Quote Originally Posted by Raelsar View Post
WoW has left a LOT of bad blood behind it because of how the game has evolved over the years, the majority of which have pushed it in one particular direction -- towards the hardcore, ultra-competitive and endlessly repetitive endgame.

But being the breakout hit of the MMORPG genre, it attracted all kinds of players; many of which were simply looking for another "RPG", likely viewing the whole MMO aspect as a novelty. Due to the aforementioned changes, a lot of the former audience has either drifted away or turned sour towards the game; it wouldn't be inaccurate to say many of them have a chip on their shoulder over it. Conversely, those who liked those changes over the years because the game increasingly became their sort of thing... they're practically sycophantic towards it. Getting the two parties to have a reasonable discussion is easier said than done.

The shortest version is that if you consider yourself a competitive and goal-oriented player who enjoys the endgame to the point you'd prefer the rest of it didn't exist? Go with WoW.
If you aren't competitive and want to focus on the more traditional RPG aspects like storytelling, exploration, visual customization... or pretty much anything else that isn't strictly endgame? Go with FFXIV.
What's really ironic there is that when WoW first came out, it gained so much popularity because it was the alternative to the niche hardcore raiding games like EverQuest. Even though EQII came out at almost the same time and also was supposed to be an alternative to the group-centric EQ, WoW was even more accessible than EQII. Now they are both games that cater to the very audience they patterned themselves against.