FFXIV Naoki Yoshida Interview Transcription

[Aksannyi]

To be perfectly honest, most of the fanboi's and fangirls from FF just heard about how easy leveling was in WoW and just passed the entire game off as an "EZMODE GAME!" when raiding in WoW is more challenging than anything SE has put out that wasent retarded like AV or PW in their hey-days.

So true, I used to think WoW was super easy and used to bash it too, until I played it.

[miokomioko]

Doing synths that yield 500~600+ exp per success are not just mashing enter at all. If you want to sit there mashing enter for hours on end because your recipe of choice gives you 100exp per success... go for it.

[Lordender]

On this turbo controller thing that I've seen around. I own one and never thought of using it till people brought it up, but would SE see it as botting? Like would it be risky to do it while sleeping.

I doubt they would but botting is so rampant its ridiculous, even out in the field I see miner bots screw up sometimes and they're just walking into a mountain for hours upon hours. I remember a few days ago, I was power leveling my GLD up in the miteling area west of n.wells around where daddylong legs is and I saw a bot fuckup and I remember coming back later on that night and seeing the same bot running into the mountain. Today I go back there for a few hours and the same guy is running the same pattern as before, runs into a mountain again for about 2hrs.

[Sephiroth]

Maybe you should read a little more because he clearly states there are going to be 2 crafting systems. One which gives you control over quality (similar steps as it is now), which leads to you controlling the chance. The other with the select craft and auto make w/ low chance of HQ.

I'd be all for this if they weren't making HQing retarded in 1.20. Guaranteed HQ with HQ mats makes the crafting game irrelevant, it may as well all be automated. All those abilities designed to help HQ may as well not exist. Announcing that so early is already affecting the economy as no one is buying my HQs. The only things people are buying is trash to turn into materia.

[Kaiyoko]

I'd be all for this if they weren't making HQing retarded in 1.20. Guaranteed HQ with HQ mats makes the crafting game irrelevant, it may as well all be automated. All those abilities designed to help HQ may as well not exist. Announcing that so early is already affecting the economy as no one is buying my HQs. The only things people are buying is trash to turn into materia.

So sell trash? They also said they'd be modifying the drop rates of HQ next patch. Unless you're selling +3s people are in fear +2s will even be HQ next patch. +1s are becoming NQ, why would I purchase NQ gear unless it's for Materia purposes.

Edit: Remember also people can still make HQ using NQ mats, or a mix of both, maybe some wont wanna sit out and grind getting all those HQ mats. We still don't know what the drop rate will become.

[miokomioko]

Guaranteed HQ with HQ mats makes the crafting game irrelevant, it may as well all be automated. All those abilities designed to help HQ may as well not exist. Announcing that so early is already affecting the economy as no one is buying my HQs. The only things people are buying is trash to turn into materia.

The abilities focused on quality would be for turning HQ raw materials (fiber/ore/logs/etc.) into HQ parts (ingots/cloth/lumber/etc.) because those HQs are not guaranteed.

The abilities focused on success/stablization/etc. are going to be for the recipes that are Lv.60 or so, where you can still completely blow it with your all-HQ ingredients.

[Toxictaru]

As great as the interview was, and to be honest, there are things that were said that can still redeem FFXIV, its just sad that it took them this long to really say "yes, we know, we're going to add them."

Should SE have learned from Blizzard? I was talking about that crap back in alpha. It NEEDED to be more like western MMOs. The single biggest reason is the subscriber base. Is it really that hard to sit back and ask "what is Blizzard doing right that we're not?" FFXI was (and mostly still is) great, but its dated. Making a new game with a dated mindset = dated game.

So am I glad that they're going to try and do more WoWesque things? Absolutely, I might actually start playing it again. FFXIV still feels so barren to me, and I don't believe it is just a perception thing.

I'm just having a problem with applauding comments by devs about the good things that should have been part of development in the first place Good on SE though, at least they have some who realizes they fucked up hard and has the balls to a) admit it, and b) have a really good, solid plan to fix it. Cause honestly, I'm getting bored of WoW (for the 10th time), and I really want some good Final Fantasy action.

[Burningthought]

As great as the interview was, and to be honest, there are things that were said that can still redeem FFXIV, its just sad that it took them this long to really say "yes, we know, we're going to add them."

Should SE have learned from Blizzard? I was talking about that crap back in alpha. It NEEDED to be more like western MMOs. The single biggest reason is the subscriber base. Is it really that hard to sit back and ask "what is Blizzard doing right that we're not?" FFXI was (and mostly still is) great, but its dated. Making a new game with a dated mindset = dated game.

So am I glad that they're going to try and do more WoWesque things? Absolutely, I might actually start playing it again. FFXIV still feels so barren to me, and I don't believe it is just a perception thing.

I'm just having a problem with applauding comments by devs about the good things that should have been part of development in the first place Good on SE though, at least they have some who realizes they fucked up hard and has the balls to a) admit it, and b) have a really good, solid plan to fix it. Cause honestly, I'm getting bored of WoW (for the 10th time), and I really want some good Final Fantasy action.

I understand your point about them adding stuff that should've been in the game to begin with...

It really makes you think just how different would the game have been had Yoshida been in charge from the very beginning. I think it would've turned out a lot better, especially knowing Yoshi's gaming background and how open he is when it comes to game concepts and different player types.

It's interesting to play "what if" but I realize that, that won't change anything in the past or the future. I'm just glad FFXIV has a producer that actually listens to feedback, and tries incredibly hard to stay active within the community.

One thing that I do agree with Tanaka's philosophy is that XIV should stand out, it shouldn't be a clone of wow, or any other mmo. I hope they add these fundamental features to the game, but continue to work on stuff that is unique and hasn't been done before, it would be a shame for FFXIV to turn into World of Final Fantasy. A few things that have been worrying me a little bit that other people have brought up is the Content Finder and the Worldless clusters. Hopefully everything works out, and it helps newer players find help for content, and ensures that there are plenty of people in every level range, but at the same time FFXI brought the precedent of a close community. People who had reputations, linkshells who were badass, and those that sucked. I don't want that precedent to be lost in XIV2.0, I want to be able to recognize people out in the field and in town just like in XI.

[Sonomaa]

If you read the questions in order, youll notice that Yoshi was the first one to mention wow, not myself. Previous interviews with SE have all been candy coated affairs where they picked out which questions you could ask and even then didnt answer the fucking things, like we were all little tiny babies who got treats from them such as "I dont know" or "We will take that back to japan with us". Did you read a lot of the other interviews? I did, and I dont want to brag or come off like an ass but a lot of them asked really easy questions. I went for the throat, so when yoshi talked about wow, there was blood in the water, and I went for the jugular.

Yes Ive played wow, and yes there are a lot of things that I didnt like about it, there are a lot of things I liked much better in FFXI but there are a lot of things that simply didnt compare. Crafting was hard in XI, and while that wasnt bad, it wasnt as easy as wow. While I didnt mind having to gather the materials, when I was trying to skill up or make arrows, I would rather not have to sit there and mash the enter button over and over again, it would have been nice to let it automatically craft something I was either ok with breaking or was way far ahead in skill level. I like yoshis approach of a dual system, one where you can craft without a higher chance of HQ automatically, so you can either skill up or make shit you need as materials, and then the harder system where it goes one at a time and gives you a higher chance of HQ.

There are a lot of things that wow does that are and should be the staples of every MMO. The quick and smooth movement system, the dungeon finder system, an easy to understand questing and map system, easy access for high level players to get where they need to go without going stupidly far out of their way (not necessarily flying mounts in XI but more so perma chocos for the higher levels and faster running airships to get to different towns).

The job system in XI and XIV is far superior to other systems, I love it. I wish there was more character customization such as hairstyle and even paid body style changes, but we cant always get what we want. Blizzard did a lot of things right, things that were ok in XI and still need work in XIV.

Finding a happy medium between the things done right in XI, the things done right in wow, and making them into an MMO that everyone will enjoy is what I think Yoshi is trying to accomplish.

[Kurokikaze]

Doing synths that yield 500~600+ exp per success are not just mashing enter at all. If you want to sit there mashing enter for hours on end because your recipe of choice gives you 100exp per success... go for it.

Talking out of your ass here. I've been making Iron Celeta Visors to level up since 34 getting 700+ a synth (now its about 450-550) and all I did was hold X down.

[Sephiroth]

So sell trash? They also said they'd be modifying the drop rates of HQ next patch. Unless you're selling +3s people are in fear +2s will even be HQ next patch. +1s are becoming NQ, why would I purchase NQ gear unless it's for Materia purposes.

Edit: Remember also people can still make HQ using NQ mats, or a mix of both, maybe some wont wanna sit out and grind getting all those HQ mats. We still don't know what the drop rate will become.

I guess I'll wait and see before bitching more about that. They pleasantly surprised me with the crafting changes in 1.19.

[Kaylia]

The job system in XI and XIV is far superior to other systems, I love it.

As much as I love the jobs system, they need to fix inventory management issue that come with it. Changing class in a game like WoW takes approximatively 10 sec (or w/e is the time it take you to load), but in FFXIV, it's still a pain in the ass despite all the improvement.

[TacoTaru]

They mentioned having gear auto-load between jobs like the action bar does now. Or at least that's how I interpreted that line of text.

[Cichy]

They mentioned having gear auto-load between jobs like the action bar does now. Or at least that's how I interpreted that line of text.

They are working on what they called "mannequin system" which is going to save your gear. Still when they implemented saved action bar in 1.19a it made the game so much more enjoyable for me.

[Toxictaru]

If you read the questions in order, youll notice that Yoshi was the first one to mention wow, not myself. Previous interviews with SE have all been candy coated affairs where they picked out which questions you could ask and even then didnt answer the fucking things, like we were all little tiny babies who got treats from them such as "I dont know" or "We will take that back to japan with us". Did you read a lot of the other interviews? I did, and I dont want to brag or come off like an ass but a lot of them asked really easy questions. I went for the throat, so when yoshi talked about wow, there was blood in the water, and I went for the jugular.

...

Finding a happy medium between the things done right in XI, the things done right in wow, and making them into an MMO that everyone will enjoy is what I think Yoshi is trying to accomplish.

Exactly what I was getting at. The previous interviews have been shit, with little in the way of solid answers and instead just typical "well, we'll see" response bullshit they're so fond of.

And I think we ALL wanted a game from the get-go that had a nice happy medium between FFXI, WoW, and how many other success RPGs out there that need to be partially emulated. How many of us went in to the testing of FFXIV thinking that we were going to be basically playing FFXI v2, despite common sense telling us that wasn't happening? It was already said best when asked how much better the game would have been if Yoshi-P had been running the show from the start. My only concern, hence my post, was that SE didn't learn anything from the time FFXI was released to when FFXIV was becoming a more final (in their eyes) product, and that in the end, OUR hopes and expectations were dashed because they couldn't learn those lessons.

Of course, that all being said, this interview clearly has a lot of people thinking this game may still have a chance. SE wants us all to wait and have faith that it will be fixed, and I think SE may have found a way to reinforce that faith. The interview has a lot to do with that, solely based on the response in this thread so far.

[Kurokikaze]

The mannequin system is going to help a bit more. But I don't people comprehend just how much of a godsend it is to have the game remember your action bars for different classes now. SOOOO much better.

[Kaiyoko]

The mannequin system is going to help a bit more. But I don't people comprehend just how much of a godsend it is to have the game remember your action bars for different classes now. SOOOO much better.

Only issue I find w/ it is that it completely CDs spells like Rebirth that have a 30min timer. Really should be 0 if it hasn't been use in the last 30min regardless of your class. If I switch to COJ for any reason I have to wait for that to be 100% effective.

[Kurokikaze]

You are correct in that suggestion. Or at least make it so that the CD starts at 10-20 seconds after every swap.

[Sephiroth]

Only issue I find w/ it is that it completely CDs spells like Rebirth that have a 30min timer. Really should be 0 if it hasn't been use in the last 30min regardless of your class. If I switch to COJ for any reason I have to wait for that to be 100% effective.

What I don't get is it says this in the patch notes:

"When changing to a class for which action bar settings have been saved, those settings will automatically be loaded. Any recast timers in place will not be reset by changing classes."

Maybe it's a bug.

[Kaiyoko]

What I don't get is it says this in the patch notes:

"When changing to a class for which action bar settings have been saved, those settings will automatically be loaded. Any recast timers in place will not be reset by changing classes."

Maybe it's a bug.

Nah some masochist at SE is mad that XIV getting to ez or something. So he thew in some code to make it harder.