If I was given the money, the team, and had to gamble...

[Sothis]

Kings and a lot of the overworld NMs were a terrible idea, in my opinion. I'm always surprised when people look back on them fondly, because most people I know found them boring and tedious (not to mention sometimes immensely frustrating thanks to bots and That One LS full of jackasses). And because sitting in town for hours attempting to get a party/find a tank and healer to make a party to level and coming up empty-handed was so much fun.

But seriously, I mostly enjoyed FFXI back in the day (trying not to look at things with rose-colored nostalgia)... but I think that day is done. There just isn't as much of a niche for the punishing, extremely grind-y games anymore. Thinking back on it, some of the most dedicated, hardcore types I played with.. work full time jobs now, have families to spend time with, other responsibilities, etc. They simply don't have the time or drive for a game like old school XI, and I think that's a trend with most MMO players as a whole.

[Shirai]

While I have really enjoyed ffxi for a long time, including the HNM era, I do not long to go back to those days.
If you wanted to be at the top of the game back then you pretty much were required you to play between 5 to 9 hours a day, sometimes wake up at really wonky hours if you wanted to have a shot at everything and the progress was slow, so darn slow...

While it was manageable in my 20's when I played XI most acively, I am now in my 30's, have a carreer and several other hobbies so I long for something at a lower pace while still being able to stay on top of the game without resorting to long or weird playtimes and XIV does offer that to me right now.

I just hope that Mr. Yoshida doesn't make the same mistake his colleague Mr. Matsui made by making nearly all old content and gear completely irrelevant and removing every motivation to start a long term project (REM) in a single update.

[Jackl3]

You guys are pin-pointing on two aspects of FF11. Grinding and HNMS.

However, you aren't looking at the many positives:

A decent Auction House system.

Items that had decent stat allocations: Why can't my Monks AF+1 body have: e.g. "Enhances the effect Greased Lightning" - Exciting, useful stats.

Weaponskills: Fun system - Relics should offer something unique! It's all boring, plain stats.

Crafting: It was stronger compared to now. Genie Weskit - useful, Dusk Gloves - Useful etc.

Fishing: It was useful and worked. You could earn some cash injection from Angel Skins.


A lot has me thinking this is all restrictive, plain and boring because they are afraid of RMT.

I don't want stupid vanity player housing, they wasted dev time and money on this.. seriously? ... I want things that work, and work well.

[Sothis]

Leveling and HNMs were pretty major parts of the early game and what you spent the vast majority of your time doing, so you can't really blame us for focusing on them.

Different people enjoy different things. I find XIV's crafting so much more involved and fun than XI's ever was (there was only ever a handful of things worth crafting for each craft in XI, and as the game progressed, those became less and less relevant) - not to mention how nice it is to be able to level more than one craft! - and "stupid vanity player housing" is one of the things I'm really looking forward to for XIV.

Fishing in XI didn't really become a truly useful thing until Hakuryu, and to a lesser degree, Talacca Cove (and that was mostly for the bots). Fishing up the Manta required no fishing skill, and wasn't really "fishing" in the sense of.. going after actual fish.

I will agree with you on the stats, though. They're very linear, but I guess it's an intended 180 from XI/1.xx, where you could have a relatively low level item that had stats superior to much higher level things because higher level gear didn't offer the stats you needed. I would definitely like to see some unique stats on job-specific gear.

[cloverkitty]

So basically FFXI was a great game after a couple of expansions and 1-3 years of updates. (depending on your view).
Yes I played FFXI and enjoyed it for the around 7 years I played it.
Rise of Zilart was the 1st expansion and released around the time of the US release.
Chains of Promathia was another year later, that is when things started to really open up and what most people remember as FFXI (That is also when many of the major nms you remember came about).
The Expansion that caused things to really take off was Treasures of Aht Urhgan which came out 3 years after the initial release.

Nothing against anyone but 12+ hour respawn windows (even after waiting a day for that window to open which you had to know). Link shells would litterally have to get people to sit in places for hours or days to watch for a pop then everyone rush out there from that LS and keep it quiet. Then there were the botter LS that would autoclaim the mob regardless of who hit it. No thanks. It took me a month of multiple hours of camping and some luck to even get trotter boots. Now that I am older with a family I can't spend that kind of time at the game.

After 2-3 years of updates (expect possibly 1 expansion and about 4 updates a year) then come back and tell me if this game made the right choices.
This game has only been out for a little over a month, it was a complete revamp of a failed game in less than 1 year. I would have to say I am quite impressed.
I also enjoy this game and it works great with my schedule.

There are of course things I would like to see improve or change and I am sure much of it will.

[viion]

no thanks, don't want any of that.

[Quesse]

Almost all of FFXI's design was built around the concept of XP loss on death.

Dying was painful. So enemies were more scary, sneak/invis useful, endgame strategy different.

FFXIV you can die 30x on one 80min Titan instance and suffer practically no penalty. Everything is easy mode because death doesn't matter.

But do you really want to go back to that?

[Hulan]

There is really a fundamental issue with this idea, and those like it, that has nothing to do with whether FFXI was a good/better game or not. I was an extremely long time FFXI player; though I played it.... I don't want to say casually, but not with an eye for end game. That being said, let us work through what would have happened - theoretically - if FFXIV was a remastered version of FFXI.

A lot of current FFXI players would have switched from FFXI to FFXIV. Meanwhile, best case, many of the ex-FFXI veterans would have joined up for the nostalgia. It may have snagged a few new players, but let's face it, the people who never played FFXI don't want to play FFXI refurbished or otherwise. Assuming that it gained a 100% resubscription rate, many reports put FFXI's max population around 500,000 to 700,000. Right now, somewhere around 250,000 of those still play FFXI, if most reports are to be believed. That's a between 250,000 and 450,000 bump in subscriptions, since many of them would just be migrations from FFXI. Even assuming another 100,000 to 300,000 tried the game out because it was "new", that's only slightly above SE's target stable population - theorized to be somewhere around 500,000 month-to-month subscriptions.

Retention rates are never 100% though, closer to 50%, that puts FFXIV: FFXI Edition optimistically around the 400,000 level (100,000 below SE's target numbers). Now, these numbers are, for the most parts, estimations, but they hold up to reason.

So while making FFXIV: FFXI Edition would have made an - admittedly substantial - core group of players happy, it would not have been anywhere close to economically viable.

[Warlyx]

Accomplishments, raging from easy to extreme. > OK

Crafting worked. It paid off. > IT sucked , wasnt fun , wasnt engaging ,was just a mesh , breaking materials and crystals for no reason other than "luck"

Auction House. It worked. > and FFXIV dont?

Fun story line / fights. > OK

Fishing: Was fun - Fishing Devil manta for angel skin, yum. > bah never liked fishing

No stupid retard vanity transports. > whats wrong with mounts?

Items were job relevant and fun, with stats that made you go ... I want that > items that made your char OP or else worthless? no thx , buyt enhanced skills were fun.
Ninja AF2 gloves .....+ Af3 boots

Experience parties (Might have lowered the requirement and speed of leveling easier). > OK

Open world Notorious monsters - Server competition. Rewards. > NO THANKS, if endgame isnt instanced = FAIL (claimbots , camping ....)

Punishment for being retarded : Sneak / Invis > True sneak True Sight mobs that can 1 shot u...say HI!

That element of danger from other monsters. They could that level of danger or excitement to the game!. > getting killed near the zone u want to go or in the middle of 30 mobs w/o no option for tractor or raise , because losing exp wasnt enough u had to travel the whole world upside / down again

[CrystalRainbow]

Everything comes back again.

There will be a time when people will want to grind mobs with friend and stuff we just currently aren't there yet, give it another 3-7 years of mmos