MGP too much of a grind

[RobinRethiel]

You know, you still have never replied once about why you're still paying for and playing something you clearly have a significant amount of negative opinions about lol. About why you're complaining about grinding in a genre of game that is all about the grind.

MMORPGS and especially FF14 is not about grinding per se. There are some grindy parts, they are indeed bad, but Square said, they want to change this. If they do not change it, of course, there is no need to stay in a game, which is the same as any other bad MMO, true. But until now, I (and many others) believe in Square's promises and are waiting for 3.0.

If they stay on this path for more and more dumb grind, yes, we will leave. Many will. Some already did.

[ServerCollaps]

you couldnt even name a "good" mmorpg without grinds...

Many will. Some already did.

so thats why the playerbase increased from 2.5m to 4m

[RobinRethiel]

you couldnt even name a "good" mmorpg without grinds...



so thats why the playerbase increased from 2.5m to 4m

Name a good MMORPG with grind. A grind like killing 10.000 monsters. And of course: it must be the main element and make you feel forced to do it. Not optional. - And forget to call the Gold Saucer optional. It's a very big new element in FF14 and designed to serve all players as fun park beside the normal stuff.

WoW? You don't have to grind there. You can, there are some things here and there, but they are very optional. If it would be a grindy game in the core, they would never had caught so many players.
Guild Wars? There are possibilities to grind, but again, you don't have to in the slightest. You don't need to grind to get good gear.
Star Wars? Didn't feel grindy, got others problems.
and so on...

By the way: Grinding is a main part of F2P games, because grinding is annoying and F2P games are supposed to have such annoying stuff inside, so people buy the packages. That may be the reason, why you think, that MMORPGs must be grindy. No. F2P MMORPGs must be grindy, else no one would buy those +X XP stuff and so on.



Playerbase does not work that way. Yes, actually it may rise, but for an MMO you must hold them the long term. If they would really have that much more ACTIVE players, there would be more servers. And you will never gain and hold a big player base with grinding. The grind is, what make people leave, all the other, good parts, FF14 got, they bring bigger numbers. The grind and rng may destroy this, if they are not careful, polluting all the good they got.

Did you just imply that Gold Saucer isn't optional?

Hahahaha!

Show's over folks, this thread has reached its climax.

The whole game is "optional", kid. Try to get real.

[MomomiMomi]

Name a good MMORPG with grind. A grind like killing 10.000 monsters. And of course: it must be the main element and make you feel forced to do it. Not optional. - And forget to call the Gold Saucer optional. It's a very big new element in FF14 and designed to serve all players as fun park beside the normal stuff.

Did you just imply that Gold Saucer isn't optional?

Hahahaha!

Show's over folks, this thread has reached its climax.

[Moqi]

The whole game is "optional", kid. Try to get real.

Yeah, it never made sense. I've always wondered what non-optional content in a video game is. I still live if I don't log in one day.

[Welsper59]

MMORPGS and especially FF14 is not about grinding per se. There are some grindy parts, they are indeed bad, but Square said, they want to change this. If they do not change it, of course, there is no need to stay in a game, which is the same as any other bad MMO, true. But until now, I (and many others) believe in Square's promises and are waiting for 3.0.

If they stay on this path for more and more dumb grind, yes, we will leave. Many will. Some already did.

When did they say they wanted to change the formula for MMORPGs, and thus, traditional RPGs in general? Maybe I missed that. I know they said they wanted to change their approach for certain mechanics that are all-or-nothing, like Titan, but I don't recall ever reading/hearing anything about the grind (except to ease up a little on specific content that involved that... note: that does not mean remove).

And the entire genre is about grinding (in some form or another). A repetitive process that involves bettering your character in one way or another. That's RPG at its core, don't delude yourself into thinking otherwise. I don't think anyone is arguing against the notion that too much grind is bad, but rather that you're fighting a battle that you won't win lol. You won't win it because you don't understand everything about what you're arguing against. It'd be like if I went to a CoD forum and argued that the idea of FPS games having to use guns or be in the eyes of the character to be old and lazy design. It'd be clear I don't understand what an FPS involves, particularly with the CoD series.

Also that implications that there are an overwhelming majority of players that don't understand what a traditional (see Final Fantasy style) RPG is. People leave MMOs for many reasons, please refrain from making it seem like that is not the case. If you ever choose to leave, so be it. You won't be missed, just like the rest of us won't be missed when it is our time to quit. Many leave, many join... that's a fact of the ways that consumers take part in the MMORPG market (assuming you have a hit, like this game is).

[RobinRethiel]

It'd be like if I went to a CoD forum and argued that the idea of FPS games having to use guns or be in the eyes of the character to be old and lazy design. It'd be clear I don't understand what an FPS involves, particularly with the CoD series.

You don't even get near the point. Bad design in an FPS would be for example a bad AI, which is compensated by godlike powers, for example, that enemies ALWAYS see you. Taking guns out of a shooter would be like taking the skills out of a MMORPG. Taking grinding out of an MMORPG would leave the MMORPG completely intact. There would still be the whole game with everything, you would just not have to grind to play it effectively.

Grind is a lazy design. You don't see it in FPS, since there is seldom something to gain on the long term, so no grind is possible. FPS got other problems. Bad AI, boring/bad level design, bad UI (more important in a FPS than a MMORPG, because it's faster gameplay) and so on.

But since Square said, they will raise the MGP, I don't care any longer for this "discussion". Gone.

[Welsper59]

You don't even get near the point. Bad design in an FPS would be for example a bad AI, which is compensated by godlike powers, for example, that enemies ALWAYS see you. Taking guns out of a shooter would be like taking the skills out of a MMORPG. Taking grinding out of an MMORPG would leave the MMORPG completely intact. There would still be the whole game with everything, you would just not have to grind to play it effectively.

Grind is a lazy design. You don't see it in FPS, since there is seldom something to gain on the long term, so no grind is possible. FPS got other problems. Bad AI, boring/bad level design, bad UI (more important in a FPS than a MMORPG, because it's faster gameplay) and so on.

But since Square said, they will raise the MGP, I don't care any longer for this "discussion". Gone.

I didn't mention anything about design specifically. I referred to understanding the genre as a whole. Your examples are rather poor though on that side matter. How exactly does taking the skills out of an MMORPG no longer make it an MMORPG, when the concept of grinds being removed does nothing at all? I never heard of anyone making that claim between the two. In fact, I dare say that most people would associate the grind to be more fundamental to an MMORPGs identity than "skill".

You don't see a grind in FPS games because it's not a genre associated to it. However... if you add in the RPG element, what happens? The grind is there. Borderlands is a perfect example of that, where it's an FPS and an RPG. Seriously, name a single traditional style formula RPG that does not have a grind to it? In other words, an RPG that involves leveling up and bettering your character in some way (gear, skills, etc). You can't. It doesn't exist because the genre itself involves it. You're arguing for something that cannot happen without changing the genre itself.

You could take out many things from everything that ever existed, and it would still seem to be the same. Much of the "grind" in an MMORPG involves RNG. So, lets say that you take out the RNG from an RPG. It'd be the same game right? Let's say you did the same thing with D&D. You took out the die... would you still consider it the same thing? I mean, the players are still there and the DM still exists. You only took out the random frustrating part of it. Hell, even for this game, you took out the leveling since... well, that's a perfect example of a "grind" that everyone deals with. Immediate "max" level. You really can't pick and choose your arguments when talking about a genre as a whole.

I mean, do you really believe people will stay in an MMORPG for years if they got literally everything within a week? Taking out the grind will indeed keep the content there, unchanged, but it won't keep the players there... which is exactly why it exists. Not everyone likes the grind, but that's how it works. That's part of the reason for what kept players around long enough to make MMORPGs a mainstream genre. The grind keeps players around long enough to experience many things they otherwise wouldn't from instant satisfaction. It's a design partly based around psychology (many genres of games and forms of entertainment do the same). People write books on the environment within casinos and the human brains reaction to it. Everything has some sort of underlying reason behind its existence.

Besides that though, I'm still waiting for your source of information behind much of the things you're claiming. Such as SE claiming they will remove or never add in any elements of "grind" to the game in the future.

And yes, the MGP argument is over for Chocobo Racing. I have a feeling we'll see you again shortly after complaining about it though lol.

[Snugglebutt]

Grind is a lazy design. You don't see it in FPS, since there is seldom something to gain on the long term, so no grind is possible. FPS got other problems. Bad AI, boring/bad level design, bad UI (more important in a FPS than a MMORPG, because it's faster gameplay) and so on.

It is apparent you have no idea what you are talking about. There is grind in most FPS titles just like there is in MMO's and RPG's. FPS games have actually started more and more to add RPG style components alongside things which you grind for examples levels, gear, maps, achievements, rankings, scores and more. As said in the other thread, a grind is nothing more than having to do something multiple times whether that's for something you want or something you need. The only way to have no grind is to make every single thing you do give you every possible thing you want or need from it on your first try with zero chance of failure. Even super casual games like Candy Crush, Flappy Birds or Tetris have grind, the grind is beating your previous score or getting further than you did before.

[RobinRethiel]

It is apparent you have no idea what you are talking about. There is grind in most FPS titles just like there is in MMO's and RPG's. FPS games have actually started more and more to add RPG style components alongside things which you grind for examples levels, gear, maps, achievements, rankings, scores and more. As said in the other thread, a grind is nothing more than having to do something multiple times whether that's for something you want or something you need. The only way to have no grind is to make every single thing you do give you every possible thing you want or need from it on your first try with zero chance of failure. Even super casual games like Candy Crush, Flappy Birds or Tetris have grind, the grind is beating your previous score or getting further than you did before.

Kid, games are my job. I know these things very well. Candy Crush and co want to bleed you. They hook you, then they bleed you dry, that's the plan. Because of that, they implement game play elements, which SUCK when you don't pay. The games are indeed casual, because you don't need much time for them, you play them on your smartphone while you are waiting somewhere and so on. The grind is not. The grind is there to ANNOY them, so they spend money.

Grinding = annoying. The game industry knows this. And they use it. In MMORPG's which are not F2P (there the grind shall annoy players, too, same mechanic) it just exists to buy time. It got no other reason. An daily or weekly lockout will do the same and while also annoying, it is LESS annoying and you don't rob the time of the players, who maybe should do something else, too, in their life.

For those few who only play a game for a grind, you can just copy&paste items, write "1337" on it and sell it for 10 times the prize. Grinders are happy and can pose with their 1337 item.

Very, very, very few % of players cut through content. They much more often have a problem, that developers focus to much on this very small minority of hardcore gamers.

Take Coil. For ~90% of the FF14 players it would make not difference, if it does not exist at all. That's why Square is changing the system, into normal and HM Alexander. So they can reach more players = more people who have fun = more people who stay and wooing for the game.

Grind is the same. Sure, it is easy, but the majority of people hate it, so they feel left out again.

I know all those mechanics, how they work, how developers are using them, and even what most of them think about it (because yes, there are very bad ***** developers out there, who give a **** about players, if they wouldn't have the money they want, it's sad, but real).

If I would think, that Square is such a developer, I would not care to write here.