Will you still play Aion when FFXIV comes out?

[arus2001]

C'mon Hyan, does it hurt at all being such an SE apologist? It is possible to criticize and dislike moves they've made without damning the company as a whole, but practically every point people have brought up you've basically countered with an elongated "Nu-uh!" while implying we couldn't possibly know the horrors the dev team endures. I'd spin that and say neither do you.

It might be a common sense approach to reason that money limits what we get, but I still stand behind the fact that they screwed around on fund distribution as a whole. Money made from FFXI should've gone toward bettering FFXI first, not FFVII: Cid's Quest for #@$!ing Tea and other iterations of failed games that Wada instead turns around and bitches over SE not making enough money. XI's lost that chance, though, and they're bleeding subscribers as people take Aion as a stopgap or others await XIV for the coup de grace. I don't know about you, but once the server mergers happen and things dwindle too far, SE is going to have to either adjust large-scale content so a lower population can tackle it more easily or just pull the plug. Can you tell me how much either angle will cost? Nope. Either way, people have a hard enough time getting help for content that's over 6 months old, and part of that stems from the methodology of punishment (EXP/Gil/Time loss) vs. effort and reward.

Just as evidenced here or, say... the US government with this whole Health Care crap, there's always going to be someone who disagrees with something, sometimes just because they can. "Oh, your idea has flaws!" Easy to fucking say. What's the flaw in making an event playable or a job functional again? Gimme a break. I'd say their whole unanimous decision system is flawed, and should instead go by majority vote. Some may piss and moan, just like those here have done over EXP adjustments, drop changes like Thief's Knife, and so on, but these vocal minority no-lifers or those blessed with the bestest linkshell evar aren't the target audience. Much as I hate to invoke the WoW card, listening to your userbase and filtering the noise from the meat isn't a bad thing. What's the magic number of subscribers needed so SE would do the same? Because, really, I doubt us XI players want an XI-2.

[Hyan]

Psh, call me an apologist if you want, but there's a line between unbiased criticism and biased one, which I'm trying to prove here.

Unbiased criticism must take into account that there is a chance that the devs actually are facing the issues I told you about instead of stating ignorantly "they're just lazy". Like before I proved how things aren't so black and white as many of you seem to think "just raise drop rate, just add moogles, just fix X". Behind all of these issues arise unforeseen aspects that you can't figure out without looking at the issue unbiasedly.

Do you think that I don't have my own opinion about SE's updates and tweaking? Just like everyone else, I have formed my own opinion about which issues would need to be fixed first and as you may have guessed, SE hasn't done what I thought was necessary. However, the big difference between me and you is that I've thought about it in different perspectives instead of being content with thinking "my views and ideas are brilliant and SE is the worst MMO company ever because they never did what I wanted and my million friends who are obviously right too wanted".

You can have your biased opinion (as an ex-FFXI player like me) that they screwed the funding, but I find that pretty humorous claim mainly based on the fact that SE hasn't really had any issues with it's playerbase leaving for years (suddenly with the announcement of XIV players started leaving though, which I don't find surprising). As I said before, if more players aren't joining the game and the current playerbase isn't leaving anytime soon, that tells me about the funding being just right rather than insufficient. You're basically saying that all the profit SE got from XI should have gone down the drain instead of to other projects that give much more profit than tossing money at XI would ever give. Yeah totally would work out for you but SE isn't here for charity.

The basic idea of making a job functional or event playable again has no flaws in itself. The flaws come when the devs start thinking about how this can be accomplished without other aspects of the game not getting screwed over in the process. It's just as easy to say "just make the job functional again" without even considering what any kind of change would do to rest of the game.

So you're content with the funds going to the wrong place, or the fixes screwing up the game even more than it currently is, except this time there will be more fixes like that? That's what majority's vote will do. "Alright alright we know this fix has massive issues but 60% voted yes so oh well, we'll go on with it." Of course it's an approach like any other, but doesn't really sound any better to me.

[Priran]

I think it's cute he thinks he's unbiased

[Hyan]

Hah, I think it's cute you assume I'm unbiased even though I haven't even hinted at anything that'd point towards that. All things taken into account I'll be more likely to side with SE, I'll give you that, but the important thing is to take those things into account before making the decision. Now, if you think this fact somehow makes my point invalid feel free to tell me how, otherwise it's irrelevant.

[ringthree]

Just as evidenced here or, say... the US government with this whole Health Care crap, there's always going to be someone who disagrees with something, sometimes just because they can. "Oh, your idea has flaws!" Easy to fucking say. What's the flaw in making an event playable or a job functional again? Gimme a break. I'd say their whole unanimous decision system is flawed, and should instead go by majority vote. Some may piss and moan, just like those here have done over EXP adjustments, drop changes like Thief's Knife, and so on, but these vocal minority no-lifers or those blessed with the bestest linkshell evar aren't the target audience. Much as I hate to invoke the WoW card, listening to your userbase and filtering the noise from the meat isn't a bad thing. What's the magic number of subscribers needed so SE would do the same? Because, really, I doubt us XI players want an XI-2.

I think you are missing the irony in your criticism here. FFXI is still going, and doing it while facing a whole lot of much newer competition.

You are being the person that is shouting "Your idea has flaws!" It is easy to say, but there are still a whole lot of people that disagree with you and play FFXI. FFXI still has a lot of players and they are, at some point, still satisfied with the game.

If you were going to compare it to the WoW situation, you really need to look at Ghostcrawler's responses to most of the player base. Most of his comments are explanations of why they can't/don't/won't give the players what they want.

To me, you are the one that is pissing and moaning after you have already moved on. Most people that played FFXI for so long can recognize that they enjoyed it (most enjoyed it immensely) but left for one reason or another. Presented with the opportunity, they would play an updated version. They are not bitter about their experience.

[Kyo]

Lots of White Knighting going on in hur.

[ringthree]

I think it's cute he thinks he's unbiased

I think it's cute that this was the only thing you could lift from his entire post.

I also think it's cute that you don't get that you are doing the exact thing you think he is doing, while he is not.

Ironic... don't you think?

[arus2001]

Of course I'm biased. FFXI was a huge time investment and while some would brush it off as just a game, I don't foolishly do the same. Only time I draw upon that sentiment is when people expect me to unreasonably sacrifice my time for whatever end they deem appropriate. I paid SE to play, not the other way around. I wanted XI to be better, and not just for myself. Sometimes those motives selfishly overlapped, sure, but I've also been critical of myself in reevaluations of things as the game's aged and the feedback of others in shaping it.

Frankly, I don't believe the number they claim on subscriptions seeing like 4k users back in the day at same number, then maybe 1500 tops when I canceled. And even then people paying a monthly fee doesn't guarantee they're actually playing or aren't just somebody's dual-boxed mule that's only online during a Tiamat window. They've nickel and dimed us. They've done the bare minimum to keep the less than average player who doesn't know better content, but even that balancing act is slipping of late with updates being 4+ months apart and barely looking like 1/4 of something we would've seen in 2005 in terms of content.

I haven't even touched on Windower and what their programmers have done to better the FFXI experience... for free, but that avenue is also an untapped potential SE hasn't looked into. Why not have a monster design contest every few months where the winning model gets added to the game? How about player written quests where the chosen gets coded up and implemented? Oh wait, that's time they don't have and refuse to hire people for. This is every bit of our game as it is theirs, and while they'll lay the foundation of a world and its mechanics, the ability to help flesh that out further is probably the difference between XI's 500k subscribers and WoW's 11m. $6,475,000 a month against $142,450,000. Dunno about you, but I'd be willing to gamble on user input if it meant 22 times the payout of the "lazy" model in a single month. And even in the event of backlash, they'd have to lose 10.5m users just to fall back to old standards. I'll just say that's unlikely to happen, but really, XIV's biggest hurdle will just be keeping people after launch while expanding from there. It's no secret people have enjoyed NCSoft being more communicative than SE about Aion in this short time, but of course, there have also been naysayers that bitched about stuff like the double EXP weekend or just that it's not enough.

In the end, I don't give a shit if XIV is a WoW-killer, but as I said, I'm not interested in XI-2. The whole small, tight-knit community spiel is BS. There are good people and assholes all around in any game. I want to enjoy XIV when it comes out. I want other people to do the same. I don't want to see the same stonewalling or mechanic traps that proliferated XI solely to string us along. If you blow through content too fast, that's your own fault only if SE's been frugal like they have been lately. Go outside. Read a book. Watch a movie. Fuck some bitches. I don't care. While I won't claim to be a god of gaming affairs, I helped code and run a couple MU*s back in the day. I've juggled the feedback angle, I've tweaked content, I've come up with new things, and largely people were happy. Only fault of such systems were they were text-based, and the rise of MMOs as more or less graphical MUDs did more harm to the genre than anything myself or other wizards had done to our little sandboxes. Really, upkeep of a game isn't the hard part once you have the core systems in place. And even if the core is bad, you go back and adjust it to do what you want. End of story.

[arus2001]

I think you are missing the irony in your criticism here. FFXI is still going, and doing it while facing a whole lot of much newer competition.

Touched on it briefly in my last post, but I'd differentiate between "going" and "going strong" in the long run. We can't easily judge how much the game is being played just by the number of subscribers, be it FFXI or WoW, but I just know what I know of XI from experience. People aren't doing events because they're fun, but feel more or less obligated to because they've either gotten something from it or are still waiting to. Nothing really fresh has come along, and I don't think the whole itemization problem needs to be rehashed as it is a side-effect of this.

So, yeah, for an outright newbie to XI, they'll have a lot to do. I think they'll have a lot of trouble doing it (making money and quests/missions), and why I wouldn't recommend the game to anyone in this state, but even for middle of the road players who have a 75 or two, they might not have the ability to commit to an HNMLS and do more beyond pick on colibri or Campaign. And if they can, well, hope they enjoy being last on lists or miles behind on points. Such are some of the walls I've inferred to in a prior post, as well.

If someone wants to summarize all of my comments as bashing the game with nothing but bitterness, then fine, their call. The FFXI that could've been and the FFXI we got are far different visions for myself and others, though. I think that's the real tragedy here and solely why XIV as a fresh start is appealing.

[Priran]

Hah, I think it's cute you assume I'm unbiased even though I haven't even hinted at anything that'd point towards that.

Unbiased criticism must take into account that there is a chance that the devs actually are facing the issues I told you about instead of stating ignorantly "they're just lazy". Like before I proved how things aren't so black and white as many of you seem to think "just raise drop rate, just add moogles, just fix X".

lol ok

I think it's cute that this was the only thing you could lift from his entire post.

I also think it's cute that you don't get that you are doing the exact thing you think he is doing, while he is not.

Ironic... don't you think?

Who are you and what are you babbling about?

[Kyo]

Fuck some bitches.

Thats what Im talkin about.

[Hyan]

You talk about being critical at yourself, but I don't believe you. You would have seen the things I've been talking about otherwise. You're not that blind.

Well then, you just answered to your own question from before. You believe the playerbase has been shrinking, but want SE to throw more money at a game that is making less profit every month? That is.. interesting. You want the game to do better (and SE does too), but you're not chained by the fact that the game needs more money to accomplish that feat and as you maybe could have guessed from thinking a bit, giving more resources for the sake of having a less broken game that nobody would play is not exactly productive. Then they have to ask themselves, how many people would we have to stop from leaving that it'd be worth it to increase the funding?

If you want to blame them for making the game like they want then feel free, but this is one of those "gray zone" issues once again. They're the ones making the game, not us. It is their vision, and we can choose to follow that vision or not. It's not our game, where are you basing this nonsense? It is their game, and they can do whatever they want with it.


Yeah let's look at things from one sided angle again, you're pretty good at that. Because SE doesn't use it's players to flesh out the content is the reason why XI has 500k and WoW 12,000k players. We can ignore once again irrelevant things such as this game not being designed to be casual friendly in the slightest, from soloing to drop rates. We can ignore that SE were not doing good at developing the game until some time ago, at what point it was too late already, which made players move on to WoW instead.

Of course people enjoy more communication- people enjoy more of like, anything- but it doesn't make the game better, which makes it as important as some holiday event with santa hats as reward that essentially do nothing. MUST HAVE SANTA HATS.

Hm, I hope you're not comparing text based MUD's to large scale 3D MMORPG's of today when it comes to upkeeping of the game. Must be some massive MUD's you developed back in the day. You won't need as much resources, sure, but do you think the companies are willing to put out millions of dollars to one single game not just for the span of it's development time of maybe 6 years, but 6 more years after that too? Nnnnot so likely.

[Hyan]

lol ok

Good boy, you just pointed out what unbiased criticism is. Does still not make me unbiased however, only proves that I use said criticism to get to my own, slightly biased conclusions. Still better than ignoring the facts and going straight to conclusions though (= my point).

If someone wants to summarize all of my comments as bashing the game with nothing but bitterness, then fine, their call. The FFXI that could've been and the FFXI we got are far different visions for myself and others, though. I think that's the real tragedy here and solely why XIV as a fresh start is appealing.

And why I am optimistic about the sequel, is simply because while I don't agree with every action SE has done, I feel that most of the game's problems stem from the early era of RoTZ/CoP and are not as easily fixed as some of us imply. This is why I think that the devs as they are currently can create a better game from the ground up instead of having to dance around retarded issues they created when they still were noobs about this whole MMORPG thing.

[Priran]

Good boy, you just pointed out what unbiased criticism is. Does still not make me unbiased however, only proves that I use said criticism to get to my own, slightly biased conclusions. Still better than ignoring it and going straight to conclusions though (= my point).

Uh, what? I think you're forgetting that most of us played FFXI for years too, you can't hide complete and utter bullshit from us with a veil of semantics and half-truth.

You're claiming to be giving unbiased criticism. There's nothing to argue about, it's straight from the horse's mouth.

[Hyan]

Uh, what? I think you're forgetting that most of us played FFXI for years too, you can't hide complete and utter bullshit from us with a veil of semantics and half-truth.

You're claiming to be giving unbiased criticism. There's nothing to argue about, it's straight from the horse's mouth.

That's right. And you're claiming that I think I'm unbiased while implying that I'm not, which is false, because I do think that I am biased. That's all there is to it, stop trying to be a smartass.

I think you're forgetting half of the things I said. Most of us played FFXI for years, most of us are simply content with thinking "Devs r just lazy" like it's the only option. I'm not, and that is quite the eye opening experience.

[arus2001]

Yes, I am comparing MMOs to MUDs. The complexity is just higher in the MMO environment due to graphics and geographic positioning beyond simply being in the room with the mobs (which we should know was a term that originated from the MU* scene). Both have quests. Both have puzzles. Both have combat. Both have worlds. The MMO is just far better eye candy over colored ascii on top of slight control improvements and actual audio. Though, some games even tackle XYZ coordinate systems. Dunno if you've ever messed with Hspace, but I'd probably call that the closest a MU* would get to MMO combat with some creative administrators.

Anyway, I'm just saying it's too late to really rejuvenate FFXI now. They fumbled with CoP big time, which was also around WoW's picking up steam if I'm recalling properly. I can't buy SE not knowing how to run an MMO and accepting what we got when WoW was Blizzard's first MMO, too. Unless you wanna call Diablo II as perpetual instanced content an MMO. SE's fixed things here and there since, I won't refute that, but ToAU and WotG weren't really enough to renew outside interest and if you tell me it's okay that WotG isn't complete 2 years later, then I dunno what to say. Hell, I'd call releasing an incomplete expansion numerous times one of their biggest flaws, but I get the feeling you'd justify that with the hardcore blowing through it all in a few days and then whining about nothing to do. Of course, this comes back to getting meaty content with frequent updates using the money your game makes. Juggling replayability over the timesink approach is also something SE hasn't done well, but this also stems back to fairness in content access (Couple examples being HNMs and Relics/Mythics).

Not really sure what else there is to say on this whole matter, though. I have faith in the ability of SE to make a good game if they don't half-ass it. Yes, to some degree, I am telling people to piss off who don't agree with me. I want millions happy to be there playing with me instead of thousands demanding perfection less you risk failure, and anything that's a threat to that is cause for alarm.

[Priran]

That's right. And you're claiming that I think I'm unbiased while implying that I'm not, which is false, because I do think that I am biased. That's all there is to it, stop trying to be a smartass.

ahaha oh wow

I'm really interested in how citing something you said as an example of an unbiased opinion isn't proof you think you're unbiased.

[Hyan]

ahaha oh wow

I'm really interested in how citing something you said as an example of an unbiased opinion isn't proof you think you're unbiased.

My opinion is biased. I wasn't giving out any opinions before, I was laying down the facts to the table and in light of that got into my own biased conclusion. That's what unbiased criticism is. Think what you want, but at least look at the facts first.

I guess we're done then, Arus. I think you changed the topic quite a bit there but let's not go into that now. It's irrelevant though, see ya'll in game later anyway.

[Elvis]

Ergo...Concordently....Vis a Vis....

I win.

[arus2001]

http://www.blogcdn.com/news.bigdownl...08/12/whoa.jpg