What went wrong? Is it the game or the grenre?

[Oleander]

The game is only 5 months old. I'm not ready to cry foul and give up just yet.

[Kallera]

The game is only 5 months old. I'm not ready to cry foul and give up just yet.

I've heard this song before. It was overplayed on the radio.

The reason the dev team is planning on nerfing the current content(and will likely do so in the future as new content is pushed out) is because they want retention. instead of many different hubs of content like in MMOs of yore, now there is one hub of major content, with minor quests near teleports, or a hop skip and jump away.

MMOs back in the day had more than just hubs; even if some eventually included them in later in development, there was still the experience and feel of a world, with variety and activities. These days, something like Cracktusk(http://www.angelfire.com/games2/eqfo...s/zones/sk.htm) would be considered a bug, or the nights in Qufim(FFXI-ROZ)would be too stressful. "Blind" could reduce your accuracy or make you literally NOT SEE, but no, that halts progression. In the name of "progression" Zones are trimmed and walled off, monster and status effects defanged, everything is tucked away behind their own little box--oh I'm sorry, instances. Everyone has their comfort zone, I'm not asking for free for all PVP, but a world of no danger and ephemeral vertical progression, you can't help but see the hamster wheel a little clearer.

[Jonjon]

The game is only 5 months old. I'm not ready to cry foul and give up just yet.

No it isn't. It launched in 2010. Besides this is a terrible argument. Especially when you can see the developing view of the game based on what came before, what is currently, and what is coming. There is a pattern and a good chunk have noticed.
Also as evidenced by hundreds of 40+ member friends lists that are getting emptier every day.

I have seen people throw out terms like "Them Park" and "Sandbox" in regards to games, and honestly I had no idea what these referred to so I looked it up and I realize what the problem has been with a lot of recent MMOs, at least for me. The industry is starting to realize that theme park MMOs are just terrible. People burn through them far to fast, FF14 2.0 is no different.

A lot of gamers are tired of playing a game like it is on rails. This game is especially bad in that there is only one direction.


Luckily the MMO scape seems to be shifting. Companies are realizing that Theme Park, play on rails games are a bad move. They sought to capitalize on WoW's success when not even Blizzard could hope to replicate that, and while that landed them some decent short term revenue, it would never last. The shift is going towards a balance between sandbox and open world. Players still want a game story, but they want the ability to play that story how they wish and have the ability to design their own adventure.

[DSX]

I think the fact that we have like 5 of these threads on the front page at any given time (and that outside these forums, most of the discussion of this game is negative) speaks volumes about the shaky foundation FFXIV is sitting on.

Even if the people complaining ARE a minority (for the time being), they're typically the same people who paid for FFXI for nearly a decade. It's generally not a good idea to piss off your loyal customers who have proven to be a reliable source of income in favor of a fickle-minded mainstream crowd who generally jump from one flavor-of-the-month to the next.

What are SE going to be left with when those customers hop on the next shiny new MMO to come out (the same way they hop on the next shiny piece of gear and forget about the last one)? The older players who they've now lost the confidence of.

SE made the decision to try and grab 2 million subs for a year or two at best, instead of 3-500 thousand for a decade. Bad business move, but investors and stockholders are completely blind to long term sustainability and only want to see immediate gratification and returns, just like the customers they're pandering to.

This is correct. The sad thing is the investors in most cases does not have the slightest idea about gaming in general or the gamers their company is making games for. They rely on finance department for their decision but the finance department also have no idea about the gamers or the gaming culture or what those games their company makes means to the gaming universe.

So we get a lot of games canned or disapproved and a lot of wasted money in the process of making most of the gaming big titles on stuff like getting a famous actors/actresses to do voice overs and pay them gazillions then blame the gamers for not paying it back. In a lot of cases the players actually pay enough to cover all the money wasted by the investors and financial division on stuff that will not raise the game quality (but they believe will bring more of those average joes/janes people to buy the game) but the profit margin is not satisfactory to these financial departments (which they look at movies profits in a lot of cases to compare) and thus to the investors when they hear from them (bu but we think this should make 250% profit but it only made cost + 60 million dollars we should find more ways to convince average joe/jane to buy our games ).

Because of that we got the disaster that is FFXIV ver1 AND because of that we have now FFXIV ver2 and they are on a roll we will see what we get next. The talent that make the games does not get to realize their vision but instead be made to realize what the investors and the financial decision think will make profit (But in the case of FFXIV ver2 I think (I could be wrong) this is also what Yoshi-P team like to make themselves too, maybe this is one of the reasons he got chosen to man the helm for FFXIV ver2 project).

I've heard this song before. It was overplayed on the radio.

The reason the dev team is planning on nerfing the current content(and will likely do so in the future as new content is pushed out) is because they want retention. instead of many different hubs of content like in MMOs of yore, now there is one hub of major content, with minor quests near teleports, or a hop skip and jump away.

MMOs back in the day had more than just hubs; even if some eventually included them in later in development, there was still the experience and feel of a world, with variety and activities. These days, something like Cracktusk(http://www.angelfire.com/games2/eqfo...s/zones/sk.htm) would be considered a bug, or the nights in Qufim(FFXI-ROZ)would be too stressful. "Blind" could reduce your accuracy or make you literally NOT SEE, but no, that halts progression. In the name of "progression" Zones are trimmed and walled off, monster and status effects defanged, everything is tucked away behind their own little box--oh I'm sorry, instances. Everyone has their comfort zone, I'm not asking for free for all PVP, but a world of no danger and ephemeral vertical progression, you can't help but see the hamster wheel a little clearer.

The dangerous world is one of the best allies of any MMORPG. It does wonders on how the player base look at the game. But sadly the companies do not want anything in the game that could scare the average joe/jane away once they set foot in the game world.

[saber_alter]

No it isn't. It launched in 2010.

the basic framework is the same, but the games are two entirely different beasts.

both arguments are old and bad, and one could argue either way. i'm in FFXIV. i don't care if it's 5 months old or 3-4 years old.

[Kiara]

I prefer the design where you grind on mobs to level up, and quests are hard and few with real story, that reward significant stuff, which you aim for. The whole focus on end-game is being overdone now in ARR, I think, allowing people to level cap in only few days. The RPG part of the MMORPG got lost in the process. I think the game should strive to provide a journey first, a journey people can enjoy, not a taxi ride where people find the shortest route most efficient way to do everything and skip anything that isn't efficient.

Build a journey people enjoy, and when people get to the end of the jouney, then add the "end-game" content. This way, those who arrive at the end-game pleasantly find more to do at end-game. But the way it is now, people want nothing of the journey, if possible they want to start at the end-game already; and they are not to blame, because that thinking is encouraged by the current game design.

"I wanna quickly level to 50 so I can get started with..." is the problem with this game.

Also, the speed at which people can level decides the speed at which people expect to attain their goals, I think. If it took a good 3 months just to get to level cap, one can be sure people won't be expecting to get their relic in one night. They'd expect the relic quest to be so epic it takes weeks to finish.

Which brings out those who sneer, "I have a life I don't want to waste 40 hours a week on a game". But that is only a problem if that time is really wasted. Does it matter if you're level 50 tackling Binding Coils of Bahamut, or your level 17~20 tackling Halatali that has the same difficulty as Turn 1? So what if it takes 2 months to level up to 50? It is only a problem (a "waste of time") if the game itself is designed to "start at 50".

Imagine those who don't want difficult content can just ignore dungeons and slowly grind their way to 50. Those who love the so-called end-game content, can experience that "end-game experience" all throughout their leveling time. With level sync, they also get to re-experience all these dungeons the way it was, with new friends, or a friend's alt class. Imagine having 12 "end-game dungeons" already at launch, because every dungeon in the game is of "end-game" quality.

The current design makes it very easy for a new player to catch up. Which is exactly the problem. The game itself is treating its own content like throw-away trash.

Fantastic post, Zfz. I couldn't agree more.

FF XIV 2.0 was beautifully remade from scratch. It has a gorgeous world, cool looking landmarks and areas to explore... except Yoshi P and team have decided that basically 90% of the world is "trash" and just window dressing. They're pushing players to rush through Levels 1 - 49, to get to 50 as soon as possible.

As you said, if they made the journey more interesting and not as rushed, but they gave us dungeons that *mattered* and were fun during the intermediate levels, it would only make the whole experience that much more meaningful. Imagine if Pharos Sirius was a Level 25 Dungeon? Or Aurum Vale was Level 30? etc. And that World Mobs actually were worth something?

With a slower leveling curve, *but* more interesting content (truly challenging, engaging content), and allowing Crafted / Materia Gear to be meaningful as well, there would be a lot of tinkering, adventuring, experimenting going on, and Yoshi P and his team wouldn't be in the situation they are now, where they rushed everyone to Level 50 and now have to rush out content to satisfy everyone who's stuck at the max level spectrum of the game. Now, he's talking about raising the level cap and item levels (again) and saying Leviathan Weapons will be very powerful. It's becoming a WoW Gear Grind, where you try to get the latest and greatest every few months.

[NeruMew]

I think humanity went wrong.

So nope, neither the game nor the genre.

[aray0002]

to save FFXIV they need to incorporate the feel of vana'diel > progression by grouping.
Keeping the current FATE leveling system in tact but those looking to Pull Mob to camp and Grind should be able to do so.
This builds teamwork , friendships and job / class understanding.
Incorporate : true limit breaks / skills trees and magic burst like XI
Allow dungeon farming not set to a Timer but more like a place to meet up with others and GRIND levels. Lock outs suck : do away with them. People Pay to Play not Pay to Wait. Allow people to join more than one FC. Why restrict them to 1 ?
Make Minions do stuff instead of just look cute. Have them drop items every so often.
Bring back : mannequin I like my chocobo but having a mannequin was even better.
I want one that looks like Minifilia. > MAKE IT SO !!!

[Mintyfresh]

and read, *SNIP* writted content. .
8 years ago *SNIP* Maybe the only problem with this industry is that is trying to appeal to that 90%... Thank god there is still hope in games like this.

I agree with what you say but you have to evolve your way of thinking.

Demographics of people who play the game have changed.
If it wasn't for the revenue from the 90% maybe the game wouldn't even go past it's initial development stage.

I find it very refreshing when I find some quests with something witty, but if you are asking me to pay attention to every quest that is asking me to kill 5 coyotes, 6 ladybugs and 7 crabs, no, ty!
How about NOT designing quests like that.
(cont.)

[Mintyfresh]

(cont.)
The core storyline, i.e, your story, should pack a punch, should have a "OOMF" to it.

This game did that 10% of the time, the other 90%, I was traveling from point A ->B->C->A->C->B->A collecting ABSOLUTE garbage.
I can't tell you the number of quests that sent you from person A to B to C for NO reason.

You can generate that shit using an algorithm! You don't even need a brain to design that shit.
And that's what happened.

On a side note..WTF is up with the goddamn word count limitation on these forums. WTF is this? twitter?
Should I reduce my name to 3 characters? You folks have storage space issues at SE?

I can build a bloody NAS filer at home that stores more text than your bloody forums.