1.0 vs ARR Areas - A Visual Comparison

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Originally Posted by Enkidoh

And Dzamael Darkhold... I think. (Funny how that one is always forgotten about. :P)

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Ohhh yeahhhhh you're right lol

Can tell which left more of an impression on all of us *shudders*

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Originally Posted by Ransu

Your weird complaints (player bazaars in XI and XIV 1.0 were terrible, sorry, not sorry)

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I have described the 1.x market wards to people as "take our current housing system, including everything that's wrong with it, and now make the marketboard work that way."

This usually produces a look of confusion and/or horror from the person I am describing this to.

For those who don't know what I mean... the ability to put a retainer out in your yard and have them sell things out of their inventory is basically what I'd call the vestigial remnant of the 1.x market wards. To sell goods, you would go and pay to rent a stall in one of the market wards, then put a retainer there to sell stuff. Which, yes, meant that just like how there can be no housing available, there could be no market stalls available.

In addition, each ward had certain "correct items"; sales had a 5% tax on them, but if you sold things in the correct ward, you would only have a 3% tax. So if you were trying to sell crafted weapons, if you snagged a stall in the appropriate market ward for battle stuff, you could sell it with a discount on the tax. But if you were selling other things in addition to the weapons, those things would still have a 5% tax on them.

For added fun, this meant if you were shopping you had to wander through the wards to see what the various stalls were selling. Obviously if you were looking for weapons you'd go to the appropriate ward for battle-crafts... but there might also be weapons for sale in, say, the grocer's ward (where cooking ingredients and crafted foods and so on would get the preferential tax treatment) if that was the only place where someone could get a stall.

And yes, the system was exactly as bad as you're thinking that sounds.

For those who would like a visual reference here you go.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=308m7doHx2U

In 1.0 at launch it was literally a room full of retainers and there was no search function. Later they added a search function, but you couldn't buy from the search function. No you had to search for the item, get the retainer name and then find the retainer and oh btw you might run past the retainer before it loads on your screen. It was an awful experience. They added the ability to rent the stalls in 1.2 I think. Selling items on the market board through retainers is basically a legacy feature.

Oh, and did I mention that at launch NPC's only repaired your gear to 70%? Ya you had to leave your character logged in and offer a fee on your character who would have a hammer icon to let crafters know you're asking for a repair meaning you had to keep an eye on material costs or you could offer materials......Ya 1.0 was garbage lol.

But ya, 1.0 was visually impressive and I reiterate that I wish 2.0 still retained some of its higher resolution textures, ESPECIALLY on characters and gear. I can understand the whole flower pot thing and it having as many pixels as a player and that's a little insane lmao. But man I remember 2.0 looking so muddy and being kinda sad about it. Good thing the game was solid.

Wasn't part of the loading problem in the open world of 1.0 due to them having also loaded in the entire ocean that for the most part you wouldn't see? Also the reason there's huge corridors of nothing/samey stuff in 1.0 was to hide lode times.

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Originally Posted by SannaR

Wasn't part of the loading problem in the open world of 1.0 due to them having also loaded in the entire ocean that for the most part you wouldn't see? Also the reason there's huge corridors of nothing/samey stuff in 1.0 was to hide lode times.

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I mean, 1.x literally had "loading hallways". If you wanted to go to Limsa, you'd start walking across the bridge, cross a boundary, and then the camera would sloooowly progress along the bridge, through the gatehouse, and across the second part of the bridge until you reached Bulwark Hall and the city proper; it would unload one zone and load the next while you were doing that.

And Limsa's loading tunnel specifically was so incredibly long, it was the major factor in why I avoided Limsa as much as I feasibly could in 1.x.

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Originally Posted by Ransu

Oh, and did I mention that at launch NPC's only repaired your gear to 70%? Ya you had to leave your character logged in and offer a fee on your character who would have a hammer icon to let crafters know you're asking for a repair meaning you had to keep an eye on material costs or you could offer materials......

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Ugh. I'd managed to block that bit from my brain.

Also, if you tried to overmeld gear and the overmeld failed, didn't the gear itself break, rather than just the materia?

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Originally Posted by Packetdancer

Ugh. I'd managed to block that bit from my brain.

Also, if you tried to overmeld gear and the overmeld failed, didn't the gear itself break, rather than just the materia?

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If I recall yes it destroyed the gear.

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Originally Posted by Mikita

Hm. I recall the Limsa Lominsa aetheryte being in a hall near the Drowing Wench... not out in the open on the lower level where it is now. I probably have a screenshot of it somewhere. I'll post it later if I can find one.

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The actual 1.0 Aetheryte Plaza was on the Upper Decks:
https://imgur.com/UuxYIl3.jpg

The main issue is that Limsa's Upper decks changed a lot from 1.0 to now, and though geographically in the map the old plaza would have been somewhere roughly where The Aftcasle currently is, the old building is just completely gone. The whole area has been redesigned almost entirely.

Looking from the same passageway from The Drowning Wrench:
1.0 (Building with old Aetheryte Plaza in view on the left-center)
https://imgur.com/ikcp0ql.jpg

ARR (The Aftcastle in view instead of old building)
https://imgur.com/3wZjcev.png

The only feature that remains is the building to the right, and even that had its bridge changed from wood to stone.

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Originally Posted by znushu

I am still pissed that the team got rid of letting players buy items off of other players anywhere since it not only made my shopping alot easier but it also gave me a reason to socialize with other players too.

This is what Yoshida took from us. He stolen the games mmo aspect.

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The only reason you'd even wanna do that is because the old Market Wards were horrendous. Click one retainer at a time and pray they have what you want... wait, it's loading... give it a moment... there it is... oh no, no item. I should click on someone else I guess... oh wait, the retainer models aren't even loading on that side of the ward, let me walk over here... ok, they finally loaded. Also, if you wanna buy from retainers, they've found new homes in housing districts, if you enjoyed the experience of literally walking around and buying things from NPCs without a search functionality.

Yeah, of course people would wanna just trade directly, which you can still do by the way. It wasn't "stolen" or whatever lol. People will put up PF notices to sell items and skip MB's taxes (which I've done for hairstyles), not to mention the plethora of Omnis offering their services to craft high level gear or glam stuff if you bring the mats, new crafted HQ sets and fully pentamelded sets as well.

Don't act like such player trading interactions are gone because that's just a lie.

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Originally Posted by Reclusegamer

I am amazed at how much more mazy 1.0 toto-rak is based on the map I'm looking at. XD

I wasn't around for 1.0 so I wouldn't know but it sure looks like tons of parties would get lost down there.

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You could take different paths and fight different bosses each run. Time of completion would alter what rewards you'd get, you could tackle it with any amount of players, and you could switch jobs anytime in the dungeon. If this sounds familiar to recent news, that's because most of these features are actually coming back with Criterion Dungeons (:

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Originally Posted by ReynTime

There was a lot of empty and copy-pasting in 1.0 but one thing I still prefer about the maps is the sense of scale. The sense of scale and distance was perfect.

Well, except the shroud. That has always sucked and I prefer ARR shroud.

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Originally Posted by Packetdancer

I am normally a very calm individual, the peacemaker in a group who tries to get folks to get along, etc. "Rage" is not a thing I usually do.

But the 1.x Black Shroud actually did the near-impossible and inspired the flames of fury in me after I spent an entire evening trying to get across it, getting lost, dying, and so on—and thus utterly failed to meet up with some friends. Not that their luck was much better than mine.

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I didn't like running through the old Black Shroud either, or trying to run past the ants in eastern Thanalan without getting aggro, or through the narrow cliff passages trying to get to Broken Water as a base for the fight with Ifrit.
But those old places did inspire awe, wonder, and sometimes fear or anger.

The overworld in 1.0 was a much bigger part of the game than it is now. I don't think I would want to go back, so I'll just savor the nostalgia.

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Originally Posted by znushu

I am still pissed that the team got rid of letting players buy items off of other players anywhere since it not only made my shopping alot easier but it also gave me a reason to socialize with other players too. I even use to have a list of players I knew on my server that always sold certain items I needed and would seek them out in the world to buy from them directly.

This is what Yoshida took from us. He stolen the games mmo aspect in favor for making it more like a single player game.

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I think Tanaka, the old producer, intentionally made things difficult to force people to work together in hopes of creating a community.

Like you, I got to know who could make what items I needed. It was really hard to be an omni-crafter and so it helped to know who had what and befriend them.
I actually got to know my best friend, whom I still play with today, because she was a high level miner and I chased after her to buy some colorant materials from her personal bazaar.

Of course a lot of people ended up hating those design decisions and the rest is history.

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Originally Posted by Mikita

Of course a lot of people ended up hating those design decisions and the rest is history.

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That's sadly true as the demographic the game caters to today doesn't resemble the one that it catered too during the 1.0 era.
Both were catering to different types of players and while not every mmo needs to cater to everyone. I still find it sad that my slow paced classical ff styled mmo is now largely restricted to ff11 still, I was one of the few (outside of rokien) that was looking forward to them possibly bringing back that version with a separate product or something which I honestly doubt in my old age.

I guess I can always just bite my tongue and keep silent on my old school mmo loving takes until Pantheon Rise of the Fallen releases and just continue to enjoy modern ffxiv as the single player mmo it is.

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Originally Posted by znushu

That's sadly true as the demographic the game caters to today doesn't resemble the one that it catered too during the 1.0 era.
Both were catering to different types of players and while not every mmo needs to cater to everyone. I still find it sad that my slow paced classical ff styled mmo is now largely restricted to ff11 still, I was one of the few (outside of rokien) that was looking forward to them possibly bringing back that version with a separate product or something which I honestly doubt in my old age.

I guess I can always just bite my tongue and keep silent on my old school mmo loving takes until Pantheon Rise of the Fallen releases and just continue to enjoy modern ffxiv as the single player mmo it is.

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Originally Posted by Mikita

I think Tanaka, the old producer, intentionally made things difficult to force people to work together in hopes of creating a community.

Like you, I got to know who could make what items I needed. It was really hard to be an omni-crafter and so it helped to know who had what and befriend them.
I actually got to know my best friend, whom I still play with today, because she was a high level miner and I chased after her to buy some colorant materials from her personal bazaar.

Of course a lot of people ended up hating those design decisions and the rest is history.

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Any place in particular either of you would like to revisit with a few screenies? I'll gladly post a couple.

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Originally Posted by DiaDeem

Any place in particular either of you would like to revisit with a few screenies? I'll gladly post a couple.

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all I want is a screengrab from one my favorite place in the old version of game... black shrouds hawthrone hut.

Feeling really nostalgic for things I've never experienced.

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Originally Posted by znushu

all I want is a screengrab from one my favorite place in the old version of game... black shrouds hawthrone hut.

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1.0
https://imgur.com/fXCzPdx.jpg

https://imgur.com/BHZy1vA.jpg

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*Edit: ARR
https://imgur.com/xjvF2AK.png

https://imgur.com/KvNAVo2.png

These aren't really comparable, but since I've been posting both versions in all my posts so far, just decided to add the ARR screenies for consistency.

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Originally Posted by NekoMataMata

Feeling really nostalgic for things I've never experienced.

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I started playing ARR on PS3 in September 201 and I never got to play 1.0 but I'm just fascinated by the history of the game and 1.0 is like an archeological site for me. Remnants of a Realm and Secrets of a Realm by Speakers of Hydaelyn is probably the best resource out there for this kind of thing honestly.

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Originally Posted by NekoMataMata

Feeling really nostalgic for things I've never experienced.

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Honestly, that's probably the best option here; you get all of the fun of looking back and going "Huh, that sounds cool in theory!" without having had to actually experience all the downsides.

I mean, it's easy to be vaguely nostalgic about some of it now, from a safe distance (e.g. a decade of linear time), sure. But I am a decade older than I was then, with these annoying things called, like, "job responsibilities" and "adult life" and whatnot. And while I deeply enjoy fighting with content, I suspect I have a lot less patience now for fighting with the game itself in order to actually get to the content.

So I don't think you could pay me to return to 1.x.

Especially not if you dropped me in the Shroud when I got there.

(...that said, I do actually kind of miss the threat that the overworld could present. Which is probably why I actually enjoy Eureka. So maybe I haven't entirely learned my lesson...)

The 1.0 ascians stood out to me, and it was fun checking all the npc shadows because back then in lore they didn't have them.

Also those treants that sucker punched you into next firesday, level 99 or whatever lol. Due to the maze terrain design and their size, it was an intense space.

Less graphic related but there were a lot of unique npc interactions in 1.0, I've seen a few in Endwalker but my memory tells me way more existed back then. Like snurbles could heal you. Different aggro types..

Or the incapacitation system, where your skills targeted specific body parts and you could break horns and stuff.. very early you could equip skills from other classes and be a thaumaturge tank XD, wild times. Nothing like the good ol days when it took 5 seconds to open your character sheet lol.

I understand it was a nightmare to navigate but 1.0 Black Shroud certainly feels much more like a foreboding ancient forest than the current version which is for the most part pretty open. I always feel so disconnected from Gridania story bits when they say something like "don't get lost in the dangerous dense woods!" then I go to Central Shroud and I'm like "WHAT WOODS?"

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Originally Posted by NekoMataMata

Feeling really nostalgic for things I've never experienced.

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If you want to get a basic grasp at how 1.0 played like then just watch these two tutorials for dungeons back then and some other stuff. watch these and you will understand the jist of how it like once you got past the tutorial.

Dzemael Darkhold

Part 1:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJAkyH7Xtj8

Part 2:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1ONBtLq77I

Part 3:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKq3R0BqEFA

Part 4:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2352GZ-WgCA

Part 5:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JSdb2dcD1c

Battle Regime

Tutorial:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llfFDu10rds
Example:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ub0bsD-Icxg

U'Ghamaro Mine

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGWw4cYpcEg

Synthesis Guide

Part 1:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Qh55GNK03A

Part 2:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PyDkFUvpHOc

Party Recruitment

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gbya17PW25E

User Interface Customization

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CEGfOwYQQI

incase you are wondering, yes. I use to be a 1.0 content creator and kept track of what others creators uploaded at the time. so that's why I can pull up these types of videos so easily.

Btw everyone 1.0 Gridania jackanapes says Hello!!!!

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Originally Posted by Shougun

The 1.0 ascians stood out to me

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Travanchet hasn't been addressed, even though we're wrapping up with the Ancients. Last we heard of him he was causing trouble in Alexander, but after that... who knows.

https://64.media.tumblr.com/1c6ecd5a...934o1_1280.jpg

The West Shroud - It was completely destroyed in the Calamity. This is what's left of it, as seen in the distance from the Central Shroud in ARR
https://imgur.com/Bhk29p4.png

There isn't really an equivalent view in 1.0 but here's a place called Lichenweed in the West Shroud as it was then.
https://imgur.com/BAgZtIP.jpg

It'd be kinda cool if the West Shroud was re-introduced in 7.0 or something...

"Ah, Warrior of Light... our scouts have finally found a path to the West Shroud. There's a strange concentration of aether in the area and two of our scouts have gone missing..."

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Originally Posted by DiaDeem

Travanchet hasn't been addressed, even though we're wrapping up with the Ancients. Last we heard of him he was causing trouble in Alexander, but after that... who knows.

https://64.media.tumblr.com/1c6ecd5a...934o1_1280.jpg

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If there is any one thing left from 1.x that I would like payoff on—beyond the blink-and-you-miss-it "hey, remember that thing he stole from Y'shtola and you all on Seal Rock? Look what he did with it!" moment we got during the Alexander quests—it is Travanchet. We don't know what Ascian he was—one we've seen in another form? One we've heard about? Just one of the lesser ones? He's certainly the only Ascian I can think of who we've seen take a host that wasn't a Hyur (or, I suppose, a Garlean), what's up with that?

I'd really, in general, to learn more 1.0 lore. It's kinda sad that we don't have a chance from the game itself, to know all that happened in 1.0.
I remember looking up all the thaumaturges questline, for character building reasons, and it was soooo good, so much better than anything thaumaturges got in the current incarnation.

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Originally Posted by DiaDeem

It'd be kinda cool if the West Shroud was re-introduced in 7.0 or something...

"Ah, Warrior of Light... our scouts have finally found a path to the West Shroud. There's a strange concentration of aether in the area and two of our scouts have gone missing..."

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all im saying is black boar gate is still closed so they left an opportunity to add a west shroud connection even if the central shroud path is blocked off

imagine a level 90-100 area closed to novice adventurers, answering some of the mysteries still relating to the shroud

I have so many screens from V1.0 from the first closed alpha test and lots of others. They are all on my old PC and I play on PS5 now but if I get chance sometime I will try and upload some.

I loved the style of V1.0 way more and I have a lot of love for the memories and also the journey of 12 years. The one thing I do miss is the world feeling and looking more alive and I feel the modern glams do not really fit with what the game began as but times change I guess and I am getting old haha <3

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Originally Posted by NekoMataMata

Feeling really nostalgic for things I've never experienced.

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I promise that you missed absolutely nothing. Graphics aside 1.0 was REALLY bad. There's a reason they burned it to the ground lol. Yoshi did what he could with 1.2 and made it somewhat playable, but there was no fixing that games mess.

There's also a bit of a caveat when it comes to map size.

1.0 had no sprint or jump, and only got mounts (Chocobos) later in its life. Go to any HW+ area and navigate it only on base running speed and every single map will suddenly feel massive. Not as massive as a 1.0 map but this is does contribute to the sense of how big a map can be. I imagine if flying ever made it to 1.0 that many areas would have suddenly felt way smaller.

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Originally Posted by DiaDeem

There's also a bit of a caveat when it comes to map size.

1.0 had no sprint or jump, and only got mounts (Chocobos) later in its life. Go to any HW+ area and navigate it only on base running speed and every single map will suddenly feel massive. Not as massive as a 1.0 map but this is does contribute to the sense of how big a map can be. I imagine if flying ever made it to 1.0 that many areas would have suddenly felt way smaller.

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Moreover, I feel like in my recollection, most of the zones other than Coerthas had something like 80% of the map consist of the same copy/pasted assets. "Look, there's that rock again." "Hey, look, it's Tree Cluster #3, again!" Etc. And in some cases they blocked off what would be a rational path from point A to point B just to make you go out of your way. (Which, I mean, the overworld was dangerous and you don't want players shortcutting around that, so... fair, I guess?)

The practical result being they weren't just incredibly huge, they were also incredibly easy to get lost on at times.

*cue silent glaring at the 1.x Black Shroud again*

(Side note: I am convinced that the ARR version of Toto-Rak had the little ledge you had to jump up on at one point to continue through the dungeon just so they could be like "Look! You can jump now! Jumping, hooray!" Especially since dropping down those exact same sorts of ledges prevented you from backtracking in the original Toto-Rak due to the inability to jump...)

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Originally Posted by DiaDeem

There's also a bit of a caveat when it comes to map size.

1.0 had no sprint or jump, and only got mounts (Chocobos) later in its life. Go to any HW+ area and navigate it only on base running speed and every single map will suddenly feel massive. Not as massive as a 1.0 map but this is does contribute to the sense of how big a map can be. I imagine if flying ever made it to 1.0 that many areas would have suddenly felt way smaller.

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I remember going into ARR from 1.0 and feeling that the world suddenly got really small.
The larger 1.0 zones with their sparser camps, dangers, and hassles of getting around, made Eorzea feel more like "a world" that we were in.

Not feeling like I really want to go back to that, but I do have fond memories of that version of Eorzea.
FFXIV 1.0 was pretty much my first game ever, so naivity just made everything fresh and interesting.

Anyway. Here are a few of my screenshots.
It was more wide open and atmospheric.

https://img2.finalfantasyxiv.com/acc...f2fbbb226e.jpg

https://img2.finalfantasyxiv.com/acc...80896a634a.jpg

https://img2.finalfantasyxiv.com/acc...dfd83cbeef.jpg

https://img2.finalfantasyxiv.com/acc...e923b5d4c8.jpg

We spent so much time running around the world to get places.

https://img2.finalfantasyxiv.com/acc...163158c598.jpg

I remember looking at the chocobo that was stabled in Western Thanalan thinking "I wish we could ride one of those!"

https://img2.finalfantasyxiv.com/acc...6916cbbffe.jpg

A couple of my not-so-favorite places in old Eorzea.

https://img2.finalfantasyxiv.com/acc...9e6eecfc11.jpg

https://img2.finalfantasyxiv.com/acc...28b3c7228f.jpg

Also for comparison, battle was much slower and less flashy. But it had some really interesting lighting effects -- like someone would shine a spotlight on you whenever you used spells and weaponskills.

https://img2.finalfantasyxiv.com/acc...f858995ecb.jpg

https://img2.finalfantasyxiv.com/acc...b2659dd6f5.jpg

https://img2.finalfantasyxiv.com/acc...d021b66293.jpg

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Originally Posted by Mikita

It was more wide open and atmospheric.

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*whispers* Except the Shroud, which was borderline claustrophobic.

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Originally Posted by Mikita

A couple of my not-so-favorite places in old Eorzea.

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*small tic develops near eye when seeing what appears to be 1.x Larkscall*

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Originally Posted by Mikita

Also for comparison, battle was much slower and less flashy. But it had some really interesting lighting effects -- like someone would shine a spotlight on you whenever you used spells and weaponskills.

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Anything else aside, I gotta say that the lighting in 1.x -- in combat or otherwise -- was on point in a way I've seen in few other MMOs.

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Originally Posted by Packetdancer

If there is any one thing left from 1.x that I would like payoff on—beyond the blink-and-you-miss-it "hey, remember that thing he stole from Y'shtola and you all on Seal Rock? Look what he did with it!" moment we got during the Alexander quests—it is Travanchet. We don't know what Ascian he was—one we've seen in another form? One we've heard about? Just one of the lesser ones? He's certainly the only Ascian I can think of who we've seen take a host that wasn't a Hyur (or, I suppose, a Garlean), what's up with that?

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I prefer to believe Travenchet is on a random beach rolling up some fogweed and chilling with the rest of the unaddressed Ascians.

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Originally Posted by Tlamila

From what I heard it was sort of a permanent instance where people got in and out of for grinding instead of an actual dungeon like our version has?
Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

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From what i heard, it was an open non instance dungeon that you did Leves in.

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Originally Posted by Mikita

I think Tanaka, the old producer, intentionally made things difficult to force people to work together in hopes of creating a community.

Like you, I got to know who could make what items I needed. It was really hard to be an omni-crafter and so it helped to know who had what and befriend them.
I actually got to know my best friend, whom I still play with today, because she was a high level miner and I chased after her to buy some colorant materials from her personal bazaar.

Of course a lot of people ended up hating those design decisions and the rest is history.

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People tend to misunderstand the point of the camps that every video talking about 1.0 makes fun of too. Making them mandatory for initiating guildleves and behests made it very simple to gather adventurers together in small parties while leveling and still contribute with the immersion of being an adventurer making a living working with others for bounty. I miss that. And the difficulty of the battle leves.

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Originally Posted by CidHeiral

I understand it was a nightmare to navigate but 1.0 Black Shroud certainly feels much more like a foreboding ancient forest than the current version which is for the most part pretty open. I always feel so disconnected from Gridania story bits when they say something like "don't get lost in the dangerous dense woods!" then I go to Central Shroud and I'm like "WHAT WOODS?"

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They could have kept the eerieness of the original Shroud without a labyrinthine design. Of course, they didn't even bother. After all, the Calamity was used as an excuse to downplay the importance of the elementals and brush woodsin aside.

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Originally Posted by Mikita

I remember going into ARR from 1.0 and feeling that the world suddenly got really small.
The larger 1.0 zones with their sparser camps, dangers, and hassles of getting around, made Eorzea feel more like "a world" that we were in.

Not feeling like I really want to go back to that, but I do have fond memories of that version of Eorzea.
FFXIV 1.0 was pretty much my first game ever, so naivity just made everything fresh and interesting.

Anyway. Here are a few of my screenshots.
It was more wide open and atmospheric.

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ARR Zones were indeed tiny, and I'm gonna fully blame the PS3 for that one. It's kind of a miracle that they somehow fit Heavensward on the console at all. They were enough for me at the time specifically, but keep in mind: My prior MMO to XIV was Ragnarok Online, so the move to a (in comparison) huge and super detailed 3D world definitely skewed my perception of ARR's areas. I really wanted to play XIV ever since 1.0 was around (even knowing of the backlash at the time), but my little laptop at the time would have never been able to run the game, so I decided to wait for the PS3 version... and we all know where that eventually ended up in.

Not too long ago I did a "just run around" session in the Shadowbringers areas, which meant no mount and no sprint, and they do feel way larger than they do when we fly around in them, which.. why wouldn't we, right? Even then, yes: They don't feel as big as 1.0 areas, and a point of reference I definitely don't have is how the areas felt with other players around or when there were monsters around, so I can't say for sure how that was, as my screenies are rather limited in that sense. The tradeoff being (as many have pointed out) that you could be in Central Thanalan or in Eastern Thanalan and you wouldn't know it just by looking around from the excessive re-use of assets, which is never an issue with ARR areas.

The one area which I wish had been somewhat as massive as a 1.0 area was the Azim Steppe. It's described as this "Gigantic space filled with plains as far as the eye can see" and... not really? Not even with the "Just walk-no mount" trick. I would have love to visit more of the Xaela tribes in a map that big.

Dunno, mixed feelings. Your screenshots are awesome! It's always really cool to see genuine 1.0 era screenshots.

IMHO the vast, mostly flat, barren emptiness of most maps they added since Heavensward aren't that much better than the copy-pasta excess from 1.0.

ARR is hands down the best when it comes to map detail, regardless of size.

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Originally Posted by ReynTime

They could have kept the eerieness of the original Shroud without a labyrinthine design. Of course, they didn't even bother. After all, the Calamity was used as an excuse to downplay the importance of the elementals and brush woodsin aside.

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I was lucky enough to get Odin weather as I was making this post, and the South Shroud in particular I feel really captures that feel:
https://imgur.com/c3e5u55.png

Other than that... Sylphlands? Maybe?...
https://imgur.com/VKfTwkI.png

Mind you, I don't think 1.0 shroud was that eerie to begin with.. and it just doesn't feel like a forest to me. Forest aren't closed off corridors like that. It just feels really artificial. In that sense, I don't think either version got that part of the Shroud right. If anything, I think Dimwold is what captures that feel the best, even if it's just a tiny section of The Fringes. Well, that and Odin weather.

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Originally Posted by ReynTime

People tend to misunderstand the point of the camps that every video talking about 1.0 makes fun of too. Making them mandatory for initiating guildleves and behests made it very simple to gather adventurers together in small parties while leveling and still contribute with the immersion of being an adventurer making a living working with others for bounty. I miss that. And the difficulty of the battle leves.

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Yeah. There's plenty of stuff to make fun of in 1.x, but I'd agree that the camps are not one of them; the system had its clunky aspects, but I do think it gave more of a feeling of an adventuring party gathering.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ReynTime

They could have kept the eerieness of the original Shroud without a labyrinthine design. Of course, they didn't even bother. After all, the Calamity was used as an excuse to downplay the importance of the elementals and brush woodsin aside.

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I will admit, for all my dramatic whining about the 1.x Black Shroud -- most of which was, sadly, deserved -- the sheer ominous "if you do something the elementals don't like, they will just Thanos snap you out of existence" factor of the greenwrath is something I really do miss from 1.x. I disliked a lot of the design of the Shroud in 1.x, but dang the lore was really meaty.