My opinions on Flight and world design in FFXIV and my reasons for quiting the game.

[cbaltfist]

Firstly, I'm ready for this to be an unpopular opinion for lovers of this genre or the world of Final fantasy. I am giving my opinion as someone who normally does not play MMO's but really enjoys the dungeons in FFXIV but no other parts of the game. I first played this game in 2015 and LOVED it. But the complexities of the maps has increased 10 fold since then and FFXIV's dev teams ability did not rise enough to complement it.

I understand that unlocking flight in each area of the game only takes around 30 minutes, 15 minutes to do the quest, 15 minutes to find the Aether currents. However in many of the areas I have played in so far it takes an additional 30 minutes or more to get because of aether currents that are given by MSQ's vice side quests or are locked in parts of the map that you cant access due to the MSQ, ultimately intending for you to finish the MSQ in that area before unlocking it.

In most games I wouldn't be bothered by this since Maps are High quality making it easy to find your way around, or the maps are just relatively simple to navigate. In Final fantasy this is not the case. The zone maps in FFXIV are poorly drawn and labeled giving the appearance of "False paths" that should be there based on the map, but factually don't exist. The world of final fantasy is BEAUTIFUL; but no matter how beautiful it is, I lose my mind when I see constant issues of poor map design and knee high unscaleable ledges. I understand most people will grab my gripe with flying and ignore the rest, but the core of my complaint here is: Final fantasy does not do a good enough job designing their maps or parkour mechanics to justify limiting flight without the addition of some sort of guiding tool or parkour ability(I'm serious, even a simple thing like a higher jump or the ability to climb over a waist high ledge would fix 90% of this).
I would also like to talk about those MSQ's. The quests themselves are terribly boring. Fetch items here, kill mobs there, fight 30 some odd enemies while our unlimited mana healer protects you. Honestly, it seems like the quests are nothing but filler to get you from cutscene to cutscene. At any rate it is obvious where square enix funnels all their creativity. But this is forgivable, and I want to point out the unforgivable. Mob density in this game is absolutely insane. Before I started using stealth with a gathering class to help, I usually had to fight 10-15 enemies unrelated to my quest just to get to the location. On more than one occasion I failed a fight in a quest, not because of the mobs SE intended me to fight, but because of random mobs that got aggrod while I dodged an AOE attack or more frequently, respawned on top of me because the last guy to do this quest killed them before hand since it was the only way to do it without assistance. All of this combined just creates a grind to get you to put in more hours and pay them more money in subscriptions.

[cbaltfist]

My ultimate take on this game is that the only thing that would convince me to play it without improvements on the previously mentioned issues is the ability to skip ALL of the story missions to include the current expansion so I can get to the dungeons I enjoy so much, but at that point I'm not even played the game. I would like to remind people that when I first fell in love with this game before any expansions came out I didn't have an issue with any of this. I only quit playing the first time because of work related things. But now, it just feels like Square Enix has bitten off more than they can chew and released an inferior product aimed only at people that want to watch cutscenes and fall in love with the lore.

[Vahlnir]

I would probably disagree with you on just about everything you said. As far as the questing goes though, the only tedious part I can possibly imagine is going through the ARR post launch content. But I wish you luck should you decide to quite the game completely. It just might not be for you and that's totally fine.

[LisSquid]

I can't really agree on flight, but I have complained that zones are basically mob farms since SE moved away from ARR design. (I really miss the way they made the zones in ARR. I still walk through them because they feel like a world.)

But, yeah, half the quests in this game are go here to see this to go there to see that, when they could just have easily put those npcs in the same place. Or had some kind of courier send that message. We're the Warrior of Light, ffs! We have better things to do than be someones messenger. It really is just to pad time.

Sad to see you go, but hope you find what you're looking for elsewhere!

[Puremallace]

One thing I could see them doing over time is delinking the amount of Aether current unlocked via flight in say Heavenswards but keeping the Aether current. Honestly...... just unlock it since it is like 2 expansions old. There is a compromise here over time.

[Jeeqbit]

Flight should require completion of the MSQ in that area, because you only get the on-foot experience once and it's nice. Being able to fly would allow you to see parts of the map that give away what happens in the story. There just are parts of the maps that make it pretty obvious they are involved and give clues to what happens ahead of time.

You can collect the aether currents by pressing the compass on the way to each quest task and complete sidequests while doing main quests nearby and this makes it very efficient and painless. I have done it on multiple alts and it does remove the pain of collecting them most of the time.

The invisible walls and unclear maps are annoying but this issue is quickly eliminated by flying really.

You said quests require you to kill 30 enemies. That is true in other MMOs, but in FFXIV you are only asked to kill 3 enemies on average. I found this a big reason for me to play this game actually. More than 3 is about where you start to get bored and it becomes grindy.

Yes the game is mostly full of cut scenes, but those cut scenes give context to the dungeons, trials and raids that you do, making them more enjoyable and have more fun mechanics.

You complained about fighting enemies on a gathering class. I found that to be part of the fun of a gatherer - that you had to avoid enemies. As you said, they did change it because they listen to player feedback.

As you have said the story and cut scenes are a big part of this game. It's a story-driven game and that's not for everyone. If you did buy a skip as you seem to have implied, getting through Shadowbringers isn't that hard. I've skipped through shadowbringers on multiple alts. Just spend a weekend doing it and it's out of the way.

[MPK]

Dude people only care about the actual content. No one visits old areas unless they're doing maps.

[ItMe]

One thing I could see them doing over time is delinking the amount of Aether current unlocked via flight in say Heavenswards but keeping the Aether current. Honestly...... just unlock it since it is like 2 expansions old. There is a compromise here over time.

I have a pal who's just hit Shadowbringers.
Today I realized that while trying to play catchup one of the many things they've neglected is unlocking flight as they move through areas, even though they feel limited and hampered by being stuck on the ground.
I wonder if they couldn't also make it so old expacs unlock entirely through MSQ, just like ARR flight does.


Also, OP, sorry to see you go.
I hope you find satisfaction wherever things take you next.

[Allegor]

I can't really agree on flight, but I have complained that zones are basically mob farms since SE moved away from ARR design. (I really miss the way they made the zones in ARR. I still walk through them because they feel like a world.)

I really miss ARR style zones too, when you saw a building it was an actual building you could go in, some with npcs inside and all, but pretty much every single "building" in SB for example, is just a giant cube with a paintover, and that really kills the illusion of it being an open world rather than just a stage.

As for the aether currents, they're a joke compared to "complete every single quest in every single zone, get exalted reputation with several factions, complete like 100 fates, and complete this ~3 months long, time gated questline, and when if you're all done, wait for like a whole year till we unlock the feature anyways"

[Kyrj]

Flight should require completion of the MSQ in that area, because you only get the on-foot experience once and it's nice.

I could disagree with this. The on foot experience in FF14 boils down to Talk to Guy 1, Guy 1 sends you to Guy 2, Guy 2 can't help but he knows a Guy 3 who can, Guy 3 sends you to a purple goop ring and you fight two mobs, Guy 3 sends you back to Guy 1. Sometimes the Guys send you to an actual fight and you fight a Primal that gets stomped on in 2 minutes. MSQ in a nutshell.

Also there's a nude Y'shtola every once in a while, I'm also taking bets on if we'll get a scene like that in Endwalker.