Out with the OLD, IN with The NEW -- A Look Back to Epicness

[Fizzy]

Lemme tell ya whats wrong here : UR 1st MMO feeling is very subjective, let us ask those who say FF14 is their 1st MMO, shall we?

This is my first paid MMO and only the second I've ever played (played Guild Wars when it first came out). I'm no stranger to them or games in general but after a year playing ARR, I'm a little curious about the where they are taking this game. With each patch of limited content and repetitive gameplay, my enthusiasm drops a little. I'm still managing to have some fun but the gameplay and unrewarding grinds are starting to wear me down when its made the main focus. It's certainly a beautiful game to run through though. Unfortunately, many of the most interesting places about it are unreachable or cannot be explored.

My biggest gripe though would have to be lack of immersion through gameplay and game design. The open world doesn't seem very big or open to me and lacks any sense of danger that an open world full of monsters should have. Teleports are nice but take away the immersion in the open world and reduces the overall size of the game when any point in the game can be reached fairly quickly, especially when the large aetherytes are close together. Combine that and the instances that dungeons are played through and I do feel like I'm playing an arcade game rather than a mmorpg. Basically, there's no adventure to be had in the open world. Opening it up is the peak of adventure right now and everything that follows is just repetitive play. I'm hoping that future content will change this.

[CGMidlander]

The open world doesn't seem very big or open to me and lacks any sense of danger that an open world full of monsters should have. Teleports are nice but take away the immersion in the open world and reduces the overall size of the game when any point in the game can be reached fairly quickly, especially when the large aetherytes are close together. Combine that and the instances that dungeons are played through and I do feel like I'm playing an arcade game rather than a mmorpg. Basically, there's no adventure to be had in the open world. Opening it up is the peak of adventure right now and everything that follows is just repetitive play. I'm hoping that future content will change this.

Running around in FFXI and XIV 1.0 was annoying, not fun. The zones were big, but mostly empty.
It's "immersive" in theory, but it's really just a novelty that one can easily get tired of after familiarization.

[Amberion]

Running around in FFXI and XIV 1.0 was annoying, not fun. The zones were big, but mostly empty.
It's "immersive" in theory, but it's really just a novelty that one can easily get tired of after familiarization.

Not really sure what you mean with empty. Not many mobs? Very little trees and other things? Few players around?

To me it felt like a world in itself. And that for me in a RPG is important.

[CGMidlander]

Not really sure what you mean with empty. Not many mobs? Very little trees and other things? Few players around?

To me it felt like a world in itself. And that for me in a RPG is important.

Have a gander at Black Shroud 1.0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ti2AIhEoH9Y

Lots of copy-pasted blocks and very low monster density

[maxthunder1]

Xi was epic, XIV is lack luster at best. What XIV is missing is danger it is missing forced grouping. There is no reason to group up in XIV there is no reason to do anything other than sit in town. At some point the hand holding needs to stop but well we know that wont happen. Xi's story pulled players in XIV story is well something to be desired. You have casual players who think they are elite and thats due to how easy everything is, you take away how easy everything is and the attitude's would change. XIV has a horrible community compared to XI's and thats because in XIV every one and their mom can have anything with little to no effort put forth bring back the days where you had to work for something, not this give it to me now attitude and the game would change for the better.

[Amberion]

Have a gander at Black Shroud 1.0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ti2AIhEoH9Y

Lots of copy-pasted blocks and very low monster density

I was more talking about XI.

I played FFXIV v1, and I can honestly say that I did not notice the copy paste thing until it was pointed out. I wonder how many people where like me and never noticed until told.

[Renik]

...I find that because ARR is INSTANCED based it lacks the sort of 'Adventure'...

Agree, i always thought the main problem of this game was the way everything is instanced, i was very happy the first time they announced hunts, then they made them a zerge content, there's no open world content at all, if you don't like instances or zerges, or are a solo player, you have absolutely nothing combat related to develop your character, but well, this is a young game, there's place for improvement.

[Jon_00]

In my opinion, FFXIV is good but get's boring -quick-.

Truth of it, it's a boring MMO after a while. Lots of mundane tasks, with the potential for an epic feel to them are reduced down to boring fetch quests that anyone can do. The daily quests the beast tribes give out are excruciatingly dull and were a source for potential decent quests that could feel on a more grandeur scale and each of the tribes offer the same end reward, a mount. I occasionally log into FF these days but never actually travel outside of Mist as you're always doing the same thing each day: Roulettes.

Let's face it, we've had only 8 bosses of content to do since the game was launched (Turns 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9) back in early 2013 - If you really wanted to count the primals that's 13 bosses. A typical WoW patch back in it's 'prime' would release 13 bosses in a single raid. It's just not enough.

[Quesse]

I think a better question would be: Will MMO's ever feel epic again?

A follow-up: Why shouldn't they?

MMO development has lost its way... for a time... but like me and the OP, there are lots of people out there yearning for that epic MMO feeling and someday, I truly believe, someone will be smart enough to make a game that delivers. But it won't be FFXIV.

Let's face it, what we're looking for is a REAL Massive-Multiplayer-ROLEPLAYING-Game. FFXIV is not that. Like many other recent games, FFXIV is just an MMO. Its an adventurish MMO. Destiny is an MMO too. There's not a whole lot of different these days. Make a party, kill stuff, get loot. The epic role-playing feeling has been sucked out for the most part. Instead its replaced with a standard checklist that has somehow become the default for all MMOs.

I'll be patient, THAT game will eventually come.

[Jon_00]

snip

MMOs are a business model that focuses primarily on enticing new customers in, rather than retaining existing subs. An MMO is judged to be successful if they're bringing in more subs than they're losing.

With this business model comes dumbed down mechanics and hand-holding throughout to earn it's name as 'accessible'. Until this stops, MMOs won't feel epic.