Play other games :)

[Misplaced_Marbles]

God, DON'T get me started on them, AND the problem is, the community largely SUPPORTS them! Yeah, they can be great for driving players to a goal, and getting players back into games for each season, but they are inherently AWFUL. This is a trend I absolutely detest in games. Literally, like every game has one now too! It's a matter of severity; just how much they expect you to grind for it. Combining fomo with it all too.. "Oh it's just cosmetics".. I LIKE cosmetics. -.-

Consumerism, not even once.

[TowaIsBestGirl]

God, DON'T get me started on them, AND the problem is, the community largely SUPPORTS them! Yeah, they can be great for driving players to a goal, and getting players back into games for each season, but they are inherently AWFUL. This is a trend I absolutely detest in games. Literally, like every game has one now too! It's a matter of severity; just how much they expect you to grind for it. Combining fomo with it all too.. "Oh it's just cosmetics".. I LIKE cosmetics. -.-

People will pay for cosmetics. They will gleefully pay dearly for cosmetics they are highly unlikely to ever obtain from that accursed gacha. FOMO is cancer, and I gladly condemn any who defend it for whichever crusade they woke up and chose to embark upon that day.

Well, given how even some of the most ardent naysayers around here who left for a bit still came back and are actively playing again, apparently the answer is "not yet."

Also, the "play other games" thing has been around for years (it's nothing new), and it simply points out how FFXIV allows you to do exactly that without feeling like you've fallen insurmountably behind. It's a game that actually values your time and basic healthy things like diversifying what you play for fun rather than no-lifing one game.

After his most recent break, as soon as he reappeared so did a whole giant group of you who all vanished around the same time. That's definitely not suspicious at all.

Have people just missed the fact that a free login campaign took place recently? I highly doubt those posters who apparently according to some hate this game are paying a dime at this point in time. Why would they, when Square is so willing to let them game and post for the low, low price of free?

[Avoidy]

Across every mmorpg I've ever played, when it became clear that standards were objectively slipping and people brought this up, we'd always get told to just quit if we didn't like it. I'll never understand this perspective. Barring some obvious trolls, generally speaking someone who cares enough to waste their time going to the forums to address the game's trajectory probably isn't just doing it to shit on your favorite toy. They don't want to quit. They want to watch the game succeed where so many other mmos peaked and then got complacent and failed before it.

People who enter threads that are critical of the game and just reply with a meme image saying they didn't read it or whatever, are some of the cringiest people here. Not only are they bumping the thread to the top for more people to see, but they're also declaring to the world that they're too stupid to read a few paragraphs, too undisciplined to just scroll past a topic they're exhausted by, and wholly unable to produce a real counterpoint.

[Gemina]

Bored? That's fine! It's what Yoshi intended, and he knows best!

Unsubscribe, let your house lapse, let your FC lapse.

Let the bots take over, let the fake FCs take all of the wards.

Only sub during MSQ, then promptly unsub to..

Play other games.

Translation: "My need for validation from anonymous forum posters in a vast echo chamber is quite high. Please smash the like button as my self-esteem is very much at stake here. TIA!"

[R041]

Translation: "My need for validation from anonymous forum posters in a vast echo chamber is quite high. Please smash the like button as my self-esteem is very much at stake here. TIA!"

Hell yeah brother, smash that like button

[Renalt]

Across every mmorpg I've ever played, when it became clear that standards were objectively slipping and people brought this up, we'd always get told to just quit if we didn't like it. I'll never understand this perspective. Barring some obvious trolls, generally speaking someone who cares enough to waste their time going to the forums to address the game's trajectory probably isn't just doing it to shit on your favorite toy. They don't want to quit. They want to watch the game succeed where so many other mmos peaked and then got complacent and failed before it.

People who enter threads that are critical of the game and just reply with a meme image saying they didn't read it or whatever, are some of the cringiest people here. Not only are they bumping the thread to the top for more people to see, but they're also declaring to the world that they're too stupid to read a few paragraphs, too undisciplined to just scroll past a topic they're exhausted by, and wholly unable to produce a real counterpoint.

It's because we have seen it before. Multiple times. By the same people. That's why they do it. It's why I did it till I decided to just ignore them instead.

Now I just focus on better things. I wish the others would follow suit and ignore them too but I do not speak for them and can only be in control of my own actions and control how I act.

[Semirhage]

Ah yes, the eternal playerbase argument over the relic grind. "Tomestones are boring" leads to "lol you all asked for this when you said you didn't want to do Eureka".

Whaaaaaaaat, players bored with grindy repetitive content didn't want to go into the Korean Grinder MMO Fate farming corral? Clearly there's no pleasing them, they didn't want to do the boring repetitive grind or the boring health sponge field mob grind. Those are the only two options.

[Deo14]

Well, given how even some of the most ardent naysayers around here who left for a bit still came back and are actively playing again, apparently the answer is "not yet."

Also, the "play other games" thing has been around for years (it's nothing new), and it simply points out how FFXIV allows you to do exactly that without feeling like you've fallen insurmountably behind. It's a game that actually values your time and basic healthy things like diversifying what you play for fun rather than no-lifing one game.

Curious that I have never heard this "just play other game" in my 11 years of playing GW2 off and on. That game actually allows you to take a break, whenever you want, however long you want, unlike here, where you can throw your gear into trash once it's 2 patches old and you also risk missing out on content like V&C, since it dies in a week. My ascended armor I crafted back in 2014? Still BiS. My legendaries? Still super prestigious. All while having no subscription fee.

GW2 isn't overconfidently vertical like FFXIV, content released years ago is still active, worth doing, is close to original difficulty, and most importantly, is designed like MMORPG. All the while the game is still being super casual friendly. Being social there is much easier.

So where's the difference? The game let's you play the game. I know, shocking. It has enough content to keep you occupied, devs have mastered creating something out of nothing. Something that is impossible if you develop content with no longevity in mind. Devs do not need to make excuses like "You can play other games" because they cannot provide content.

Obviously, you will get burned out, just like in any other game, for me, it's usually after 3-6 months. So you do get breaks, but it's when you decide you want to take a break, you're not forced to stop playing just because there is nothing meaningful to do. After a while, I'll come back, try to remember what was I doing last time I stopped and choose if I want to continue it or check new things. I've been doing this for 11 years and I never felt forced to take a break.

Inb4 SE apologists will try to convince me that I hate this game, even though I love this game, and I just want it to be better.

[Ath192]

Curious that I have never heard this "just play other game" in my 11 years of playing GW2 off and on. That game actually allows you to take a break, whenever you want, however long you want, unlike here, where you can throw your gear into trash once it's 2 patches old and you also risk missing out on content like V&C, since it dies in a week. My ascended armor I crafted back in 2014? Still BiS. My legendaries? Still super prestigious. All while having no subscription fee.

GW2 isn't overconfidently vertical like FFXIV, content released years ago is still active, worth doing, is close to original difficulty, and most importantly, is designed like MMORPG. All the while the game is still being super casual friendly. Being social there is much easier.

So where's the difference? The game let's you play the game. I know, shocking. It has enough content to keep you occupied, devs have mastered creating something out of nothing. Something that is impossible if you develop content with no longevity in mind. Devs do not need to make excuses like "You can play other games" because they cannot provide content.

Obviously, you will get burned out, just like in any other game, for me, it's usually after 3-6 months. So you do get breaks, but it's when you decide you want to take a break, you're not forced to stop playing just because there is nothing meaningful to do. After a while, I'll come back, try to remember what was I doing last time I stopped and choose if I want to continue it or check new things. I've been doing this for 11 years and I never felt forced to take a break.

Inb4 SE apologists will try to convince me that I hate this game, even though I love this game, and I just want it to be better.

Deo for president.

[SturmChurro]

...

Yep! I have been playing GW2 again as well since last year, when I was previously taking a hiatus from the game (again, still am, all I did was log in to post). I like being able to hop in and out whenever I want, and there are always people doing content in the world. I really don't like feeling like I have to play something. At the moment, I am working on getting my skyscale. It's nice to have something I can work on at my own pace, and well, just something to look forward to getting after putting in the time and work. There really isn't anything like that in this game, at least in EW. Similarly, it's why I have been surprisingly enjoying my time in Genshin, taking the open world at my own pace, with a nice amount of little collection and completion mixed in.

Simply put, if FFXIV continues like it is, there is very little reason to put much time into it. I don't even really bother gearing out anything other than my WHM, and even now, it's very out of date. I literally haven't bothered to grab the last relic weapon.