO coming out in 2012 (AND IT LOOKS LIKE WoW) go figure....

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I'm not saying XI should be around forever. I'm saying, in the current climate (XIV currently in limbo and the XI community generally weary and constantly in awe of how stupid the dev team is), SE cannot afford to be cutting corners and pulling things like this out of their ass.

If there is sufficient demand for a product (much like people asking for new content/UI overhauls) then a company should be capitalizing on that demand should it be high enough. Instead we have a skeleton development team pretty much insistant on covering their ears and implementing what they "think" we like, rather than listening to players and enticing people to continue playing and subscribing until the next big thing.

SE currently have two stagnating MMOs and it's in their best interest to not try screwing up the one with the esablished playerbase right now, else there won't be anyone supporting either when FFXIV 2.0 rolls around. If people think XI is crap, and XIV 2.0 is 9 months away, they're not going to be waiting around paying for a game they don't like. They'll be going directly to the competition.

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Originally Posted by Unleashhell

Funny how nobody complained when abyssea came out about rehashing old zones and just adding new monsters. All everyone cared about was the gear you got from it. Now that everyone has all the gear they want and weapons that do massive damage all of a sudden they are bored.

SE gave us a timeline for what they say is "content". Abyssea was part of that "content" yet everyone seems to forget about that now that they have everything from Abyssea. You seem to misunderstand that fact that SE is moving on. They are creating newer and better things. Not sure why people on here don't see that. There WILL be a day the servers shut down for this game. There WILL be a day that SE says we will not be supporting FF11 anymore.

Now do I want to see that happen? Of course not. Putting 8+ years into this game this is almost like a second job for me. Granted what I say sounds negative, but its reality.

Lets do a quick google search and see what we come up with.

Lets look at this...

http://www.pcworld.com/article/24346...in_a_year.html

Read this article and you tell me how you take it. Then read all the comments at the bottom. WoW still has years to catch up to the length of time FFXI has been out. By that time their subscription numbers will continue to tank. Even the comments at the bottom say they need to revamp the game.

Lets look at this...

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/gaming/...-of-warcraft/1

Funny how you guys say its bad business to release another MMO to compete with your own products. Then turn around and say this is why Blizzard has done things right. Meanwhile they have a new MMO coming out in 2012 (AND IT LOOKS LIKE WoW) go figure....

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Blizzard's new MMO won't come until 2013/14 and it will be a fps MMO. It won't compete with WoW.

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Originally Posted by Crysten

I bolded the main part here, but if you've been paying attention for the past year, but FFXIV was originally supposed to be the "bigger and better thing." We all know how that turned out, and it's potentially going to take them two tries and going vastly overbudget to get it right. Any right-minded company would have pulled the plug and had the original dev team fired, but this is Final Fantasy. The brand is far too important and SE have gone all in to make sure that succeeds.

Abyssea was a cut and paste job in terms of zones, I concede that, but you also had completely fresh elements not ever seen before - the stagger system, cruor buffs and Atma being the main part and the sudden U-turn from grind-filled level 75 content being the other. Arguments for/against Abyssea aside, Abyssea had an intriguing battle system and then they went and abused the idea into the ground by extending it into the other endgame at the time; Dynamis, WoE and Voidwatch.



I'm not saying XI should be around forever. I'm saying, in the current climate (XIV currently in limbo and the XI community generally weary and constantly in awe of how stupid the dev team is), SE cannot afford to be cutting corners and pulling things like this out of their ass.

If there is sufficient demand for a product (much like people asking for new content/UI overhauls) then a company should be capitalizing on that demand should it be high enough. Instead we have a skeleton development team pretty much insistant on covering their ears and implementing what they "think" we like, rather than listening to players and enticing people to continue playing and subscribing until the next big thing.

SE currently have two stagnating MMOs and it's in their best interest to not try screwing up the one with the esablished playerbase right now, else there won't be anyone supporting either when FFXIV 2.0 rolls around. If people think XI is crap, and XIV 2.0 is 9 months away, they're not going to be waiting around paying for a game they don't like. They'll be going directly to the competition.

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For the most part I agree with you on your statements. But consider how long FF11 has been around. If you read about MMO's alot of articles will tell you that most (not all) MMO have about a 5 to 10 year or so shelf life. Final Fantasy 11 is already pushing the 10 year mark and that in itself is a pretty awesome accomplishment. As a business SE needs to push forward, and they decided to make FF14. Unfortunately FF14 came way too early imo. They should have waited another 2 years maybe even 3 before releasing that. They figured they would have both games out and a decent amount of players from FF11 would play both 11 and 14.

Unfortunately as we know it tanked big time. So SE most likely said look we gotta get all hands on deck here and salvage what we can. Don't forget this is a very long running series and has a very loyal following. SE knew if they screwed up 14 it could potentially have a huge impact on any future products they release especially anything with the Final Fantasy name attached to it. Unfortunately FF11 took the big hurt from this and almost all of the resources from 11 had to salvage what they could of 14.

From a business aspect in a way they had to do this, it effects them long term. Plus they have to not only fix FF14 but they have to continue with new products. They cant put everything on hold just to fix 14, nor can they put too much into ff11 which is close to the end of its shelf life. So you can see how spread thin I'm sure SE is right now. Its not a matter of just going out and hiring more people. More people will equal more payroll, insurance (not sure how insurance works in Japan so I'm just going by the USA) etc etc throwing budgets even further into negative numbers. I'm not sure exactly when it happened but SE had a MAJOR tank in its stock price. I believe it was a few years ago. That is alot of money lost right there. So they continue to be spread thinner and thinner.

This is why sometimes I try to defend SE on my posts because I can understand things from their side. Which leads to debates, arguments /lolignorelists etc. I'm not here to fight with people and I can understand where the player is coming from. Things aren't as easy said and done. I blame alot of FF11 lack of attention because of the failure of 14 which I'm sure we all can agree on. But they have alot at stake and they need to redeem themselves.

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Originally Posted by Alhanelem

I don't know what GW II is, but Diablo III isn't even in the same genre. It's not an MMO, it's a co-op Roguelike game. It's not a persistent world and you only play with a few people in created games at a time.

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Guild Wars 2?
May bee.

There's nothing impossible to obtain. Everything can be done by any casual player. Why all the complaining?

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Originally Posted by Hercule

It's important to keep an impossible dream somewhere.

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Er, no, if it's impossible then only a retarded idiot would try to do it, normal people will just pack up and leave if that's all there would be keeping them playing.

People here are agreed on that, the debate is just how near 'impossible' the thing should be, because right now it is, for all practical intents, 'impossible'.

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Originally Posted by Hercule

It's important to keep an impossible dream somewhere.

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Just wondering, but do you get your philosophy from fate/Zero? Are you a king?

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Originally Posted by Yarly

There's nothing impossible to obtain. Everything can be done by any casual player. Why all the complaining?

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Yeah a casual player and 17 of his closest friends literally devoting years of their lives to obtain a single item just for him. I suppose it technically isn't impossible, but I'd like to see you get it done. I'll stop back by in a decade to see how it's going for you.

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Originally Posted by saevel

WTH is your issue with F2P MMO's? They wouldn't be making money unless there was a demand for them, which means customers. Or are you wanting to turn the MMO industry into a authoritarian dictatorship where only Sparthos approved MMO's are allowed to be published.

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This is an opinion board and my opinion is that F2P MMOs are a blatant cashgrab designed to squeeze money from players rather than creating a world where people enjoy themselves. It's no different than the system of DLC that also plagues the market - publishers give you less and less for your 40/50/60 dollar purchases then nickle and dime you for things you'd have normally got with the original bundle. Console releases already do this to the annoyance of gamers and MMOs only scale up the problem.

F2P reward people with deep pockets and to those who are on tight budgets? You're screwed because you can't afford to "play" (keep up with) the game. People play games to escape the realities of real-life, not to be shown that they can't obtain beamsword +12 because it costs $5 in a cash shop and has become the standard in gameplay within the virtual world. F2P almost always turns out costing the player more than the subscription model so it's no wonder that publishers are more than happy to put a price tag on everything, especially when doubled-down with the obsessive nature of MMOs.

Wait, here's where you say "Spar, you don't have to buy anything at all you'll simply just have to limit yourself." and to that I say why shouldn't players be on equal footing? The developers demonize RMT activities then turn around and basically design a game around it, what a joke. As far as I'm concerned F2P models actively encourage the old adage of throwing money at problems and quickly become less about enjoyment and all about keeping up with your credit card.

The developers know it and that's why most of the good things wind up in the cash shop. Or should I call it the Crysta shop to blunt the reality of it being an RMT store?

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There is nothing wrong with F2P, it's a different revenue model with P2P and if implemented horribly will result in your MMO shutting down and going out of business. If implemented properly then you'll turn a profit. See Turbine.

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Who said anything about profits? You think I can't see the lucrative benefits of a company doing a F2P MMO? Oh I can see it but that comes at the price of selling your playerbase down the river. Instead of centering on satisfying the customer (who is willing to pay) you become totally obsessed with turning a profit by pushing the envelope. The "free to play" is the bait and once they have their hooks in you it becomes $1 here, $5 there and $10 to go anywhere.

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Originally Posted by Sparthos

This is an opinion board and my opinion is that F2P MMOs are a blatant cashgrab designed to squeeze money from players rather than creating a world where people enjoy themselves. It's no different than the system of DLC that also plagues the market - publishers give you less and less for your 40/50/60 dollar purchases then nickle and dime you for things you'd have normally got with the original bundle. Console releases already do this to the annoyance of gamers and MMOs only scale up the problem.

F2P reward people with deep pockets and to those who are on tight budgets? You're screwed because you can't afford to "play" (keep up with) the game. People play games to escape the realities of real-life, not to be shown that they can't obtain beamsword +12 because it costs $5 in a cash shop and has become the standard in gameplay within the virtual world. F2P almost always turns out costing the player more than the subscription model so it's no wonder that publishers are more than happy to put a price tag on everything, especially when doubled-down with the obsessive nature of MMOs.

Wait, here's where you say "Spar, you don't have to buy anything at all you'll simply just have to limit yourself." and to that I say why shouldn't players be on equal footing? The developers demonize RMT activities then turn around and basically design a game around it, what a joke. As far as I'm concerned F2P models actively encourage the old adage of throwing money at problems and quickly become less about enjoyment and all about keeping up with your credit card.

The developers know it and that's why most of the good things wind up in the cash shop. Or should I call it the Crysta shop to blunt the reality of it being an RMT store?



Who said anything about profits? You think I can't see the lucrative benefits of a company doing a F2P MMO? Oh I can see it but that comes at the price of selling your playerbase down the river. Instead of centering on satisfying the customer (who is willing to pay) you become totally obsessed with turning a profit by pushing the envelope. The "free to play" is the bait and once they have their hooks in you it becomes $1 here, $5 there and $10 to go anywhere.

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Couldn't say it better myself.

Technically, all MMOs are a cash grab. but hey, let's blanket bash all f2p games, there aren't any good ones out there!

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Originally Posted by Sparthos

This is an opinion board and my opinion is that F2P MMOs are a blatant cashgrab designed to squeeze money from players rather than creating a world where people enjoy themselves. It's no different than the system of DLC that also plagues the market - publishers give you less and less for your 40/50/60 dollar purchases then nickle and dime you for things you'd have normally got with the original bundle. Console releases already do this to the annoyance of gamers and MMOs only scale up the problem.

F2P reward people with deep pockets and to those who are on tight budgets? You're screwed because you can't afford to "play" (keep up with) the game. People play games to escape the realities of real-life, not to be shown that they can't obtain beamsword +12 because it costs $5 in a cash shop and has become the standard in gameplay within the virtual world. F2P almost always turns out costing the player more than the subscription model so it's no wonder that publishers are more than happy to put a price tag on everything, especially when doubled-down with the obsessive nature of MMOs.

Wait, here's where you say "Spar, you don't have to buy anything at all you'll simply just have to limit yourself." and to that I say why shouldn't players be on equal footing? The developers demonize RMT activities then turn around and basically design a game around it, what a joke. As far as I'm concerned F2P models actively encourage the old adage of throwing money at problems and quickly become less about enjoyment and all about keeping up with your credit card.

The developers know it and that's why most of the good things wind up in the cash shop. Or should I call it the Crysta shop to blunt the reality of it being an RMT store?



Who said anything about profits? You think I can't see the lucrative benefits of a company doing a F2P MMO? Oh I can see it but that comes at the price of selling your playerbase down the river. Instead of centering on satisfying the customer (who is willing to pay) you become totally obsessed with turning a profit by pushing the envelope. The "free to play" is the bait and once they have their hooks in you it becomes $1 here, $5 there and $10 to go anywhere.

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Ahh there is our difference. Your referring to some horrible F2P MMO's that are similar to drug dealers. I'm referring to significantly better ones. Specifically I'm referring to DDO run by Turbine, something I've been playing on and off for several years now.

DDO is free to download, no purchase necessary. There is nothing you can "buy" that isn't obtainable in game. You can either spend money on a TP bundle and buy the Drow race, or you farm fame for a week and buy the Drow race option. Nothing is locked out from F2P members, they only need to put in the effort to acquire the points if they want access to things.

DDO has three systems, first being F2P where it's 100% free no purchase required yet does require time. Second option is the most popular where people occasionally spend $5~20 for a point pack and use that to speed up the unlocking process. The third system is a full blown subscription model. I spend $15 per month subscription fee, for this fee I get a fully unlocked account bank, access to all zones, access to all jobs and races, and access to all expanded content on day 1. I never need to buy an expansion pack as due to being a subscription member it's provided to me for free. Along with this I'm provided with 500 TP per month to spend on things like XP / Loot potions or consumables. Both potions only provide a +20% bonus over the course of three hours and are a something like 200TP each. Their designed to be used prior to spamming quests for level ups / loot rewards. Did I mention the entire game is instanced. The only zones that are shared are the city's which are used as quest and market hubs. The moment I walk outside I get an instanced zone of the region. This would be like walking out of Jeuno and getting an instanced copy of Rolenbery and everything attached. For my moneys worth, DDO provides me with significantly more then FFXI. So if it's a "cash grab" then so too is FFXI.

Now I play both because while I enjoy a hardcore MMO like FFXI, I like to have something I can jump in / out of as a break to prevent the burnout that eventually sets in.

So yes I agree with you that many "F2P" MMO's are absolute crap and do nothing but force players to "pay to win". I would never play those games because I can recognize a rip off when I see it. Also realize that there are good F2P/P2P hybrid games out there. They use the F2P model to get casual players in and the subscription model for the hardcore players and thus establish a large player-base with which to interact.