Quote Originally Posted by KaldeaSahaline View Post
Correct. My mark. I'm not defining it for you, I'm defining it for me, and for anyone who happens to agree with me. I apologize if you mistook that for anything else.

However, rather than be emotional, why not try to demonstrate where I am incorrect in my analysis?

For instance - take the few example systems I've detailed below and give me some insight into how each of these was either well designed, scalable, or fun; in your own words of course.
  • Chocobo Racing
  • LoV
  • Diadem (1 & 2)
  • Eureka
  • Materia
  • Dungeons
  • Squadrons
  • Retainers
  • Airships/Subs/any other menu content
Ooh, I want to get in on this.

Chocobo Racing
I really love the way they designed genetics in chocobo racing (i.e., realistically). The abilities and the way you customize them are pretty interesting as well. I had a lot of fun with this content for a while, though as I've gained in rank I have hit a bit of a wall where it's not really worth trying to advance. But I got plenty of fun out of it, so I'm pretty pleased. A bit annoyed that I can't really complete the win-based MGP challenges anymore though.

Lords of Verminion
I admit I haven't actually finished all the tutorials, because I suck at LoV (good at making an initial plan, terrible at reacting to changes on the battlefield). However, the depth of strategy here is pretty cool and I used to spend quite a lot of time statting out good combos of minions. I am impressed at how well they made this clearly mouse-driven style of game work with a controller. Even though I've kind of run out of ways to really enjoy it, the 10,000 MGP weekly challenge keeps this somewhat relevant for me.

Diadem
I never did Diadem when it was current, but I have looked at it after the fact (duoing from my FC house) and it seemed like an interesting idea. I can see why it failed on a combat level, but I do think the gathering was a neat idea as an alternate way to get some rarer items. The spoils have also been pretty useful as another option for getting various materials.

Eureka
I initially resisted Eureka because the idea of FFXI-style grinding wasn't appealing. By the time I decided to try it, everyone had moved to the NM train model. I've only recently started actually participating in Eureka, but I have to say I find it strangely compelling. There's a lot of downtime on the NM train, and my attempts to level outside of it have been pretty terrible, but the camaraderie of waiting on NMs and the level to which people go out of their way to help low-level nubs like me has been pretty great. I really misjudged this one.

Materia
Materia has gone through so many forms, all the way back to the strategic conversions of 1.0. Now that they've added materia to most dropped gear and allowed for materia removal, this system has really become something amazing. I'm pretty lazy with updating my combat gear, but in leveling crafting and gathering on alts the system as it stands now has been hugely helpful. I finally don't feel like my materia is just going to sit there waiting for the perfect time to be used. There are tons of ways to get good materia as well, and it seems pretty well-balanced between allowing you to easily get decent materia and it taking effort to get grade VIs and crafting overmelds.

Dungeons
While I appreciate the early dungeon design with the alternate routes and such, they quickly became frustrating because no one ever uses them. Most of my alts still don't have map completion on a number of ARR dungeons. The newer dungeon design cuts out the fat and just leaves a great experience with fantastic bosses (Genbu being one of my all-time favorites in terms of neat mechanics), awesome visuals, and usually great music. I still love the Stormblood boss theme to death. I hate the type of speed running that was in vogue in the 2.x series, and I think they've done a good job of limiting that sort of thing to a fairly reasonable compromise. I have no complaints about dungeons.

Squadrons
I love squadrons to death. Initially leveling them up isn't terribly compelling, but once you unlock the weeklies and are strategizing what items to go after, doing missions just to hit synergies for cheap bonus items, and recruiting new wacky characters, it gets pretty fun. I am anxiously awaiting 4.3 for the squadron glamours. But the reason I love squadrons is command missions. There is no better way, in my view, to level a character to 50. Gaining 2+ levels per run, being able to kill everything without anyone complaining about taking your time... it's bliss. If you like the old school dungeons, this is the way to experience them.

Retainers
I have a lot of retainers and a lot of characters and I make the most of them. Now that ventures are a currency and not an item, I have a ton (over 2k on my main at one point) and I use retainers extensively to gather items, especially for FC projects. I spend my red gatherers' scrips getting them better gear (because how many hi-cordials do you need, really?) and spend a lot of effort customizing and glamouring them all.

Airships/Subs
I only got into the airship game after Stormblood released, as I moved servers and started my own FC. I've personally built every type of airship and sub piece, and capped all their levels, and enjoyed doing it. It's laid back content you can do whenever without much pressure, and you can get pretty cool stuff at relatively little cost beyond the initial building. Every now and then I send my retainer squad out to get a bunch of dark matter clusters for repairs, but otherwise it's a well-oiled airship/sub machine that provides me with a ton of weird mats, materia, and crystals to do with as I please.

Overall I'm very happy with the direction of this game. I never really thought about all these systems separately, but it is kind of amazing how much different cool stuff they've made here. I'm also a big fan of hunts, maps, chocobo companions, and gardening. There's a ton of stuff that you can do at once, which makes me feel like I'm being efficient even when I'm not really doing anything. Now if only I could get off my lazy butt and actually customize my housing a bit...