Ok, lets do it, WHAT is wrong with this game?

[KaldeaSahaline]

I could probably write a book on my opinions on what is wrong. I'll just pick 2:

Netcode - Honestly, Not really much of a need to go into detail. Look at nearly any other AAA MMO today (not even MMORPG, just MMO) and you'll see a staggering difference in quality of responsiveness.

Derivative content design - I've said this elsewhere, but I'd much rather have 5 different rides that are deep, well designed, and offer robust gameplay options for VARIOUS playertypes. Compare that to the existing design paradigm where you have 10 rides, that are as shallow as a puddle (no depth) and are catered to various niche player types. This leads to DOA content because if that niche doesn't like what you designed for it, NO ONE ELSE is likely to touch it either.

I've given countless examples over the years about how they could have made Chocobo Racing a real thing instead of the mess we got. Several examples of how Eureka could have been more engaging and involved for multiple playertypes. I've covered how LoV or Squadrons could have been etc.

[Hypnotic13371337]

Uh, I'm not sure which WoW you're referring to, but over the dozen years or so that I played it, the vast majority of quests there boiled down to "kill X number of Y mobs," "kill X mobs until you get Y number of Z item," "pick up X number of Y items off the ground," "go to X location and use Y item," or (more rarely) "escort X npc from point Y to Z." FF14 has pretty much all the same quest types (granted, the last one you see more often in fates than actual quests.) The one thing that WoW did have less of than FF14 was the number of back-and-forth "talk to this npc, then that one, then the first one again" quests. But SE seem to be cutting down on those here, so that's actually kinda nice.

Well, nowadays they have things like "Vehicle quests" where you either use a mount/shredder/something you can ride that has its own set of abilities to use while you are in it (Plants versus Zombies is a sidequest randomly placed in Hillsbrad). Treasures, there are a bunch of items not tracked on your map or are related for any quests that you can find and hunt down for a bit of lore, money and a few quests worth of EXP. Things like Garrison Abilities that give each zone of the expansion have a bit of unique personality as it lets you pick between two abilities that you will gain and can use only in that zone.

There is a lot more that wow has added since those 12 years ago, but i recently had picked it up because of the lull in 14 so not sure what more they added XD

[Penthea]

The general playerbase being of below average skill level and refusing any and all help to improve, and instead choosing to complain about "difficult" content.

How can the general playerbase be below average skill? The general playerbase are the bulk of the player population. You have just said the average player is below average skill.

Also that's not something wrong with the game, that's something wrong with people. You find bad players who don't listen in every multiplayer game.

[ko_]

I'll paraprhase what I said in another thread since it's more appropriate to this:

SE is TRYING to listen to the fanbase, but whenever they DO, another group pops up saying that's not what they wanted and that they screwed up, or the same group saying that's not what they meant and they screwed up. We wanted FATEs to be relevant again: Diadem; cue whining. We wanted the raid storylines to be accesible to everyone: Normal and Savage; cue whining because "MUH GATING". We wanted harder raids: Midas; cue whining because "TOO HARD". Complaining about the raids being too hard: Omega; now it's "TOO EASY, WE'RE CLEARING ON DAY ONE!!"; harder fight? Ultimate; whining because "TOO HARD! AND WHY DO I HAVE TO CLEAR SAVAGE FIRST?!?!?!" Don't want to level alt jobs? Role skills; "WHY DID THEY TAKE HALF OF MY CLASS SKILLS AND I ONLY HAVE 5 SLOTS!!". Want whole new content and the XI players want open-world NMs? Eureka "BUT IT'S TOO BRAINLESS". New type of content? Rathalos Ex; "IT'S TOO HARD! I HAVE TO LEARN TELLS!". Complaining about the Relic/Anima having too many steps? Eureka, again, just do the crystal farming, the relic was always supposed to be a grind weapon in contrast to the raid weapon.

And nothing comes from free, we've been getting less dungeons per patch because the dev team is too busy trying to tweak and test and create this new content from whole cloth to keep up the ARR routine, and SE doesn't see a big need to add more people (and they ARE hiring! so, you know, maybe learn some Japanese and you can take your complaints straight to them). (As an aside, asking for a game-changer every x-pac is a recipe for madness; complaining it's the same game as ARR is...well, it didn't suddenly turn into FFXVI when HW came out...)

I think it's a testament to how much Yoshi-P actually values the fanbase that he still does Live Letters and answers some questions that are clearly uncomfortable to him 'cause he still has to answer to the SE higher ups, even when he doesn't answer some that the fanbase has because he's answered them before but people didn't like the answer/the questions weren't as "liked" as the other questions that people are complaining should have been higher up.

Thank you. I wish I said this.

[Ilan]

Uh, I'm not sure which WoW you're referring to, but over the dozen years or so that I played it, the vast majority of quests there boiled down to "kill X number of Y mobs," "kill X mobs until you get Y number of Z item," "pick up X number of Y items off the ground," "go to X location and use Y item," or (more rarely) "escort X npc from point Y to Z." FF14 has pretty much all the same quest types (granted, the last one you see more often in fates than actual quests.) The one thing that WoW did have less of than FF14 was the number of back-and-forth "talk to this npc, then that one, then the first one again" quests. But SE seem to be cutting down on those here, so that's actually kinda nice.

But the quests in WoW are at least worth doing them to earn exp and gold. Here they are just an annoying thing that unlocks stuff sometimes.

[Rymm]

There is a lot more that wow has added since those 12 years ago,

Just to clarify since you seemed to miss it, I said I played WoW for 12 years, not that I played it 12 years ago. And back when mounted combat was first added in WotLK, most players haaaaaaaaaated it. It took around four expansions of them tweaking it to get it to the point where it was even tolerable and the bulk of the playerbase would still rather do without it. That's not something I would like to see here.

But the quests in WoW are at least worth doing them to earn exp and gold. Here they are just an annoying thing that unlocks stuff sometimes.

I've never really had a problem with the amount of xp that FF14 quests give and this game already has a problem with an over-abundance of gil. Flooding the economy with more and not adding any new gil sinks (something we desperately need already) would only make matters worse in that regard.

[SamRF]

Uh, I'm not sure which WoW you're referring to, but over the dozen years or so that I played it, the vast majority of quests there boiled down to "kill X number of Y mobs," "kill X mobs until you get Y number of Z item," "pick up X number of Y items off the ground," "go to X location and use Y item," or (more rarely) "escort X npc from point Y to Z." FF14 has pretty much all the same quest types (granted, the last one you see more often in fates than actual quests.) The one thing that WoW did have less of than FF14 was the number of back-and-forth "talk to this npc, then that one, then the first one again" quests. But SE seem to be cutting down on those here, so that's actually kinda nice.

That's what it seems, but you'll really notice a difference if you jump into WoW right now, I'll give some examples.

For example, there could be a quest in which you have to collect 10 items by killing mobs, then combine the items to perform a ritual for example, then after you do the ritual a huge demon spawns. This all as 1 objective which you can all do without interacting with anything specific which makes it much more immersive.

Another example is a quest you sometimes get on your own without the involvement of an npc, you might have to investigate a crime scene or something and you keep going further on the investigation (which you accept an complete on the go).

Quests in which you have to talk to npc's in which you can choose dialogue which can turn the NPC against you.

Small bits of parkour, converting mobs and making them follow you and help you with ongoing fights. Having to escort NPC's, going to fight some kind of boss together with your questgiver.

Having to steal a key from guards to open the locks of prison crates to free your allies (and in return they help you fighting for example).

There's also some really impressive stuff from excort missions on vehicles, to litteraly turning into a flying elemantal and killing a giant boss on top of a huge volcano, these are likely impossible in ffxiv maps though and is probably a worthy sacrifice for the map details and graphics.

There's likely more scenario's I haven't mentioned that you will never see in current ffxiv, and I get that there's limit to what you can do with the size and graphics of the maps, but it doesn't change the fact that the objectives are very very repetitive. Variety is very rare, and the objectives are very linear. It just feels like there isn't much possible in ffxiv as far as open world content goes.

[ko_]

That's what it seems, but you'll really notice a difference if you jump into WoW right now, I'll give some examples.

For example, there could be a quest in which you have to collect 10 items by killing mobs, then combine the items to perform a ritual for example, then after you do the ritual a huge demon spawns. This all as 1 objective which you can all do without interacting with anything specific which makes it much more immersive.

Another example is a quest you sometimes get on your own without the involvement of an npc, you might have to investigate a crime scene or something and you keep going further on the investigation (which you accept an complete on the go).

Quests in which you have to talk to npc's in which you can choose dialogue which can turn the NPC against you.

Small bits of parkour, converting mobs and making them follow you and help you with ongoing fights. Having to escort NPC's, going to fight some kind of boss together with your questgiver.

Having to steal a key from guards to open the locks of prison crates to free your allies (and in return they help you fighting for example).

There's also some really impressive stuff from excort missions on vehicles, to litteraly turning into a flying elemantal and killing a giant boss on top of a huge volcano, these are likely impossible in ffxiv maps though and is probably a worthy sacrifice for the map details and graphics.

There's likely more scenario's I haven't mentioned that you will never see in current ffxiv, and I get that there's limit to what you can do with the size and graphics of the maps, but it doesn't change the fact that the objectives are very very repetitive. Variety is very rare, and the objectives are very linear. It just feels like there isn't much possible in ffxiv as far as open world content goes.

To be extremely fair. Every ff game is linear tho so SE isnt doing anything they don't do.

[TruebladeNuke]

I'll paraprhase what I said in another thread since it's more appropriate to this:

SE is TRYING to listen to the fanbase, but whenever they DO, another group pops up saying that's not what they wanted and that they screwed up, or the same group saying that's not what they meant and they screwed up. We wanted FATEs to be relevant again: Diadem; cue whining. We wanted the raid storylines to be accesible to everyone: Normal and Savage; cue whining because "MUH GATING". We wanted harder raids: Midas; cue whining because "TOO HARD". Complaining about the raids being too hard: Omega; now it's "TOO EASY, WE'RE CLEARING ON DAY ONE!!"; harder fight? Ultimate; whining because "TOO HARD! AND WHY DO I HAVE TO CLEAR SAVAGE FIRST?!?!?!" Don't want to level alt jobs? Role skills; "WHY DID THEY TAKE HALF OF MY CLASS SKILLS AND I ONLY HAVE 5 SLOTS!!". Want whole new content and the XI players want open-world NMs? Eureka "BUT IT'S TOO BRAINLESS". New type of content? Rathalos Ex; "IT'S TOO HARD! I HAVE TO LEARN TELLS!". Complaining about the Relic/Anima having too many steps? Eureka, again, just do the crystal farming, the relic was always supposed to be a grind weapon in contrast to the raid weapon.

And nothing comes from free, we've been getting less dungeons per patch because the dev team is too busy trying to tweak and test and create this new content from whole cloth to keep up the ARR routine, and SE doesn't see a big need to add more people (and they ARE hiring! so, you know, maybe learn some Japanese and you can take your complaints straight to them). (As an aside, asking for a game-changer every x-pac is a recipe for madness; complaining it's the same game as ARR is...well, it didn't suddenly turn into FFXVI when HW came out...)

I think it's a testament to how much Yoshi-P actually values the fanbase that he still does Live Letters and answers some questions that are clearly uncomfortable to him 'cause he still has to answer to the SE higher ups, even when he doesn't answer some that the fanbase has because he's answered them before but people didn't like the answer/the questions weren't as "liked" as the other questions that people are complaining should have been higher up.

Thank you for saying this. I was just thinking that as I was reading this thread. I'd add to this even, but doing so risks me un-bottling my searing rage on the matters of "Fanbases VS Developers" and why many, MANY game developers will never be able to win with their fanbases. (See the TV Trope "Unpleaseable Fanbase")

I think it's best I keep that bottled up.

[Rymm]

That's what it seems, but you'll really notice a difference if you jump into WoW right now, I'll give some examples.

I was playing WoW up until about 3 months ago.

But this is getting wildly off-topic, unless you are suggesting that FF14 should just do all the exact same things as WoW. People already accuse it of being a "WoW clone," usually as a detraction, so I'm not sure that's the best idea.

I can agree that FF14 would benefit more from more open-world content. The thing is, rather than the world quest formula that WoW uses, FF14's open world content is Hunts, FATEs, and Diadem/Eureka. The FATE system, much as I like it, really needs an overhaul to make it more relevant past leveling; it needs some sort of reward system. Unless they add more items from GC seals, there is really no reason to do them. The Hunt system has it's flaws too (very repetitive/in-fighting between players over kills,) but at least there are rewards worth going after from it. Diadem/Eureka is a mixed bag. They tried to give it more of an open-world feel but a large, vocal portion of the playerbase is dissatisfied with it, to put it mildly.

I can agree that the dynamic world quest system on WoW was a great idea and works well, but I still think that FF14 should do it's own thing; either overhauling its current open world content or coming up with something other than a ripoff of another game.