Suggestion: How to Implement Flight in 2.x Areas Without Delaying Expansion

At PAX East, the answer regarding implementing flight in A Realm Reborn areas was that doing it in the short term would likely delay the 4.0 release since we'd have to model terrain that we can't see from the ground but would be able to see were we able to freely fly.

Why not just put flight boundaries such that we still can't get to the "wrong" side of such scenery? We already hit invisible walls when we try to fly too far in Heavensward areas. Just put those boundaries a bit closer as needed in ARR areas.

Wouldn't work. Simply by being able to fly upwards would give you a perspective that you wouldn't be able to get otherwise, meaning you would be able to see over existing terrain and into the void beyond. If they were to put in such flight boundaries, it would be so restrictive that it would defeat the purpose of giving you flight to begin with.

It can work if we can't fly higher than head height (just to have the increased speed)

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Originally Posted by Felis

It can work if we can't fly higher than head height

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It can't be that hard to be a little slower. Those areas are not made for flying and being a little slower won't kill anybody.

ITT: People talking as if they're game designers.

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Originally Posted by Phireblast

ITT: People talking as if they're game designers.

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You don't have to be a game designer to know why flying would be a pain to implement in 2.x zones.

You just have to have an appreciation for going out of bounds in those areas. :3

Ya, 2.X zones were designed only with X/Y in mind. 3.0 zones, wide and open are designed with X/Y/Z in mind. Adding that extra dimension takes more work that just saying "Oh I'll just allow players to manipulate their Z positions".

Placing boundaries in the older zones isn't as easy as say putting Cheese on your sandwich because you decided you wanted to add it to your ham sandwich. It's more like Making a pizza and realizing you forgot to put the yeast in the dough. You can't really use that dough to make a pizza now, you have to start from scratch. While you might have the core ingredients on hand still, you still in a sense have to start back at square one in order to properly make flying zones.

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Originally Posted by EveK

Why not just put flight boundaries such that we still can't get to the "wrong" side of such scenery?

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Because the direction of "Up" is part of that whole "Wrong side" thing.

I'm actually fine with a delayed expansion if they want to include this in 2.0 areas.
I mean, yes, expansions are fun to have and give you more features than a patch update, but if it's an option, I can go a few months longer without needing to dish out an extra $20 for the next expansion in order to have HW more complete.

Like everyone is saying, this wouldn't work. However, I do think we should keep asking for it. I don't think it would cost us much in terms of what we'd be sacrificing to receive it.

What they should do is fix the old areas zone by zone and implement a few per major patch.

I actually don't see the point in adding flying to old areas if you're not going to do anything with it... Getting the increased speed would be nice, but old zones are relatively small and have no real need for a speed boost...

I'd still like them to add flying to old zones, but not as just a "Fine, here you go" sort of way, in a way that actually provides something new to the old zones. Take Southern Thanalan, rather than just adding flying to the area, I'd say add new areas to the area that make use of flying. There is that big old tower in the distance for example... So rather than it just being a case of "Here's the old zone, now you can fly in it", it's a case of "Here's the old zone, now you can fly in it and discover new areas!".

To be honest, SE is being disingenuous here. They knew they wanted to flying well before 3.0, obviously. Why did they not simply redesign the 2.0 zones back then? They could have actually started small, maybe one zone a patch, or whatever. The players would not have even know since the redesign would only have affected things we couldn't see anyway.

If they had done even half of a zone each major patch since 3.0, which could have been done concurrently with everything else... they'd be done by now, or at least well into having it ready by 4.0 without delaying anything. it's not a zero-sum game.

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Originally Posted by FaileExperiment

To be honest, SE is being disingenuous here. They knew they wanted to flying well before 3.0, obviously. Why did they not simply redesign the 2.0 zones back then?

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They aren't being disingenous at all. They just never intended to add flying to those zones in the first place.

There's really not much reason to do so, honestly. The old areas are so small it's not needed.

I would be fine with delaying 4.0 to do this. I mean people would ask the same thing if they implemented swimming in the next expansion anyway.

I don't think we need flying in the 2.0 areas.

People already complain about the world feeling "small" and what will this do? You'll be able to cross SoThan in like, two seconds. I think the areas are fine without flying, thanks.

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Originally Posted by Lemuria

Wouldn't work. Simply by being able to fly upwards would give you a perspective that you wouldn't be able to get otherwise, meaning you would be able to see over existing terrain and into the void beyond. If they were to put in such flight boundaries, it would be so restrictive that it would defeat the purpose of giving you flight to begin with.

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Mm. Yes, that does make sense. Ah well.

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Originally Posted by AskaRay

I don't think we need flying in the 2.0 areas.

People already complain about the world feeling "small" and what will this do? You'll be able to cross SoThan in like, two seconds. I think the areas are fine without flying, thanks.

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Imagine very small areas like Upper La Noscea, lol.

I would be ok with them adding even more areas that have no aether currents and no flying. Even an underground zone perhaps. I think there's a place for both flying and flightless zones to exist.

why do we even need flight in 2.0 areas??? waste of time n resoursces even considering it ffs

I think only one zone really needs flying; Coerthas Central Highlands. All the other zones are just too small or have enough Aetherytes to keep land-only travel fine (Southern Thanalan and East Shroud are close to needing flying, but still don't really need it). If they can get this one zone redone without pushing things back, it would be great.

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Originally Posted by Felis

It can work if we can't fly higher than head height (just to have the increased speed)

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Then what's the point. No serious developer would implement a half-arsed 'solution' like this.

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Originally Posted by Ashkendor

Imagine very small areas like Upper La Noscea, lol.

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I think it would be a good opportunity to go back and merge Upper La Noscea and Outer La Noscea, like the original idea seems to have been. Though that would make Wanderer's Palace slightly more annoying for me...

Although now that I mention that, the caves in the 2.0 areas really were not designed with flying in mind... You only need to look at the occasional Outer La Noscea Hunt spawn to realize that... I guess Diadem indicates that they can actually toggle flying on and off though, since you cannot fly in the caves in Diadem IIRC.

They would have to tack on artificial backgrounds to cover up untextured areas or add more area to each zone which I could see S-E doing if/when they do stuff to 2.0 regions like making West Shroud a thing again.

I'm pretty sure we gonna be getting a Cataclysm (WoW) style of an expansion where all old areas will get revamped.

Adding flying to old areas will present the same issue that it would in WoW back when they did it. There are a lot of areas we can't see over, like the rock walls in thanalan for example, there isn't really anything behind those, it's just untextured empty space and even if they put an invisible wall there it would look really ugly. La Noscea wouldn't be as bad because of the water areas but they'd still have to texture the areas we can and cannot go to but I doubt the devs want us to see an empty void or a sudden drop behind the rock walls since there's no textures behind it.

But if they do this revamp, I actually hope they make the world a bit more seamless. Like being able to fly from say aleport straight to the isles of umbra or fly to the ships for the sahagin dailies rather than taking the elbst. I thought about them making a idyllshire a part of it's zone but after thinking on it more, I think idyllshire should stay as is.

2.X doesnt need flying, 3.X didnt need flying, 4.X doesnt need flying. All it gave us was annoying quests where the verticality of the quest objective was unclear and zones that while massive are hugely dull in comparison to 2.x areas, with massive stretches of landscape whose purpose is just to make the zone bigger.

*Edit* Oh, and not to mention more mounts that SE can pedal us on the mogstation!

I love flying , everything about it I love and a huge grats to SE for implementing it so well in HW. Very excited to see how they handle swimming one day.

We don't "need" flying in 2.0 zones anymore then we "need" another silly game in the gs, or any ui changes, we don't "need"a glamour book, or "need" gear to be gender shared....we certainly don't need another pvp area , more mounts or pets let alone another primal fight for the game to survive.

However I would love the addition of flight in 2.0 areas ,I see it as an improvement.

I view all the things I mentioned above as improvements if added...ANY improvement in the game is a plus whether I personally will use it/play it/benefit from it or not. Because someone else will...some other paying customer will and that's the goal of any game. Not just to survive, but thrive. :p

I think they should just expand the old ARR areas so flying would be more useful. As is, flying isn't necessary, because they're so small, but if the expand them, then yes, let us fly. Upper La Noscra & Isles of Umbra really need expanding. In Outer La Noscea, we could finally go to the floating islands they have. In Eastern Thanalan, we could explore more of that tangled crystallized area in the east. We could finally have West Shroud and see the damage caused by the Calamity. Explore more Sylphlands in the East Shroud. There are so many things we could explore in old areas where flying would be acceptable.

I won't nay say flight in the 2.0 area's, but if swimming is added at all to the game that needs to be added to the 2.0 area's first. Its been killing me to sit at the shore line of Costa or Mist for the last few years. That being said if sailing is added we need fishing fates in the ocean as well.

I hope with redesign the devs also mean making them bigger, full with canyons like western Highlands.
And a sea zone that allow us to fly between La Noscea and Thanalan.

I really don't care about flying in 2.0 zones. They are smaller than 3.0's and flying is not that useful plus we have a reason to use our old ground mounts.

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Originally Posted by DukeGr

I'm pretty sure we gonna be getting a Cataclysm (WoW) style of an expansion where all old areas will get revamped.

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We already had that

I imagine if/when they add flight to 2.0 areas they will likely expand the smaller zones so that new areas (with higher level content) are reachable via flight. Incorporating actual content would help justify adding flight to those zones.

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Originally Posted by Ashkendor

They aren't being disingenous at all. They just never intended to add flying to those zones in the first place.

There's really not much reason to do so, honestly. The old areas are so small it's not needed.

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Indeed. Just for kicks, I just rode chocobo from Gridania to Ul'dah - following the roads, no short-cuts or cross-country. Took me about 8 minutes. So that's about 2 minutes on average, to cross each zone, following the roads. Could probably chop a couple minutes off that if I took short-cuts. And of course, there's Aetheryte crystals you could port directly to once you have them.

If they added flying, at current flying speeds, forget it. You'd be across the zones in seconds. It'd be ridiculous.

What gets me are those acting like it's somehow needed, or important enough that adding it should take priority, even if it means pushing back new areas/content for an expansion. I mean seriously? "No no no, don't put priority on designing and introducing new content and areas for your players to explore. I'd much rather be able to fly around in 2+ year-old areas. That's much more important. Those new areas can wait."

Yeah, okay. lol

Sure people want flying in the old zones, because they want it. But to argue that it's needed, or should somehow be a higher priority? Come on.

Would be a waste of development time. I'd rather see new content and systems then a rework of zones I hardly ever visit.

Flying zones are ok so long as they are designed with flight in mind, using resources to add flying to 2.0 areas just for the sake of flying would be pretty wasteful imo. I kinda liked when Yoshi hinted at areas getting flight if they need it only, since this brings things like adding areas with underwater mechanics within said areas, or as someone suggested underground areas with underground only travel mechanics. (I want a mole machine! do it! :P) I think if they do "change" the 2.0 areas to flying it will be because it will involve new content within said zones at said xpacs, like someone said using southern thanalan that zone could get reworked with new areas only reachable by flight at w/e lvl, and leading to a zone(s) south.

Halting future development just to get it in for the sake of convenience atm though, I cannot agree with that XD

guess what i mean is i never want "well we cant do that cuz then we have to add it everywhere else" to be a reason to not add content. I want to continue to see more content! =D

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Originally Posted by DukeGr

I'm pretty sure we gonna be getting a Cataclysm (WoW) style of an expansion where all old areas will get revamped.

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Well 2.0 was essentially the same thing in function and story.

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Originally Posted by Felis

I hope with redesign the devs also mean making them bigger, full with canyons like western Highlands.
And a sea zone that allow us to fly between La Noscea and Thanalan.

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They are not just one huge zone with instance portals. The zones are not seamless. The lands are separate pieces and I highly suspect they couldn't be connected like a jig saw.

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Originally Posted by Preypacer

What gets me are those acting like it's somehow needed, or important enough that adding it should take priority, even if it means pushing back new areas/content for an expansion. I mean seriously? "No no no, don't put priority on designing and introducing new content and areas for your players to explore. I'd much rather be able to fly around in 2+ year-old areas. That's much more important. Those new areas can wait."

Yeah, okay. lol

Sure people want flying in the old zones, because they want it. But to argue that it's needed, or should somehow be a higher priority? Come on.

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couldnt agree more lol

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Originally Posted by Ashkendor

They aren't being disingenous at all. They just never intended to add flying to those zones in the first place.

There's really not much reason to do so, honestly. The old areas are so small it's not needed.

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well, what about 2.0 Coerthas? Only one aetheryte and ppl going from A to Z have to ground it all the way since there are no other aetherytes at say Whitebrim or the giant tower further south to get to for example, a hunt mark that will melt with everyone on the server heading to it even if you get there via the Mor Dhona exit, or the thavnarian mistletoe node. Just a couple examples of convenience. I mean even 1.0 Coerthas had multiple camps all over the zone besides Camp Dragonhead with their own aetherytes you could teleport to and now we have just the one. It was faster and easier to get around 1.0 Coerthas than it is now for some even with the zones technically being a fraction of the size they were in 1.0. 1.0 Mor Dhona had the same thing, but then again, it was also much larger than it is now.
I think it would just maybe simpler to put more aetherytes in that zone for example and some in the Hinterlands if it's even possible.