Other MMOs that you think ARE ACTUALLY BETTER?

[Shurrikhan]

If not for its awkward in-combat movement speed limitations, I'd have to say many Blade & Soul classes create more appealing combat flow, choices, etc., especially when playing content for which one is undermanned and undergeared than any XIV class, especially prior to the purely optimized levels, where small internal balancing issues leave much to be desired.

Certain of Black Desert Online's classes also feel better than any XIV class (bar maybe highspeed Monk on a no-ping connection, especially the Heavensward variant), provided the content isn't neither braindead easy nor so numerically intensive as to demand permanent kite-striking.

Certain iterations of WoW also beat XIV's combat out, imo, across the majority of their classes. (LFR, similar to our story mode versions, aside) WoW raids across most expansions also beat out XIV's raids (ARR through SB) in variety, mechanical originality, etc. First Coil and Savage Second are about the closest they've gotten for me, while Ulduar or ICC tend to beat out XIV tier since by a very large margin.

But it's on a class by class, intensity level vs. intensity level, raid by raid, fight by fight basis.

There are plenty of examples of design philosophy, responsiveness, system fluidity, and beauty in simple solutions that I'd love to see XIV borrow from other MMOs. But many of the things I take issue with in XIV, such as a shallow undermechanics base (which, being so shallow, then requires that any increase in depth tend to have an exponential increase in complexity, rather than a small investment of complexity offering exponentially more depth), poorly wrought story lines, issues of scaling (why is a single Ala Mhigan settlement, which was as a kingdom no more than twice the size of Ul'duh, allegedly, large enough to fit 400 of the latter citystate within it? How could so many warring tribes, each said to be hundreds strong, possibly fit within such a small valley?), are found across all the others as well.

Edit: Though just a bit more aimed at memorization than difficult but intuitive mechanics than I'd like, I was moderately impressed by the latest 24-man fights. Much like Shinryu normal as a final MSQ, it felt sufficiently threatening without yet being irritating (except when the unlucky candidate for the final boss's Rake-charge turns when already perfectly behind it), and provided an enjoyably over-the-top fireshow in its AoEs. Looked great, and played out pretty enjoyably. About as difficult as Ozma, but a touch more intuitive aside from the the numbers mechanic; a good place to be in.

[Jib]

For a small period for me SWTOR (Star Wars the old republic) was better. A lot of focus on story, great lore, all voice acted, but also focus on endgame/raiding/pvp. But only for a small period. The game had always “bugs” being bioware , couldn’t handle a lot of players on open world but there was a “golden period” for me. At the moment Swtor is but a “shell” of what it was and potentially could have been.

Ffxiv is miles away better.

Then you have obviously WoW, but again for me the lore, the world doesn’t reallly interest me that much

[KaldeaSahaline]

WoW popularized the actual raiding, and that's the kind of raiding that is in FFXIV 2.x. This is also why a lot of the "game spoiling" tools are tools designed to optimize a raider's time and suck the fun out of playing the content. There are studies showing that "raiding" is a health hazard since people are glued to their computers for hours, hence where FFXIV has actually improved over other games in that the raids themselves are not 20-hour long efforts but at most 2 hours, and even then, an optimal strategy brings it down to 10 minutes.

You always have some kind of chip on your shoulder about raiding and always paint it in a negative light, usually with grandiose claims and gross exaggerations.

1) In what world is raiding in WoW a 20 hour thing? Please cite your analysis and studies for review.

2) In what world do these tools "suck the fun out of content"?

3) You don't even raid, yet here you are making claims about how raiders feel? Mind citing how you arrived at your conclusion?

[illgot]

Gw2, Swtor and LoTRO have a better outfit system.

Those are features i miss in this game.

The UI in this game also seems to be schizophrenic and takes too many confirmations on PC.

[loreleidiangelo]

I think for an MMO that's easily comparable to FFXIV, WoW pretty much blows most things XIV does save story/presentation (probably crafting system too) out of the water. Better raids, better experience for casual players, more stable servers, better customization/QoL/functionality, better glamour/transmog, better combat (why are DPS jobs in this game so convoluted and involved but tanks and healers are some of the most faceroll homogenized garbage I've ever seen?), better storage and inventory management, better alt character support, better leveling experience (both aren't great, but WoW at least changed scaling so you can do zones you like and skip ones you don't like), better cash shop.

I'm sure some people with misinterpret my post as hating on this game or wondering "why doesn't she just go back to WoW then" (I play both currently, FWIW), but it's not like my statements in and of themselves mean XIV is a BAD game - I just think WoW is the BETTER game. Honestly though, since this is the FFXIV discussion forums, it makes sense that the only real "approved" response here would be FFXI.

[Tanathya]

Honestly though, since this is the FFXIV discussion forums, it makes sense that the only real "approved" response here would be FFXI.

This made me genuinely chuckle.

[KokonoeAiyoko]

The upside to this is that there wasn't an epidemic of undercutting and prices stayed far more stable. Considering stability is a fundamental hallmark of good markets, I'd say FFXI's system was hands-down better than FFXIV's currently is.

Also, there's really the same amount of work involved for FFXIV. It's kind of stupid to just look at the prices of currently-listed items. I've lost count of how many times I've seen a few copies of something up for 15k, only to check the history and see that the item hasn't sold for above 5k in the past few months. That sales history is the real guide to pricing, and FFXI had an equivalent mechanism.

Wait what? There was plenty of undercutting in FFXI, but I feel you are missing the bigger picture here. There are...

1. More players in FFXIV than there ever was in FFXI and thus there are more items.
2. Items are far easier to obtain in this game and are spammed at you thus there is gonna be a bigger chance of a undercutter.
3. Crafting is far easier to do in this game at a basic level and far less grindy and thus also contributes to much more people having access to said wares to sale combined with everything else I mentioned.

Adding in archaic mechanics isn't going to solve anything.

[Stanelis]

1. More players in FFXIV than there ever was in FFXI and thus there are more items.

That's... not true actually. At its zenith FFXI used to be as popular as FFXIV was.

[Sylvina]

This is a hard question but I'll put it this way. FFXIV is a traditional old school MMO. it does that formula very well and I love the experience. But I prefer how ESO does combat, builds, and just about every other system becuase its modern and forward thinking, and overall I enjoy those systems more. However I do NOT enjoy ESO's huge balance and exploit issues the devs wont fix.

[KisaiTenshi]

You always have some kind of chip on your shoulder about raiding and always paint it in a negative light, usually with grandiose claims and gross exaggerations.

1) In what world is raiding in WoW a 20 hour thing? Please cite your analysis and studies for review.

Use Google. LMGTFY, any time I link to studies, nobody reads them.

http://www.denofgeek.com/us/games/wo...-games-history

Alterac Valley Lasting All Day
Speaking of hardcore, how about Alterac Valley in its first couple of iterations? Whereas other battleground maps focused on smaller scale 10 v. 10 or 15 v. 15 battles, Alterac Valley was the first, and for a long time, the only 40 v. 40 map. AV was also a bit different in that it contained PvE objectives that needed to be accomplished in order to win the PvP battle. As such, AV was immensely popular with the player base.

What made the battle truly epic in the beginning was that one match could literally go on seemingly forever. If one side started to win the fight, the opposing side could "turtle" at one of several bottlenecks along the map and delay or even push back the aggressors. Add in NPCs that could be summoned into the battle to fight for you, and the overall feel of the match could change at any given moment. It wasn't uncommon for the typical Alterac Valley to last for several hours. The most epic battles would literally take up much of your day. Blizzard eventually implemented a system that gave all battlegrounds a finite amount of time to complete, but classic AV will always be remembered by those who were there.

That is where the "20 hour raid" comes from.


And here's a study: Video Game Genre as a Predictor of Problem Use
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3304244/

And another:
Impact of Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games upon the Psychosocial Well-Being of Adolescents and Young Adults: Reviewing the Evidence
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3820076/

Here's one on just play time:
http://www.iis.sinica.edu.tw/~swc/pu...ame_hours.html

And of course, China thinks it's a problem: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4183340.stm

There is a psychological feedback loop going on here: Players start playing MMORPG, Player wants to win at all costs because it stimulates their reward center, other players discover the same strategies and tools, those players denigrate anyone who isn't playing like a robot so they can keep the stimulus up. That is the same behavior addicts have, and that NIH PMC3820076 study even mentions that is what is going on due to how the reward systems work, more typically known as "the skinner box".

People want to play the content, not be forced to tools and mandatory guides just push people away from having fun with the content. Besides recent rule changes in the EU GDPR make collecting information about ANY EU people illegal without their consent in 2 days time, or the sites get fined millions. So I entirely expect players on the EU servers to start getting blocked from accessing those sites.