SE, no effort anywhere lately.

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Originally Posted by ReynTime

Video game content that provides the same experience whether you're taking a hold of the controller or whether you're watching it on youtube without paying a cent for the product is just plain bad video game content.

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Man, how did twitch ever take off then?

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Originally Posted by ReynTime

Video game content that provides the same experience whether you're taking a hold of the controller or whether you're watching it on youtube without paying a cent for the product is just plain bad video game content.

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Yes, well done, you have just described 95%+ of all video games ever.

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Originally Posted by R041

Unfortunately a lot of people try to sell XIV as an MMO experience first, and that's just where it falls flat compared to games like WoW. We need to be more upfront with what it actually is as a game.

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It is a MMO first. Whether it does its MMO job well is going to be subjective. I'll never tell (more like lie to) someone "Final Fantasy XIV is a Final Fantasy game first-" because the MMO design is constantly pushing the Final Fantasy gameplay staples away from it. And I'm not talking about ATB combat. At the same time Yoshi-P keeps locking content behind MSQ and adding a megaton of cutscenes at the cost of interactable content because he has this belief that's what makes a Final Fantasy game. And because he thinks the story is God's gift to mankind he feels the obligation to make all MSQ content so easy Final Fantasy IX is a hardcore game by comparison so no one misses out.

It's a Themepark MMORPG that wishes it was a real single-player jRPG, while hating everything a jRPG does other than the narrative tropes.

Edit: And it doesn't matter if Yoshida or other japanese producers think jrpg is "offensive". Some label is required as japanese style console RPGs and western RPGs are fundamentally different in almost every way.

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Originally Posted by ReynTime

Video game content that provides the same experience whether you're taking a hold of the controller or whether you're watching it on youtube without paying a cent for the product is just plain bad video game content.

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A lot of the games that I enjoy are mostly dialogue-based, I feel like there's great potential through storytelling this way. The music + art direction can truly make an experience that is mostly read something bigger. BUT, that being said, I also can't blame people that are playing an MMO and expect something different. Especially how solo-oriented this is.

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Originally Posted by drtasteyummy

I think if there's one thing I learned from Final Fantasy as an MMO, it's how important freedom is. Personally, I don't feel that the story that hides various gameplay elements for new players has been very well encapsulated. The issue doesn't really present itself as much unless you're a new player, and it only gets worse with every expansion. In a perfect world, the game would give you the freedom to choose between leveling through dungeons, leveling in the open world with action driven mini stories of their own, or leveling through the text driven main story. I just think it was bad design to put a gun to every player's head and tell them you're going to like it that way or you can leave.

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Yeah, it does seem like they'll eventually have to shake up that formula in some way. It was fine when you had one or two expansions, but nowadays I don't really blame people that see this as an issue. Specially with how sync works and how this vertical content eventually makes all the old content I can't honestly tell a friend of mine to come and play the game with me because realistically there's no way of a new player actually playing the game with me. At all. Unless I'm willing to get 40- dungeons in my roulette for the sake of a friendship.
I mean if you are somewhat aligned with the current patch I can see how this isn't an issue, but for a new player... oof.

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Originally Posted by Lium

And that'd be fine if that's the way you phrased it initially. Here is what you said that started this whole back and forth which was quite complimentary towards WoW.

"Some of us never actually enjoyed the way XIV has forced and designed MSQ. We assumed that maybe after 10 years they'd at least put a little more effort into the engagement and ways the MSQ is told. But nope, it's been the same boring slog."

You mixed some facts about the way FFXIV's MSQ is set up with your own opinion. So for you and everyone agreeing with you, that's what I was responding to.

Hope that clears it up. Have a nice day!

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Condescending. And Mmmmm nope - That's also pretty factual. Nothing has changed with the way they run their story formula. It's still all text and fist emote. It's not as engaging as it could be if they put more effort into the story system. They could have more VA, active rewind, quest sync, and the writing itself could be better. The Dungeons and Trials being set level points forces the storytelling into weird spots and sometimes doesn't make sense. After 10 years it still lacks choices.

The story team has become complacent with their design. Whether you think that's fine, doesn't matter. It's still dull and hasn't evolved to match today's gaming standards.

So yeah, it's not as engaging as it could be. Both MSQ gameplay and storytelling just have neglected their opportunities for evolution.

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Originally Posted by Melorie

A lot of the games that I enjoy are mostly dialogue-based, I feel like there's great potential through storytelling this way. The music + art direction can truly make an experience that is mostly read something bigger. BUT, that being said, I also can't blame people that are playing an MMO and expect something different. Especially how solo-oriented this is.

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I enjoy Visual Novels, and at least every single one I played had a far more interactable plot than XIV's. Even when they're linear stories the playable parts tend to be tied to theme and make the player more immersive into the context of the setting, because they give weight to the player's agency and not paying attention to the plot punishes you with extra time to make progress or worse depending on the game. XIV wants to be 80% cutscene with its MSQ but nothing outside of the delivery/pick-up and enemies that die to your sneezes demand a degree of player agency. Even the dialogue options don't change more than a single line of response.

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Originally Posted by R041

Condescending. And Mmmmm nope - That's also pretty factual. Nothing has changed with the way they run their story formula. It's still all text and fist emote. It's not as engaging as it could be if they put more effort into the story system. They could have more VA, active rewind, quest sync, and the writing itself could be better. The Dungeons and Trials being set level points forces the storytelling into weird spots and sometimes doesn't make sense. After 10 years it still lacks choices.

The story team has become complacent with their design. Whether you think that's fine, doesn't matter. It's still dull and hasn't evolved to match today's gaming standards.

So yeah, it's not as engaging as it could be. Both MSQ gameplay and storytelling just have neglected their opportunities for evolution.

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Likewise, if you find that dull, it doesn't matter at all. I'd recommend playing WoW, which is a system you greatly prefer. (According to your own posts.)

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Originally Posted by R041

Condescending. And Mmmmm nope - That's also pretty factual. Nothing has changed with the way they run their story formula. It's still all text and fist emote. It's not as engaging as it could be if they put more effort into the story system. They could have more VA, active rewind, quest sync, and the writing itself could be better. The Dungeons and Trials being set level points forces the storytelling into weird spots and sometimes doesn't make sense. After 10 years it still lacks choices.

The story team has become complacent with their design. Whether you think that's fine, doesn't matter. It's still dull and hasn't evolved to match today's gaming standards.

So yeah, it's not as engaging as it could be. Both MSQ gameplay and storytelling just have neglected their opportunities for evolution.

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Given how the population continues skyrocketing and setting new records with each new expansion, it would seem they exactly recognize and play to today's gaming standards and have developed a leveling formula that works very well...

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Originally Posted by Striker44

Given how the population continues skyrocketing and setting new records with each new expansion, it would seem they exactly recognize and play to today's gaming standards and have developed a leveling formula that works very well...

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https://i.giphy.com/media/Fml0fgAxVx1eM/giphy.webp

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Originally Posted by Striker44

Given how the population continues skyrocketing and setting new records with each new expansion, it would seem they exactly recognize and play to today's gaming standards and have developed a leveling formula that works very well...

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From the newest Lucky bancho

https://livedoor.blogimg.jp/luckyban...3/437ac23a.png

The number of active characters is about 1.39 million , an increase of 30,000 from the previous (1.36 million) .
The number of new characters is about 100,000, a decrease of about 40,000 from the previous 150,000 .
The number of returning characters who were inactive last time but became active this time is 420,000, a decrease of 20,000 from the previous 440,000 .
The number of active characters since the last time is about 860,000, an increase of 80,000 from 780,000.