Quote Originally Posted by Asiaine View Post
So yes, the game is dumbed down... a lot. But the average 'IQ' (or game-hardiness) of players has also gone down, as more 'casual' people play now than before.
Casual players are not stupid as you suggest. Instead, casual players only have a limited amount of time to play during each play session. For example, 2hrs vs 6hrs per day. Playtime has nothing to do with how "dedicated" or "skilled" a player is.

Secondly, you are mistaken in thinking that FFXI was "hard". XI was *very* time consuming. That doesn't make the game "difficult".
Yes, certain fights were a lot of fun and they were hard but most of the game was spent leveling or camping NMs (which btw also wasn't difficult). However, if you knew people who would stick with you you could even cut the leveling grind down enormously. I knew a person who went 1-75 on thief pre exp nerf in three days.

In XIV the leveling grind isn't nearly as long. Yes, you could take several months to reach 50 but that has nothing to do with your skill as a player and everything to do with your play time. XIV also has fun fights, some of which are very difficult some of which aren't.

Overall, XIV has it's faults but it's not nearly as bad as certain people make it out to be but if you ask me, it is an improvement over XI. People need to stop looking at XI with rose tinted glasses already. It was a good game but it wasn't the holy grail of what MMOs should be like.