Gaming Media reacts to and reviews FFXIV launch

[Hyan]

The notion of SE telling people to wait a month before reviewing is an utter joke in itself.

Yet it is painfully obvious that for a player-based economy to establish, it will take a while no matter when the product is released and before that happens, the game is a lot less user-friendly. Even if this game was ready and had 2 expansions released, it would still make sense to wait a month before making a proper review if there is no working economy.

There are reasonable expectations and unreasonable expectations, and having a proper, established player-based economy from day one is an unreasonable expectation, plain and simple.

[person2007]

You're joking, right?

People plopped down $80 for an unfinished product, but it's ok since the first month is free? The notion of SE telling people to wait a month before reviewing is an utter joke in itself. Don't want a negative review? Don't release an unfinished product. SE deserves everything they get as they obviously have not watched the market that's been saturated with early releases that past 3 years.

While saying MMO's are an evolving entity shouldn't even need to be said, that still doesn't change the fact that first impressions are everything. You only get one shot and SE blew it.

Lol, i still can't see why people bought the CE + retail and thought the game would have had massive changes within the time they had. They should have waited until March of next year to release it, but nooooooooooo gotta rush the game because Cata is coming. The game has already flopped imo, maybe SE set a record of how fast you can lose your fanbase. There are so many easy things for SE to change that could make this game 10x better. But they are ignorant as fuck and dont even communicate with us. Is it really hard to get on a PC everyday and write how they are fairing with updates and changes? There are F2P mmos that arent as bad as this, especially when most of the bugs come from the first friggin alpha test.

[person2007]

Yet it is painfully obvious that for a player-based economy to establish, it will take a while no matter when the product is released and before that happens, the game is a lot less user-friendly. Even if this game was ready and had 2 expansions released, it would still make sense to wait a month before making a proper review if there is no working economy.

There is no economy because the game is new. They could have just put a fucking AH. Let's be honest who is really gonna check through peoples bazaars to find the item they are going to sell to find the current going rate, unless they add some kind of instant search function in the Market Wards.

[Riposte]

Well, you certainly made your mind up. I guess there is no reason for the SEDF to argue with you any further. That was fun guys. Lets take a nap while we wait for some on-topic material.

EDIT: But then Hyan doesn't know how to shut his mouth.

EDIT: Here, I'll solve it for you: It is obvious SE wanted reviewers to wait a month because they think it might net them better scores. Why exactly no one here knows. Maybe because this is for an update or maybe for the "economy" or something like that or maybe they just think they will like it more if they play it longer. We don't know, it is all speculative. More importantly nothing changes by finding out exactly what they are betting on.

[Hyan]

There is no economy because the game is new. They could have just put a fucking AH. Let's be honest who is really gonna check through peoples bazaars to find the item they are going to sell to find the current going rate, unless they add some kind of instant search function in the Market Wards.

The current system makes it even harder to build a proper economy, I agree, but AH or not what I said still applies. It takes some time for the economy to establish, which is why reviewers should wait "a while".

[Alderaan]

I can't argue with the economy taking time. It was never even an issue with me.

[Kurokikaze]

I don't get why its so out of the ordinary for SE to ask reviewers to wait at least a month to post a review for their MMO. Most game critics do this anyways since they know you can't play an MMO for a week and slap a rating on it like you can with any other game.

While not at the request of the publisher... this has been done for many MMOs before. Aion, AoC, Warhammer, and WoW included.

Common practices are common.

[SamanosukeShiva]

I'm gonna wait till FFXIV have content before I review(read: play) it.

[millionsknives]

It's kinda funny SE thinks a month will make reviews any kinder then if they were done now. 14 will have all the same faults in 4 weeks. Just shows how clueless they are.

[Cow_k]

While saying MMO's are an evolving entity shouldn't even need to be said, that still doesn't change the fact that first impressions are everything. You only get one shot and SE blew it.

This is only true if the company behind the MMO can't support the game due to lack of funding. If Square keeps up with it, I can almost guarantee that plenty of people would check back when they heard of improvements.

[Loziel]

Well. its pretty certain that this will not make a dent on WoW, i see another FFXI level of subsription tbh, maybe more or less depending on how they treat XI and if they fix some of the glaring issues with XIV

[ascalon]

This is only true if the company behind the MMO can't support the game due to lack of funding. If Square keeps up with it, I can almost guarantee that plenty of people would check back when they heard of improvements.

Like they did with Age of Conan! It has a reasonably healthy playerbase despite almost 18 months of restructuring inbetween.

Back on topic, I have to disagree with certain viewpoints being presented about reviewing the game in the first couple of weeks. Not everybody in the world follows the MMO scene as diligently as we here seem to; nor may they have been following the development of FFXIV closely. For these people, I think it is very worthwhile having a "review" of initial impressions of the game, as long as it is stated in said review that MMOs develop over time and that in 1,2 or 6 months the flaws currently present in the game may not be there.

If I was new to the genre, I would want to know if it was worth shelling out my money for this new Final Fantasy title! And I imagine I would rightly be put off by the current reviews. But as long as I was then informed that changes would be being made, I'd be happy to check back in time. If I didn't have the reviews and just took a snapshot of the game as it currently stands -- without knowing that, as an MMO, it would be getting updates and revisions -- then it would be even worse. In this sense, I think early reviews might actually be a good thing.

[Zane]

At least FF XIV might get the benefit of two reviews. When the PS3 version launches in March, it might get a second review, and it should be (at least I hope) better then.

[CrstyCptSteveWitherspoon]

Aside from the lack of content, which is understandable at release;

Auto sort
Retainer lag
Fix party mechanics (this includes SP bug and some sort of SP boost for partying: chains?)
Retainer search function
Transportation (Airship/chocobo)
Basic XI search for player UI

With these fixes, which I don't see them being very hard, the game at it's base is pretty sweet. There's more to fix of course, but if these issues were cleared up the game wouldn't be hard to play and most people would enjoy themselves.

[Meresgi]

There is no economy because the game is new. They could have just put a fucking AH. Let's be honest who is really gonna check through peoples bazaars to find the item they are going to sell to find the current going rate, unless they add some kind of instant search function in the Market Wards.

It's pretty easy to figure out how much an item is going for on your server. Most people sell the same items within their profession. The only differing items price wise are materials and people price those depending on how hard it was for them to find, look them up on databases to see what they are used in, etc etc. If you have half a brain cell that part of the economy is working fine. Now there does need to be a search function or something to divide up what people are selling. Right now in wards I only look at the booths and then move on, im not going to shift through 200 retainers, SE said they are going to sanction off each floor to specific items though so that will help while we wait for an auction house system. The only reason I want an AH right now is for materials, not even for gear because thats easy enough to find, but finding all the materials to make gear can be a bitch sometimes.

Hint: IF you need armor/blacksmithing stuff, head to Limsa around the guild, same for any other type of item.

The game has already flopped imo, maybe SE set a record of how fast you can lose your fanbase.

I'm not going to white knight the fuck outta this statement but seriously? Name a single MMO that launched in the same state it is currently and never had issues problems and was not rushed out. Like people have said, reviewing any MMO after a week after launch or even a month is stupid. Wait till the first major update patch, see what they fix and then base decisions upon how they addressed blatant problems. Or you can sit there, bitch and cry about how you would have made the pinnacle of entertainment, not rushed the project and included every iota of detail anyone could every imagine within launch.

[person2007]

I'm not going to white knight the fuck outta this statement but seriously? Name a single MMO that launched in the same state it is currently and never had issues problems and was not rushed out. Like people have said, reviewing any MMO after a week after launch or even a month is stupid. Wait till the first major update patch, see what they fix and then base decisions upon how they addressed blatant problems. Or you can sit there, bitch and cry about how you would have made the pinnacle of entertainment, not rushed the project and included every iota of detail anyone could every imagine within launch.

Dont give me that "its new, give them time" They havent even addressed bugs that were found in the Alpha stage, you think that this next big patch will sort things out? Ha. Obviously i dont expect the game to be perfect. I expect it not to have the amount of ridiculous mistakes and decisions that they have put in the game.

[Meresgi]

Dont give me that "its new, give them time" They havent even addressed bugs that were found in the Alpha stage, you think that this next big patch will sort things out? Ha. Obviously i dont expect the game to be perfect. I expect it not to have the amount of ridiculous mistakes and decisions that they have put in the game.

The bugs are there, yet the game is playable. Alpha was about making the game playable, not addressing every issue. There are things that need to be fixed, do they ruin the game completely? No, unless you're that stuck up about it. The crafting system pisses me off right now but at the same time I can see it actually being interesting down the road with each crafter being an actual class unlike most MMOs where it's an addon to your main job. The mini games are annoying, but only due to the lag with menus, which is not game breaking, just annoying.

Market wards are annoying as hell, but a fix is in motion and most people do exactly like I do and only browse people who use a stand, or go to specific guilds and browse bazaars there to find items. I have not personally done any partying with more then 2 people so I can't speak on that front. The only major thing I think that pisses me off is the lack of a reply hotkey like Shift+R or something, because who the fuck doesn't put that into a game nowadays?

[Sign]

Dont give me that "its new, give them time" They havent even addressed bugs that were found in the Alpha stage, you think that this next big patch will sort things out? Ha. Obviously i dont expect the game to be perfect. I expect it not to have the amount of ridiculous mistakes and decisions that they have put in the game.

In any development when it comes time to fix bugs as you enter crunch time you have to prioritize. First up is game-breaking bugs, and by that I mean bugs that crash the game and make it so that people literally cannot play. From there each bug gets rated and dealt with accordingly. If they didn't fix a bug it is most likely that there was an even more pressing issue at hand. SE's mistake is not failing to fix the mistake since Alpha, it is failing to acknowledge the issue and let the community know they are aware of it and will be getting to it in time.

People that think SE did nothing over the Alpha/Beta but sit around with thumbs up there asses are living in their own special dream world, the one that is polar opposite to the white knight everything is ok and SE cannot do any wrong dream world.

Oh, and before you accuse me of whiteknighting I have my own gripes with SE the biggest which I have documented in the tech forum, but I understand code development and know what it is like to have people screaming at you to fix bugs they see while you are trying to squash even larger bugs that they don't see.

[Gokulo]

True, you prioritize. And that sucks, because S-E has their priorities all screwed up

[Cayos]

The only major thing I think that pisses me off is the lack of a reply hotkey like Shift+R or something, because who the fuck doesn't put that into a game nowadays?

There is a ctrl + r, but you have to have sent the person a tell. Open up the chat box first and give it a try.