What keeps you playing?

[hagare]

necromancy

[Minarisweet]

My friends, my miqo'te and I recently started achievement hunting which honestly makes the game make much more sense... I recommend other people start achievement hunting too.

[Thaciscokidd]

Variety.

Play XiV do roulettes,pvp, alts and stuff til I get bored then go play WoW and World PVP and kill rares in Zereth Mortis, help people get AoTC before Season 4 starts and prog mythic, then go play Lost Arc(Since Tera is shutting down rip) then play an offline/mobile game (SRW, FGO, Genshin Impact, Elden Ring) then by that time my itch to play 14 starts again and I start the whole cycle over again.

[Vav2021]

Hi folks. Been off the game for a while after a massive bit of burn out. I'm finding it hard to go back. I'm just curious... What keeps you playing the game? Maybe I can find a new reason to enjoy. Thanks!

What keeps me playing? Well, for one, it's better than WoW. For a frame of reference of where I came from, here's a video I recorded about two months or so before I left.
https://youtu.be/YqoJOrWqCtU
It's 9 minutes long. I posted the video because nobody is going to believe me with what I am going to tell them: I was playing one of the most popular and renown MMORPGs in gaming history, on a "highly" populated server. In that video I posted, I chain-travelled to EVERY hot spot, mid-day. Ghost towns. I even went over to the Horde side, to find it empty. This is on WoW, a "highly" populated server, I need remind you.

I'm about five months into FFXIV. The community is active, and growing. It does have problems and could use some work, yes, but just about every MMO game does. This game isn't too difficult, and I like that. In addition to the gameplay dying, activision/blizzard started making very alarming business decisions -- from hiring the Leukophobic Misandrist, madeleine roux (Whom they did not comment on her hateful behavior), to actively attacking the player base. Speaking of the playerbase, you know what's worse than not hearing from the devs? How about having the game hijacked from the consumers, openly and unapologetically?


And again



I like the players. I like the atmosphere, the classes, the game doesn't have real world socio/political issues in it, I love the pets (especially the fat cat), the game just overall is a breath of fresh air compared to what I played before. I mean, for God's sake I see people arrange orchestras on a regular basis.

In short, what keeps me playing, is that it's good. To me anyway. And if you're a fellow WoW refugee, I have just one question for you....





Edit: Also, the Fat Cat is a factor on why I keep playing. It makes me smile, and brings me to a more positive attitude. It's just so adorable.

[Illmaeran]

I even went over to the Horde side, to find it empty. This is on WoW, a "highly" populated server, I need remind you.

That's one thing I appreciate about XIV; we have plenty of hub locations to hang out in. I'm in NA and play on a JP DC, so I'm between 11 and 13 hours behind the majority of the player base there. Yes, it's dead during my weekday primetime, but when I log on in the morning before going to work I see people all over the place. It's even busier on Saturday and Sunday; and I'm on one of the lower population servers. If I hop over to Limsa on Tonberry, that place is jumping. I can only imagine what it's like on a place like Balmung.

[MilkieTea]

I keep playing it because I derive joy out of it. There are things it can improve upon - if there weren't I'd be scared for the game because that means it's only downhill from there. But I feel as though what it does, it does well. I enjoy the story, the characters, glamming, and raiding. I recently cleared P2S (Not well, but I did it!) and my group is about to mount farm tomorrow. I'm working on leveling my alt, clearing my map of quests on my main, and just having fun.

[Theodric]

A combination of the following factors:

- There's no real viable competitors on the market at the moment that are to my liking.
- I like my character's design.
- The dreaded 'sunk-cost fallacy'.
- I'm lucky enough to own a mansion in-game.
- I still harbour some hope that my issues with the game will be addressed at least to some extent.
- Friends and associates.
- The new PvP mode is pretty fun.

[Foraet]

I think online multiplayer is a toxic wasteland and organizing gaming time with friends feels like trying to move a mountain. This game, for the most part, seems to be the exception. I get a lot of runs that are pretty chill with the occasional friendly banter and I like that. Sure it's not perfect; there are people who insist on being obnoxious or others who just gotta drag the mood down but it feels a lot more muted compared to other games I've tried.

Don't get me wrong, I'll drop my sub and play something else if I get bored. Only so many times I can run the same content before I need a break. I've got a huge backlog I need to tackle anyway.

[Nizzi]

snip

Former WoW players try not to stifle criticism of XIV by bringing up WoW every 5 seconds challenge (IMPOSSIBLE)

[Vav2021]

Former WoW players try not to stifle criticism of XIV by bringing up WoW every 5 seconds challenge (IMPOSSIBLE)

Don't folks have a right to compare a product to another? Take a man that's been drinking water in drops, and give him a water fountain, he's bound to tell you the water fountain is better than drinking drops of water. I don't know what your gripe is with someone referencing wow, and saying how much better XIV is to the former Genre Titan, but I think that the Drop Drinkers that used to play WoW have merit describing how much better the Fountain of XIV is.

Edit: Keep in mind, yes, XIV has flaws that need to be worked on, but it's still comparatively good.