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My big fear with FFXIV
Arioc
Member Posts: 299
As a MMO developer, I know we spend allot of time creating massive amounts of quest and encounter (read: dungeons, instances, scripted events) into the game prior to initial launch. We spend years creating the world and populating it with a dense blanket of content of variable quality and complexity, but enough to keep most people busy for a fair chunk of time without artifical barriers.
Now once the game is out; we have very little time before people grind through the low to mid content, that's a polish period to discover bugs which slipped through internal QA and evaluate player feedback on the areas of the game which need improvement or attention.
Now I see FFIX out the door with a limited number of quests, most repeditive "tasks" more then quests. I am deeply worried that no matter how hard they try and address the lack of content, the player base will devour the sparce monthly content updates and still be very hungry for more.
A developer cannot sustain a live game the way they would a game in development, financially it dosn't make sense.
So my big fear is that try as they might to fix the bugs, give the UI an overhaul and add re-do the spawns, item tables, loot, crafting, etc... they're constantly playing catch-up and will never be able to invest enough content into the game AND fix bugs fast enough to make this feel like a fully developed title.
Case in point AC2. Another game which was released prematurly with too much repedative content. The dev's tried hard to fill the game with quests, but each month maybe 6 quests were added (they had to be beefy enough to keep the players busy for that month, as well as fill out the lack of world content). It was an uphill battle, and ultimatly they couldn't keep the staff needed to sustain it so they had to let people go, which slowed down development of live content, which killed the game.
I see the same thing down the road for FFXIV, although I am saddened by this---it was a game I wanted to play.
Arioc Murkwood
Environment Artist
Sad but true.
Comments
I think this is one of the most interesting and well thought-out criticisms of the game I've read. Then again, I've always tried to argue that the lag and the menus and the horrible interface are all things that FFXIV for the most part could have survived with if they only had any content.
There are a lot of games with absolutely awful playability that are loved dearly due to an engrossing and involving game environment, and while certainly there would be lost subscribers due to those other problems and interface issues, I always thought that it would be much easier to keep a serious core of players running so long as you had something for them to do.
I'm not in any way suggesting that the other issues don't need to be addressed, and certainly some have a very high priority (the lag was/is eternally, PAINFULLY frustrating), but so many non-content-related problems in so many other games are often even (at least temporarily) resolved by player-invented stopgap measures...but there has to be an actual game there to begin with.
This game makes me sad. All I can hope for is a massive world upgrade with the realease of a first real game expansion (assuming the game even lives that long) because the monthly (or tri-monthly) patch game is just going to be like you've said...trying to play catch up with an eager fanbase...and there's really no good way to win that.
Nice topic.
Here's where I don't necessarily agree. Look at FFXI. It went through the IDENTICAL development cycle. It was in worse shape with less content when it released in Japan. Most NA players don't know this because they received the game a year later plus an Expansion pack. In the end, FFXI has more to do end game than most MMOs combined.
SE, unlike any other MMO developer, is GREAT at not making content obsolete. Take WoW for example, until Cataclysm, Vanilla WoW areas were completely empty. In FFXI, you would find yourself back in the original zones but with new content. You would have a boss or a quest that would take you a deep part of a cave that you visited a 100 times before.
The BEST part of FFXI, and FFXIV for that matter is the release of new classes. Because the game is entirely designed around horizontal progression, there is ALWAYS incentive to start a new class. But this time around, you experience the new class while also experiencing the new content across all levels.
To be honest, the quality of content won't be an issue with SE. It also won't be the issue of exausting the content too quickly. In WoW, there were no artificial stop gaps between 1 and 60. You could grind your way to "end game" in 10 days. In FFXI, there was subjob quest, choco quest, kazzam keys, airship pass etc. Though I have yet to see those in FFXIV, I don't doubt it will be there.
Heck, look at the surplus system, it's designed to prevent maxing your level in a very short period of time.
Unlike you, my biggest worry is that FFXIV in a year or two is going to have A LOT of content that is compelling, fun and challenging. BUT, there won't be anyone here to experience it because people left for other MMOs (Rift, Tera, GW2, and SWTOR)
/agree
The OP has the right idea as well, SE can never catch up.... or so we think (logically). This almost reminds me of an Age of Conan scenario. Another game that brought in a ton of hype and initial sales, followed by mass exodus. By the time Funcom got the game nearly perfect, not a soul would go back to it and play. Today, AoC is a great game, but unfortunately, nobody is playing it! Which means, someone like me, who would like to play, gets bored running around trying to find people to group / pvp / interact with, and I cancel and leave.
SE will have the same problem. The game, even after the November Update I find playable. (and believe be, I considered this to be the worst gaming experience of all time!) But I find the improvements are a step in the right direction, the biggest issue, SE has to really push to get or keep its player-base - because in 6 months, when the game is finally AAA material, the whole 13 people still playing it will be awfully lonely.
The one thing we don't know as spectators in this whole scenario is just how much $$ SE will throw at this.
I'm not sure SE is willing to let a flag ship name go down in history as a failure. On top of that, they have fairly high aspirations for PS3 version sales and retention. I'm pretty sure, they are figuring this out, dumping as many resources as humanly and finacially possible to give this game a 2nd chance next year @ PS3 release.
Most people think SE is suffering due to the PC user fallout. Technically, even if a small percentage of the initial buyers retain subscription between now and the PS3 release, that could be more than enough. The amount of play testing and feedback they are getting is invaulable, sure the reception their getting is completely negative, but they still have a very rare 2nd chance with the PS3. Not many MMO companies have that luxury.
Hey TSW Players http://www.unfair.co/ for Mission guides, Lore Locations and stuff....
This is a double edged sword. Personally i found the horizontal progress in XI, while really fun when levelling new jobs, does nothing but create bottlenecks at the end. You end up with 300 people sitting around a pit waiting for a dragon to spawn for 5 years.
Now, i put all the blame on the horrible itemization and SE's reluctancy to outdate gear. Sure it feels great knowing i can go back to XI years later and know i still have the best gear, but in the big picture it's not a good way to go.
At the same time, once your main story missions are done, you don't have the joy of completing them on other classes because the'ye always the same. Interesting story archs and quests that take you on your own path in a seperate part of the world would be something i would prefer over one big main story and nothing else.
FFXIV needs quests, thousands and thousands of quests. Fun quests that tie in story and region. Those take time, and it's obvious SE was not willing to put the time into that aspect as they gave us the wonderfully boring Leve system. Content isn't the only problem obviously as i thnk the combat system and mechanics are terrible as well.
SE had a perfect launch date. Nothing on the horizon to excite people for 6 months. The ONE thing they couldn't do was release a terrible and unfinished game, which is exactly what they did. I'm affraid it's too late now, SE blew it. I gave it a chance, i waited 4 years for it, since i first saw screens shots of it. I couldn't fathom coming back in 6 months when there will be better MMO's with actual content that looks fun.
SE have not charge a subscription fee yet
i understand what your saying and i completely agree with you 100%. its a game i wanted to play and with much disapoined i have stopped, i dont belive the game will catch up with all the issues it has. it will take at least 2 years for it to be fully complete and polished. this is a big problem with mmo's today they release unfinished games collect subs and then fix it as they go.
Age of Conan is not a great game. I played it just recently, the PvE is horrible. The constant quest grind was boring, I find it more boring that than grinding in this game under the previous SP system. The quests were really badly written and got much worse it seemed after Tortage.
Plus end game PvE was a joke with their tiered raids (which was a pretty small end game for a game that has been out so long) and how due to constant balancing they could would go from easy to hard and back making progression (when progression is really all there is because you have such a tiered and limited end game). Classes I also found to be pretty boring, and the combat system once you got up high made for really boring and repetitive gameplay for most.
It is pretty much the same game it was at launch, Khitai didn't exactly change anything. I didn't really have issues with AoC at launch that were specific at launch, I just grew tired of it. When I went back after godslayer the same thing happened.
No one plays AoC because it is in fact not a great game. If people want to play it there are all sorts of trials, and you can get it for cheap. It is not some hidden gem all sorts of people play it, but for a lot of people it just isn't fun now so they stop playing it.
The same with Warhammer, and the same with Vanguard. People do try these games (I know I played vanguard for years), but they don't stick around and too many others quit for various reasons. Bottom line is they aren't suffering because they missed their "one opportunity" it is so easy to play any of those games that anyone interested in MMO's can. It's as simple as that, if people want to try them they can and tons of people do (more than enough to make the games highly profitable again), they just don't end up subscribing long term or at least not at a high enough rate to negate the high turnaround in those games.
LoTRO and DDO, and EQ2 only seem to recover in great numbers right now with high numbers because they are free to play, not really the same thing as buying a subscription to a game is it?
http://xivpads.com/?1595680
http://guildwork.com/users/murugan
This only happens when majority of your playerbase starts playing at the release.
If most people join in the game after 6 months, year, or more, SE has had enough time to develop content for them.
Not to mention the way the game is set up, there is always something to do and it is worthwhile.
Most successful games don't get nearly as many initial subs compared to the size of the playerbase after few years. That is healthy.
Of course if SE were to start creating content now, they would always be behind the curve as far as player levelling goes
however we are assuming SE does not have a whole ton of content sat behind the scenes, with final work being carried out..
My understanding is htat SE are well known for making huge updates at the drop of the hat, with all behind the scenes work almost top secret. There have already been comments around the net about where ffxiv is going, with companies, housing and transportation. All huge parts of the world, one can only assume SE has a massive amount of content to fill in between.
After all, the single player FF games all offer lots of questing, why would SE have decided this was unnecessary in an MMO.
Its still early days, i think the areas we have been given so far are purely starter, training areas, with hte rest of hte game to come, and probably quickly.
Im likign this game a lot, but unless huge content updates emerge, or they extend hte free trial, i wont pay a subscritption, i have lots of other beta mmos ill pl ay in the mean time.
We know what content is coming. NM's and more guildleves in December, hamlet defense battles, "NM battle content" and something to do with Companies in March (housing, PvP).
Only 5 regions out of 10 in the vanilla have been implemented as well.
Nothing massive, but at the end of vanilla things should be packed.