Commitment issues

[Magistrella]

XI's development cycle != XIV's development cycle. Expansion packs were more prevalent back in the early aughts because internet speeds were slower, so offering big content updates via patches was less viable.

Every huge maintenance following the first RoZ and CoP release had you download several hundred MB depending how many Areas where added. You really should look at a zone/content release time-line of XI. Original Release Size for FFXI: 1CD POL and Tetra Master 3CDs XI 1CD RoZ 2CDs CoP, with a maximum of 700MB of compressed data per Disc. The Game with RoZ and CoP installed and patched was about 8 GB (now the game is at 11-12GB +POL Data depending if you have both or only one client language installed). I dont know how good the compression was back then but i remember downloading for around 2-3 hours the first installation, thats around 2-3.5GB with my connection.

And on the point of Internet Speed:
In 2004 (CoP Release) 72% of JP households had an ADSL Connection
I Personally have still the same connection as back then - i live in a very rural area with 3MB/s too, the first wide spread released DSL connections released in 2001 in Germany. And we were, and still are, far behind Japan.

[Kaedan]

Bunch of pointless and useless dates

The amount of time that passed between release and Zilart is irrelevant. Development cycle =/= Development time.

Heavensward is the first expansion for FFXIV and it raised the level cap to 60. At the exact same stage of development, FFXI wasn't even available in the US. And at the time of the first expansion for the Japanese only version of FFXI, the only endgame content was Dynamis and Sky.

The version of the game that non-Japanese regions finally got was a heavily updated Rise of the Zilart.

What RotZ did to FFXI is exactly what HW did to FFXIV... it trivialized the endgame of the original FFXI. Now HW has Alex Normal, Alex Savage, 3 end-game dungeons, 3 endgame trials and 2-3 options for current end-game gear. Actually FAR more than RotZ had at it's launch.

So no, the OP is quite wrong.

[Eekiki]

And at the time of the first expansion for the Japanese only version of FFXI, the only endgame content was Dynamis and Sky.

Dynamis and Sky were both added with RotZ. Pre-Zilart FFXI had a level cap of 50 and the Shadow Lord was the end of the main story. "Endgame" was only a few BCNM fights.

Which proves the OP wrong even more.

[Magistrella]

And thats why he said "life cycle" and not "development cycle" - which means for me, the time passed after the MMO went live

After the same time (as in, after going live) XI had more endgame content, more zones, more cities and more classes(and a shitton of more skills) then XIV, as well as 4 level cap increases for jobs and crafting(50 to 65/70/75 and 60 to 80/90/100 in 3 patches over the course of 11 month close to CoP release. After CoP it stayed at 75 for 7 years, making gear obsolete with the first Abyssea release.
The only thing that made your char stronger was the merit system which kept you working on a class after 75, which i really miss here. But it would end the same as the BiS bullcrap people are worshipping like monks on lsd.

Going with your holy development cycle, XIV would not hit the same point until 2017 until 4.0 is released as that marks the last update of RoZ and 2 month after the release of CoP. If they keep the time between expansions the same as 2.0->3.0 then the release of sea would get close to the equivalent of Christmas 2018 in XIV.

[MugenMugetsu]

I fear that 5 years from now we aren't going to have content like Dynamis, Sky, Sea, Einherjar, actual NMs, or HNMs we're going to have more instanced dungeons, primals, 24 man raids, and 8 man raid content like BCoB and Alex. Like basically using the same formula over and over and over and over. It's going to be a constant grind for some kind of tomes and we'll constantly be replacing gear we worked very hard for with new gear that we purchase with a new kind of tome or get from new endgame raid content which has stats that are slightly higher than the previous gear that we worked hard to get. It's fun now. I love the game don't get me wrong, but if they continue with the same formula indefinitely I see a lot of people getting turned off from the grind. I sincerely hope that one day we do have endgame content similar to Final Fantasy XI. I'm not saying I want the game to be just like XI. I played XI for 3 and a half years. I would, however, like to see more variety of endgame content and more horizontal progression for gear as well as lengthier "lifespans" for gear. It's such a bummer to play for 3-6 months working hard on gearing all jobs, with limited playtime, only to have all that hard work flushed down the drain because now there is new gear out that's much better and I need to go grind these 3 new dungeons to earn a new kind of tome, or run endgame, to get the new gear.

I also fear that 5 years from now we will be ilvl700+ and level 90+, but regardless of the treadmill and the grind, I'm sure I'll still be playing 5 years from now and will get to see for myself how things turn out. ( ~.ø)b