Letter from the Producer, XXVIII (05/28/2012)

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Originally Posted by Starlord

When a Company is trying to get their game into the light.. there's really no such things as "lies". If they "feel" that Not showing the Trailer there and its better to show it at gamescom, but still show alot of stuff at E3 Regarding FFXIV in General to people who don't know, so new people can see the new improvements of the game. Then so be it. It doesn't make them "liars" they just think that this is a better route to go.. the only thing us players need to do is accept it.

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This. Chances are they're trying to get their foot in the door with any info they might be displaying at e3, with the hopes it starts drawing interest in the game again, then show the trailer at Gamescon to a hopefully already-gathered audience. Sure, lolGuild Wars 2 and all, but it makes sense from a marketting perspective.

XIV has literally vanished off the face of the earth media-wise. Sure, you can blame that partly on the fact that TOR launched this past december and all discussions, insults, flaming and raging have been related to TOR, but few outside of those who beta-tested XIV have been keeping track of it. SE needs to step in and remind the world that XIV is still aroudn, that they are working on it and that it might be worth a second look. When you do something like that you don't want to rush in and go solely on hype created by a CGI trailer; not when that was part of the chain of events that got you in trouble in the first place.

Very disappointed... I actually cared about E3 this year.

When SE either makes Fire and ice not so god damn useless on bosses and hit as hard as the Thunder/Thundara combo, my expectation will go from .001% to something higher. Atleast fire and ice lines, I am not even asking for the rest of the spells anymore, cause that's obviously asking too much...

It's pretty sad when most MMOs have more than two spells on Wizard/Mages and they all do the same damage but different resistance for different situations. When SE can't even get one of the most basic class/job to an MMO right that should be a clear sign someone doesn't know their job.

This letter was pretty disappointing and I hope there is something new (or anything at all) to show off at E3. The game could really use good publicity.

Wallpaper woes:

http://i.imgur.com/2glmS.jpg

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Originally Posted by Donimo

This letter was pretty disappointing and I hope there is something new (or anything at all) to show off at E3. The game could really use good publicity.

But on top of the letter not being so great, even the chocobo wallpaper was half-assed. The designer sloppily repeated the original illustration's background texture without caring about variation. I swear it looks like work done by an intern.

http://i.imgur.com/2glmS.jpg

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Wow, really dude?

This is what you're nitpicking about?

Do you constantly have a black cloud hanging over your head?

I just noticed that they were made by Yoshida himself apparently so I'll let it slide! If it was put out by a designer on their team, then yes I would be more critical of an employee paid to do marketing materials.

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Originally Posted by Donimo

I just noticed that they were made by Yoshida himself apparently so I'll let it slide! If it was put out by a designer on their team, then yes I would be more critical of an employee paid to do marketing materials.

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Eh, my left third is typically covered by Icon's anyways. I'm not all that concerned. The expression of personal conviction was more of a bonus for me than worrying about the quality of graphic design.

You want a better wallpaper? Make one. Most people seem to have photo Editing tools today anyways.

this is so lame... i was expecting a lot more information.... /wrist

One interesting note is that a strong majority of people feel that the speed of levels is just right, and not too fast. Square should take note.

Also, I'm interested to see how the jobs portion of the poll turned out.

I think we need some clarity on what we're actually going to get at E3. I hope a Community Rep shows up in damage control mode to give us the facts.

This is really starting to remind me of the months leading up to 1.0's release. Not that it really matters for us since we'll all have access to 2.0 anyway but, it just doesn't sit well with me.

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Originally Posted by Amherst

This is really starting to remind me of the months leading up to 1.0's release. Not that it really matters for us since we'll all have access to 2.0 anyway but, it just doesn't sit well with me.

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Starting to remind you have 1.0? They didn't tell us nothing about 1.0. Only thing they said was this is only 10% of the game then it was actually 99% of it, and that was because the other 1% was the rest of the lvls and story.

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Originally Posted by Amherst

This is really starting to remind me of the months leading up to 1.0's release. Not that it really matters for us since we'll all have access to 2.0 anyway but, it just doesn't sit well with me.

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Really? Because this is a strong left turn AWAY from the events leading up to 1.0. Heck, the fact that Yoshi was so open about the whole of it to begin with is pretty much the exact opposite of what we had in 1.0. I mean, not to dispel your sinking feeling or anything but I have to wonder what you are expecting to be so afraid of it not being met.

Perhaps you should check your expectations some?

I wanted to see the results about the new race even though I'm sure bunny people won

At least Yoshi-P was up front and honest about it. We never got that from Tanaka.

Disappointing results.

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Originally Posted by Starlord

At least Yoshi-P was up front and honest about it. We never got that from a lot of developers for the longest of time until recent years.

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Much more accurate.

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Originally Posted by Elexia

Much more accurate.

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I totally agree with you =)

for those of you who cannot stop complaining, 4th option down

Plenty of other MMOs out there.

SE are doing a good job, and their decision is their decision. I think I'll make this my final forums post because this crucifying SE over every decision they make is just getting out of hand.

I'm not going to lie, waking up this morning to see the 28th letter had arrived, this was me:


http://assets0.ordienetworks.com/ima...ggjuo1_500.gif

After reading about a lack of a 2.0 trailer in a few more days, this was me:

http://assets0.ordienetworks.com/ima...48-240-196.gif

Lol but in all honesty, I got over it in a few hours and would much rather see what kind of "flood" they got in store instead of a single trailer.

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Originally Posted by Stiffmeister

I'm not going to lie, waking up this morning to see the 28th letter had arrived, this was me:


http://assets0.ordienetworks.com/ima...ggjuo1_500.gif

After reading about a lack of a 2.0 trailer in a few more days, this was me:

http://assets0.ordienetworks.com/ima...48-240-196.gif

Lol but in all honesty, I got over it in a few hours and would much rather see what kind of "flood" they got in store instead of a single trailer.

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The flood isn't occuring @ E3 Were getting something at E3 not sure what that entails besides the website we know about. The Flood, will be coming in August, at Gamescom, when they Launch their New Marketing Campaign.

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Originally Posted by Starlord

The flood isn't occuring @ E3 Were getting something at E3 not sure what that entails besides the website we know about. The Flood, will be coming in August, at Gamescom, when they Launch their New Marketing Campaign.

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Oh I know, I'm just saying I'd rather have that down the line than a single trailer at E3. But, I wouldn't have minded the trailer at E3 and THEN the "flood"!

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Originally Posted by Stiffmeister

Oh I know, I'm just saying I'd rather have that than a single trailer. But, I wouldn't have minded the trailer at E3 and THEN the "flood"!

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hehe, Well will have to see what happens, you never know.. maybe this is all a trick to Surprise us with the Trailer.. who knows, but the facts are the facts right now, that Trailer will not be at E3 :P.

why there is people is complaning about this? yoshi p wants everything to be carefully done instead rushing/hype content like tanaka did when the game released first time on september. please understand.

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Originally Posted by Galaxia

why there is people is complaning about this? yoshi p wants everything to be carefully done instead rushing/hype content like tanaka did when the game released first time on september. please understand.

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Indeed, I agree! =)

If they aren't ready to show it yet, I'm okay with waiting.

Releasing ANYTHING 'too early' will only be PR suicide. The FFXIV team has been spending the past two years trying to make up for the OBVIOUSLY 'too soon' release of FFXIV 1.0. Releasing content too early for the overhaul that is supposed to 'make up' for every mistake in the past would only make it seem as though they have learned nothing from their past blunders.

Yeah, I'm disappointed. I wanted a trailer.... but I'd rather they iron out the details first. I don't want to see something sloppy and rushed. If this 'new' teaser site for 2.0 is anything to write home about, the complaints in this thread will be irrelevant... everyone will move on and finally have a 'taste' of what they have been waiting anxiously to see. I sort of understand where Yoshi is coming from when he says he wants to release a lot of content at once rather than letting it 'trickle' out.

After reading a few rage posts about this, I've come to the conclusion and question:

Does them coming out with a trailer even matter for E3? I mean this in the sense that the FFXIV 1.0 trailer was flashy and looked nice, but it did the actual game and gameplay no justice at all. Most of the spells/actions/weaponskills used in the trailer STILL haven't been avaialble to players, and thats 2 years later! Another thing about the trailer too, I still haven't been able to fight a Marlboro through a Levequest, regardless of which city....just saying. Also from the wording Yoshi chose for explaining why the trailer won't be there, would it be wrong to think that there's a possibility that an alpha version of the game could be shown?

I also wonder if potentially one of the main reasons why they chose not to show trailer at E3 is cuz the trailer is going to be the benchmark? /shrug

I always thought that there would not be much big stuff at E3 for SE because:

E3 is a news/publicity thing.
News/Publicity will be focused first on the big players.
Then on 'new' announcements.
Then on 'updates' announcements.

2.0 falls under 'updates'. It therefore suffers the risk of being squashed in the media blitz by bigger announcements. (Let's be honest, 2.0 of FFXIV is not going to be as big news as any other major company or game comming out).

So why go out during that time, when they can go out later and secure more media attention. Put otherway:
Show trailer at E3 = Little link/blurb at the bottom of the day's reports.
Show trailer next month (during media dry spell) = Big link/blurb on the top of day's reports.

Then this can of course play into a controlled media release schedule up to launch (which is what is really important).

Meanwhile.... back at home... they will keep us happy with patch and 1.23 ^.^b

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Originally Posted by Hyrist

Really? Because this is a strong left turn AWAY from the events leading up to 1.0. Heck, the fact that Yoshi was so open about the whole of it to begin with is pretty much the exact opposite of what we had in 1.0. I mean, not to dispel your sinking feeling or anything but I have to wonder what you are expecting to be so afraid of it not being met.

Perhaps you should check your expectations some?

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How exactly is he "more open"?

Besides these forums, S.E. is just as secretive as ever. We didn't even know Hamlet Defence was instanced content until the day of patch notes. S.E. still really don't give much away at all, despite pretending they do.

The fact that we don't know much about 2.0 at all 3 months before its supposed release is almost exactly the kind of stunt S.E. pulled pre 1.0.

Remember when people thought there would be like 50% more zones on release, with sidequests and voiceovers and boss fights just waiting for us on release, and we were all wrong? Well, history repeats itself, because we are promised the exact same thing now, only with much less proof of its existence.

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Originally Posted by bobbygunz

How exactly is he "more open"?

Besides these forums, S.E. is just as secretive as ever. We didn't even know Hamlet Defence was instanced content until the day of patch notes. S.E. still really don't give much away at all, despite pretending they do.

The fact that we don't know much about 2.0 at all 3 months before its supposed release is almost exactly the kind of stunt S.E. pulled pre 1.0.

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They don't have to tell us every single detail about the game's development. They don't HAVE to tell us anything at all, like most other games, but they do.

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Originally Posted by bobbygunz

Remember when people thought there would be like 50% more zones on release, with sidequests and voiceovers and boss fights just waiting for us on release, and we were all wrong? Well, history repeats itself, because we are promised the exact same thing now, only with much less proof of its existence.

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The poor release of the game was SE's fault. The "don't worry about it, we're getting more stuff!" was the players fault. False hope, sincere optimism, call it what you want. But the fact was that the last stage of beta was crap, and the playerbase basically lied to themselves that all this stuff would be added.

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Originally Posted by bobbygunz

How exactly is he "more open"?

Besides these forums, S.E. is just as secretive as ever. We didn't even know Hamlet Defence was instanced content until the day of patch notes. S.E. still really don't give much away at all, despite pretending they do.

The fact that we don't know much about 2.0 at all 3 months before its supposed release is almost exactly the kind of stunt S.E. pulled pre 1.0.

Remember when people thought there would be like 50% more zones on release, with sidequests and voiceovers and boss fights just waiting for us on release, and we were all wrong? Well, history repeats itself, because we are promised the exact same thing now, only with much less proof of its existence.

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Agreed, 2.0 is going to be 1.0 all over again, Yoshi-p has hyped this up and promised too much if you ask me, yes yes before anyone says well people ran away with their expectations so its their own fault.. goes without saying really.

I think this is just the tip of the disappointment though, guess we will have to wait til August to see this "awesome website"

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Originally Posted by Jinko

Agreed, 2.0 is going to be 1.0 all over again, Yoshi-p has hyped this up and promised too much if you ask me, yes yes before anyone says well people ran away with their expectations so its their own fault.. goes without saying really.

I think this is just the tip of the disappointment though, guess we will have to wait til August to see this "awesome website"

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We also plan to unveil a brand new promotion site for version 2.0 soon after E3 ends.

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it say right after E3 ends so why do you think it going to be in Aug? the only thing that would be in Aug would be the video and more information but the site would be update with information on FFXIV 2.0 from E3 ends too 2. beta

Yeah I agree they need to be more open with 2.0 so the same mistake does not happen again.

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Originally Posted by Zenaku

it say right after E3 ends so why do you think it going to be in Aug? the only thing that would be in Aug would be the video and more information but the site would be update with information on FFXIV 2.0 from E3 ends too 2. beta

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Not to be too technical, but it says soon after, not "right after."

Mr. Yoshida has done wonderous things in such a short time frame, so I'm not trying to cut him down here, but the translations of his letters have made it seem that he uses the word soon quite liberally. Often times taking weeks or months. So given the track record, it's not unreasonable to assume "soon" might mean six or so weeks.

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Originally Posted by Babydoll

Yeah I agree they need to be more open with 2.0 so the same mistake does not happen again.

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Which is why I keep at the spell reform for Thaumaturge/black mage. It's a very repetitive, single combo class.

It's uninteresting now, and no developer says it's going to change by 2.0, then how can I expect 2.0 to be any better than it is now?

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Originally Posted by Jinrya-Geki

Which is why I keep at the spell reform for Thaumaturge/black mage. It's a very repetitive, single combo class.

It's uninteresting now, and no developer says it's going to change by 2.0, then how can I expect 2.0 to be any better than it is now?

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Exactly >_< This game needs more of a fix then removing the lag, animation lock and new zones. They need to redo lot of the spells and battle stuff too ; ;

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Originally Posted by Sephrick

Not to be too technical, but it says soon after, not "right after."

Mr. Yoshida has done wonderous things in such a short time frame, so I'm not trying to cut him down here, but the translations of his letters have made it seem that he uses the word soon quite liberally. Often times taking weeks or months. So given the track record, it's not unreasonable to assume "soon" might mean six or so weeks.

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You are correct, but he also gives the frame of reference "Soon after E3 ends." And August is not exactly soon after the end of E3.

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Originally Posted by bobbygunz

How exactly is he "more open"?

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The list is too long to state. But you usually never hear about the PR team taking action on behalf of a game form the developer itself. Lets start there.

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Besides these forums, S.E. is just as secretive as ever. We didn't even know Hamlet Defence was instanced content until the day of patch notes. S.E. still really don't give much away at all, despite pretending they do.

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First off, the bolded. You just acknowledged that Yoshida is more open, so you lose weight in your entire argument here. I've been saying for this enitre duration that Yoshida's policies should be adapted by Square Enix as a whole. But that does not discount the fact that he's more open

And as far as 'We didn't know Hamlet Defense would be instanced!' complaints. Honestly, how could anyone with a brain not figure that it would be? The game engine is run in instances. You can't load more than 40 models and even in instanced combat, it's pushed to the limit. Not to mention every plot story and situation in this game runs instances for any situation that causes character models to not be in their default positions.

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The fact that we don't know much about 2.0 at all 3 months before its supposed release is almost exactly the kind of stunt S.E. pulled pre 1.0.

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Yeah, because we defiantly had a rough outline as to the production times, features, and full concepts of FFXIV 1.0 as soon as they started production on it. It's very hard for me to have any respect for you as so much of what you are saying is flat out lies. We have had more information about FFXIV's 2.0 than we ever had about any Square Enix game previously at this stage.

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Remember when people thought there would be like 50% more zones on release, with sidequests and voiceovers and boss fights just waiting for us on release, and we were all wrong?

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Actually, no. I distinctly remember watching as a bunch of fanatics on the forums drove themselves into a wild frenzy of hype and hatred as I sat telling people to lower their expectations as launches are never as good as they are intended to be.

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Well, history repeats itself, because we are promised the exact same thing now, only with much less proof of its existence.

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Again with the lies. First off, we were never promised anything major outside the outline, and when things were coming down the pipeline that did not seem feasible for 2.0 launch we were told that it would likely be post launch content.

Magitek mounts? Likely wont be in 2.0 launch - Figured I'd warn you now seeming it's obvious you haven't been paying any attention to these forums besides your own little rants for the past two years. PVP? Also questionable at launch.

I know it may seem like a lot of work, as you can't even fact-check yourself before you spew bile all over the forums, but please cut your expectations and your raging emotions down a notch. I've been stating this forever and it does not seem to get through. We're not getting anything gloriously awesome in 2.0 content wise, aside from the game engine revamp. Look at the outline and you've pretty much got the answer to all of your questions you would have up until this point. Don't expect more than what's on there, and pay attention to the timeline of it.

We're right about the time where we are going to start getting details, but Yoshi has been told to hold off and give a large bit of info rather than trickle it down as initially intended. It's a smarter move IMO.

I can't imagine how far in depth the rants and cries have gone, now that we're 24 pages in. But it's just hilarious the amounts of whiners, complainers and cry babies that are in here, yet...we're all paying to play the game.

E3 is still a bit of a joke today and has been downhill since they took a year off a few years ago. They are probably saving most of the promo work for TGS which is from 9/20-9/23 this year. I really doubt SE won't have XIV info at E3 but it seems like they're saving the trailer for the relaunch at this point.