Would you trade new ingame content for an engine upgrade?

[Clover_Blake]

I'd definitely be up for it! I wouldn't mind waiting for such an upgrade, it'd be very worth it to my greedy eyes.

[Beytran70]

Me, personally? Absolutely 100%.

I'm one of the people in this game who barely touches anything beyond the MSQ. I gather sometimes and do Gold Saucer stuff, and if there's some cool glamours or something from new dungeons I'll do them, but otherwise most of my time is spent RPing anyways. I don't think it would take the devs long to make some substantial improvements if they were to just cease content development for a bit, but I know that would never happen. Still, I hope they continue working on it when they can.

[AnnRam]

the ever present elephant for these kinds of things are, its an old game, people play it on potatoes. not everyone, but the danger they run is, lets say that they upgrade everything, and suddenly all those old machines/consoles cant run it. sure, you might be able to turn down the graphics settings or what have you, but people in general do NOT like doing that if they are used to things looking a certain way, they do not want, ever, to turn down graphics settings, even if it makes things run more smoothly. some will, but lets face it, few people will want their game to look less pretty.

so, it will boil down to either SE saying "this is the direction, if you want a new engine, you will have to put out cash to upgrade your computer, plain and simple", which I cant see SE doing, because they arent a NA game company. The other option is developing 2 versions of the game, one old engine, one new, which I also dont see SE doing because from a cost perspective, makes no sense.

would it be awesome? sure would. is it possible? sure is, but its a very tricky slope.with the way the dev team works to make the game accessible to everyone however, I dont see them really upgrading things enough to keep some happy with new HD components etc, if its going to drive off the people on potatoes.

Please, this game cannot even reach over 100 fps properly on populated/raid areas with a RTX 3070, it have been always horrible optimized like a PS3 tittle.

SE won't update/upgrade anything all the money they get by subs/cash shop goes to other projects. Viera's/Hrogs are never going to be fixed, Jesus they refuse to even update the character creator from 2010.

[Saimeren]

Why would it have to be one or the other? The people that are responsible for making quests aren't the same team that makes dungeons or raids.

And those people aren't responsible for the overall world map.

And none of those people are likely to be involved in an engine upgrade. Separate people for separate jobs.

And I doubt money to hire more people is an issue at this point with the massive popularity spike recently. What with the sub increase plus the incredibly successful expansion launch, they definitely have the funds to fund a new team.

I don't know why people buy into this kind of thing when a company sais it'll be one or the other. All they're doing is penny pinching and trying to convince you to settle with what you have so they can get away with doing less work.

[Beytran70]

Why would it have to be one or the other? The people that are responsible for making quests aren't the same team that makes dungeons or raids.

And those people aren't responsible for the overall world map.

And none of those people are likely to be involved in an engine upgrade. Separate people for separate jobs.

And I doubt money to hire more people is an issue at this point with the massive popularity spike recently. What with the sub increase plus the incredibly successful expansion launch, they definitely have the funds to fund a new team.

I don't know why people buy into this kind of thing when a company sais it'll be one or the other. All they're doing is penny pinching and trying to convince you to settle with what you have so they can get away with doing less work.

Because if we want it to happen quickly then it would need to be an all-hands-on-deck situation. For a substantial overhaul to in-game systems it would be of great benefit to have devs from all areas of the game working together to combine their knowledge and ideas. It can't all just be back end coders and the like, they'd need real knowledge of how the game functions on the player side as well as how it works in development as well.

[Lihtleita]

during the yoshida era of 1.x the dev team was split in two. one section worked on 2.x while the other gave regular updates to 1.x until its end.
I wouldn't be opposed to that.

[Avidria]

If it meant better character customization, properly complete Hrothgar and Viera, and a less clunky and obnoxious menu and inventory system... then yes absolutely

I don't actually know if it'd allow for that though lol

[Ath192]

Upgrading the engine is the most meaningful thing they can do for this game. It shouldn’t even be a question. The graphics are outdated and it would fix all the technical issues the game has.

Unreal engine 5 looks jaw dropping. In fact, if I had two MMORPGs and it was this one or one that used unreal 5 and the gameplay or story wasn’t terrible I would switch.

And I’m sure they are coming, so from that perspective it would behoove SE to upgrade the engine to at least something where people wouldn’t feel tempted to leave for more modern better looking games.

The only thing keeping XIV alive is the story. If it goes south that’s it for the game. So they should invest in graphics and other things beside the MSQ to make it feel like a vibrant world with great gameplay so if the MSQ turns meh later on there will still be plenty of reasons for subscribers to stay on.

[Lihtleita]

Upgrading the engine is the most meaningful thing they can do for this game. It shouldn’t even be a question. The graphics are outdated and it would fix all the technical issues the game has.

Unreal engine 5 looks jaw dropping. In fact, if I had two MMORPGs and it was this one or one that used unreal 5 and the gameplay or story wasn’t terrible I would switch.

And I’m sure they are coming, so from that perspective it would behoove SE to upgrade the engine to at least something where people wouldn’t feel tempted to leave for more modern better looking games.

The only thing keeping XIV alive is the story. If it goes south that’s it for the game. So they should invest in graphics and other things beside the MSQ to make it feel like a vibrant world with great gameplay so if the MSQ turns meh later on there will still be plenty of reasons for subscribers to stay on.

While I do agree that we are due an upgraded engine, I think we're more likely to get the full Luminous (FFXV) engine rather than Unreal. We already run on a tiny version of it, so wouldn't it be an easier transition for devs accustomed to weird SE engines? I could be wrong tho.

[Ath192]

While I do agree that we are due an upgraded engine, I think we're more likely to get the full Luminous (FFXV) engine rather than Unreal. We already run on a tiny version of it, so wouldn't it be an easier transition for devs accustomed to weird SE engines? I could be wrong tho.

Yeah I don’t mind. Unreal 5 is just an example of upcoming engines that make our current graphics look completely obsolete. And seeing as they will surely be making lots of games with it it’s just a warning of the competition that’s heading this way. So if Luminous can be close to it in it’s capabilities it will be a welcome addition.

Here is what modern engines are capable of, and while it’s more dark and gritty, a similar engine applied to the more anime aesthetic of XIV or FF engines would yield impressive results as well.

https://youtu.be/nOMIwsupy9k