So no more jobs at this point?

[Midareyukki]

Normally I would agree with this, except they are planning a complete graphic overhaul, which isn't something one does at the end of a game's life cycle. Same thing with streamlining all the older content to be soloable.

While I think the *market* may make a soft decision that FFXIV is over, I do not get the impression that the *developers* believe it is yet. Furthermore, FFXIV is *the* FF theme park MMO and has primarily succeeded on pulling together referential content from every game in the series. They have literally no direction they could take a new MMO that won't be viewed as either a retrod or an inferior experience. The smarter business model is to continue building out FFXIV instead of starting from scratch, either by extending its lifespan for another 10 years or making sure whatever next MMO they create is a natural, backwards-compatible extension of FFXIV.

Put another way, regardless of what sunk cost it took to get here, FFXIV, like WoW, is now "too big to fail." It would be financially irresponsible to go for a hard reset on something so massive, expensive, and integral to the FF brand, and if all viable paths require retaining and channeling XIV's playerbase into a "new game", why not skip the middle man and development costs and just roll the "new game" up into the old one?

Personally, while I think that FFXIV could absolutely be iterated on mechanically with a push away from scripted fights and rotations (and the remove of classes), I do not see any reason why SE would risk it all on a hard reset. I would rather we get a "FF XIV-2" with new mechanics but the same world, jobs, and characters to build out from.

To be fair, streamlining the game for it to be soloable is what happened on FF11 before it got shelved. It started with Trusts.

And a graphics overhaul that's honestly long overdue and won't include Hrothgar and Viera, the races that need it the most, doesn't really make me think of much outside "let's make this game look a bit more appealing in the future, but we honestly don't have much else to add". I know I'm being pessimistic on this one. Usually yeah it does happen halfway through a project that will still get attention, but I'm torn between "WoW levels of attention" which has kept the game alive so far (WoW fans, forgive me for saying this), and "11 levels of attention" where there's a big burst of attention to make the game look somewhat presentable before it's placed on the shelf.

That's the thing though. Are they really invested into the game? Considering everything else that's been happening all throughout Endwalker, I'm not too sure.

[Deveryn]

To be fair, streamlining the game for it to be soloable is what happened on FF11 before it got shelved. It started with Trusts.

And a graphics overhaul that's honestly long overdue and won't include Hrothgar and Viera, the races that need it the most, doesn't really make me think of much outside "let's make this game look a bit more appealing in the future, but we honestly don't have much else to add". I know I'm being pessimistic on this one. Usually yeah it does happen halfway through a project that will still get attention, but I'm torn between "WoW levels of attention" which has kept the game alive so far (WoW fans, forgive me for saying this), and "11 levels of attention" where there's a big burst of attention to make the game look somewhat presentable before it's placed on the shelf.

That's the thing though. Are they really invested into the game? Considering everything else that's been happening all throughout Endwalker, I'm not too sure.

11 is/was very tedious and demanded a lot of time. XIV sounds like it started off in a similar manner and the reboot paved the way to something more successful. Everquest isn't nearly as appealing and it's still holding on after almost 22 years. If there's some kind of extreme shift in what's being done and how it's being done, then it might be time to be concerned, but I don't see that here. Folks need to learn to relax and enjoy the ride. There's way too much nitpicking and fussing over the smallest things. Patience would be another thing to learn.

[KizuyaKatogami]

11 is/was very tedious and demanded a lot of time. XIV sounds like it started off in a similar manner and the reboot paved the way to something more successful. Everquest isn't nearly as appealing and it's still holding on after almost 22 years. If there's some kind of extreme shift in what's being done and how it's being done, then it might be time to be concerned, but I don't see that here. Folks need to learn to relax and enjoy the ride. There's way too much nitpicking and fussing over the smallest things. Patience would be another thing to learn.

An entire role and race being ignored and gutted isnt small things. Patience? Healers have had patience for 6 years. Hrothgar have had patience for 3 years. What did they get in return? After those 3 years they got only 6 new hairstyles, each one cutting off their racial features. But by all means, be patient sure lmao. Relax and enjoy the ride. The ride of what exactly? The story where they contradict their own themes, rush conclusions, throw away plotlines players have been invested in?

[Deveryn]

An entire role and race being ignored and gutted isnt small things. Patience? Healers have had patience for 6 years. Hrothgar have had patience for 3 years. What did they get in return? After those 3 years they got only 6 new hairstyles, each one cutting off their racial features. But by all means, be patient sure lmao. Relax and enjoy the ride. The ride of what exactly? The story where they contradict their own themes, rush conclusions, throw away plotlines players have been invested in?

Shit happens and in the grand scheme of things, none of what you mentioned actually matters. You can't call the game broken and on its way out based on a few cosmetic things and this odd opinion of how a role should operate. Yeah, I said it. This game could've failed and been discarded 10 years ago, but they gave it another shot and they're still working on a lot of things. They're still working on your precious lionesses, btw, but keep carrying on.

People claim pvp sucks now, but elsewhere in the world, people actually know how to play the various modes, so I'm inclined to believe there's a very skewed perception of things in the western world.

[Nav_Fae]

11 is/was very tedious and demanded a lot of time. XIV sounds like it started off in a similar manner and the reboot paved the way to something more successful. Everquest isn't nearly as appealing and it's still holding on after almost 22 years. If there's some kind of extreme shift in what's being done and how it's being done, then it might be time to be concerned, but I don't see that here. Folks need to learn to relax and enjoy the ride. There's way too much nitpicking and fussing over the smallest things. Patience would be another thing to learn.

With Endwalker being the Climax, we're now in the Falling Action portion of the story. It's not unreasonable for people to feel impatient now or have given up hope entirely.