Updates: FFXI and FFXIV, a comparison

so they are working on things, and none of them are working .........is delayed even more (chocobos 2012? are %$"$"$ kidding me ?) , is half implemented or whatever............cool ~~

betel , where are u getting this info ?

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Originally Posted by viion

While true, why not post screenshots? they've posted 1 and it was ages ago. And even put up post of 1 dungeon in the Lodestone which has crappy images (to match the theme).

Goblin was never put in our files until day of release, but there are other mobs existing now in the files, couple even fully complete but they are not being used anywhere in the game, so its confusing.

Still as Warlyx and Wolfie are talking about, being this quiet, returning near nothing in information, the last post on lodestone is the last patch, makes game look very dead and like the dev team are not concerned. It doesnt seem like they're doing much behind the scenes.

Knowing my luck though I always state this then a fking news letter comes out after weekend. I know we wont get anything until Monday onwards because no one works during weekends in SE. Also with e3 I think things will be quiet.

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They could post screenshots, but they seem more concerned with surprising people than actually just telling people what's up. I really don't see them becoming more open until FFXIV has its own public test server.

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Originally Posted by Warlyx

so they are working on things, and none of them are working .........is delayed even more (chocobos 2012? are %$"$"$ kidding me ?) , is half implemented or whatever............cool ~~

betel , where are u getting this info ?

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Lol

I am merely demonstrating what would happen if they were to release every adjustment separately. Adjustment that relates to multiple other features being worked on. And when a feature X being worked on needs to be changed, already implemented feature Y needs to be changed as well or they wouldn't work together.

Battle system and everything it entails
Job system
Items
Content
Crafting
Servers, engine

Everything relates to everything. If you change something on one feature, every other feature potentially needs to be changed. Thus you can't work on them separately based off concepts alone.

This seems to be really hard to grasp for some people.

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Originally Posted by Warlyx

so they are working on things, and none of them are working .........is delayed even more (chocobos 2012? are %$"$"$ kidding me ?) , is half implemented or whatever............cool ~~

betel , where are u getting this info ?

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He posted a strawman argument about what it would look like if they released things unfinished.

Which begs the question, why is so little finished after such a long period of time? Or, where are features not related to the battle system, since Yoshi said there are multiple, specialized teams working on this game? Or, where are status updates on other things if they're not ready to be implemented yet?

Oh, that's right. They're not working on anything else.

/sarcasm on

I'm pretty sure the entire Square-Enix office is just standing around sucking their thumbs, I mean clearly they aren't doing anything, and clearly they're losing so much money they must be lazy.

/sarcasm off

They have to -reprogram- core systems in the game. They have to fix their formulas, algorithms, etc. They have several teams working on their respective content, some are translating, some are designing new art, some are writing stories, etc. Unfortunately in the world of game development we don't get hourly twitter feeds straight from each individual member of the dev team. I'm sure they are already working way ahead of "battle redesign" in other departments, but unfortunately the community (us) gets stuck behind the bottleneck at the programming team. Could they be short on staff? Sure. But the game is free, be patient or play something else.

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Originally Posted by Wolfie

Which begs the question, why is so little finished after such a long period of time? Or, where are features not related to the battle system, since Yoshi said there are multiple, specialized teams working on this game? Or, where are status updates on other things if they're not ready to be implemented yet?

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if you had fully grasped the post, you would have realized that the features need to be developed in parallel. You simply can't make a concept, and then build features one at a time based on said concept.

Why? Because concepts =/= reality. The feature you end up developing will never be like the one in the concept. When features need to work together this results in all the features working differently (= not working as planned, not working together, being a huge mess).

They develop everything that relates to each other at once. Then it is not merely the concept that works and looks good on paper, it's the end result that works too. When there's a problem with AA that affects other features, they are changed accordingly. At the end every feature is ready simultaneously and there are no issues to be had.

Features not related to combat in any way are in short supply. Because most features do, and those features have the priority from the whole team before anything else.

Lastly, I can't wait to hear what other MMO's have done this before (to which you surely base all your claims on). XI changed 2 handed calculations slightly once from what I recall. Woah.

This whole overhaul excuse is about as much bullshit and overused nonsense as Beta was when the excuse was "Come release it will be better, this is beta theres no need for all content ^^" yah that worked out super great.

Overhauling a game engine has absolute NOTHING to do with making 3D Models, or Animation effects or.. sounds? lol.

"I cant make a new battle song! The VIT algorithm doesnt work and is VITAL TO THE KICK DRUM AHHHHH"

overhauling the game engine? huh?

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Originally Posted by viion

This whole overhaul excuse is about as much bullshit and overused nonsense as Beta was when the excuse was "Come release it will be better, this is beta theres no need for all content ^^" yah that worked out super great.

Overhauling a game engine has absolute NOTHING to do with making 3D Models, or Animation effects or.. sounds? lol.

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Yes, let us compare the situation where the players made up shit about unreleased content when the devs had not ever even implied there was such things to the situation where the producer himself has said several times that there will be overhauls which are being worked on in parallel which are released together instead of in small doses due to it being more efficient for them to work that way.

The players did not create any of these claims. The developers did. I think there is slightly more weight in this argument this time, but keep living in denial. You act in the exact same way those people did a year ago, only you're on the opposite side of the spectrum

So, how do you release an armor model which has no stats or job to equip it, or a monster without any content it can appear in?

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Originally Posted by Betelgeuzah

So, how do you release an armor model which has no stats or job to equip it, or a monster without any content it can appear in?

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Make the 3D Model then come battle overhaul you can add the stats, or hell just add what you know will work and tweak it like every other armour will get.

Just because stats will have to be changed does not mean you cannot make the piece, the 3D model and show it to us. What does a battle system have anything to do with Chocobos? Or a Mail System or LS controls or Airships?

They added goblins into the existing area without adding them to any relative content. So your statement does not make any sense.

And as I said earlier, maybe in this post or not, a lot of issues seem to stem from not having enough people working on the game, which again makes no sense considering the dramatic pressure its under.

Lol some people are just plain Ignorant. First of all the new dev team has been here 5 months? and the fact that they are building stuff from the ground up and it's gonna implemented in 4-5 months is amazing by dev standards. My best friend who is game dev is laughing at you nubs who is saying this process is going to slow. You don't create a new battle system and other things in 4-5 months if anything you should be worried its coming out in 4-5 months cause it could be really shitty.

The core system is mess up so they also need to fix that lol

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Originally Posted by Firon

Lol some people are just plain Ignorant. First of all the new dev team has been here 5 months? and the fact that they are building stuff from the ground up and it's gonna implemented in 4-5 months is amazing by dev standards. My best friend who is game dev is laughing at you nubs who is saying this process is going to slow. You don't create a new battle system and other things in 4-5 months if anything you should be worried its coming out in 4-5 months cause it could be really shitty.

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They changed battle system Alpha to beta which in our representation is about 3 months, that was with the old core team.

btw they only replaced Leads and Producer, the team who do all the chor coding is the same old peeps who've been working on it since day one. Do you think there is a team of 8 people on this entire game? lol

And wtf does "your friend who works in the industry" have anything to do with it? I know people in the industry who say total opposite, some say total same, they are viewing it no differently than we are.

Infact all the indy people just laugh at how slow this is considering what company is involved lol

Honestly even you are ignorant for thinking things are fine and everything going swimmingly and that this next update is going to be the brilliance when no doubt in 2-3 months time we'll be back here bitchen about the same thing because nothing will change. Even XI updates got slower and slower over the years and started with a 3 month cycle. XIV has already begun to got slower within its first year lol.

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Originally Posted by viion

Just because stats will have to be changed does not mean you cannot make the piece, the 3D model and show it to us. What does a battle system have anything to do with Chocobos? Or a Mail System or LS controls or Airships?

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Nothing, which is why they have a lower priority until everything related to battle is finished. And there's a lot.

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They added goblins into the existing area without adding them to any relative content. So your statement does not make any sense.

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Depends on what you mean. I didn't know this game was in such a dire need for more normal monster types that they should be working on them instead of... pretty much everything else imaginable.

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And as I said earlier, maybe in this post or not, a lot of issues seem to stem from not having enough people working on the game, which again makes no sense considering the dramatic pressure its under.

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And as I said earlier, there is no problem to be had if they can keep their timeline. Once workforce is freed from developing everything battle related every other issue is a small fry in comparison. Due to the engine and server improvements also easier to implement.

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They changed battle system Alpha to beta which in our representation is about 3 months, that was with the old core team.

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First of all they had the beta battle system ready already just in case people didn't like the alpha version.

Edit: Indy games lol? my buddy works on stuff like Gears of war 3 he know's how much time it takes to test and get stuff ready

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They changed battle system Alpha to beta which in our representation is about 3 months

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Yes, they implemented the stamina gauge and called it a day.

Dayum.

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Originally Posted by Betelgeuzah

Nothing, which is why they have a lower priority until everything related to battle is finished. And there's a lot.

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But even still, the people who work on the Battle system should not be the same people who do the interface or create 3D Models. If you've got people multi-tasking as Jack-of-all-trades then no wonder this game is in such a bad state because joat employees suck.

For Alpha to Beta, even if they had the battle system ready, how long ready, double the time meaning 6 months of work, hmm seems no different from the new team!

Not only did they add Stamina they changed how attack works, changed action bar changed skill menus and during Alpha and Beta did several changes to how stat works regarding algorithms. I'd say about 6-7 updates worth of stat tweaking.


Anywho we keep going back and fourth with the same thing and the new battle system will be out this month, then there will be no more stupid "overhaul" excuses as it will of been done. And then we can see around Autum if they've picked up.

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Originally Posted by Betelgeuzah

if you had fully grasped the post, you would have realized that the features need to be developed in parallel. You simply can't make a concept, and then build features one at a time based on said concept.

Why? Because concepts =/= reality. The feature you end up developing will never be like the one in the concept. When features need to work together this results in all the features working differently (= not working as planned, not working together, being a huge mess).

They develop everything that relates to each other at once. Then it is not merely the concept that works and looks good on paper, it's the end result that works too. When there's a problem with AA that affects other features, they are changed accordingly. At the end every feature is ready simultaneously and there are no issues to be had.

Features not related to combat in any way are in short supply. Because most features do, and those features have the priority from the whole team before anything else.

Lastly, I can't wait to hear what other MMO's have done this before (to which you surely base all your claims on). XI changed 2 handed calculations slightly once from what I recall. Woah.

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ffxi battle changed just as much in less time and they had many other changes going on at the same time

http://zeusls.llima.net/download/ffxiupdatehistory.html. they are moving pretty slow, unless they have massive amount of content they are holding back, which is possible, but i wouldnt bet on it.

Betelgeuzah i think you should just leave it there cause Viion will never agree to anything you say. Simple Menu changes could take months cause the code could collide with tons of other things but people don't know that they just asume when you make xyz item its easy to implement in game.

Code is everything the same reason why after one update on XI SATA was working in front of mobs cause they didn't test it properly.

...Why would we get new mobs without getting new areas?

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Originally Posted by viion

But even still, the people who work on the Battle system should not be the same people who do the interface or create 3D Models. If you've got people multi-tasking as Jack-of-all-trades then no wonder this game is in such a bad state because joat employees suck.

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Uhh...

There are separate people working on 3D models and people working on interface. No one is multitasking.

Do you not understand that all of these people are preparing the battle patch? Creating models and assets, designing AA GUI, developing the materia interface. Regardless of if there is a clear connection or not, these features can not be released before the feature it supports is ready.

And dear God, we have gotten UI improvements, new models and effect improvements during the last few months. What the hell is even your point?

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Not only did they add Stamina they changed how attack works, changed action bar changed skill menus and during Alpha and Beta did several changes to how stat works regarding algorithms. I'd say about 6-7 updates worth of stat tweaking.

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and "all" of it resulted in shit that needs to be changed yet again. Truly remarkable.

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ffxi battle changed just as much in less time and they had many other changes going on at the same time

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"Just as much"? XIV team hasn't even implemented the plethora of changes being prepared. XI team has nothing going on in parallel that would slow them down. Obviously they will get ahead until the XIV team is done.

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Originally Posted by Elexia

...Why would we get new mobs without getting new areas?

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because areas dont have enough monster variety already. why have we not gotten a cap increase? why is many gears currently in game unreleased, why did they have dungeons in game since alpha unreleased? exactly how long do you think it takes to create content? game is coming on 9 months its been out. in 9 months of ffxi, they were like 2 months from an expansion, and the still added more to actual game then we have gotten here, by far.

http://zeusls.llima.net/download/ffxiupdatehistory.html

game came out without dlevel, different enimity, less classes, added jueno metalworks, northlands magic bursts, readjusted auto attack, balanced skills, added skills rebalances skills added tax, blah blah, they did way more in ffxi in less time is the point WAY more. they did just as much balancing of core algorithims, while releaseing content.

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Originally Posted by Betelgeuzah

Uhh...

There are separate people working on 3D models and people working on interface. No one is multitasking.

Do you not understand that all of these people are preparing the battle patch? Creating models and assets, designing AA GUI, developing the materia interface. Regardless of if there is a clear connection or not, these features can not be released before the feature it supports is ready.

And dear God, we have gotten UI improvements, new models and effect improvements during the last few months. What the hell is even your point?



and "all" of it resulted in shit that needs to be changed yet again. Truly remarkable.



"Just as much"? XIV team hasn't even implemented the plethora of changes being prepared. XI team has nothing going on in parallel that would slow them down. Obviously they will get ahead until the XIV team is done.

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look at the changes man, they changed many core battle things, auto attack algorithims among them, dlevel, accuracy, skill chains magic bursts, all while releasing actual content.

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Originally Posted by Physic

look at the changes man, they changed many core battle things, auto attack algorithims among them, dlevel, accuracy, skill chains magic bursts, all while releasing actual content.

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They changed specific elements of existing features, they did not remake them from the very beginning. There was no need to develop in parallel (although there was a need to develop in accordance to other features already in place).

The difference is still like night and day.

And to whoever said the economy is not going to be changed... lol.

They are essentially shifting the item acquisition methods from crafting-based to quest- and other NPC specific methods, while using the materia system to keep crafters and gatherers relevant in an economy where items are obtained elsewhere. Materia system also removes excess items from the economy.

The economy could hardly change any more than this.

But there is no devtag for "economy rehaul" so it can't be true LOL.

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Originally Posted by Physic

because areas dont have enough monster variety already. why have we not gotten a cap increase? why is many gears currently in game unreleased, why did they have dungeons in game since alpha unreleased? exactly how long do you think it takes to create content? game is coming on 9 months its been out. in 9 months of ffxi, they were like 2 months from an expansion, and the still added more to actual game then we have gotten here, by far.

http://zeusls.llima.net/download/ffxiupdatehistory.html

game came out without dlevel, different enimity, less classes, added jueno metalworks, northlands magic bursts, readjusted auto attack, balanced skills, added skills rebalances skills added tax, blah blah, they did way more in ffxi in less time is the point WAY more. they did just as much balancing of core algorithims, while releaseing content.

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I played XI since the JP beta, I recall the layout and the revisions it went through. However, throughout all of XI's history new enemies came with typically new areas same with most MMOs out today. You rarely see them plop new enemies in old zones unless it's linked to a quest or a Pet for example in Rappelz.

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Originally Posted by viion

Make the 3D Model then come battle overhaul you can add the stats, or hell just add what you know will work and tweak it like every other armour will get.

Just because stats will have to be changed does not mean you cannot make the piece, the 3D model and show it to us. What does a battle system have anything to do with Chocobos? Or a Mail System or LS controls or Airships?

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Most of that stuff (the art) is probably already created, it's just not in the live client yet because there's no point. Why show the community everything several months in advance? Where's the fun in that?

And mail system/LS controls probably tie in with the awful programming they need to fix. Chocobos I don't know, it sounds like they don't want them to be just a boring mount system and haven't really settled on a decision yet.

Omg guys I've been sitting around on the internet complaining and whining that I want my big purple elephant monster!

Where is it?! What have they been doing all this time? Never seen any company so lazy and not listen to their customer base.. I'm the one paying them!

/sarcasm

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Originally Posted by Betelgeuzah

They changed specific elements of existing features, they did not remake them from the very beginning. There was no need to develop in parallel (although there was a need to develop in accordance to other features already in place).

The difference is still like night and day.

And to whoever said the economy is not going to be changed... lol.

They are essentially shifting the item acquisition methods from crafting-based to quest- and other NPC specific methods, while using the materia system to keep crafters and gatherers relevant in an economy where items are obtained elsewhere. Materia system also removes excess items from the economy.

The economy could hardly change any more than this.

But there is no devtag for "economy rehaul" so it can't be true LOL.

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they arent remaking battle from the ground up, that would be like making the battle like tera or something. They are adding auto attack, and changing the damage algorithim, and removing stamina. Its not that hard, they are slow, apparently going by the letter from the producer, they have a lengthy analysis time, then they move to implementation. Im guessing he plans more carefully that whoever planned ffxi.

However careful isnt allways the best solution.

Looking back now at ffxi method, which was full of stops and starts and readjustments, its probably a better system in terms of getting a lot of changes done fast, that will lead to a stronger game. In ffxi model, they may have had to fix ls 3 times by now, but it would have been fixed by now.

Id say its probably too much planning and hesitation, but lets give it about 2 more months, with a reckless do it now and fix it later attitude ffxi came a long way in 11 months, lets see how far this game will get in that time.

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Originally Posted by Physic

they arent remaking battle from the ground up, that would be like making the battle like tera or something.

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Made-up definitions, yay!

I don't give a damn what your own personal definition of rehaul is, and your list of the changes isn't even half accurate on top of it. Way to go.

Like I said, the XI model and XIV model are not even close to being similar in any shape or form.

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Originally Posted by Betelgeuzah

Made-up definitions, yay!

I don't give a damn what your own personal definition of rehaul is, and your list of the changes isn't even half accurate on top of it. Way to go.

Like I said, the XI model and XIV model are not even close to being similar in any shape or form.

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you are just in argumentive defense mode right now.

heres what it is, overhaul can mean whatever you want it to mean, but coming up with an algorithim for auto attack and implementing it, and taking out stamina is not a 6 month change. The man said in his letter himself, that most time is spent planning and analyzing cost, then getting the ok. They have not spent 6 months reworking battle, they spent 4 months thinking about what they wanted to figuring the cost and 1.5 months implementing it.

heres the point
FFXI used one style of updating, rapid updating, adjusting as they go sometimes redoing something
FFXIV used a style with a lot more planning cost analysis, approval of ideas, implementation testing etc

Ideally both styles will give at least equal results.

right now that is not even close to the case, but im willing to test this in 2 months, i think its enough of a sample size to compare the two methods.
even with the changes he has proposed for end of summer though, it still will not come close to the amount of changes and content outlined in that link. we can list the changes to this game to date in one paragraph, if they add one paragraph by september thats still only 2 paragraphs, compare that to ffxi. compare it to any other MMO, compare it to a game in development, or beta, in almost any comparison this games expected progress is behind other games in a 1 year cycle. this is not deniable.

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coming up with an algorithim for auto attack and implementing it, and taking out stamina is not a 6 month change.

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Uhh, yep, it isn't?

I think I'll come back to this thread later this month, I feel like we can have an argument that makes sense then.

To the OP, you pretty much answered your own question.

That said, I'm not convinced the FFXIV crew is working as efficient as they should be. You have to remember that unless something changed, they have 100+ people working on this project and the changes so far have been so miniscule, they're hardly worth mentioning.

I've been telling myself that it's because they've poured most of their recources on making the summer patches, but I'm not sure anymore. Recent comments have made me think otherwise, but then this whole project has made me completely paranoid.

Who are you kidding really?

The biggest thing they did was add an auto-attack. OOoooOOooOOooo...

After XIVs release XI has had a boatload of game wide xp balancing while introducing new events and completely new areas and storyline quests with new weapon upgrading systems and game changing inventory management options.

During that time the biggest patch to XIV has been the one that made the menus lag less.

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Originally Posted by Ava

Most of that stuff (the art) is probably already created, it's just not in the live client yet because there's no point. Why show the community everything several months in advance? Where's the fun in that?

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The fun is not losing billions of costs in production and well over half a million users before the first year. That is why you start being clear cut. TERA realised it within 3 months after losing 80k Koreans, (Still have 100k daily active) and have decided to be crystal clear and its receiving good reception.

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XI can afford to have content, XIV can't, especially given how uppity the community is with complaining about every little detail.

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Go see the XI board, its the same thing lol. We complain, they complain, no one is ever happy, doesn't matter SE does what it wants anyway beyond the basics that we bring to their attention.

I see this issue in another light to maybe most people for me while i can see ff10 has got good updates since its 5-6 months since i left the game, its still not enough for me to want to go back , i would only go back if new areas and a full size expansion was made. Reading there full plans for 1 years that does not look like it will happen.
ff14 on other hand is something new and i wait to see what happens next update and what will happen with subscriptions.

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Originally Posted by viion

The fun is not losing billions of costs in production and well over half a million users before the first year. That is why you start being clear cut. TERA realised it within 3 months after losing 80k Koreans, (Still have 100k daily active) and have decided to be crystal clear and its receiving good reception.

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tera lacked content (gameplay wise is cool ) , since lots of ppl left , the company has been working really hard , have the resources no doubt :P , so will be released in USA / EU with lots of content :D

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Originally Posted by Seif

Who are you kidding really?

The biggest thing they did was add an auto-attack. OOoooOOooOOooo...

After XIVs release XI has had a boatload of game wide xp balancing while introducing new events and completely new areas and storyline quests with new weapon upgrading systems and game changing inventory management options.

During that time the biggest patch to XIV has been the one that made the menus lag less.

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You do know this happened because the game was already established and XIV got released, right? Why do people continually ignore we won't get a lot of content till this game is fixed is beyond me.

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Originally Posted by Warlyx

tera lacked content (gameplay wise is cool ) , since lots of ppl left , the company has been working really hard , have the resources no doubt :P , so will be released in USA / EU with lots of content :D

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It lacked anything to do endgame. So first thing they did was fix that and added endgame content, they opened a test server so people could test it with an instant 50 char and complain about any issues, the content is being released this year with several dungeons including difficulty settings and new armour, level cap, all your usual jizz jazz ready for the story expansion pack later in Summer. Bluehole listened to their fans, they dont want to be losing another 80k of their team so they fix the primary issue. XIV primary im afraid is not the battle system lol. But ah well.

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Who are you kidding really?

The biggest thing they did was add an auto-attack. OOoooOOooOOooo...

After XIVs release XI has had a boatload of game wide xp balancing while introducing new events and completely new areas and storyline quests with new weapon upgrading systems and game changing inventory management options.

During that time the biggest patch to XIV has been the one that made the menus lag less.

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FFXI = 200k+ paying subscribers fronting up $12.99? per month in a game that's a success and 4 years into full profits mode.

FFXIV = ZERO paying subscribers.

Hmm I can't possibly see why one game would be getting more content.