Naoki Yoshida's Comment in Regard to Jump Potions/Boost Potions

[Zaiaku]

If the worry that leveling is going to be too long easy alternative methods could be implemented. Things such as experience materia could be added to quicken but not destroy the leveling process, this along with experience boost gear sets would be a far easier solution than just smashing the lovingly crafted story to bits.
Another idea could be to implement low level quest packs, giving players the ability to level alternative jobs and classes through side quests (A quest chain in the vein of Hildbrand with a decent amount of experience and experience items attached). This would be a far nicer way to flesh out the game at lower levels, incense players to return to old content and if you really must, make some money on the side if you really must sell something… (Yes I know development cost is expensive).

I would be deeply disappointed and disheartened if this idea is given the green light for a worldwide roll out.

[Jas710]

When MMOs reach the point where content becomes so expanded upon that jump potions and other shortcuts are necessary (for the most part, they are), that's a sign for all of us long-time players to look at jumping ship and move on to another game.

Let the jump potion-sucking trainwrecked generation take over at that point. Lion King Circle of Life and all that. Nothing lasts forever.

[Callinon]

When MMOs reach the point where content becomes so expanded upon that jump potions and other shortcuts are necessary (for the most part, they are), that's a sign for all of us long-time players to look at jumping ship and move on to another game.

Let the jump potion-sucking trainwrecked generation take over at that point. Lion King Circle of Life and all that. Nothing lasts forever.

So when a game has been around for a long time and has a lot of content or at least a super long leveling process.... you should leave?

That does not make any sense.

[matteoxyz]

On one hand I'm excited that I will be able to level my remaining classes to play them at end game. I don't much enjoy the low level content/grinding and don't have time to get everything to 60 otherwise. This will make the game much more enjoyable for me.

[Zaiaku]

So when a game has been around for a long time and has a lot of content or at least a super long leveling process.... you should leave?

That does not make any sense.

Imagine you bought a game today (Say Skyrim), It's been out a while and all those other players who bought the game ages ago are way ahead of you through investing their own investment of time into the game, that is just "unfair" and so the game should just give you all of the experiance and gear and money and mounts if you pay for it.... No you are right it makes no sense at all that people would be put off playing a game that has huge amounts of content, stories, side quests, sub plots, yet this is exactly what they are proposing.

[Callinon]

Imagine you bought a game today (Say Skyrim), It's been out a while and all those other players who bought the game ages ago are way ahead of you through investing their own investment of time into the game, that is just "unfair" and so the game should just give you all of the experiance and gear and money and mounts if you pay for it.... No you are right it makes no sense at all that people would be put off playing a game that has huge amounts of content, stories, side quests, sub plots, yet this is exactly what they are proposing.

Well instead of a single-player game like Skyrim, let's compare apples to apples.

World of Warcraft has just released its 6th expansion, Legion. In the advertising and general hype train for the expansion, Blizzard talks about the Broken Isles, the Demon Hunter class, the artifact weapon system. All of these things require the player to be level 100.

Let's say you're a new player and decide that you want to be a double-jumping copy of Illidan because he's a badass and you want to be as cool as he is. Well buddy let's see what we've got here... yessir that's 5 full games worth of stuff you have to get through to get there, potentially a hundred hours of gameplay before you get to the part you were excited about. Or Blizzard can include a level 100 boost with the price of the expansion. Included in this boost is a tutorial on how to play whatever class you picked.

That's basically what's happening here. SE wants to let players play the cool stuff that they're excited about rather than have to spend 40-50 hours leveling up and playing through a story they don't care about. Now to keep it from being rampantly abused, they make the boost cost a decent amount of money. That way people won't feel pressured to buy it a bunch of times to keep up on their off-jobs.

Your complaint seems to be that a new player seven expansions in should have to trudge through content they don't care about because you did. Is that about right?

[Zaiaku]

Well instead of a single-player game like Skyrim, let's compare apples to apples.

World of Warcraft has just released its 6th expansion, Legion. In the advertising and general hype train for the expansion, Blizzard talks about the Broken Isles, the Demon Hunter class, the artifact weapon system. All of these things require the player to be level 100.

Now we both know that Blizzard already sell these type of boosts and they are still loosing subscribers hand over fist, sure they do get a spike in player base when new expansions are released, but as history has shown it dwindles away, faster in more recent expansions too. I believe that this is due to a lack of solid content that keeps people coming back and takes time to break and the ease in how you can just level in a day or two heavy play.

[Zaiaku]

Let's say you're a new player and decide that you want to be a double-jumping copy of Illidan because he's a badass and you want to be as cool as he is. Well buddy let's see what we've got here... yessir that's 5 full games worth of stuff you have to get through to get there, potentially a hundred hours of gameplay before you get to the part you were excited about. Or Blizzard can include a level 100 boost with the price of the expansion. Included in this boost is a tutorial on how to play whatever class you picked.

If I'm a new player coming to the game, I would be excited for it all. Personally I'd want to go through the main story at least (Sure, I can skip side if i want to rush) and see the progression of the world, how my character evolves and what effects happen in the world with the decisions I make, I'm not desperate to get to the end and start trying to pug my way to the best equipment then sit around and wait for content updates once I've done that...

[Zaiaku]

That's basically what's happening here. SE wants to let players play the cool stuff that they're excited about rather than have to spend 40-50 hours leveling up and playing through a story they don't care about. Now to keep it from being rampantly abused, they make the boost cost a decent amount of money. That way people won't feel pressured to buy it a bunch of times to keep up on their off-jobs.

The people that are excited are the ones playing the game now, the ones leveling or finding something within the game to do, Hunts, finding Easter eggs, completing alternate classes and so on. As I already stated, they could do it so many other ways from experience items (yes, WoW had them in their second expansion and it worked for them back then. I'm not saying that it was perfect but it helped a lot of people level alts).

[Zaiaku]

Your complaint seems to be that a new player seven expansions in should have to trudge through content they don't care about because you did. Is that about right?

Way off mark. I was aiming for if you buy a new game, do you want to then spend $X amount go right to the end boss and finish the game, or do you want to play through the story, enjoy it and immerse yourself in the story and then get to the end boss? If i could get a game with 3/4 years of content for $50/60 I'd pay that to play it. Sure it's going to cost me a little a month, but it's nothing I wouldn't spend on a indie game, or something on sale on steam that would probably last a day or two, possibly a week, I get a month for that.