1. FFXIV Reset Timers
    Last daily reset was 3 hours, 53 minutes ago / Next daily reset is in 20 hours, 6 minutes
    Last weekly reset was 1 days, 20 hours, 53 minutes ago / Next weekly reset is in 4 days, 13 hours, 6 minutes
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  1. #61

    Quote Originally Posted by drwaffles View Post
    This is dumb. There is no way in hell the number of potential customers that would've been lost by releasing the "finished" game a few months later would've come anywhere close to matching the number of potential customers they've lost forever by releasing it too early in its current, broken state. Fucking up and then regaining the trust of whatever playerbase remains will not make the game "better" than if they'd released it when it was actually ready and thus gotten a favourable reception. You're certainly correct concerning the fact that releasing a product early can sometimes be an effective business strategy, but it's a disastrous one for something like an MMO where first impressions are absolutely crucial.
    Put it this way. Do you really think SE would have ever thought to allow addons and UI customization if it weren't for this whole thing? NO CHANCE IN HELL. But that alone is fucking huge, really. Who knows what that translates to in customers, or whether after-the-fact modifications can recover the loss of potential customers. The game is almost certainly going to be better due to this whoel thing. Whether or not they'll end up with more customers as a result, who knows

  2. #62

    Quote Originally Posted by miokomioko View Post
    I don't understand how there are as many people as you suggest that are so ridiculously stubborn that they refuse to play the game EVER AGAIN because it was rushed to release.
    Because many of FFXIV's problems go beyond things that can be fixed. Everyone expects that UI lag and things like that to be eventually adjusted, but not the core problems.

    There are people who don't like how 2/3 of the available classes are non-combat ones, for instance. Is it absurd to think that there might be players who are not interested in a game that focuses so much on crafting and gathering?
    Or the fact that this game has so many useless timesinks like equipment needing repairs (what does this add to the game's experience other than wasting your time even more?), the very definition of "fatigue" and "retainer", every item having 3 HQ copies of itself instead of just one, storyline and job quests being incredibly poor designed and boring to do, etc.

    SE can satisfy players' requests but only so much. They don't want players to hit rank 50 in a week, they want them to waste their time playing FFXIV so they get the money from the subscriptions, which would be ok if the game was actually fun to play.
    And since "fun" in a MMORPG usually equals to "progression", especially for veteran MMORPG players, there is a problem here, since it goes against FFXIV's core concepts (horizontal progression and preventing players from advancing too fast).

    The reason you don't want players to advance quickly is only one: you can't keep up with content updates to keep them busy once they hit the cap.
    Even if FFXIV turned into a game where you can hit rank 50 in a week, people would eventually get bored and quit, so SE still loses.

  3. #63
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    This game doesn't really have such a huge market for the PC atm because most of the mmorpg crowd out there have older computers that can't handle it to good but a few years down the road people will have updated computer systems but there'll be quite alot of competition at that point. There's millions upon millions of PS3 systems out there and FFXIV is the only mmorpg that's going to be available on that console so that's going to hopefully bring in hundreds of thousands of players. I would honestly be shocked if this game doesn't have upwards of a million players in the next months after March 2011.

  4. #64
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    Quote Originally Posted by Nevex View Post
    Because many of FFXIV's problems go beyond things that can be fixed. Everyone expects that UI lag and things like that to be eventually adjusted, but not the core problems.
    Can you list some of them?

    I would honestly be shocked if this game doesn't have upwards of a million players in the months following March 2011.
    I'm honestly rather interested in seeing how they're going to lure in the PS3 FF players with no MMO experience. Marketing? Maybe.

  5. #65
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    "Problem" in this sense seems relative, we're talking more about design decisions which some may view as bugs, but others as intentional (e.g. the random nature of SP gain). Lack of an AH ("retainers", even with a search function, doesn't have the same ring to it to some), rapid durability of items, leve cool-down, the amount of grind to rank up 20+, the combat system, the crafting and gathering mini-games (more so crafting in this context, which is far more random even if SE are saying "look, it's meant to work this way" more and more), transport and anima cool-down - regardless of whether these are problems or design decisions, they have pushed some players away. These are different from UI lag etc. because they seem, at least in part, intentional, and some players don't like them.

  6. #66
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    I don't know why the distinction needs be made. If it's a bug, it will be fixed. If it's bad design, it will be fixed.

    Is it because other games for the most part don't fix their design once they go live? Granted, they focus on getting it right instead of fixing bugs and get away with it, pretty much. SE's focus on bug squashing seems rather counterproductive in that sense, as bugs seem to be forgiven more than bad design. But now they can focus most of their efforts on fixing the design, as the game really is not that buggy right now.

    Intentional or not is hardly relevant, as even intentional things can and will be changed.

  7. #67
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    Fixing design inherently requires that the designers admit that they were wrong, which is no small task.

    Look at the (lack of an) AH. In order to fix that "design flaw," the designers would have to acknowledge that their "player-based economy model" was a failure. This isn't like improving UI lag or adjusting anima regeneration, where you're tweaking the edges to realize their vision for the game in a more player-friendly manner... you'd have to throw away one of their major design philosophies for this game, one that was clearly intentional. That is not something that's going to go away without a major fight.

  8. #68
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    True.

    But if you want to try something new, you pretty much need to be prepared that your ideas, most of them in fact, are not going to work as you intended and will need either tweaks or major overhauls in the worst case. Some more, some less.

    If they want to keep doing things the way they are, this kind of mindset is pretty much crucial. They must be aware of it. If you don't want to deal with the consequences, you should just copy others.

    That we have gotten 2 free months was probably not the easiest decision, as it implies that the people in charge of that decision have admitted complete defeat. You just gotta be prepared to do so in this industry and especially with this kind of development policy.

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    Just because a concept was poorly executed in its first implementation doesn't mean it was a failure. If you're going to create something, you must have ready a plethora of possible adjustments/additions to utilize if it doesn't work in its bare-bones version. It's not always about abandoning a design concept entirely... it's about making it adapt.

  10. #70
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    Usually that's done before the game hits the shelves though, but... yeah.

  11. #71
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    Exactly, people are seeing the natural design process in action when they are simply used to things being in a much more finalized form by the time it's officially launched. They just throw their arms about and say "design failure" because they already paid for a game that hasn't had a chance to mature into something fluid.

  12. #72

    I still consider FF14 design was aimed toward JP players plus the specific western audience that enjoys true JRPGs.
    The more I read about interviews and their visions and goals, the more I think the game core design will stay the same (cities as hubs, world ares to host mobs and ??? spots, party grind to 50) and they'll just tweak UI lag, a few numbers (1-20 ranks) plus add NMs and their drops.

    I'm sure people will eventually appreciate that but I doubt this will ever push the subscribers outside FF11 numbers.

  13. #73
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    Quote Originally Posted by Tomino View Post
    cities as hubs, world ares to host mobs
    Honest question... What games show an exemplary alternative to cities/towns being the hubs and the field/wilderness being full of monsters? That sounds very... RPG to me and not very J or W specific.

    I'm not sure what the point of a city would be if it were not a hub for commerce/rest/etc. Isn't that the entire idea of a civilization?

  14. #74
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    I think what you're trying to say Tomino is that the game tries to be traditional?

  15. #75

    The game wants to stay true to JPRG tradition, which is not a bad thing but more of a market choice. Instead of going against every single "next WoW killers" there will be, it will simply keep going on sideways. So I think everyone expecting this to turn into a western styled MMO will be dissapointed even after all these patches.

    SE big issues at the moment is that they failed to please their own fans and supporters, which were the ones keeping the JPRG haters at bay; unchecked, all the cool kids around were free to flood the net with negative reviews and shit storms. Back when I was playing FF11, I met a lot of gamers who thought the game was boring, dull and bad designed but still, the overall worldwide evaluation of FF11 was good because it delivered what was expected from it.

    Honest question... What games show an exemplary alternative to cities/towns being the hubs and the field/wilderness being full of monsters?
    Usually a western styled MMO has the world map covered with quest hubs. You have the big city, the outpost, the caravan, the refugess camp and so on.
    Also, many key NPCs (repairs, consumables, etc) are duplicated in each hub so there's no actual need to hand out in one of the main cities full time.
    WoW pushed this even further by adding the Looking for Dungeon feature so you wont need to shout for something in the most crowded in-game plaza. On the contrary, you're free to stay in one map for days without "homepointing" to town every 2 hours.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Hyan View Post
    Intentional or not is hardly relevant, as even intentional things can and will be changed.
    Sorry, but this is false and you know it. There are some things in any game which some players won't like but are fundamental to the design vision (or whatever you want to call it) that they're never gonna go, even if they change somehow. They might make things more "regular", but as long as random SP exists in any form then some people will be unhappy; whereas others think it's an OK idea. "Bad design" is not an absolute statement, it is a matter of opinion, even if everyone agrees on some things.

  17. #77
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    Quote Originally Posted by Nevex View Post
    SE can satisfy players' requests but only so much. They don't want players to hit rank 50 in a week, they want them to waste their time playing FFXIV so they get the money from the subscriptions, which would be ok if the game was actually fun to play.
    This. I am 100% with you again here Nevex. Draining cash out of the player is all they care about and many many parts ingame are designed that way. Not only the many time sinks which make player subscribe for longer times but also the (extra) markets wards linked with the extra fee which are "so much better" as an AH according to SE.

    I definetly dont mind to pay if the product is worth it; if the game was what I expected it to be before it got released i wouldnt even mind to pay a bit more.

    The core game sucks major balls and even if SE make it f2p or add unlimited free trial periods they can get the fuck out

  18. #78
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    Quote Originally Posted by Hyan View Post
    Intentional or not is hardly relevant, as even intentional things can and will be changed.
    Sorry, but this is false and you know it. There are some things in any game which some players won't like but are fundamental to the design vision (or whatever you want to call it) that they're never gonna go, even if they change somehow. They might make things more "regular", but as long as random SP exists in any form then some people will be unhappy; whereas others think it's an OK idea. "Bad design" is not an absolute statement, it is a matter of opinion, even if everyone agrees on some things.

  19. #79
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    Quote Originally Posted by Dooom View Post
    There are some things in any game which some players won't like but are fundamental to the design vision (or whatever you want to call it) that they're never gonna go, even if they change somehow.
    Hmm. Like?

    Either way.. I'm not saying the whole game will be changed. Just the parts that majority agree are considered "bad design". Once we get to the point where it starts to be a mere matter of opinion of the few, there is no need to go further. But we aren't there yet.

  20. #80
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    Like random SP, which is a common complaint about the game and the example I always seem to use in these kind of discussions. While I expect this will become less random in time, I doubt it'll ever be changed completely to the kind of regular exp/sp gain we had in XI.

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