Count me amoung the skeptics ...

[Augury]

It's a good game underneath alot of crap. What the game needs is to strip the MMORPG conventions from itself, and reapply tasteful troupes of Final Fantasy games, or just open ended RPGs in general, but VERY VERY DISCRETELY, for familiarity's sake. This isn't just a mechanical issue, but more of an actual play issue... Because it feels like playing WoW or another MMORPG, which makes it hard to seem accessible to fans of FF-games, RPG games, and anything other than MMORPGs. This is what makes Monster Hunter so massively huge in the east- it's a difficult game that doesn't lend itself to troupes or familiarities of other games, and if a dev hopes to make it in the world of MMORPGs (where ALOT of money is floating around), they have to be ambitious with GAME ideas, not MMO ideas.

[Preypacer]

It's a good game underneath alot of crap. What the game needs is to strip the MMORPG conventions from itself, and reapply tasteful troupes of Final Fantasy games, or just open ended RPGs in general, but VERY VERY DISCRETELY, for familiarity's sake. This isn't just a mechanical issue, but more of an actual play issue... Because it feels like playing WoW or another MMORPG, which makes it hard to seem accessible to fans of FF-games, RPG games, and anything other than MMORPGs. This is what makes Monster Hunter so massively huge in the east- it's a difficult game that doesn't lend itself to troupes or familiarities of other games, and if a dev hopes to make it in the world of MMORPGs (where ALOT of money is floating around), they have to be ambitious with GAME ideas, not MMO ideas.

That's a very good point, and I think what you're describing was (surprise surprise) reflected very well in XI... at least to me.

One way I would describe XI to people who were trying it and having trouble wrapping their heads around how different its approach was, was to say that FFXI wasn't the FF theme shoe-horned into a typical MMO mold. Rather, it was a FF game - with all that goes with it (massive world, epic storylines, etc) - put online. SE had created their idea of what an online FF game should be like. They didn't follow all the typical conventions that "everyone else was using" (and that, incidentally, contribute to why so many MMOs these days feel "samey"). They chose an approach that best suited the kind of online FF experience they wanted to create.

That's essentially how I would explain it to people. In most cases - as long as they'd played other FF games - it clicked, they suddenly "got it" and their view of and approach to the game changed. A number of them went on to enjoy the game, where they were ready to quit otherwise.

I really do think that was part of XI's brilliance and why it maintained such a strong following for so long (~500k players after 7 years is nothing to sneeze at for a MMO that released when it did). By the same token, I think that in trying to conform to "the MMO standards" followed by other devs lately, XIV loses that almost completely.

With XI, SE seemed to create content and game systems that conformed to and supported the unique vision and identity they had of what an online FF experience should be. This time around, with XIV, SE didn't seem to have a strong vision or core identity while designing it, and seems to be trying to mold the FF theme to fit with typical MMO conventions.

The results each approach has had for them, I think, speak for themselves. XI was a strong and solid MMO that was internally consistent and had a strong core identity. XIV feels a bit wishy-washy and adrift. It seems, to me, to have no core identity or internal consistency at all.

I am concerned that SE has decided to take XIV in a direction to make it more like other MMOs, borrowing pretty much directly from what other devs have done, and seems to be moving away from making it more of its own game.

Time will tell on that, though, I guess. Perhaps they'll find that "spark" again and pull this baby out of the rut it's in. There's a great game hidden somewhere in there.. They just have to find it, pull it out, clean it off and polish it up.