Tanaka was Right!

[HyoMinPark]

Just popping in to say that Tanaka did nothing wrong and was scapegoated by SE because they didn't want to give him enough time to actually finish the game so they outsourced it to China and, in order to save face, fired Tanaka. People like to pretend like Tanaka is definitely The One Guy responsible for 1.0 being garbage, but it was literally an upper management problem. Just wanted to correct the record for those that weren't aware, especially since XIV recently saw an influx of new players from Shadowbringers. Alright, cya!

I mean, he certainly didn't help the game. After all, he thought us having a basic jump function wasn't necessary, and he thought having a minimap would take away the "fun" of exploration and finding out way through the hot mess that was 1.0 Shroud....

[SpookyGhost]

I mean, he certainly didn't help the game. After all, he thought us having a basic jump function wasn't necessary, and he thought having a minimap would take away the "fun" of exploration and finding out way through the hot mess that was 1.0 Shroud....

I mean, the jump function still isn't a thing in XI and it works just fine (as it's designed around not needing to jump). I'm personally a fan of minimaps, but you could easily make the argument that in an MMO forcing people to interact with eachother is a large part of the philosophy of the design - and taking away easy navigation tools means you have to actually talk to people and ask them how to get to X.

e: To be clear though, I'm not saying Tanaka is perfect or anything, he made some really awkward decisions with XI too. But he's definitely not the sole person responsible for 1.0 being garbage, similar to how Yoshi-P isn't the sole person responsible for reviving it in 2.0.

[xbahax92]

L

I mean, the jump function still isn't a thing in XI and it works just fine (as it's designed around not needing to jump). I'm personally a fan of minimaps, but you could easily make the argument that in an MMO forcing people to interact with eachother is a large part of the philosophy of the design - and taking away easy navigation tools means you have to actually talk to people and ask them how to get to X.

e: To be clear though, I'm not saying Tanaka is perfect or anything, he made some really awkward decisions with XI too. But he's definitely not the sole person responsible for 1.0 being garbage, similar to how Yoshi-P isn't the sole person responsible for reviving it in 2.0.

As the leading director he takes the full blame, be it his or his team's fault. Even if he had good ideas and is being scapegoated to hell, he took that position willingly and he should of known that it can be risky.
What I am also wondering is, why he hadn't the guts to redo the game back in 1.0 then. I guess he didnt want to take more risks?

[Daralii]

I mean, he certainly didn't help the game. After all, he thought us having a basic jump function wasn't necessary, and he thought having a minimap would take away the "fun" of exploration and finding out way through the hot mess that was 1.0 Shroud....

Don't forget using full mocap for every single cutscene. It looked great, and I wish there was easing on any of the transitions between the stock animations now, but what a horrible waste of time and money.

[Ayuhra]

I mean, he certainly didn't help the game. After all, he thought us having a basic jump function wasn't necessary, and he thought having a minimap would take away the "fun" of exploration and finding out way through the hot mess that was 1.0 Shroud....

I mean not being able to jump was a little annoying but how often do you jump in real life?

Clearly he was just trying to give the game realism!

[Wanzzo]

I mean not being able to jump was a little annoying but how often do you jump in real life?

Clearly he was just trying to give the game realism!

It was impossible when you see that some areas are just copy/paste of the same terrain. I remember outside Ul'Dah. The same pattern repeated 3 or 4 times until you reach vesper bay '-'

The 1.0 gave the sensetion that it was an incomplete game but with no room for improvement since they chose a bad engine to build the game. I remember back then they saying that they needed to learn more about the very engine to try different things in order to improve the game. Someone with more experience in MMOs would easily see that engine wouldn't fit in any MMO since games of this kind need a constant refinement and expansion of contents and features changing the scripts and making them more complex. Picking a wrong and not know engine from the start was their big mistake and Tanaka was parcialy to blame...

Wrong decisions, bad knowledge of MMOs and engine and unprepared stuff.

I don't hate him, but it's a little impossible to give him credits. He's like that bad tanker in the roulette whose don't know his job well and never get all the enmity and never uses his AoEs. In the end, it's a little impossible to give him commendations :P

[Nemmar]

None of that sounded good... so... too bad for you.

[Mikhaill]

Me when who people like 1.0 for x reason
and everyone comes to send them to the stake.

[Iromi]

I wouldn't mind him coming back and introducing some stuff. He had some really good ideas in FFXI (also had bad..but let's just use the good please lol)

I'd love to see his take on longevity for content and gear. Also wouldn't mind to see him design some fights. Doubt that will ever happen though. Afaik he is done.

Fun fact..the JP do not blame Tanaka for 1.0's failure..they blame Nobuaki Komoto, who is actually still on the XIV team and he is the one who makes all the content everyone seems to complain about (relics, eureka, etc..anything with the grind? he makes it, and did in FFXI too) the JP playerbase really, really dislike him. In FFXI he was in charge of an expansion where end game and other content was inaccessible unless you had cleared the previous expansions end game resulting in a lot of people claiming false advertising and unsubbing.

He also made the crafting, desynth systems, etc. He made the Ehcatl putty, if anyone remembers that, which Yoshida did not even know about until the patch went live back then and caused a lot of issues with players due to how grindy it was..iirc.

Anyway you can google him if you want and find out a lot more. It's just puzzling how ONLY Tanaka got the blame and I am sure he has some, of course, but not all, when the truth was that the CEO rushed FFXIV out which is why it had no content and everything was just crap..talking about 1.0 only, not 1.x, along with this Nobuaki Komoto fellow, who JP players blame for the 1.0 mess.

[Fayt1203]

I wouldn't mind him coming back and introducing some stuff. He had some really good ideas in FFXI (also had bad..but let's just use the good please lol)

I'd love to see his take on longevity for content and gear. Also wouldn't mind to see him design some fights. Doubt that will ever happen though. Afaik he is done.

Fun fact..the JP do not blame Tanaka for 1.0's failure..they blame Nobuaki Komoto, who is actually still on the XIV team and he is the one who makes all the content everyone seems to complain about (relics, eureka, etc..anything with the grind? he makes it, and did in FFXI too) the JP playerbase really, really dislike him. In FFXI he was in charge of an expansion where end game and other content was inaccessible unless you had cleared the previous expansions end game resulting in a lot of people claiming false advertising and unsubbing.

He also made the crafting, desynth systems, etc. He made the Ehcatl putty, if anyone remembers that, which Yoshida did not even know about until the patch went live back then and caused a lot of issues with players due to how grindy it was..iirc.

Anyway you can google him if you want and find out a lot more. It's just puzzling how ONLY Tanaka got the blame and I am sure he has some, of course, but not all, when the truth was that the CEO rushed FFXIV out which is why it had no content and everything was just crap..talking about 1.0 only, not 1.x, along with this Nobuaki Komoto fellow, who JP players blame for the 1.0 mess.

Though Nobuaki still works on FFxiv he not the lead director anymore. there where many factors that 1.0 fail using game engine that was used for FF13 and did struggle on that was never made for mmo but they still used it, then the details were to much(funny how that works flower pots anyone) even high end computer´s that trouble running the game,server structure and many more, the management was just bad on FFxiv side and on the Square side. Tanaka was the Producer at the time and he he took on him self the responsible of the mess..