Of course, one of the major components to making each of the starting cities and subsequent areas stand out is the worldbuilding efforts of the development team. The most recent Making of Eorzea documentary covers precisely this, and not coincidentally, it can be viewed past the cut. With a discussion of the scenery and the visual culture of the game's landscape, the video is something every Final Fantasy XIV player can enjoy, and it shows that the vibrancy of the world has been a big priority during development.
I wish there were some more meaningful and direct method to communicate with these people...they really need to update and fix their UI. The signal to noise ration on forums is abyssmal, feedback forms on sites probably lead to an inbox that never gets sorted, and the people you get access to at trade shows, etc are usually just PR and have no ability to affect anything. I think most people want the game to succeed in NA but I don't feel like the average MMO player is going to put up with that horrible interface.
Well, When Final Fantasy first emerged on the NES, I thought the UI and combat was slow and terrible. I mean after Mario and Zelda, what the heck was up with this FF game? But look where it is now. *shrugs*
I'm hoping it sticks with the current control system, it'll give me that real sense of a Final Fantasy game. That's mainly what I'm looking for, another story in the epic series.
Even if the masses (or "PC Gamers"* that hate and refuse to use a gamepad) doesn't pick up this game and only Square-Enix and FFXI fans pick it up, then it'll be just fine by me.
In my opinion, FFXI had the best community of any MMO that I'd ever played and if it'll be just these people that are playing XIV, then I'm okay with that.
*And what with PC gamers that limit themselves to only keyboard and mouse control? I'm a PC gamer and I enjoy using keyboard and mouse on FPS and RTS like anybody else, but why limit yourselves? I understand everybody has a preference, but why swear off all other methods of control?
Personally I have more games on PC that I use a gamepad with (Batman Arkham Asylum, Prince of Persia, Transformers: War for Cybertron, Assassin's Creed II, Split Second and Blur) than I do with kb/mouse (StarCraft II, WarCraft III, and Dragon Age).
Duh I saw that "best community of any MMO" in some polite thread about !why! some people criticize FF XIV. And it sounded more like rude elitists , who mostly say "get back to WoW, we don't need You here". I'd pick LOTRO community any time as it's mature in disagreeing and respects You if You say stuff in calm way.
Over last 8 years from FF XI MMORPGS on PC evolved and some standards were made. UI is one of them - no matter if it's AAA title or some korean grinder - it says nearly same. Time for Square Enix to catch up or stay in the niche and be odd symptom of Japanese culture rather than international company. Defending stuipd UI as it is usable when...is like linux nerds were defending console based system with no GUI as it works even better when...
I actually agree, I remember fondly how great the FFXI community was. Everyone worked together, there was little to no griefing and you could always have a friendly chat with people on linkshells.
I think a large part of it was that FFXI was pretty much 100% a PvE game, and did really well because of that.
The same way, I'd like FFXI to do well enough, but not so well that everyone floods over from other MMOs (though that will happen for a while at launch). I'd like it to do well enough to be a success, like FFXI, but not so well that we have every WoW folk moving over (Nothing against wow, I had some great friends on WoW, but there are also folks that are...less reputable shall we say)
There are still tweaks to be made but overall I'd say the game in on track. I can deal with the 48hr leve time down, but Im also concerned about the lack of the auction house with no viable alternative in game just yet.
Overall, I loved the video and can't wait to be able to play in other cities.
"no PVP" actually a reason for success of FFXI, everyone was super cooperative and always worked together to get stuff done, probably the best MMO community to date. I'm fine with PvP games, but I don't think PvE games should tack on PvP just to say they have it (Like WoW PvP is awful I think, and brings little to the game).
Crap UI. It seems fine to me, better than the XI one even.
Horrible controls. Get a gamepad, I am sure you have one from your 360 or PS3 (and if not, you really should get one of those consoles, missing a lot of great games). Or just play the game on the PS3 when it comes out there, I probably will be.
Character Design - Aa, you are one of those. I'm sorry, but I think the character designs in this game are absolutely fantastic, I'll take it any day over the ridiculously overmuscular characters that are common in western MMOs.
Stuck to the ground - Why do you need to jump, really? I honestly don't know.
The community seems ok but to be honest you play solo most of the time. They did say they are working on ways to make people want to group more. Also it is a ton of grinding...so far all the levequests I'v done are grind quests. However the main storyline is interesting. I would also agree that the UI is really bad and if you don't have a good rig I think you will pull your hair out playing this game.
I think there are enough worldwide fans of FF that this game would have to be really bad and continue to be really bad for it to fail. The story is good, the concept is solid, the design is quality. All of the problems this game may or may not have are not problems central to the operation of the game. everything else is fixable, you cant fix poor design though, all you can do is work around it. Thats what FFXI PvP is like, its annoying because it wasn't intended for the game so it just doesn't play with any excitement and I love PvP in a lot of other games. I really hope SE can fix the grouping incentives before release because I would hate to be forced into a Valkurm Dunes situation, but I gotta say Valkurm is quite memorable because its the first chance you have to really interact with other players and learn party mechanics. Only problem is they make you learn party mechanics being thrown into the fire instead of being gently guided.
This is something new they are trying. WoW has group quests but the only reason people group up for them is because they are too difficult to solo. Most WoW players I would say, generally solo to cap and if you want a party you queue for a dungeon run, you don't just invite someone and start doing questchains. What they are trying to do in FFXIV is create great incentive for people to emulate FFXI grouping without being forced to do it. I personally loved leveling in FFXI, I just hated that it was hard to XP, but when you had a good party it was extremely engaging gameplay. That mechanic continues into the endgame too, it just becomes even more engaging the more difficult the opponent is.
