Ludicrous game mechanics are ludicrous

[Kraggy]

Although I've been playing since early '05 it never ceases to amaze me how ludicrous some of XI's game mechanics are: of the many, the most direly bad IMO is Reputation. It is so totally typical of SE's "tell 'em nothing, make 'em use a fansite" philosophy which permeates the entire game.

This fact hit me again over the weekend when, for the umpteenth time in nearly 8 years I did the NIN scrolls in Norg. Think about how this works and then tell me with a straight face this is how enjoyable MMOs should be .. and don't for one second say "use the web" because that just proves my point for me ...

To do the six Norg quests for these scrolls you need to get rep. level 4. Of course, the game doesn't tell you this, nor remotely hint at it, at all. This goes for the entire rep. system, there's zero in-game indication what that little fanfare when you turn in a rep-bearing quest means.

Indeed, apart from the totally obscure rep-NPCs' responses should you get round to talking to them you would be forgiven for being totally ignorant the rep. system exists.

However, even should you realise this .. again, IN-GAME ONLY counts, fansites are a cop-out .. the fact that quests are rep-based is the next totally hidden feature.

Taking my Norg quests in particular, let's say to find the quest giver in Port Bastok and do the initial quest. The NPC does indeed tell you that it's repeatable and you may, for 350 gil, do so.

However, that's it, period. The fact that you're gaining Norg rep. isn't made known, even obliquely.

When you eventually get to Norg and speak to the NPCs that give these quests there is nothing at all that remotely hints that these guys have any quests to give you, far less any idea that the rep. you need for them largely needs to be done by 20+ repeats of a quest half the world away: yes, there are other quests, like the Yagudo necklaces which are equally hidden as to their outcome.

Thus, in order to get these quests you need to perform repeated actions to raise a stat you know nothing about for a number of times you have no idea about and even if you finally manage to stumble upon these quest NPCs when your rep. is somehow level 4 you'll have no idea why.

Can anyone, from SE or outside, seriously tell me, with a straight face this is how it should be and that, in the absence of the 'official guide', 'DAT mining' and other third-party efforts like the Wiki, the quest system in this game is at all playable?

The sources of all the Teleport scrolls, Warp 2 (Warp is likely to be stumbled upon since it only needs rep. 2 to get), the most required NIN Ichi scrolls, etc. are a huge mystery that only the Wiki reveals.

Is this how an RPG should be?

Seriously?

No, I don't want it 'dumbing down' to the level WOW has become, or indeed how FFXIV seems to be headed, but there's a happy medium between "silver platter" mode and the absolute requirement to ALT-TAB to a Wiki to know what's going on.

Oh yes, one final thought, what sort of asinine rep. system is it that allows me to become a HERO of much of the original gameworld by feeding 25 stacks of moss to a sheep in an obscure little fishing village in the middle of nowhere?

[Demon6324236]

Good points!

[Caketime]

Don't hate on the moss trading. It's either that or stealing all of the babies and poaching.

[Tsukino_Kaji]

Is this how an RPG should be?

Yes. From what you are getting at, it seems that you have very little experience in RPGS or even other games in general. Go play games that have compassess to show you the way or the ones that give you directions to where you need to go. Those games are over in a matter of hours. Start at point A, go to point B as instructed, game finished. They lose all replayability. Games should be like this and not handed to you ona silver platter. The point is, is that if oyu want to, someone else already did go through the same thing and has told other people of such. Even before teh hard information age we have now, there were stratagy guides for this kind of thing.
My first serious RPG was Crono Trigger. Aside from 5 or 6 things that had to do with the main story, you weren't told jack. You had to go out and figure out everything by yourself. This is how games should be. Things from one area affecting another without you even knowing about it. I.e. Things from the past changing the future and then you aren't able to take on said thing in the furture anymore. All of this is called effort, it's a dirty word I know. Back in '04 I never touched any online sources to play FFXI. I would say to people in the LS, "Hey, how do I X?" And guess what, there were people who knew, or knew people who knew. "Oh btw, you need fame for that."
"What's fame?"
Admittedly, perhaps there should have been some blurb when you go to somewhere like Norg from quest NPCs saying something like, "Who are you?" With increases like "Weren't you that guy?" or "Weren't you here before?" much like the fame NPCs change what they say. It would show that there might be something there later.
But the biggest point is, is that back in the day, you had to you know. Go places and talk to people.

[Evandis]

Yes. From what you are getting at, it seems that you have very little experience in RPGS or even other games in general. Go play games that have compassess to show you the way or the ones that give you directions to where you need to go. Those games are over in a matter of hours. Start at point A, go to point B as instructed, game finished. They lose all replayability. Games should be like this and not handed to you ona silver platter. The point is, is that if oyu want to, someone else already did go through the same thing and has told other people of such. Even before teh hard information age we have now, there were stratagy guides for this kind of thing.
My first serious RPG was Crono Trigger. Aside from 5 or 6 things that had to do with the main story, you weren't told jack. You had to go out and figure out everything by yourself. This is how games should be. Things from one area affecting another without you even knowing about it. I.e. Things from the past changing the future and then you aren't able to take on said thing in the furture anymore. All of this is called effort, it's a dirty word I know. Back in '04 I never touched any online sources to play FFXI. I would say to people in the LS, "Hey, how do I X?" And guess what, there were people who knew, or knew people who knew. "Oh btw, you need fame for that."
"What's fame?"
Admittedly, perhaps there should have been some blurb when you go to somewhere like Norg from quest NPCs saying something like, "Who are you?" With increases like "Weren't you that guy?" or "Weren't you here before?" much like the fame NPCs change what they say. It would show that there might be something there later.
But the biggest point is, is that back in the day, you had to you know. Go places and talk to people.

Oh please get off your high horse and stop spouting this stupid silver platter crap. This is a game and when you look around at other MMOs, specifically the one that you are putting down indirectly, they have far more players. You know why? Because it's fun for more people than those who have no jobs or simple jobs that require no deduction skills. Many people go to work 5 days a week and solve complex issues and want to come home and enjoy a game, not a second job.

The real reason the game is so bland on information is because, as usual with SE, they want to force you to buy the strategy guide as well. And there was quite a large one sold for this in 03/04. This mixed with SEs apparent disdain for anything not Japanese is one of the major downfalls to this game, and the fact that 500K subscribers was the peak of it. This game seems to have been released outside of Japan begrudgingly, as a money making idea and not a true decision by that idiot Tanaka, and he is an idiot that can kill games with promise because of BS mentioned above.

Many MMO makers have found ways to make a game both fun and challenging without just adding 2 billion collect this and collect that items and quests. You say that those games have a short lifespan...please, WoW is smashing on MMOs with their subscription AND player loyalty rates and will have a much longer lifespan thanks to it.

WoW was too cartoony for me, but there are many things about FFXI that are frustrating, and downright insulting to those who want to play and enjoy a game. I don't want to see everyone walking around with Mythic, but maybe if there was some sort of logical hint and progression system with most of these quests and fame based scenarios, there would be many more new players who play and stay.

Also, the JP gaming community has gotten a lot more localized responses to their questions and hint dropping from SE. It's why when this game started in the NA in 2003, most of the information was gleaned by NA players who could read the JP sites.

[Elexia]

Oh please get off your high horse and stop spouting this stupid silver platter crap. This is a game and when you look around at other MMOs, specifically the one that you are putting down indirectly, they have far more players. You know why?

Commercials.

[Evandis]

Whatever you need to tell yourself to sleep at night.

[Elexia]

Whatever you need to tell yourself to sleep at night.

No really, commercials is the main reason many games have a lot of subs. Wizard 101 is far from an amazing game yet it has a ton of subs to it and guess what you see almost all day on certain family stations? Commercials for it, seems its just you that need to tell yourself something to sleep at night.

[Alhanelem]

Yes. From what you are getting at, it seems that you have very little experience in RPGS or even other games in general. Go play games that have compassess to show you the way or the ones that give you directions to where you need to go. Those games are over in a matter of hours. Start at point A, go to point B as instructed, game finished. They lose all replayability. Games should be like this and not handed to you ona silver platter. The point is, is that if oyu want to, someone else already did go through the same thing and has told other people of such. Even before teh hard information age we have now, there were stratagy guides for this kind of thing.
My first serious RPG was Crono Trigger. Aside from 5 or 6 things that had to do with the main story, you weren't told jack. You had to go out and figure out everything by yourself. This is how games should be. Things from one area affecting another without you even knowing about it. I.e. Things from the past changing the future and then you aren't able to take on said thing in the furture anymore. All of this is called effort, it's a dirty word I know. Back in '04 I never touched any online sources to play FFXI. I would say to people in the LS, "Hey, how do I X?" And guess what, there were people who knew, or knew people who knew. "Oh btw, you need fame for that."
"What's fame?"
Admittedly, perhaps there should have been some blurb when you go to somewhere like Norg from quest NPCs saying something like, "Who are you?" With increases like "Weren't you that guy?" or "Weren't you here before?" much like the fame NPCs change what they say. It would show that there might be something there later.
But the biggest point is, is that back in the day, you had to you know. Go places and talk to people.

I'll just say this: There is a fine line between holding a player's hands the whole way and making something cryptic but solveable. You can have information in a game (e.g., information that any real person could and would reasonably give if they were the NPC) that needs thought in order to make use of, without telling the player every single little thing ("hand holding")

For the example of reuptation- There is nothing anywhere in the game that even hints that there might be some secret number you need to jack up before an NPC will talk to you. I think SE figured that people would simply earn rep over time and people would discover more NPCs would give them stuff to do, but even if you do manage to figure out there's some kind of rep system, there's nothing to tell you exactly when it's changing (except a sound effect that just sounds like "yay you beat the quest") or that there's different rep for different places, or that NPCs in totally unrelated places can increase your rep somewhere else.

The OP isn't suggesting that we add flashing signs every step of the way, but simply that important game systems aren't completely hidden from view and not able to be determined by the average player without consulting a guide on a website.

If you can't, WITH REASONABLE EFFORT, decipher how to solve a quest or game mechanic, then not enough information is being given.

Simple fix for reputaiton: When you complete a quest, have it display a message: "Your reputation with <insert NPC, place, or organization here> has increased." It doesn't have to say how much, or explicitly what it does- just letting the player know it exists and that they made it go up should be plenty enough information.

[Prrsha]

What about the NPCs that tell you your current fame? If a person spoke to every NPC in the town, you are bound to come across him. It's how I figured it out when all the guides that existed were in Japanese.