Did Yoshida went a bit too far by cloning WoW?

[Rumpelstiltzkin]

XIV 1.0 may have been graphically impressive, but artistically and in terms of level design? No

Which looks more fun to explore?

This


or this?

They have done everything in their power to make sure there is nothing to explore regardless. There are no surprises, there are towns and teleports 1 min away from wherever you are in the world and there is nothing out there to do because it is all instanced. So your point is quite moot tbh. I mean it is funny, but if we are talking stricly about the world WoW did it so much better its not even funny simply because there were not an aerthyte around every corner. That being said the 1.0 world was not very interesting either and I am not saying 1.0 was better in any way except for visuals, but this game is so bad at several things too including an interesting world.

[justinjarjar]

Sounds like vanilla wow, new wow lets you tele everywhere from your house and gives you no reason to explore. I loved the explore of old wow, but alas it is a thing of the past now. (and wow stole that from games like this tbh)

[Fendred]

Sounds like vanilla wow, new wow lets you tele everywhere from your house and gives you no reason to explore. I loved the explore of old wow, but alas it is a thing of the past now. (and wow stole that from games like this tbh)

What you mean to say is that every MMORPG past the year 1999 borrowed the idea of an open world from Everquest. Saying that they stole something "from games like this" when FFXIV:ARR came out ten years after it doesn't make sense.

[justinjarjar]

What you mean to say is that every MMORPG past the year 1999 borrowed the idea of an open world from Everquest. Saying that they stole something "from games like this" when FFXIV:ARR came out ten years after it doesn't make sense.

I said the TP idea being brought to WoW.... god do you read? Or just jump to salt? Yes every game takes some influence from other games (even wow over time has added other games features) like art takes influence form previous art or engineers take influence form previous work. Everything does it, the question is what do you add? An artiest takes a new take on how to perform or new ideas, the engineer makes a better bridge or a cheaper bridge. Nothing is wrong with taking some influence form your predecessors.

[Sandpark]

They have done everything in their power to make sure there is nothing to explore regardless. There are no surprises, there are towns and teleports 1 min away from wherever you are in the world and there is nothing out there to do because it is all instanced.

I dislike the concept of everything being instanced. But the towns and teleports I have no issue with. Those can be seen as a boon when the progression is quest lines involving running back and forth between the same twos areas, also know as padding.

In other words, as long as the environment is interesting and there are plenty of interesting things to do and little padding, then the size of spaces is irrelevant. I haven't progressed through heavensward enough yet to know whether that is the case here. Although I have heard complaints about moogle finding.

[NamNem]

Moogles! Moogles everywhere! *runs*

[Rumpelstiltzkin]

I dislike the concept of everything being instanced. But the towns and teleports I have no issue with. Those can be seen as a boon when the progression is quest lines involving running back and forth between the same twos areas, also know as padding.

In other words, as long as the environment is interesting and there are interesting things to do and little padding, then the size of spaces is irrelevant. I haven't progressed through heavensward enough yet to know whether that is the case here. Although I have heard complaints about moogle finding.

The problem is that the quests are made the way they are because of the teleports and towns. No one would think about having quests like they do in XIV (a lot of them being really horrible because of the "padding" as you put it) if it weren't for teleports everywhere. So we have teleports and towns everywhere to the point where there is ZERO room for an open world and exploration and interesting content. Sorry, but the bad quests exist much because of the teleports because they are a requirement for that type of quest to at all work in a game. Of course there are bad quests in every game, but the type of quests they have in XIV are only possible because of the teleport system so if they did not exist neither would the quests and therefore the teleports could never be seen as a boon for bad quests. Do you know what I mean?

Add to that the fact that the world is more or less nonexistent in terms of open world if you actually enjoy doing something in it and so I can't agree with you. As for space being irrelevant that is just a matter of opinion and mine is not any better than yours. I disagree with you though simply because the bigger (to an extent of course) the world the more possibility for exploration and the more interesting content you can have in it. Make it cramped and both of those things starts lacking plausability. Towns everywhere makes it cramped, teleports everywhere makes the world smaller and the sense of adventure is completely lost which for me is a very large part of the MMORPG experience. The result is a game full of instances with a small and pointless open world. There are of course other things that enhances this problem, but those are a big factor.

[justinjarjar]

I think arch age has what you are looking for mate. Cannot think of a theme park mmo that has interesting open world content.

[Rumpelstiltzkin]

I think arch age has what you are looking for mate. Cannot think of a theme park mmo that has interesting open world content.

I have to be honest I think I want a mix. I am not saying there should be no instances because I think they have their place too. I don't want a pure sandbox and as far as I can see the biggest contender to be somewhat along the lines of what I want is Everquest Next, but with SOE becoming Daybreak and all the people being fired etc I don't know how that will end up anymore. I will keep my fingers crossed though, you never know.

[Sandpark]

I have to be honest I think I want a mix. I am not saying there should be no instances because I think they have their place too. I don't want a pure sandbox and as far as I can see the biggest contender to be somewhat along the lines of what I want is Everquest Next, but with SOE becoming Daybreak and all the people being fired etc I don't know how that will end up anymore. I will keep my fingers crossed though, you never know.

I want a mix as well as you can see in my forum name. Pure sandbox leaves fun creation entirely up to the player which can be bad, believe it or not. Pure themepark has a more lustrous shine the first few runs. But eventually that shine dims if the game is played to often. EQ next was aiming for a great blend. But with the company in turmoil, I don't see that turning out well.

I guess I like what FFXIV has done so far and I would like to see it continue that. But I also want to see them get bold and try and bring something new to the table with polish and depth.