Did squenix make a mistake by investing too much in graphics and not enough in

[Louisville15]

Off the top of my head I can list quite a few games that require very hefty systems to run adequately....

Metro 2033, Witcher 2, Crysis 2, Shogun 2... Metro 2033 is even worse than FFXIV... Running it on 2560x1600 with Max AA, tessellation, max textures, shadows... have fun with that.
Try needing multiple cards to run it max

I get much better frames in Metro maxed than I do in FFXIV not maxed, and the former looks much better.

i7 930 @ 3.6ghz
3x GTX 470 SC in Tri-SLI
6GB G.Skill Ripjaws
Windows 7 Professional
OCZ ZX1250 PSU

[Aldwin]

First thing first, if you want to jump and climb buildings and all that other stuff, go play WoW as you mentioned or go play a platformer..

Funny you would mention this. I haven't played platform games since ps2 days strictly because I liked the freedom of pc games more. They tend to be larger, and have more options.

Ffxiv i wouldn't even call a pc game. It is more of a platform port to pc.

And second. Why does wanting my opinion of freedom from a game have to be assaulted with "gtfo".

And as to the graphics of this game. Maybe i should have stated what my opinion of good graphics are. A rich, high poly count and CREATIVE world is what makes gaphics to me. Just because they used 10billion polygons on characters, and 2gig textures doesn't make this game great graphics. IMO rift has better graphics than this, I didn't enjoy that game at all.

I suppose if there was a square room with real life pictures textured onto them some people would be like "omg these graphics are great.

Why don't you go running around and take a closer look at the world. Try outside limsa. The very scaresly positioned shrubs and trees are nothing more than 2 polygons set inside of each other with high resolution textures (if you're running the game on high settings) better known as sprites. All games use these, ffxiv did nothing different with them at all.

[Geesus]

And second. Why does wanting my opinion of freedom from a game have to be assaulted with "gtfo".

I didn't say gtfo I said go play a platformer if you want jump and other options.

IMO rift has better graphics than this,.....

Then I guess it IS a matter of opinion. I saw Rift and thought the graphics were just as crappy as Aion. Matter of fact, the games look almost similar. Personally, I think the gfx in XI are nicer in comparison. WHy you ask? Well, in AIon in order to see ANY detail, I had to be zoomed in almost on top of my toon; unacceptable. Also, the gear and characters themselves looked like crap. But that's imho and Rift looked amazing but sucked is your's.

[Aldwin]

I didn't say gtfo I said go play a platformer if you want jump and other options.



Then I guess it IS a matter of opinion. I saw Rift and thought the graphics were just as crappy as Aion. Matter of fact, the games look almost similar. Personally, I think the gfx in XI are nicer in comparison. WHy you ask? Well, in AIon in order to see ANY detail, I had to be zoomed in almost on top of my toon; unacceptable. Also, the gear and characters themselves looked like crap. But that's imho and Rift looked amazing but sucked is your's.

I think as far as graphics we are argueing the same point.

Yes your character looks amazing. The poly count is huge (hence why the loading of character at a distance is horrible in this game, and was in xi), and the textures are very detailed. But what else looks great? The very dull design of towns and zones? There really is, nothing there except a few flat polygons with more high res textures.

Running through zones, there is very small patches of low poly count grass scattered around. And each "patch" of grass or shrubs is nothing more than a copy/paste replica that was used over and over. Yes I know all games use this method. But it also has never been more obvious to me it was done as it has in this game.

[Gramul]

Should they not have hired one of the artists that worked on the other Final Fantasies?

[Ilean]

Should they not have hired one of the artists that worked on the other Final Fantasies?

What? They used artists?

Sure the textures and high-poly characters look nice. But the graphics end there imo. The world is so empty i can't even think of a word to describe it. Everything is so "square". The towns are so simply built from a design view. I've done 3d graphics programming in school, albiet nowhere near on this level of course. But a large portion of the world looks like they just put in 4 polygons and through on a nice texture. The graphics of this game are far from ground breaking imo.

QFT

[Gramul]

What? They used artists?

Yes. For the characters, equipment and detail work of the city. For the environments, they just took some of the concept art and made a few large chunks for their tilesets.

I'm just wondering if it would have been cheaper not use Yoshida for the art direction.

[Corrderio]

They've been making this mistake since they jumped to 3D.

[PrettyPrincess]

They've been making this mistake since they jumped to 3D.

that's a matter of one's personal opinion don't you think?

[Kiote]

When you take into consideration that MMO have historically started in horribly bad condition and the fact that every other MMO on the market has essentially the worst possible graphics for this era and the fact that SE want and MMO that will run for ten years, the answer is simply no. You can fix system level problems and you can make new content but you can't go back and redo the all the graphics in an MMO to update it to the present. Look at Cataclysm, Blizzard basically spent enough to make a new game on that and it managed to extend the life of WoWs outer core player base by one year. There has basically never been an MMO that was what we would consider now to be successful in its first year. 9 time out of ten that is because of the problems FFXIV had at launch. By focussing heavily on graphics SE has ensured that the game will remain visually appealing for the life of the MMO and simplly has to deal with the same problems that every MMO from UO to Everquest to WoW had to deal with. Rejected Mechanics and Server Issues. If the game makes it to next year the horrible launch will become the equivalent to a camp fire ghost story. Someone will cringe but mostly will just not give a crap. Thje graphics, however, will be the best graphics of any MMO for the next Decade because no other company even tries.