This game is on a terrible state right now.

[Atelier-Bagur]

That's attributed to several reasons, be it the method of obtaining them. People have endlessly complained of the method and the choice or lack thereof, and their response was to just tie it to tomestones, giving people the greatest degree of flexibility possible. Even relics back in the day of ShB for step-2 were churnable within a couple of hours if you so wished, and similarly could do many stages concurrently. I'd argue the grind was just as easy back then, frankly.

Good then you're of a fairly cohesive argument and we can quite as happily conclude that the product has always practically been in this state. It's absolutely nothing new in this regard, as much as people would like to parade otherwise.

Dungeons were always corridor simulators with very very little in the way of threatening design.
Relics were always garbage that recycled older content and gave a false illusion of bountiful content, under the guise that the cookie for once was tasty enough for you.
The content was a once-in-once-out-esque piecemeal. People were hardly on the edge of their seats getting excited over Doman Reconstruction aka the weekly piecemeal. Just as people weren't lining up in droves to experience the umpteenth failure of exploratory Diadem.

My point is, and as I have said at an earlier point in time, absolutely nothing is new with this respect and people are just looking at their older experiences with rose-tinted glasses, and could hardly see the fact that if they were to release an expansion the exact same as HW or SB right now, then absolutely nothing would change, if you were starved with EW, you'd be just as starved had they released any other expansion at this point in time. Well, minus the fact we'd be complaining about Pagos and/or poetics.

Im so glad Im not the only other person that truly sees the game from behind the curtain.

Literally every single player who tries to play the nostalgia factor of previous expansions having better systems and combat fall short because they werent anything substantial. This game has always been this mediocre and the funny thing is, our generation is slowly adapting to liking "mediocre". Everything needs to be streamlined, everything needs to be simple, everything needs to be accessible, if the product wants to succeed in todays age and market.

Of course there are always exceptions but when it comes to MMOs this seems to be the norm

[R041]

Im so glad Im not the only other person that truly sees the game from behind the curtain.

Literally every single player who tries to play the nostalgia factor of previous expansions having better systems and combat fall short because they werent anything substantial. This game has always been this mediocre and the funny thing is, our generation is slowly adapting to liking "mediocre". Everything needs to be streamlined, everything needs to be simple, everything needs to be accessible, if the product wants to succeed in todays age and market.

Of course there are always exceptions but when it comes to MMOs this seems to be the norm

You're kinda right and wrong I think - Back then, we were pretty content with doing even basic grinds like Materia Farm because the classes themselves didn't seem as braindead as they do today. So yeah the shit content was there, but it wasn't so glaringly obvious that it was shit because stats and abilities had some nuance to them. That and open world could actually kill me.

[Moonlite]

You know maybe Relic needs to be rethought. The relic is limited and late to protect raiders feelings. Since they deleted/merged job quests. A weapon quest that is tied to the job and you do each patch.



Or something else completely different. Just because something was always done one way doesn't mean that needs to be the case.

[Kaurhz]

Im so glad Im not the only other person that truly sees the game from behind the curtain.

Literally every single player who tries to play the nostalgia factor of previous expansions having better systems and combat fall short because they werent anything substantial. This game has always been this mediocre and the funny thing is, our generation is slowly adapting to liking "mediocre". Everything needs to be streamlined, everything needs to be simple, everything needs to be accessible, if the product wants to succeed in todays age and market.

Of course there are always exceptions but when it comes to MMOs this seems to be the norm

Yes, it has always been this way. People just cannot look past the nostalgia of being a new player. If people were to look beyond this fact they'd see that, in fact, nothing has changed, most especially if you're to view relics as not being content, and just some arbitrarily boring grind.

You could have released absolutely any expansion in the place of EW and people now complaining about lack of content would still be complaining about lack of content regardless of what expansion they were to place here. That's just a consequence of being a long-standing player.

The older systems weren't anything substantial, just different. Different in a way that was more annoying. Carbonized matter for materia melding was not a great system and added absolutely nothing onto that system, bar another monotonous gatherable item that added absolutely nothing of value whatsoever to the overall system. Was spiritbonding really that great of a mechanic when the conversion of the gear meant the particular piece of gear was lost e.g., farming V materia via Carbonweave? Most especially when the census is that xyz is in fact not content. Or did people just bite the cookie because they were told they had to and at the time knew no better?

Not saying that anyone thinks otherwise but people are really kidding themselves if they think HW/SB was doing it any better.

[Padudu]

That's attributed to several reasons, be it the method of obtaining them. People have endlessly complained of the method and the choice or lack thereof, and their response was to just tie it to tomestones, giving people the greatest degree of flexibility possible. Even relics back in the day of ShB for step-2 were churnable within a couple of hours if you so wished, and similarly could do many stages concurrently. I'd argue the grind was just as easy back then, frankly.

Good then you're of a fairly cohesive argument and we can quite as happily conclude that the product has always practically been in this state. It's absolutely nothing new in this regard, as much as people would like to parade otherwise.

Sorry if it looks fucky, mobile is not playing nice with me

Who was arguing that it was new? People are saying that it just simply.. isn't considered content, or at the very least, content that people want to do.

[Kaurhz]

Sorry if it looks fucky, mobile is not playing nice with me

Who was arguing that it was new? People are saying that it just simply.. isn't considered content, or at the very least, content that people want to do.

It happens regularly on practically every single thread. HW/SB so great, amazing, gib more plz. Was able to do more in less time, hurray. etc.,

You'll find one on the first page of this thread #4 post in fact if you're devoid of references. (Also sorry, I'm known to go on tangents at times)

[Kaurhz]

You know maybe Relic needs to be rethought. The relic is limited and late to protect raiders feelings. Since they deleted/merged job quests. A weapon quest that is tied to the job and you do each patch.



Or something else completely different. Just because something was always done one way doesn't mean that needs to be the case.

My memory is foggy, but if I am to recall correctly, back in ARR the relics were actually aligned in such a way that they were used for that set of raids on the patch. E.g., I think the Animus weapon was released with the base patch for 2.2 which put it on the same schedule as SCoB.

It needs to be sooner, with more filler stages and needs more proactive progression e.g., x.2, x.28, x.3, x.38, they don't necessarily need to be more substantive. More steps, smaller in the way of grind per step and it'll be good, I think.

[Padudu]

It happens regularly on practically every single thread. HW/SB so great, amazing, gib more plz. Was able to do more in less time, hurray. etc.,

You'll find one on the first page of this thread #4 post in fact if you're devoid of references. (Also sorry, I'm known to go on tangents at times)

Ooo okay yeah they're smoking lol. I think relics just haven't hit a sweet spot tbh. The grind is either too much (AR, HW) or too little (EW). I think SHB had a good amount of grind, the only problem is that it's locked behind sorta dead content (well, dead if you try to solo it. Easier if you go through the Bozjan discords). I don't think I've ever found a person personally to enjoy ARR/HW grind LOL at all.

[Incinerator2]

It happens regularly on practically every single thread. HW/SB so great, amazing, gib more plz. Was able to do more in less time, hurray. etc.,

It only seems like ShB/EW was just the same old if you naively compare the content 1-to-1. But they weren't 1-to-1. An HW/SB alliance raid was worth more than an EW alliance raid because you actually need to learn what's going on. Some mechanics, like disorientation, the rotating exaflare etc. were first introduced in alliance raids. By contrast an EW alliance raid felt samey even for the first time. Eureka Orthos is worth less than PotD, because PotD was fresh when it was introduced in HW. Orthos isn't new: people have literally done the same ol' already. If you compare PotD to Orthos 1:1 and you don't see the problem I don't know what else to tell you.

Beyond the copy-paste content we now get in EW, all classes and jobs have been dumbed down. This removes a huge chunk of playtime dedicated to mastering a class, both combat and DoH. It probably took me more time to learn HW MCH than to learn EW SMN, RDM, WAR, DRK, GNB, WHM, SCH, AST, SGE combined, and the latter was also more boring. Only EW BLM counts as real content these days.

People call the predictable content delivery stale but that's only because you can expect the same mechanics, same playstyle, and these days even the same storyline from each patch.

And yes, most of the side content they make is incredibly shallow. But Island Sanctuary has somehow managed to be even shallower than Eureka Anemos, and the only saving grace is the criterion/variant dungeons. You know, if they just stuck to their guns and kept pumping out more Eureka/Bozja style content and used it as a vehicle for making creative 48-man raids and unique job playstyles with actions they could've gone far. The reason they didn't is obviously because it's expensive to do so and "spare no expenses" is a lie. Eureka and Bozja started out crap and ended fine and ready to be built on in the next expansion.

[TomsYoungerBro]

You're kinda right and wrong I think - Back then, we were pretty content with doing even basic grinds like Materia Farm because the classes themselves didn't seem as braindead as they do today. So yeah the shit content was there, but it wasn't so glaringly obvious that it was shit because stats and abilities had some nuance to them. That and open world could actually kill me.

I think this is the main point people seem to overlook. "Its always been this way" isn't necessarily true. Its not just the amount of content that has changed, but also the tools we tackle said content with. I'm not saying every nuance of classes was good (as I can only indirectly speculate on those as i started in late ShB), but I can agree with those who did play back then that the classes now are very plain and samey. It ruins the replayability of the existing content cycle. Not to mention the content itself has also been simplified as well. TOP/DSR are harder than any of the 70s/80s ultis, but those older fights feel more engaging. You can also see this when you compare 90 savages to current Omega raids. P8s is considered one of the harder savage fights, but it isn't as engaging as say O12s O8s or O4s as an example.