Alpha First Look: Video 3 - The Black Shroud

Just for notice, 3rd alpha video is up

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/58241-Alpha-First-Look-Video-3-The-Black-Shroud

It would seem Yoshi-P is hold up on his word! =)

Wow, nice! I feel safe to say that the new compositions actually sound like Final Fantasy music. :) Seems to have a Hitoshi Sakimoto vibe to it. :)

Only thing I'm slightly miffed about is how much of the map is revealed when you enter a unexplored area. Gives me a feeling we wont actually need to explore the map to reveal it, they are rather small compared to what we have now. As long as just aether hoping to all the nodes doesn't give you a full map I'm fine.

Still can't stand that locked camera, I hope to see a video with a free camera not locked onto the character while moving like we currently have in 1.0.

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Originally Posted by Jynx

Only thing I'm slightly miffed about is how much of the map is revealed when you enter a unexplored area. Gives me a feeling we wont actually need to explore the map to reveal it, they are rather small compared to what we have now. As long as just aether hoping to all the nodes doesn't give you a full map I'm fine.

Still can't stand that locked camera, I hope to see a video with a free camera not locked onto the character while moving like we currently have in 1.0.

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As I mentioned in the other thread, those who want to explore will do so. Those who don't care will do the bare minimum either way. I like the chunk reveals personally but that's just because I'm a completionist lol.

Overall though I absolutely love the new video. Gorgeous new areas and superb music.

Looks like Square is really going to flesh out those side areas. Video shows Central Shroud between Gridania and Bentbranch, a tour of Bentbranch, a waterfall north of Gilbert's Spire, a tour of Hyrstmill, and a tour of Spirithold/Warren Prison, south of Greentear/Greentear Selective Cutting Area.

Hey at least the door opens away from the character as oppose to people complaining about it opening towards you...

Awesome video. I'm so pumped up and can't wait to explore FFXIV ARR!

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Originally Posted by IndigoDarkwolf

Looks like Square is really going to flesh out those side areas. Video shows Central Shroud between Gridania and Bentbranch, a tour of Bentbranch, a waterfall north of Gilbert's Spire, a tour of Hyrstmill, and a tour of Spirithold/Warren Prison, south of Greentear/Greentear Selective Cutting Area.

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Here are the start times for each area:
0:00 Walking from Gridania to Bentbranch
1:37 Bentbranch
2:50 Waterfall area north of Gilbert's Spire
3:24 Hyrstmill
4:30 Spirithold/Warren Prison

Loving the music and how the camps are actually full camps and not just a tent!

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Originally Posted by KaMuiSouZou

Here are the start times for each area:
0:00 Walking from Gridania to Bentbranch
1:37 Bentbranch
2:50 Waterfall area north of Gilbert's Spire
3:24 Hyrstmill
4:30 Warrenhold Prison

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The Eorzean alphabet on the map calls it "Spirithold", the Japanese text labels it "Warren Prison".

Edit: Obviously, none of the names are final, just thought it would be interesting for people who want to know.

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Originally Posted by IndigoDarkwolf

The Eorzean alphabet on the map calls it "Spirithold", the Japanese text labels it "Warren Prison".

Edit: Obviously, none of the names are final, just thought it would be interesting for people who want to know.

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Ah, yes you're right. I'm not too good at kanji so I read the "warren" and assumed the rest was "-hold prison." I guess I ended up combining them in my head when I read your first post haha. Edited my post, thanks.

Really enjoyed it. The wait for 2.0 is so painful. ;_;

Still annoyed by no character animation when panning the camera. I know it seems small but it really just takes something away from the game when the character doesn't move at all...just rotates like it's on a turn table or something. I really want to see our character's feet shuffle when panning the camera!

Yoshi-P: Please fix this!

That said...I find the rest of the video very enjoyable! I REALLLY love being able to go behind the waterfall; It is at least 1000 times better than all of the waterfalls being untouchable/non-explorable sights in 1.0!

i like how the music is. too bad its months away.
i wonder how LL looks now most of all.

how many will make post that the video had to much jumping?

Animation still terrible. Fix please

Is there a comment anywhere about the maps?

Except for npc marked quest locations I dont want to see an areas name and what buildings it has there before I've even been there.. >.> lol. But I love the color style of the map bet there will be exploring achievements now :D

And I keep looking at the stone pathways going "tessellation baby here we come" anyone else? lol

Hyrstmill is looking good! Excited to try the new Hamlet there!

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Originally Posted by SirOleas

That said...I find the rest of the video very enjoyable! I REALLLY love being able to go behind the waterfall; It is at least 1000 times better than all of the waterfalls being untouchable/non-explorable sights in 1.0!

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Well, what self-respecting fantasy game doesn't have at least one waterfall with a cave/tunnel behind it?

It is nice, though. I like the attention to detail on the waterfall, too. You don't just have the main cascade of water, but the water dripping from water collected on the stone/earth surfaces beneath it. That's a good sign that they really are paying attention to "all the little things", not just giving the basic once-over, making everything merely "functional".

to solve that camera issue, they simply need to unlock the camera from the character.. like the old xiv, and like every mmo.

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Originally Posted by Dragonheart

to solve that camera issue, they simply need to unlock the camera from the character.. like the old xiv, and like every mmo.

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btw even the dear OLD WoW, has a "turning" animation when the character turns 360° on standing himself...

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Originally Posted by Dragonheart

to solve that camera issue, they simply need to unlock the camera from the character.. like the old xiv, and like every mmo.

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http://youtu.be/TnFLSH2jkjw?t=1h14m9s

If you've played World of Warcraft, you'll know that holding the left mouse button results in just the camera moving, and holding the right mouse button results in the player turning in the direction you want to go. The newer footage is clearly using "right mouse button" movement, because in the link above, the camera rotates but the player does not.

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Originally Posted by Jynx

Only thing I'm slightly miffed about is how much of the map is revealed when you enter a unexplored area. Gives me a feeling we wont actually need to explore the map to reveal it, they are rather small compared to what we have now.

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Same feeling here :/

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Originally Posted by KiriA500

http://youtu.be/TnFLSH2jkjw?t=1h14m9s

If you've played World of Warcraft, you'll know that holding the left mouse button results in just the camera moving, and holding the right mouse button results in the player turning in the direction you want to go. The newer footage is clearly using "right mouse button" movement, because in the link above, the camera rotates but the player does not.

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hmm you're right. I hope that the camera animation are work in progress, it looks really bland right now.

As i said before even characters in WoW have animation when you hold the right mouse button to move the character 360°.

Meh.

Is anyone else depressed it seems like they only video's we've gotten to see any gameplay / walking through of is around Gridania.... ? ; ; Heck I'd go crazy to see a new zone or even something not next to the Cities.

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Originally Posted by Endigiont

Is anyone else depressed it seems like they only video's we've gotten to see any gameplay / walking through of is around Gridania.... ? ; ; Heck I'd go crazy to see a new zone or even something not next to the Cities.

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The Alpha is only in Gridania/Black Shroud, so it's all we're going to see. The beta might add more, but I doubt it until it's much later in the test.

See that's the only thing that makes me uneasy about ARR.... How quickly they can push out new maps... Although from what we've seen of Gridania / Black Shroud at least what they're doing is high quality.

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Originally Posted by Endigiont

See that's the only thing that makes me uneasy about ARR.... How quickly they can push out new maps... Although from what we've seen of Gridania / Black Shroud at least what they're doing is high quality.

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Well, the test isn't really for looking at the zones. It's testing out mechanics that work everywhere.

The 1.0 Alpha and most of the Beta were in La Noscea/Limsa Lominsa. Given, the game was awful then, it wasn't because of the lack of zones, it was the bad mechanics.

I just mean for myself one of the major let downs of XIV was it was basically only 5 zones, 5 huge barren copy pasta zones...

Yah I get that it's only the Black shroud in the Alpha, but I'd like to see some screenshots or something to know how the rest of the world is coming along, and I hope some places don't exude a lot more polish and redesigns than others.

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Originally Posted by Endigiont

I just mean for myself one of the major let downs of XIV was it was basically only 5 zones, 5 huge barren copy pasta zones...

Yah I get that it's only the Black shroud in the Alpha, but I'd like to see some screenshots or something to know how the rest of the world is coming along, and I hope some places don't exude a lot more polish and redesigns than others.

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http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/static..._20_PUB_14.jpg

http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/static...UB_0901_02.jpg

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Originally Posted by Endigiont

See that's the only thing that makes me uneasy about ARR.... How quickly they can push out new maps... Although from what we've seen of Gridania / Black Shroud at least what they're doing is high quality.

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I don't know about High Quality, it looks pretty bland and washed out to me, maybe they are playing on a PS3?

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Originally Posted by Sartori

I don't know about High Quality, it looks pretty bland and washed out to me, maybe they are playing on a PS3?

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I mean the last video of the Black shroud all the little buildings and such, you know stuff in the zone.

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Originally Posted by Endigiont

I just mean for myself one of the major let downs of XIV was it was basically only 5 zones, 5 huge barren copy pasta zones..

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Don't play MMOs, especially ones by SE because they're not going to release 720 areas at launch, they'll release 20 areas at launch, then 20 in first expansion then 20 in second and so on with 4 new areas in between in patches based on content addition.

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but I'd like to see some screenshots or something to know how the rest of the world is coming along, and I hope some places don't exude a lot more polish and redesigns than others.

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All MMOs suffer in world design after awhile...but if you look at even FFXI you could see that they do just fine with world design and don't "slack" on it even if you only ever see one city. XIV 1.0 was just lazily done compared to its predecessor.

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Originally Posted by Sartori

I don't know about High Quality, it looks pretty bland and washed out to me, maybe they are playing on a PS3?

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Don't sugar coat it..the graphical direction of ARR is bland in the sense it really does look like a generic MMO now. So there's a chance due to missing shaders it looks like that..or it's simply how the game will look.

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Originally Posted by KaMuiSouZou

Here are the start times for each area:
0:00 Walking from Gridania to Bentbranch
1:37 Bentbranch
2:50 Waterfall area north of Gilbert's Spire
3:24 Hyrstmill
4:30 Spirithold/Warren Prison

Loving the music and how the camps are actually full camps and not just a tent!

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100% with you on this, the zones were fine before imo, but these are looking amazing, though i still think the world is a little static..
Personally i would love to see things like:

Passive mobs moving away from you
curious mobs back, but with a lesser follow then they had before

NPC's Channing from day/night,
NPC's walking off so they are not their every day all day unless they need to be.
NPC's movign around town's camps (just for show to make them feel more alive)
Changing of the city/camp guards (maybe groups walk to a camp, swap and the old npcs walk back)

It's the kinda fluff that won't make or break the game, but it would give FFXIV something over other mmo's atm, yes its not something you pay attention to, but it could really ad to the Emerson level and make it stand out..

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Originally Posted by Esk

100% with you on this, the zones were fine before imo, but these are looking amazing, though i still think the world is a little static..
Personally i would love to see things like:

Passive mobs moving away from you
curious mobs back, but with a lesser follow then they had before

NPC's Channing from day/night,
NPC's walking off so they are not their every day all day unless they need to be.
NPC's movign around town's camps (just for show to make them feel more alive)
Changing of the city/camp guards (maybe groups walk to a camp, swap and the old npcs walk back)

It's the kinda fluff that won't make or break the game, but it would give FFXIV something over other mmo's atm, yes its not something you pay attention to, but it could really ad to the Emerson level and make it stand out..

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You do realize making XIV stand in in the whole purpose of ARR, right? Making it stand out is going to take a lot more than mobile NPCs.

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Originally Posted by Endigiont

I just mean for myself one of the major let downs of XIV was it was basically only 5 zones, 5 huge barren copy pasta zones...

Yah I get that it's only the Black shroud in the Alpha, but I'd like to see some screenshots or something to know how the rest of the world is coming along, and I hope some places don't exude a lot more polish and redesigns than others.

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Well, I recall reading that we'll have 40 zones in A Realm Reborn (Source). We'll still have the 5 regions to my knowledge (based on the official Final Fantasy XIV page), so that'd be about 8 zones per region.

Final Fantasy XI launched with 55 zones (source), some of which are very small, like Horlais Peak, Altar Room, etc.

That means we'll have 15 less zones (given the "40 zones" thing is accurate, as there's no source cited on the Wikipedia page), we don't know how big they'll be in A Realm Reborn. Going off of the Alpha footage we've seen so far of The Black Shroud, it appears at each part (2 shown so far) are quite large, I'd guess about the same size as Sarutabaruta from FFXI, only with more stuff littered around instead of vast open spaces of nothing.

I have no doubt that the zones in A Realm Reborn will be quite massive with plenty to explore.

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Don't play MMOs, especially ones by SE because they're not going to release 720 areas at launch, they'll release 20 areas at launch, then 20 in first expansion then 20 in second and so on with 4 new areas in between in patches based on content addition.

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Well aware of that, I've played XI since 04, and have knowledge of which zones were in the original FFXI and which were added in Zilart and the rest, however 5 really is a low number especially as you've said were so lazily put together.

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Originally Posted by Elexia

You do realize making XIV stand in in the whole purpose of ARR, right? Making it stand out is going to take a lot more than mobile NPCs.

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lol well Derp...

clearly, its just something i feel would add to it standing out in that one specific area.

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Originally Posted by KiriA500

Well, I recall reading that we'll have 40 zones in A Realm Reborn (Source). We'll still have the 5 regions to my knowledge (based on the official Final Fantasy XIV page), so that'd be about 8 zones per region.

Final Fantasy XI launched with 55 zones (source), some of which are very small, like Horlais Peak, Altar Room, etc.

That means we'll have 15 less zones (given the "40 zones" thing is accurate, as there's no source cited on the Wikipedia page), we don't know how big they'll be in A Realm Reborn. Going off of the Alpha footage we've seen so far of The Black Shroud, it appears at each part (2 shown so far) are quite large, I'd guess about the same size as Sarutabaruta from FFXI, only with more stuff littered around instead of vast open spaces of nothing.

I have no doubt that the zones in A Realm Reborn will be quite massive with plenty to explore.

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Yah and 55 was quite a bit, considering the level cap was 50 at launch so you had more than 1 zone a level. Also think of how different all those field zones were and even the dungeons zones (Low level, and High level Beastmean dungeons, 1 for each of the 3 main beastmen races).

I guess my problem is I liked how different the zones (Even the zones in the same region) where in FFXI, from beaches to snowy mountains, to swamps and forests. Where as you just don't get all that geographical variety in 14 yet.

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Originally Posted by Endigiont

Yah and 55 was quite a bit, considering the level cap was 50 at launch so you had more than 1 zone a level. Also think of how different all those field zones were and even the dungeons zones (Low level, and High level Beastmean dungeons, 1 for each of the 3 main beastmen races).

I guess my problem is I liked how different the zones (Even the zones in the same region) where in FFXI, from beaches to snowy mountains, to swamps and forests. Where as you just don't get all that geographical variety in 14 yet.

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Yeah. 1.0 really lacked in world design. Hopefully this will all be fixed with A Realm Reborn. I'm kind of glad we only get to see Gridania/Black Shroud so far, because I'd like a little more of the game to be a surprise to me when it's finally out!

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Originally Posted by Endigiont

Well aware of that, I've played XI since 04, and have knowledge of which zones were in the original FFXI and which were added in Zilart and the rest, however 5 really is a low number especially as you've said were so lazily put together.

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FFXIV launched with 5 zones because they wanted a seamless system, they wanted each region to be in it's own zone, if you look at all the zones in 1.0 they are in area bigger than the regions in XI, this however lead to very bland copy and paste zones.

With the system they are implementing with ARR, they can do a lot more, they can have transitions from forest to desert to swamps to beaches much better, with a zone system over a seamless system.

To me...the music screams Final Fantasy Tactics, which by all means sounds amazing to me.