Quote Originally Posted by Physic View Post
Its a good idea to try to appeal to a new market, but i think if they want to hit an offline rpg market, they need to lower the grind, and increase the content/story. This game as it is, is basically just a leveling game. Most people buy offlinerpgs for the story adventure, and progression, which the game is currently lacking. And honestly they talk of WoW and EQ and other styles of current MMOs as their blueprint, those games would not appeal to the main final fantasy market.

If thats thier market they should have spent all this time creating a gripping story, interesting charachters and stories weaved into the adventure and exploration of the world. Leveling is low on the list of priorities of an offline rpg player, It happens naturally over the course of exploration/adventuring.

While it seems they want to go the direction of standardized MMOs i think to hit that market they need to go even further away from that.
SO true... but there is a difference between having a good story and telling a good story
Kind of like how journalist go where the story is, and even if there is an interesting story to tell.. It would be boringly dull if told by Ben Stein

Case and point... FFXII in my opinion had a great story. Dalmasca caught in turmoil... Basch, Ashe, Balthier... All really likeable characters...
But being told from the viewpoint of Vaan (Who had no real business being there in the first place) and narrated by the Marquis Ondore (Who is the video game mix of Ben Steins voice with Charles Dickens overly wordy writing style), the beautiful story that existed was never told in a way befitting it's splendor

Similarly, Eorzea has rich history and lore, but the lack of later story telling content, Coupled with the poor NPC dialogue (I am only commenting on the English, I can not comment on the entertainment value of the Japanese dialogue) lead to a very poor grasp of the story

Most of the side quests that tie into the story repeat the same semi-foreboding mild warning so much that they lose impact.

tl;dr The story is there, it's just being told very slowly...