New Player: General game review

[AsteriaStarfall]

New Player Perspective with scores given for each area of review. Just like WoW, here on the FF Forums, comments and friendly debates are welcome. I am sure not everyone will agree with everything i put in my review so feel free to comment on what you like and do not like as well.

First a little back story into my days playing MMO's. I played WoW for 4 years, it was the first MMO i had ever played. I raided endgame content as a healer for those 4 years and was positive i would never play a different MMO. After the recent Draenor expansion, i realized that the game i had used to love and play each day was no longer holding interest for me. I would log in, do my garrison dailies and log out. Nothing made me want to go out and explore after reaching the end game raid. Nothing made you go out either. You could sit in your garrison, go raid and nothing required you to step one foot out your garrison door. A lot of the WoW forum posters were expressing what type of different games they were moving to and Final Fantasy was one of those mentioned quite often. So i decided to download the game and give it a shot.

What a complete breath of fresh air, and the amount of things to do picked up my interest right away.
Graphics/Details first impression: 10/10
Graphics are so much better compared to WoW, and a lot more life like (water, trees, ect) Wandering around my first few days i took all of the landscape in, so much attention to detail was paid by the development team that kudos are in order. As a side job and hobby i am a photographer, so landscapes and lighting effects are usually the first thing i notice about an outdoor environment game. The movements of the characters and the muscle/joints seem to be very fluid and life like as well. The wind effects on robes was one of the first things i noticed about the armor and was impressed how something very small that many might not notice can impact a more immersive experience.

Questing/Classes: 9/10 (would have been 10/10 had the mobs in heavensward had slightly less HP)
Quests are pretty standard throughout many games, and it always bothers me when people say "Oh the same old go collect/kill so many of these things" The problem when people use that statement is that they give no example of what they think a good quest would be. Questing was fast and fun, followed the main story line while doing a few things here and there outside of it. When the MSQ turned red, i just did a couple dungeons until i leveled. I started out playing a Conjurer knowing i would want to be a healer in this game as well. One thing that FF does very well compared to WoW is that healer classes can actually quest and not feel like they are hammering on something for a half hour to kill one thing. One thing i would like to see is healer classes when solo could have their dps mana costs reduced. There were a lot of times i would go to kill 3-4 in a row only to be out of mana. Not a big thing, just a thought.
A big thing was how the quests made you feel the part of the hero the whole way. I love the story and lore behind FF and enjoyed how many cut scenes there were. You got the backstory and was made to feel a part of the events the entire way. You the hero are just that, the hero that the entire adventure is based around, and not just a side character like a lot of games make you feel like as you watch CGI rendered videos that never mention you.

Dungeons: 10/10
They are not just pew pew, it takes a group effort, and sometimes even for low levels a little bit of planning for pulls. Fights in later dungeons may take once or twice to get right but are easy to pickup and learn. While you will need to learn the fights, it isn't impossible and the content is very much accessible for all. The way aoe or boss attacks worked took about a day to get used to (the orange AoE indicator) that you had to be out of before it disappeared even though the attack hadn't landed yet was different, but easy enough to figure out after a day or two of playing.

Music: 11/10 This score receives a +1 modifier to it's score as the music in this game has something for everyone. Heavy metal (not a fan of, but hey the tempo is consistent with the fight speed), Instrumental (The Praetorium...my favorite and enough said), ect. Music can make or break a game. Movies and tv shows are a prime example of this. Watch a movie/show with a drama scene and listen to the music in the background, how well does it convey the mood of the scene? Music in a game is no different, and in most cases the music in FF is spot on.

Raiding: ?/? Tentative 9/10
The only raid I have gotten to expierence is the new Alex raid. What i was most impressed with is that people could join in Duty Finder, and actually down bosses on a difficulty level that wasn't completely dumb down like in WoW LFR (Looking for Raid). For those that have never played WoW, or tried raiding, LFR is the most mind numbing version of boss fights ever. 25 people, half could literally go AFK and the boss would still die. Content For All!...at the expense of any actual mechanics or challenge at all.
I was very excited to see that Duty Finder used the same level of difficulty that premade groups could do (now i understand extreme cannot be done via duty finder, the highest level of difficulty should not be accessible without a preformed group, in my opinion) This allows for the casual players to get loot and shiny stuff, while still allowing the more dedicated players their level of gear and rewards. I think that this balance is very well done.
Why this gets a 9/10 score, is i felt that few added mechanics would have been nice for some of the bosses, as they felt at times a little to pew pew and not so much "Pay attention" type fights.

Crafting 8/10 The one thing that makes FF really break away from other MMO's is that you can do everything on one toon, and not have "alts" unless you really want them. One thing in any game that i despise is the "handouts" game developers give because so many people think that just because they pay for a game they should get everything handed to them instead of working for things as other people that put more time into the game have. However crafting all the way from 1-50 to be ready for heavensward was a chore. Since i was new, i was unaware at how much the crafting classes were intertwined, had i known this i would not have discarded all of the low level crafts since they could have been used in others. There was also no quick catch up mechanic, but again i do not mind working for something that others had put a lot of time into. Just a small little gripe. Now with that said, my weaver was the first to hit 60, GSM at 55, and all others 40 and below, with most being around 20-30. Now to get the recipe book for master crafts for weaver, you need to craft a lot of items, and those items require mats from other professions. So unless you were someone going into heavens ward with everything at 50, and then leveled everything to 60 at the same time, you were really put behind in the way of crafting unless you had millions upon millions of gil to buy the items.

Flying: 10/10
This is exactly how flight should be handled. Exploration and a few quests to unlock flight in an area. And the most important thing, once you unlock flight with the last MSQ quest in that zone, you still have to go back and get to use flying for later quests! You are returned to those zones multiple times, so unlocking flying as you go is a nice way of rewarding you so that later when you have to go back, you can get to were you need to go so much quicker. Brilliant design!

Community: 9/10
Overall not anywhere near as toxic as WoW, people are generally helpful and friendly. Each time i was new to a dungeon, never once did i have a single person complain to me about anything, they were understanding and helped explain things if i just didn't get it on my own. Since then, i have started leveling other classes as well through the dungeons, and i can count on one hand the amount of times, i have ever seen anything said in party chat that was putting another person down. The commendation system greatly helps with that and is something i feel should be more in the center of the screen when leaving a dungeon. I always try to remember to click the box and give one out, but sometimes i forget it's there, especially if i am not going for gear, i just leave the instance because leaving negates my roll anyway, and in doing so, i forgot to click the commendation box that was right about the loot box.

Overall General Score: 9/10

To SE, you have an amazing game, and i truly hope with how Blizzard handled all the customer/player complaints with Draenor that you have seen your subscription numbers rise higher and higher. Keep the direction of the game going the way it is, and you now have a new subscriber that you will keep for a long time. There is a fine line with keeping casual players interested and rewarded, and also rewarding the "hard core" players as well that put a lot more time into the game. The balance you guys have come up with is in my opinion spot on.
Again, thank you SE for breathing life back into my MMO playing days.

[Catwho]

Welcome aboard, and thanks for sharing your thoughts with us.

[IzzyData]

I'd just like to suggest the idea of using a rating scale of 1-10 instead of 7-10. The middle (5) means that it was neither good or bad and most game ratings would only give a 5 to the absolute worst piece of shit imaginable, but that isn't how it works. Your ratings just seems absurdly high.

[Elim]

Wow! I'm actually impressed with this review. It's a positive one, unlike the two or three recent threads, complaining about having to actually play through story, dungeons, levels etc. New people who have been posting recently seem to want a shortcut to endgame; a button that automatically unlocks and gives them everything. I'm not sure if that's a mentality from WoW? Never played WoW but I heard you can buy high level characters from their cashshop or something.

[AsteriaStarfall]

@ Elim, it is definitely the WoW mentality. The developers have given to much into the casual players and basically made it so everything can be unlocked by everyone no matter the dedication or effort applied. It is one of the core reasons i made this review. Compared to WoW, FF is still in its infancy stage of an MMO, and what they have here is what WoW used to be like in terms of the amount of effort needed to go into something. Now that WoW has gone down the path it has, and subscription numbers plummeting, i wanted SE to know, why their game got my attention, and now my money

[pouncing]

Welcome!

While I think you may have gone a bit overboard with all the "9/10's its almost as good as bacon" -IGN Final Fantasy is a great game that has really found what its trying to deliver.
The only thing that i can say is that in your raiding section The Alexander Gordias raid we have right now in a whole is essentially LFR and the Alexander Savage that comes out on Tuesday is the real raid that will make you pay attention. "Please look forward to it" -Yoshi P

[Reinha]

First a little back story into my days playing MMO's. I played WoW for 4 years, it was the first MMO i had ever played. I raided endgame content as a healer for those 4 years and was positive i would never play a different MMO. After the recent Draenor expansion, i realized that the game i had used to love and play each day was no longer holding interest for me. I would log in, do my garrison dailies and log out. Nothing made me want to go out and explore after reaching the end game raid. Nothing made you go out either. You could sit in your garrison, go raid and nothing required you to step one foot out your garrison door. A lot of the WoW forum posters were expressing what type of different games they were moving to and Final Fantasy was one of those mentioned quite often. So i decided to download the game and give it a shot..

Nice to hear about other WoW players joining this community! My MMO history is similar to yours, except I got the recommendation to try FFXIV from a friend who was also quitting WoW. I started about 4-5 months ago and was blown away by the amount of things to do. There's still so much stuff left for me to finish after this many months! Crafting, alt jobs, glamour, relic quest, beast tribes, money for housing etc... Anyway, your review was thorough and I agree with it for the most part. I hope you have a good time in Eorzea!

Here's how I'd score the game (1-10), if anyone is interested.

Details, first impression: 9/10 Game starts a little slow but hooks you after a while. They have put a lot of attention to detail, especially NPC dialog.

Graphics: 7/10 The art style is amazing, but on the technical side the graphics are quite hard on the pc so I have to keep them low.

Questing: 10/10 Interesting story that actually gives you tangible rewards like new content and faster travel. Plenty of sidequests that also sometimes give nice rewards. The leve system is kind of like daily quests which you can store for later, so there's plenty to do even on alts. Having unique quests for each class is a big plus for me.

Classes: 7/10 Some of them are a bit slow especially during low levels. All of them are good at their role while also being distinct from other jobs. The armory system is nice for people who want to play only one character. Some jobs had some odd additions in Heavensward and that drops my rating a little.

Dungeons: 8/10 Level sync and roulettes ensure every dungeon stays relevant, this is really nice. Low level dungeons are done very well because they get gradually harder and can't be mass pulled from start to finish. Level 50 ones are too easy because the item level sync is too high. Some dungeons have annoying gimmicks like cannons, which I personally don't like. I want to play my character and not a vehicle. :P

Raiding: ?/10 Haven't tried.

Music: 8/10 Battle music should be able to be toggled imo. Some tracks are a bit simple but most of them are good and do put you in a certain mood that suits the area. Heavensward did music better than ARR.

Crafting, gathering: 10/10 You need a combination of luck, knowledge of rotations, gear and patience. It's challenging, time consuming and most importantly rewarding, and it also encourages exchanging things with other players with a different crafting focus. In other words it's a complete end game of it's own and is also completely optional. Perfect.

Flying implementation: 9/10 Good overall, but I wish they had added a different quest marker for the required side quests. I also wish you could fly straight up but I guess it's more realistic this way.

Community: 8/10 The in game community is very helpful and people usually take wipes and mistakes well. Can't really say anything about the raiding community. Commendations are a nice thing to have. Sometimes people are a bit quiet though, and there isn't really a continuing chat going on in cities. Linkshells are used for in game events on some servers, and there are some events on the forums too, for example Eorzea's next top model competition.

And to add a few things...
Glamour/mounts/pets/titles i.e. vanity stuff: 9/10 There are so many of them only after 2 years! It keeps collector people busy for a long time. However, there could be a bit more unique mounts instead of reskinned chocobos and ponies. Glamour restrictions (gender, armor type) could be less strict.

Housing: 4/10 Beautiful housing wards, so many furniture options and even gameplay (garden, chocobo stable). All of this is unreachable for the majority of the player base because it's not instanced. Quite a big disappointment in that sense. I hope that once I get enough gil for a big house they have added more wards.

Dailies, weeklies: 8/10 Beast tribes, roulettes, Cactpot, hunts, leves, GC turn-ins and challenge log all give nice rewards and combined they can fill up your play time quite well. They are mostly used for gearing and leveling up, and I hope they add more repeatable stuff for vanity in the future.

Overall rating: 8/10 Great game! Worthwhile money and time investment even though some small things could be improved a bit.

[Sylve]

Great review. One that shows you actually gave the game the time it needed to properly review.
I have a feeling the other "review" threads were just alt accounts of those complaining about the MSQ job unlocks.

As for Raiding, Not sure if you've discovered it yet, But you can use the Duty Finder to do the old Binding Coil of Bahamut while syncing your level and item level down to minimum required.
This will let you experience the Raid mostly as it was originally intended outside of some generic nerf/fixes they made during 2.x.

I highly recommend you try and get a group together to do a full Coil run, as the Story there (While Side Story) is actually really good. Not to mention smexy gear for glamour

I only bring this up because you didn't mention having done Coil at all, just Alexander. As a former WoW player (7 years. RDruid<3) who quit for the same reason you did, this feature made me really bloody happy, As i was always kind of upset i never got to do the old BWL or AQ when it was proper content. And its just not the same steamrolling it at max level :<

[MrSmiley]

wait til you see our tri-monthly patches XD amazing stuff

[Rumpelstiltzkin]

I am glad you enjoy it so much. Keep having fun and take it at your own pace! My own opinion is in reference to your comments:

Breath of freash air? They basically made a FF WoW... Yoshi even said so himself. To be fair they made some things better, but imo that is made void simply because they made others so much worse.

Questing is nice if you look on the main storyline, love that you can follow it to max level more or less. Horrible that they are not reset so I can do them when lvling on new jobs because FATEs etc is amongst the worst type of content I've ever encountered in any MMO. Classes? Hard to find a game where they are so homogenized as in XIV, the whole job/class system is one of the biggest things they should have changed from 1.0-2.0 when they had the chance, it is horrible. Several of the jobs have abilities that are clunky and feel tacked on a job that it does not belong to.

Dungeons, hmm well the dungeons below 32 are so horrible it is a good thing they have the storyline to level your first job on because it makes the first job lvling experience okay because it makes you forget the dungeons. After 32, extremely predictable with little variation in how long they are, no options in terms of where to go, what bosses to go for etc. Too little feeling of storyline in the actual dungeons themselves. Would be fun to actually fight some of the storyline NPCs etc. They are there to some extent, but could be better. Overall I think they are okay or some even good, but only for a run or two, after that my eyes start bleeding because its so boring to do again since it is just the same over and over. Especially so since you need to grind it all for tomes but that is a different problem.

Music, yeah it is hard to disagree that the music is really nice. I absolutely love the music in the expansion areas and the battle music has always been great.

Raids, I can't really comment on it because I have not played it. From what I have seen they seem to be kind of fun but have the same issues the dungeon does somewhat.

Flight was nice I agree, it is cool to be forced to explore and find things to be able to fly. Too bad the open world is mostly pointless so not sure I have much use of being able to fly when I finally get it, but that might change or I am wrong in what I can do there. Have only gotten one zone so far.

Community I think is the same as most WoW like games. Seen worse seen better but overall it is fine and honestly as long as you find a good guild/fc it does not matter THAT much anyway. I am not even going to talk about the toxicity hunts promote because even if it is there it is not representative of most of the game imo.

Overall: If you have not played 2.0, 3.0 is just a nicer version of it and decently fun to play for a few weeks. After that not so much. For me I got enough in 2.0 already, many enjoyed it past that, but I hear more of the same complains I've had since 2.0 pop up more and more frequently. It really is more of the same with the same strengths (looks good, music, story), same issues (extremely repetative, very little use of open world and bad implementation of the few things that are there, no horizontal progression and very little item variety/options and the same goes for jobs).

Pretty good game, would have worked better if it had not been done a million times before. Has several strengths as well as several weaknesses.

6.5 / 10