The absent players

[Neptune]

I've had a very different experience. Many people I know did play FFXI once upon a time, but came to FFXIV looking for something different. My husband, in fact, despised FFXI and only agreed to play FFXIV with me because it promised to be different (and he has actually enjoyed playing FFXIV). But there are also plenty of people in my LS who never played FFXI.

In fact, I've only met ONE person in my travels in FFXIV who specifically said they 'were expecting FFXI with newer graphics'. This was a random newbie I met at the aetheryte outside of Limsa Lominsa the first month of launch who needed some help figuring things out.

To me, Final Fantasy means engaging story, beautiful graphics, and amazing music. Not the outdated concepts of FFXI.

I think that FFXIV can look ahead to the future without losing the integrity that is Final Fantasy. And I think that is the key to getting the attention of the absent players.

Very well said.

And youngblood, it's unlikely that wow will ever die but I think FFXIV will be popular, if a certain school of thought doesn't choke it like a weed.

[gifthorse]

FFXIV's only target audience at the moment is people who like graphics engines and craftville.

Those are the reasons I play FFXIV, to craft and look good while doing it.

If people want engaging combat, they will go TERA. If they want dynamic quests, then Guild Wars 2 says hi. If they want a sandbox fantasy game where they can change the world around them and explore then they will go to ArcheAge.


There is a very small majority of people who like FFXI-Everquest style of gameplay.

FFXIV needs to take a direction in order to capture an actual, existing market. I have absolutely no idea what direction they are taking at the moment. This is something they have to figure out.

[Keith_Dragoon]

I played XI from NA launch to this very day. I do not base my suggestions and feedback on the game but I do take key elements that worked well in that game that is lacking in this one. (hence why i started a thread on the LS Options: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...kshell-Options)

As far as jump goes I am only against it because it just doesn't do the FF name justice in all of the FF numbered titles jump was either not there or automatic at designated jump locations. there has never been any sorta free form jump in any of them. Now I would not quit if it was added but I just hope they have limitations to it or something to keep me from jumping around like a complete jackass. Cause everyone I play with knows that if people are dying due to lack of heals, its because I'm jumping in circles over to the side being totally distracted.

Now something does need to be done to ease player frustration cause the only reason jump is wanted is because the maps aren't friendly on the shoes so to speak. There are plenty spots where your journey is cut short by a 3 inch high brick you can't just walk over. or a ledge that barely passes your shin. These were also in XI but even in that game alot of these spots were setup so that the player would go up and over. That is not the case here unfortunately and is the main reason these debates get so heated.

[Youngblood]

I'm posting this thread because I'd like to point out an issue. This is going to seem like a flame but please don't get alarmed when I bring up schools of thought.

We have all seen that there is a division between posters on this forum. Have you ever stopped to think about why? Why are we here? Some of us are Final Fantasy fans, some are MMO fans, some are FFXI fans, we all are gamers.

I'm sure it is pretty obvious that there is a group here that is very passionate about FFXI. In the discussion of FFXIV I see FFXI brought up a lot. According to the first players' poll about 20% of FFXIV players played FFXI. Some portion of them spent so much time with FFXI that they don't like where FFXIV is heading. Even though there's only a few hundred of you here boosting topics up like "About jumping" I want to pose some serious questions to your school of thought.

I couldn't find any numbers on the market size for players in the MMO genre but I did find a financial figure.

http://www.mobitrends.com/2010/12/06...o-market-size/

The MMO market is a 6 billion dollar a year market. According to Activision Blizzard's financial statement, World of Warcraft is an approximately 1.2 Billion dollar a year game.

http://investor.activision.com/reports.cfm

At FFXI's peak of 500,000 subscribers it was approximately an 80 million dollar game. And now it's probably 1/5th of that or less.

FFXIV sold 600,000 copies at its release. This would have made it more successful than FFXI, but FFXIV never charged subscription fees. On top of that, the game population dropped 97% to under 30,000 players in November. Those are the loyal fans who would stick it out to the bitter end. At this point some of those 30,000 are the players that spent a lot of time with FFXI, who are posting in threads to influence FFXIV's course.

Now the question I want to ask is, how valuable is your opinion to influencing how big of a game FFXIV can be? If you make suggestions based on what you are comfortable with and like, are you going to be playing an 80 million dollar a year game?

What about the absent players? There are 4.8 billion dollars a year worth of absent players.. what kind of game would they play? I see it as my duty to use my loyalty to influence FFXIV to be the best game it can be. So that even more people can enjoy its beauty and adventure.

Sadly unless WoW dies I don't ever see the game ousting it in popularity and sales. They have a way lot of work to do before that will happen. As it has been stated they'll have to appeal to a broader base of MMO players and not just FFXI/FF fans. They gotta work hard to even appeal to current loyal fans and now with this quake business i'm sure SE is gonna be set behind both timewise and financially.