Current Game Feedback.

[Kaurie]

I've played since [it doesn't matter how long I have played since. Having played more/less doesn't make my opinion worth any different].

I currently am fairly displeased with the game. There were a lot of things in 2.x that I disliked, that I understood was because Square was 'just getting the basics down' and '3.0+ was going to spice things up'. I definitely misunderstood what this goal meant and it's been eating away at me ever since.

My personal issues with the game:

Crafting & Gathering - I dislike that you need to swap gearsets and use skills on these. I prefer a system like World of Warcraft, Wildstar and Guild Wars 2, where gathering is a simple activity you can do while you are out in the world questing or what have you, and that crafting is a simple leisure activity. The complexity of crafting makes it it's own mini-game, but the mini game is not fun or rewarding.

Character Progression- This game completely lacks trait paths, specializations and so on. This was, theoretically, handled by having multiple jobs on one character - but it doesn't work out quite that way. I feel very much the same as everyone around me, and the lack of choice takes away a significant part of the identity that allows me to immerse myself in the game.

Stats- Stats in this game are incredibly dull and inconsequential. We have 35 attribute points that we can put into a stat of our choosing, but there really is no choice. There is 0 benefit to adding STR / DEX / INT to my SCH, etc. Attributes could be made much more interesting, like in Guild Wars 1, every profession (class/job) had their own set of attributes to choose from. An elementalist could apply attributes to fire, water, earth, air - for example. Beyond this, stats on gear are incredibly linear and boring. There is no gear that changes out we play, or mixes up our rotations. Secondary stats are made so insignificant in comparison to WD and main stat that they are hardly worth thinking about.

Gear- Even if stats were made interesting, it would be a moot point, because we have 0 horizontal progression. There is only 1 220 item (outside of crafting, I guess) that I can choose for my legs, and 1 230 item I can choose. Due to the stats being as lame as they are, the 230 item is better.

FATEs- FATEs lack any sort of immersion or involvement, I barely ever know what is going on with them and they are incredibly boring to complete. I am going to be honest, I don't know exactly what is wrong with them, but when I compare these to Dynamic Events in Guild Wars 2, the range in level of fun I experience is staggering. It would help a lot of FATEs also gave some sort of significant reward, to provide a reason for open world involvement at max level.

Hunts- These are either insanely hard or insanely easy, depending on how many people are present. The mechanics that make you sleep for 40 seconds are just dumb - and the openworld nature resulting in zerg fests are also quite dumb. There are many ways to adjust these so they are challenging, but Square has done nothing to address this.

Dungeons- These used to have some sort of puzzle solving and mechanics that involved thought; however, every new patch of dungeons seems to be more linear and straight forward than the last. They're obviously being specifically designed as a mindless daily farm, as opposed to fun and involved content. Too linear, too basic, too easy.

Duty Finder- This needs to have some sort of option to select your type of play - way too many conflicting playstyles are placed together, so that they are aggravated. It would be great if you could select, 'casual play' 'serious play' etc, so that you are matched with people with similar play styles to your own.

Add-ons- The complete lack of add-on support is frankly disappointing. The user base often can help create a lot of great QoL addons that the dev team just doesn't have the manpower to do (or maybe the knowledge of the problem to address). Addons can help customize your experience to yourself, as everyone has different preferences. Parsers, in particular, is a major concern. I do not understand how DPS checks can be so prevalent as a mechanic, with 0 way of an officially support way of addressing it.

Harassment- Adding on to the note of parsers, it seems to be a big deal that we don't have DPS parsers to prevent harassment. Yet, despite this, negative behaviour is seen constantly with very little done about it. At least, nothing publicly visible is known.

RMT- The solution to this is quite simple. Allow players to create a chat filter that blocks certain text. Guildwork is an app for PC that already does this - it's not a difficult thing to implement.

Raiding- Bringing in a normal raid mode has really lowered the meaning in raiding. Reaching higher levels of the tier was in part to see the story unfold. Further, we are now experiencing the same bosses and areas twice - by the time we get to Savage the 'awe' factor is lost. We're left with an enjoyable fight, but something is missing. It also sucks that we have so few raids per tier, and that they raids themselves are quite short.

Primals- Primals are turning less and less from fights that are all about coordination and teamwork into a dance that everyone needs to have remembered to pull off. It's less about coordinating damage/buffs/mechanics with your team and just making sure that your team doesn't derp and goes to A at the appropriate time.

Story- The main story is easily the best thing about this game, but there is 0 replay-ability. It would be awesome if we could use our journal to reactivate old story quests and replay them.

Housing- Limited housing plots is a very frustrating experience, I'd personally much rather have instanced plots than what we have now, if it meant that everyone could have a house if they wanted (think Wildstar).

Marketboard- I really prefer other games where you can sell and buy from the same location, rather than having to sell via a retainer and buy via board

Gold Saucer- Unfortunately, I find all of the gold saucer content to be quite boring. Choco racing, triad and verminion all have different issues. Choco racing was like Mario Kart, but more static and awkward feeling, it had potential but it didn't deliver. Triad, I never really liked the idea - so I will chalk up my disappointment to that. Verminion is way too complex for what it is - this should be a simple minion battle game, but instead the rules were so lengthy and complex, I didn't even finish the tutorial before quitting it completely.

Currency- There are way too many currencies in this game that take up inventory slots. All of these should be moved to your wallet

Glamour- This game definitely needs a glamour wardrobe, so that you do not need to hold onto all of your glamours and waste inventory/server space

Direct X 11- While the game looks prettier, there are so many surfaces which now look like mud or jelly

Exploratory Missions- The name and marketing for this really did not set us up for what it actually is. There is 0 exploration that goes on during these missions - I have more of an exploratory journey when I wander through Idylshire. These were mindless zerg fights that last for a ridiculous amount of time. If you want people to keep their attention for a long time, you need something that requires thought process.

Roulettes- There are way too many roulettes, and more just keep getting added. The bonus rewards on these are so large that they feel necessary to complete, and thus logging in usually results in making sure you get them done. It's less about, let's log in and do a fun dungeon! and more like "I better make sure I do my expert before reset". It's a chore instead of a fun activity.

Obtaining Gear- This is done almost exclusively through tomestones. The few methods where you don't get it via tomestones are slowly moving in that direction (midas/gordian manifesto, hive token etc etc.). Getting your gear through a currency at a fixed rate of play is boring. There is very little satisfaction from obtaining your reward. Picture it like going to a fair and there is a game where you need to toss rings on pop bottles (or whatever fair game you choose) and if you get a high score, you get a prize. Obtaining that is rewarding. However, if they changed it that once you throw 10 rings you get a prize no matter what, it's all of a sudden a lot less fun. That's what this is - to me at least.

Difficulty- So much of this game seems to cater to the lowest common denominator. We shouldn't be nerfing things liek Steps of Faith. It was quite easy to begin with and anyone who put any effort and time into it would be able to clear it in no time. By reducing everything to faceroll easy, you make most of the game content boring. It leaves the only interesting part to = raids. There needs to be more content that is less difficult than savage and more difficult than almost everything else.

Open world end-game zone- The complete lack of a level 60 zone is rather sad as well. I enjoy in games like Guild Wars 2, WoW and Wildstar doing daily activities in the open world with challenging monsters. Azys La is sort of this, but has not been taken advantage of (it's also a very ugly zone that I wouldn't want to spend time in). Daily Quests/Challenges are a great way to incentive people into the area. FATEs could also act as this function, if improved.


That is all I can think of atm, but honestly, I feel I touched on everything except Dragonskin maps and Sightseeing Log (which I have issues with as well, but not enough to write up about).

Before any of you say, yes, I am planning to unsub and have resubbed to another game.