Eureka vs Maple Story and a Plea to SE

[Ayirez]

Hello and welcome to yet another Eureka thread. On today's episode of Eureka the land of the grind and tears I would like to make a comparison to an old game from my childhood, Maple Story, a game that was great for its time, or not depending on who you ask. Either way, I'd like to go over a few points and then make a clear statement after doing so, so, leggo!

Mob Chains

In both Eureka and Maple Story the main way to get EXP is through an action called chaining, where the Player kills one mob after another to create a chain. The higher the chain the larger the EXP bonus. In Maple Story every 50 mobs gives a small chunk of bonus EXP, the higher your chain (called a combo in MS I believe) the larger the bonus EXP. In Eureka it is much the same, every 10 mobs gives you a "large" bonus, while each mob individually raises your exp bonus by +3%. Two additional features in Eureka are that after every 10 chain milestone you gain an increased chance at loot (whereas in Maple Story there was simply too much loot on the ground to reasonably pick up) and that your chain resets at 30 (whereas in Maple Story it simply continues to grow larger and larger until it simply caps out but still rewards you every 50 kills).

The point here is that they follow the same trend; Chain kill mobs for an EXP bonus with set milestones every X kill.

Notorious Monsters

In Eureka after killing a set amount of a specific mob (±100) a Notorious Monster Fate will spawn and allow Players a chance at gaining massive amounts of EXP for completion. In Maple Story on the other hand once you kill a large amount of mobs in any given zone a Boss Monster will spawn, killing it will yield high grade loot and a good chunk of EXP as well.

The point here should be obvious, it's pretty much the exact same.

Party Play

Within both games when playing with friends and other players your EXP is drastically cut, in Maple Story to the point of it being nearly pointless to grind regular mobs with friends and in Eureka to the point where exp gain via mob killing only comes from taking on vastly higher leveled mobs in comparison to your level. Additionally, playing with lower level friends yields nothing but negatives in both games, but unlike Maple Story where no such mechanic exists to aid in this, FFXIV HAS LEVEL SYNCING. That you cannot sync to your friend's lower level in order to gain chains off of mobs you can both reasonably fight is complete and utter nonsense, but I digress.

The point here is that neither truly promote party play aside from ganging up on Notorious Monsters.

Furthermore though,

The Main Point

The best, if not the only real way to level in both Eureka and Maple Story is to grind Mobs and spawn Notorious Monsters, working up a chain to maximize gains during the grind. Maple Story is face paced, killing monsters is relatively easy and the enjoyment comes from rapidly moving from mob to mob, killing them in droves and speeding around the map to kill the next, keeping your chain up. Eureka on the other hand is anything but fast paced, killing mobs alone takes time and gives such pitiful amounts of EXP while taking a long time to gain a chain, while killing in a group is faster and allows for a chain to be built quicker but cuts your exp by the amount of players in the party while making any lower leveled people contributing less than a 100% efficiency that solo playing would allow.

Maple Story was made in 2003, 15 years ago. It is nearly identical in mechanics to Eureka aside from the nonsense non-choice mechanic that is your Magia Board (you spec everything into one column and then rotate it to the mob you're fighting either to become more tanky or more damaging based on your role. There is zero choice in it). Even then, even though they're nearly identical, which is more fun? Maple Story is, easily. Maple Story feels more rewarding for what it is, it feels good to gain a chain of 999 as you hop around the screen and kill mobs. Eureka is so slow and so mind numbing I personally find it hard to derive any enjoyment from it whatsoever (I'm Elevel 7, so I have put some time into it I assure you).

SE, if you're reading this, please wake up. You need to be innovative, you need to give the game depth, you need to give Players actual choice with their Magia Board and there is a super easy way to do it (Which is to give the Player increased substats based on the element as well as the bonus the elements already give, for instance Wind would give better defence against Wind mobs, higher attack against Fire mobs, and increase Skill Speed. There are even more ways in which making speccing into multiple elements, but I'll cover that in another thread). SE, you've become stuck in the mud, you found your cookie cutter and have been using it for 5 years. Dungeons are always the same, 3 bosses with mobs in-between. Alliance Raids are always the same, 4 Bosses with mobs in-between. Trials are always the same, first phase, second phase, boss LB's, third phase. End-game raids are always the same, a set of 4 arena boss battles.

While you've thrown in some fun and neat mechanics here and there for the fights, they are always scripted, they are always cookie cutter precise and lacking in Boss AI and the ability for it to mix things up. They lose their novelty after the first time in there. I have played FFXIV for 5 years, I love the game to pieces, but if you never break out of the mold that you yourselves have made I cannot continue to justify playing for much longer. You need to be innovative, to take risks, to do wild things that have depth and are difficult in other ways aside from the awful grind that we all know TOO well at this point.

Please SE, the winds of change must blow, otherwise our beloved FFXIV will wither and wilt till its community is no more.

[Torquil]

The throwback nature of the content is intentional.

[Ayirez]

The throwback nature of the content is intentional.

And because it's intentionally a throwback that makes it fun, engaging, and a mode full of depth? No, it does not. Some may find it fun, sure, but there is a rather large outcry of people who simply detest it. It has potential to be a great mode but as it is now it's a skeleton without form or flesh.

It's fine to make a throwback to old games (In this case FFXI) and old systems, but improving upon them and making them unique is also important. Currently the only thing different that I can see is that you have the Magia Board which gives the illusion of choice but offers no real choice in reality. If you're a tank, set it to the same element as the mob, if you're dps set it to that element's weakness. If you're a healer you can choose which you want to do, usually I do weakness while mass murdering the adds and then the same for raised defence against the NM itself. I'm level 17 now so I've definitely seen this mode through and the only reason I'm playing it is to finish my relic weapon and armor. Once that is done I'm out of there, idc about other classes enough to do it and I can't even help my friends due to the mechanics of how things work.