What is keeping FFXI from reaching the potential it has?

[Damane]

I have always had this feeling that most of what ffxi has turned into isn't what the developers had in mind, when they created it. I mean, take the very beginning of creating a character for example: When you join the game, you have like 20 slots or something for characters. I'm guessing the developers imagined people would level a Galka War, then a taru WHM, then a Mithra Thf, then an Elvaan PLD, etc etc, have one separate character for each job needed.

Then you have things like Kings - I don't think they imagined that DA or BD would be packed with 100-150 people on a nightly basis all spamming JA's to try to claim it. I think originially it was expected to be killed maybe1-2 times a week, by "advanced players" who dared to venture into those areas.

There are alot of things I think we'd all "suggest" that could be changed, but in the actual experience of the game as a whole, I think they really did a great job with the game. We all cry about botters and item duping bans, and ZOMG i've done Xarcabard for 1.5 years and still don't have RDM AF2 hat etc etc, but again, I think people don't realize that, they really DO have a hell of alot of drops, just their expectations continue to mount. They finally pick up RDM AF2 hat in Xarc, and now they want BLM AF2 hat, or THF hands, or PLD body etc etc, not realizing they already own like 4-5 pieces of Xarc AF, just its now become "not enough" for them.

All those things I explained above have been "The essence of ffxi" for most of the NA/EU players, like, all this game is about is HNM's and loot, when, if you take a look at it, there are HUNDREDS of quests and missions that those "experienced HNMLS members" have never done, nor could figure out themselves if it weren't for ffxiwiki or some other walkthrough site.

I think the game has lived up to more than spectacular, as a part of the FF series personally. I do think that there is a much higher Time Spent > Drop Acquisition on most things, but you have to remember that most events take anywhere from 6-18 people, and if you get 1 good drop off that final event, instead of it being good enough for 1-2 people in your group to have it, we all want 18 of them instead, so we kinda create the whole "lack of reward for time spent" problem.

Exactly because you can choose and lvl multiple jobs on ONE character should imply that the droprate has to be or should be higher. Now I am not talking on 100% drop rates but a 5% droprate on salvage gear, defending ring etc is realy sucktastic. Same goes for dynamis drops, but the norhtlands got buffed so I am fine with them now.

the thing is with FFXI, if you only bother with one job you are fine (most of the time), if you try to gear up more then 4 jobs (that are totally different, lets say mage, support, melee, tank) perfectly you will bang your head against a wall.

[gamez]

Just a thought, but that new contest on the POL frontpage for NA players has a 250 limit feedback field, I actually did put 'low reward for high effort' and 'reused models with minimal effort to reskin' as feedback issues. The more times it comes up short & simple, the more they're going to have to tally towards it being an issue when surveyed.

I play on PS2 the majority of the time simply for ease, unless I need the longer macros available on my PC for larger damage/events.

It just runs with minimal choke-up on the PS2 compared to my horrid PC. Anyways, the problem I actually have with them always saying PS2 limitations, is that I'm curious if they're limited to letting us not turn off weather, effects, etc. like PC users can, on PS2 you cannot turn down any of those settings, so in somewhere like glacier you're stuck fulltime with the double snow effect, whereas I can have my PC screen sitting right next to the TV screen and see clearly with weather turned off. If our system requirements are already so horrendous, where's the harm in letting us cool off a bit of the problem to even the field.

It should be mentioned that the PS2 HD is capped at 40 gigs, but outside that I don't really know it's limitations/rpm etc. The only other game to come out for the PS2 HDD in North America was Resident Evil Outbreak, which had its service discontinued in December 2007, due to the online mode not actually having any voice input capability it kind of choked, so there is all that space, I heard about 9-10 other games hit for the Japanese version, but nothing wholy supported/ran off the HD rather just loaded up partially, graphically the PS2 may be limited, but in terms of expansion the thing has a huge amount of space available for simple things like reskins and new .dats.

[orson]

Exactly because you can choose and lvl multiple jobs on ONE character should imply that the droprate has to be or should be higher. Now I am not talking on 100% drop rates but a 5% droprate on salvage gear, defending ring etc is realy sucktastic. Same goes for dynamis drops, but the norhtlands got buffed so I am fine with them now.

the thing is with FFXI, if you only bother with one job you are fine (most of the time), if you try to gear up more then 4 jobs (that are totally different, lets say mage, support, melee, tank) perfectly you will bang your head against a wall.

This is probably one the most important reason the drop rates slowly need to be increased in old event. Demand is going up exponentially and the supply isn't matching it at all.

[MarkM.]

Kind of a point/kind of a question. How long has it been since SE added new BCNMs/KSNMs to the game?

Those are events ANYONE can do, and I know that over half of them probably aren't accessed once a month.

[Saxon]

I always used to imagine the invisible block in jeuno was just [GM]Dave silently watching over us >.>

Most of the ToAU gear was just reskinned models. Askar - > homan, morrigan -> errant. Ares being the exception. For lack of truely new gear I do buy the "ps2 limitations" fallback. PS2 only has so much memory.

Late to the party, but Ares is just a reskinned DRK AF.
& Skadi is Dusk/Tiger? idk

[Pendas]

You'd think that the only MMO where a character can level multiple jobs on the same character would have a higher drop rate to complement that fact when in reality it has the worst... It's mind boggling. I'm sure if jobs were restricted to 1 per character people wouldn't complain about the drop rates so much.

[shulula]

Communication between SE and users is what holds FFXI back. Imagine if they asked you what you wanted, then spent their time developing it. Lets say they created gear sets so when you changed jobs, you can move your items as a group instead of clicking one at a time with a stupid delay. Or allowed you to warp from Jueno to WG like you can from other cities.

They come with the PS2 and Game Balance non-sense, but ultimately its the theme park approach to the game. They create rides that they think are fun. Some work and you have a long line of people trying to get on. Others suck and no one even bothers, but either way they develop in a box with no input from their users.

[Silenka]

I really don't think that the lack of PvP in FFXI is a good reason for why FFXI needs help. The devs have said time and time again (and the history of the franchise has shown as well) that Final Fantasy is just not a PvP-oriented game. It's more about players fighting monsters than players fighting each other. The PvP we do have is set up storyline-wise to be a sort of good-natured contest/game between nations or groups of people, rather than a bloodthirsty mortal combat to the death like it is in other MMOs. You cannot honestly blame the nature of the game as a whole for holding back FFXI, because if you really want PvP that bad you should be playing a totally different game.

[Antithesis]

I really don't think that the lack of PvP in FFXI is a good reason for why FFXI needs help. The devs have said time and time again (and the history of the franchise has shown as well) that Final Fantasy is just not a PvP-oriented game. It's more about players fighting monsters than players fighting each other. The PvP we do have is set up storyline-wise to be a sort of good-natured contest/game between nations or groups of people, rather than a bloodthirsty mortal combat to the death like it is in other MMOs. You cannot honestly blame the nature of the game as a whole for holding back FFXI, because if you really want PvP that bad you should be playing a totally different game.

Just because its FF's nature is teamwork and stuff doesnt mean we cant have bloodthirsty friendly PvP matches now can we? :D

CTF = Brenner. Take those fucking flying monitors out and Brenner is good.

[ronin sparthos]

Chocobo Racing could have been "PVP", Pankration could have been "PVP". In both cases they turned out to be niche events few people care for because the former is merely a long drawn-out cutscene and the latter has very limited control.

[Mesiah]

Late to the party, but Ares is just a reskinned DRK AF.
& Skadi is Dusk/Tiger? idk

Ah, I guess it is. Touche. Now I don't have to feel ashamed that I never got into doing salvage, I dont like drk af anyway

[Tomiko]

What if:
SE filled DA with really high level true sight/sound mobs and made it a huge pain in the ass to even get to fafnir, then removed the pop timer completely, making it possible to spawn any time within 24hrs after it's death.

I like the idea of making it hard to get to the area, but I'm heavily opposed to the respawn idea since that's one of the biggest issues.

Would some linkshells simply sit and camp in the same spot 24/hrs a day?

Some already do. Look at Tiamat and Khimaira camps. Then there's also things like Argus and the Fei'Yin Shadows.

[Gergall]

Or allowed you to warp from Jueno to WG like you can from other cities.

They finally added Jeuno to WG warp a patch or two ago.

[Katarzyna]

...Where ffxi really shines is actually where alot of you people blast them. Alot of people don't realise just how stable and glitch free ffxi is, especially concidering it spans 3 platforms. After my first day on WoW I wanted to rip my hair out because of all the glitches. Glitches that people on WoW find common and hardly blink an eye for, people on ffxi would freak and SE would have an emergency maintenance to fix it in under 24 hours. So, if you want blizzard to take over ffxi, be careful what you wish for

The 950 people who got perma/temp banned recently, and the linkshells that went down in flames would disagree with you.

FFXI may be stable and *cough* glitch-free *cough* but that doesn't mean the system works. As other people have mentioned, there is just so much wrong with this game.

Challenge is fine. I'm not arguing against challenge. I enjoy challenge. I don't enjoy the sick masochistic definition SE calls "challenge" however.

PS2 limitations are limitations to the software itself. That doesn't have anything to do with the abysmal drop rates, the sometimes insane amount of time to camp NMs, the fact that years later we STILL don't know how to defeat AV "the correct way" or the fact that SE's communication is so fucking poor, you soon realize talking to deaf person who can't read lips is more worth your time. Put that all together and you have a nice heaping pile of "WTF", courtesy of SE.

[Lordwafik]

PS2 limitations mean nothing to the PC and Xbox user. They can complain all they like about it, but there is nothing stopping them from releasing a different graphic for people on PC/Xbox.

Evidence to support

• Downloads are separated by PS2, Xbox, PC, depending on which one connects, you do not download a generalized patch.
• People on PC can .dat mod their graphics without a problem to any of the other consoles being affected as it just affects local machines.
• Continued from the first point, developers code differently for each one (as supported by the glitch where console users were fishing an an insane rate compared to PC users).

SE can say "We want to make it fair between all three" but that is once again a scapegoat for not wanting to release different models for the ones that can handle it.

Reskinning isn't hard, hell they replace icons every now and then, reskinning isn't hard. Some things don't even need reskin more than a pallette swap. I'm sure everyone wearing an antares harness wouldn't mind as much if it was just recoloured black so it's noticably different.

[Hyan]

I remember them saying they'd like to go back and make new recolors for the ZNM armor sets, can't remember where I saw it though. Some jp interview I guess.

[ringthree]

Both.

PS2 "apparently" also limits the amount of content they can add and do to the game. I am just wondering if the PS2 is Satin and the PC is God while the Xbox 360 and PS3 are Jesus. One's evil and outdated, the other is constantly evolving and always has room for improvement and the last two are basically PCs in a sense.

They have moved away from PS2 limitations really as the general excuse and just keep it for gear storage and other technical difficulties.

The problem is that we are playing a JP game run by JPs. They prefer a different level and style of difficulty.

There are a whole bunch of things they could do to spruce up the game. Redo a lot of the old graphics to make them comparable to the graphics they are producing today. Particle effects on weapons and gear, individual status icons for all effects, status effect animations on in game characters.

My random thoughts would include customization of weapons and gear. This would include sub-menu storage like Puppetmaster and MMM allows. More content like Salvage e.g. limited participation but much longer and rewarding than Assault and other similar content.

[ringthree]

PS2 limitations mean nothing to the PC and Xbox user. They can complain all they like about it, but there is nothing stopping them from releasing a different graphic for people on PC/Xbox.

Evidence to support

• Downloads are separated by PS2, Xbox, PC, depending on which one connects, you do not download a generalized patch.
• People on PC can .dat mod their graphics without a problem to any of the other consoles being affected as it just affects local machines.
• Continued from the first point, developers code differently for each one (as supported by the glitch where console users were fishing an an insane rate compared to PC users).

SE can say "We want to make it fair between all three" but that is once again a scapegoat for not wanting to release different models for the ones that can handle it.

Reskinning isn't hard, hell they replace icons every now and then, reskinning isn't hard. Some things don't even need reskin more than a pallette swap. I'm sure everyone wearing an antares harness wouldn't mind as much if it was just recoloured black so it's noticably different.

There problem is obviously not technical, but philosophical. They don't want to provide content for some people that is denied to other people. Again, that is more a JP thing than an NA thing.

[Kainos]

Is it just me or does anyone think FFXI's main goal is to make back the money lost on "The Spirits Within" CG Movie.

***"The film received mixed reviews[9] and despite aggressive promotion by Sony, it became a huge box office bomb. With a budget of $137 million (including marketing costs) the film made $85 million worldwide, meaning total losses were approximately $94 million (the studio typically receives half the box office gross). The domestic box office loss was, at the time, the largest in film history."**

and this

**"The idea to develop Final Fantasy XI as an online game was conceived by Hironobu Sakaguchi when establishing Square Pictures headquarters in Hawaii."**

The way I see it is you take one of the biggest franchises in video game history, with an extremely loyal fanbase and create a MMORPG. Make the game a time consuming experience and drain that money over a long period of time to make back all the money they lost on the movie. It is exploiting/pimping your "cash cow" franchise.

I know I am probably wrong on this "conspiracy" but it has always gone through my head regarding SE attitude to the playerbase. I'm not a WOW fan but if you compare the level of customer service and work that Blizzard puts into it makes SE look like trash.

[Hyan]

With the playerbase WoW has, I'd be shocked if Blizzard put only the same amount of work to their MMO as SE and not a lot more. And still, while it could be around 20 times better it really isn't :D.