An Important Announcement for FINAL FANTASY XIV Fans

[miokomioko]

You're mistaking nostalgia for quality!

[kisada]

can't ever go wrong with jeuno christmas music

[Hyan]

While XI got it right with shit like ronfaure, gustaberg and zi'tah, I definitely like most battle tracks much more in this game, especially the coerthas battle theme.

[Lucavi]

You're mistaking nostalgia for quality!

Not at all. Quite a few of the WotG songs sound better. S. Sandy, and S. Windy, for example. Even the original stuff sounds better to me. Heaven's Tower. Divine Might. Raogrimm's death theme. WoTG's party battle theme (towards the back end).

The only songs in XIV that really scream out to me are Black Shroud's leve theme and the battle theme out at Coerthas. That song is incredible, and I wish I had more of a reason to be out there.

[miokomioko]

I exp in Coerthas any chance I get, even if it's slightly over my rank just because of the scenery/zonemusic/battlemusic. Anyhow, at least the music in XIV is of higher orchestrated quality. I'm glad the town musics are subtle... I don't want those to drive me mad.

[Gokulo]

Subtle? I've played XI for years and there's no town music I hate so much as I do LL already.

[Arximiro]

Yeah LL gets annoying fast.. the other 2 are nice

[miokomioko]

Oh yeah, I'll give you Limsa Lominsa, but that one doesn't get inside my head any more than Windurst, San d'Oria, or Jeuno. Gridania and Ul'dah are mellow enough to be able to be in town for long periods of time without snapping. I still can't stand the music the Black Shroud ended up with. It's so damn boring in comparison to every other zone. I want to switch it out for something like XII's Sochen Cave Palace/Eryut Village/Great Crystal/Stillshrine, or something along those lines.

[Lucavi]

I exp in Coerthas any chance I get, even if it's slightly over my rank just because of the scenery/zonemusic/battlemusic. Anyhow, at least the music in XIV is of higher orchestrated quality. I'm glad the town musics are subtle... I don't want those to drive me mad.

Orchestrated quality doesn't equal better, though. I still think The Redwings is the greatest FF song of all time, and it has nothing to do with how high the orchestral quality is. The notes simply string together so well.

[miokomioko]

I know~ I'm not going to arguing about which songs are objectively "better" but I still prefer what I have heard of XIV's music over vanilla XI's once you take nostalgia out of the equation. Since that's what the original remark was. I think Nobuo Uematsu did a great job apart from shit like the Black Shroud. Mistbeard Cove is another one that's pretty good but few people have heard it.

[Charismatic]

This isn't from XI Vanilla but it's probably the most awesome song I've heard in any MMO.




XIV's got a lot of catching up to do in the music dept but I do think that Vanilla XIV music is better than Vanilla XI music, honestly.

[Hyan]

If XIV's music can advance as much as XI's did from vanilla to WoTG... shit will be epic.

If this new guy can lead us there, that is.

[Lucavi]

Well if Coerthas is any indication of where it can go, we're in for a wild ride. I do wish songs would be a bit more... epic in certain areas. You never hear a lot of war drums or something; typically everything has a "rock band" feel to it if there are actually drums. I'd like to hear more war-pounding music; something that sounds like Orcs would be marching to.

Of course, FF has never had a true dungeons and dragons feel, and since all the races are pretty much spot-on humanoids, it makes sense, I guess. Its sad, though. I'd like to hear Nobuo stretch outwards a bit.

[Katlan]

XIV soundtrack so far sucks compared to Vanilla XI one..

I completely agree. XIV has a few good tracks, but most of it sucks imo. a lot of XI music is great, even WotG stuff is awesome

[Elcura]

Both XI and XIV have standout tracks, but vanilla XI has less music that I want to listen to than vanilla XIV. Now, if we move onto RoZ and/or CoP vs vanilla XIV, then XI easily wins out.

The music you hear during the THM quest and I think Ul'dah opening (0A or 08?) is the best battle music, up there with the Ark Angels and the music that plays when you fight Ouryu. If battle music is more like that, then it'll surpass XI, but tracks like that aren't common in any OST.

[Sign]

I would love something like this in XIV, this has always been one of my favourite tracks in XI.

[Levin]

Track 11 from the FFXIV leaked ost sounds like it would be used for a final boss. I prefer that track over Awakening if removing the nostalgic factor.

[bruiser]

xi may have been boring to you in the beginning but the immersion quality was fucking on point. It hooked countless of people and made some of them into present day fanboys you see around nowadays. Ask anyone who played 11 they either liked it or they didn't. In it's prime people get nostalgic about the awesome noob memories 11 housed. That's showing they did something fantastically right. Those who thought 11 sucked ran to WoW and stayed, then bitched from afar. Different style means it's not for you it doesn't mean the game was shitty and boring.

Been away for a while, but wanted to respond to this. FFXI was fucking garbage. I get nostalgic about it too, that doesn't mean it wasn't terrible. And BTW, I thought it sucked and I didn't run to WoW and stay. I actually had a relic, and played FFXI for a long time. It was shitty and boring, unless you think all of the following things are fun:

1) Remaining stationary anywhere from 2-6 hours waiting for a certain monster to pop, only to have it claimed by someone else.
2) Wandering aimlessly and doing absolutely nothing for anywhere from 1-3 hours waiting for a party invite.
3) Spending weeks (or months) camping the same mob for a rare drop, having it stolen from you or claimed by bots most of the time.
4) Killing the same mob continuously for 4-6 hours (literally) while trying to level up or earn merit points.
5) Losing millions upon millions of gil breaking synths that you are far, far too high level to be breaking.

There was nothing fun about FFXI. It was, however, addicting. But the only good memories from FFXI, and the only thing people get nostalgic about are, as you even said yourself, from the times when you were a noob. The rest of the game was an addictive piece of shit.

FFXI was basically Progress Quest, with a character that you can move around and influence the behavior of. It was nothing but grinding, literally. At the time, though, it was new and unique. If FFXI had come out after WoW, the game would have flopped majorly. Luckily it came out before WoW, and they got people hooked before WoW had a chance to take them. And no, I'm not a WoW fanboy (I only played for about a year before quitting, compared to about 4 years for FFXI), but facts are facts, and anyone who rather cater to 100,000 people than to 12 million should have just been aborted, it's breathtaking how stupid you would have to be to actually want to be a failure. And it seems the development team of 14 didn't even look at WoW when designing this fucking turd of a game they've released in 14.

One time I tried to get a friend of mine to play FFXI. This guy was a huge fan of the FF series, to the point that he once heard my ringtone on my phone and knew exactly which game and which boss fight it came from (and it was obscure too, I think it was FFV but it was a while ago). He started in Windurst, and after getting to like level 7 he was like "I've been killing bees for 4 hours, this isn't much fun ". That sums up the game right there, and even at the time I realized he was right. It isn't fun.

[pingpong]

In a weird way all that waiting around helped highlight the moments you got to fight something. The rush you get from FFXI fighting anything is way higher than WoW (at least PvE wise).

[bruiser]

In a weird way all that waiting around helped highlight the moments you got to fight something. The rush you get from FFXI fighting anything is way higher than WoW (at least PvE wise).

Err. Really? In FFXI big boss fights are just massive endurance tests. There is absolutely nothing unique or interesting about any boss in FFXI. Nothing feels hectic at all. You can sum up almost every boss battle in XI with a flowchart with probably like 4-5 squares on it. Of course, even the boss fights are a grind, considering how long it takes to kill them. 2 hours of keeping eyes focused on the chat log so you don't miss a Stun. That sums up FFXI's approach to boss fights.