Quote Originally Posted by Bahati View Post
Has the "modding community" proved there is room for improvement that SE is not utilizing? Or is their work only impressive because it is "client side"?
I think modders have certainly proved there's room for improvement (though this has nothing to do with client-side or not; virtually everything involving visuals and UI - the things modders tend to work with - is run client-side). I mean, really, let's consider that modders have managed to substantially improve certain character textures and hair textures, despite absolutely no assistance from SE at all. No mod tools, no character editor - and yet still, people have figured out how to improve on what SE builds. I can't even imagine what they'd do if given access to the modding tools available for titles like Fallout 4 or Skyrim.

That said, I don't completely fault SE, either. Sometimes, it's easier for a modder to accomplish something than a development team, for various reasons. I do fault SE on two fronts, though.

(1) There really should be an official high-definition texture pack. People with PS4 Pro / Xbox One X, and even more so people with higher-end PCs, can handle massively higher levels of detail than what we currently have. It's worth keeping in mind that FFXIV had superior textures on its 1.0 release back in 2010. Let that sink in: FFXIV had better-quality textures in 2010 than it does today. That's mind-blowing, and quite possibly a wholly unique situation across all of gaming. I realize that XIV 1.0 had performance issues back in the day, and that it was necessary to scale back elements of it in order to support the PS3, but for Hydaelyn's sake, none of these limitations apply for the PS4 or Xbox One, let alone modern PCs. SE needs to remedy this. It's almost certain that they have the high-resolution texture collateral stored in-house; typically what we get are downscaled versions of what is produced. Give us better stuff if we can handle it.

(2) SE should be crucified for its stance on user mods. They aren't alone here, either - most publishers and development teams should be ashamed of their approach, too. I still find it amazing that FFXI's Windower mod, which began as an effort to simply let PC users alt-tab out of FFXI smoothly, wasn't something SE was comfortable sanctioning. It's insane. Mods grow a game's community, mods improve a company's product - all for free. Start enabling them, rather than officially placing them on the same level as bots or RMT.