Do we want another 10 years of FF14 on this engine?

I am not really talking about the graphics. I am talking about the mechanics. The time it takes from push button to in game response. How animations for skills can go off but the skill does not trigger. The ability to place objects in a 3d space of housing. The animation limitations they are constantly experimenting with via Hildebrand.
They are trying to make this engine do things they never intended for it to do when they first made/adjusted it.

It can only bend so far. They will hit a wall eventually and the game will not be able to evolve any more. And old problems will be tolerated less and less as new games come out that dont have those problems.

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Originally Posted by Necrotica

I am not really talking about the graphics. I am talking about the mechanics. The time it takes from push button to in game response. How animations for skills can go off but the skill does not trigger. The ability to place objects in a 3d space of housing. The animation limitations they are constantly experimenting with via Hildebrand.
They are trying to make this engine do things they never intended for it to do when they first made/adjusted it.

It can only bend so far. They will hit a wall eventually and the game will not be able to evolve any more. And old problems will be tolerated less and less as new games come out that dont have those problems.

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That isn't even the engine. That's more of a connectivity / infrastructure thing that often has nothing to do with what they've done on their end.

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Originally Posted by Necrotica

I am not really talking about the graphics. I am talking about the mechanics. The time it takes from push button to in game response.

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For GCDs it's not a problem. The issue is with Abilities. I think that they can change the ability, animation or network code without making an entirely new game.

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The ability to place objects in a 3d space of housing.

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Although it may be difficult for them to get it to work without messing things up because of how big the game is, I'm not convinced that it's that hard to do generally.

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The animation limitations they are constantly experimenting with via Hildebrand.
They are trying to make this engine do things they never intended for it to do when they first made/adjusted it.

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It is true that it is not designed to express tears. They have admitted that numerous time, so they have worked around it by putting a sin eater model inside and pushing it through the eyes in Shadowbringers, a shine effect on the eye, covering their eyes with a hand or looking away from the face and showing a tear drop to the ground.

In any case, the way SE has opted to build their game seems to have caused them a lot of technical grief. People can argue about the semantics of what is and is not a game engine all day, but it doesn't change the fact that this game is very constrained.

The old 'Engine limitations' and 'Legacy code' lines they like to trot out explain but don't really excuse the lack of polish around some features. If this game is going to continue for years to come, they really do need to do some housekeeping and address some of the more glaring problems.

Most of the limitations are from the game being on the ps4, not the engine itself. You can modify and improve an engine, but you can't overcome fixed hardware limitations.

If the current engine and net code are all we're going to get, then yes. I'd rather have 10 more years of this than nothing.

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Originally Posted by Necrotica

Do we really want another 10 years in this? Or would we rather get FFXIV-2?

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If we ever get a FFXIV-2 title I want it to be a single player RPG, or at most 4-8 player Monster Hunter-esque game based in Eorzea only (the main 3 states + Ishgard), with it focusing on being a relatively strong adventurer exploring the world instead of being the Warrior of Light.

As for a new MMO, PSO2:NG happened and we all saw how that went. I think FFXIV ARR is pretty young for an MMO. I'm not a software developer but I think they can fix up those issues with the engine and improve it if they decide to put their efforts into it.

EverQuest lasted 20+ years on their jankiness. Don’t see why FF14 can’t.

Many people like the current engine as-is. Most raiders have gleefully accepted “snapshotting” and “slidecasting” as core gameplay mechanics, and would probably be upset if they were removed. The very nature of raids—highly scripted, repetitive, and tedious—is something that is deeply beloved in the raiding community. They enjoy how it’s predictable and more focused on graphics and flashiness, as that’s something that WoW doesn’t do. They also have a lot of story cutscenes (for easy mode) and good music to compensate for the gameplay shortcomings. If the raids felt more responsive and real-time, people all across FFXIV would feel bothered.

That is, if they’re not unsubbed while playing other games. And let’s face it, the jankiness also plays into that. Because raiding is so tedious, many raiders like to take breaks and play other stuff. This is a widely lauded feature of FFXIV. Other games force you to play, but FFXIV, by being janky, actually gives you the right to play other games or do things in your life. Many are enjoying the current drought because this winter has a really good line-up of other games like World of Warcraft: Dragonflight. So by not wearing out as much, gamers might feel forced to raid more in FFXIV, cutting into their time spent on vacation.

In short, many FFXIV players do not want the game to change from what they fell in love with. Every expansion has at least a 90 on Metacritic, and all those reviewers can’t be wrong about the gameplay, can they? Nor can all of the advertising and self-made marketing from others in the fanbase, including fans buying billboards to advertise the game on Square’s behalf, all out of pocket??

To change the engine requires make the game almost from scratch. That's not very good idea for an ongoing game that needs content every few months. They will instead try to improve engine in next expansion, but a totally new engine is for next MMo if they do it. WoW or SWTOR to cite examples didn't change engine in all the years, just added improvements.