[Feedback] A New Player's Perspective (Will update if there's interest)

[kaynide]

Preface:

So, we had summer break. I read the forums of people hating on the game experience, so I thought why not... let's give it (another) try.

...but this time I got my 9 year old daughter involved.
I'm 40 (warrior), she's 44 Summoner nearing Stone Vigil.
I've made a point of NOT explaining anything unless she asks, or gets frustrated.

I purposefully played poorly: In dungeons w/ NPCs, I would run in and AOE/get aggro and then just do nothing unless I lost aggro; no other abilities, no dodging mechanics outside of bosses. In boss fights I just did normal 1-2-3 attack only. I would regularly AFK mid dungeon while NPCs slowly chipped away at the mobs.

Observations (Not all are the GAME's fault):

1. Kids are lazy; She will NOT read walls of text. She tried the originals, but it overwhelmed her quickly.
2. Similarly the ability blocks are a lot of text where icons would work better.
3. There really is no set tutorial on how to play a specific job.
4. She has been able to clear everything almost exclusively using Ruin/Ruin II. Everything else is unnecessary; Carbuncle "gets in the way".
5. If she ever makes it to endgame, she will be deep into glamours. She loves the dress up part, and loves creeping on people in Limsa.
6. The 1-50 job quests... I myself am not really learning anything. It's fun story-wise, but I'm not learning anything about what I'm supposed with Warrior/Marauder or how I'm supposed to play. "Hit the rock with ATTACK B!" indeed. Same deal for her on summoner.

Recommendations for the Devs:

1. Make time spent for job quests meaningful/educational, 4th wall be damned.

   NPC: "Do 1! Great! Now do 2! Ok! Now 3! Ok, see how you've built up this gauge? Use it to do 4!"
2. Refine your blocks of text. Say what you need to say in a simple picture or diagram. Use icons for things. Homogenize certain things like range numbers. It's less important that it's 5 meters or whatever than it is to understand "This is an AoE around you" and "This is a ranged attack with splash damage".
3. Similarly, instead of this grants "Blah Blah", which you have to interpret what that means/look up what skills it connects to, just have a graphical icons that shows [Current Skill] --> [Next Skill in chain, with shiny dot outline!] in the description.
4. -Added- Turn off weather effects in cutscenes, and force the time to be something sensible.

TL;DR summary, as a 10ish year vet watching a 9 year old noob:

1. The game does not do any favors making learning to be competent easy, nor does it really even seem to care that you ARE competent.
2. You can beat (at least to level 50) without really even playing the game; Good for non-gamers and first timers who are there to enjoy the sites, but not so much in replay value and long term retention.
3. The core story is fine; kid loves it. She even hates Minfilla just like everyone else.
4. For additional context, she plays in Japanese and has very minimal English reading skills. She can play and better understands HOW to play Guildwars 2 than FFXIV...which is entirely in English.