Is "Traditional" a cop out?

[Rydin]

This is not my opinion so dont flame me....
I'm actually on the fence on this one and cant make up my mind....
But with the game being down it seemed like a good time to discuss it

With the game being so unpolished and downright unfinished..... Yoshi P has made many references to going back to the FF roots... and pulling from previous games, mentioning several previous installments...

But what does that mean to YOU, the gamer, the Final fantasy fan, the new MMO player.. the FFXI vet, the WoW vet... whatever your background is...

I've always felt that SE balanced new and old so well in every game.... Each FF title had familiar elements (chocobos, which we wont talk about here, Cid, Moogles, Recurring MOBs) but the gameplay elements were always drastically different....
And that was good...
VI was cool... we loved Blitz and who didn't fall in love with the auto-crossbow
And as good as VI was (Damn near perfect)
VII was completely different... and WE LOVED it
And VIII was even more of a deviation from the norm
X Didn't even have levels
XII didn't have random battles
final fantasy IV introduced the ATB (Active time battle) system that we all came to know and love
We've seen new weapons (gun blades and sports balls) mixed with old favorites (swords, axes, staffs)
And with all this, maybe even because of this, SE has always been able to mix Medieval with fantasy, retro with futuristic, realism with the unbelievable with such ease that we had no choice but to be drawn in....

With that being said... How do you feel about the "If it aint broke" mentality?
Materia wasn't broken... but it wasn't in VIII?
and we were better gamers for it.... in fact, when they tried to rehash old ideas (Tetramaster in IX) it didn't go over well...
If you're going to remake VII, then remake VII.... if you're going to redo XI, then give that game an overhaul.... or call a new game XI-2...
but should a numbered title be made to look like an older title, just to try and please people?
SE has never had to try and please a pissed off community.... Is that line of thinking going to hurt this game?

What would be wrong with inventing brand new jobs to work as advanced jobs for these classes?

Do all the answers for this game lie in FFXI??? FFVII? FFVI? FFX??? FFXII? you get the point...
discuss.... try not to flame... and expect me to play the devil's advocate (See: devil's advocate but not troll)

[Gicker]

You make some good points, but you didn't hit home on all of them in my opinion.

Mainly, yes, you need to please the masses. The reality is we have two main camps of players that tried FFXIV. We have the wow heads and their cousins, and we have the ffxi players. Both expected certain things but neither really got what they wanted. The wow heads all went back to wow, and we're left with the old ffxi players, who do expect certain elements from ffxi, because they worked there, and that's why they're playing this franchise of online games.

There's more to this than just following the traditional FF path of creating new games. The world of single player rpgs and that of mmorpgs is very different. What you can get away with in a single player game you can't get away with in an mmorpg. What you're suggesting is exactly what SE did, and it very nearly cost them the entire game an irreparable damage to the franchise if the game actually did fail.

The reality is, most people here have played ffxi in the past, and are playing here now in some part based on that fact. While no one really wants to play a graphical upgrade of ffxi I don't believe, I think there many who have certain expectations of ffxiv based on their experiences with ffxi, and certain other expectations based on what they liked from other mmorpgs they played.

Personally, I like the direction the game is headed in, from what I know of it. I like the fact that we seem to have a great deal of say as to where this game goes developmentally as well. And I think that a certain amount of development needs to go to pleasing the masses so to speak, and a certain amount needs to go to maintaining a certain vision and expectation of the game itself as it relates to the FF franchise. I don't think this game can succeed if those two elements aren't heavily considered and in relatively in balance with each other.

That's my 2 cents at least.

[Rydin]

There's more to this than just following the traditional FF path of creating new games. The world of single player rpgs and that of mmorpgs is very different. What you can get away with in a single player game you can't get away with in an mmorpg. What you're suggesting is exactly what SE did, and it very nearly cost them the entire game an irreparable damage to the franchise if the game actually did fail.

True... but was it a fail because it was different.. or did it fail because it was grossly unfinished? How many ideas from early on in the "Tanaka era" would have been better received had the game been finished with little to no lag, or bugs... and a plethora of content? Its like someone giving a presentation in a dirty suit, with wrinkled graphs.... smudged papers and an overall bad smell...
The ideas weren't necessarily bad but no one gave them any consideration because the packaging was so rough

[Evenstar]

I do not think they should look back and "copy" things from singleplayer Final Fantasy games. However, when you play FFXIV you get the feeling this is their first and only MMORPG. They completely forgot everything they did in FFXI and started from 0 instead of taking the good parts of FFXI and implement them into FFXIV.

Some example
A search function to find player around the world.
An delivery/mailbox system.
An easier to understand and an easier to use create party system.
Map notes.
Camera system (including not being able to assign the arrow keys to anything in FFXIV).

Those things above are just a few examples. All of the things I mentioned above are important details that can make or break a game. However, none of those details needs to be unique in every single game. I am sure none would have whined about having the same /sea function as in FFXI or having the same delivery system as in FFXI or even have an action house like in FFXI.

To have a more direct answer on your question. No, I do not think all the answers for FFXI lie in the other FF games. They should look at FFXI a bit more and copy the good working parts of that game into FFXI. Not the whole gameplay, but simply things like a /sea function, party create function and so on. You summed up the other FF things pretty well (Cid, Chocobo, Airship, even Moogles). Those are things that are in every FF and they are in FFXIV too.

The thing I miss most right now is the thrill I had when I started FFXI. I miss the missions, the quests, the whole conquest feeling. If they would just copy that part from FFXI, but give it a FFXIV feel it would be good enough for me for the time being.

Maybe it will come, who knows. After all FFXI was out for a while before the NA release arrived (I am from EU but got the NA release myself). The last patch made me start playing again, but I would lie if I wouldn't say that I was stil la bit disappointed, especially at the new quests ....

[napalmninja]

Your right, the reason we love Final Fantasy is because each and every game is different and special in its own way.

The problem with XIV however, is it strayed to far from its FF roots. The Current Class/Job names are fine, but they don't sound or feel like a FF class.

I think that Yoshi-P has made many references to the roots of FF because that's what we love, the roots. I don't think he meant he wants to copy the other games, but he wants to rebuild the foundation with what made these FF games.

Basically it's about rebuilding with the FF foundation and then branching out to make XIV its own unique game.

[Malakhim]

I'm willing to bet that the game was a flop because it was unfinished. Had Tanaka actually had an extra year or maybe just another 6 to 8 months before releasing the game, I doubt it would be anywhere near the state it was at launch.

[Jennestia]

I'm willing to bet that the game was a flop because it was unfinished. Had Tanaka actually had an extra year or maybe just another 6 to 8 months before releasing the game, I doubt it would be anywhere near the state it was at launch.

Yeah, it pretty much got pushed out before it was ready, which the blame could be placed on Wada - Since 6-7 months later FFXI was already beginning to expand and grow and shortly after, the first expansion pack.

[Rydin]

Some example
A search function to find player around the world.
An delivery/mailbox system.
An easier to understand and an easier to use create party system.
Map notes.
Camera system (including not being able to assign the arrow keys to anything in FFXIV).

Those just seem like common sense though, regardless if you're the company that made FFXI or not... those seem like things even a new MMO maker would want to include
A delivery system for items and messages in game just makes sense to everyone... How possible is it that those things were meant to be put in, but just got lost in the severe deadline and time constraint?

[AmyRae]

Final Fantasy is at its best when it's a remix of itself with a new cast and a new story. It's the one thing that shouldn't change.

[sini]

...The reality is we have two main camps of players that tried FFXIV. We have the wow heads and their cousins, and we have the ffxi players. Both expected certain things but neither really got what they wanted. The wow heads all went back to wow...

Not all the "wow heads" went back to wow. Wow was too dependent on other players at end game for me. I may run into the same problem with this game when i get there. I'm hopeing that's not the case. In the mean time i'm enjoying FFXiv.