Island Reflections

[Knot_D]

Its pretty boring. I wish the resources spent on this went elsewhere, because did this game need a "single player browser-style game"(sic) that has no connection to the rest of the game?

I wish the Ultimate resource spent elsewhere as well because who did that boring content really? And what's even the connection with the FFXIV story? Like, jeez.

[ameliaw]

I wish the Ultimate resource spent elsewhere as well because who did that boring content really? And what's even the connection with the FFXIV story? Like, jeez.

Yeah, lets use the ultimate resources to make another clicker minigame!

[Jojoya]

Now I'm seeing crowds of people waiting at the island ferry npc when a rare animal is about to spawn. Everyone's following a weather tracker app and loading into their instance at the correct times the same way we would gather on schedule at unspoiled nodes or big fish.

When I see crowds like that it gives me the sinking feeling of being sheep, going through the motions exactly when the game tells you, just like everyone else. It's another factor that takes away from this being a personal getaway experience that we can make our own.

Because people choose to go through the motions of what they think they're expected to do instead of asking "is this really what I want for myself?". It's bizarre how often I see people go "I must have it because I'm a collector" at the same time they're complaining about the required grind is for something they'll never actually use once collected. If you're not going to use it, wouldn't it be better to spend your time doing things you actually enjoy?

It's also something we wouldn't be witnessing if it weren't for the bug that keeps the ultra rare creatures from spawning correctly. You would have no idea who is trying to capture those rares because they'd be able to stay in their instance.

[Iscah]

Because people choose to go through the motions of what they think they're expected to do instead of asking "is this really what I want for myself?"

It's a hard mindset to break when it's a thing that's put in front of you as part of the content, and I think it can be about not wanting to do it wrong and waste effort. I slipped into thinking I needed to be chasing the rare creatures after reading a list of the "best setup" for your farm to get a balance of materials out of it, and it took a few days of chasing bugged spawns to realise that actually it doesn't matter at all and I don't even want to own most of the creatures on offer, or have plans for the items beyond "sell for cowries", making the exact variety of items irrelevant.

[Freeflare]

Hey everyone - thanks for your replies, nice to get other viewpoints. Also, I will say that I had to cull 1700 characters from the original post so some of the extra nuance was probably lost. Oh well.

Anyways, regarding the 'the devs said not to expect Animal Crossing!' I can't say that I did, nor can I say that I expected much of anything beyond 'an island you get to personalize '. So even that rather modest expectation was not delivered upon. I was also unaware that the Animal Crossing comparison was specifically mentioned - I only read the liveletters sporadically - but if you announce something like this the instant visual and mental comparison is Animal Crossing. So I appreciate that they tried to get in front of it, but that was something of a doomed effort.

Ultimately the problem isn't that it's not Animal Crossing or improved/accessible player housing, but that it's just not fun. If I had at least gotten a charming story out of my pointless and expansive collecting of mats that do absolutely nothing, I still wouldn't have been impressed with the content but I wouldn't have bothered writing up a full sheet of issues about it. Beyond that, it's almost directly opposed to the general gameplay design of FFXIV. Most of the features of this game that fall under this category promote player interaction in some aspect - zone population if nothing else. This removes players from the general world to do a long, storyless grind. And I know they've said they want people to be able to play this game as a solo experience, but things like tribal quests can absolutely do that while providing other benefits as well. There's no charm here, just mindless grinding and a tedious goods market.

This in of itself isn't a problem, and I'm sure there are some people who like this sort of gameplay so by all means enjoy, but development resources are very much a zero sum game. This could have been so many things, but it's Sim Industrial Park. And I do not understand why this was deemed a good way to spend development time.

[OgruMogru]

I feel really guilty saying it but the island just depresses me. Like I try not to read into it too much but I actually feel like I've ruined the island by being there. The crafting workshops and the little schedule is cute in theory but it feel too disconnected. I've just ruined an island rampaged around it ripping branches off trees on the way past, crammed a bunch of disparate wild animals into an open pen so they can get hoofrot in the endless rain as they just stand in their own leavings until their absentee captor finally returns.

Pointless mechanised production.

A bathtub for robots??

Who's eating all that tomato relish I made?

Implement a rewilding option. Let me bleed the island enough for the blue cowries and then let me give it back.

[hagare]

SE: Don't expect a replacement for housing
SE: Don't expect Animal Crossing

Gee, SE, what should I expect then? At this point I expect nothing and still get a half baked idea. lol

I expect logical and common sense but I am often disappointed

[Iscah]

I feel really guilty saying it but the island just depresses me. Like I try not to read into it too much but I actually feel like I've ruined the island by being there.

I get that feeling too. I started up the sanctuary on a second character that may want the motorbike mount (Twelve save me) and there's this lovely wild tangle of jungle plants directly opposite the hideaway that gets erased while you're off gathering your first lot of materials and turned into the blank space for building your workshops. And every step of the way is "you should delight in tearing out these trees" (which apparently go to waste because we get zero logs out of it and are then obliged to go cut down even more trees elsewhere).

I was also disappointed to find that "completing" the animal enclosure meant tearing out the thicker of trees that was providing shelter for them and leaving a great empty paddock of nothing.

[Rufalus]

Because people choose to go through the motions of what they think they're expected to do instead of asking "is this really what I want for myself?". It's bizarre how often I see people go "I must have it because I'm a collector" at the same time they're complaining about the required grind

Well yes you can choose to do nothing, collect nothing. I'm just saying if you do want to collect those things, that is the way they are designed, you watch the clock. I'm not a fan of timer content that tells people to be at X position at X time.

My preference would be having X number of opportunities to see something each day and you can do that at any hour you have available to play. In this island content example, it could give you 3 special lures each day, like some luring scent item you can use whenever you feel like and it attracts rare animals which you then have an opportunity to catch. That way you don't feel like so much of a drone waiting for the specific hour you're allowed to click something.

That's what I used to imagine gathering content would be like. They almost did with the favors system in Heavensward but it had some flaws and was later removed. You spent scrip tokens to spawn your own hidden nodes at any time. People just didn't like the time-reward balance and the RNG of getting a variable number of rare spawns.

I think that's fine if it's rewarding enough and generates a fixed amount of rare nodes and doesn't take too long. I like it better than the unspoiled node design, the loop of constantly teleporting to different zones at specific times. I'd rather gather some rare stuff in a more flexible way, then trade it for the crafting mats I want at a vendor.

[Addy]

I don't hate the island, but I don't -like- the island. I wish you could customize it more and that there were a lot of less mammets, but that is just the small stuff to me, the thing that bugs me most is that the green shells are just freaking pointless. Like you made a second currency that you basically do nothing with except to get glamour prisms or dispellers that you already can easily get alongside cordials for gathering. I kind of wish you can get some other items with it idk what, but something to make them more worth while....