Patch 2.5 Notes

[Ophannus]

It's so stupid though. The animations are there already and they spent tons of money motion capturing different animations for every race-gender. Why not use them? They have the files for them already from 1.0. Is it because of PS3 limitations? Server strain? It's something that set ffxiv ahead and beyond any other MMO--realstic and weighty animations.

[Karbuncle]

You know i never got to enjoy 1.0 fully but gd it looks so much better animation wise... That Chaos Thrust is beautiful... and what I can assume is Rage of Halone looks amazing.

[Niiro]

It's so stupid though. The animations are there already and they spent tons of money motion capturing different animations for every race-gender. Why not use them? They have the files for them already from 1.0. Is it because of PS3 limitations? Server strain? It's something that set ffxiv ahead and beyond any other MMO--realstic and weighty animations.

2.0 limitations.

[Rocl]

It's so stupid though. The animations are there already and they spent tons of money motion capturing different animations for every race-gender. Why not use them? They have the files for them already from 1.0. Is it because of PS3 limitations? Server strain? It's something that set ffxiv ahead and beyond any other MMO--realstic and weighty animations.

Something about minimum spec requirements? They thought 1.0 had needed too powerful a computer for the avg mmorpger? idr exactly i don't even know if 2.0 requires a less powerful pc than 1.0 lol

[Niiro]

Clearly the PS2 could handle the different animations, but PS3 cannot.

(seriously, even if they didn't want to do the work to convert every weapon skill to the 2.0 engine, not even just the attack stances and 3 auto-attack animations? that would be enough to make the races/genders feel somewhat unique in combat)

[Rocl]

Clearly the PS2 could handle the different animations, but PS3 cannot.

are you implying 1.0 was supposed to be released on PS2 or that XI can handle it so why can't XIV cuz idk wtf to think about any posts ppl make anymore but i'd rather 1.0 or 2.0 gfx than XI PS2 gfx for sure

[Rocl]

also can we talk about how fucking annoying the in-combat voices are

[Niiro]

are you implying 1.0 was supposed to be released on PS2 or that XI can handle it so why can't XIV cuz idk wtf to think about any posts ppl make anymore but i'd rather 1.0 or 2.0 gfx than XI PS2 gfx for sure

It was just a jab pointing out that they could make different animations for every race in XI which had to run on a PS2 but decided not to bother keeping them going from 1.0 to 2.0.

also can we talk about how fucking annoying the in-combat voices are

It feels like half of them aren't even audible in combat tbh, but some of the ones you can hear clearly are really goddamn annoying -_- (see: the high pitched JP-pixie female voices)

[Rocl]

fucking bard ones are the worst i can always hear bard screaming over music

[Alkar]

They made different animations in XI for each race but they've never added many past Zilart. Every single new job used old weaponry in XI and they barely added new WS after that. FFXIV requires a completely new animation set for each job they add because they all get new weapons. Scholar/Summoner are the only exception but they also get unique casting animations.... something FFXI didn't have other than the magic type ones.

[Lucavi]

Dear God, I can't watch that 1.0 lancer. So.... slow....

[Niiro]

They made different animations in XI for each race but they've never added many past Zilart. Every single new job used old weaponry in XI and they barely added new WS after that. FFXIV requires a completely new animation set for each job they add because they all get new weapons. Scholar/Summoner are the only exception but they also get unique casting animations.... something FFXI didn't have other than the magic type ones.

Are you forgetting the part where the majority of those animations were already made in 1.0?

That aside, I can understand not wanting to make unique animations for every race for every WS, but a single battle stance and 3 auto-attack animations is not asking for a lot.

XI had 12 melee weapons (2 ranged, as far as animations are concerned) with ~10 WSs each and they took the time to not copy/paste them because they knew it gave the game character and made your character feel more unique.

The 2.0 team does not seem to care about that kind of subtle detail and the game suffers for it.

[Qeomash]

I would imagine they cannot reuse the animation data from 1.0 because we have new models and therefore new skeletons for the player models. Not something that is easily convertable. Making animations is tedious, time consuming work. Motion capture can be expensive, and doesn't work terribly well for oddly porportioned races like Lalafell.

Creating unique weaponskills for several jobs' abilities across several races would be a lot of work. I agree unique animations would be cool, but I'm not blaming them for not doing them.

[Alkar]

Are you forgetting the part where the majority of those animations were already made in 1.0?

Yeah, and? They still made them for FFXIV so why throw them away? We also have unique animations for each ability you use unlike in XI with all the JAs using the same one.
And saying that the team does not care about details is simply a lie. C'mon, they made new running and jumping animations for Ninja just to make it look different and that's pretty much what you're asking for except it's for jobs and not races.

[Niiro]

Yeah, and? They still made them for FFXIV so why throw them away?

You misunderstood what I was trying to say:

They did throw away a ton of the animations used in 1.0, they normalized a bunch of stuff in 2.0 that they had already made unique animations for in 1.0.

[Lucavi]

And saying that the team does not care about details is simply a lie. C'mon, they made new running and jumping animations for Ninja just to make it look different and that's pretty much what you're asking for except it's for jobs and not races.

People are pissed off and are speaking without thinking. Anyone seriously talking about the team not caring about details is as foolish as they are emotional. This thread, and XIV threads in general, have become so much more hostile since the XI announcements. The salt spray reminds me of my fishing trips on a headboat in the bay.

[Kaisha]

fucking bard ones are the worst i can always hear bard screaming over music

Hearing "HNNNNnnyuck!" every three seconds in BCoB before our BRD Fantasia'd into something less annoying were good times on VoIP immitating it.

Notice when the PLD runs and then stops running, they take an extra step because of momentum and inertia. In 2.0 we stop on a dime and it seems so fake and plastic.

Gameplay design choice. You don't want movement with accel/deceleration in a dodge-heavy MMO. I'd rather the precision.

As for animations, I'd rather we'd not have any more sliding around as it is just so we can have 'prettier' animations that you never notice in combat because of the speed/movement and effects spam. The 1.0 shit was mo-capped on the assumption you were locked in place during it and that they had 3 seconds to throw in some flair.

[Shenrien]

For the movement itself they stop on a dime but they have an animation that brings them to that sudden halt to give the illusion of forward momentum, there is no actual movement that continues to pull them forward. Watch closely in the video you had linked and you will see it with the paladin going forward to the next set of mobs, his target circle or whatever stops instantly the moment whoever is controlling chooses to do so and what you're left with is a whimsical animation to trick your eyes and brain into interpreting something that is not there.

The animations of 1.0 are recreated in 2.0 but at a faster pace because the game play you experience is set for that pace of combat. The animation time of chaos thrust in 1.0 would never work in 2.0, the same goes for the jump, it's so slow that it could not be utilized in any big raid setting if the rest of the games combat is set at a faster more chaotic pace. Things were slower in 1.0 so it worked in 1.0, and because things were slower you appreciated the animations for what they were. The animation for 1.0 spirits is the exact same for 2.0 spirits but you have more time to observe what is going on in 1.0 than you do in 2.0, you still break your wrist, spin around and jab the enemy with a big explosion of fuck before registering the damage.

So I don't really see what you're getting bent out of shape for, we have animations now for all of our abilities rather squatting like we're about to shit ourselves which is a great improvement in my eyes and visually, yeah from a short glance through youtube videos the world looks nice, but I wouldn't trade it for what we have now because you would likely encounter really quick the issue that everything would begin to run like shit if you entered an area that had more than 20 visible characters, NPCs and any form of occlusion in the background to further make your pc chug those high polycount models and sprites. Not to mention there would probably be some pretty intense culling to prevent that from happening so you enter a crowded area and all you're left with is PC models, and NPC models poping in and out around a small circle around you and the rest of the world would look empty when in reality it's actually full and shit. Which is something I don't think was present back at 1.0, I don't know myself because I only played for about a month and forgot that I even had the thing subbed when they turned that on but yay slightly cheaper cost I guess.

[Elcura]

Wow this conversation is old, didn't we have this back when 2.0 was starting?

You know why there's no unique animations? Because making new animations takes time so making 6-7 different animations of the same move isn't very efficient when you can just have 1 animation across all races/genders.

Even if they could reuse 1.0's animation they wouldn't because it would screw them over long term for every new job, race or ability they added. But I'm sure having unique animations is more important than having more jobs or races.

[Destinye]

Something about minimum spec requirements? They thought 1.0 had needed too powerful a computer for the avg mmorpger? idr exactly i don't even know if 2.0 requires a less powerful pc than 1.0 lol

They retconned this at some point and he basically admitted he just didn't want to spend the time doing the animations. Only later to make various idle stances while your weapon is drawn.

It's pretty silly and it's why I hate ARR's direction so much. DQX/XI/1.x shown so much creativity, the little things you know? But instead they want to go the simplistic route and do as minimum as possible as long as its passable, which is fine since people are gobbling it up or coming from WoW. Hell I remember them saying 1.0's specs were due to the engine using so many shaders for even just one object, that's not the case for ARR.

Look at Male Roegadyns MRDs versus everyone else, they already have a unique battle stance while holding an Axe..they clearly have the ability to do varied animations.

The "I don't want to" crap needs to go >.>. Even the most generic throw away korean MMOs have more creativity when it comes to various jobs and races/genders. As for voices..it's way more annoying in ARR than it was in XI or 1.x because of the whackamole battle system ARR uses. Especially Archers.

So help me if Machinist starts speaking one liners everytime they shoot.

You know why there's no unique animations? Because making new animations takes time

This is why most skills in XI used the same base then built off of it.

Also: Draw your weapon and look at the new idle stances they added. You know how much time that took for something you can't even see in actual battle? Time is a moot point when they waste time doing shit like that no problem.