The fact of the matter is

[Betelgeuzah]

At this point, wouldn't it be a little difficult to overhaul their engine?


Aside from that, I agree with you.

I think so. However, it is necessary. Otherwise, and it pains me to say this, but they will have too tough of a time working around the limitations.

Just look at them struggling to implement simple things to the UI. They seem to be proud to announce that soon all three action bars will be visible... simultaneously. months of work and they're finally close to the goal!

Goddayum.

[Razor]

I think so. However, it is necessary. Otherwise, and it pains me to say this, but they will have too tough of a time working around the limitations.

Just look at them struggling to implement simple things to the UI. They seem to be proud to announce that soon all three action bars will be visible... simultaneously. months of work and they're finally close to the goal!

Goddayum.

I'm sure that ever since release everyone on the XIV development team has been working late nights and weekends specifically assigned to making all three bars visible.

Really? If this was the case we wouldn't be seeing any of the additions we have been seeing. Your signature even outlines it perfectly: "Yoshida: We’ll do our best! (laughs) We have to start with the fundamentals though. If we try to take on everything at once, we won’t be able to release anything at all." Things like UI and server fixes have likely been on the backburner and completely untouched because things like developing content and fixing the battle system took precedence.

[Tsukino]

I think so. However, it is necessary. Otherwise, and it pains me to say this, but they will have too tough of a time working around the limitations.

Just look at them struggling to implement simple things to the UI. They seem to be proud to announce that soon all three action bars will be visible... simultaneously. months of work and they're finally close to the goal!

Goddayum.

I fully support your main idea that the game needs to run better net-wise so that it can actually be played properly without lag. I'm one of the many people who "liked" your post for it.

But the idea that it has anything to do with the graphics engine or that the graphics engine should be "overhauled" is ridiculous. They spent years developing JUST the engine, and the entire purpose of such an engine is to be able to implement artists' work more easily into new games. To overhaul it would defeat its reason for existing in the first place. If they needed to redo the graphics (which they don't) then they'd just scrap the game entirely and build a new one from scratch.

They do need to fix the net code and stop asking the servers for extra special confirmation on every action. We need to be able to play the game and not have up to a few seconds of lag on a regular basis. We need more streamlined UI that doesn't ask as many questions as it does, or require scrolling windows where they're unnecessary. But the graphics engine does not need to be overhauled to accomplish this, nor would it even be remotely feasible to spend time and money on at this point, in what is already the best looking MMO around.

[Tibian]

They do need to fix the net code and stop asking the servers for extra special confirmation on every action. We need to be able to play the game and not have up to a few seconds of lag on a regular basis. We need more streamlined UI that doesn't ask as many questions as it does, or require scrolling windows where they're unnecessary. But the graphics engine does not need to be overhauled to accomplish this, nor would it even be remotely feasible to spend time and money on at this point, in what is already the best looking MMO around.

This, all of this.

[Coldfire]

Just wanted to mention:
The devs for ingame logics, GUI, graphical engine, netcode, etc. are most likely all different people. So they should be able to work on different things at the same time... that's how it's fastest actually. No point having the whole team work on a new battle system when everyone is expert in a different field :/
It almost seems like they lost the parts of the team responsible for the gfx engine and the netcode. Until now we only saw minor fixes to those things even though most complaints are about the lag and the high resource usage on slower systems.
Would offer them my help but I don't speak japanese that well xD

[Winterclaw]

I fully support your main idea that the game needs to run better net-wise so that it can actually be played properly without lag. I'm one of the many people who "liked" your post for it.

But the idea that it has anything to do with the graphics engine or that the graphics engine should be "overhauled" is ridiculous. They spent years developing JUST the engine, and the entire purpose of such an engine is to be able to implement artists' work more easily into new games. To overhaul it would defeat its reason for existing in the first place. If they needed to redo the graphics (which they don't) then they'd just scrap the game entirely and build a new one from scratch.

A game engine is more than just graphics. It's the toolset they use for working on the game. If that toolset sucks, then it hinders their ability to make changes. You know how people in the game are complaining about the bad interface and how some basic features are lacking? Well if the toolset is of the same quality as the rest of the game, you can be sure it's hurting the dev team.

You know what would be even better? If American PC gamers would realize that SE is a Japanese company and far more people in Japan are interested in and capable of playing an MMO on their home console than a PC, and that SE would fail miserably trying to run a game that didn't cater to their own country's population. Bonus points if they also finally understand that FFXIV specifically is completely doomed without its last chance to regain subscribers with a re-launch for the PS3 after they fix things up.

Then perhaps SE failed by trying to design the game for the east first seeing that FF14 is

1. Currently PC only
2. Has an interface that sucks for PC use
3. There's no mention of a PS3 release date so all those people this game was designed for still can't play it.
4. Forgetting that most MMO players use a PC instead of a PS3 for gaming so this game was optimized for a niche market to begin with.

/facepalm

[Tsukino]

Then perhaps SE failed by trying to design the game for the east first seeing that FF14 is

1. Currently PC only
2. Has an interface that sucks for PC use
3. There's no mention of a PS3 release date so all those people this game was designed for still can't play it.
4. Forgetting that most MMO players use a PC instead of a PS3 for gaming so this game was optimized for a niche market to begin with.

/facepalm

Everyone knows they botched the release of this game. That's why we're all here now posting about what we want to fix it. That's why it has a restructured development team. That's why it's still not working right with half its features (or more). Doesn't change the fact that it was always supposed to be a console game as well, and it still has to be in order to pick up the subscriptions it needs.

Of course the PC version should run well and have a good UI. I play on PC myself and would love it if keyboard+mouse would finally just work. I was just responding to the general idiocy of saying SE should drop support for the PS3 because it's "holding the game back" when it's actually the only chance the game has to survive at all.

It's the same as people whining about "PS2 limitations" with FFXI. Did it cause the game to lack a lot of new features that could have been added if it were PC-only? Of course, because the PC as a platform always has more dynamic capabilities than any console. Would it still be worth it to do? No, because the fact that FFXI has console support is one of the things that set it apart from other MMOs and make it more accessible to more people, and a large number of players in Japan would be unable to continue to play at all.