Why does everyone complain about STORY based MMO's?

[Avoidy]

Not this again, indeed.

You can increase the difficulty of content without making it anywhere near Extreme or Savage levels. Insinuating otherwise is simply being disingenuous. Presently, the MSQ as a whole is essentially one massive participation reward that's almost impossible to fail. This does undercut the whole epic saga of the story when the supposed big bad can be facerolled. A prime example of this is Thordan. Even as a brand new player only ten months into FFXIV when I first cleared, I was disappointed by how much of a joke he was—to the point I stopped even dodging mechanics because not only was nobody else bothering. When I was hit myself, they did next to nothing. Did it ruin the conclusion of Heavensward? No. However, it certainly left a sour taste. Shinryu, conversely, was much better despite still being easy enough. Sadly, power creep as trivialized that fight but in his heyday, he was good.

Even ShB's final boss suffers from this; it's so sad. It burns down so fast.
Basically if you ever take a newbie to any cool old trials, you've gotta select the minimum item level/no echo settings and run in with a full party so they can get some semblance of a good experience. It shouldn't need to be this way. But every time people propose retooling it or tweaking it or making the mechanics have any consequence at all, some people stomp their feet because they think we want it to be Ultimate.

I believe this is just another element contributing to the story feeling sort of "meh" for a lot of people. Like, these bosses can take dozens of hours to arrive at, and then you stop and wait in a queue for ages depending on your job, and once you get in the thing just... melts. Retooling the ARR stuff was a good start, but the rest of the game desperately needs that treatment as well. Thordan is a joke like you mentioned, but most of the older trials are as well, and the dungeons are basically a 14 minute stroll.

[Tyjacon]

Just curious, how many other Final Fantasy games have you played?

The final fantasy franchise has always been story driven rpg's.
I don't see the story aspect of XIV changing anytime soon since the final fantasy franchise is the flagship of SE.
And Yoshi has said that one of the main reasons XIV is including the duty support is to attract the portion of the final fantasy fan group that don't currently play mmo's.

That's what being a FINAL FANTASY game is, at least to me. And I've played every numbered one published.

[Minarisweet]

No one does, xiv players complain about the game not having a good difficulty curve for its msq which is a completely valid complaint to have, especially when the solution to the accesibility issue is as simple as adding difficulties...

[ASkellington]

Because just because it is a story based MMO doesn't excuse it from it being y'know AN MMORPG.

FFXIV is a story based MMO yes, but it also is a holy trinity MMO (as in it has dedicated Tank/Healer/Dps) and it has things that are MMO staples such as raids and dungeons.

While I will always say FFXIV has one of if not the best stories in the genre, it isn't going to save it from what I think it utterly fails at:

• Lack luster dungeon content
• Lack luster midcore content (that hopefully gets fixed with Criterion Dungeons)
• Poor job design with Tanks/Healers in a Trinity MMO

And that's my opinion. I can give FFXIV what many people say is the greatest MMO (I don't agree) a complete 1/10 for job design if I so wish. Doesn't mean that it isn't a 7-10/10 for story.

[MagicPeanut]

Honestly, I only ever see people legitimately complaining about the story on the OF, lol. Personally, I believe this game ranks up there in having one of the best storylines in any game I've ever played. It's gotten to the point where I'm very much spoiled by how amazing the writing is, so sometimes when I play a new game and expect the same level of competence, I feel ultimately let down.

I acknowledge of course, that EW's plot in particular could have benefited from more time baking in the oven, but overall, I think it was still exceptional. I eagerly look forward to future MSQ.

[Striker44]

In a game where the story is main focus behind the game, you are not rushed to get to endgame, you are not FORCED to play optimally to get through content...

Yet every day i see the same thing: 'WAH WAH STORY IS TOO LONG'

Seriously, The game IS the story.

It is a FINAL FANTASY game.

There are plenty of MMO's out there that destroy their own storylines for the 'endgame progression' aspect of the game, if you want to play those, then do that.

FFXIV should never move away from the story aspect of the game, the MSQ is what keeps this game coherent.

I think the answer to your question is that most people don't complain about the story - they actually love it! The forums here are probably the only place that has such a negative tone, and that's because there's a band of about a dozen or so dedicated naysayers who just badmouth the game whenever they can, seemingly because the writers didn't choose to write exactly the story they wanted (go figure). Peruse practically anywhere else, including Reddit of all places, and you'll see people being overwhelmingly positive about the story. The forums by their nature also tend to attract the more "hardcore" and eSports focused crowd, and there's more of a tendency among that kind of group to focus almost exclusively on endgame and find getting there (aka the story) to be an irritant, but they're far and away the minority when it comes to the FFXIV playerbase.

The only part of the story I find generally gets complaints is the post-ARR questline leading to Heavensward, but even that's almost disappeared since they re-vamped it. In-game, on Youtube, on Reddit - people are enjoying the story. I don't see SE changing that about FFXIV anytime soon, either - as you pointed out, it's the key draw and main focus for this game. So kick back, relax, and enjoy!

[Jojoya]

Just curious, how many other Final Fantasy games have you played?

The final fantasy franchise has always been story driven rpg's.
I don't see the story aspect of XIV changing anytime soon since the final fantasy franchise is the flagship of SE.
And Yoshi has said that one of the main reasons XIV is including the duty support is to attract the portion of the final fantasy fan group that don't currently play mmo's.

That's what being a FINAL FANTASY game is, at least to me. And I've played every numbered one published.

For many of us, FFXIV is the first and only FF game we've played. We didn't walk in expecting a FF game. We walked in expecting a MMO similar to others that we played.

Being an avid reader, the story focus drew me in rapidly and I adapted fairly quickly. Others who prefer combat focused content would have a much more difficult time even given warning what differences to expect.

If the goal is to attract new players in the younger generations, SE has to keep in mind what those players are used to (which most likely will not include another FF game) so their transition can be eased instead of assuming they've played other FF titles and know what to expect.

Because just because it is a story based MMO doesn't excuse it from it being y'know AN MMORPG.

FFXIV is a story based MMO yes, but it also is a holy trinity MMO (as in it has dedicated Tank/Healer/Dps) and it has things that are MMO staples such as raids and dungeons.

While I will always say FFXIV has one of if not the best stories in the genre, it isn't going to save it from what I think it utterly fails at:

• Lack luster dungeon content
• Lack luster midcore content (that hopefully gets fixed with Criterion Dungeons)
• Poor job design with Tanks/Healers in a Trinity MMO

And that's my opinion. I can give FFXIV what many people say is the greatest MMO (I don't agree) a complete 1/10 for job design if I so wish. Doesn't mean that it isn't a 7-10/10 for story.

Different people have different reasons for picking up the game. It doesn't need to be saved from anything when it's got a decent sized core audience that enjoys the story driven content and isn't particularly concerned about job design.

Things like the lack of midcore content might slow population growth but won't kill the game. Thanks to WoW's past success, gamers have a rather warped view of how many active player a MMO needs to be financially successful. It's much smaller than most think. Even the original WoW developers never expected to hit the 100,000 player mark (though they did dream it might happen). One of the Path of Exile developers said in a recent interview that their game would only need 10,000 active players to remain financially viable.

Out of curiosity, where do you think the game is missing out on the RPG side of things?

[Nav_Fae]

There's also massive survivor bias within the community, what about the opinions of those thousands who tried and got utterly filtered by the combat or the MSQ or whatever?

My personal experience is that not one single person I've got to try the game out finished the MSQ because of just how long it is for how it's presented no matter how much they push themselves. Point being XIV is very far from being all praises, but it's all people in the community tend to hear because most people who have criticism towards the game either already moved on and/or got backlash, because I've seldom seen a community so allergic to criticism.

That's because it's non-constructive criticism

[Larirawiel]

Even ShB's final boss suffers from this; it's so sad. It burns down so fast.

Almost every MMO has this problem. And i do not know how to solve it. And yes, it is a huge immersion breaker when a big bad and evil enemy burns down very fast. But if you set the difficulty higher then this enemy will become an impassable wall for many players. And FF14 would be literary over for them.



Cheers

[Supersnow845]

Almost every MMO has this problem. And i do not know how to solve it. And yes, it is a huge immersion breaker when a big bad and evil enemy burns down very fast. But if you set the difficulty higher then this enemy will become an impassable wall for many players. And FF14 would be literary over for them

We also have to consider the immersion for other people though, there is a non zero amount of people who would have quit the game after the disappointment and frankly immersion break that happens when you topple bosses like thordran or shinryu with almost no effort

What about their experience is that not equally as valid