Tanaka or Yoshi?

[Mushy]

I love how there's so many people talking about how great XI. I'm not going to doubt that it was probably very good.. but I remember when I first started playing it. It was horrible in comparison to other MMORPGS.

And if your look at the XI forums now about all the news going on with that game, it doesn't seem like a very happy community to me =)

Sure Tanaka had ideas.. however ideas might seem lovely until they're put to practice in which they're not that great.

My only hopes for this game, is that there are more things to do than do daily quests, dungeons, and raid (WoW), and that 2.0 is awesome! :P

FFXI in in hay-day was amazing. Though I quit after CoP(life got busy..what can ya do?). I forgot when Tanaka left - but current XI has nothing to do with tanaka. all I know is Rise of Zilart, and CoP were MMO masterpieces

[WinnipegJet]

What I find hilariously sad is those people who say xiv should branch off have the original xiv at release(which they claim they would pay for) and have yoshi-p's version. I only bring this up because I see the surface of that idea being touched upon here. I do not understand how ANYONE could want what final fantasy xiv was at launch. I know its like... an opinion but come on... xiv at launch was complete and utter crap and everyone knows that - hence why there was such a quick staff change when it launched. I don't remember how many months after release that took but it was QUICK, and thank you SE for it. because I sure as hell wouldn't of been here today along with a lot more people not including those who left initially probably forever.
They are smart in doing this welcome back campaign. My friend is going to come back on May 9th to try it - and if not then hes going to give it another shot at 2.0. It is the best thing they can do to get people back.
I also think the damage was already done so bad that 2.0 should even shed the XIV name, and just go for Final Fantasy Online. let it be the first of that. Then with future FF MMOs they can do FFO2, FFO3 and such. That will also please the non-mmo playing crowd as we dont take up their mainline #'s. AND yes I am serious about rebranding it. I think it will let people know it is truely a new game

This. Friends of mine who previously dismissed the game (without playing it) are now considering picking it up come 2.0 as a result of changes they've SEEN (and NOT me selling them on it).

So, good job to the devs. Remember: marketing, marketing, marketing!

[UmJammerSully]

Way too little love for Yoshi here, the current team has more or less salvaged the game from a pit of despair in my opinion. Considering how poorly the foundation of the game was set out and the annoying limitations the current dev team are working with, I don't see how anyone could argue that a complete redesign wasn't in order.

All eyes are on 2.0 to see if they can truly deliver though.

[Valmonte]

So, good job to the devs. Remember: marketing, marketing, marketing!

Marketing is the bane of video games...if you have to spin the brown pile of crap to make it look golden in Marketing it usually means the game isn't even worth review.

[Gentaro]

I like that Tanaka had a different approach instead of just making an MMO thats just as the rest - on the other hand I feel like blaming him for doing really EVERYTHING different.

The usual reaction by a company would have been -> F2P, milk as much money out of the people as you can, shut down servers - I'm glad SE didn't do that to fix the problems instead.
Because of this we're able to experience a really unique MMO - Usually you start at level 1 and end up at the cap, no matter if you start during release or 2 years later. The story being told feels like its happening now, instead of working yourself through a story, you're living it.


But for the next MMO: PLEASE put as much afford in it as in FFXIV - but PLEASE don't refrain from "copying" some things, you don't need to invent a Conjurer, its ok to have White Mages and Black Mages, nobody will be mad if you copy FFXIs elemental wheel. It is possible to create a unique game experience even with those things, but then you can also Call it a Final Fantasy game

[WinnipegJet]

Marketing is the bane of video games...if you have to spin the brown pile of crap to make it look golden in Marketing it usually means the game isn't even worth review.

Even in this case, where they're trying to show the world that the crap game that initially was no longer exists?

We'll have to agree to disagree.

[elreed]

Maybe Tanaka is still doing his stuff from the shadows, i wouldnt think SE that fool to loose a good producer because a failed release that they even brought by greed, Yoshida has been doing every single thing that was planned with some tweaks, FFXIV returned from pure inovation to a FFXI sequel (of course in a positive way), they have upgraded the armoury system with jobs, i dont think the FF feeling is being lost, in any case i think is being reassured, when this game was released i didnt felt nothing special on it, even without considering all the flaws it had, it didnt had the FF feeling,

Since patch 1.18 the feeling has been growing, today i did the new company quest and i was impressed how everything changed from being a dumb paper doll adventurer to an Eorzea heroe, i saw that coming since job quest, but anyways i did the Limsa Lominsa one and it felt epic the way the leader engaged enemies, the speech the way my character walked into battle while everyone else was running away.... You know the epic feeling that Final Fantasy always had, i havent tried hamlet defense yet and i know this are only the blueprints for 2.0 so i have a good feeling as how this game will be by that time.

So as i said i dont think Tanaka's vision is gone at all, every good or bad planning team makes a general blueprint of the game in advance so they know where they're going, imho i think we're seeing all that Tanaka planned but executed and released with the quality that it should had for a FF game

[Valmonte]

Way too little love for Yoshi here, the current team has more or less salvaged the game from a pit of despair in my opinion. Considering how poorly the foundation of the game was set out and the annoying limitations the current dev team are working with, I don't see how anyone could argue that a complete redesign wasn't in order.

All eyes are on 2.0 to see if they can truly deliver though.

Yoshi can weave a good story, ill give him that and who knows maybe he can save this game. however the shear amount people that think he's the golden grail is concerning, again what has he truly accomplished that Tanaka with all his experience in the FF franchise couldn't?

the man wasn't even given the chance to fix his project...hell he wasn't even allowed anywhere near it.

[bobbygunz]

Yoshi and Tanaka were and are both fundamentally flawed. A lot of what the original development team wanted to implement was quite ambitious (the lack of jump, swimming, etc, notwithstanding), but they obviously tried their best to create a huge noninstanced world (and eventually realised they couldn't with the current engine, and hence we get repeated land formations), they also wanted to create a robust crafting system (and it ended up quite punishing for beginners), and they also wanted to give players their own ships and such (although that was never realised either), but the fact is they tried.

Where Yoshi fails is he doesn't try to realise their dreams, and falls back to the status quo. That is to say, smaller zones, simplistic crafting (although now it seems they recognise the value in complex recipes), autoattack, generic class builds, and so on. In some respects Yoshi is ambitious too (he would like to add jumping and swimming, and good on him) but where he falls short is the vision for what an MMO should be. The previous development seemed set on creating a more sandbox world where player interactions were pivotal, and Yoshi is more about instanced raids and chasing the next piece of gear or Primal weapon.

Tanaka made a lot of mistakes. But look at Yoshi too. What about auto-attack slated as a "combat revamp"? Also the gear-dying fiasco where colour of gear was restricted to classes (an idea which he blamed on his underlings... something Tanaka sure never had the privelege of). What about Yoshi's reverence for tehempark MMOs like WoW which were last-gen's games? He's as tired as Tanaka ever was, and doesn't have the excuse that he's trying something different.

To me it all comes down to Yoshi's abandonment of active combat, and Player-run Companies, and his destruction of the Open World style of FFXIV (all of which were part of the original vision). These things call into question his position as a better leader than Tanaka. I always hated Tanaka, but be that as it may, Yoshi fails where Tanaka succeeded.

[Rokien]

tanaka and yoshi just need to make a baby. Problem solved