to Yoshi P. (Please read)

[Kairyu]

To all FFXIV fans/players If you disagree with anything I have said im sorry but I know for fact these are the views of many. Please refrain from flaming and keep this thread open for cirtical comments. Also if anyone would like to add anything to this post it up and I will edit this post.

Yoshi, first Ioff I want to say thank you for doing everything in your power to fix this game. I know you have your work cut out for you as this game was one of the biggest mmorpg letdowns to date at launch. To no surprise almost everyone whom Ive talked to and everyone on the forums is rooting for you to make this a game we all can play and enjoy as we did so in FFXI. A little background about myself, I started playing FFXI at NA release and played it right up to FFXIV release. I know I dont speak for all but im sure I speak for most when I say I had some of the most fun and memorable gaming experiences of my life on FFXI. We want FFXIV to do the same, with that being said please and I STRESS please listen to your hardcore fanbase and not the people that rarely play and just want things to be easy and handed to them. The reason FFXI was so amazing and so memorable is beause there was so much sense of Accomplishment.
I know I am only one person but here below is things that I feel would bring us the perfect FFXIV experience. Final Fantasy will not capture the wow audience or the everquest audience, so please go in your own direction. There is a reason ffxi was sucessfull and that is because it was different. I hope FFXIV can serve as a different mmo as well.

1. Leveling (Yes, alot of people complained about the grind in ffxi, but personally I loved it. If I wanted to level my character to the cap by questing I would go play literally any other mmo on the market. As I feel FFXIV is actually headed in the right direction in this category, I have heard some things I did not like, such as yoshi saying it would become more easy to level. One of the best things about ffxi to me was lvling my character. Parties were fun! I loved good grinding parties. That was a experience in itself leveling my character to 75. In this game it is flat out boring. I used to HATE regional leves as I felt is was a boring, repetative, and a un-enjoyable experience to level your character. That being said after the adjustments you guys have made, I think there is a place in the game for them as long as they arent the main focus when leveling your character. As much as I hate solo content some is needed and I dont think this is a bad route to take. I love the fact that recently people have started partying. Although I am a little tired of killing raptors and going to the same camps over and over, I still feel shades of FFXI while grinding. I really wish though it wasnt so much roaming like merit parties were in 11. I loved merit parties but if parties are going to be roaming parties then the mobs need to be closer together with a higher respawn rate. THE MAIN FOCUS OF LEVELING YOUR CHARACTER SHOULD BE GROUPING.. ANYTHING IS UNACCEPTABLE AND WILL LEAD TO THE DEATH OF THIS GAME.

2. Grouping (The idea of light party and full party needs to go away. Yes it is better than what we had before but I would like to see the traditional 6 person party with the option for an allience when doing harder things. I know you can still sp with 4 players or you can do it with 8 but it just makes the game so much more balanced if a party can just have a normal set amount of players. Why change something if it wasnt broken in the first place. 6 person party is the way to go, as long as we have alliance options.

3. Quest (Thank you, thank you thank you, for making the side quest pretty much worthless, I have done them all and while I got some sp and gil from them the rewards were small. This is a good thing. I have always been a firm beleiver in quest shouldnt yield xp. I mean again like i said if i wanted to lvl off quest id go play wow. Quest should be there as sense of accomplishment with only some offering decent rewards. The idea of fame in ffxi was great. I would love to see city-fame make a return in this game.

4. Crafting (while extremely boring, I dont have to many complaints about this. I mean what did you expect? Its SE and things will be random and thats pretty much how crafting is. The stuff I would like to see changed is being addressed such as supprt/HQ/NQ and a few other small minor tweaks. PLEASE OH PLEASE FIND A WAY TO GET RID OF BOTTING.

5. Sense of acomplishment (One of the number one complaints on this game so I wont drill on it to hard but something has to be done. As cool as seemless zones are I miss my zones... looking at the same scenery all day makes me not want to play.

6. Endgame!! (most important of all)

A. HNM- Please put HNM into this game, I know many people hated them but they dont have to do them. FFXI did it right and here is why. HNM served as probably the most time consuming endgame content that yielded the least amount of gear. The gear that did drop was some of the best gear on the game and it really seperated the hardcore players from the casuals. You didnt have to have hnm gear to have good gear or be a good player, there were other options. Personally I LOVED HNM ever with the problem of the bots. Yes i know bots would win alot of the time but I claimed many hnm in my day without one. Id rather do hnm where people botted then do gay dungeons and other instanced content that is easy and the gear will just become obsolete with a new patch.

B. Open world content- Holy freak was sky and sea amazing.... I mean seriously years and years people spent doing those things.. It offered so much content and was so well done. It let linkshells compete against each other in certain ways. All I will say is if there is no sea/sky in this game I will most likely quit.

C. Dungeons- Plain and simple if I wanted to do instanced dungeons id go play other mmos. Not only was darkhold horribly done, it was just a bunch of copy and paste tunnels that offered nothing but repetitiveness. Oh and please do away with gear dropping from chest before the freaking bosses... really??? You want to reward people just for putting a group together and running in a kiling a few lvl 50 mobs to get a few pieces of gear? What a joke. My favorite thing on 11 was that gear was hard to obtain but it made it worthwhile once you got it. A dungeon here and there is ok, but if this is the main focus for endgame content, again I will not play.

D. Make endgame acess for certain things actually hard/worthwhile to obtain..
I know i keep bringing up ffxi but seriously Zilart and CoP did it perfect.. Again it seperated hardcore players from casuals. Im sorry but just like in life there are poor people and rich people, sick people and healthy people.. Its a cycle, casual players should not be able to do everything the hardcore players do. Plain and simple, If I have to work my ass off for gear then as soon as I turn my head casuals are getting it becase its either easy in the first place or it is dumbed down for them then again I wont play.

JUST TO PUT THIS IN THE MIDDLE OF THIS, US FF FANS ARE HARDCORE AND WANT HARDCORE CONTENT NOT THE SAME CONTENT IN OTHER MMOS.

E. Instanced content- There is a place for instanced content such as something like a dynamis, nyzle isle, salvage, ect.. but please make them fun/memorable and something you want to keep coming back to. Please stay away from instanced dungeons.

F. Meriting- One of my favorite things about ffxi. Plain and simple I loved it and i wish this game would even go further in detail with it.

Hopefully, I didnt upset to many people with this post, but I am almost sure I speak for most of you with what i have said here. I hope you took the time to read this yoshi as we are all rooting for you to bring us the game we want to love.

[Ferth]

alot of people complained about the grind in ffxi, but personally I loved it.

I'm sorry, this as far as I got before I had to comment.

Thank you. I knew I couldn't be the only one who enjoyed gaining experience on the jobs I enjoyed playing. The party dynamic was very engaging, it was satisfying to be in a successful party.

Now, I will go back and finish reading the rest of your post.

[Hartigan_Redsail]

Go play FFXI, this isn't FFXI 2. I loved FFXI, but you can't expect the same game.

[Travesty]

Go play FFXI, this isn't FFXI 2. I loved FFXI, but you can't expect the same game.

While it's absurd to want the exact same game(which I don't think anyone is suggesting), it's pretty reasonable for people to want a similar experience.

[Seif]

While it's absurd to want the exact same game(which I don't think anyone is suggesting), it's pretty reasonable for people to want a similar experience.

FF XI was not the only FF game with optional and compulsory grinding in it.

Every single FF game has grinding in it as a massive part of the experience. Sometimes people think that all FF-esque game mechanics were invented in XI and that makes it the embodiment of evil.

People have bought over 100 million copies of the FF games all of which have grinding and questing as a very key components of the main experience.


I'm sure when people ask for "XI-like" features they're more FF-like features than anything else. XI is after all heavily based on the design of Komoto's FF III.

[Bled]

FF XI was not the only FF game with optional and compulsory grinding in it.

Every single FF game has grinding in it as a massive part of the experience. Sometimes people think that all FF-esque game mechanics were invented in XI and that makes it the embodiment of evil.

People have bought over 100 million copies of the FF games all of which have grinding and questing as a very key components of the main experience.


I'm sure when people ask for "XI-like" features they're more FF-like features than anything else. XI is after all heavily based on the design of Komoto's FF III.

Yeah, next people will be saying Disgaea games are horrible because of their grind... its not only intended but traditional to the series. It has just become popular to think grinding is out and instant lvl 100 fully equipped is the next gen.

[Coombah]

While it's absurd to want the exact same game(which I don't think anyone is suggesting), it's pretty reasonable for people to want a similar experience.

Not me , it's like watching old reruns once in a while you'll watch and chuckle hahahaha but..it's time to move onto another channel / show.

[Anapingofness]

While it's absurd to want the exact same game(which I don't think anyone is suggesting), it's pretty reasonable for people to want a similar experience.

Actually no it isn't reasonable at all. FFXIV is supposed to be a completely different game. The similarity is supposed to end with how similar the races look.

Wanting some of the things that bogged down FFXI for years is just plain stupid. I for one hate the idea of HNM being added to this game and I am glad that it won't be (as of right now).

Eventually this game will become pay to play. The key word being "play". That means that I don't want to sit in a zone for hours, waiting for something to spawn. Sitting in a zone does not equal to playing the game.

That being said, Abyssea was one of the best things that happened to FFXI in terms of gameplay. It made the game very casual while still maintaining the difficulty aspect of it. Players did not have to get the boosts at the entrance if they wanted a "challenge" nor did they have to get the Brew to kill bosses. If players wanted a "challenge" so badly then they could go the way they were and they would get it.

Back to FFXIV.
Players need to stop comparing everything to FFXI. Yes, I'm guilty of it too but unlike other players, I am using FFXI as a frame of reference to explain the differences between the two games. Also, I am pointing out the mistakes FFXI made with its game play, or conversely the things they did right.

In the end FFXI should be used as a starting point only, a framework so that FFXIV can be a better experience than FFXI, not its duplicate. Don't get me wrong, I loved FFXI. I've been playing since 2005 and I've loved it (I still play). I think the game is amazing in its own right but I also think that FFXIV shouldn't try to be like it. If I want to play FFXI, I will go and play FFXI.

Right now, I want to play FFXIV, not a clone of FFXI or a FFXI wannabe.

That is all, thanks for your time. I'm sorry if this came off strong.

[Zenaku]

Go play FFXI, this isn't FFXI 2. I loved FFXI, but you can't expect the same game.

Who playing FFXIV? FFXI players so yes we expect the same thing but 100x better and new and even new stuff for ffxiv. At the end wow player would go back to wow and ffxi players would play ffxi or join ffxiv.

[Ferth]

If I could go back and play FFXI pre-abyssea again, I would.