Depth Vs. Accessability

There is understandably a lot of criticize going around how XIV shouldn't take elements from XI because of the way a lot of the quests in XI require a lot of work. Frankly many of the quests in XI are nearly impossible to complete without an online guide written by the few guys who cracked the code and discovered something new.

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I'm not one of those FAQ writers and with my limited time to play I doubt I'll ever be.

However I've grown to love the inclusion of the complex elements and I love the gardening system in all it's complexity even though I've never grown a single plant successfully and here's why:


XI has PLENTY of easy missions. I started playing late so I've had to solo most of the storyline missions with a BLM even though many told me it's not possible and honestly I'm not that good of a player anyway.

However it's the inclusion of these utterly absurd crazy-hard-to-figure-out secrets that makes the game world feel alive and you begin to think like absolutely everything has 10 layers of depth and modifiers working under the hood. It makes the world of XI feel like it's full of secrets and it's not in a hurry to spoon-feed you all of the content it has. Those who seek will find but for the rest there's also a casual way to play the game in the form of FoV (=read leves without timers and more freedom) levelling, farming and missions.

It's like storytelling in all forms of entertainment and art; the most interesting thing is always the unknown, unseen -a hidden element.

The problem with XIV is that I don't believe there is anything to discover. Along this belief I don't pay attention to NPC dialogue as it can't lead me to find anything else than the quest mobs marked on my map. Leve text feels like skippable "flavor" text and the missions don't feel like they're telling a story of a real living breathing world.



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In conclusion I personally feel that these concepts aren't mutually exclusive. The player should have the choice of staying on the easy-street but also the knowledge that there's an ocean of possibilities to discover.

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I prefer Shallow waters, less chance of sharks, well aside from those sharks that lunge at you trying to drag you into deep water so they can maim and devour you.....

Indeed, depth is very important and seriously lacking in XIV. Opposite of XI(in the past), I think they went way too far with easymode. It's convenient, but also boring. Though I think because of that it gives them the opportunity to build on it and fill the world in with more life, mystery, & challenges. Adding that depth with optional things that don't keep the people who want the easier route from enjoying the game too. Hopefully they can pull that off.

Why do people always make these chapter-long, feature-length, rational threads?

There is mystery about the future and somewhat about what's in the game (deaspected crystals and the 7th umbral era).

However, secret quests and the like would be nice...but I want the basics done first, IE: Battle rework, class balance, jobs, mounts...making the game enjoyable as a base before adding the depth.

being more accessible is not the same as easy.... you can have depth and it is easy. And you can have challenging content that anyone can have. What ffxi lacked was prolong fun. get that term FUN these are ganes meant for "cheap" entertainment. Fun is the only thing they need to be. You just feel if something is easy opr if something is challenging. Honestly ffxi wasn't hard, just not that accessable. The quests were not that hard either. If I git stuck I asked someone, the only reason people made guides was to limit getting bothered by newbies.

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Originally Posted by SuzakuCMX

There is mystery about the future and somewhat about what's in the game (deaspected crystals and the 7th umbral era)..

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Its hardly a secret/mystery when everyone knows it relates to unimplemented content. It is also something you cant discover more off.

I do think that FFXI's quests are WAY too vague and don't give enough valid information to complete them. There's a difference between challenging-to-figure-out and totally unreasonable content!

I'd prefer the depth of FFXIV to be discovered by, for example, getting a quest and it taking you into the depths of Eorzea where you wouldn't otherwise go, and find things out about the world that way. As opposed to having to google the location of a '???' mark that is, essentially, a needle in a haystack.

I do like the sense of community that seems to develop when people have to work together to figure new things out in FFXI, though. I much prefer things to be added in a shroud of mystery rather than being immediately obvious.

You know what I liked
LA Noire it is a challenging game a fun game and an easy game at the same time. :)
Pretty much You do need to think when doing interrigations the more right answers the bettter the info. Like you watch the npc talk about the story, and you need to really focus on ther face, their attitude and what they say. If you think someone is lieing, you need to state the correct evidence (which isn't obvious) Thats the challange, the fun is its sorta set up like gta but your playing a cop. It acts just like the old 1940's dectective "gumshoe" flicks. With a old husky narrator talking all this old lingo. Like "it was raining like cats anbd dog that night, then suddenly this dame walks in. She look like one of them ol' pin up gals ya see in them calanders" (something to that effect) Amd it is easy because anyone can play it, it isn't hard to figure out what to do.

Honestly, too many people already admited they do not want a larger player base then ff11. Which imo fail logic.

I very much agree with the OP. If there was one monumental achievement in FFXI it was the splendid sense of solidity Vana'diel had (has...?) It was all out of a sense of mystery, which made you pay extra attention to little details because clues could be anywhere. And there were intricate relationships at play.

There are two types of players concerning this: Those for whom depth and mystery are encumbrance to their speedy race to the cap, the "level, level, level!" type; and then there are those who enjoy slowing down to take a meandering side-road through deep content. You can, theoretically, please the first type within a world designed with provisions for the second. But it's unlikely the second will find solace in a world designed with only the former in mind.

I also agree that relationships and the solutions to mysteries could/should be made less arcane and the knowledge less esoteric and willfully hidden. No more of the change-your-furniture-around-to-get-the-right-moghancement-and-then-face-west-during-a-waning-gibbous-on-Lightningdays-to-synth-that-belt kind of lore, please! Ah, and also don't make us reverse-engineer the game's code to figure out the consequences of having eaten that garlic cracker.

Bump!

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Originally Posted by Kilta_Firelotus

You know what I liked
LA Noire it is a challenging game a fun game and an easy game at the same time. :)
Pretty much You do need to think when doing interrigations the more right answers the bettter the info. Like you watch the npc talk about the story, and you need to really focus on ther face, their attitude and what they say. If you think someone is lieing, you need to state the correct evidence (which isn't obvious) Thats the challange, the fun is its sorta set up like gta but your playing a cop. It acts just like the old 1940's dectective "gumshoe" flicks. With a old husky narrator talking all this old lingo. Like "it was raining like cats anbd dog that night, then suddenly this dame walks in. She look like one of them ol' pin up gals ya see in them calanders" (something to that effect) Amd it is easy because anyone can play it, it isn't hard to figure out what to do.

Honestly, too many people already admited they do not want a larger player base then ff11. Which imo fail logic.

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Very little of this makes any sense in the context of FFXIV.

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Originally Posted by Rutelor

I very much agree with the OP. If there was one monumental achievement in FFXI it was the splendid sense of solidity Vana'diel had (has...?) It was all out of a sense of mystery, which made you pay extra attention to little details because clues could be anywhere. And there were intricate relationships at play.

There are two types of players concerning this: Those for whom depth and mystery are encumbrance to their speedy race to the cap, the "level, level, level!" type; and then there are those who enjoy slowing down to take a meandering side-road through deep content. You can, theoretically, please the first type within a world designed with provisions for the second. But it's unlikely the second will find solace in a world designed with only the former in mind.

I also agree that relationships and the solutions to mysteries could/should be made less arcane and the knowledge less esoteric and willfully hidden. No more of the change-your-furniture-around-to-get-the-right-moghancement-and-then-face-west-during-a-waning-gibbous-on-Lightningdays-to-synth-that-belt kind of lore, please! Ah, and also don't make us reverse-engineer the game's code to figure out the consequences of having eaten that garlic cracker.

Bump!

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I don't think SE has to choose to which audience it's catering to as both can easily co-exist as long as people are willing to accept the fact that finer details of the systems take time to learn but aren't necessary to know to complete the missions.

Same happens in every FF game. Sorry actually in every GOOD FF GAME.
There are always hidden bosses that take probably weeks to even discover and killing them requires hunt for legendary weapons with their own complex quests. IX is my fave FF but X is absolutely brilliant in this aspect.

Another example would be water based magic attacks in XI. Learning the weaknesses of enemies is easy but having an extra boost on a right elemental day gives the player just a slight advantage if he know how to take advantage of it.

I'm not the type of player who actively uses this kind of hardcore information but I can feel the existence of such systems fully in the way I experience the world of XI. It's full of mysteries and every year I play it I learn something new. Learning new things of the same game makes me feel like I'm getting better at the game as opposed to me just blindly grinding the same leveling 101 routine over and over in different locations.

Same also applies to the numerous NPC cutscenes. It might take months to learn the full story of some npc but when you get to that cutscene after a hard or long or a luck-based task you're reminded of the fact that this world has it's history and it's secrets and you've probably only just scratched the surface of it's brilliance.

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Originally Posted by Sephr

Very little of this makes any sense in the context of FFXIV.

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it was an example of making a fun challenging game that ANYONE can play because it isn't hard.

I prefer quests that are intuitive, challenging and interesting. If you read it and can figure it out that's all I want. I don't want things handed to me but I don't want to require a guide at any point. I should be able to figure it out on my own in a reasonable amount of time with the information given to me.

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Originally Posted by Arcell

I prefer quests that are intuitive, challenging and interesting. If you read it and can figure it out that's all I want. I don't want things handed to me but I don't want to require a guide at any point. I should be able to figure it out on my own in a reasonable amount of time with the information given to me.

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^^this!

I think the markers seriously make me think of the quest dialogue as useless spam as I don't need any of it to play the game. This in turn makes every quest feel like a leve and thus the world has no "soul" to it.

Depth is overrated,
Besides, if the content is too little, it can be 'enlarged'

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Originally Posted by Randis

Depth is overrated,
Besides, if the content is too little, it can be 'enlarged'

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But the down time suffered from the content being enlarged, can be quite long.

just enlarge it by 150%