Interview: Face-to-Face with FFXIV's Naoki Yoshida - Article on MMORPG website

[Ayer2015]

I feel like one of the few people that never look at guides for MMOs and just do whatever the fuck I want.

[odintius]

Then pretty much we shouldn't have gear or weapons with stats/materia on them and keep it purely cosmetic and base content around just your character level only this way the devs can create content even easier without those extra stats, this way we can make gear even more boring than it currently is and just look fabulous imo. This is one the reason now I just play story content and forget end game know I can easily put this game down and play something else so Yoshi-p nailed it on that I guess! /Shrugs

[Ghastly]

That's the way mmos are going. The more gear/customization and the grind behind them the less popular that mmo is (no sure how Wow does things) but yes. I rather my skill determine how content is completed than my gear determining that. Those mmos where the gear determines the most how well you can do content are the bad ones.

[odintius]

That's the way mmos are going. The more gear/customization and the grind behind them the less popular that mmo is (no sure how Wow does things) but yes. I rather my skill determine how content is completed than my gear determining that. Those mmos where the gear determines the most how well you can do content are the bad ones.

Yeah thankfully I don't consider this a mmo it more a mulitplayer feature to me you que up with people and do instance fights with and get a dlc's with story content to go solo stuff at least I get to play more games on the side and wait a few patches to see were the story goes.

[kikix12]

That's the way mmos are going. The more gear/customization and the grind behind them the less popular that mmo is (no sure how Wow does things) but yes. I rather my skill determine how content is completed than my gear determining that. Those mmos where the gear determines the most how well you can do content are the bad ones.

Purely your opinion. And no, that's not how MMO's are "evolving". That's how Yoshida decided for Final Fantasy, and it's the only game I've come across where variety is removed, instead of added. I may have missed other games like that, mind you. I'm not as much of a player as I was in the past. But it have little to do with players and more with budget. It's simply a lot cheaper to make a crippled game than one that offers more than an illusion of choice. And Yoshida admitted to that. It just makes it easier for them to balance stuff.

[DreamAngel-Ren]

Q: What reducing the number of dungeons introduced in odd-numbered patches allowed the team to do?

A: It’s part of a wider redistribution of resources. “We gained breathing space not only from including less dungeons but from abolishing battle-type leves from the game. When it came to these, the text cost was enormous and almost everything was handmade; because we abolished this, the team was able to focus on the main scenario and add special battles and enrich the storyline.”

When I read this, I went, "YAAAAASSSSS!!!" I just love the story of FFXIV so I'm happy that they're trying to focus more on Main Scenario.

As for the glamour part, with me being a glamour addict, I'm one excited gal. Looking forward to that Live Letter event

[Clover_Blake]

Personally, to me the current gear system isn't boring. Quite the opposite, what I can't stand is the kind of system where you can "customize" your stats. I have experienced it in several games before and it never did anything good to me.

Putting aside the fact that it'll likely be more difficult for people to take breaks and come back later on (as Yoshida well said), there's also the problem that the community will expect you to follow the cookie cutter build everyone will have -and to max out your stats on top of that-, or else you'll likely be treated like rubbish. At least such has been my experience in games that used this kind of system.

So, I agree 100% with everything Yoshida says. There are different players with different tastes, and I stayed in FFXIV because it allows me focus more on the fun than on the stats.

[SenorPatty]

I'm pretty much satisfied-and excited- about bearly everything Yoshida said. My major gripe though was his response about tanks being equal.

Yoshi

Yoshi pls

Saying DRK are equal to the other while simultaneously mentioning both of their party-wide mitigation skills doesn't make sense.

[Genz]

customization has to answer the question, "For what purpose?"

Without additional purposes, why waste time customizing?

It's the other way around. There are inherent motivations to make a progression system with choices (it's a pleonasm ; the appellation should be simply "progression system"), and it'd be an interesting talk, but the defendant here is FFXIV : why waste time imitating a progression system? The level, the stats on gears, the gauges to fill, all of these are just appearance. FFXIV has nothing of the benefits of an usual progression system, but it does have some of its potential problems like the grind (which gives an excuse to the devs to sell the jump potion). There are also some other specific little problems, like how we spend most of our time in level synced content without all our abilities.

I don't really hope for the devs to add customisation in FFXIV, because it wouldn't be good, since Yoshida doesn't seem to believe in it. It may be better if they did to the whole game what they've done to PvP : remove level and stats on gear and make a new progression (like, "level up" a class by just doing the donjons in order, or something)

[RLofOBFL]

Living Dead is absolutely horrid. It is nowhere as good as Hallowed Ground in any normal situation.

I was really just taking into consideration the shorter CD so potentially it can be used significantly more than Hallowed. The two situations that I can think of that fulfill this are O4s Delta Attacks(can immune all 3) and perhaps Shinryu(debatable but LD comes up enough for an extra use in final phase, but isn't required)