JE Equips FlameshieldFollow

Give me the FFXI with juiced up graphics the ability to jump fresh servers old school group leveling a little less grindy and I'm set for another 5 years. That said, I bought FFXIV with the blind hopes that FFXIV would become my new "first love." That obviously failed and now I am hanging my hat on this.

Group play shouldn't and does not have to require long LFG times, though. FFXI required it because certain class roles were required for a party to function. If you look at GW2, they did away with that staple (though at the same time, made partying nonexistant, which is one of the game's greatest weaknesses). Every class was self-sufficient. People are so in love with the trinity even though it's one of the worst things that ever happened to party-based play. There are many ways to promote party-based play without requiring that at least three unique roles be assembled before a party can take off (never mind other factors like level disparity and area access). And developments in social media have demonstrated just how much more fluid party building could be than sending an /invite or /tell to every other person with their flag up.

Not every game has to appeal to your current amount of free time, though. That's what I never understood: casual-oriented people have, indeed, almost every MMORPG aimed at their lifestyle, yet I often hear them complain at the mere chance of one appealing to an audience willing to invest a lot of time into a game.

I may not have anywhere near as much time as I did 7 years ago either, but that doesn't mean that I require every game to stoop down to accommodate an hour of hop-in, hop-out play; I still want extremely distant goals and lofty challenges.

Three rate ups for you!

the fact that an MMO has difficulty settings scares me >.>

Getting a Legendary weapon is a lofty goal. Gearing out your character in a full set of current tier heroic gear is a lofty goal. Completing some of the achievements in the game are lofty goals.

The horse has been beaten into glue... Difficulty != time required to obtain.

You're baiting a fight that has been had a zillion times already with no clear winner. How long you spend chasing after your [insert nifty reward here] in whichever game you play is not a clear indication of how difficult it was, nor is it an indication of how much you enjoyed the journey. The point of games is to have fun.

No one will disagree that Blizzard put WoWs highest achievements closer to the majority of their players than XI did. Why would Blizzard want the majority of their players to be able to experience all of the content of their game? Why does SE want to keep many of their players from even attempting to participate in some of the content in their game?


This land of perpetual mediocrity... you realize that this is the land where XI currently resides now, don't you? So basically what you're saying is, damned if you do and damned if you don't?


Edited, Dec 18th 2012 7:13pm by FilthMcNasty

I may be misunderstanding you here, but I never really understood why people considered it a bad thing to appeal to or accommodate players who don't have as much time to spend. I'm with you on wanting the lofty goals and difficult challenges. Why does adding casual content detract from the hardcore player's ability to enjoy the game? Conversely, how does including long-term goals and achievements take away from the casual player?

Most of an MMO's population will be casual players, and even most hardcore players will shift to casual play eventually as their life progresses (or devolves, but let's try to keep it positive). And let's face it, even hardcore players actually want an audience to lord their superiority over, and who better than the masses who can't get the hard fought prizes that take too much time to get?

So I never understood this need to alienate or flat out banish casual play from an MMO. Because such an MMO would lose the majority of its core audience, not make as much money, which won't allow it to afford to keep developers developing, and with nothing new to look forward to, eventually bore even the hardcore players into quitting.

Really you want to have both casual and hardcore play together in the same place. Because more casuals means other people are financing a better hardcore experience within the game than hardcore players alone could muster. It's a win-win!

The bolded part of your post makes it sound like you don't think WoW is capable of presenting players with challenging goals to reach, or that they don't compare.

If I misunderstood what you said then I apologize, but I'd imagine that just about anyone who read it would have interpreted it that way.

well HNMs in FFXI really werent that hard... PW, AV and 90% of the CoP missions on the other hand... were...


but anyway the information I was trying to acquire is simple. I was under the assumption that WoW was as I described above "easymode" and just about everything could be done in 1-3 months tops (kinda like what is the case with the current state of FFXIV). As another poster in the topic said

" And let's face it, even hardcore players actually want an audience to lord their superiority over, and who better than the masses who can't get the hard fought prizes that take too much time to get? "

while I wouldnt phrase it the way he put it, Id say Im one of the hardcore types he spoke of.


So I figured if FFXIV was basically copying WoW to get more subs and everything in WoW could be done in 1-3 months, then everything in FFXIV could be too, thus wed never have anything for the hardcore. But if what you say is true and there are indeed fights in WoW that would kick my ass, and there are hard sought items that can take 6+ months to obtain and if FFXIV is borrowing from/trying to copy WoW then that means such things will exist in FFXIV as well (assuming FFXIV does it right and not just focuses on the casual/accessible aspects of WoW). Thus FFXIV will please me just fine


sidenote: I like how you say "you don't have to read a wiki to figure out what you're doing" You know the devs never gave answers and someone had to WRITE those guides and wiki's you read right? which means SOME of us are capable or figuring things out on our own. After all guides and boss strategies didnt exist when my group and I did CoP.. and we made it to Sea without any help.

Why were you under this assumption? I get that hating WoW is popular in the XI circles, having spent the better part of the last decade hearing about it, but I'd like to know exactly where you got this information that it's ezmode from. There's content that is out of the reach of casual players. They are called 25 man heroics. And they aren't kidding. They are @#%^ing hard, and you have never played anything like it. Rift is the same way. I'd love to see some of the "hardcore" XI players here go mess around with Akylios or Laethys and then come back here claiming anything that isn't XI is ezmode.



Also, where did you get the idea that XIV would be copying WoW? that's not even CLOSE to what Yoshi-P said in his interview. What he said was he thought that the same thing as they did with XI should have been done here: The dev team played Everquest for a year to see what it was about the game that was so appealing and make it into a Final Fantasy game. Playing World of Warcraft for a year to see what about it has captured the interest of millions for almost a decade and making THAT Final Fantasy isn't the same as copying WoW to cater to the lowest common denominator which is essentially what you are saying (and insulting an entire playerbase of multiple-millions in the process).

It's taking inspiration and not reinventing the wheel, like they tried, and failed, to do with XIV.

Edited, Dec 19th 2012 12:21pm by Torrence

I don't understand why people get so upset or confused, when SE says they are gonna look at another game, and take from it and improve their own.... That is the basis for Squaresoft, they looked at DQ and copied it, made it easier and more accessible and we got Final Fantasy :) They did the same exact thing with EQ, they used it as the blueprint for XI, Xi is nothing more than EQ with better graphics. So who can blame SE for trying once again what has been their recipe to success ? There are plenty of things they can take from WOW/GW/Rift and translate to their game, with a FF Spin on it.

As for lofty goals in wow as compared to XI.... we cant really compare for in XI there where no hard fights, AV and that other fight are just horrible design fights..... outside of that everything else is cake... and boring to look at.... if you compare a high tier fight from Xi to one in Wow... the difference is like the earth and the sky... one is boring standing around casting and w/e the other is engaging, and 50 things going around at once.

So i assume you are talking about RNG.... Which is not hard is just stupid.

You're precisely right. We love (and love to hate) those aspects from XI... That's what made XI a gem in it's own right. Sure, that model may never sell 8 bazillion subs like WoW... But it's apparently sufficient to get enough subs to be the most profitable FF of all time.


Edit:

Quote - I don't understand why people get so upset or confused, when SE says they are gonna look at another game, and take from it and improve their own....


I'm not sure what people don't get about this??? XI players by large majority (not all but certainly a majority) HATE, HATE, HATE WoW.

Now using a line of logic (not saying you lack logic, just throwing a point out there.) XI players will presumably make up the next base of XIV... If XI players HATE WoW, why would those same players want a new game based off WoW???

Now with that said, I can understand the counterpoint that many of the original XI players have moved on and no longer game, or are more casual gamers... well let me provide an anecdotal example.

It is true that I may be a more casual gamer now, however towards the end of XI when one could still start at the beginning and level up a job from 1-75 without all the mega ezmode extras they've added now, I introduced my two little brothers to the game who are now 17 and 18 (the same age I was when I started XI.) They in turn introduced the game to their friends and so on and so forth. They likewise hate WoW, and prefer the more immersive world that is XI.

I know for a fact that there will always be people who like a more hardcore experience... SE shouldn't make the fatal flaw of assuming this type of gamer isn' out there. Because they are, and they will always continue to yearn for an experience like XI... not only that, but this customer tends to also be loyal, as evidenced by the amazing run XI had.


Edited, Dec 19th 2012 3:24pm by je355804

Edited, Dec 19th 2012 3:24pm by je355804


Sorry -- one last edit:

I liken the XIV transforming into a WoW like this...

To us (meaning true players of XI), XI was a Ferrari... It was hot, sexy, and not many other people had it, sure the maintenance cost on it was a beeyotch but that's the price of driving a ferrari... In other words, it's going to be expensive to drive this Ferrari (XI - time cost mostly.) But damnit when you get out of your Ferrari you feel like a bad mofo.

Then our neighbors have a Honda Civic (WoW). Everyone has a Honda Civic. Even everyone's grandmother has a Honda Civic. Even some senator made the news because they have a honda civic. GREAT FOR THEM! We're Ferrari owners (XI.) We don't want some grocery getter, that takes us from point A to point B with little to no cost at all (lack of relative time/hardcore cost of WoW.) We want to get 4 mpg... we do it because we love it.

Now the maker of Ferraris (SE) calls all it's owners and tells us, "hey guys, we've noticed Honda Civics have sold millions more than Ferraris, so guess what?! We're going to make the new Ferrari modeled after Honda Civics!!! ISN'T THAT AWESOME, AREN'T YOU GUYS HAPPY???"

I know this is an absolutely exaggerated metaphor, but I truly believe this is how many feel about the WoWification of our precious Ferraris.

Edited, Dec 19th 2012 3:33pm by je355804

But then when you peel back the layers to try to find out why, you see posts by people who never even played it. DuoMaxwell who has no clue what he's talking about in regards to its difficulty. Catwho who watched some friend of hers once healing a raid and assumed it was just random clicking boxes. These are the posts that influence the population into just hating the game for no real reason. Are there folks who tried it and just didn't like the art direction\interface\fact its on a pc? I'm sure there are, but the most rabid ones trumpeting its alleged shortcomings tend to lean towards those who barely scratched the surface of what the game has to offer.

XI players in general need to be a LOT more reasonable and stop living in this bubble where jumping in an mmo is the end of the world.

I played WoW at the lower levels and you're right, I never got far, because I didn't like the art direction of the game. As for the raid I watched, I didn't say it wasn't hard for the healer, just boring looking. The stuff everyone else got to do, throwing chains on a dragon and running around avoiding fire breath, was conversely quite exciting looking on her screen. She dodged the fire too, then stood in one place and clicked boxes again.

No matter how much thought process has to go to which box to click.... it's still just clicking boxes with a mouse. If I want to play "think hard about which box to click first" there's always Mine Sweeper on any Windows machine :P



Edited, Dec 19th 2012 5:09pm by catwho

Sounds more like a Nissan GT-R (XI) vs a Corvette (WoW) to me.

I always thought the forced groupings for the genkai, and the travel to high(er) level, far away places in a big group, really added to the sense of community in FFXI.

Of course regular grouping and having one character helped too, but these things have to be made easier to do and accomplish.

As much as I like auto grouping, it doesn't seem the same when you have to ask someone; "Need a group for GK1?".."Yes Please!" Just that can add a personal touch to the sense that you're working together within a world.

The length of time (in FFXI) it took to get places also was a blessing in disguise. Needing sneak oils to get to Jeuno from the starter cities was an experience that I've never had in any other MMO. Again that time to many was a turn off and time sink, but it also made the world seem huge. Plus it made quests for Chocobo and airship access worth it.

The teleportation of FFXIV was nice, but I didn't feel as immersed like I did in FFXI.

There are many other "bittersweet" things that FFXI did that I don't think can be reconciled in today's gaming environment. Things I both loved and hated about the game, because although they added frustration, they added a sense of immersion.

Lastly, the quests made no sense in FFXI. I don't even know how most of them were solved; the internet namely "Somepage" was my friend.

So, I think that if I were to have to make concessions, I'd make a game that made it easy to group up, like a level sync, or just no level restriction; you'd be dropped down to an average level of the group; and fighting for general low level fights wouldn't need a healer.

And for genkai, or things where you had to group to progress, it would have to be a little easier to group as well; or give incentives for higher level players to replay a certain event.

Lastly #2, if combat and grouping is a bit easier, then the world should be huge and it should take a bit longer to get places; require quests to get more travel capabilities.

All of that being said, if the devs wanted to make a WoW type FFXIV through the solo/quest/instance for group vein, then I won't really complain. I liked WoW and other games in that genre like Rift, but they were short lived.

You can't appease people like me and be successful and I think Yoshi-P knows that. So why not err on the side of millions of subscriptions?

Edited, Dec 19th 2012 7:38pm by Kierk

In 2045 a 'boomer' generation will come along and demand a return to those mythical days of necessitated teamwork. They'll demand that the genre once again be called MMORPG rather than the bastardised renaming of MSPORPG* (asterisked to appease the small contingent of hardcore duo-groups).

Of course by then I'll be the crazy old cat lady screaming outside my window. >.<

I fully agree with you, and that is my argument, that as far boss mechanics and design SE is a joke when compared to other developers, as far as the entire game being easy mode, i don't agree fully that XI was easy mode, but most of the difficulties came from RNG and huge time sinks, as to opposed to skill gap. Up until Ifrit SE has not been able to design a fight that is engaging and challenging skill wise, they have always been on the extreme, either a tank&spank or a 50 phase boss that has a trillion hp, and has some secret way of killing in which if you miss one step, even if you are in Phase 49, but you did not kill that one rat in phase 1, he will become invincible and wipe you lol.

As far as Planetside 2 well planetside one which i bough and played on release, is a group game, is a massive combat pvp game, totally different from a MMORPG.

Well in all honesty i am pretty sure some bosses in XI required skill, but more often than not, it was the exception not the rule, i guess that is my point overall, i played XI, i actually love RPG'S and FF to me was the best series that delivered a good/decent story with engaging game play. XIV in my eyes failed to deliver both, it has good graphics, but the story is so not well delivered and slow paced, and the game play was boring, way to slow, and simple. Now i do hope that changes with 2.0, since we have already seen what ? 3 battle system changes ?

As for Planetside, PS1 was also a perpetual world, you would log in, on your factions main base, where you could make groups, organize, change your outfit(Guns/skills etc etc.) and then you would either ride on planes or use a portal to one of the areas that where being contested, or invade one.

From what you have said, PS2 follows the same formula which is good. i enjoyed PS1, it was a really good game.

This is the last things I wanted to address in this thread - If you never played WoW, you have no idea what the community is like. Pleae don't pretend to based on something you heard from someone who read that someone trolled someone else who ninja'd something in a pug in trade chat one day.

You would think that it's easier to hide in a group of 10 million, but it's really not as easy as you think. Ninja'ing items doesn't happen in WoW like it did in FF. There are loot rules you can set in place so the leader of the raid can hand things out to who they are supposed to go to. It's not like in XI where the leader of the group\linkshell has no real power over who lots on the items in the treasure pool. Jerks were more pronounced in XI not because they were so rare, but because in the overwhelming majority of cases, there was literally nothing you could do to prevent them. You couldn't kick a troublemaker from your shell unless he was a pearl and an online sack could kick him, or if he was a sack you were REALLY in trouble because then the leader had to be online to kick him (frequent in those all-sack shells). Or you could contact SE, wait weeks and hope that they would ask the person to drop their pearlsack. You couldn't just get the report from your officers, and then find the person's name on the guild roster to remove him. He had to be online, and so did you.

It actually goes both ways with your comment regarding the population and reputation. I actually know far more people who were less than pleasant in Final Fantasy because they happened to play ninja and everyone and their mother needed ninja tanks, or they happened to be a soboro sam and you needed their dd, or... they happened to be a bard and for some reason everyone in XI had to kiss their asses. Don't get me started on the linkshell rivalries and abuses as they camped NMs, or the fighting and bickering at the bird camps when a group with a more efficient make up literally overran a less efficient group that was there first because they "deserved the camp more due to they had a bard lol".

I played XI for years, and people like to have these grand and fond memories of the friends they made and I get that, I made them too... but to pretend the XI community was this close knit, loving, caring, considerate group of people toward each other is just nostalgia of the worst kind.

Edited, Dec 20th 2012 9:21am by Torrence

If you had read the very next sentence behind what you bolded, you would see that I clearly stated that I might be wrong. I have no illusion of knowing exactly how things are, I was simply stating my opinion. I also clearly did not have a tone of "XI is better than WoW." I didn't cover every aspect of both games, but did point out what I view as flaws in each. Actually, did I list a positive aspect for either game? Did I note anything about XI that could be seen as nostalgia? I think not. I've stated in several posts that while I love the grouping aspect, I hated the xp grind that required specific setup groups. So why don't you try and calm down.

At least I was mobile. Running around and clicking boxes is at least twice as exciting as just standing there and clicking boxes, in my book.

Now I'm a true LazyBard (tm) and I pop my macro to set songs off for six minutes and go grab a coffee.