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Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn | Eorzea Reborn | The Problematic Diadem | MMORPG
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn | Eorzea Reborn | The Problematic Diadem | MMORPG
Are exploration missions in FFXIV fun? Or is the fun being optimized out of the experience? Let’s take a look.
Comments
I was looking forward to this content as I believed it could provide that facet of gameplay I was missing in FF14, but it looks like the community has gobbled it up, chewed it to bits, and shredded it apart. Since the team has never really "fixed" hunts, I imagine the same will go for here.
PUGS will NEVER have the same outlook. Many of them want to speed run it and get it done and over with vs maybe my group wants to pull 1 pack at a time while on TS and chat. Maybe the Pug wants to MIN MAX everything and I dont. Again forcing people to pug much like WOW is; is killing this game. I play an MMORPG to have a social network of friends so a high percentage of my grouping will be with these people. A low percentage is with Pugs and most of them from my own server. So with that said the current roulettes kill my grouping and are driving me away as a player.
I will say this still FFXIV is the best MMO on the market, but they spend too much time and focus on what the Japaneses players want instead of listening to all players. On the Japaneses servers bad behavior is not tolerated, and Pugs know what they are doing and fail much less. WHY? Because their learning groups are done all by pre-made vs US Pre-Mades are often learning groups or people looking to be carried. The root of all the problems is the Cross Realm Duty Finder vs PreMade groups. We all know why games have gone to hell with Cross Realm Duty Finders, thats because there is no accountability in them and never will be.
Any mmo worth its salt should be like a good prostitute when it comes to its game world- One hell of a faker, and a damn good shaker!
oh well i got 3 awesome items from it and now currency for some materia V ....if only wasnt that boring
speaking of HARD , normal mode tried it once and was a bit chaotic , pugs are lazy and slack a lot
First, the community turning sour, the once overly friendly game now becoming more and more critical of everyone. There is no patience, nobody playing to have fun, just to gear up treadmill style.
Which leads us to the second problem - the devs are making awful decisions. Since the expac they are on a bit of a streak:
They added flying, you basically never see other players outside of a hunt, city, or instance.
The expansion zones are the worst in the entire game, bad quests, unfinished graphics, and empty of other players.
Two of the expansion classes stink. Balance patches have been bringing them up, but machinist and astro started as laughable and are now scraping bottom of the barrel.
Class design is all focused around the same style - memorizing a 20 button opener, then boring 2.5 second GCD until your Cooldowns are back up.
They released the expac with next to no content. Two max level dungeons, one raid with a hardmode, two trials.
When they finally released new content, they put the two new dungeons in their own queue, seemingly just to increase how long it takes to find a group.
They realized that the zones were barren, so their solution was to add a huge grind to the hunt that allows people to upgrade to max level gear. Now zones are empty except for the mega zerg at the hunt target. Soon that zerg will be gone again once their equipment is upgraded.
They saw people getting sick of the gear treadmill, so they added the diadem and "exploration." Despite all of their talk about how it is about exploring as a group, and their previews showing players treating it like a social experience, the community quickly turned it into what it was at the core - a boring zerg on the gear treadmill.
It seems to me like they are paying enough attention to the community to know that they have screwed up, but that they do not have any good idea on how to fix the mess they have made. The devs are hoping a gear treadmill is all it takes to keep players interested, and they are going to find out they are wrong. I am not saying I know how to fix it, seems like there is no recovering after a game adds flying. It is the MMORPG version of jumping the shark. It makes the entire game world insignificant, and reduces your game to the areas where you cannot fly - instances. Their entire expac needs a rework like the initial release of FFXIV did.
This is exactly why they need to stop forcing pugs and get back to not allowing pugs to do certain content. Its not hard to get 8 people for a raid. Also they need to stop wasting their time on stuff like the golden saucer and spent their development 4 to 6 dungeons every 6 months or so. Make this dungeons for people who do not want to do Raids, and drop gear in this dungeons NOT TOKENS. Make it so that all the bosses have the same loot table AND that it's a more focused RNG Drop. Example If there is no one in the group that can use Bard or Ninja gear, that gear does not enter into the RNG roll, just gear for the Jobs that are in the Dungeon. It makes it so people want to do boss kills for gear NOT a tread mill for Stone. Yea its a gear treadmill but if you make it also more Pre-Made friendly (Reward Premades) then the treadmill even lessens there.
I disagree, I like dungeons and I like raiding, but I dislike running it over and over and I hated how once raids on farm my time was pretty empyu (using wow as an example). I like the other content in ff14 and there needs to be more of it.
Flying in MMOs is just a bad idea. Why FF14 thought this was a good idea to add yo their game is beyond me.
You'd think........
Anarchy Online launched in 2001. It had flying. The 1st expansion, Shadow-lands, did not.
Did Blizzard learn from this? No. They painted themselves into a corner with flying and now they have to deal with players who want to fly and I don't blame them after years of collecting and buying mounts. Even though it wrecks the content.
And now FFXIV is going to learn players shouldn't be able to bypass open world content.
The problem is two part,one is bad ideas,corner cutting and the other is the players.Players don't want a rpg,they want to be able top speed through everything,get the best gear then leave the game until the next xpack and gear arrives.
Their decision to copy Blizzard was pathetic,it is like "we bow before you",Blizzard can't make a good game if their life depended on it.
When they made FFXI it was about the journey,ideas to discover that were never seen before,no hand holding and all about your jobs/classes in stead of about the gear.Once you turn a game into a gear fest ,the game is ruiend forever because you can't turn back,you have to keep luring players back for Ilevel 100...ilevel 110...ilevel 120 etc etc.
IMO that is a pathetic game design decision and a poor reason to game....period.
Yes FFXIV does a lot of good things,nice graphics,nice maps,nice crafting but the core design of the game was designed to support a RUSH JOB and it can never be fixed.These other developers don;t even need to be in a rush,.they are just taking ideas and slapping them into a game and calling it a mmorpg.Square has the one up on all these other developers if they ever get their head out of Blizzard's ass and back into their home field where it belongs.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
I hate what this mmo has become.
You know, the thing that bothers me is that I agree with most of you and I've gotten scared of playing the game. My FC stopped playing and the only two people playing is my fiancee and I. We love the game, but I hate playing it because I get forced to do all this group content that we should be able to do on our own. And I don't mind playing with other players if the players weren't all douchbags trying to min max everything and they leave at the first wipe or mention that it is my first time in the dungeon. Why can't you just be helpful? And they aren't, because they're there to get the tokens at the end of the dungeons and if my newbness is going to force him to play for 15 more minutes t because we're slow, I have to leave and find a faster group. And they can't even help with tips or tricks, they just insult you and leave.
I hate what this mmo has become.
Heyo! Saw your post.
Let me know what server you're on via Private Message here. I might be able to help you find a more active free company or refer you to a linkshell.
That, or you could try discussing it on the FFXIV subreddit requesting for help finding a more friendly and inviting atmosphere for playing the game.
A writer and gamer from the Philippines. Loves his mom dearly.
Can also be found on http://www.gamesandgeekery.com