I've been having fun in FFXIV and mostly i agree with op with a few exceptions:
-Multiple Avenues of Advancement!!! Don't like questing like me? Do Fates, or get a kill-chain exp group and grind mobs. Don't like any of that? Quest!
I prefer questing to grinding, always did and possibly always will. But leveling a 3rd class on the same character, i have a huge gap in between quests, forcing to grind FATEs and/or leves. It annoys me alot.
-The class system is a welcomed change from the "Alt Grind" of other MMOs. The fact that you can literally level any class is a breath of fresh air (a better implementation of FF11's job system).
I always made alts to experience different parts of the story. In FFXIV i've made 3 alts to explore the 3 cities. I was really displeased that at level 15-16 the story becomes the same, not only that it forces me to do dungeons to progress. 1 hour waiting for a team to do a dungeon is not fun.
However i do like the class system, just wish i had enough different quests and story to enjoy leveling them.
Another hack opinion piece. What I find most fascinating are the posters reading this "opinion piece" and forming their opinion to not try the game based on one person's personal game preferences. Really? You are not going to play the game based on the opinion of some novice on a game forum? Even when you read post after post discrediting many of the opinions expressed by said novice? What does that say about you? *boggles the mind.* The fun factor in a game is subjective people. Be an independent thinker. And if you must form an opinion about whether to play a game or not, read multiple reviews ... by professionals. If you were to do that, you would come up with a more educated opinion about the game than a hack piece by a novice on a game forum. And this goes for both the positive and negative reviews by any novice poster on any game forum. I am often left to wonder why anyone would care about any one individual's opinion on a game. What is it about these people that they feel their opinion is so "worthy" that they must take to game forums and distribute it to the masses.
The large majority of "professional" reviews about FF:ARR are overwhelming positive. Likewise, FF:ARR tops the games list on the majority of websites offering that perspective. This same website has FF:ARR at the number one spot by a large margin. That is the type of information you should be basing your opinion on, not on some hack piece by some novice on a game forum. And as a matter of practicality, look at the response from the majority of players playing the game. As it stands, the game's servers are jammed packed, people can't even buy the game as they have stopped sales due to the overload, and even those people who have managed to buy the game can't even create new characters on the majority of existing servers. But I digress, I am fully cognizant of the "ignoramus" dynamic. As it pertains to this thread, I'll simply respond to the OP with two simple letters and a number ... L2P.
So, disclaimer, I'm a hardcore Sandbox player at heart. Soooo if you like games like WoW or RIFT, you most likely will disagree with everything I say (or a little bit?)
-The game definitely feels like a Final Fantasy game! Something that is pretty hard to pull off, but I feel is primarily due to their avid use of sounds for almost every action (that little arrow thing pointing to an action from a player or npc is a nice touch).
-The Audio is very well done and, again, just screams Final Fantasy.
-The "Art Style" definitely fits the overall atmosphere of the game. It isn't "Cartoony" or "Realistic", but a proper balance between the two. The Art Director obviously knew what they were doing.
-The "Graphics" are very nice, but the textures are low quality compared to what we KNOW exists. Most likely an issue with it being only weeks after launch?
-Multiple Avenues of Advancement!!! Don't like questing like me? Do Fates, or get a kill-chain exp group and grind mobs. Don't like any of that? Quest!
-Crafting is reasonably engaging, and i've been told is addicting as heck. I know people who meant to play as Bards or Black Mages but got engulfed by crafting from Day-One.
-The Lore and Story is good for an MMO, much better than other games that have come out in the past 5years.
-The races to choose from are diverse and offer many choices as well as personalities to shine through.
-The class system is a welcomed change from the "Alt Grind" of other MMOs. The fact that you can literally level any class is a breath of fresh air (a better implementation of FF11's job system).
-The class-switching system is completely redesigned from FF11's system. Instead of going to an NPC to setup your job and subjobs, you just switch to a class specific weapon, bam.
-Gear Sets for quick swaps between classes at the drop of a hat for the need of a group/raid encounter.
-CHOCOBOS!
-Experience bonus for subjobs below your maximum leveled job. In other words, if I have a level 50 Gladiator, and I level an Arcanist, said Arcanist will have +50% exp to ALL experience from EVERYTHING until level 50.
-The lighting system will "shock" you, pun intended. The first time you see a thunderstorm in Gridania will make you go squeee!
-Forced single-player storyline that makes you choke on your own blood in order to unlock core-gameplay features. (REALLY? Forcing me to do some stupid quest-line in order to unlock Dungeons, or go to other Cities to play with friends?!)
I don't agree with you that this is a bad thing, MMORPG's core was community and community is developed by engaging with other players. The new breed of MMO's has been what is killing the genre, people should have to work together to accomplish goal and this makes a lot of old school MMO'ers like myself very happy that someone realizes this and it isn't a single player game; if you want to experience everything the game has to offer, even leveling up
Personally, I put this in the good section, as a sandbox player, where the world revolves around player interaction, I can't believe you didn't.
-Gear system is basic, and unintuitive. Crafted gear isn't any better than drop/quest gear. Limited choices of gear throughout the levels.
Not true at all, High level crafters can craft ilvl 70 gear which can only be beat by Tombs of Philosophy and Mythology and some of that gear isn't as good as what can be crafted due to materia slots in crafted gear...the highest loot in a dungeon is ilvl 60 unless you are doing BC raid. So crafting gear is VERY VERY useful at endgame
-Dungeons aren't worth doing more than once until you're level 50. The loot is pathetic, and the exp is even worse for more than your first time. Due to the scarcity of gear drops in Dungeons, you'll out level ANYTHING that drops in them until level 50 faster than doing a couple dungeon runs in a day. You could get a 1/5th of a level doing a 60minute dungeon and probably get zero loot/gil, or you can do 60minutes of Fates for 2000gil and a level at level 30. Really??!?!
Agree, but it is a FF game so the lower level dungeons are about 2 things, Learning your class and telling a story
-Trials are fun, and epic, but aren't worth doing more than once. Worthless XP, no Gil, No LOOT!!! All of them are story-blockers, and require quick-thinking groups. In other words, Pubby-Hell!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Same as above, Hard modes do offer loot
-You can AOE-Ability spam your way through FATES in order to go from 1 to 50 in a week, and that's without the sub-job exp bonus of +50%.
True but not sure how they can fix that, same problem in Rift and GW2
-Gathering resources for Crafting can be the most frustrating thing in the entire game in terms of progression.
Eh it is but I can't think of a single game where its actually any different, gathering wise that is. Go to one spot pick / mine / etc...go to the next spot
-Many pet commands don't work anymore since BETA. You cannot macro "/pet attack" style macros anymore, and most seem to be unaware of the newer system that has ZERO documentation from SquareEnix. In other words, most Arcanist/Summoners are manually clicking pet attack unlike what other classes can do with Macros.
Don't play a pet class so I don't know about this
-Gladiators/Paladins primarily use crappy Daggers/Short Swords. Ruins the whole "Tank" feeling of the class (personal gripe).
I thought "Sword and Board" were the epitome of "Tank" and "Feel"
-Limited number of skills per class makes the entire system feel watered down despite the limited number of cross-class skill usage that is possible. Unfortunately, MOST cross-class skills are pathetic at best, but at worst they're just worthless (looking you at Thaumaturge cross-class skills!).
Not sure how you can say this, I have a lvl 50 black mage and I promise you that you aren't meeting the full potential of your class if you are not using the arcanist and archer abilities to buff your dmg and reduce your threat...I don't think you are speaking from experience here
-Most classes are underpowered, or completely unbalanced. Developers remaining silent about the whole thing has community constantly spamming their forum about obvious issues.
Game has issues no doubt but all games do, as far as them being silent, this development team has given more information and been more open with the community than any other development team I have ever SEEN...this includes Trion which is also great at it
-The language barrier between [Insert Any Other Language other than Japanese Here] -> Japanese Developers is frustratingly obvious on the forums. Feels as if the Developers aren't even taking input from non-Japanese forums sections.
has affected me but I can't argue this
-Digital sales are still locked down despite many key-resellers still selling keys left and right. SE shooting themselves in the foot on a daily basis.
Agree
-Character Creation on 90% of current servers are still locked down. New players cannot play with friends, but are burning "Free" time given to them by their registered purchase of the game.
Character creation is only down on 3 servers right now, a far cry from 90%
-Client is heavily unoptimized still.
Ummm can't comment on this, I have a pretty beffy machine so I play it fine but can't argue that some may have issues
-Yoshi P, director or FFXIV, refuses to unleash his grip on the Video Settings for FFXIV claiming that going any lower than they allow would "Break the original spirit intended to be experienced by the player". I'm looking at you, inability to disable Shadows-On-Everything Option. (Seriously, shadows are the MOST cpu-intensive option ever, and is ALWAYS disable-able).
Agree, they should give people the ability to fine tune the settings a bit more
-Almost ALL skills are on a Server-Timed Global Cooldown. This makes combat highly clunky and unresponsive/buggy at times. A lazy method for developers to reduce server load, but is known in the MMO industry as "How novice game developers solve network traffic problems".
I agree with this, I still enjoy it, but it does need a little more polish.
-No "Social Equipment" tab, meaning you're forced to look like a vagabond that stole equipment from different fashion outlets.
-Anti-Social clowns are prolific within this game. Ask for a rez after a FATE because some jerk moved 10+ frontal-aoe mobs ontop of you during the FATE, and you're called a noob and ignored by the zerg moving on to the next FATE.
Same as above and same problem with other games that have a FATE like system; nothing new here but certainly not saying you are wrong either
-Tanks thinking they're DPS
Sometimes they are, demond wall comes to mind...there are situations where tanks ARE dps as well
-DPS thinking they're healers
Yep
-Healers spamming CureII until they're OOM within the first 1/3rd of a Boss fight, and then blaming the tank for having crap gear.
No idea what they spam but I run with my guild most of the time, not all, and I have never really seen a healer run out of mana unless someone else in the group wasn't pulling their weight..dps or a tank can't hold aggro and they have to heal more people or even worse COMBAT REZ
-The Main Storyline's tie-in by locking core gameplay mechanics (mentioned in "[The Bad]", but bears repeating here).
Again, I like this, it forces interaction with others and gives your character a feeling of progression, another thing that is lacking in most MMO's today, no progression
-Dungeons do NOT sync you properly to their level if you're a higher level. You essentially have any ability above said level range locked from you messing up your hotbar/rotations/etc completely. Gear doesn't scale well, if at all, either and can cause proficient end-game tanks to become squishy novices in lower level dungeons to help friends/FC/etc.
No true, your abilities do sync, if you are not supposed to have the ability at the level sync it will not be available to you. Ask me as I spent almost a min trying to figure out why my Thunder III wasn't casting in the sunken temple
-The Storyline actually locks friends out of helping you with main story battles. This can cause issues for classes such as WhiteMage (healers) whom run out of power mid-fight and then wipe because they can't meet a timed event based on damage, or just can't heal themselves any more.
Some are solo but going back to what I said before, this game actually tried to make you learn your class and not get carried like every other game allows you to do. "Oh screw that I'm not going to go read or practice anything I'll just do what I do and eventually someone will carry me" ; not in this game, not if you want to finish the story and I personally LOVE it
-Lack of a decent Auto-Attack means everything is active-skill based. Healers and Mages beware!!!
Whats wrong with that?
-Almost no class differentiation by end-game save for Warrior vs Paladin, or WhiteMage vs Scholar. Everyone else essentially does the same DPS end-game. (hopefully changes with the first content update!!!)
Huge difference, single target dpser vs aoe dps vs dot dps vs dd dps. I'm beginning to thing you really haven't played this game at max level
-Lego style shadow settings in order to bring the game down to playable FPS.
I don't experience this but as I said above I cannot argue that some might
-Summoner pets are disappointing. The tank pet looks like a giant floating chicken-nugget, and the "DPS" mini-ifrit pet does so little damage you might as well be auto-attacking the mob.
Haven't played a summoner but according to the people in my guild that do play them...they are fine
-The /teleport command making the game feel like a tiny mini-inclosed hand-held GameBoy product.
Don't use it
-Gil, aka: Gold, is almost impossible to gain prior to level 50. Even then, gil gain is so pathetic people are creating petitions to fix how the economy works. People have stopped doing end-game dungeons due to repair costs vs gil income.
People that are complaining are the smash and grap FPS crowd that want everything handed to them now. Making gil in the game is NOT HARD at all you just have to be willing to craft, even selling to a vendor nets you gil.
I'm sure there's more that I forgot to mention or missed, but I'm sure you get the overall point by now !
I'd give the game a solid 7 Bears out of a possibility of 10.
Needs improvement, and obviously the developers are novices when it comes to online gaming development. MANY mistakes being made that FF11 developers discovered, and fixed, a long time ago. Makes you wonder if FF11 developers are even on the FFXIV team.
Overall however, promises to be a solid Themeparktitle.
Regards,
-Bear
You did take your time to write this but frankly I can't agree with most of what you have said. Doesn't make either one of us right or wrong we just see the game different I guess which is fine.
Comments
I've been having fun in FFXIV and mostly i agree with op with a few exceptions:
-Multiple Avenues of Advancement!!! Don't like questing like me? Do Fates, or get a kill-chain exp group and grind mobs. Don't like any of that? Quest!
I prefer questing to grinding, always did and possibly always will. But leveling a 3rd class on the same character, i have a huge gap in between quests, forcing to grind FATEs and/or leves. It annoys me alot.
-The class system is a welcomed change from the "Alt Grind" of other MMOs. The fact that you can literally level any class is a breath of fresh air (a better implementation of FF11's job system).
I always made alts to experience different parts of the story. In FFXIV i've made 3 alts to explore the 3 cities. I was really displeased that at level 15-16 the story becomes the same, not only that it forces me to do dungeons to progress. 1 hour waiting for a team to do a dungeon is not fun.
However i do like the class system, just wish i had enough different quests and story to enjoy leveling them.
As for everything else op said, i agree with it.
/sigh
Another hack opinion piece. What I find most fascinating are the posters reading this "opinion piece" and forming their opinion to not try the game based on one person's personal game preferences. Really? You are not going to play the game based on the opinion of some novice on a game forum? Even when you read post after post discrediting many of the opinions expressed by said novice? What does that say about you? *boggles the mind.* The fun factor in a game is subjective people. Be an independent thinker. And if you must form an opinion about whether to play a game or not, read multiple reviews ... by professionals. If you were to do that, you would come up with a more educated opinion about the game than a hack piece by a novice on a game forum. And this goes for both the positive and negative reviews by any novice poster on any game forum. I am often left to wonder why anyone would care about any one individual's opinion on a game. What is it about these people that they feel their opinion is so "worthy" that they must take to game forums and distribute it to the masses.
The large majority of "professional" reviews about FF:ARR are overwhelming positive. Likewise, FF:ARR tops the games list on the majority of websites offering that perspective. This same website has FF:ARR at the number one spot by a large margin. That is the type of information you should be basing your opinion on, not on some hack piece by some novice on a game forum. And as a matter of practicality, look at the response from the majority of players playing the game. As it stands, the game's servers are jammed packed, people can't even buy the game as they have stopped sales due to the overload, and even those people who have managed to buy the game can't even create new characters on the majority of existing servers. But I digress, I am fully cognizant of the "ignoramus" dynamic. As it pertains to this thread, I'll simply respond to the OP with two simple letters and a number ... L2P.
You did take your time to write this but frankly I can't agree with most of what you have said. Doesn't make either one of us right or wrong we just see the game different I guess which is fine.