Quote Originally Posted by MsQi View Post
The housing wards are the deadest zones in the game. Thing is the inside of the house is instanced. It's not like you can be walking along and see people through the window, which I'm sure people would complain about if that were possible. Iirc Wildstar gave you a big plot of land in your own instance, but you also had neighboring plots. SWTOR housing is instanced but it feels much less claustrophobic. It would be cool to have your own floating island in the Sea of Clouds.
XIV's housing just bums me out. Honestly, this game should not have limited housing. I'd love for them to introduce proper-instanced housing that is available to everyone. Not just an apartment-like instance, but something with a nice view, decent yard, house you can just walk right into without having to zone (again). Make it feel open and airy. As you mentioned, most wards are incredibly dead and empty. It was a nice idea, but it's just not something that seems to work that well in XIV.


Wildstar had amazing housing! It was fully instanced, but everyone got their own island to themselves - and early on in the game as well. They later added a community feature where 5 players could all live together in one instance - each still with their individual plots, but on one giant island. You could tweak so much with their housing, and some people were just insanely creative. I loved visiting the various islands to see what people could come up with. Sadly, I got into the game far too late (never reached max level before they shut it down). Tis a regret of mine

I think my own personal favorite for housing is Archeage. It's out in the open world, and they have such a huge variety of different homes and buildings you can choose from. They have a basic homes, fancy gilded homes, farm houses, farm land, plazas, gigantic beanstalks, treehouses, mansions, and other things. It makes for rather unique looking housing areas (which are scattered all over the place). Since it's all out in the open, your windows and doors open up into what's outside and you don't have that awful boxed in feel. The downside there is that it is finite space, so you may not always be able to get as much land as you want right off the bat (can always wait for demos or buy from other people though). I miss the housing quite a bit D:

BDO also has an interesting take on housing. They have phased housing (I believe that's the term). It's a bit like the apartments in XIV where everyone just uses the same entrance, but there is no cap to how many people can 'own' the same location. They have available rooms and houses scattered throughout towns and in the outskirts as well. You can rent as many as you like, as long as you have enough contribution points to do so. Also, you can still see the world outside your window so again, so it helps a little bit with that closed-in feeling you can get in some games. TO ME, it still felt a bit boxed in, but I really enjoyed how much flexibility it gives you.

The only other game I've played with housing was XI. But even there, every player got their own mog-house (apartment type instance) that could be expanded to add a second story, patio, and had a large garden instance. Compared to games now, it's definitely lacking in some spots, but I was always nice to see them expand it over the years.