Do We Remember That a Game Is Meant to Be Fun?

[Kishin12345]

We saw what they learned when they took risks changing BLM in 7.2 or destroying AST's RNG in 7.0. It was hated.

Plus it's not like they care about the backlash either way. Nothing gets reversed once it changes.

But blm is so much better now? Theres a blm in every duty. I made it my main job after picto got nerfed too much. Before not many played blm and the changes really were mostly hated by blm veterans. The job is now opened to a bigger audience. I've never considered the timers part of blm identity anyway. No blm in any other ff game had to manage timers and blm still plays the same as before.
Blm always was the mage with hard hitting spells and it still is but now the devs can be more creative with fight design because they dont have to design around blm timers anymore.
So i dont think removing blm timers was a risky move at all.
Astro RNG was more annoying than helpful, too. So not mad about that either. Fishing for the balance didnt really provide depth.

[Aidorouge]

Except, the game is trying pretty hard to try to appeal to everyone.

I don't know... based on current job and encounter design or hell, even just content difficulty, I get the impression Square-Enix is only trying to appeal to a limited subset of players these days.
+++

I wonder if the lack of interest in content nowadays is in any way related to the general player disconnect with the story and the direction they've taken it in.

I feel like Dawntrail rendered a lot of the lore, world-building and atmosphere of the past arc completely meaningless, and there are no concrete rules or boundaries governing the story anymore. The consequent lack of identity makes the game feel soulless, and without that sense of investment the often tedious reality of MMO grinding becomes more difficult to justify.

Probably depends on what people wanted out of the story. Personally for me FF14's plot started to lose the narrative in Stormblood, and fell off completely in Shadowbringers. There's a lot of people who think SHB was "peak" storytelling, but for me it was a huge valley.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

God forbid the fortune-teller-flavored job has RNG in it. I enjoyed it and now it's gone because those that hated the RNG couldn't stick to the other 3 Healer jobs.

This is one of the issues I have with dev’s chosen method(s) to make X jobs more ‘appealing’. They could keep job A & B fairly unique, that will attract their own ‘fanbase’. Now you have job A fans & job B fans, adding to an overall more numbers of players. Then someday, somehow they got an idea that one of them isn’t appealing enough, so their approach to ‘alleviate’ this is to… turn job B into pseudo job A but different colors? Where will the old job B’s fans going to next, if they even have any other option that tickles them the same way their beloved old job B did?

Congrats for them to increase the playrate on job B finally, I guess? If their goal was to even out the playrate numbers between job A & B (or whichever other job mains they siphoned those numbers off from), even if it means they have to alienate the old job B fanbase? Lol…

[Kaurhz]

I don't know... based on current job and encounter design or hell, even just content difficulty, I get the impression Square-Enix is only trying to appeal to a limited subset of players these days.
+++

So, the thing you need to consider here is that -- Trying to appeal to all does not mean that they will be successful in those endeavors… In fact it more often than not will result in the opposite than intended from happening.. It just happens to be that in this instance they had a good hit with those raiding, and not for those that aren't interested.

The intent of trying to appeal to everyone is made pretty clear as well in their content release cycle.

[Valence]

I dunno what creativity you are exactly expecting from them because every single time they try to do something.. a very vocal minority loses their shit. The game is the way it is BECAUSE of people like you... Everything that you are arguing is because some Andy crapped out in the forums with "game is dying", "game is no fun" game was better in vanilla", or " jumping in the game breaks my immersion"(yes it was an actual forum post, look it up) and somehow you think you are saving everyone when in fact you ain't saving anyone.

Let them cook, give them creative freedom, and vote with your wallet. That's all I'm gonna say.

Isn't it the irony? They almost never try to do something? People precisely "lose their shit" because nothing is improving, nothing is being creative, and nothing changes. If you were so eager to see them cook and create new things as you seem to imply, you wouldn't be defending the current statu quo in such a staunch manner.

[Kohashi]

Isn't it the irony? They almost never try to do something? People precisely "lose their shit" because nothing is improving, nothing is being creative, and nothing changes. If you were so eager to see them cook and create new things as you seem to imply, you wouldn't be defending the current statu quo in such a staunch manner.

I said this before, and I will say again. The game reached this state because ppl were crying in the forums about X and Y. This is what YOU and other doom poster Andies enabled to happen. The game state is an effect of people like you.

Also, they innovated nothing? Remind me, why are you playing this game for?

[Xieldras]

I said this before, and I will say again. The game reached this state because ppl were crying in the forums about X and Y. This is what YOU and other doom poster Andies enabled to happen. The game state is an effect of people like you.

Also, they innovated nothing? Remind me, why are you playing this game for?

The Devs don't even read these forums anymore, but yeah let's blame the players expressing the feedback where the game said feedback need be addressed. Plus, it's not like the team doesn't have the agency to comb through the feedback and decide which is best or not. No, they're complete servants to our whims.

What we've seen a lot from this Dev team is, though they do sometimes hear the feedback, they do not know nor understand how to properly implement it. So most innovations they bring to the table feels disjointed or completely different from what people actually wanted (see ol' Island Sanctuary). Also most of their current innovations are so small that the best 'new thing' I've seen in a while is the Pâtisserie mini-game, the rest being simple additions or versions to existing systems.

Also I am laughing at being called an Andy. Toy Story isn't even my fave Pixar franchise (I prefer Monsters Inc.). Is this the new 2026 insult?

[Kohashi]

The Devs don't even read these forums anymore

How can you be certain of it? Did they publicly state that they do not read forums anymore? Provide the exact place and where they said that. Also, the most important shifts in the game took place when they were supposedly reading the forums, and mentioning it in their LL, so???

most innovations they bring to the table feels disjointed or completely different from what people actually wanted

Who are those most people?

It is fine for you not to like the innovation, changes, and stuff they bring/put in the game, but stop generalising.

[Ankhira]

It was removed because it was unreliable and ineffective. I get it, it was probably fun for you to see which card you pulled, but classes should be effective in all types of content, not just super casual, where you feel happy just rolling your cards.

AST was and still is a buffer. Will I pull arrow 3 times in a row, or will I get the proper cards to get the maximum buff? AST was the first healer I ever mained, and those cards and RNG still give me shivers thinking about them.

AST was perfectly viable even with the RNG. People complain about job identity but when a job is slightly less "efficient" you're screaming a job is bad and how balance is bad and how it needs to be changed. I loved AST in SHB and EW, I hate AST in DT. It's not fun nor does it even feel like AST.

It's okay for a job to be unique and be slightly less reliable. Not everything has to be rigid for perfect effectiveness. Every job is effective in every type of content in the game so long as people press the buttons correctly. Just have fun, what is this all nonsense about "efficiency and reliability." you're playing a game, not a job where everything has to be effective and reliable. Just have fun with it? Gamers today are so obsessed with fine tuning everything it's so strange to me.

And if you say "I have fun with efficiency." good for you, but it shouldn't come at the cost of job identity.

[Valence]

I said this before, and I will say again. The game reached this state because ppl were crying in the forums about X and Y. This is what YOU and other doom poster Andies enabled to happen. The game state is an effect of people like you.

Beyond the "NO U", I'd seriously like an explanation on how complaining about a lack of innovation is preventing the game to improve. This is the most unhinged thing I've had the displeasure to read today.

Also, they innovated nothing? Remind me, why are you playing this game for?

... And why are you if that's the case?

What kind of nonsense question is this? There is still things remaining in the game I do enjoy? Hello? Else why indeed would I still be playing??