Risk Factor. Can I have it?

[Rokien]

Right and that's all well and good except Demon's Souls was created specifically for a hardcore audience who likes being mercilessly punished apparently. Final Fantasy XIV was not created with the hardcore audience in mind and even since Yoshida has taken over has continued to cater to a more casual audience than FFXI. If you want a really hardcore game, FFXIV is not it and I don't think it ever will be.

LOL the biggest casual gamer I know even played demon souls and loved it!~ there for hardcore mechanics can work in a casual game ^.^
He also thinks this game is way easy. Even though he doesn't like to put effort into it.

[ArnoMorley]

The point is: It might be surprising, but some of us actually DO play FFXIV precisely because it isn't FFXI. If we wanted to play FFXI, we'd go play FFXI. Trying to satisfy everyone is akin to the fable about the old man, his son, and the donkey and I'd rather they just pleased themselves trying to make a game that they could be proud of.

I highly doubt you'd draw many people back to the game with "Come back and try FF14! We've made it more tedious, impenetrable and grindy!". People that like that usually end up playing Darkfall.

People loved FFXI because it was harder, that's what people played it for. If you noticed they did NOT start losing players until wotg came out and exp became easy to solo via campaign. Campaign was a grind, and it was quite boring, before when people were tired of partying they would go enjoy the game's content, therefor quests/missions designed for lower levels actually had meaning. Heck it took me a year to get my first 75 but the way there was an incredible journey.

And we can't go enjoy FFXI anymore because they ruined it. It's become a lot like 14 is, max level in hardly any time and everything is easy. At least XI was a good grind, XIV's method is easy content that repops instantly but has a low drop rate. Not to mention XI's 10 years old, the fans deserved a next gen FFXI, do they expect us to keep playing a ps2 game forever?

I personally wanted an FFXI-2, most of their users wanted it too. they imported the same races, they made it resemble XI and put the same development team on it and then change it to accommodate a new fan base instead of us.

What kind of logic is that, turn on your client base and try to go after WoW's audience? Even if XIV had been a 10/10 title at launch WoW's audience is going no where, most of them are too narrow minded to give a JRPG a shot. And it's not even a nationalism thing, they just can't relate it.

[Arcell]

LOL the biggest casual gamer I know even played demon souls and loved it!~ there for hardcore mechanics can work in a casual game ^.^
He also thinks this game is way easy. Even though he doesn't like to put effort into it.

Okay, good for you. You know someone who likes the game. Doesn't change the fact that this game was not created with a hardcore audience in mind.

That's not to say we don't need more difficult content, however timesinks and masochistic death penalties do not equal difficulty. More challenging mob AI, longer fights and fights that require strategy and thinking are difficult.

[Malachite]

What's so dynamic and diverse about sitting in town waiting until a RDM or a BRD and a PLD or NIN logged on and wasn't snapped up within 15 seconds by other desperate groups?

Aye, there wasn't anything fun about waiting for a group. I'm not saying FFXI didn't have its flaws.

when dealing with people with attention spans shorter than their vocabulary and bladders the size of peas (just how difficult can it be to synchronise a toilet break?).

Hahaha, I hear ya. But that's partially what I was talking about. The party system in FFXI (when you were lucky enough to get into a group) had a very dynamic aspect to it. Like you mentioned above, something as insignificant as a toilet break caused an interruption. Everyone had a particular role in an exp group and mobs were balanced around full 6 man parties. So, one person not paying attention changed a group's dynamic pretty significantly and that's just taking into account one person. A full group had 6 people. What we often times saw in a typical exp group was something like this: one person was very focused and paying attention, while another was only half paying attention, while the healer may not have known 100% what they were doing, while the puller sort of sucked at pulling, while the tank was great and doing an awesome job, while the SAM had a problem ever since childhood of not being able to go longer than 15 minutes without peeing (poor guy), and while you're fighting a mob, some guy runs by you with a chain of bats that will soon turn around and aggro onto your group.

To most people this probably sounds like the dead opposite of a good time, and I would agree. But what I do like about the above group sample is that it exemplifies the diversity that the system allowed for. The example above is just one possibility. There were practically an infinite amount of ways for a group to play out. Personality, perseverance, gear, player ability, focus, and externalities such as other groups that were playing around you were just some of the factors that made up a very diverse party system.

FFXIV has very little of this. If someone is only partially paying attention, it doesn't really matter. If someone is a bad healer, it doesn't really matter. If someone isn't a very good puller, it doesn't really matter. If someone goes afk for 30 minutes, it doesn't really matter. If someone dies every 5 minutes, it doesn't really matter.

I would take all of the crappy things (and there were quite a few) that were a part of FFXI's combat and partying system in a heartbeat if it meant that we would get a system even half as diverse as FFXI's. Okay, maybe not the long waiting time for invites, but everything else! FFXI did a lot of things wrong, but it also did many things right. Its healthy population (one of the most successful P2P MMOs to date) is a testament to that. When first hearing of FFXIV, I remember thinking "Wow, this is going to be great. It will take all of the good things from FFXI and build upon them." My one biggest disappointment with this game has been the realization that this was not the case.

[Rokien]

Okay, good for you. You know someone who likes the game. Doesn't change the fact that this game was not created with a hardcore audience in mind.

That's not to say we don't need more difficult content, however timesinks and masochistic death penalties do not equal difficulty. More challenging mob AI, longer fights and fights that require strategy and thinking are difficult.

This game is ment for casuals, you said it yourself, they cant add hard stuff!~ aka more challenging mob AI

In an mmo, you can't have two polar opposites. You can't go easy/hard, people will complain and they will bump the hard down to normal/easy. You can have hard and exrta hard, or easy and medium. In the end one group has to be shafted ^.^. Also, if you are playing an MMO you can't complain about time ^.^ if you don't have the time, an mmo is not for you.

[Arcell]

This game is ment for casuals, you said it yourself, they cant add hard stuff!~ aka more challenging mob AI

Don't go sticking words in my mouth, casual players can handle difficulty. I consider myself a bit of a casual player and I fully welcome difficult fights. I do not, however, welcome wastes of my time due to masochistic death penalties, obnoxiously stupid lock out timers and the like.

[Pallaton]

I dont think a death penalty is the way to engage people. What would be good is to have the option of having a more complex battle system.
I say option because like in ffxi you could win a fight by just standing and hacking a mob or you could make it a bit more complex by gear swapping but making it much faster. So hardcore players will invest time in making proper gear sets and be more proficient whereas casuals would not bother but still be able to do the same things but just slower.

[Catharsis]

And we can't go enjoy FFXI anymore because they ruined it. It's become a lot like 14 is, max level in hardly any time and everything is easy. At least XI was a good grind, XIV's method is easy content that repops instantly but has a low drop rate. Not to mention XI's 10 years old, the fans deserved a next gen FFXI, do they expect us to keep playing a ps2 game forever?

I personally wanted an FFXI-2, most of their users wanted it too. they imported the same races, they made it resemble XI and put the same development team on it and then change it to accommodate a new fan base instead of us.

What kind of logic is that, turn on your client base and try to go after WoW's audience? Even if XIV had been a 10/10 title at launch WoW's audience is going no where, most of them are too narrow minded to give a JRPG a shot. And it's not even a nationalism thing, they just can't relate it.

Fine, if you feel that strongly about it, go complain on FFXI's boards then. IIRC, Hiromichi Tanaka is back at work on it (him being largely responsible for all the stuff you seem to like), putting all the tedious grind you could ever want in a game into magian relic upgrade trials - and if you love Tanaka's style of game-creation, you should by all means support him. Still, FFXIV has a right to a unique existence. I prefer to keep my faith in Yoshi-P.

[Catharsis]

@Malachite
Thanks for being so horribly reasonable, it's rather offsetting coming from these forums.

I can empathise with some of what you're asking for, but I generally just assume that it'll come into effect with the addition of more abilities and content. It does, however, require GOOD balancing of class roles and perceptions (perception being key) - A party is not at its best sitting around forever waiting for a Conjuror to log on as the only "healer" in the game. (Not that I think healers are necessary in a FF14 experience party, but to make a successful exp party without them requires that nonexistent "skill" you're talking about.) The pace of FF11 was so glacial, as a non-red mage, you spent large amounts of your time staring at the floor (this is before level cap raises), which is hardly engaging.

Pigeonholing people into class roles actually paradoxically limits dynamism and causes another plethora of problems by throwing the player onto the mercy of public perception. Remember pre-Colibri Dragoons? The joke was they had the job ability "Auto-Leader", because there certainly was very little of a snowflake's chance in hell they'd get a party otherwise.

[ArnoMorley]

Fine, if you feel that strongly about it, go complain on FFXI's boards then. IIRC, Hiromichi Tanaka is back at work on it (him being largely responsible for all the stuff you seem to like), putting all the tedious grind you could ever want in a game into magian relic upgrade trials - and if you love Tanaka's style of game-creation, you should by all means support him. Still, FFXIV has a right to a unique existence. I prefer to keep my faith in Yoshi-P.

Yoshi P is the only reason why I'm still here, game's not complete yet but based on all of the outlines and all of the interviews I truly believe he has a vision. Recent FFs seemed very shallowly put together, like they were put together using a template rather than employing deep thought and originality. I think Yoshi P is different and he'll make XIV into a good game just not the game most of their users wanted.

And about your FFXI comment, it's a ps2 game it's 10 years old, there is no bringing it back even if tanaka is back on the project. It would be one thing if the games were the same age, but they made 14 look like it would be the next FFXI. Then they changed their target audience. XI was one of the most successful games of all time, my question is where is our game at if you want a new audience? They should at least make the game a little harder and more like XI for us. Doesn't mean make it a clone but why take it so drastically in the casual direction?

Is it so unreasonable to want a death penalty for XIV? You can solo a mob for 1k exp, even if it's 10%/level exp loss like XI was, you can get that back in 5 fights. Die several times, do 1 leve solo and you recap. If leveling was as long as it was in XI I could see you not wanting exp loss for dying but exp is so easy in this game it's so easy to get back.