Quote Originally Posted by Elexia View Post
Let's break it down:

"Alpha four weeks ago" -

It was stated the version we tested wasn't the actual version of the game that they've been working on, this point doesn't matter one bit in terms of what the OP was referring to.

"Detailed new roadmap" -

Subject to change, may not even be largely accurate. What information did this give us besides general points? What screenshots or videos? The fact the release is likely June/July (most likely July) you'd see a lot more by now, even if it's beta.

"He posted up a letter two weeks ago" -

This letter didn't actually say much in regards to Information, what the OP is talking about.

"the new beginnings cutscene was added one week ago"-

We seen 99.9% of this from E3-End of an Era in November. Barely 2 minutes of that video was actually new and not even..much. No one is being impatient, what have they actually given us in terms of solid information lately? Everything has generally been hush hush due to Alpha, and if you have any form of Internet skills, everything SE posted themselves you got more of from Testers lol.

So really, take a trip to the Seeker's of Adoulin website for FFXI's new expansion, see that information? It's a tiny bit as well but it's more along the lines of what the OP is more than likely talking about, not being impatient.
Nope, not buying this explanation, Elexia... and as the old adage goes, "this is why we can't have good things". The OP using certain terms to badger the forums just to alleviate his impatience is not cool... and NOT the done thing. If the OP didn't want these types of responses then he should have been more intuitive, polite or delicate with the thread's title. True story.

First off, establishing the word "drought" in any form of use indicates a lack of anything for a prolonged period of time... hence the reason I had to explain to him that there HAD been a flow of information on a weekly basis.

Next, stating that Yoshi's New Year's day letter not saying much is just downright disrespectful... and you obviously aren't getting the point. It doesn't HAVE to contain a lot of information... what is critical is that he generously posted it on New Year's day while most people round the world were relaxing with some turkey. What that really says is that he and the entire dev team actually cares about being in touch with the fans. That speaks volumes in my book.

Thirdly, the Dev Team are being VERY transparent with their release of information and the frequency of this information... they even added a developers blog for people to follow their progress. Most of the other MMOs currently out there (Aion, TERA, GW2 etc) did NOT give this much information when they were in their Alpha to beta stages. That's a fact.

And your statement their road map is filled with general points actually exhibits how little you are familiar with game development. They HAVE to give an approximate ball-park date for several reasons ranging from programming issues to legal issues... not to mention time for the marketing crew to select material that will really exhibit the game in a positive light. All these processes require long hours with dedicated skill.

Sheesh...Just the programming aspect of tweaking stuff from a game's Alpha build is a workload in itself and anything could push the timetable off by a month (editing the AI, texture mapping, diffuse mappings, server architecture latency, rigging + skinning, kinematics, audio + sound management...name it)

Inbetween having to deal with all these, you are more concerned with how soon you can get your mitts on a benchmark? Heck, if I remember correctly, during 1.0 the benchmark didn't get released until JUNE, which was less than three months before release.

So yeah, if you don't understand by now WHY the team is giving those kinds of dates in the road map then you're just being insensitive to how much 300+ people around the world are working themselves to the bone to make this game phenomenal.