"Final Fantasy XIV helps drive revenue spike"

[SenorPatty]

Who is this awful waifu you speak of?

I could be wrong but I believe that would be a shot at Lightning from FF13. Apparently the director was very enamored with the character to the point where he decided to make 2 more sequels.

[Fawkes]

Oh so the OP is poking fun at WoW. Took me a bit to decipher that.

I think he's talking about other FF titles. Mainly 1.0, XIII, and XV.

Who is this awful waifu you speak of?

Lightning.

[TankHunter678]

That's great and all but given the fact that we're more than likely going to see a repeat of more of the same, if argue a cut corner version of it especially with the new races, what does that really matter to me the consumer?

The game driving a revenue spike is great for company heads and shareholders but as a consumer who hasn't seen any meaningful growth to the game itself since the end of Heavensward this means nothing to me. We're more than likely not going to see an increase in quality or quantity in regards to most non-MSQ content and will more than likey see further use of the system's limitations as an excuse as they keep building up technological debt.

At this point they've already fallen back on the "Patch it Later" mentality that Yoshida himself noted as a sign of failure for devs in a GDC following the reboot with Hrothgar and Viera. Sure the story is great and the music is top notch, and Ishikawa and Soken should be proud of it, but exactly what has been done at all in regards to this game's evolution given that it stays to a rigid formula after 3 expansions of player increase? Practically nothing since HW set the formula. The revenue will more than likely not affect the game and we'll more then likely see the same stagnant endgame with minigames added here and there.

I ask again, why does this matter to me the consumer?

FFXIV does not need to try to reinvent itself every expansion like WoW did. WoW tries to reinvent itself constantly and as a result one expansion mechanic after another gets patched in, patched out of the game at the end of the expansion, left forgotten or only carried over if it helped MAUs. The only thing they have that is consistent is raids and dungeons.

[Barta]

I see you were so proud of said post..you made it twice..

Couldn't get the Pikachu image in huh?

Not that I know of? I did edit it though cause I forgot the link to the article.

[Barta]

I think he's talking about other FF titles. Mainly 1.0, XIII, and XV.



Lightning.

Correct. I mean.... They had to fire the entire team and restart 1.0

XIII is heavily panned and the director fell in love with his joik-bait waifu Lightning.

And XV barely has a story and half the content was cancelled, the game barely existed ten years after development. And the narrative is still piecemeal rubbish if you exclude the DLC and movie/anime, barely a game.

Disgusting.

But at least they remember how to make a game this time. Impressive.

[Barta]

The news that FFXIV is doing super well deserves a far better post than you wrote.

It's a shame that none of their other projects come feature full or within a moderately timely manner.... Or without a small mountain of development issues and otherwise.

Hopefully they actually use the funds to better this game, rather than dumping them into more frivolous idiocy.

[Barta]

That's great and all but given the fact that we're more than likely going to see a repeat of more of the same, if argue a cut corner version of it especially with the new races, what does that really matter to me the consumer?

The game driving a revenue spike is great for company heads and shareholders but as a consumer who hasn't seen any meaningful growth to the game itself since the end of Heavensward this means nothing to me. We're more than likely not going to see an increase in quality or quantity in regards to most non-MSQ content and will more than likey see further use of the system's limitations as an excuse as they keep building up technological debt.

At this point they've already fallen back on the "Patch it Later" mentality that Yoshida himself noted as a sign of failure for devs in a GDC following the reboot with Hrothgar and Viera. Sure the story is great and the music is top notch, and Ishikawa and Soken should be proud of it, but exactly what has been done at all in regards to this game's evolution given that it stays to a rigid formula after 3 expansions of player increase? Practically nothing since HW set the formula. The revenue will more than likely not affect the game and we'll more then likely see the same stagnant endgame with minigames added here and there.

I ask again, why does this matter to me the consumer?

Exactly. I mean, it's great that we're all still wearing 125x125 textures with barely any bump mapping or definition. It's great everything in the game looks like plasticine or thatched plasticine...

Or worse, the pixels are so large they are the WoL's hand in size. I'm looking at you HIEN and countless others.

[Alexandre_Noireau]

FFXIV does not need to try to reinvent itself every expansion like WoW did. WoW tries to reinvent itself constantly and as a result one expansion mechanic after another gets patched in, patched out of the game at the end of the expansion, left forgotten or only carried over if it helped MAUs. The only thing they have that is consistent is raids and dungeons.

And on the other end, XIV design is so terribly repetitive that has become an inner meme (see tomestones) where the basic design of absolutely all content gets repeated to no end. If you been playing since 2.0, everything done in ShB is basically repeated content from a design and mechanical stand point, very little new stuff has really been done. And no, changing the name of things doesn't make them new. Patches still predictable, content flow is still the same, boring really.

Just see dungeon structure: corridor, circle, corridor, circle, corridor, circle. We done.

Raids have been turned into glorified trials. The level design in general is just bad. Looks and feels and narrates well, but from a design stand point, FFXIV is STAGNANT.
Let alone the falling into so many trendy anime/contemporary sci-fi tropes that is just tiring. I say, XIV needs to reinvent a lot of things, the first player/early game experience would be a great place to start. A better sync system (one that doesn't chop your skills away) and much more non-linear non-streamlined game design, with more open ends to player progression and customization, and less vertical and more horizontal progress.

[Noodle_Trinidad]

FFXIV does not need to try to reinvent itself every expansion like WoW did. WoW tries to reinvent itself constantly and as a result one expansion mechanic after another gets patched in, patched out of the game at the end of the expansion, left forgotten or only carried over if it helped MAUs. The only thing they have that is consistent is raids and dungeons.

I will admit that this is a valid complaint against WoW and how it handles itself but I am mostly focusing on FFXIV itself and the issue it has in regards to its non-changing design regardless of the increase in revenue and playerbase. I will be honest and admit that have to an extent come to hate this argument of "WoW fails cause it keeps trying to reinvent itself" mostly due to the fact that many seem to think that this argument itself absolves FFXIV's non-growth. While we can both agree that WoW and its constant need to Reinvent the Wheel hurts that game badly I would argue that FFXIV has become the polar opposite in regards to this flaw. Where as WoW will always feel the need to reinvent itself for its growth FFXIV decides to do nothing and play it safe and on a rigid design that sees nothing more than the same solid but bland foundation that we have come to be able to predict. Wouldn't be amazed if several players have already gotten the timeframe for patch releases and the standard content count already laid out like they did for Stormblood. This game does nothing in regards to growth and I think its becoming a massive issue that many players think Growth = WoW's "Reinvention".

We're 3 expansions in and the game is producing more money than ever and holding the largest player pool it has ever had to date, which it also did with Stormblood during its launch, and we're more than likely going to see nothing in return to this game's experience. It's funny how you say the only consistent thing WoW has is Raids and Dungeons when thats the same exact thing FFXIV has, Raids and Dungeons hell you could argue that Primal fights are essentially raids given the way all our Raid Series work. Anything not consistent is generally a mini-game that gets forgotten, an additional PvP map and w/e the 3rd iteration of Diadem will be, nothing that adds onto the very solid foundation that FFXIV has.

So yes why would the increase in Revenue even matter to me as a consumer since I'll see the same boring tripe I've seen 3 expansions in a row now. It's like a weird hell of Pre-1.23's version of "Ifrit Only" endgame where the only thing that changes is the paint its covered in. Were it not for the great story by Ishikawa and Soken's complimentary music it's more than certain this expansion would have been slammed harder than Pokemon is with the National Dex incident.

[Losara]

Raids have been turned into glorified trials. The level design in general is just bad. Looks and feels and narrates well, but from a design stand point, FFXIV is STAGNANT.

I agree with the comment about raids. They shouldn't even be called raids at this point since they are literally just trials. We aren't exploring anything any more. The last actual raids we had were the Alexander tier raids. The Omega raids were all Trials.