It's become a chore to even log on to the game

[Amyas]

You're right I DO want a different game-

FINALLY.

Pack it up boys, we can all go home.

Enjoy spamming Fire, Fire, fire, Fire, Fire, Ice, I ce, Ice, Ice, Ice 3 years from now on Garuda God Mode, because SE changed their minds and didn't want to retire the Primals at just the Extreme modes!

And you've finally shown your true form.

[Swishytail]

Enjoy spamming Fire, Fire, fire, Fire, Fire, Ice, I ce, Ice, Ice, Ice 3 years from now on Garuda God Mode, because SE changed their minds and didn't want to retire the Primals at just the Extreme modes!

Yeah, I'm fairly certain 3 years from now Fire and Ice are going to be the only 2 spells that SE can manage to
keep/put in the game. Well played.

I mean hell, look at XI. They didn't add anything different there in 3 years, either.

[JanVanding]

I too am beginning to find the lack of will to log into FFXIV, rather than throw up a whole new thread, I'd thought I'd share here to hopefully shed light on the situation that SE seems to be overlooking when it comes to the games presentation and general flow.

First things first, I've been around MMORPG's since the Early days of Anarchy Online and Dark Age of Camelot (I'm not going to Claim UO because not nearly as many folk played UO as we seem to have claim, MMO's didn't really become popular until EQ: Scars of Velious expansion and they saw steady growth until WoWs release) I've played just about every game that the MMO market has to offer in current day so I've come to know what works and what doesn't.....

FFXIV, simply does not work.

Now lower your hatchets, torches and lalafell effigy pitchforks fans! I have an explanation!

FFXIV is confused, it has NO idea if it wants to cater to hardcore players or to casual players and fails to actually convince either group while successfully adding reasons for those groups to NOT want to play the product.

So I'll put by player type the reasons why those groups would feel offput.

Hardcore Raiders:

-Lockout timers, nothing gets on a Raiders nerves more than being told they cannot get shinies more than "x per week", yet they still allow you to continue running the raid even though you will get nothing after your drop so it has sort of a Jim Bowen off Bullseye thing going of "Lets have a look at what you could've won!". In a game geared by loot, lockout timers = BAD.

-Trash run daily levequests, is it really neccessary to force someone looking for their first set of gear to re-run the same content they did forty levels ago? I understand the ideal that has gone behind it but the implementation is poor.

-Enrage mechanics, It's lazy, it's sloppy it ISNT a good mechanic a lot of the older Raiders absolutely despise this mechanic (speak to anyone that was part of the large number of people that left WoW before WoTLK, we left because every boss was given that Mechanic because Blizzard were getting too lazy to come up with interesting boss fight mechanics) No serious Raider worth their salt enjoys being exposed to a timed battle unless the mechanic makes absolute sense on that particular boss.

Casual Players:

Locked progression on what should be a "solo" story: I absolutely understand what SE was going for here, I can say they absolutely dropped the ball too. Unless you rolled on a heavily populated server, you WILL struggle to progress at certain points, your Grand Company Hunting Log will be the biggest hinderance as one of the Dungeons (Haitain) never ever gets run on the quieter servers so you will find your GC progression halted and stuck for a very long time. Trials Yes, Dungeons No.

Headless chicken content: This is the name I give to content where you find yourself running back and forth between an NPC over and over, nothing more than an unneccessary time sink that makes the grind become apparent.

Levequest lockout limits: Whoever thought this was a good idea imho is absolutely bonkers, new players will not realise that you can save your levequests for later and thus build them up to a point where you have a reasonable number to quickly grind out levels, the lockout is a major putoff and one of the largest contributing factors that will stop players opening their wallets to a subscription.

Grindy content: Yes, the game has a heavy grind that isn't apparent until you reach your late 20's early 30's of class progression. Weather it be repeating fates, Levequests, Guildhests or your solo content you begin to feel the grind and it begins to take its toll. Now it's no secret that every MMO has grinding, that Grinding is very much part of the MMO business model, but the idea is to make the grind Subtle. FFXIV's grind is about as subtle as a sledgehammer (I've experienced real grind back in Anarchy Online when we had to run Adonis and Inferno hecklers 8 hours a day every day, I HATE grinding because of that experience and I feel like I'm back in that grind cycle when playing FFXIV)

Conclusion:

FFXIV does have some fun aspects to it, I actually quite enjoy the crafting system (but even that becomes grindy and monotonous) and feel the game has an absolute TON of potential that just isn't getting realised because it's being held back by:

-Lazy Mechanics
-Unneccessary Lockouts and Gating (Gear is enough of a Gate, there is NO need for a second Gate)
-Grinding
-Headless Chicken Questlines
-Repeated Content

I am going to give the game a chance to change my mind however, because I'm a huge FF Fan, especially of the Job system (my fave FF game was FF Tactics) so I'll give it a couple of months until ESO goes live to see if they can polish it up and if any of these issues are addressed because I really want to see this game succeed, but right now...I honestly cannot see it.

[Kyoreore]

It's the very beginning of this game. You should come back @ its first expansion at least and see how things feel then.

[JanVanding]

It's the very beginning of this game. You should come back @ its first expansion at least and see how things feel then.

Only two games have ever gotten better with Expansions:

Dark Age of Camelot: The Shrouded Isles

Everquest: Ruins of Kunark.

Expansions throughout the MMO years except for those two instances have often made the Base product Worse even WoW (widely regarded at its best back in Vanilla pre-TBC) so unless SE sit down and seriously take on board every critism and make steps to fix them, the legacy of MMO Expansions weighs heavily against it getting better.

[Ehayte]

Dark Age of Camelot: The Shrouded Isles
Everquest: Ruins of Kunark
Everquest: Scars of Velious
Everquest: Shadows of Luclin
Everquest: Planes of Power
Everquest: Lost Dungeons of Norrath

Fixed that for ya : D


Anyways, I play a fair amount, and I still have fun every time I log in. I play 2 characters, and do Coil with both every week up to T4, do primals, cap myth, mess with crafting, etc. I play probably like 20 hours a week? Maybe a little more? My FC is small so we didn't blast through content and Coil and X modes.

I am having a very pleasant experience in this game : D

I do agree the world is A BIT bland for an FF game. I think with the expansion of the beast-man tribes it might get a little better. I really prefer the story telling of Everquest (couldn't have guessed that, could you have?) In which every quest or NPC you talk to contributes in some way to an overarching theme per expansion. i.e. Talk to mob_01: "BattleLord EvilFace has invaded our home and enslaved us!", talk to mob_98 3 zones over: "To defeat BattleLord EvilFace, ancient magics must be harnessed, and can only be found in RaidZone_01." Kind of stitching together an overall situation that is brewing, where you don't need to watch cutscenes to understand whats going on, you just get the impression of what happening.

While that is not the case here, the gameplay is engaging if not challenging, the world is astoundingly beautiful, the developers are vocal, active, and producing new content A LOT, and there is a veritable "crap load" of potential. We've got new IPs like Coil of Bahamut, and a HUGE library of untapped pseudo-meta-lore from other FF games (seen this in Crystal Tower being implemented already). We've got A LOT of new classes and jobs that are conceptually drawn out already and only need to be executed. We've got chocobo breeding on the horizon.

I think FFXIV is healthy for the MMO Landscape, in that it satiates the accomplishment-crave that make MMOs so attractive, but it doesn't make me feel like I don't have a chance to be respected in the community if I can only play 2 days in a given week. If you are out of things to do (everything @ 50, DL'ed, AFed all crafting, capped everything for the week, Coil'ed etc) then go for a walk, adopt a pet, volunteer at a homeless shelter.

[Mattia]

Only two games have ever gotten better with Expansions:

Dark Age of Camelot: The Shrouded Isles

Everquest: Ruins of Kunark.

Expansions throughout the MMO years except for those two instances have often made the Base product Worse even WoW (widely regarded at its best back in Vanilla pre-TBC) so unless SE sit down and seriously take on board every critism and make steps to fix them, the legacy of MMO Expansions weighs heavily against it getting better.

You forgot FFXI RoZ and COP

[IndraDeus]

I'm with you Mihael, I just feel pretty stupid that I was suckered in by the "Final Fantasy" name and played this. I mean none of these characters are even memorable, nor is the content interesting at "end game", you log in clear turn 1-5 you cap myth and log out. Not only that but the developers keep making this game easier as if it wasn't Care Bear enough, and for crying out loud this is an MMO and yet there is no content that instills a sense of competition. inb4someonementionscrappypvpandworldbosses. Tell me, how does the pvp adds to the story? It doesn't! This is just something that was added for people who have nothing else to do in order to distract them from the stale "end game" content and it doesn't even do that. What other reason is there to gear up with coil/myth gear other than to do "harder dungeons/instances"(lol)? Do you get achievements (or PSN trophies) for having a complete set of either? Would you use it in pvp over pvp gear? NO! inb4youreaspeacialsnowflake.

[Kyoreore]

Only two games have ever gotten better with Expansions:

Dark Age of Camelot: The Shrouded Isles

Everquest: Ruins of Kunark.

Expansions throughout the MMO years except for those two instances have often made the Base product Worse even WoW (widely regarded at its best back in Vanilla pre-TBC) so unless SE sit down and seriously take on board every critism and make steps to fix them, the legacy of MMO Expansions weighs heavily against it getting better.

Idk if I can agree with this. All of FFXI's expansions were pretty exciting Pre-Abyssea imo. This game just needs a lot more depth which I'm sure will be added. Not counting 1.0 since it never received any real updates in terms of content. Just vhill

[Kyoreore]

Lol mobile. Can't edit posts ftw.