Cultural Differences, North American Strangers

[CianaIezuborn]

Sasakusaku, I will try to clairfy, I'm not really a mean person so i'll try to clear precisely what I mean. Through the story progression you only are forced to group with strangers temporarily, fates and DF last from a few minutes to an hour and you never see these people again unless you go out of your way to try to friend everyone you see in a fate or dungeon. What i'm talking about is that there should be mechanics which promote real grouping on your server, of the sort where you need to form bonds and real friendships with like minded individuals just to progress through the game. Some people play mmos because they want to be the most badass and show off their gear. Ya know, i can be badass by playing Devil May Cry...I play mmorpgs not just to play a fun game, but primarily to be SOCIAL in a fun game. In this game you are not really urged to make real bonds until you get to the point that DF during end game content becomes almost a negative. Do you see what I mean here?

On the other hand, when i read about the DF and fate situation on JP servers, as soon as you get into a DF dungeon people are automatically chatting and saying things like nice to meet you and such and so it appears that on their side, the mechanics we have work well to form friendship relationships for them via random stranger grouping. That simply isn't the case on our end.

I think Jayrune put it best with "if you want to be social, be social". I'll throw my two cents in to the pot though.

I tank. When I'm in a dungeon/party/whatever with my FC mates or friends, I'm social, though usually in Ventrillo. I prefer to party with them, for the social aspect and the obvious advantage to having static groups. When I do use the duty finder, or hell even if I form a pug group to take into the duty finder, my objective and my responsibility to the group is to pull my weight to get us through the content. I didn't hit Join Duty to play some weird game of FF14 chat roulette hoping I'd get paired up with a cute cat girl that I can dance around with and talk about my feelings. I'm there for the big Duty Complete message at the end and I'm assuming the rest of the folks are too.

The most I usually say involves 3 lines at the beginning, 1 at the end, and fight strats if neccessary.

"Hey guys"
"Anyone not know the fights?"
if "I don't" then
"Alright I'll pause before tricky encounters and summarize"
else
"Alright, pulling"
finally
"Thanks for the run guys"

To that extent, you won't see me chatting you up in party chat, I'm concentrating on holding aggro, marking targets, tagging patrols, and over all making sure we get through this bus ride without a hitch. I don't mind if you want to sing Kumbaya on the way, but don't expect me to sing along and keep your eyes on the road. My social responsibility is to be civil and courteous to people I meet, but that doesn't mean I have to be your friend. I have friends, I like my friends, I like the fact that I get to choose my friends. If I had the urge to sing Kumbaya, I'd likely sing it in Vent with my friends.

That could be considered a cultural difference between American and Japanese, though I doubt it from anecdotal evidence that I've encountered from the very limited amount of Japanese born people I know.

Regardless of the cause though, you might think the guy on the bus is rude because he won't have a conversation with you, but know that he thinks you're rude for not leaving him alone and letting him ride in peace.

[Jayrune]

So what I get from the OP is that the OP thinks that players should be restricted in their options and forced to play the game in a way that requires people to take the time to form groups of people that get along with each other, instead of simply letting players who want to form groups of people that get along with each other do so and those that do not want to do that to not have to do that.

I cannot agree with or support the assertion that one group of people should be forced to do something for the benefit of another group, MMO's can be fun for the solo player too and you don't have to worry about them. If you want to be social, then be social.

I suspect that this is actually just a veiled reference to trolling via duty finder, where a tank will exit mid fight cause he/she is pissed off or likewise for a healer. I would agree that trolls need to be dealt with but i do not think restricting the options of the entire playerbase is the appropriate response.

When you say it like that it definitely makes my post seem pretty bad, but in my experience, the mmos in which you pretty much weren't going to get very far on your own although they were a pain...in the end those were the games which to this day I still have the people who i grouped up with as facebook friends and we go from game to game because we remember the hardships and accomplishments we went through to get to and conquer end game content etc..

I personally feel that grouping oriented gaming is in the end a much better system than a solo oriented game with the random stranger grouping and completely optional make a friend here and there scheme.

Fair enough, we'll just have to agree to disagree.

[Yoko_Kurama]

So what I get from the OP is that the OP thinks that players should be restricted in their options and forced to play the game in a way that requires people to take the time to form groups of people that get along with each other, instead of simply letting players who want to form groups of people that get along with each other do so and those that do not want to do that to not have to do that.

When you say it like that it definitely makes my post seem pretty bad, but in my experience, the mmos in which you pretty much weren't going to get very far on your own although they were a pain...in the end those were the games which to this day I still have the people who i grouped up with as facebook friends and we go from game to game because we remember the hardships and accomplishments we went through to get to and conquer end game content etc..

I personally feel that grouping oriented gaming is in the end a much better system than a solo oriented game with the random stranger grouping and completely optional make a friend here and there scheme.

[Yoko_Kurama]

Because the moment you substantiate your claim, it no longer is advice based on opinion, it becomes a research paper which if you live your life only choosing to give your opinion to people only when you have research and citations backing up your opinion than that is your choice and you probably are pretty boring person at parties lol.

An opinion can be (and in certain contexts, should be) backed my evidence. There are multiple ways to interpret and understand the information that is given to you. Opinions about what you like or prefer mean nothing and can be formed however you want them to be. If you're talking about large groups of people and attributing certain traits and attitudes to them, you better be sure you know what you're talking about if you don't want to look like a fool/offend other people. Even more so if you're giving advice.

This is understandable I suppose, but in the sense of an opinion which is trying to bring to light some cultural differences which seem to be obvious to me in this game, it would be impossible to interview every american and every japanese player in this game. Thus, all I can do is talk about my opinion based on my personal experiences in this game and any other game and people who i talk to in forums and in game etc...These ofcourse do not truly qualify as citation because in the end all of that information would still be from my perspective correct? If this is true then from the very beginning you asking for citation or facts is ridiculous because it's impossible. Do you understand what I mean here? You have a great grasp of English grammar and composition of ideas and sentences but it seems like you keep bullrushing everything I say without actually thinking about what you yourself are asking for.

[Ssuusshhii]

Because the moment you substantiate your claim, it no longer is advice based on opinion, it becomes a research paper which if you live your life only choosing to give your opinion to people only when you have research and citations backing up your opinion than that is your choice and you probably are pretty boring person at parties lol.

An opinion can be (and in certain contexts, should be) backed my evidence. There are multiple ways to interpret and understand the information that is given to you. Opinions about what you like or prefer mean nothing and can be formed however you want them to be. If you're talking about large groups of people and attributing certain traits and attitudes to them, you better be sure you know what you're talking about if you don't want to look like a fool/offend other people. Even more so if you're giving advice.

[Aenarion]

If you're talking about large groups of people and attributing certain traits and attitudes to them, you better be sure you know what you're talking about if you don't want to look like a fool/offend other people. Even more so if you're giving advice.

Unless it's Americans, there is just something about those 300 million+ people that just makes for spot-on sweeping generalizations

[MochaLatte]

If we look at the population results posted from the recent live letter... it's almost 50% guys/girls playing in Japan. Versus 60% guys, 40% girls playing in NA/EU.

Many guys playing video games in NA are competitive, aggressive towards others while playing, critical of others, impatient, etc...NOT friendly. Look at the behaviors of people who play CoD, WoW. I would think that has something to do with the unfriendliness of the NA community.

[Ssuusshhii]

I don't see the problem. Even when I was using dungeon finder, the incentive to not be a tool and be nice with others is that it's more enjoyable and effortless than slamming a bunch of people you know nothing about for no gain. The story continues level 50 and onwards and encourages you further to form a community once you've gotten a feel for the game.

Also, if you don't care enough about your opinion to do some research (over a large and sensitive topic) and actually substantiate your claims, I fail to see why you posted it, why you bumped it, or why you feel you're knowledgeable enough to give advice to SE when you don't even know what you're talking about.

[Alpheus]

I stopped reading the initial post when I hit the whole Nuclear Plant Crisis v. Katrina thing it just rubbed me the wrong way. I'm tired of this trivializing of individual actions of goodwill just because the frat boys/jocks gave you the MMO equivalent of a wedgie or w/e the hell you wanna call it. Stop with the pedastaling of one community over the other it accomplishes nothing and makes you look like a child who can only think in simplistic good v. bad terms.

[Aenarion]

Thank you for proving my point; willing to bet you may treat others outside your FC like dirt. Just like your response to me.

I'm not sure you have any ground to stand on yourself. Your generalizations are actually far more offensive than anything he wrote. While he may be guilty of poor grammar, you are far closer to those "terrible Americans" than he is.