BYE TANAKA!

[Lastranger]

Thank u for the many game expieriences given to us by your hard work over the years, Hope your health gets better and that u enjoy ur retirement.

[Nala]

I don't like what he did with XI and XIV, but he worked on some of the best single-player RPGs of all time. So, I hope he gets back on that and stays away from online games. He directed the DS remake of FFIII which was great, and was a producer on loads of great games I'm sure you're all fond of: Xenogears, Chrono Cross, Secret of Mana. Oh, and he was a programmer on one of my favorite games of all time: Final Fantasy Legend II (SaGa II in Japan).

So even though I think his policies were bad for XI and XIV, I wouldn't go so far as to condemn him entirely. He's done good work, but online games just aren't his thing and it's taken too long for SE to realize that.

Eh i hated chrono cross from its storyline basis, while the battle system was somewhat innovative from a standard take turn RPG it felt like a step back from what chrono trigger was also via scraps and tidbits basically suggest that every main character from trigger was dead including robo (prometheus was integrated into mother brain and eliminated during the course of the story) that and it had far too many characters with little to now back ground story or direct story line involvement, having a few POWERFUL but baseless special characters is nice, but not 30+ (iirc 40ish total) non essential and normal playable characters.

That said cross had some of the best music of its time, have a few of em in my mp3 player in fact good nostalgia music.

Heh kind of got off on a long tangent, he has really done some great works in the past but the fact that he will no longer be heading up 11 makes the future of the game seem brighter as such i will not miss him as director of this game, though am sad to know that SE had lost some good expertise in the single player world.

In reguards to the undeserved hate he had garnished while lack luster content was being released due to the new expansion being developed i can't agree that it was totally undeserved, only in the fact that if they were going to go through with this they could have been teasing us with tidbits and hints all the while much like how they use to when these forums first came out instead of letting people get pissy and subscriptions starting to lapse.

Would have kept peeps interested/excited through the bland parts.

tl;dr Disliked Chrono Cross' story line for killing off trigger's characters, will not miss tanaka where 11's concern but SE did lose a great man, he deserved any hate he got during the last year of lack luster content because he failed to hint/tease to keep us placated and or excited for things to come.

[Arciel]

Tanaka-san,

Thank you for 10 years with Final Fantasy XI.
All the best in future and take care of your health!

田中さん

このＦＦＸＩの１０年間に大変ありがとうございました！
お大事に　お疲れ様でした

[Sparthos]

Tanaka gets so much UNDESERVED hate it's unbelievable.

If not for him there wouldn't have been a FFXI. You also have him to thank for getting us Seekers of Adoulin. Hindsight tells a different story. People were hating on the lack of content to VW and Legion and such, Tanaka gets the blame and is called shit all throughout, while this whole time they've been working on a relatively large expansion with all original areas, new enemies, new jobs, new gameplay, new guilds, etc. in secret. I guess he just grinned and took it like a man, since it seems the devs actually do like to participate in the community when no one's watching and I doubt he missed the massive shitstorm of hate and whining. He apparently loved FFXI.

Then come vana'fest, the man looked pretty damn ill. Seriously, look at a pic from a year ago or so, then watch his vana'fest footage. I was talking about it with my friend and wife, and at the end he retired due to "health problems".

Thank you very much Mr. Tanaka.

He gets hatred as a developer, not as a person. It's totally fair to call Tanaka out on all the silly, poor, backwards and stubborn decisions that got him the ire of both NA/EU/JP players because so many of them could have been avoided had Tanaka stopped developing in his bunker and communicated with the base that would have been more than happy to nudge him in the right direction.

For all the mockery of balance and Tanaka himself most players would have liked the guy if he simply had been more vocal to the concerns of his customers. He may have been skilled at single-player games but it was clear that Tanaka was not the ideal choice for MMOs and he nearly killed two SE titles in the process.

You're right that time will tell if Tanaka was the sole reason this game suffered so much but as it stands:

Tanaka the developer = Bad.
Tanaka the person = Unknown.
Tanaka the ailing human being = Deserving of empathy.

[Raksha]

[Dragoy]

I was listening to/watching the stream at night/early morning (my time), and while I do understand quite a bit of Japanese, I wasn't quite certain that he was 'passing the torch' and leaving, but there we have it.

I'm sure there are people jumping for joy, but I for one do hope he will be OK, and am able to say thank you, and farewell with the best regards in mind.

さ
ら
ば
だ
。
。
。

[Zerich]

desu tanaka-san....desu

[ForeverZero]

I hope Tanaka will be ok and has a quick recovery. Thanks for all you have done for Final Fantasy XI and past games, Tanaka!

[saevel]

The reason there is so much hate for Tanaka is that he worshiped the status quo and used it as his guiding principle. Basically his design philosophy was that nothing should change. New gear, content and abilities, as long as nothing changes. Our relative power level and ability to accomplish goals must remain the same no matter what content is released, hence the years and years of side grades and "situational" gear. The fact that gear obtained in 2005 was still not only relevant but often the most powerful in slot in 2008 is testament to the problem. He didn't like Abyssea because it changed the status quo and allowed us to do things we couldn't do before thus forcing more work on the development team. He then spent the rest of the time after Abyssea trying to force the status quo of 2008 back onto us.

This isn't a bad idea for single player console RPGs, it's the absolute worst thing you can do for dynamic evolving MMORPGs.

[Dazusu]

This isn't a bad idea for single player console RPGs, it's the absolute worst thing you can do for dynamic evolving MMORPGs.

Considering Tanaka had no idea what he was doing - FFIX has done pretty well for its self being in its tenth year of service, with enough subscribers to warrant a new boxed expansion and thousands of people turning up to VanaFests whenever they're thrown. Not to mention the fact that all the same people who sit on the forums and cry about the game every day continue to be active subscribers, and by extension, players.

Remind me again why we're all still subscribed?

The fact you're still subscribed yourself makes your posts in this thread scream of hypocrisy.

Clearly the man was doing something right; and if you think he made all the decisions of every aspect of game play, then you're severely mistaken. Judging by how well written your posts are, I'm surprised that the content of them is as flatulent as it is. MMOs need teams and experimentation to get things right, and while I agree that FFXI (or any other MMO for that matter) don't always come up with the best ideas - to scream "zomg it's all tanaka's fault" is pretty short sighted.