Yoshi-P says the secret to keeping Final Fantasy 14 fresh

[Bonoki]

I feel like they always spend alot of time hyping up changes that mean nothing or go nowhere remember when SB’s most exciting feature was being able to swim and dive, and then it turned out to be nothing at all

I don’t doubt change is coming with DT but I don’t know it’s going to be the actual type of change people are looking for

I remember them saying that places like the Moon were going to have zero gravity to make it more immersive and they wanted to do things like space helmets but decided against it for convivence. So we will probably never see something like that again. Honestly, I wish we had more swimming sections in dungeons and stuff like we did for the Stormblood Alliance Raid, but I guess the reason we don't get that is cause the majority of people thought it was a waste of time since they tend to farm these raids more than once.

[GoatOfWar]

FF hasn't felt fresh in a long time.

[Eldtagg]

I have not played the game as much as the majority of people here, but my two complaints with FFXIV are basically this:

1. Quest Design
2. Open world.

When I say quest design, I am not referring to writing or animations, but for example, suppose you have an MSQ quest in which you "walk" with Alphinaud from point A to point B, but instead of doing as every other MMORPG has done for the last 12 years (NPC's follow you around or escort missions), you must stop at marked positions along the way to trigger cutscenes in which Alphinaud briefly talks with you before running away (disappearing) and you must find the next spot to trigger another cutscene. Over and over and over until you reach the last stop.

What can we say about Open World? Well, why does it exist at all if the game never uses it properly outside of hunts and fates?

Nothing happens in the Open World; animals do not attack each other. Friendly NPCs do not roam about to make the world appear "lived-in". There's no NPC merchant caravans breathing life into the world.

I truly adore how the Open World looks, but having enemies just standing about waiting for you to beat them over the head or fling spells at them makes FFXIV feel much older than it is.

These are, and will probably always be, my two gripes with this fantastic game: it desperately needs a system update so that the world/questing seems seamless and immersive rather than just setpieces.

When you finish the quests, the game zones are dead since nothing happens outside of questing, including NPCs, hostiles, and wildlife, which are all static, doesn't move and lifeless.

[Hik3n]

The problem with FF14 right now is exactly Yoshy P and his weird idea of an MMO. People just need to look at the modifications they did on the old dungeons, they removed every mechanic, even if they were little things,they made everything easy outside of Savage and Ultimate, and do everything in their power to transform the game in a big Single Player RPG. They didn't innovate anything in the last 4-5years, they just do the same boring thing, we need an Open World overhaul, Trial, and Raid overhaul, a bit harder content that is closer to a trial difficulty when it comes to casual things, an overhaul on the quest designs, we need radical changes for this game to be better, and Yoshi-P is not the man who can do them, and there is 2 reason for this, 1 this is all they can do because they are burned out in the last 10 years, and have no new blood in the team, because they didn't expand the team even thought the game has way way more players, or 2 Square Enix uses FF14 as a cashcow giving this game the bare minimum to run, and the rest goes in other projects. But at this point, i'm more than sure, this is all they want with this game, make the story expand, the only thing they are really good, and do the bare minimum with the rest because one of the reasons i listed up there, this game will probably run on life support for the next years until they quit it.

[ReynTime]

The real secret:
-Adding cute glamour and mounts
-Have at least one cutscene per patch where a sexually attractive character does a funny
-Send Yoshi-P to do some PR like "you can play other games!" so social media will go crazy over how wholesome he is and that the game deserves support
-Emphasize how regions based on non-European countries are featured in the game's lore

Basically nothing to do with how the game plays

[sindriiisgaming]

mmmm guess you'll have to quit then. byeeeeeeeeeeee!

but then whos posts will you cry on

[Neoyoshi]

I wouldn't read too much into those statements, because the great thing about a live service like MMORPG's, is that they can change over time, and try new things, or then later go back to older ideas with a fresh perspective and alter how those ideas were handled.

Having a lot of ideas is not a bad thing, it's how they are used that matters. Yoshi-P wants another 10 years out of FFXIV, so we have lots of time to see what they iterate, change, and improve on.

[Rufalus]

His design philosophy won't allow them to freshen up the game. Dawntrail isn't out yet but I know one of the two towns will have a vendor row with a tomestone girl who sells me a body piece for 825 tomes.

They made a game template a decade ago, then spent the rest of their careers reskinning that template into new locales with the same gameplay loop. The plan is to keep doing that, because that's what they've always done.

[Solakor]

Same formula in ff14 expac after expac while dumbing down combat/crafting.
FF16 ripped whole combat system out of DmC.
I'll admit the big bad being a depressed bird caught me off guard so i'll give them that, but what is the fresh thing that he is talking about because i have no clue.

[Roda]

I have not played the game as much as the majority of people here, but my two complaints with FFXIV are basically this:

1. Quest Design
2. Open world.

When I say quest design, I am not referring to writing or animations, but for example, suppose you have an MSQ quest in which you "walk" with Alphinaud from point A to point B, but instead of doing as every other MMORPG has done for the last 12 years (NPC's follow you around or escort missions), you must stop at marked positions along the way to trigger cutscenes in which Alphinaud briefly talks with you before running away (disappearing) and you must find the next spot to trigger another cutscene. Over and over and over until you reach the last stop.

So, they did "fix" this in endwalker, but it's functionally the same since you have to stop at points to get dialog. Baby steps, eh? (pls voice these and trigger them automatically, se...)

What can we say about Open World? Well, why does it exist at all if the game never uses it properly outside of hunts and fates?

Nothing happens in the Open World; animals do not attack each other. Friendly NPCs do not roam about to make the world appear "lived-in". There's no NPC merchant caravans breathing life into the world.

I truly adore how the Open World looks, but having enemies just standing about waiting for you to beat them over the head or fling spells at them makes FFXIV feel much older than it is.

These are, and will probably always be, my two gripes with this fantastic game: it desperately needs a system update so that the world/questing seems seamless and immersive rather than just setpieces.

When you finish the quests, the game zones are dead since nothing happens outside of questing, including NPCs, hostiles, and wildlife, which are all static, doesn't move and lifeless.

Agree with all of this tho. Open world feels no more than just a dead set filled with props so that the cutscenes can not be set in a black void, sometimes with kill or click quests because "it's an mmo". There's just no joy put into the gameplay of anything outside of boss encounters (and even then, they're feelin' real paint-by-numbers here) and maybe gpose creations?? The MMO genre is decades old at this point and the same tricks of having a pretty world with static npc vending machines and painting a "zone" of meandering mobs to imply a breathing world just doesn't work anymore. The fact that this game is pretty much traversed entirely via queue and cutscene has me describing it as a lobby game instead of an mmo now...

This quote from him basically kills any hope I had of maybe DT getting some life breathed into it. :T