What is so bad about FFXI?

[Shipp]

Do we want FFXIV to become XI-2, the answer is yes to a degree.

A XI clone is guaranteed will fail, just like a WoW clone is guaranteed to fail.

We need defining concepts from XI, the story arches, the intertwining quest and missions, and the basic elements to a final fantasy game. We need to draw on what XI did to keep 95% of its playerbase active for over 7yrs, something no other mmo has ever done. We need to draw on the long term goals which keep players playing for a very long time, we need to let people build their characters over years not update to update. We need to large scale content. We need stuff that hardcore simply cannot breeze through in a week/month/year.

We also need defining concepts from WoW(mainstream). The userfriendly interface, The auction house system which is superior to XI, Content for solo players, tiered battles so the hardcore can be challenged and the (I would say casual but even they can do hard stuff) less talented do not get pushed away from the game. PvP since it is a staple of mmos despite whether people like or hate it, and the guild management systems in place.

Outside those concepts, everything must be original or the mmo will never take off. In the end no one will pay for a mmo when they can have the same experience elsewhere except the older mmo has 20 fold the content. We need something that has never been done, A game that is fun for Casual mainstream players, and no-life hardcore players. A game where there is endless content, a game that is unlike any other mmo out there in the end.

I completely agree with this. We need the XI feel like the artistic direction (which XIV is sorely lacking, though 2.0 looks promising), more fantasy and less boring realism. You can have realistically visioned fantasy which is more along the lines of how XI was. Still maintaining the realistic models, yet high fantasy areas such as floating islands. We do not need the time grind of waiting to get a party for hours, waiting on 3 hour HNM windows, and time-sinky ridiculousness. UI elements from actual MMOs that know what they're doing in regards to the PC is a plus. The same type of content is also a plus from other popular MMOs, just with enough of a unique twist where it does not feel like you're doing a carbon copy of another MMO with different skins. Instances/raids would be better if they were more like how XI was in terms of actually feeling like you're part of something instead of just mindlessly AoEing crap down to get to the boss, or completely skipping everything but the boss. Hallways like WoW would be the wrong direction. Boss encounters like WoW would be the right direction, however. More bosses, less trash.

I think XIV could be awesome if it successfully mixed the popular elements of most MMOs with XI, though it could also be done horrible if it's half-assed. I enjoyed pre-ToAU XI, but ToAU largely destroyed the game for me since I played mages. Segregating the playerbase like that was not a good idea, and I hope XIV doesn't make that same mistake.

[Baxter]

FFXI was my first serious mmo, as such it holds a special place in my heart. I think "we don't want it like ffxi" or "we dont want ffxi-2" comes from some of the aspects that really should have been redone in it's infancy. Like the party feature, a ton of job adjustments and mechanics, content like worldspawn HNMs, storylines battles, crafting, gathering, rmt actions that should have never been, instances, inventory.. these are just a few of an ever growing list of problems that afflicted xi and scarred both long term players and short term. In my opinion it's not saying change or do not implement what has made xi great, but please do not implement the things that caused a lot of frustrations/ragequits/and for some..tears.

[Mishakai]

I don't want to keep playing the same game over and over.

Same here. We aren't talking about a photocopy of XI though. Trust me, if the first thing I had to do in XIV was collect 10 rabbit skins from the bunnies in West Ronfaure, I would have been pretty pissed. That's not to say they can't include other factors from XI into XIV. Heck, we already have identical looking/named weapons, mobs, ingredients etc...

Meat Mithkabob.. Meat Miqobob.. really??

[Brillen]

The main draw XI still holds over XIV for me is the job system. The usage of Job/Sub is so far superior to the "use whatever skills from whatever class you want" system that XIV has implemented.
Other than that I've very pleased with XIV and just wish they would have had more direction in the main storyline, and how you explore and develop it. I find myself getting excited to do the main scenario quests, only to be let down by the quests being a mere "walk here, listen to cut scene, get xp"

[HoolieWho]

Nothing is more natural than to compare FFXIV to FFXI. I expected things that worked in FFXI to be carried over into FFXIV, and if not, then I certainly hoped the innovations would be for the better.

Seek/Search

FFXI had group formation tools that worked, but could have been better. A party recruitment feature is a nice innovation compared to FFXI, but it fails on its own. Better to seek endlessly in FFXI than to use the FFXIV tool and wonder "is this thing on?" It boggles my mind that an MMO is released without a useful means of getting in parties. A year later and my mind is still BOGGLED!

Still, I didn't expect a system identical to FFXI, I expected something better. Seek and recruit on any/multiple jobs for different types of content. An auto-grouper like the proposed Content Finder would be a welcome tool in addition to more interactive group formation tools.

Guild Leves (Battle)

A variation on the leveling mechanic compared to FFXI. I like leves for solo/duo play, but they are a disappointment for party play. Groups of monsters instead of always a solo monster and the lack of fighting over monsters in popular camps are good innovations. But it seems to me that an MMO should be focused foremost on party play and I miss the party focused leveling of FFXI.

Battle Regimes

Compare to skillchains from FFXI. A greater variety of actions building toward a greater variety of effects. I like the innovation but the requirement of entering a Battle Regime Mode took away from the flow of combat. High marks for an attempt to promote teamwork though. I would say a good innovation over FFXI in principle, but needs better implementation.

Market Wards

Quaint, but inconvenient. Convenience wins when it comes to buying/selling goods. We want Amazon.com and they gave us a strip mall anchored by Bob's Misc. Mob Drops and Amy's Weaver Emporium. I'm not sure what I would prefer over the FFXI AH.

Crafting

I prefer FFXIV crafting over FFXI. Local leves allow leveling progress without the need to create and dump a bunch of useless leveling fodder. And the crafting mini-game is more interactive than the all-or-nothing FFXI method. But the mini-game really needs Quality to mean something. It should mean something for crafting leves and it should mean something for actual crafted products.

Indirectly crafting hurt FFXIV if it influenced the creation of the Market Wards as a place for crafters to showcase their goods. It also hurt the game if it dictated the lack of challenging mission battles in order to accommodate dedicated crafters.

Plenty of other features to consider, like NM spawn conditions, loot distribution mechanisms, auto-attack, LS tools, seamless zones, etc.., but all of it will be compared to FFXI and if it doesn't compare favorably, it will be harped on. Rightly so.

[Zenaku]

I want it to be ffxi in the sense of great storyline and gameplay so far ffxiv does not meet that. Sky,COP,whitegate all of this is great but FFXIV is becoming more like wow or a western game and don't sit there and tell me no it's not. Right now FFXIV 2.0 is noting like ffxi. 1.0 is really like ffxi but i understand in today market we need to have stuff that are in other MMO have and that fine by me. But to make this game great for both hardcore / casual you can't make it 100% like ffxi or 100% like western type mmo.

FFXIV should try and stay unique systems while adding ffxi and wow system within if they can do this then it would be a great game if they go and make it ffxi 2.0 or a wow-clone it wont get far at all. Let's hope Yoshi-p knows what he doing when it come to 2.0 so far i loving everything there only a few things that should never be added but we see how it work out.

[ellohwell]

I want it to be ffxi in the sense of great storyline and gameplay so far ffxiv does not meet that. Sky,COP,whitegate all of this is great but FFXIV is becoming more like wow or a western game and don't sit there and tell me no it's not. Right now FFXIV 2.0 is noting like ffxi. 1.0 is really like ffxi but i understand in today market we need to have stuff that are in other MMO have and that fine by me. But to make this game great for both hardcore / casual you can't make it 100% like ffxi or 100% like western type mmo.

FFXIV should try and stay unique systems while adding ffxi and wow system within if they can do this then it would be a great game if they go and make it ffxi 2.0 or a wow-clone it wont get far at all. Let's hope Yoshi-p knows what he doing when it come to 2.0 so far i loving everything there only a few things that should never be added but we see how it work out.

I don't play an MMO for story, per se, so I would rather have gameplay instead (and 2.0 will be releasing new forms of gameplay such as PvP, sieges). But overall I must agree with your position that FFXIV is becoming more generic, and I don't want that either.

Since the bad launch of 1.0, it seems like SE has lost confidence in their own ideas and so are merely trying to respond to market forces. And although this strategy can be good, and maybe even foster innovation, most of the time it doesn't and is the worst enemy of art and creativity.

[Tanoshii]

Nah, the "XI-2" issue generally comes from people who are against that game (for whatever reason) and assume anyone who even mentions it (btw, Yoshida mentions FFXI a lot lately when referring to foundation systems) wants a direct copy. I mean, naturally when you hear Final Fantasy XIV as well as It's an MMORPG which is being developed by Square Enix you naturally assume they would have built off of what FFXI laid over the past 10ish years.

Not a clone, but building off of it -- XIV could have launch with damn well an offline RPG worth of storyline content if they built off of the same flow as XI, same with content systems, i.e Besieged/Campaign (guess what Imperial raids are reminiscent of?) Assault type systems where you do x type of raids and gather points to purchase gear and items and so on. Basically, things like that, which obviously is present in other RPGs, but the way XI did it had a twist to it, usually incorporating it into the storyline, most MMOs don't really add raids and the like to storyline, just a small backstory blurb as to why the instance even exists.

So there's nothing wrong with FFXI really and XIV wouldn't even exist as an MMO if they didn't succeed with XI because if it failed like some people in the XIV community like to say, they wouldn't have attempted FMO (didn't fail either, but wasn't as popular) nor would they do it a 3rd time (FFXIV).

As said there's really 3 eras of FFXI, which linked with how the MMO community changed:

CoP - Era, also known as the challenge era and golden age of FFXI, because not only did it offer a lot of base content expansion, it also offered twice as much end-game content than vanilla and zilart.

ToAU/WoTG - Era, also known as the beginning of the casual era. It fixed all of the problems people complained about, i.e having to actually do work for the storyline and made the storyline doable in a very quick pace ignoring Japanese midnight waits. It also added in a bunch of point based systems as well as one system we all love or hate (Salvage.) Later, it added poppable NMs (ZNM) and Einherjar (tier based dungeons.) Not to mention WoTG's epic storyline, but it also was the start of XIV's physical production...so the storyline spanned over 3 years....

Then comes Abyssea, which is the ultimate requiem to how MMOs are these days - Do a little work, gain massive rewards to the point you're almost overflowing with handouts. That's not to say it's a bad thing, but it does show just how MMOs have changed and what people come to expect. Whether you love it or hate it, Abyssea was well received because people who just join the game can get well geared in very short time compared to how long it used to take back in 2004-2006.

Even if FFXI would have failed completely, they probably still would have came out with another MMO (DQX).

FFXI is so slow the player skill ceiling is extremely low. I'm glad they're moving away from those types of systems.

[Charismatic]

FFXI is so slow the player skill ceiling is extremely low. I'm glad they're moving away from those types of systems.

DQX says they aren't.

[Reika]

FFXI put me to sleep on several occasions.