Final Fantasy XIV (Guide in first post)

mkopec_sl said:

From the sound of it seems like the honeymoon phase is over anyway. Welcome to typical mmo in the 2010's.

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I dunno, FC still running like 70 online even with the AFK kick and activity still seems really high. I can see the people who were wanting to dump 40+ hours a week into this game getting bored, but it looks to have 90 days worth of entertainment for me and outside of Eve, I think that'll be a first since WoW's release.

Man0warr_sl said:

There will never be a new MMO that can appease the hardcore for more than a month. They can't generate content fast enough - you should all quit MMOs now.

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I am a bit hardcore in playtime (retired, online during the daytime) but not playstyle but ff14 just feels so unfinished, like every single game system was put together by different teams with nobody vetting stuff or checking out how things work all together. Most of all I just feel like "wait... why I am playing this instead of wow, or rift, or even swtor/tera" when those all do pretty much everything better. The big draw, being able to do everything on one character, ends up being a real pain in the ass due to inventory management and quite frankly I prefer having alts to do different stuff but of course that is a personal thing.

The only thing I can think of is that I am not a big final fantasy fan (only played 7 as a kid, don't remember shit except sephiroth), I guess if you know all the lore and stuff this may be good but I have no idea about any of it and so it just feels like retardedly stupid anime-shit to me.

fwiw I played rift for 8 months, tera for 7, TSW for 3, swtor for 3, and resub to wow for every xpac (vanilla acct) but I'm not even bothering to pay the first month in this game and doubt I'll ever be back. Don't get me wrong though, it was easily the best $20 for entertainment I have played in a while but it just makes me sad at how many things feel unpolished. Its the Windows 8 of MMOs.

The fact you played TERA for 7 months completely invalidates any opinion you have.

I should hit 50 today, and while I've mostly enjoyed it, I don't see myself paying a sub fee for it. Outside of the IP and having a working LFG tool, don't feel it really does anything better than TSW. As Spronk said definitely worth the 20 bucks, and I can see possibly checking it out again down the line to see what they add.

spronk_sl said:

Most of all I just feel like "wait... why I am playing this instead of wow, or rift, or even swtor/tera" when those all do pretty much everything better.

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This is where I'm currently at. The game works for what it is, but I also keep asking what's in this that's going to keep my attention any more than Rift or WoW, and both of those are (in my opinion) equal if not better than this (WoW wins on content alone). Are we so deperate to play anything new that we'll cling onto anything that works in the beginning?

I think it depends on how much and how quickly content is generated. It's an awesome experience until 50, when it turns into "run the same dungeon ad nauseam". What gets me is that they went through the trouble of adding so many low level dungeons that people only run once or twice because of the pace of leveling and the disproportionate fate exp gain. I would love to run 50+ versions of sash, stone vigil, cutters, and brayflox, and I think having them as alternatives to doing AK forever might have alleviated some of the tedium. I also wish that instances gave much better exp, because fate grinding is as boring as hell as it was in GW2 and every other game where you run from event to event in a giant zerg of window-lickers.

1-50 was a lot of fun, but it's gone by really fast, even playing casually.

I'm sure we will see a bunch of 2.1 info at TGS next week. GTA5 is looming ever closer though. I haven't even done any 50 content yet, just been levelling alts and doing other shit. I was not expecting to be playing this game for more than a week to be honest but i'm still hooked.

I give up trying to understand people. They seem to play something while the entire time wishing they were playing something else.

Guess I'm the weirdo, im doing turn 5 coil and crafting/gathering and still having fun. I can easily see still playing for another 1-2 months still.

Oh and I have never played a FF game.


I'm waiting for the game that really slows down leveling(ie takes months to max out, either via levels or skill systems) and the huge bitch fest that will follow

cinge_sl said:

I give up trying to understand people. They seem to play something while the entire time wishing they were playing something else.

Guess I'm the weirdo, im doing turn 5 coil and crafting/gathering and still having fun. I can easily see still playing for another 1-2 months still.

Oh and I have never played a FF game.


I'm waiting for the game that really slows down leveling(ie takes months to max out, either via levels or skill systems) and the huge bitch fest that will follow

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I don't think it's so much wishing to play something else, it's the feeling you've played this game before and it wasn't even that long ago. This is the same problem Rift had by the way. After a while you realize you're not doing anything fundamentally different than you did in WoW. There is a reason why people are tired of WoW.

Understandable, but you can't say you were shocked to learn that. It's been known that since beta, and everyone should of noticed that in p4. Knowing that and still buying it, you can't really complain afterwards. If anything should of not bought it, to not support the "same ol" that you dislike. Me personally, I don't mind the design and plan on in the future to play more games that follow this path(wildstar) but will also play those that don't, why limit myself.

mkopec_sl said:

Nah I don't mind it that much. That's why I bought it. $30 is a steal for this game IMO. Still the point stands.

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Yeah, I think the problem isn't so much that it's a wow-alike, I've actually really enjoyed it despite usually hating them (Like I quit rift around level 25, it felt way too much like wow without the soul). The challenge is going to be keeping people paying $10 a month 3 months from now. My personal opinion is that they need to introduce frequent content: otherwise I think people will just slip back to TSW or GW2 or whatever else is f2p. For $10 a month people really need to have stuff to do. A lot of people will be really turned off by grinding AK too. I might not make it past the darklight hump of running AK 50 times or whatever, because i'm going to get bored of that content fast. If they can keep introducing new content for people at 50 (both bleeding edge and just more to do in general) I think it'll work out ok. But I want to run a wider variety of dungeons without having a to grind a single one for weeks, and I think a lot of people will feel the same way.

They nailed 1-50, it sounds like they're keeping the 50+ hardcore happy, I feel like the only demographic they may be dropping the ball on is the 50+ casuals who don't really want to keep rolling alts.

This game is very interesting in the way that it hooked me. I am and have always been a hardcore EQ1 player. I've never played the "wow style" mmo more than a month so I'm not familiar with the gear treadmill and boring grinding that everyone here is posting about. For me, I'm level 42 and I'm loving most things about it so far. My biggest gripe is that the best exp is from mindlessly zerging fates over and over. I agree 100% that dungeon exp needs to be raised to make it the best leveling path (as it should be).

The graphics are a big sell for me personally because I like the more realistic style. Some complain about the speed of combat but to me its very welcome. Again I'm an old EQ1 player so slow combat is in my blood I guess. When I played wow for the one month it came with, I quickly realized that I could set my entire rotation on a keyboard macro key and his 1 button to spam my skills in order when they came off cooldowns. The macro wasn't easy to write but it was a million times easier than having to watch the bars like a maniac. I realized back then that if I'm trying to automate something, I really don't enjoy it. For me the global cooldown is a very enjoyable.

Even with all the things this game does right it does have some flaws. The biggest are the exp fate grinding and the delay on telegraphed attacks. Overall I'm really enjoying the game and would recommend it.