Glamour Outfits is a good direction, but...

[NegativeS]

...remind me again why, after 11 years and 5 expansions, we still need to be shackled by the Dresser at all?

There is so much gear in this game. So much gear with wildly different styles, each suited for a different type of player or event.

For years I've been on the Dresser treadmill, pulling out gear that I still use for Glamour to make room for the New Thing™, filing the old into the absolute dumpster fire of this game's inventory management, likely never to be seen again. If I'm lucky, I'll notice it a few years down the line and put it back into the queue of things to be filed back into the Dresser where something else will take its place. If I'm unlucky, I'll be clearing out a retainer or my saddlebag and not even notice when it's been shredded down to the byte.

Hell, I've entirely stopped putting weapons and accessories in the Dresser because they just take up too much space. All my weapons are glamoured manually from my inventory (read: dumpster fire of this game's inventory management), and all my accessories are just singular items that I think look good with everything I wear.

You know what game I never had problems like this in? World of Warcraft.

Even before they redid the transmog system to make it infinitely better, I never had problems storing all the gear I used. Their banks and inventories are spacious and easy to organize compared to what one character would need, and while it was a pain to have to pay gold for transmog every time, they made up for it by adding ways to do it from anywhere in the world, without needing to retreat to a city/inn.

After they redid the transmog system? It might as well be perfect (aside from still needing to pay gold for it). No gear cluttering my inventories, so much room for sets I can't tell you if there's a limit to them, and a way to actually search for items I want by category, source, type, and name without needing to leaf through the pages like a damn bureaucrat.

And the worst part is, despite a WoW character not needing nearly as much space for this stuff as a FFXIV character, they still made the change. If WoW had the dresser and XIV had the catalogue, I don't think I'd care as much.

See...

What I'm trying to say here is, such a fundamental system to the game shouldn't be so crimped by the creative decisions of a single man. And I know it's a fundamental system because it's all there is to do in endgame unless you are lucky enough to get a house or feel like grinding your patience down with Ultimate-grit sandpaper. And I know it's the creative decisions of a single man, because it's those creative decisions that have also crimped housing, and PvP, and job design, and (depending on who you ask) the story.

I guess this is what we get for playing a JP game, apparently they take their lumps like something else over there. Why listen to people with standards when you can still make money not doing that?

Just add the Glamour Catalogue. Just do it. Do it. Nobody wants the dresser anymore. It isn't cute or thematic enough to warrant it superseding all other options. We literally use magical crystals and glass panes to project clothing holograms onto our bodies, and you're telling me I'm still forced to use a tiny box in a room I don't even own to store everything?

So stupid.

For any further inquiries, please see my signature.

[Hypnotic13371337]

Something tells me that they never thought of a plan for something like the Tmog system in wow when first making the glamour system in ARR and the dresser is their best attempt at it.

If they can't throw the glam toilet in the trash and come out with a PROPER Glamour system then it will always be a disappointment.

Wow does it, GW2 does it. Hell, Blade and Soul pretty much HAS the glamour dresser, but its a UI Element so you always have it on you. If 14's excuse is "Sphagetti code" after having around 10 years with the Glamour system, then thats their fault for not fixing that sooner.

[Shougun]

Something tells me that they never thought of a plan for something like the Tmog system in wow when first making the glamour system in ARR and the dresser is their best attempt at it.

If they can't throw the glam toilet in the trash and come out with a PROPER Glamour system then it will always be a disappointment.

Wow does it, GW2 does it. Hell, Blade and Soul pretty much HAS the glamour dresser, but its a UI Element so you always have it on you. If 14's excuse is "Sphagetti code" after having around 10 years with the Glamour system, then thats their fault for not fixing that sooner.

In 1.0 forums I and some others asked for an item log, they were working on it- it came with lore quips. They scrapped the idea due to amount of work (which I'm sure was a lot, is a lot still), but man if they had kept at it that would have been amazing.

[mallleable]

I bet the last dev who tried to tackle the dresser got consumed by the jank, and was never seen again or heard from again. D:

[Hypnotic13371337]

In 1.0 forums I and some others asked for an item log, they were working on it- it came with lore quips. They scrapped the idea due to amount of work (which I'm sure was a lot, is a lot still), but man if they had kept at it that would have been amazing.

I'd love to see those same devs that answered how they would answer now lol

[NegativeS]

In 1.0 forums I and some others asked for an item log, they were working on it- it came with lore quips. They scrapped the idea due to amount of work (which I'm sure was a lot, is a lot still), but man if they had kept at it that would have been amazing.

I don't even see how it would take that much work.

I'm sure they already have a database or list or variable or SOMETHING containing every equipable item in the game (and if they don't then they're stupid and this game deserves to shut down yesterday).

Make a UI window that shows all of these items in a list. Then add character-specific (or if you're feeling spicy, account-specific) flags for each item denoting that that item has been soulbound before. Doesn't have to be a ton of data, just a simple true or false. If true, the item appears in the window. If false, it doesn't. Anything in the dresser already or in inventories/retainers can be automatically grandfathered in.

Then just... connect it to the existing glamour plate system.

Unless the spaghetti is orders of magnitude more tangled than even the most pessimistic person might be led to believe, this is something a CS undergrad should be able to do in their sleep, with both hands tied behind their back. Hell, I'm a college dropout with only hobbyist game dev experience, and I could probably bust out the framework for such a system in an afternoon, tops.

The only reason I can think of why it hasn't happened yet is because of a purposeful decision.

[Sekundessounet]

"I'm sure they already have a database or list or variable or SOMETHING containing every equipable item in the game (and if they don't then they're stupid and this game deserves to shut down yesterday)."

They definitly have, the issue is not "putting it into the game", it's "making it work into the game without completely crashing the servers or destroying character date because of the humongous amount of data the server would have to load for each player at all times". Add to that the spaghetti code that they had to work with since after 1.0, and it's a nightmare to develop.
Yoshida has already said that he would definitly like having such a system in place better than what they have now.

[Zakuyia]

Yeah....i forgot isn't this game built on spaghetti code not yandere dev levels of spaghetti but spaghetti

[Shougun]

I don't even see how it would take that much work.

I'm sure they already have a database or list or variable or SOMETHING containing every equipable item in the game (and if they don't then they're stupid and this game deserves to shut down yesterday).

Make a UI window that shows all of these items in a list. Then add character-specific (or if you're feeling spicy, account-specific) flags for each item denoting that that item has been soulbound before. Doesn't have to be a ton of data, just a simple true or false. If true, the item appears in the window. If false, it doesn't. Anything in the dresser already or in inventories/retainers can be automatically grandfathered in.

Then just... connect it to the existing glamour plate system.

Unless the spaghetti is orders of magnitude more tangled than even the most pessimistic person might be led to believe, this is something a CS undergrad should be able to do in their sleep, with both hands tied behind their back. Hell, I'm a college dropout with only hobbyist game dev experience, and I could probably bust out the framework for such a system in an afternoon, tops.

The only reason I can think of why it hasn't happened yet is because of a purposeful decision.

You know how when you enter the game you get a queue? Like the game CAN handle you, but it makes you parse out into smaller numbers 'to' handle you? The issue here is making a system that players can access that has thousands of variables, wont crash the game, and fits the framework they've set up. Is a glamour system as we 'want' it possible? Yes, we've seen it like 5 times by now. With WoW being the easy hand point. Is it going to be easy in FFXIV? Who knows, but they told us it was hard, and we do know from WoW that (if I'm remembering correctly) hired a third party team to work on just that system.


With how they described code early on, and how we see they have memory limitations- it seems like they've opted for very stable, very predictable, also limited and not dynamic systems.. Instanced housing, glamour logs... these things hate static understandings. Like how they described memory management in like.. 2013 lol, was very much how I remember learning C code.. its known, its loaded, its ready to goooooo. Meanwhile later I was more like "Don't care, we'll know where we're going when we get there! We're going to ride this baby until you run out of resources" ALL YOUR RESOURCES ARE BELONG TO ME!!! (just like chrome ). Or for your 101 programming class, how a string works in C vs in C++.


Do I think SE gets a pass just because of all that? No, but I do imagine that they would have snapped their fingers already if it was possible. Just to shut us up lol.


Additional insight, Yoshida is a big fan of Dark Age of Camelot, he's an old school hardcore gamer. I imagine this is one of the reasons why our bosses are so invested (incredible music, visuals, and pretty good mechanics). Anyway, If you look at that game's housing system, its basically ours. I hate it, I think it was a bad choice, but it is what it is and we / they made it worse by allowing players in (though if they didn't let players in I'd still hate it lol, I am a diehard instanced player-- wildstar, ESO, type stuff is gold). Originally it was only FC and I think the housing system would have handled his desires / the way the system was designed far better if houses NEVER accepted players....buuuuttttttt we wanted dat housing, and thus we have many ghost wards (which defeats really the only benefit). So I think housing started intentionally to what it was, but given player desires they shifted but couldn't change the freight train's direction very well.


Also my personal thought is Yoshida can make a life raft from a coconut and two strands of rope, and this is what allowed him to save FFXIV from 1.0-- having 1.0 play while they remade it for 2.0. Efficient with what is given to him; however, I think a mix of his own style and also likely heavy clamping from above (because people like making money, not spending it) that he and 'they' have a hard time reinvesting oodles of gil or ripping the freight train off the tracks if they believe minor adjustments can be 'good enough'. Which to explains why we don't have what he might think are superfluous systems and unneeded investments in dev tools, but are, imo, what are creating a sandblasted experience where texture is only lost each expansion and we all rely on the story or dungeons. Like why in WoW when you walk on corrupted blood it corrupts you, but in FFXIV when you walk on the moon its the exact same experience as if you walked any where else. When you walk in the sludge of Ultima Thule, its just like water.


The overworld is a tunnel to lead you to MSQ / bosses. I respect the responsibility of his position, so many jobs, and players, rely on him not to mess it up... so its easy for me to be here and be like "if only they would have done X" but.. I'm going to do that now lol, and I think through all the problems / I / experience but also a very common problem I'm seeing grow can be explained through the fact that gameplay is streamlined into such narrow beams. Even when they add a new system they use the very similar beam on it, like in Island Sanctuary they hardly added any new game system (they added none if you don't count excel as gameplay). I think his ability to optimize and plan (I mean our patch cadence for years upon years was incredible), is now also becoming a problem.


The ship is not agile because it's planned out for years, the ship is not very creative because it isn't the conservative path forward. While we're told we are treading into waters unknown with a new patch or expansion, you can mentally play the whole thing out except for very specific contents which if they don't hit hard will dull the entire experience (like if the story is lacking, or if you dont LOVE the new raid). I think the exploratory zones were appreciated by some because it was new, though I think in general if I have to compare to me it just seems like a more narrowed borrowed power system from WoW... if we were going to do that I just imagine "why not have all the zones in that expansion be cool, and add new zones that are unified as an experience" instead of making an instanced that'll die with cool things that will be forgotten.


...So yeah.. I kind of get it, but I still want what I want and hope the game will be the best game that it can be (though that is obviously seen through the bias of my eyes). Also contextually I have been on the drums of instanced housing and glamour logs, consecutively, for probably the longest (seeing my absurd post count, and the majority of it being feedback / desires).

[AyumiCosplayGlam]

Im sorry but if a code is that bad, that they are unable to put a hat on a Viera consistently, can't create more races because its such a headache to put one together or create an easier to handle glamour system, then maybe, just maybe they should have been reworking the whole thing in the background for years at this point.

With patch cycles getting longer and longer they better be working on it and hard, because i sure as hell dont see what justifies it otherwise.

If we think about it, the WoW glamour system is just an achievement system if you break it down. We literally have that system working in the game right now and we can grab gear directly from the achievement panel as of right now, the only thing we cant do is grabbing it multiple times which should be so easy of a fix that it takes like 5 minutes for someone who works on the game.
All they would have to do to create a 1000 times better glamour system, is creating an "achievement" for acquiring the gearpiece, once completed, it allows you to grab the gear associated with it anytime you want.
Dare i say its also possible to create these achievements for putting certain colors on said gear and you could grab those as well from that point.

This is literally all they would have to do, it is not rocket science, its all already existing and working code. The reason they haven't done it yet is exactly why it took 2 years to reach a point where a materia change dosnt break our portrait, and the reason why their website is borderline unusable. Which is to put it simply, overcomplicating simple tasks.