Make FFXIV more like FFXI and less like WoW

[LiadansWhisper]

Damm you coil and ct!

:-\ If you're failing at Coils, it's not RNG. I mean, unless there are gear/skill issues in your group (in which case, you're right - you could win or fail based on RNG).

I think you are missing the point.

It's not that players are demanding Final Fantasy 14 be Final Fantasy 11. They just wished for something that followed in its tradition but with significant improvements. Instead they got WoW with better graphics. Which is all Final Fantasy 14 is.

But does it follow that because people want it to be more like XI that it must be more like XI to be a "real FF game"? Because I don't think you're correct in that. There are quite a few things that it does completely differently from WoW, but it's funny...WoW is the most successful MMO that's ever been on the scene, and there's a reason for that. There's a reason it works. There's a reason it continues to make money - and that even at it's lowest sub numbers, it has more individual subs than all the other MMOs combined.

But you somehow feel that taking things that work in that game, and have made Blizzard huge amounts of money is a bad thing? That SE instead should go to a much less profitable model? I mean...I don't see the logic.

I am glad you like it. It is a solid game. But it's nothing remarkable. Final Fantasy 11 was far more ground-breaking in its scope and span and it would have been nice to see a sequel to that game instead of WoW.

If this game is still around 10 years later as a subscription-based model like 11 is I will be very surprised.

WoW's been around for 9 years at this point. It's currently sitting at 7.7 million subs. XI had, what, 500k subs at its peak? When you look at it from a business standpoint - from SE's viewpoint - I wonder that you can't see why they have made the decisions they have made.

Not sure where I said that. Are you responding to me? I like things that are hard and require me to hit my head against a wall, yes, but I recognize that I'm the minority. Still, would be nice for optional things for people like myself to partake in.

I have many guildies who have played XI, and every single one of them said that if FF implemented things from XI - especially the RNG, grindy crap that the game had - they would quit in a heartbeat. Every single one of them had stories of how terrible the crafting was, how stupid the PvE was, how grindy it was. The only thing that was worse was actually 1.0 FFXIV, which a couple of them also played.

I simply would rather it be more Final Fantasy and less WOW. That's just me. It is a Final Fantasy game, after all.

But it is a Final Fantasy game. This game does not have to be like XI to be Final Fantasy. XI is not the be-all and end-all arbiter of what is and is not FF.

As for the argument for me to just go play FFXI, I actually can't. I stopped playing it for a reason. It's not supported on any system I own.

Then fix that instead of trying to change this game.

Just to throw in my two mighty cents.
I'd like this game to have the adventurous romance that XI seemed to have. I don't like the robotic and bureaucratic nature of the content. There is no disguising of world mechanics through lore based interface. It's all lists and checks. It doesn't feel like the world is alive.

If I could somehow have that feeling back, I would probably play this game much more often.

It's really hard to be "adventurous" or "explore" when you're stuck in what amount to canyons of varying widths on the map. I admit - that is one of the things that really bugs me about this game. Many of the maps are quite small, and I don't feel that I can really "explore" anything because we're stuck in canyons with invisible walls. I can't even climb hills. It's the one thing that I do wish they would change (though I have no idea if XI had the same sort of layout).

[Dale]

:


But does it follow that because people want it to be more like XI that it must be more like XI to be a "real FF game"? Because I don't think you're correct in that. There are quite a few things that it does completely differently from WoW, but it's funny...WoW is the most successful MMO that's ever been on the scene, and there's a reason for that. There's a reason it works. There's a reason it continues to make money - and that even at it's lowest sub numbers, it has more individual subs than all the other MMOs combined.

But you somehow feel that taking things that work in that game, and have made Blizzard huge amounts of money is a bad thing? That SE instead should go to a much less profitable model? I mean...I don't see the logic.
.

I never said the word must.

If SE wants to try and copy WoW they can, and have.

Also, I should point out one of the main reasons for WoW's success is their excellent server performance. Something Final Fantasy 14 is having difficulty with. So I think they lack this key ingredient to become the next WoW.

And I disagree with you that this game does quite a bit things differently than WoW. It really doesn't. It is a shameless copycat. And you need to just admit that.

Now you may be right it was a smart financial move. Time will tell. I won't even attempt to argue that WoW is not profitable, because it is. But is it the type of game most long-time Final Fantasy fans were looking for? I kind of doubt it.

[Doo]

:-\ If you're failing at Coils, it's not RNG. I mean, unless there are gear/skill issues in your group (in which case, you're right - you could win or fail based on RNG).

Oh thought you meant loot. FFXI fights were more fun and there was more of a variety of styles. In FFXIV it's mostly in/out dodging or simple tank/spank and take care of adds. It's probably due mainly to how simple FFXIV mechanics are that it's impossible to add much variety.

[LiadansWhisper]

I never said the word must.

If SE wants to try and copy WoW they can, and have.

Also, I should point out one of the main reasons for WoW's success is their excellent server performance. Something Final Fantasy 14 is having difficulty with. So I think they lack this key ingredient to become the next WoW.

And I disagree with you that this game does quite a bit things differently than WoW. It really doesn't. It is a shameless copycat. And you need to just admit that.

Now you may be right it was a smart financial move. Time will tell. I won't even attempt to argue that WoW is not profitable, because it is. But is it the type of game most long-time Final Fantasy fans were looking for? I kind of doubt it.

This isn't WoW. Not by a longshot.

- The most obvious reason is that I can level every class on one character, something that's impossible in WoW.
- There are no Jobs in WoW.
- There are no cross-class skills.
- You can only have 2 Crafts in WoW, and it's impossible to HQ anything (and crafted items are patently useless to PvE until max level and have almost no use for PvP).
- Food does not last through death (although it lasts longer than in FF), and the raid-quality food generally only gives one stat - a primary stat such as Intellect, Stamina (Vitality), Dexterity, or Strength. You can't HQ food.
- There is no Archaeology in FF.
- Herbalism (aka Botany) is only used for Alchemy and Inscription. The only way to find cooking ingredients is to kill animals that drop them, or grow your own - on your own farm.
- There is no use for lumber or wood - and, in fact, you can't gather them at all.
- There are almost no loading screens in WoW. The only "loading screens" are between continents. You can fly from the top of Winterspring to the tip of Tanaris in Kalimdor, and there isn't a single loading screen.
- You can fly in Wow.
- Mounts have different run speeds, and flying mounts have different fly speeds.
- You have to buy successive levels of mount training.
- You can climb to the top of any hill in WoW - or fly to it, outside of Eversong and the Draenei starting area.
- You can fall to your death while out of combat. In fact, I spent a good long time dying horribly in Howling Fjord trying to get to mining nodes while too low level to fly.
- You can level from 10-90 without ever stepping foot in the world - leveling entirely in dungeons or PvP Battlegrounds.
- You can level from 1-90 without ever stepping into a dungeon or Battleground - leveling entirely through quests.
- You will never run out of quests in WoW. If you exhaust the quests in one zone, you simply go to the next zone and there will be more quests there.
- You can level 1-90 by doing nothing but grinding mobs. It'll take a long time, but you can do it.
- You can level 5-90 by doing nothing but gathering professions (aka Mining and Herbalism). Each node you harvest gives a small amount of experience, depending on how high level your gathering skill is, and how high level your character is.
- You can trade Justice Points in WoW for trade good items, like ores, enchanting materials, cloth, Spirits of Harmony, etc. Unlike FF, there is nothing overtly "special" about these items, and you can also farm them separately on your own.
- You can trade Justice Points in WoW for "Heirloom Gear," which are pieces specifically tailored to a particular class or spec, with all of the correct stats on it, that levels up with your chracter and gives you an experience bonus while leveling that alt character so that you level faster.
- You can use your non-combat pets in WoW to battle other non-combat pets, a la Pokemon.
- You can run non-heroic dungeons as many times as you want in WoW, and they do not have a lockout. However, Heroic Dungeons have a 24 hour lockout (resetting at like, 3am PST every day) after you have completed one (unless you do it using WoW's version of Duty Roulette).
- Like FF, WoW's raids have a 1 week lockout, resetting every Tuesday morning. Unlike FF, you are not immediately locked to an instance by entering it after bosses have been defeated (unless it is a Heroic version of the raid, but even then you are asked whether you want to stay by a pop up window).
- Crafts in WoW are not separate classes. You do not wear special gear to use them, and you do not use experience points to level them. In fact, nothing you wear will change the outcome of the item you are creating. You cannot fail at creating an item. You can mass create items and have 0 chance of failure - even if you were doing it naked.
- Crafting items does not incur durability loss.
- You can friend people cross-server.
- If you meet some cool guys in a dungeon, you can queue for a new dungeon with them again at the end of your run - regardless of what server they are from.
- Raids in FFXIV are fixed at 8 man parties, or 24 man alliances (being 3 groups of 8). Raids in WoW can be 10 man, 25 man, or 10-25 man "Flexible," allowing groups to participate regardless of raid size. If you have 10 people, you can go! If you have 12 people, you can go! If you have 17 people, you can go! And so on.
- If you want to enter a raid instance in WoW, the system does not care how many people you bring inside - so long as you do not exceed the maximum number for that raid size. So if you want to do a 10 man with 2 people, you can do it! If you want to do one of the old 40 man raids with 1 person, you can do it! If you want to do a 25 man with 5 people, you can do it! WoW's system doesn't care if you would probably fail at trying to do an on-level 25 man with 5 people - it's your choice to go in.
- Most endgame gear - including that purchased with the equivalent of Tomestones - has gem sockets (i.e. Materia slots).
- Gems (i.e. Materia) are created by a crafting profession (Jewelcrafting).
- You cannot lose gems while slotting them into an item, but you cannot "overmeld" an item.
- Most pieces of gear can be specially enchanted with extra stats.
- If an item has poor stats on it for your particular Job, you can "Reforge" some of those stats into a more beneficial stat.
- WoW has Glyphs, which can change the function of a spell or ability.

I mean, I could go on for pages. These are not the same games. FF has some things from WoW that have worked really well, but it is, by no means, a WoW clone. It's not even close - and it's not trying to be (which is one of the beauties of the game).

Oh thought you meant loot. FFXI fights were more fun and there was more of a variety of styles. In FFXIV it's mostly in/out dodging or simple tank/spank and take care of adds. It's probably due mainly to how simple FFXIV mechanics are that it's impossible to add much variety.

I'm not going to argue that the fights in FFXIV are simplistic. I think the most "complicated" fight I've seen so far have been Ultima HM. Even then, it's very much in a set rotation, whereas the hardest and most rewarding fights I've encountered in WoW were extremely complicated and had an element of RNG to them that doesn't really occur in this game.

[Devilray]

This isn't WoW. Not by a longshot.

- The most obvious reason is that I can level every class on one character, something that's impossible in WoW.
- There are no Jobs in WoW.
- There are no cross-class skills.
- You can only have 2 Crafts in WoW, and it's impossible to HQ anything (and crafted items are patently useless to PvE until max level and have almost no use for PvP).
- Food does not last through death (although it lasts longer than in FF), and the raid-quality food generally only gives one stat - a primary stat such as Intellect, Stamina (Vitality), Dexterity, or Strength. You can't HQ food.
- There is no Archaeology in FF.
- Herbalism (aka Botany) is only used for Alchemy and Inscription. The only way to find cooking ingredients is to kill animals that drop them, or grow your own - on your own farm.
- There is no use for lumber or wood - and, in fact, you can't gather them at all.
- There are almost no loading screens in WoW. The only "loading screens" are between continents. You can fly from the top of Winterspring to the tip of Tanaris in Kalimdor, and there isn't a single loading screen.
- You can fly in Wow.
- Mounts have different run speeds, and flying mounts have different fly speeds.
- You have to buy successive levels of mount training.
- You can climb to the top of any hill in WoW - or fly to it, outside of Eversong and the Draenei starting area.
- You can fall to your death while out of combat. In fact, I spent a good long time dying horribly in Howling Fjord trying to get to mining nodes while too low level to fly.
- You can level from 10-90 without ever stepping foot in the world - leveling entirely in dungeons or PvP Battlegrounds.
- You can level from 1-90 without ever stepping into a dungeon or Battleground - leveling entirely through quests.
- You will never run out of quests in WoW. If you exhaust the quests in one zone, you simply go to the next zone and there will be more quests there.
- You can level 1-90 by doing nothing but grinding mobs. It'll take a long time, but you can do it.
- You can level 5-90 by doing nothing but gathering professions (aka Mining and Herbalism). Each node you harvest gives a small amount of experience, depending on how high level your gathering skill is, and how high level your character is.
- You can trade Justice Points in WoW for trade good items, like ores, enchanting materials, cloth, Spirits of Harmony, etc. Unlike FF, there is nothing overtly "special" about these items, and you can also farm them separately on your own.
- You can trade Justice Points in WoW for "Heirloom Gear," which are pieces specifically tailored to a particular class or spec, with all of the correct stats on it, that levels up with your chracter and gives you an experience bonus while leveling that alt character so that you level faster.
- You can use your non-combat pets in WoW to battle other non-combat pets, a la Pokemon.
- You can run non-heroic dungeons as many times as you want in WoW, and they do not have a lockout. However, Heroic Dungeons have a 24 hour lockout (resetting at like, 3am PST every day) after you have completed one (unless you do it using WoW's version of Duty Roulette).
- Like FF, WoW's raids have a 1 week lockout, resetting every Tuesday morning. Unlike FF, you are not immediately locked to an instance by entering it after bosses have been defeated (unless it is a Heroic version of the raid, but even then you are asked whether you want to stay by a pop up window).
- Crafts in WoW are not separate classes. You do not wear special gear to use them, and you do not use experience points to level them. In fact, nothing you wear will change the outcome of the item you are creating. You cannot fail at creating an item. You can mass create items and have 0 chance of failure - even if you were doing it naked.
- Crafting items does not incur durability loss.
- You can friend people cross-server.
- If you meet some cool guys in a dungeon, you can queue for a new dungeon with them again at the end of your run - regardless of what server they are from.
- Raids in FFXIV are fixed at 8 man parties, or 24 man alliances (being 3 groups of 8). Raids in WoW can be 10 man, 25 man, or 10-25 man "Flexible," allowing groups to participate regardless of raid size. If you have 10 people, you can go! If you have 12 people, you can go! If you have 17 people, you can go! And so on.
- If you want to enter a raid instance in WoW, the system does not care how many people you bring inside - so long as you do not exceed the maximum number for that raid size. So if you want to do a 10 man with 2 people, you can do it! If you want to do one of the old 40 man raids with 1 person, you can do it! If you want to do a 25 man with 5 people, you can do it! WoW's system doesn't care if you would probably fail at trying to do an on-level 25 man with 5 people - it's your choice to go in.
- Most endgame gear - including that purchased with the equivalent of Tomestones - has gem sockets (i.e. Materia slots).
- Gems (i.e. Materia) are created by a crafting profession (Jewelcrafting).
- You cannot lose gems while slotting them into an item, but you cannot "overmeld" an item.
- Most pieces of gear can be specially enchanted with extra stats.
- If an item has poor stats on it for your particular Job, you can "Reforge" some of those stats into a more beneficial stat.
- WoW has Glyphs, which can change the function of a spell or ability.

I mean, I could go on for pages. These are not the same games. FF has some things from WoW that have worked really well, but it is, by no means, a WoW clone. It's not even close - and it's not trying to be (which is one of the beauties of the game).



I'm not going to argue that the fights in FFXIV are simplistic. I think the most "complicated" fight I've seen so far have been Ultima HM. Even then, it's very much in a set rotation, whereas the hardest and most rewarding fights I've encountered in WoW were extremely complicated and had an element of RNG to them that doesn't really occur in this game.

Pfft... way to be ignorant. You are just turning a blind-eye to the similarities between WoW and ff14 2.0: Dungeon/Raid Finder (dailys), (!)'s over NPC heads (questing being the main way of leveling up, quest HUBs), fast-access to mount travel, mobs stop chasing you when you get far enough, HM=heroic dungeons, typical raid spam 123 button to DPS or tank fights and avoid circles of death. The things that make it different from WoW are mainly from FF11: Cutscenes, the FF universe, and the job/class system. But most of the other things are just WoW systems with different names and slightly changed up. Don't be ignorant. Most of the points you are stating are basically implemented into ff14 but in a different fashion or named differently. It doesn't matter if you can't do it or buy it the exact same way. It is basically the same type of MMO elements between the two games. Even the producer admits to following in WoW's footsteps for the base of FF14 2.0. And just because something is missing/different does not make them unlike each other. They just said "Let us just leave that out (change it up) so it is not a 100% carbon copy to spare us the humiliation of being a copy-cat MMO". You are taking everything at face value and completely ignoring the whole idea of a CONCEPT.

[Ahzarhuuk]

Pfft... way to be ignorant. You are just turning a blind-eye to the similarities between WoW and ff14 2.0: Dungeon/Raid Finder (dailys), (!)'s over NPC heads (questing being the main way of leveling up, quest HUBs), fast-access to mount travel, mobs stop chasing you when you get far enough, HM=heroic dungeons, typical raid spam 123 button to DPS or tank fights and avoid circles of death. The things that make it different from WoW are mainly from FF11: Cutscenes, the FF universe, and the job/class system. But most of the other things are just WoW systems with different names and slightly changed up. Don't be ignorant. Most of the points you are stating are basically implemented into ff14 but in a different fashion or named differently. It doesn't matter if you can't do it or buy it the exact same way. It is basically the same type of MMO elements between the two games. Even the producer admits to following in WoW's footsteps for the base of FF14 2.0.

WoW gives mounts based on level.

FF Gives a mount on main quest story progression. A mount that can fight by your side as a companion and that you can customize however you wish, WoW lacks that entirely.

WoW has Cutscenes. Has had Cutscenes since Wrath of the Lich King. But Cutscenes are such a basic Game feature you may as well call it a cloned feature for the fact they both have keyboard controls. You accuse others of ingorance yet this little nugget alone robs your accusation of any teeth.

That, and WoW completely lacks Hunting Logs, Fates, and the Limit Break system. They also don't have a veterancy program like FF XIV does but that's more a studio call than clone or not.

It's not a clone no matter how hard you and the rest of the jokers try to make it such.

[Devilray]

WoW gives mounts based on level.

FF Gives a mount on main quest story progression. A mount that can fight by your side as a companion and that you can customize however you wish, WoW lacks that entirely.

WoW has Cutscenes. Has had Cutscenes since Wrath of the Lich King. But Cutscenes are such a basic Game feature you may as well call it a cloned feature for the fact they both have keyboard controls. You accuse others of ingorance yet this little nugget alone robs your accusation of any teeth.

That, and WoW completely lacks Hunting Logs, Fates, and the Limit Break system. They also don't have a veterancy program like FF XIV does but that's more a studio call than clone or not.

It's not a clone no matter how hard you and the rest of the jokers try to make it such.

WRONG. Cutscenes in FF11 are done in the same fashion they are done in ff14. WoW had no cutscenes till Wrath of the Lich King (which came out way after FF11's cutscene system). WOW does not use cutscenes for basic quest giver dialogue. See the difference? Cinematic vs quest giver dialogue. OK?

Edit: and let me restate what I edited in before "And just because something is missing/different does not make them unlike each other. They just said "Let us just leave that out (change it up) so it is not a 100% carbon copy to spare us the humiliation of being a copy-cat MMO". You are taking everything at face value and completely ignoring the whole idea of a CONCEPT. " They took a concept and built on top of it. ; It is a clone that has been enhanced/trimmed. STILL, it is a clone, but with add-ons and other things purposefully left out.

[LiadansWhisper]

WRONG. Cutscenes in FF11 are done in the same fashion they are done in ff14. WoW had no cutscenes till Wrath of the Lich King (which came out way after FF11's cutscene system). WOW does not use cutscenes for basic quest giver dialogue. See the difference? Cinematic vs quest giver dialogue. OK?

They do, actually. They actually have cutscenes with voiced dialogue. It's not as prevalent in Cataclysm and Wrath of the Lich King content, but it is alllllll over Mists of Pandaria.

Edit: and let me restate what I edited in before "And just because something is missing/different does not make them unlike each other. They just said "Let us just leave that out (change it up) so it is not a 100% carbon copy to spare us the humiliation of being a copy-cat MMO". You are taking everything at face value and completely ignoring the whole idea of a CONCEPT. " They took a concept and built on top of it. ; It is a clone that has been enhanced/trimmed. STILL, it is a clone, but with add-ons and other things purposefully left out.

And you have an agenda. You want to be able to say that FFXIV is a "WoW-clone" and willfully ignore all of the things that make the two games different.

Pfft... way to be ignorant. You are just turning a blind-eye to the similarities between WoW and ff14 2.0: Dungeon/Raid Finder

Okay. So do Rift and SWTOR. Does that mean FFXIV is a Rift or SWTOR clone? o_O

(dailys)

Dude...I mean...dude...there are 6 dailies in this game. Six. Do you know how many dailies there are waiting for me in WoW? Over 25. That's not including my daily dungeon, daily scenario, and daily heroic.

(!)'s over NPC heads

So does every other major MMO out there, including ESO. So is ESO a WoW clone? Or a FFXIV clone, since it's not released yet? o_O

(questing being the main way of leveling up, quest HUBs)

Um...so does every other MMO out there. ESO has it. SWTOR has it. Neverwinter has it. Rift has it. So...is this game a clone of all of those?

fast-access to mount travel

It's actually easier in ESO to get a mount than it is in this game. There's no level requirement - you just have to have the gold. In WoW, you have level requriements before you're allowed to purchase the riding skill, and the speed is also bound to your level (and additional inputs of gold). In Rift, you could ride at level 1. In SWTOR, I want to say I got a mount on Tatooine? That was, what, 20 something? It was significantly easier than getting a mount in this game - all I needed was credits.

mobs stop chasing you when you get far enough,

The way mobs leash in this game is much closer to the way they leash in Rift or SWTOR than it is in WoW. You can go quite a distance before mobs give up in WoW

HM=heroic dungeons,

Okay...Rift and SWTOR have the same things. ^_^ For that matter, so does Neverwinter last time I checked? Does that mean that FFXIV is a Rift and SWTOR clone? o_O Or a Neverwinter clone? I mean, we can't pay to win there, at least...

typical raid spam 123 button to DPS or tank fights and avoid circles of death.

If this is what you think raiding in WoW involved, I feel really sorry for you. You must have raided the super easy mode content. That's not how it works in hardcore raiding, but it doesn't surprise me to see you spouting off such ignorance. I fully agree, however, that the raids in this game are boring by comparison.

The things that make it different from WoW are mainly from FF11: Cutscenes,

As others have pointed out, WoW has cutscenes and has had them since WotLK. So, for that matter, does SWTOR (an entire game basically built on cutscenes).

the FF universe, and the job/class system. But most of the other things are just WoW systems with different names and slightly changed up.

I've played WoW since Burning Crusade, and while some things are similar, anyone who thinks this is a WoW clone is deluded.

Don't be ignorant.

I think you should take your own advice.

Most of the points you are stating are basically implemented into ff14 but in a different fashion or named differently.

They're actually not, but as I said before, you have an agenda.

It doesn't matter if you can't do it or buy it the exact same way. It is basically the same type of MMO elements between the two games. Even the producer admits to following in WoW's footsteps for the base of FF14 2.0. And just because something is missing/different does not make them unlike each other. They just said "Let us just leave that out (change it up) so it is not a 100% carbon copy to spare us the humiliation of being a copy-cat MMO". You are taking everything at face value and completely ignoring the whole idea of a CONCEPT.

I really doubt they ever said anything like that. You really should take care not to insult people and show your own ignorance. I very much doubt you're sitting in their design offices.

[Ahzarhuuk]

WRONG. Cutscenes in FF11 are done in the same fashion they are done in ff14. WoW had no cutscenes till Wrath of the Lich King (which came out way after FF11's cutscene system). WOW does not use cutscenes for basic quest giver dialogue. See the difference? Cinematic vs quest giver dialogue. OK?

Edit: and let me restate what I edited in before "And just because something is missing/different does not make them unlike each other. They just said "Let us just leave that out (change it up) so it is not a 100% carbon copy to spare us the humiliation of being a copy-cat MMO". You are taking everything at face value and completely ignoring the whole idea of a CONCEPT. " They took a concept and built on top of it. ; It is a clone that has been enhanced/trimmed. STILL, it is a clone, but with add-ons and other things purposefully left out.

Oh, I see.
You just don't know what a clone is.

Gotcha.

[Dale]

This isn't WoW. Not by a longshot.

.

Yes it is. Most of your so-called examples of differences were extremely trivial and bordering on the absurd.

For example: when your argument relies on such insignificant semantics as there are no jobs on WoW you aren't going to be convincing anyone you are right. In fact, after going through that long lists of so-called differences you wrote you have done nothing but convince me even more that this game is basically a WoW clone. Because judging by what you listed, if these are your best examples of a contrast I remain unconvinced. In fact most of what you write actually shows the similarities with WoW not the differences. You just focus in on tiny details and act like they make a difference.

FF14 basically copied and pasted WoW's model. An endgame grind that focuses almost entirely on using an instance finder to get tomestones, justice points whatever you want to call them for character upgrades. It also relies heavily on twitch-game play - such as dodging traps - to provide challenge rather than a complex and strategic battle system. It's even copying WoW's pvp model now. And if you can't see this you are just being difficult on purpose in my opinion because it is so obvious it's just impossible to deny.

In all of the fundamentals, such as over-all design, structure and game play - this game is basically a copycat of WoW. Rather that's a good thing or not depends almost entirely on if you like WoW's design or not. But I can tell you right now, there is no honest person on this earth who hates WoW who is going to be thrilled with this game. Why? Because they are so much alike.