Disaster in the Darkhold

[Jennestia]

While I admire your constant attempts to paint SE in a glorious light

No, there's just no reason to be constantly pessimistic and cynical for absolutely no reason about everything they do when anyone who actually takes a second to think about the situation will know that it's pretty common for MMO designers to "reuse" content, especially if their MMO switches hands either managerial or company wise.

So although it is new to most players, it was not newly created. And since my point was that SE doesn't seem to be developing much new content, then I feel my point still stands.

This is assuming you have info that no one else has -- 2007 - 2009 in FFXI had almost zero content updates due to XIV's production, however right as it finished, we started to get a lot of content in quick succession and 2010/rest of 2011 is having a ton of additions, stuff that you can't just do in a week and call it a day -- it clearly has been in production for some time, and as said, XI's crew is small, especially given how SE is pushing to get XIV off the ground, this is why I say understaffing has nothing to do with it, it has everything to do with how they need to fix this game rather than expand it, and using stuff that was already present is a good way to do both.

[Arcell]

But the fact that they are reusing stuff in the game since Tanaka's leadership, suggesting a lack of development (probably because of understaffing),

I don't quite understand this particular complaint though. Most of the stuff aside from the monsters we haven't seen in the actual game yet. Whether or not it's in the .dats doesn't really matter because it was never used for anything. Now it's being used for something, it still takes time to implement. Sure not as much time from designing from the ground up but why not use files that already exist but aren't implemented?

[Gidonoidon_Sur]

Ya'll need some more hobbies.

[Kyra]

This shit just got real!

[RegaDosei]

Might be like a "Proceed to next area. [Yes/No]" kind of thing, we'll have to wait for a translation before we have any more idea.

Yeah it's asking would you like to use the transporter

[Betelgeuzah]

While I admire your constant attempts to paint SE in a glorious light, the sad fact is that this is not newly-developed content. The fact remains that these areas were in the game since open beta. So although it is new to most players, it was not newly created. And since my point was that SE doesn't seem to be developing much new content, then I feel my point still stands.

They may have reimagined pre-existing assets, but obviously nothing was created from scratch. Most of it was reused and makes one wonder if the FFXIV team is understaffed in that particular department at the moment.

I'm not necessarily saying they are understaffed, it just makes one wonder, you know?

It seems you are confused as to how the game was and is developed.

Vanilla areas have been developed pre-release. Even if they are currently not available, the assets are ready and waiting for content to be added to them. They have developed the games like this since vanilla XI. The only difference here is that regions currently inaccessible are not necessarily in the .dats like in XI, because they can make us download them through patches.

Further, as soon as the vanilla or an expansion is released, work begins on the next expansion immediately or soon afterwards. The area asset team is always one expansion ahead while the rest of the crew fills the current areas with content.

Now whether the area team is working on an expansion or the zone redesign (latter most likely), the fact remains that they are developing for far ahead in time. There may be few team members making up new assets for the dungeons, and someone working on environment collision, but the rest of the area asset team is hard at work on things in the far (hopefully not so far) future.

Just to give you some perspective, though, a proper redesign of areas requires as much work as a full-blown expansion pack. Not exactly, but close enough, depending on the scale of changes. Whether its an expansion or redesign we won't see them before the end of the year, and when we do, we'll get everything.

Lastly, if they make you download a new area that doesn't mean it has been created recently. It's an area from pre-release with slight adjustments unless there is an expansion or redesign.

[giftforce]

No, there's just no reason to be constantly pessimistic and cynical for absolutely no reason about everything they do when anyone who actually takes a second to think about the situation will know that it's pretty common for MMO designers to "reuse" content, especially if their MMO switches hands either managerial or company wise.

If I was in-charge, I too would make use of those areas, since most people won't have seen them anyway. However, my worries stem from the fact that we have yet to see much proof of strong development. We have these instances, but surprise surprise they are in previously-created areas. So then you can forgive me for questioning what the other developers (the ones who might otherwise be creating new areas) are doing?

Where are they? Where is their hand in all of this?

Have they been moved to other projects within SE while FFXIV is left to fend for itself with the scraps left from Tanaka's leadership?

Critically-thinking people will ask such questions, rather than giving undue praise to everything and rushing to SE's defence. I would just like to see proof that this game is still being developed with the amount of effort needed to bring it to standard. The rate of updates, the reused assets, the half-baked events, just everything makes me question whether there is really enough happening at SE to make this game functional for general consumption.

This is assuming you have info that no one else has -- 2007 - 2009 in FFXI had almost zero content updates due to XIV's production, however right as it finished, we started to get a lot of content in quick succession and 2010/rest of 2011 is having a ton of additions, stuff that you can't just do in a week and call it a day -- it clearly has been in production for some time, and as said, XI's crew is small, especially given how SE is pushing to get XIV off the ground, this is why I say understaffing has nothing to do with it, it has everything to do with how they need to fix this game rather than expand it, and using stuff that was already present is a good way to do both.

Well if a skeleton crew can produce so much content, imagine how much a fully-fleshed crew could produce. I think quantity of staff has a lot to do with production-rate and also the expansiveness of what is produced. Well, logic dictates.

[giftforce]

It seems you are confused as to how the game was and is developed.

Vanilla areas have been developed pre-release. Even if they are currently not available, the assets are ready and waiting for content to be added to them. They have developed the games like this since vanilla XI. The only difference here is that regions currently inaccessible are not necessarily in the .dats like in XI, because they can make us download them through patches.

Further, as soon as the vanilla or an expansion is released, work begins on the next expansion immediately or soon afterwards. The area asset team is always one expansion ahead while the rest of the crew fills the current areas with content.

Now whether the area team is working on an expansion or the zone redesign (latter most likely), the fact remains that they are developing for far ahead in time. There may be few team members making up new assets for the dungeons, and someone working on environment collision, but the rest of the area asset team is hard at work on things in the far (hopefully not so far) future.

Just to give you some perspective, though, a proper redesign of areas requires as much work as a full-blown expansion pack. Not exactly, but close enough, depending on the scale of changes. Whether its an expansion or redesign we won't see them before the end of the year, and when we do, we'll get everything.

I've already entertained that notion. But what of the lack of mobs... while the area-team is one expansion ahead of the development team, are those mob-people one expansion behind?

From the videos, it seems like more could have been done, and it simply wasn't.

When I see proof of monumental change, i will buy into your guess-work.

[Spellstar]

While I admire your constant attempts to paint SE in a glorious light, the sad fact is that this is not newly-developed content. The fact remains that these areas were in the game since open beta. So although it is new to most players, it was not newly created. And since my point was that SE doesn't seem to be developing much new content, then I feel my point still stands.

They may have reimagined pre-existing assets, but obviously nothing was created from scratch. Most of it was reused and makes one wonder if the FFXIV team is understaffed in that particular department at the moment.

I'm not necessarily saying they are understaffed, it just makes one wonder, you know?

ANY mmo reuses character models, re-skins existing assets and can take content designed long ago and introduce it into the current game. ANY MMO.

MMO's are massive worlds, if you expect an MMO to create totally new art and geometry assets every patch, for huge areas then you do not know much about game design.

This is not an indication of A:Understaffing or B:Under-funding - its simply a fact of life where SOLID game content takes a LONG TIME to produce, but subscribers expect regular updates.Its a plane and simple fact of game development and it does not mean that SE aren't investing in the dev team for this particular MMO.

Go back to games 101 and come back to the conversation when you are better informed little one.

[Sigmakan]

You actually can only resize them to a certain point or increase your resolution. There are also some things which cannot be toggled on or off regardless of how irrelevant they are.

I don't mean to rain on the parade or anything, but it just annoys me that if you play on normal resolution you play behind a fence of UI elements.

I think we have different definitions of normal resolution. Are you using 800x600?