"Where has the magic gone?"

[Atoli]

It's hard to tell if it's SE's or the players fault.
Final Fantasy games have started to follow the recent trend of working in real life problems, showing more diversity, etc.
While some games really get a lot better because of it, it won't work for all, and I get the feeling FF is one of those games whose atmosphere is hurt by it.
For example, FF XIII: We got a black guy to fullfill the quota, a boy who is a sissy and always relies on some girl so we have our non-mysoginistic quota, and so on. Not forgetting about all the discrimination stuff and everything else they tried to put into the game. Now I do realize some people liked it, but to me it all felt so hollow with all the preaching on what is bad so "be good kids and think of it next time you beat up the neighbour's kid".

For me, FF I-VII were the best parts and starting with FF VIII, it lost it's magic (although I enjoyed FF XII Revenant Wings).
The thing I love about FF XIV so much is how it recaptures the magical feeling of the older titles
I know there will be many who disagree with me, but that's just how I feel about it.

Something else you have to take a look at is ourselves.
Like you already said - we've grown up. It's way harder to give a grown-up person the same kind of magical feeling you could give to a child or teenager. The reason we still feel it in the titles we've played as kids is because our memories give it a magical feeling. It's not something controlable.
So I'm not sure who really is to blame for the loss of "magic" in Final Fantasy, but I think they are doing a really great job with FFXIV in recapturing it.

[Demacia]

It's hard to tell if it's SE's or the players fault.
Final Fantasy games have started to follow the recent trend of working in real life problems, showing more diversity, etc.
While some games really get a lot better because of it, it won't work for all, and I get the feeling FF is one of those games whose atmosphere is hurt by it.
For example, FF XIII: We got a black guy to fullfill the quota, a boy who is a sissy and always relies on some girl so we have our non-mysoginistic quota, and so on. Not forgetting about all the discrimination stuff and everything else they tried to put into the game. Now I do realize some people liked it, but to me it all felt so hollow with all the preaching on what is bad so "be good kids and think of it next time you beat up the neighbour's kid".

For me, FF I-VII were the best parts and starting with FF VIII, it lost it's magic (although I enjoyed FF XII Revenant Wings).
The thing I love about FF XIV so much is how it recaptures the magical feeling of the older titles
I know there will be many who disagree with me, but that's just how I feel about it.

Something else you have to take a look at is ourselves.
Like you already said - we've grown up. It's way harder to give a grown-up person the same kind of magical feeling you could give to a child or teenager. The reason we still feel it in the titles we've played as kids is because our memories give it a magical feeling. It's not something controlable.
So I'm not sure who really is to blame for the loss of "magic" in Final Fantasy, but I think they are doing a really great job with FFXIV in recapturing it.

Which part recaptures it? The tiny world composed of 5 huge repetitive zones, the lack of chocobos, the lack of cid, the lack of any sort of memorable characters, or the lack of deep storyline/lore?

Maybe you added a V to FFXI by mistake, because that game DID manage to "recapture the magic". Then again it was in development before the merge.

[Skyrant_Kangaroomouse]

Something else you have to take a look at is ourselves.
Like you already said - we've grown up. It's way harder to give a grown-up person the same kind of magical feeling you could give to a child or teenager. The reason we still feel it in the titles we've played as kids is because our memories give it a magical feeling. It's not something controlable.
So I'm not sure who really is to blame for the loss of "magic" in Final Fantasy, but I think they are doing a really great job with FFXIV in recapturing it.

I think we all know that even being in an older body, we never really grow up. Look into yourself and you still see that child. It's what drives humanity forward. Curiosity and adventure, don't tell me we loose that when we grow up, it's simply not true. We might not be as easily impressed or manipulated, but we still do have the need for all the same things we wanted back when we where a kid or teenager.

We need that new toy, it just changed from a toy car to a real car.

[Demacia]

I think we all know that even being in an older body, we never really grow up. Look into yourself and you still see that child. It's what drives humanity forward. Curiosity and adventure, don't tell me we loose that when we grow up, it's simply not true. We might not be as easily impressed or manipulated, but we still do have the need for all the same things we wanted back when we where a kid or teenager.

We need that new toy, it just changed from a toy car to a real car.

I like the way you think. Well said.

[Atoli]

Curiosity and adventure, don't tell me we loose that when we grow up, it's simply not true.

Until I turned 10, I played in the woods with some friends and all I needed for playing were some leaves and stones. I was happy with them, and in my imagination they turned into whatever I wanted them to be.
If you gave me some leaves and stones today, I'd say something like "I won't even touch that filthy stuff."
Face it, we lose some of that naivety, imagination and how easily we are satisfied.
Some of it, I'm not saying all of it.
Your car example is very good because it shows what I'm trying to say:
We need more and more awesome stuff to satisfy our growing needs. There's no way a game can keep up with all that, especially because people tend to become very diverse when they grow up, so it's even harder to fulfill the wishes of everyone who liked the Fandom as a child.

[Demacia]

Until I turned 10, I played in the woods with some friends and all I needed for playing were some leaves and stones. I was happy with them, and in my imagination they turned into whatever I wanted them to be.
If you gave me some leaves and stones today, I'd say something like "I won't even touch that filthy stuff."
Face it, we lose some of that naivety, imagination and how easily we are satisfied.
Some of it, I'm not saying all of it.
Your car example is very good because it shows what I'm trying to say:
We need more and more awesome stuff to satisfy our growing needs. There's no way a game can keep up with all that, especially because people tend to become very diverse when they grow up, so it's even harder to fulfill the wishes of everyone who liked the Fandom as a child.

I sometimes play old NES-PS1 era games I missed out on as a kid and I can still appreciate how much imagination and effort went into those old games. Shit, I played Xenogears for the first time last year and now it's my favorite RPG. The problem is that game devs suck ass now. Demon's Souls is an exception as that game is awesome. A big chunk of the DS/PSP library is excused as well.