The new Standard of Gaming?

[Farore]

So, this post is going to become quite massive. I'm incorporating pieces of old posts I've written to support what I'm talking about here. :P Sorry for the wall, but I hope it's not too bad a read!

Now, my biggest issue with this game is the style of combat they've implemented. At its core, the combat in this game is fantastic, and could very well set the stage for newer MMO's to come. The way they've implemented it, however, is horrible. My biggest concern regarding combat is the 2.5 second global cool-down (GCD) that is in place for both melee and spellcasters. While this may be fine for some of you, it raises several issues in my mind that need immediate attention from the little section of the development team that handles combat.

So why is a 2.5s GCD so bad, you ask? Well, this game is an MMORPG, which is characterized by an active style of combat, rather than a sit-and-wait approach that console games would take. I don't know if SE was trying to take the classic style of Final Fantasy and smash it into the MMORPG world, but it certainly isn't working very well. According to many, having a longer wait between attacks means that gameplay is more tactical, and more thought-inducing, I couldn't disagree more. When you have nearly three seconds between each attack, you're in position for the attack long before it's even ready, and you're already getting ready to make your next attack. Combat doesn't feel so much like combat, as it does a carefully choreographed dance between you and the monsters you're fighting.

Now, my solution to this problem is fairly simple. By reducing the GCD for melee (spellcasters will be different) to ~1-1.5 seconds, we eliminate a lot of the waiting around and the slow feeling of combat. By forcing the player to make split-second decisions about what they're doing, you make combat much more active, rather than passive. Now, with an attack speed so much faster than what the game is used to, you'd run out of TP very quickly. To solve this issue, we would have to look at it from a few different ways. We could increase the rate at which TP generates baseline, which would enable us to chain together our attacks without going totally dry. We could also take a look at the TP cost for abilities, and decrease / increase them as needed, making our TP able to sustain our attacks. We could also add another effect to Skill Speed, making it also increase the rate at which our TP regenerates. With those three systems in place, I feel the TP would sustain our attacks just fine, but we would still have to be careful not to exhaust it with our fancy attacks.

Spellcasters are slightly different. Since they rely on MP, which regenerates much quicker than TP, it wouldn't need so much tweaking. However, a 2.5s GCD is a bit long for a spellcaster. I would suggest somewhere around 1.8-2s, which still feels like a caster - with strong, slow attacks. This would make it easier to weave those instant cast, on GCD, spells into your rotation. Since we would use MP much quicker, we would of course have to reduce the amount of MP use of some spells, and we could also make Piety effect MP regeneration, which would keep us in a healthy level of MP.

Implementing those changes to the combat system would make combat so much more fun, and I wouldn't be bored after only two weeks!

The classes in FFXIV are great; there are so many of them to choose from, and they are all unique, interesting experiences! (Right?)In this game, I feel there is so much homogenization going on, that even Activision (Blizzard (WoW)) would be out-done! Every class feels very similar, and they really don't feel like unique walks of life; rather they feel like different flavors of the same thing.

Can you honestly tell me that you feel unique as a Dragoon using Heavy Thrust, compared to a Monk using Twin Snakes? Both attacks do extra damage from the flank, and both attacks increase your damage done by X% for a little while. Can you tell me that you feel unique using Thunder as a Thaumaturge, as compared to an Arcanist using Miasma (aside from the disease part)? My point is, all of the classes (melee, spellcaster, healer and tank classes are in their own categories) have the exact same skill-set, with very minor changes between them. In order to make each class feel unique, something needs to be done to their available skill-set. I'm not sure what you could do, but I'm sure if you boys at development put your heads together, you could figure something out.

Another part of class homogenization is the lack of any kind of special mechanic. Every caster class uses MP exclusively, and every physical class uses TP. Where's the unique mechanics, unique resources? In the description, the game tells us that Monks use seats of power called Chakra to power their bodies to do their attacks - so why not give us Chakra, a resource we build up over time, to power some strong attacks? Say you have three potential Chakra, and each attack puts a little bit of energy into one. As you attack, the Chakra fills up, and you can spend up to 3 of them on really strong, or useful, abilities. That would make the Monk stay true to their description, and add a unique flavor to the class, rather than maintaining some silly buff (can you say Thaumaturge / Black Mage?). For Dragoon, a guy who fights dragons and all that, let's add resource called Draconic Fury or some-such. As you use certain abilities, it builds up (a numerical value), and you can spend it on Dragoon-exclusive abilities like jumping attacks, drop attacks, all that. For Paladins, you could have a resource that starts at the max value, let's say that's 100. This resource increases your defensive capabilities passively (based on the number you have), but this resource is also spent to use some of your more Paladin-like abilities (heals, defensive moves, etc.). So you would have to manage both maintaining your Light Energy (it needs a name, right?), and spending it to stay alive. It could either passively regenerate, or just fighting can generate it. For Marauders, I'm going to pull something right from WoW here - simply put, a clone of the rage system. As Marauders attack, they generate Bloodlust (Why not?), which powers their more unique abilities. They have some abilities that are free to use (but cost TP, of course) that generate Bloodlust, and other moves that consume it.

The classes all feel the same, wouldn't you agree? I know I didn't cover all the classes, but I'm sure development can come up with some interesting mechanics to keep the classes unique.

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That's it for copy-paste time! Now, with what I've said before, you can get a deeper insight into what I'm talking about below.

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It's a bit depressing, what gaming has become. The quality of games these days is just abysmal. Developers are releasing half-baked games that are not fit for public release, but they'll just patch it later, so it's ok. With a society that demands easy access to the game for 'casuals' (AKA - people who don't want to work for it), gaming as a whole has become easy to the point of boredom. Gone are the days of trying over and over to get past a certain boss or a certain fight, gone are the days of working to get what you want in the game - gone are the days of gaming. Just the name, game, implies the possibility that you could lose; well, I can't even remember the last time I was stuck in a game, or unable to down a certain boss; even playing on the hardest settings possible, the game is still trivial at best. That's nothing when it comes to MMO's, however.

So what is a 'casual'? According to many people I ask, they are the people who have real-life concerns, and as such, only have a few hours to play a day. Now I ask, since when is that any different than the rest of us? Once you get a job and all that, you spend most of the day at work. So why, then, do the developers of today's society feel the need to make all the content readily, and quickly, available to people who play for no more than an hour a day? For those of us who play for more than an hour a day, you've done everything within a week, and then the game becomes a grind and it's just boring. Video games are a commitment. They will eat up your time. If you don't have the time to play video games, well, then boo hoo for you. I don't think developers should center their games around people who really shouldn't be playing video games in the first place. That's only one of the ways that video games are becoming easy, though.

Do you remember the last time you couldn't beat a certain boss, or the last time you couldn't get past a certain part of a video game, and you'd have to sit down and think about what you were going to do, and try to figure out how to win? I certainly remember dying a few times in Final Fantasy 4 (JP), until I figured out how the fight worked and how to win. I also remember dying in the old Zelda games, but not after I figured out what I was doing. Now in today's society, everybody is a winner, no matter how horrible they did. I think that, now, this ideology is moving into the video game realm, and has been for many years. Video games take a certain kind of intelligence to be really good at, and it might make others feel bad. So how do they fix that? They make the games so predictable, so linear, so easy that even someone with a mental impairment could flourish in them. Is that right? Perhaps the average intelligence is dropping with each new generation, and people just can't figure out the games anymore. Maybe, though, the developers are losing interest in making good, quality games in favor of making a quick buck. If everyone can beat it, everyone will buy it, right? Great business model for a few months, but what happens when everyone gets bored?

So in console games, we generally have a difficulty slider or setting to make the game 'harder' to beat. Well, even at the highest possible setting, I've yet to see a game that has actually challenged me. I believe this ties into my last paragraph, but why has the game become so easy, even when it's supposed to be hard, and will destroy me according to the game? MMO's, on the other hand, don't have a difficulty slider. They're at a static level of difficulty, which feels like the slider is all the way to the easy side, and even then some. What could possibly be fun about a game if you never have even a slight risk of losing? Sure, winning is fun, but when you don't work for it, it's kind of a hollow victory, don't you think? I remember being so happy I finally beat a boss, or beat a game. The complex story would come to a close (or a partial close, allowing a sequel), the game world would be saved, and since I had to work for it, I felt heroic, and I felt good about it. Nowadays, it just doesn't feel the same. You beat a game, but you never died once, and nothing ever posed a threat. You won, sure, but what did you win - a participation medal?

So by now, we've seen a plethora of games released that are nowhere near ready to be released, but are released anyway, under the assumption that they will be patched later on and then everything will be fine. Are people so impatient today that they can't wait a little longer for a quality game to be released? I'm sure many of you have played Diablo, and Diablo 2. There were many, many years between the release of the two, but guess what? Diablo 2 is still widely played to this day, and has many more loyal fans than the new Diablo that was rushed. Time usually produces quality, but in a world that needs everything now, they're not willing to wait. Then after the game is released, these same people that weren't willing to wait are now complaining about bugs, or lack of content, or something along those lines. It just seems a bit, well, moronic to me.

What has happened to the gaming world? I always thought that games would be made for quality, not to just make a quick buck. How wrong I was. At this rate, games will become little more than social engines with something to look at in the background - many games already feel that way. Where's the thought-inducing boss battles, the countless deaths / losses to get past something... where's the chance to lose?

In this game we have so many signs that they're placating the 'casuals':

1) A long GCD, which makes combat easier because you have more time to think about what you're doing, and more time to react to what happens to you.

2) Pigeon-holing jobs into very specific skill-sets and roles, which takes the thought out of creating a class, thus making it easier to understand and use.

3) A very low number of abilities, which make it easier to figure out what to do, because you have very few buttons to ever push.

4) FATEs that give ridiculous amounts of experience, and developers that say this is how it should be. Simply another way to expedite the leveling process.

5) Bosses that are just laughable and feel like a big trash monster. Making fights flashy doesn't make them hard, sorry.

6) Combat skills all do relatively the same thing. There is very little variation, and not many situational moves (there are some, but not many).

7) All classes are homogenized to the point of being a puddle of goo. They all have the same mechanics, they all have the same resources, they all do the same thing (within their respective role). There are no unique mechanics (aside from maintaining silly buffs, or pets), resources or playstyles - this is to make it easier to switch between classes / jobs.


I don't think I'm going to continue with this game beyond my free month, and I know you don't care, but I have a question.


What happened to the gaming world? Why do games get released like this? What happened to the challenge?

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This is new typing, after reading what people have been talking about. Since I'm limited to about three posts a day (which is stupid), I'll have to update my main post to respond to many ideas that have been thrown at me. Sorry if I sound like I'm getting mad or anything, but that's the way I sound when I respond to people. :P

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A lot of you guys think that a game shouldn't really start until you reach the end. Well, I couldn't really disagree more. A game, just like a book, should be interesting and engaging throughout the whole thing. If a book was just boring until the very end, and then it suddenly became a great book, would you read it? If this game didn't have the fancy Final Fantasy name tagged onto it, would you really want to play a boring game for weeks until you hit 50, and then farm for a few more weeks to get into the real content? I just don't think many people would! A good game, just like a good book, starts out a bit slow and introduces ideas and the world to people. After that, the story kicks into gear, and things start moving, and there are ups and downs throughout, not a (very slight) linear climb that suddenly leaps ahead at the end. The difficulty should look like a wave, not an L (on it's side). Granted, some fights are a bit harder than others, but they don't feel hard enough. Titan has the potential to wipe out all of Limsa Lominsa, yet he never killed me more than once (my groups wiped nearly 20 times, but I was always the last to die, so I really only died the first time I did the fight, since I was still learning). How is that anything like what a boss should be? In the spirit of Final Fantasy, remember the three witches in Final Fantasy 4 (JP)? I died several times to them, even after I had figured out how to beat them. You know why? The difficulty was such, that if I messed up in the slightest way, I would die. I had to, brace yourself, think about what I was doing. Where is that kind of gameplay here? Once you learn the mechanics, the fight is a cake walk. I think the boss should be hard enough that you can still die even if you know all the mechanics of the fight.

On the topic of boss fights, I'm going to copy a paragraph(s) from one of my old posts.

Now, I don't know about you, but I've never been challenged by any of the boss fights I've done so far. I understand that you have to make content available to everyone, but there's a point when you're taking it too far. Every boss fight is just like a regular monster, but it's a bit flashier and does more damage, with a lot more health. How does that make it all unique from a giant trash monster? I believe that more mechanics should be added for just boss fights, so that we're always kept on our toes, rather than fight a great big trash monster. I just did the Titan fight yesterday, and somehow the group died many, many times, but the fight was very easy, and I was always the last one standing. The fight was just too predictable, and all his attacks are easily avoidable. There needs to be some element of unpredictability to both boss monsters and normal monsters. Here are a few suggestions I have for the Titan fight:

So right now, we have Landslide, Tumult, and Geocrush as his main moves. The moves are fine and dandy, but they're a bit easy to deal with.

Landslide takes a while to cast, so you have more than enough time to move out of the way. If I were to design the move, I would make it instant cast, but it wouldn't go the full length instantly. Make the move look like a real landslide - When Titan smashes the ground, a giant shockwave forms and begins moving outwards. If you touch the shockwave, you go flying and take a lot of damage. Rather than the big line we have, it feels a little more dynamic.

Tumult is fine as it is, but it could do more damage, maybe take the DPS nearby to ~20% health, and give the healer a reason to be awake.

Geocrush is fine as it is as well, but it needs to do more. When Titan jumps into the air, several rocks fall from the ceiling, which players can't move through. Players must maneuver through these rocks, and make it to the edge of the platform, or they take much more damage. When Titan lands, the rocks are crushed and the platform is open once again.

That would make the Titan fight much more interesting, and a tad more difficult to beat. Right now, most content is a joke. I realize fixing one fight won't fix the game, but if you have an idea of where difficulty should be, then you can adjust other areas of the game accordingly.

In general, combat is just too easy. When a monster winds up to use a big attack, you have what, five seconds to move out of the way? I could do that using my nose on the keyboard. Monsters need to have an array of instant attacks, DoT effects, wind-up attacks (with a MUCH shorter cast time), defensive moves, and so on. Of course not every monster will have all the different types of attacks. Certain types of monsters would have certain attacks. Right now, every monster just kind of beats on you with auto-attack, and uses a wind-up every now and then. Where's the fun in fighting the same monster a bazillion times over, but it just looks different each time? I'd like to see a bit of variety!

A lot of people are saying that the game is easy at first to get new MMO players into the genre, and I think that's just a load of bologna. I mean, how hard is it, really, to hit buttons in a sequence and avoid standing in red circles? Unless the majority of people have an IQ of roughly 15 these days, I don't see a reason to coddle them so much. WoW was my first MMO, nine years ago, and you know how long it took me to become proficient at the game? About a week or two. By that time, I knew how the game worked, how to fight monsters well, how to PvP efficiently, all that. If you're telling me it takes the whole game to teach someone how to play the game, then I don't think they should be playing in the first place, it's obviously too complex for them.

Responding to one certain post here. Yes, the old games were harder. Not just because they were novel and original back then, but because they were built to be a challenge. Back then, games were based on skill, how well you could manipulate that little collection of pixels that was you. Nowadays, it doesn't matter how good you are, all that matters is what you have. Gear climbs are the worst thing to happen to MMO's. Sure it's nice to get newer, flashier armor, but when you eliminate the skill from the game, well it just gets boring. Rather than exploring the world for fun, or killing what you want to - you have to farm what you need, you have to kill what is required, you have to do this and that, or you can't experience all the content. Games are meant to be fun, they're not meant to be a job. Forcing someone to farm for gear is just wrong, and shouldn't be included in video games of any kind. Newer games can use old ideas and still be very fun, but when they're so easy a monkey could play them, it just isn't. The Zelda series hasn't changed a whole lot in 30 years, and people are still crazy about it. You know why? They make the game fun and challenging, but available to all who want to play. They write a good story for the game. They make a fun, engaging combat system. It's just quality work. Many games these days are just slapped together with no care for quality, all in the name of making a quick buck. Why does a multi-billion dollar company need to make another billion? It's not like they're going to bankrupt if they lose a few thousand a year. People are just being too greedy.

I may be adding more as I see more things brought up in replies, but that's it for now! Enjoy the extended wall. :P

[NoctisCaelus]

You haven't hit 50 yet and you're asking where the challenge is? Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

[Farore]

I have to be at the end of a game to find any challenge? That doesn't seem right. A game should be fun and challenging the whole way up, and multiply in difficulty at the end. I don't see that here. It's easy until 50, and then it goes up a quarter step at 50.

[rtpsoulx]

I bet you'll die a few times doing your AF quests~

[Evangela]

Is it your first MMO?

it's not the first game that your life (and challenge) begin when you're at max level.

[NoctisCaelus]

I have to be at the end of a game to find any challenge? That doesn't seem right. A game should be fun and challenging the whole way up, and multiply in difficulty at the end. I don't see that here. It's easy until 50, and then it goes up a quarter step at 50.

Have you read or even watch any of Yoshida's interviews or live letters? He specifically made 1 through 50 more easy, and though he said that. I honestly thought some parts through 1 through 50 was hard. The challenge comes at end game. PLUS he wanted the game to attract players who were new to MMORPGs. Especially since not many MMORPGers play on the console so a majority of them are new. You haven't even hit 40!

[jpem]

End game technically leans more towards easy as you do the very easy dungeons way more than you do the hard primals/raid.

[HurtigeKarl]

I have to be at the end of a game to find any challenge? That doesn't seem right. A game should be fun and challenging the whole way up, and multiply in difficulty at the end. I don't see that here. It's easy until 50, and then it goes up a quarter step at 50.

Play a crafting class. Challenge issue solved.

[Korihu]

I think the dungeons all the way from the first provide a good fun challenge to those who are new to the genre, and as they continue on, the difficulty of the dungeons are raised with new mechanics being introduced, such as making sure to pull the dragon in Brayflox out of poison, which from what I can tell is a dungeon you'd have done recently. It's essentially grooming people to be ready for end game. Is that not how most games in general are? Start off easy, and get harder and harder? This way, new people can slowly learn and get used to things.

[Farore]

This is nowhere near my first MMO. I've played WoW, Guild Wars 1 and 2, Maplestory, and countless others I can't remember the names of. My point is that every MMO has followed this trend, but this game is the epitome of easy.

The dungeons I've done are a joke, honestly. I've watched people doing the higher up dungeons, just to see if they'd actually be any fun, and they look just as easy. Sure a game could start out easy and get progressively harder, but the game is starting too easy and ending too easy. It's just boring.