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Just a few things...

As stated, XIV was originally intended to be the next gen FFXI that PS2 couldn't support. The reason I note 'PS2 limitations' as a valid excuse.

Also, the fact that XIV borrowed so heavily from games already on the market kinda ***** on the argument that it was a good idea in it's current state. The one thing that most players could agree on was that we wanted something different. We didn't want another XI, we didn't want an FF flavored WoW... we wanted XIV to be different.

The unfortunate irony is that XIV turned out different because it's so much trying to be everything else...

You were likely in the minority. When XIV was announced the knee jerk reaction was 'am I gonna be able to migrate all my data from XI into XIV'. As someone who worked his *** off for a slice of that relic pie, you can imagine that I wasn't at all excited about trying to start over just for the sake of more inventory space and shiny spell effects.

Nothing does WoW as well as WoW does, much less better than they do it. There's a reason why there isn't a WoW 2. It mainly has to do with already dominating the market. A caveat is that expanding and improving was never an issue because there was no console locking you into place.


XIV set out to be the same(or at least very similar) as XI and ended up being different mostly because it was the same as everything that set XI apart from those games. Many of those things were reasons why XI was a preferred game for some players.

Also, it was more than just a preference. It was almost taboo to utter those 3 letters in an XI or XIV forum(see signature). This was at a point where I was lobbying for more of the basic systems that made WoW and other games more user friendly(UI, auto sorting, better options for gear swaps, more inventory... ect.).

It's a questionable decision to make the same game with better graphics and ask players to subscribe to both games. It's flat out nutty to put out a mediocre copy of other games that are already out and expect a better result. Just my opinion.

And I think you were in the minority there.

I still have fun with XI, and it still offers a very different experience than XIV, but that's both good and bad. Take Ambuscade, for example. It's not really new and exciting content. And dear lord are the fights long and boring. But it's cool to have goals to grind for, and XI will always occupy that special place in my gaming heart, no matter how dated it gets.

Oddly, FFXI has more meaningful content still for solo players and groups of different sizes, while XIV is still stuck on eight-man content that highly favors statics. That is really holding XIV back.

Edited, Jul 28th 2016 9:57pm by Thayos

Edited, Jul 28th 2016 9:58pm by Thayos

I don't know if it was simply because I didn't play the at-launch 1.0 (I picked it up on the final build, the 1.23 under Yoshi about 4 months before Dalamud fell), but by then it really actually DID feel very much like a sequel to XI to me. Sure there were some differences like using partial TP for weapon skills and the like but the vibe and the combat felt a great deal like it was set out to be like XI but updated. Just my view of it though.

No, it's not about that at all.

I logged into XI the other night, and two of my old friends who still play were running Ambuscade. I immediately jumped in with them and we pumped out several runs. It didn't matter that their gear was much better (essentially making them higher level) or that I hadn't played in awhile, or that a third person was going to join their two-person endeavor. The content in XI is flexible enough for players to randomly jump in without needing to know a song-and-dance routine in order for the group to succeed. People who don't play often can easily jump in with people who play all the time.

This is what XIV needs more of. It needs less rigid content that allows players to just play the damn game without having to memorize all kinds of dance routines.



This is half true. The game became much more lowman friendly with the launch of Abyssea, back when the population was quite healthy. And even in XI's heyday, there were various events people could participate in (both large and small groups) without any need for statics.

The Trust system took lowmanning content to entirely new levels. However, XIV has a large enough playerbase that no trust system would be needed. SE just needs to create content that people can do with greater flexibility.

Actually, this does matter for Ambuscade. You mentioned some fights are "long and boring" and that's likely because your gear isn't as good as it could be or you're missing a lot of JP including the ability to equip Superior 1 & 2 gear. I get what you were saying in context but in current XI, this actually does matter most, but since you're with friend(s) they're not strict about it lol.

In actuality, it is the players holding this game back that Yoshi listens to more than anything. It's not a "good or bad thing", it's just, clearly when the dude outright says he won't change the formula and caused quite a lot of people to quit over the statement, I promise you someone will say:

"Well the game isn't for them"

or

"They were end-game/hardcore players"

Meaning people will easily blame the players when they don't like something about XIV and complain or quit, but not when the game stagnates because they may like the way it is and find things peachy.



While true, in XI's prime even during Abyssea/Voidwatch days, you more than likely had/were in/tried to join a linkshell dedicated specifically to events. There were pick ups for content (which is true with JP servers now on XIV) but they also usually had higher standards, ala "VW PIL looking for XYZ123 MUST HAVE RME90+" etc. So XIV does need "less rigid content" but it also needs more relevant progression content that isn't just "here you go" difficulty for groups.

In all honesty, I think the biggest problem is the extreme different cultures between JP and NA/EU, because on one side, you have people thinking you only need statics and the DF is designed to act like a mindless idiot in and on the other side, Statics are optional and the DF is only used when you actually know what you're doing so you don't waste people's time. (I mean do you know how the Japanese society is? They have even "less" time which is why their prime time is extremely late but is also why they tend to play the most efficiently.)

It wouldn't be so bad if yoshi didn't say "We won't change XIV's formula because it would be too big of a risk."

Didn't stop them from dropping content in patches, splitting up content because it would "overwhelm us" and quite frankly not care about the design because they know they'll have more than enough people happy to shell out money for nothing. I mean, the moogle mount on Mog station is $30.

People couldn't toss money at them any faster.

I think my biggest gripe is because they moved XIV to an "instanced base progression system" and not utilize it. It takes so little work to make instanced content in comparison to an MMO like XI where they have to take into consideration zone memory to do anything.



Edited, Jul 30th 2016 7:21am by Theonehio

Indeed, that's why I enjoyed duoing content and NMs (even during Abyssea's prime) with my girlfriend because you normally had at least a group of 6 or an alliance normally taking it out. Yeah it takes awhile and due to lack of jobs (in Abyssea/VW) the drops may not always be worth it, but the fact you can actually do it is what I loved most about XI's setup.

It's a lot more structured in my experience lol. Kind of like you tend to have tanks on NA side no move because no one wants to MT or because you have 2 WAR and a DRK and of course the 2 WARs dont want to tank so you end up having a healer or DPS pull the boss to get things going and the tanks still don't get off their butt etc.

So while it's not perfect on the JP servers, when you play on both...you REALLY notice the difference.

The problem is players, not partying. Even in what you described:



^ Nothing to do with Partying.



As per programming, you are partied up, which is why everyone gets rewarded. You may not get the pretty UI element of xyz being in your party but you're essentially in a zone wide party or else that style of content wouldn't function properly. Then comes the other side of the chipped coin, where you have "zone events/overworld encounters" where the loot and any exp and so on will go towards whoever lands the killshot, thus also leading to MPKing and so on.



It actually helps when there's no one available to help you. However due to their pathing being coordinate based like monsters, they're not going to be all too useful for certain encounters where the monster may power up based on people hit or an aura that will literally disable them from doing anything compared to an actual player knowing how to maneuver or recover from that kind of situation.

So yeah trusts do indeed have the issue, but it has nothing to do with the 'state of partying.'

XI had those many of those things because it was designed knowing that people couldn't race to 75. Abyssea wasn't really a playground until later in the life cycle of the content. If you were killing things while they were still new then you weren't doing it lowman. Sure people were farming the lesser NMs, but people weren't doing that for higher tier NMs out of the box.


It's more an ease of use thing than an anti-social thing. Honestly it doesn't really matter why you or anyone else prefers not to use it. It's your choice, just realize that this choice removes a lot of what facilitates raiding. Being prepared, making sure everyone is on the same page and being able to quickly communicate if something doesn't go according to plan. Because there are many players who do use it, encounters are developed with it in mind.

I never considered logging into voice chat or posting a RSVP on a group's website to be a hassle. In all but 1 of the endgame groups I've been in, voice chat was a requirement. What bothers me the most about not using it is that you're likely not the leader of your group... why not just login and listen? Though it was mandatory to login for all but 1 of my endgame groups across various MMOs, it was never a requirement to speak unless you were raid lead.

I think what XIV can't capture that XI had going for it was community. It was much easier for me to find players like myself who were trying to create a group. I think we'd probably both be surprised by the number of players who have no idea where the entrance to an instance was in XIV simply because they'd never done anything outside of queue up. It really wasn't any different in WoW until players started using map mods.

And this is exactly the kind of content FFXIV needs more of. We need more inclusive content that both small and large groups can enjoy, where people don't need to worry about finding statics for hours upon hours of practice just to get to the point of having a shot at an RNG drop.

Just as important as lowman content is the need for large-scale content where the same principles hold true to groups of larger sizes. Sky, sea, dynamis and einherjar are all examples of XI content where first-timers could jump right in and contribute, and groups didn't have to be ultra-specific sizes.

The lack of this kind of content in XI is holding the game back.



Yes, great point about gaming being more of an acceptable hobby nowadays. And the implications from aging are obvious. Back in 2004, the average MMORPG gamer was approximately 26 years old, according to studies at the time -- but that has likely changed significantly since then.

This year, a report by the Entertainment Software Association revealed this: "The average age of someone who plays games (not specifying MMOs, but I'm sure the correlation is close) is 31 years old. In fact, more gamers are over the age of 36 than between the ages of 18 to 35 or under the age of 18. They are also mostly men, but by a slimming margin. Men make up 52 percent. From 2012 to 2013, the number of women gamers over the age of 50 grew by 32 percent."

This is exactly why the lack of more inclusive content is holding FFXIV back.

Life after 30 is just tremendously different than life before 30. And while some 30+ adults haven't changed their priorities (which is totally fine), adults whose priorities do change over time can't (and shouldn't) be blamed. For many, playing video games just isn't as important as getting enough sleep, taking more time to cook healthy meals, going on runs, hitting the gym, doing contract work, hanging out with friends, making time for family, cleaning the house, working in the yard, etc. Even an adult who doesn't have barrels of other obligations may simply realize that spending so much time in a virtual world isn't exactly healthy.

And beyond the age of 35, there are more adults like me than there are adults who want to live in their games.

Don't blame game developers for designing games with those adults in mind. FFXIV was mostly designed exactly for that crowd. In the leadup to ARR, Yoshi-P talked extensively about how the game was redesigned for busier gamers who could enjoy the game in their pockets of free time. For the most part, he accomplished that goal -- right up until endgame, and then he fell a bit short.



Edited, Jul 31st 2016 9:59am by Thayos

I consider end game to be progression oriented content that requires a measure of work and cooperation. I don't consider quick grind dungeons or face roll raids to be endgame.

60 dungeons/raids pretty much

You're right about it being a misnomer in MMOs, and in XIV especially. Endgame implies the very highest, or the very final thing you could do, which would be Savage. But I see that more like.. Bonus endgame in this case. Kinda like the Dark Aeons or Ruby WEAPON.