Time for FFXI "Classic"?

[Gredival]

Basically you all are sitting here and saying Kings weren't fun.

I'm sitting here meta-analyzing what fun is as a chemical reaction and trying to talk about the best way for developers to game human psychology, sociology, and addiction to create a game that gives ideal levels of gratification.

You approach design by just saying we need a fun game. I approach it by analyzing what makes the ideal skinner box with the maximum amount of Stockholm Syndrome. Because I'm not looking for deeper meaning. The only thing that matters is the dopamine hit. If someone gets a better dopamine hit by sacrificing a week of time for a single claim and a chance at a Ridill then I think the game has succeeded.

[D44kpunk]

Sitting in an area for 3 hours doing nothing isn't fun either, whats your point? The fact that alk those other things involve actually playing the game at your own pace whenever you want.

Did you read your own post?

You were crying profusely that video games should be fun. None of those things are fun.

[Teryu]

Playing the game isn't fun? Why did you play then?

[Inactive]

Basically you all are sitting here and saying Kings weren't fun.

I'm sitting here meta-analyzing what fun is as a chemical reaction and trying to talk about the best way for developers to game human psychology, sociology, and addiction to create a game that gives ideal levels of gratification.

You approach design by just saying we need a fun game. I approach it by analyzing what makes the ideal skinner box with the maximum amount of Stockholm Syndrome. Because I'm not looking for deeper meaning. The only thing that matters is the dopamine hit. If someone gets a better dopamine hit by sacrificing a week of time for a single claim and a chance at a Ridill then I think the game has succeeded.

You are basing your meta-analysis on what expertise exactly? If FFXI's model was so spot on as you suggest, why did they change it? Why does no other MMO have a similar model? If the only thing that matters is the dopamine hit, then being able to gear up daily via Abyssea/Delve/blah blah are more effective than the 1/50 chance to get it from kings.

The 'we need a fun game' approach is all that matters. Because when you're sitting around bored you aren't thinking 'this is exciting, I'm setting up the ideal dopamine hit when I get this piece of gear in 27 days'. You're just bored

[Gredival]

Playing the game isn't fun? Why did you play then?

The dopamine hit from character progression, including getting the rarest and best gear.

The dopamine hit from claiming, even if I wasn't personally progressing, because it meant my LS could progress or at the very least the progression of those not of my tribal allegiance (HNMLS) was halted.

[Teryu]

Basically you all are sitting here and saying Kings weren't fun.

I'm sitting here meta-analyzing what fun is as a chemical reaction and trying to talk about the best way for developers to game human psychology, sociology, and addiction to create a game that gives ideal levels of gratification.

You approach design by just saying we need a fun game. I approach it by analyzing what makes the ideal skinner box with the maximum amount of Stockholm Syndrome. Because I'm not looking for deeper meaning. The only thing that matters is the dopamine hit. If someone gets a better dopamine hit by sacrificing a week of time for a single claim and a chance at a Ridill then I think the game has succeeded.

Because there is no objective thing as "fun". Most of your posts are just excuses to make other people decide that your perception of fun is the right and only way. If you have to come up with a an entire novel about why you like a thing the only person you're trying to convince is yourself. "I liked kings because its extremely competetive and i enjoy the rush of trying to claim". There i did it for you.

[Gredival]

You are basing your meta-analysis on what expertise exactly? If FFXI's model was so spot on as you suggest, why did they change it? Why does no other MMO have a similar model? If the only thing that matters is the dopamine hit, then being able to gear up daily via Abyssea/Delve/blah blah are more effective than the 1/50 chance to get it from kings.

Obama didn't tell coal workers that coal is horrible and needs to close as an energy source and that he was going to retrain them on how to be part of the renewable energy industry. He lied and said he supports "clean coal," something that doesn't exist. Hillary Clinton meanwhile was honest and said all those things and she lost all those coal worker votes.

People don't know what's best for them. We have a bias towards instant gratification, and a model where some people (by design) never reach the top will not appeal to the people that are excluded.

Cigarettes don't market themselves by saying "Look this shit is addictive but you come out ahead because you're only exchanging X% risk of getting cancer for Y amount of pleasure."

Mizuki Ito made the mistake of giving people what they said they wanted instead of being a designer whose job was to steward the game environment and balance first.

The 'we need a fun game' approach is all that matters. Because when you're sitting around bored you aren't thinking 'this is exciting, I'm setting up the ideal dopamine hit when I get this piece of gear in 27 days'. You're just bored

No ideally you are consumed by your thirst to get the gear and your hatred of the possibility that anyone outside your shell gets their gear that the thought never crosses your mind.

[Spicyryan]

Sounds like your sense of fun is based off your mediocrity not getting in the way of you achieving everything.

Tell me, in your paradigm what makes you the better player in XI? Because you grind your instances repeatedly? How is that different from my paradigm of the best players grinding nights and hours in the pit?

My grind is harder. My grind requires more sacrifice and blood. My grind gives no chance of recovery and leaves no room for error. My grind creates social pressures that crystallize into players working together in HNMLS in order to achieve personal goals.

No where have a said that my reaction time means I claim more which is why HNMs are better; in fact the whole premise of lockout is to make claiming random.

Hierarchy is an inevitable part of life. Remember in Brave New World that an all-alpha society collapses. You need the Deltas and the Epsilons. The trick is that you don't want them resenting their existence. That is the trick in creating an MMO. Hierarchy can and should exist with a level of content only doable by the best. But you stagger and tier different levels of content for different calibers of players. Some players will never make it to 75. Some will never make it past Sky. Some will never make it past CoP Missions. Some will get booted out of double BRD XP parties for being anchors. And maybe at some point the very bottom of the totem pole checks out and goes to find another game. That's inevitable and it doesn't doom the game. That's just like how people who can't hack it in DotA or Brood War have to go play LoL and StarCraft II.

But a game in which every single player makes it to the same progression point regardless of skill and effort with no distinctions at all (precisely what Abyssea was)? That game is sure to fail. And it did. That's precisely why subscriptions cratered after Heroes of Abyssea had been out for 3~ months and literally everyone had a full set of AF3 and even the worst players finished Empyrean weapons.

I am mediocre, but then again so is your sense of enjoyment which centralizes on obstructing others.

What makes players better in XI is their overall character. What they know about the game and content, what they know about mechanics and how to make the best of them, how prepared they are for situations and how well they adapt, how they work with others and plan or think of details, how well they can perform overall at anything essentially. Not how they try to rationalize excluding people as some form of fun virtual Darwinism.
Where those low on the totem pole 'just go find another game' as if someone isn't always on the bottom of the totem pole. Unfortunately, it is generally the kinder people where the weak ones will do anything to pretend they are actually someone.

Humans a predisposed to develop hierarchical structures, but that isn't some excuse or carte blanche. Nor is it justification for not keeping your ego in check.

FFXI and MMORPGs in general are progression based, yes. However, the game isn't purely about progression. Does it tie into what I said makes players better? Absolutely, but it isn't the standard by which all is measured. If you feel players don't have to work as hard and take as long as you believe they should then that is your own fucking problem. The things you and D44k say make me glad the 75 era is long dead and gone.

You find grinding JP fun?
Leveling jobs to 99 fun?
Spamming dated easy content to farm RME? (Salv/Dyna/vw)
Spamming lillith in VE fun?

You still have grinds, they are just different. Thinking otherwise makes you deranged.

Was grinding merits fun?
Was leveling jobs to 75 so that you be standing around for hours to get a party, a camp, a replacement tank or whm, and finally then still taking longer just to get XP fun?
Was any other dated content at 75 fun? Missions? Quests? AF? Avatars, etc?
Was spamming anything easy ever fun? No one has to spam Lilith on VE. They make the choice to simplify life and grind things out instead of team up. They have the option to do so instead of being pigeonholed into something that becomes an artificial gate. The same sort of gate you saw at 75 when players had something and didn't want to repeat it for others.

Don't be such a fool.

[Gredival]

Because there is no objective thing as "fun". Most of your posts are just excuses to make other people decide that your perception of fun is the right and only way. If you have to come up with a an entire novel about why you like a thing the only person you're trying to convince is yourself. "I liked kings because its extremely competetive and i enjoy the rush of trying to claim". There i did it for you.

Fun is the chemically induced feeling of pleasure/gratification/achievement we receive from dopamine. It can be hijacked with proper conditioning. This is precisely why I call MMOs skinner boxes. We are rats being conditioned to perform tasks (push the level / play the game) to receive rewards (a piece of cheese / a piece of gear). The skinner box study actually showed that when rats are over-rewarded, they lose interest.

[Teryu]

If you allow a game to have that much control over your happiness then it's no longer a game, that's an extremely unhealthy level of dependency that you should not allow any object to have over you. You should not, as a human being, be willing to chained back into your cage to be injected with those syringes.

[Tarage]

homeowner club member here

75 cap better still better

You're an idiot then. I don't want the limited resources that sustain XI to be diverted for your retarded nostalgia bullshit. Go bang some bricks into your nuts for the same feeling as dying to a bunny and losing 2 hours worth of progress.

[Teryu]

You're an idiot then. I don't want the limited resources that sustain XI to be diverted for your retarded nostalgia bullshit. Go bang some bricks into your nuts for the same feeling as dying to a bunny and losing 2 hours worth of progress.

I was talking to my brothers about original ffxi the other day and this statement came up almost verbatim.

[D44kpunk]

Playing the game isn't fun? Why did you play then?

I think you're missing the point kiddo. There are several aspects in MMOs that are required to the best that are not fun.

If you want a game where 100% of things are fun play an offline game. Even some of them have an unfun grind though.

Spicy is also missing the point

[Teryu]

I like how you think that the people you're talking to never experienced what you and gred are talking about and came from it with a different experience. I was part of the second linkshell that got the 2nd recorded pandemonium warden kills back when it was the hardest thing in the game. You're nostalgic over missing obligations and responsibilities to watch a screen for 3 hours for a "maybe".

[D44kpunk]

I like how you think that the people you're talking to never experienced what you and gred are talking about and came from it with a different experience. I was part of the second linkshell that got the 2nd recorded pandemonium warden kills back when it was the hardest thing in the game. You're nostalgic over missing obligations and responsibilities to watch a screen for 3 hours for a "maybe".

I think you're delusional. I've said this entire thread people have different opinions. You can like the current era, that's fine.

It's not the most popular or well received era though. Sorry.

[Teryu]

See, there you go again. You can't just let someone have an opinion and leave it at that. Every one of your responses to people in this thread has essentially been, "yeah ok i understand your incredibly stupid idiot opinion, i guess".

[D44kpunk]

You can have an opinion and be in a minority. Simple sub numbers strongly support what I'm saying.

I'm sorry that you can't handle being wrong.

[Gredival]

If you allow a game to have that much control over your happiness then it's no longer a game, that's an extremely unhealthy level of dependency that you should not allow any object to have over you. You should not, as a human being, be willing to chained back into your cage to be injected with those syringes.

Attachment is arbitrary. Some people attach existential meaning to their careers and businesses. Most people attach meaning to their personal relationships.

Society's approval and disapproval of the appropriateness of attachments is irrelevant. A person either becomes fulfilled or empty based on their ability to pursue those goals.

If there is a person whose happiest version of themselves is watching paint dry, even if it's not what society would consider the best version of them, who has the right to stop that person from spending their lives watching paint dry? Even if they could become a successful artist, or musician, or doctor with a family and all that stuff we idealize, if that person would have net more happiness living on the streets doing nothing but watching the paint dry on new buildings being constructed, then I think that it is perfectly rational for that person to go watch paint dry.

[Gredival]

You're nostalgic over missing obligations and responsibilities to watch a screen for 3 hours for a "maybe".

Yes I am. And I would do anything to have it back.

[Teryu]

They sure can but if it's making their lives worse they should really reconsider their values.