Suggestion: Break the game, SE

[Kuvo]

The thing is that SE has completely gone away from what made this series fantastic. Final fantasy has always been about the main story line and cutting edge graphics with epic gear and weapons being a side quest. FFXI has turned into a gear and weapon fest and nothing more. What good are these weapons and gear that takes forever to get when there is no worth while content to use them on.

I have seen people when the Almace first came out working day in and day out to get it. When they finally got it they would sit in jeuno with it equiped showing it off. Once in a while go into an Aby party and do a few WS to show off. WOOOHOOOO wow that is so worth it. As a BLM i can kill aby mobs just as quick or even faster then someone with an Empy weapon and it took me only seconds to buy the spells. To me all this game has been is "See how long it took me to get my weapon/gear show."

And the feeling of logging in and thinking today i'll be able to have some fun maybe some friends are on or my LS is actually going to do something today... has gone by by. I recently came back since november (skyrim release) to give this game another shot but my god it's worse then before.

And to SE... thank god, we as gamers, have other options.

[Falseliberty]

I would like more structured events, more aby for the casuals, more maze grinding like salvage for the more seasoned players

the problem is SE dosent seem to have the staff for for putting diff lvls of events out there for people to do

[doctorugh]

Make certain areas PVP.......if you build it they will come (or at least buy you some time to think of something to add to the game)

[Elexia]

what you all failed to mention or even realize is that SE is using the funds from this game to fund the development of FF14. they moved our GOOD dev team over to 14 and gave us back the loltanaka dev team

Lol, even though said team was on XIV AND XI at the same time? Why do think WoTG was such a slow completion process during XIV's development? You do know Tanaka was still here for Abyssea as well, right?

Not to mention if you played any older FF game or Seiken Densetsu game, I'd find it hard to believe you didn't enjoy them. Any money a company makes off of a game goes towards other projects, that's how a business works.

[Aquilla]

The only thing the XIV debacle proved is that SE is willing to hold on to however many customers they can, damn be all common sense.

SE isn't nefarious, just stupid. They aren't killing FFXI for XIV -- that wouldn't make any sense, because people who would be embittered by one shitty MMO from squeenix wouldn't flock to another MMO by squeenix.

That being said, I don't care who's doing what at SE. I'm not going to pretend to know who was in charge of what. SE, sadly, doesn't send me memos about their organizational structure. Ultimately, though, I don't care. SE opened up the forums because they wanted our opinions. Here they are.

The game needs a serious shake-up. They need to stop balancing, tweaking, or waffling. There is no reason why I, at 99, shouldn't feel more powerful than I did at 75. Aby proved that it doesn't take +5 of a stat to make a meaningful difference in gameplay. Aby also proved that it is possible to have fun in XI, to do it casually and in a non-grindy way.

Edit: Yeah, they should look into PvP. It's a real aspect of online gameplay that they are ignoring outright. Ballista died because they took their middling, tweaking, and nerfing approach to it, coupled with inconvenient access and zero to low rewards.

It's all about giving people bang for their buck. If I pay for a game on a monthly basis, than that game should be more exciting, engaging, and fun to play than the flashy F2P fare that seems to roll out on a monthly basis these days.

And yeah, I want more story, also. Unfortunately, SE's idea of storytelling is still somewhere in the nintendo era. There is no reason why gaming can't have an engaging storyline -- but quite frankly, for a franchise that was all about story, SE's recent offerings have been vapid, overblown, and godawful.

[Elexia]

And yeah, I want more story, also. Unfortunately, SE's idea of storytelling is still somewhere in the nintendo era. There is no reason why gaming can't have an engaging storyline --

Which is still better than shitty hammy voiceacting found in games like Skyrim or Dragon Age, or is that your idea of "engaging story telling?" Because I read books that beat it out pretty much every video game storyline to exist. This is the most subjective thing ever.

[Sagagemini]

The greatest problem is that Square Enix keeps the formula "let's reward the hardcore gamers for their lack of social life" while punishing heavily the majority made from casuals. FFXI was a spetacular niche game 9 years ago but these ppl grew up and their reality is completely different today.

Though some endgame linkshells are still ruled by ppl whose lives are entirely devoted to a game, the majority that are still paying subscriptions and keeping this game alive for so long, even the fresh players, are losing interest day by day with so many events relying so much on others to acquire stuff.

While it might sound nice to promote cooperative gameplay, the way events were designed in ffxi since 2003 promotes a lot of elitism and the masses are left out. One example? Try to get a af3+2 item. It's an item for your job that basically nobody else wants to do anymore since they are trying to get their 10th empyrean weapon (endgame ls leaders of course, the rest will slave-whore themselves for one empyrean.

What happens to the new players that are the breath of air that MUST be flowing inside the game? They see impossible to reach objectives unless they destroy their social lives like endgame shells require (honestly, who in their sane mind stays 5 days a week during nights at home unless you have no family or friends?) and lose interest. With games rewarding them so much faster, trying to get even a single af3+2 item seems a herculean task. You have to rely on ppl to get your Atma, then you have to rely on more ppl to get +1 seals, then you have to rely on more ppl to get +2 seals.

And you only finished 1 item. Let's not even talk about weapon trials. While hardcore gamers might see this as a perk from the game (leaving the best gear to a handful of them) its clear that this system isn't the one that keeps players logging in nowadays. The average player mentality changed.The most rare item in the world is TIME and with less and less time to play games a company that still requires you to devote so much for so little is bound to suffer from hemorrhage till it becomes a F2P.

Abyssea never made the game easier. It just created another carrot in the end of tunnel for us to hunt. The problem is, while in other MMORPG you can go on your own way to the carrot in here your pathetic character still needs the help of others to accomplish his own adventures. This worked perfectly in 2003. But not anymore.

It doesn't matter if hardcore players agree with this or not. FFXI must become more solo friendly. There is so much content in this game that even being more solo friendly it won't ruin the endgame. This is the only game where players have characters that are not tied to one class. They can farm 20 different jobs for gear. This is the only MMORPG where story matters and they can go through each one of them in their own time.

Its SE move now. FF14 will sink soon and without making FF11 an appealing game for new starters with a social life (job and family) the future is really bad towards Square in the MMORPG market.

[Elexia]

FF14 will sink soon and without making FF11 an appealing game for new starters with a social life (job and family) the future is really bad towards Square in the MMORPG market.

If 14 was to sink it would have done so in 2010 and not exist today, not during nor after a major overhaul 2 years later. SE will do just fine if they play their cards right.

Abyssea never made the game easier.

Most of us who played XI for at least more than a year prior to abyssea or ToAU can safely say, Abyssea made the game easier. Period. How often did you in 2002-2009 open a chest and got 1250 exp? Let alone open 10 chests back to back in a span of 20 seconds for 1250 exp?

How likely were you to go to a NPC and buy a full set of armor with Haste on it? Let alone how likely were you to have a weapon that beat out most Relics and Mythics for only weeks work rather than years?

[Sagagemini]

Its not about handing down every single piece of equipment to terribads. Its about making only the ABSOLUTE BEST items requiring to have a group. Things like atmas and at least af3+1 had to be soloable by any job without that idiocy of proccing that makes you having to shout for job x or y to do something for you. While players could be doing their own adventures and having tons of fun they are shouting in port jeuno. Those who are in endgame shells or have real life friends playing don't have a clue about it since most of them are being carried by their ls leaders or friends or boyfriends.

[Sagagemini]

If 14 was to sink it would have done so in 2010 and not exist today, not during nor after a major overhaul 2 years later. SE will do just fine if they play their cards right.



Most of us who played XI for at least more than a year prior to abyssea or ToAU can safely say, Abyssea made the game easier. Period. How often did you in 2002-2009 open a chest and got 1250 exp? Let alone open 10 chests back to back in a span of 20 seconds for 1250 exp?

How likely were you to go to a NPC and buy a full set of armor with Haste on it? Let alone how likely were you to have a weapon that beat out most Relics and Mythics for only weeks work rather than years?

Its much more harder for me nowadays to get a group going for VV Atma than it was to defeat Promathia back in 2005. I understand that with empyreans and 3 atmas you can basically do anything in Abyssea but first you need to get those. It was so much easier to find groups for Ouryu or any other part of COP even if you were not in a static and you could keep your progression. Now 7 years later its basically impossible to get some atmas and af3+2 items with random shouts.

How easier the game has become?


Honestly i came back to do the trivial and im not even bothering anymore about the bandwagon i lost. But you can't ask for a new player to be motivated as i am, due to my 2003 nostalgia, having to be satisfied with crap from AH or lose his social life to whorehimself in an endgame ls where he is going to complete leaders and officers gear 10 times before anything else.

This is just not the way the MMORPG market works anymore. Online gaming is becoming more and more casual. While i applaud that FFXI stays true (sort of it) to its old formula of randomness drops and devotion to get stuff (i took 3 years to get my duelist chapeau+1 back then) i also see it dying with it.

Im talking about SE future as an online gaming company. They almost destroyed their franchise with FF14 with their stubborn attitude of always being right . They have the tools to make an AAA online product BUT they must start accepting the fact that gamers now are more casual than ever and they won't devote themselves to any game that doesn't reward them fast.

Like it or not. Its money that keeps this business going and these casuals are the ones with it. Much more than the 1-5% of hardcore players.