Comments from the Devs

[Darte]

What idiot asked this question...



Haste was a HUGE benefit in almost every single FF game...

I think what he means is that he does not want haste to become THE stat like it has on XI last I checked.

[Lordender]

I just became even more skeptical after reading the entire Q&A.

Sounds like its going to take a few years to accomplish all that. So much shit has to be redesigned on just the battle mechanic's alone, I can't even imagine how much work its going to be for them to be able to support an auction house system when they can't even maintain market wards from crashing on a daily basis.

I mean don't get me wrong, I just don't have much faith that they're going to be able to get this done fast enough to keep interest in the game high. I saw way way too much "we'll look into it" types of answers. Time is not on their side at all, I feel like they're already rolling out the fixes at a snail pace as it is. I mean, we know return cost is going to be zero, we know fatigue is being taken out, these things could have simply been patched by now yet they're gonna make us wait until mid june(at the earliest)

The battle revamp is something that I completely understand that they need to take their time and do extensive testing but some of the other shit I just mentioned could have been addressed already.

[Lhyet]

I think everyone is missing the really important issue that came from this Q&A:

I don’t like how the character takes a few extra steps after you stop.

Why the fuck are they working on battle related crap when our characters have to take a few steps to decelerate after running? This shit needs to be fixed.

[Kensaki]

western mmo dev: We're fixing this and that because of this.

SE: In the future sometime we maybe will do something to fix something we can't tell you about yet.

[Hyan]

The battle revamp is something that I completely understand that they need to take their time and do extensive testing but some of the other shit I just mentioned could have been addressed already.

What needs to be understood that these changes are being done the way that makes it most efficient for them, not what makes it most enjoyable for us. The playerbase is tiny at best, majority of them are not going to leave anytime soon regardless of what they say (and even if they did, it means nothing as long as enough people remain to give feedback). Making sure we are enjoying every minute of the ride is not important. Making sure they can update the game as fast and efficiently as possible is most important. If that means they need to work on the background for months and release most additions all at once regardless of their size, so be it. Whatever gets the job done fastest.

At the end of the day whatever doom&gloom we've said between January and now becomes irrelevant once they deliver. Further, regardless of how well they may have kept us and the game up-to-date with their development if the end result is lackluster, it is still irrelevant. Only the end result determines success or failure at this point, and that's what SE needs to focus on. I think they've already limited themselves with the "no wipe" talk, there is no need for more hindrances to slow them down.

I only frankly saw two rather pointless q's in that q&a. For being picked by the devs, they did not try to ignore the plethora of problems, small or larger, needing to be addressed. That's a healthy mindset to have.

western mmo dev: We're fixing this and that because of this.

Western mmo dev: we're not fixing this and that because we ran out of money. Let's talk about seasonal events and cash shops instead, 'cause we've got big plans for them!

[Lordender]

western mmo dev: We're fixing this and that because of this.

SE: In the future sometime we maybe will do something to fix something we can't tell you about yet.

no shit, lol shits ridiculous.


for instance, Blizzard explaining something:

We recently implemented a hotfix that removes the ability for players to retain a second Battleground queue when one pops. Previously, players were able to queue for two Battlegrounds, have one queue pop and retain their second queue while they decided if they wanted to join the one that was ready. This is no longer the case. When a Battleground queue pops you will automatically be removed from the other active queue. To queue for a different Battleground it will be necessary to queue again.

SE explaining something:

We'll look into it.

[Hyan]

Wait, is that them explaining a hotfix after it had been implemented?

How does that even fit in this situation in the slightest?

Are there any questions that need an answer like that? Are you left wondering "why would they make us able to move while performing actions?" What is the proper reply?

[Lucavi]

Western mmo dev: we're not fixing this and that because we ran out of money. Let's talk about seasonal events and cash shops instead, 'cause we've got big plans for them!

Sounds like Trickster, Aika Online and all the other Korean MMOs to me, personally. "Double XP day!" "Double XXX Points day!"

For western MMOs, I just say "Yeah, we're going F2P because the market's tight (because we failed to provide a bug-free clean and couldn't commit to our promises and lofty goals). Those "eastern" MMOs just flat-out never seem to have actual goals, unless you consider launching with a cash shop and having a triple XP weekend a goal.

[Tomino]

Hyan's right when he says the only thing that really matters is the end result. Nothing either written or previewed, promises, Q&A or letters have any real weight.

This said, one can still squeeze a few impressions or comments from said infos.
Personally, I share the same fear of Lucavi : everything they're working on aims to catch up with currently active MMOs. But will this work once MMOs jump to their new level, and I mean months from now?

Also, I tend to dislike behaviours when you promise *everything* will be addressed / solved, because it slowly becomes clear it's actual promises and nothing more.
They do have a time schedule and they do have their tasks, it'd be hilarious to think they'd have not. So why not telling people what will be in 1.18 and what not, so we can avoid the usual delusion wall hit?

[Hyan]

But will this work once MMOs jump to their new level, and I mean months from now?

They can't merely keep catching up, which was a concern of mine too. They need to do something of their own. It has been stated that the dev team wants to do this, and it seems the dungeons being released already contain something slightly different. A good start is that they make the game feel like it's their own, which can be done even at this stage. Hopefully they'll keep expanding from there, like the q&a already hints.

They do have a time schedule and they do have their tasks, it'd be hilarious to think they'd have not. So why not telling people what will be in 1.18 and what not, so we can avoid the usual delusion wall hit?

Do you really think their internal schedule will be accurate? Do you think they can accurately predict how long it takes to develop, test and prepare the content? You will hit that delusion wall regardless of what they do. It's better that those delusional thoughts don't come from the devs. That makes them liars you see.

For people to stop bitching about this once and for all, somebody needs to invent a crystal ball.

[Lordender]

everything they're working on aims to catch up with currently active MMOs. But will this work once MMOs jump to their new level, and I mean months from now?

Thats what I mean, All this shit seems like its going to be anywhere from a multi year plan. I mean how long can they honestly keep people interested while this is going on? When I read the Q&A I saw a lot of things I liked and somethings I didn't but one thing for sure is we got a lot of "We'll look into it" and that worries me a lot. I personally find it hard to believe they will pull this off given the massive clusterfuck the battle system is alone and we have not even begun to talk about the other really bad issues like no auction house, mailbox systems etc.

Yoshida seems to have a plan of what he wants because we see it in his letters but the more i'm realistically thinking about just how much catch up they have to play it makes you wonder if they'll pull it off. I figure Yoshida at this point is trying to dangle as many carrots as he can to distract people while they fix stuff but eventually thats not going to work anymore.

I don't think this is doom and gloom but its more of how long can they keep the charade going. Eventually the game needs to come out of catch up mode and go into pure content mode and given the info we've seen thus far, it could be years away.

1.18 is going to cause a shit-load of QQ though because now it has so much hype that it will be impossible to live up to it.

[Tomino]

Do you really think their internal schedule will be accurate? Do you think they can accurately predict how long it takes to develop, test and prepare the content?

Depends on your definition of accurate.
I'm sure their schedule is at least months accurate, for example. Also, more than being interested in dates, I'm curious about priorities, meaning what's already being worked on and what's been placed on schedule but still not touched.

Mind you, I don't say I *demand* all of this, nor that they're stupid and don't know how to plan or schedule development. I'm just commenting that their mood of always being so vague on everything gets on my nerves especially in 2011 when you have such straight communications between production and pubblic. Again, must be a cultural choice in terms of producer/client behaviour.

[Siatdiat]

SE needs to come up with shit good enough that other companies copy it and it becomes the new standard for "next-gen mmo's." I think they can do that, I just don't know if they can do it in time for this game. That needs to be their plan too.... it has just occurred to me that they develop in a vacuum as if they have no competition, which isn't going to work with a fantasy MMO when they are already splitting their own FF franchise fans between 2 games.

[Lordender]

Everytime SE gets an idea they always do something to fuck it up like for example:

Quests that were added a few patches ago, good idea, fail that they give no sp for a turn in.
Tasks, in theory they are ok, pretty lackluster though because you have to go to each city to get the most out of them.

Quests could be so much better in this game and they could also add more life to the already barren ass area's that have no point to them. I much rather multiple ways to level up rather than seeing the same fucking 6 or so leve's over and over again.

I hope quest hubs deliver here, hopefully those quests will be repeatable like tasks are so you can do them on diff jobs. I just can't stand how leveling is right now, I already did it once to 50, I don't even know if I can look at levinshower.dunesfolk anymore.

[Kurokikaze]

Western mmo dev: we're not fixing this and that because we ran out of money. Let's talk about seasonal events and cash shops instead, 'cause we've got big plans for them!

Hmm I won't go into detail as to why this line of thinking is wrong and resonates with official forum stupidity... but I will say that by saying this you've just crossed the threshold between playing devils advocate and white knighting.

I don't think its that far-fetched to say that with 2-3 weeks to go till the next patch we still don't know what will definitely be in it. They're speaking in hypotheticals when most of us are trying to be realist and say wheres what we can expect now not going forward.

[Hyan]

Hmm I won't go into detail as to why this line of thinking is wrong and resonates with official forum stupidity... but I will say that by saying this you've just crossed the threshold between playing devils advocate and white knighting.

I don't think its that far-fetched to say that with 2-3 weeks to go till the next patch we still don't know what will definitely be in it. They're speaking in hypotheticals when most of us are trying to be realist and say wheres what we can expect now not going forward.

I can't deny I got trolled there. But the situations are still not even remotely similar.

[Cureslime]

I can't see a way that they'll be able to get everything done by mid-June. I think "end of summer" is much more likely for dungeons and battle fixes and even then they will probably be incomplete and underwhelming. Considering what they've done in 14 months it's impossible. They would have had to be sitting on this miracle patch for the past 6 months while the game fizzled and died out completely and even though it's S-E I don't think they'd do this.

[Alkar]

I can't see a way that they'll be able to get everything done by mid-June. I think "end of summer" is much more likely for dungeons and battle fixes and even then they will probably be incomplete and underwhelming. Considering what they've done in 14 months it's impossible. They would have had to be sitting on this miracle patch for the past 6 months while the game fizzled and died out completely and even though it's S-E I don't think they'd do this.

14 months? This dev team has been working on the game for 6 months at best. And stuff like dungeons and battle system obviously take more time than a bunch of quests that tell you to kill xxx monster.

[Kurokikaze]

I'm just wondering what kind of carrots they will dangle after the summer. Auction House, Delivery Box, Mog House (or some sort of personal space), more dungeons, Chocobos (I see them getting pushed back) etc.

The sad part is that everything I've mentioned is catch-up as they are approaching the one year mark. Thats not a good look bro and theres no defending it. They've got to realize that time is not on their side, at some point upper management is going to get pissed off about the losses and demand that they start asking for payment. Whether the game will resemble something I'd pay (or many of you) for by September is what I'm skeptical of.

As I've said before, I'm a realist not a pessimist.

[Alderaan]

They should be asking themselves,

Is our combat going to be as dynamic as in Tera or GW2?
Is our interaction with the world going to be as involved as in Arche Age?
Are we going to have interesting non combat content like in the above mentioned mmo's?

If the answers to all those questions is a no, then they're going to be behind when they think they've caught up. SE needs to surpass all these other MMO's while adding their own thing that makes other companies go "whoa". If their goal isn't to do this then i don't see a point.