Should FF14 take a new route? Discussion

[NovaLevossida]

Who asked them to focus a considerable amount of resources on Perform or Replay—features with either little lasting value or have been heavily restricted?

I think that stuff is important. The value in that stretches all the way back to 2001: short essay link

But that stuff is only good to develop if the rest of the game is in a good position. You can't have XIV in its current state, repackage Diadem another time, and then develop things like that. You need to get the core of the game in proper order, and then you can focus on "extra" stuff that attracts or serves an audience outside of that.

I think the problem is that they are using this game to beta test systems for the future.

I do not think this is the case. Each time they've tried new content and failed (Diadem mainly), they've been excused by a large portion of the playerbase as laying the foundation for something better later on. When you get Diadem 3.0 (Eureka) with player / mob display problems and too many DoTs on the mob coupled with Diadem 1.0 style mob grinding that leads to FATEs, you can't call that beta testing if they should know better.