The WoW FactorFollow

1) Making the game accessible to casual or new players is crucial in the modern MMO era for long term success. That doesn't mean the entire game needs to or should be catered to casual players, but the design of the game can't be a stone wall that turns away the curious and only admits those who are committed to excellence on day one.

2) The flashy graphics: They are a bit over the top when you get a lot of people together in an area, but I think that players want combat that feels dynamic and impactful and flashy graphics and sound effects help create that feeling, so I think they're here to stay. That may not be how it was on FFXI, but it's how the Final Fantasy series in general has gone, so it's still very much in character. Just one of those time where you have to put on your dark sunglasses and "deal with it."

3) "Who doesn't love competing for HNMs?" Yea, is this a serious question? Who DOESN'T love that? Uhhh, 99.8% of the population of FFXI doesn't love it. It's a terrible design in every single way. It gives RMT a valuable commodity to try to monopolize, provides massive incentive to hack and bot, etc, on top of just being a frustrating bottle neck for most players. I don't know a single person who liked killing pop mobs or waiting at a spawn point with 15 other people hoping they could get claim on a mob before it even visually appeared, but knowing that they'd probably lose to a JP or hacker every time.

4) Ease of advancement: I actually agree with this somewhat. The nice thing about a game where you accomplish things easily is that you get those rewards up front and that makes you feel good about yourself, but in the long run, it creates other problems like a feeling that the game is hollow, as well as a need for an incredible amount of content to keep the hamster wheel going. From what we can see so far, gear choices in FFXIV do look extremely boring and vanilla, and the entire concept of end game character advancement is the very shallow and unsatisfying WoW style of tiered gear sets. I do think this is a problem for many people, though there are others who will be endlessly entertained by the notion of exchanging their sword of awesome +1 for a sword of awesome +2, and later, a +3, +4, etc.

I don't see anything like FFXI where you have major milestones in the development of your character, from getting a chobobo to getting an airship pass to unlocking your subjob or your first advanced job, to getting your AF, gobbie bags, etc. All of that stuff took a lot of time, but it was important, permanent stuff that you would never replace or outgrow, and it made it feel like you had really accomplished something, even though in the end it's all 0s and 1s, and not real.

I think any good MMO does need moments of "Finally, I accomplished it!" that aren't all gear centric, especially in a game like this where gear is clearly meant to be replaced at regular intervals. So far FFXIV doesn't have any of that, and it's a problem.

XIV and XI are separate entities though. To draw inspiration from those other games would ultimately be more favourable in the long game. Those who didn't like XI wouldn't like a prettier version of it either. It was never going to be like XI, it's like expecting FFXIII to be like FFVII. It draws character ideas from it and nothing more than the regular series staples.

I admit my opinion is strong, but much as you get tired of having to defend what you liked about XI, I get tired of having to defend XIV (or any non-FFXI) game that doesn't have those elements and thus claiming there's a "lack" of accomplishment to it just because it wasn't a massive timesink.

You don't have to defend your point. If you enjoyed the game, that's completely fine and I don't mind that. I never said anything about it being an invalid argument either, just a tired one. It's not going to happen in FFXIV and I simply wish people would realize that others prefer something different, even people who have played FFXI.

My point is, it goes both ways. You can have a sense of accomplishment beyond taking months, or even years, to grind something.

EDIT:


Same as above. Just because many players see it as a huge accomplishment, doesn't mean everyone else does either. I am just an example of the opposite side. Am I speaking for everyone? No. But to act as if that sense of accomplishment is only valid because you took months/years to complete it is a complete wash. Getting level 75 is overwritten by the fact that you have to do merits, completing your AF or AF2 gear is overwritten by the fact that most of them are terrible. Getting Relics is overwritten by the fact that they suck compared to the new weapons in Abyssea and SoA. And now FFXI players mostly state that Abyssea destroyed the game they loved and are finding a new home.

The reality is while no one has had the same experience, FFXI players talk as if it things don't take forever, there's no sense of accomplishment at all. This is 100% untrue.

Edited, Aug 6th 2013 9:27am by HeroMystic

But that's what he's asking for. He's asking for dated mechanics and a sloggy grindfest. It's fine to want that, but that game has been made already.

I loved FFXI. I played it for 4 years starting in 2004. My first level 75 job took me two of those years to do. I did the NM camping, I did the story missions, I did the xNMs, I did the needing a party of six to cross the street for a hot dog.

I don't think I'm the only person who stopped playing FFXI for a reason. I'm older now, I have a business to run. I don't have hours on end to sit in one place not accomplishing anything. I still love MMOs, but I would never play FFXI today.

I am not the only person who fits that description.



Didn't I read somewhere else that, at one point, Yoshi said that anything that was in FFXI could be in FFXIV? Like.. gameplay features I mean, not design concepts? I thought I read that somewhere, I may have to track it down later. Unless I was hallucinating when I saw that, it doesn't sound like Yoshi is ignoring anything.

I never said XIV couldn't take inspiration from XI. MMOs take inspiration from other MMOs. Final Fantasies take inspiration from other Final Fantasies. But taking inspiration doesn't mean carbon copy. It's also too early for you or anyone else to know what features will be added down the line.



Exactly.

The two games are different. It's ok for them to not be the same.

Yet you played WoW longer? I feel like there's some sense of denial going on, long-time WoW embitterment (FFXI players get it, too~), or maybe a bit of "FFXI popped my MMO cherry" nostalgia if it was actually your first essentially ruining subsequent accomplishments because it just wasn't the same the second/third/etc. time around.

I also find it silly you claim XIV to have no milestones, but here, have a few:
- Getting to 10 so you can unlock and change classes.
- Completing level 15 storyline mission and getting airship access.
- Unlocking job/class abilities from quests.
- Unlocking jobs from classes at 30.
- Getting retainer and AH access.
- Getting your chocobo companion.

...this is just what we've seen out of beta. Certainly you can expect more story content, artifact quests, and who knows what other surprises as well as an actual achievement system. You're basically making the same mistake you accuse HM of making by simply omitting the "for you" or "for me" in saying there's nothing to do. Which, well, is a lie.


It probably shouldn't be much of a shocker that I align myself more with HM's terse output, but regardless of personal opinion, you can't really shake that some get more... invested, no, addicted to certain aspects of these games. Perhaps its intentional by the devs or just a psychological weakness in the individual, I don't know. What I do know is that when I see the usual, "I want such and such to be like FFXI!" epithets, it too often glorifies the good without giving the bad a fair acknowledgment. Yeah, the (H)NM game is an example. Forced partying for more mundane tasks like EXPing is another. Long-time job issues were another can of worms, too. Fundamentally, we need to stop and think that SE could have just brought FFXI into the next decade, but instead they opted for a new game (for better or worse under Tanaka's leadership). This carries the implication that maybe they thought not all was well with XI or that, indeed, times have changed and things that worked then wouldn't work now. The bridges XI burned with people would be hard to repair even with an overhaul. Thus, fresh start.

I can then say people overvalue digital goods. This carries well into endgame balancing, the economy, and how the community behaves. It shouldn't be surprising that I then correlate prestige to the precious and rare goods within a given game as they outright affect our growth and performance. I, too, want more people to play, and in turn give everyone a better chance to expand the community. At the same time, I feel those very prestige walls contradict that desire and instead segregate players into groups where the greater refuses to interact with the lesser. Art may imitate life, but I also try to remember these are games first.

Edited, Aug 6th 2013 11:01am by Seriha

I really wish people would take the game for what it's offering and try it without preconceptions about what they've already experienced in other games. Yes it borrows from other games, but perhaps the entire game as a whole will work once you filter out your expectations based upon what you've played in other games.

Your instincts are way off. I played WoW longer because Blizzard's customer service mentality was light years ahead of S-E, and because I had far more friends playing WoW than FFXI. There were also a lot of features about WoW that I consider superior, such as the UI and combat. I'm not at all bitter about WoW, I enjoyed it for what it was, and I played it for a long time, but in the end, there's only so many spices that could be added to that soup.

I'm also not bitter about FFXI. I think S-E accomplished some unprecedented things with FFXI, from the Job system and the concept of being able to accomplish everything on one character (which they brought back in FFXIV, so kudos to them) and as I have already mentioned, the fact that there are MANY things to accomplish and feel pride in other than pure "I have higher stats" epeenage. That they don't recognize the value of those things in the design of FF14 is a bit of a failure, IMO, but that doesn't mean that it won't still be a very enjoyable game or have other aspects that set it apart from other MMOs. I just believe there are some ways it could be better than it is, and this is one of those ways.

I think it's funny that you would disagree even a little bit or find fault with this because a lot of the things I'm talking about are "non elitist" goals that were accomplished in bite sized, but many staged processes. The sorts of things that you claim up and down should comprise the end game of FFXIV. I won't try to psycho analyze what it is that you "really" want in an MMO, because I think it's ignorant to think we have some deep insight into each other on the internet. As far as I am concerned, the apparent contradiction must simply be a break down in comunication.

I really think you should take this same approach instead of condescendingly thinking that you have some lens of expertise through which to interpret my comments. Your best bet at comprehension is to just take what I say about my opinions and my preferences as being the literal truth. It's disrespectful and frankly pretty stupid to think you know better than I do what I like or don't like.

Now finally, you mentioned milestones in FFXIV and I agree that they exist, but the difference between milestones in FFXIV and FFXI is that they mostly occur while still in the "learning" stage of the game and with such hand holding that they really aren't accomplishents in any way. I don't think that getting an airship pass has to be an accomplishment, it can simply be a method of gating content and opening up the world, but without something to take that spot, the game lacks texture that could otherwise exist.

Wint, that's impossible. We, human beings, can never experience anything without the context of everything that came before. You cannot un-experience previous games or MMOs and remove them from the way you interpret a new MMO. It would be awesome if that were possible, since that would allow people to have that "first MMO" magical experience again, but it's just not possible.

We can be open to the possibility of new experiences and new ideas, but when evaluating a game such as FFXIV which mainly consists of things we've already experienced in one way or another, it's impossible not to have some preferences or opinions.

I believe it was mentioned already but the average age of gamers is 30+. To add to that there are more adult women gamers (31%) than male gamers 17 or younger (19%). (taken from the website DoYouKnowGaming.com)

This would lead one to assume that as a business SE would be targeting this age group. I also fit into this age group and have limited time to play, however like many others here i have great memories and appreciation for FFXI. This game allows me to pour my feelings for FFXI into it and still have the feeling of accomplishment, increasing my appreciation at the same time.

For me (what I will call the Rule) this game is exactly what I am looking for, however for others, perhaps younger gamers or gamers with more time (the exception to the Rule), this game may only be satisfactory.

SE used up all of their risk taking with the first launch, they cannot afford to take any risk now so they are going to do what will be most appealing to the majority (or Rule) gamers.

Edited, Aug 6th 2013 11:20am by elrocco

Seems like we are getting an influx of 'new' members who post certain topics knowing its gonna cause a slew of mud slinging. Where is that op now? Just like the others, slithered away.

Oh look, another "WoW is easy/FFXI is hardcore" thread. Take your narrow mind elsewhere please. You have no idea what you're talking about.

Im happy they made crafting more accessable and able to do early on.

That's only true if you define "success" as being World of Warcraft. And if that is your standard then the only successful mmo is the one which is very casual friendly.

MMOs are no longer novel to the point that you can expect the customer to compensate for the flaws in a game. An MMO doesn't need to be easy, but it has to be accessible.