[Stormblood Budget] Where all the money's gone ?

[ToasterMan]

And to add to it.

In typical SE fashion a large part of the budget will be blown in areas that are usually fine. Such as: Fancy looking story scenes, more voiced stuff, annoying in-battle lines (sloppy! I have the power!) and so on; basically all the flash and style at the detriment of other things. I'd honestly not be surprised if half of the budget went on CG trailers alone; absurd, not likely and not true, but this is how much SE values the aforementioned flash and style over meaningful - in some cases, much needed - content, additions or revisions.

It's something I've noticed about SE in particular. They tend to put presentation over functionality. It's a serious problem they have. It might work for a cinematic single player RPG, but in a MMO? Heavens no. It's the reason why the housing in this game is awful, or the GC restrictions in PVP. It's putting lore and presentation over functional gameplay. What's the most important part of a video game?. In fact, now that I think about it, they actually structured the MSQ like a single player RPG back in 2.0. Remember Praetorium? I think SE has learned from that mistake however due to their more recent decisions. Freelancing was a fantastic idea for PVP and was a step in the right direction.

Story and Gameplay segregation exists for a reason, ask literally any other major developer out there.

[Celef]

They also said longer cutscenes so that might be some of the budget especially considering more voice acting than HW

ear me out, not saying it's useless but come one, we don't really need longer voiced cutescenes ! Once you've done them they become useless, we need things to actually do to not get bored :/

[Settiesama]

ear me out, not saying it's useless but come one, we don't really need longer voiced cutescenes ! Once you've done them they become useless, we need things to actually do to not get bored :/

Problem here is people kept bugging them that there wasn't enough voice acting and it was 'cheap' of them not to put voice acting everywhere. Sadly they end up listening to such people.

[Talraen]

Problem here is people kept bugging them that there wasn't enough voice acting and it was 'cheap' of them not to put voice acting everywhere. Sadly they end up listening to such people.

Why is that sad? Guess what, a lot of people play modern Final Fantasy games, including this one, for that sort of thing. Presentation is kind of Final Fantasy's thing, and has been since FF7.

[Settiesama]

Why is that sad? Guess what, a lot of people play modern Final Fantasy games, including this one, for that sort of thing. Presentation is kind of Final Fantasy's thing, and has been since FF7.

Because it costs a ton getting all the voice actors. That money could easily be used elsewhere for gameplay which is the most important part. Some may not like me for mentioning the game, but XI had no voice acting at all, and had so much diverse content because of the saved money. Nothing was taken away, all the cut scenes were still brilliantly played out. Hell, before X, no FFs had voice acting and they were all so much better for it. We don't need more voice acting, we need the money used on gameplay.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Because it costs a ton getting all the voice actors. That money could easily be used elsewhere for gameplay which is the most important part. Some may not like me for mentioning the game, but XI had no voice acting at all, and had so much diverse content because of the saved money. Nothing was taken away, all the cut scenes were still brilliantly played out. Hell, before X, no FFs had voice acting and they were all so much better for it. We don't need more voice acting, we need the money used on gameplay.

I think its more, they have trouble getting combat content creators. The combat team is only like, 3 or 4 people atm, and they've mentioned before its hard to find people to fill that role.

[NaesakiAshwell]

I think its more, they have trouble getting combat content creators. The combat team is only like, 3 or 4 people atm, and they've mentioned before its hard to find people to fill that role.

And no amount of money will change that either unless there are people with the talent to fulfil that role as well.

[Talraen]

Because it costs a ton getting all the voice actors. That money could easily be used elsewhere for gameplay which is the most important part. Some may not like me for mentioning the game, but XI had no voice acting at all, and had so much diverse content because of the saved money. Nothing was taken away, all the cut scenes were still brilliantly played out. Hell, before X, no FFs had voice acting and they were all so much better for it. We don't need more voice acting, we need the money used on gameplay.

I have to disagree, on all counts. I've played all of the story content in XI, and basically nothing stands out as much as dozens of scenes I could name from XIV. Not necessarily because of the voice acting, but definitely because of the more cinematic presentation. And I don't think non-voice-acted FF games were better for it. (Well, unless you liked renaming characters.) There have been plenty of great voice-acted scenes in more recent FF games. I loved Reddas's big speech in FFXII, a number of scenes in the FFXIII trilogy, all kinds of little things. Don't get me wrong, I love scenes from the PS1 era and before as well, but voice acting has not been a drag on the Final Fantasy series. Do we need more of it? I don't know about that. But it's not a waste, either. Especially if we include lyrics for ridiculous boss themes in "voice acting."

[Felis]

Heavensward: 3 New Beast Tribes (though only two Announced on the Website)
Stormblood: 2 New Beast Tribes (although once again, there could be a third one)

HW had 2 new beast tribes.
Moogles existed during 1.0 and ARR already. Not really a new beast tribe. Only new were the daily quests to them.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

HW had 2 new beast tribes.
Moogles existed during 1.0 and ARR already. Not really a new beast tribe. Only new were the daily quests to them.

They weren't added until 3.2 or 3.3 either.