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Final Fantasy XIV Review: The Official Review - Edit
5.1
| Pros |
 Fun Class System Great Soundtrack Great Visuals |
| Cons |
 Awkward Combat Clunky Interface Feels Incomplete Poor Quests Uninteresting Plot |
Odds are that if you’re a gamer, you’ve heard of the epic Final Fantasy franchise. Final Fantasy XIV (FFXIV) is the latest chapter in the series to be made as a massively multiplayer online (MMO) title, following in the footsteps of Final Fantasy XI. Unfortunately, Final Fantasy XIV doesn’t offer much for either the hardcore fans of the Final Fantasy world, or MMO gamers looking for a quality title.
Before we take a look at Final Fantasy XIV, I want to preface this article with a disclosure. Here at MMORPG.com, we are aware that games are always patching and game updates are pending pretty much forever. However, until those changes are live on the servers, we cannot anticipate how they will affect the gameplay or community, and therefore those rumors and announcements do not affect the score card detailed below. We feel we’ve waited more than long enough to give FFXIV a fair shake. Check back with us later this year for an update after those changes are live.
Aesthetics: 7/10
One thing that the Final Fantasy XIV team got right is the graphics and soundtrack for the title. This game really is stunning, and the cinema openers for each of the starter lands are worthy of the Final Fantasy name. Those early moments feel a lot like a single player role-playing game, rather than an MMO version of the world. The voice acting is complimentary, and the movies really provoke a sense of curiosity about the underlining plot within the FFXIV world. The soundtrack is hauntingly beautiful at times, compelling and others, and generally pleasant whether you’re shopping in town or fighting some of the odd and but frequently recycled monsters outside the city walls.
Unfortunately, that’s about as far as the Final Fantasy XIV got as far as developing a visually impressive video game. The user interface (UI) is horrible, with far too many unnecessary steps for doing basic things, and very little in way of a visual tutorial. The UI alone marks this category down from 8 to 7 in my eyes; though there is hope later updates to the game will improve its clumsiness considerably.
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Gameplay: 5/10
The biggest problem with Final Fantasy XIV is really that it feels like an incomplete video game, as if the final release should actually be a closed beta stage of production. Even the steps for making a new account are needlessly cumbersome and frustrating; not exactly the best foot forward, as far as impressing new players. Character creation is a bit more enjoyable, which just enough races available to provide a good variety, and even some Astrology and lore thrown into the mix. Your class is literally which weapon or tool you have equipped, so the character creation process is pretty streamlined since you don’t need to decide your permanent profession out the gate. That being said, you do have to buy those bonus weapons—or find them—so try to pick a class which interests you for a few levels worth of play.
The opening cinemas for the three starting lands are impressive, I won’t deny that. Unfortunately, the moment the theatrics are over, the player is left wondering, “What now?” The tutorial is torturous and even ineffective, with many basic elements of the game left out of the explanation process. In fact, the quest which begins during this tutorial phase is a great example of what awaits players: Monotonous running around, lukewarm cut scenes, and the bare minimum of information imaginable. It quickly becomes apparent that what looked like a storyline-rich game is actually weak plots that are uninteresting and poorly woven together through dialog and quest content; I felt completely uninformed—and worse, disinterested—in the world around me.
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Truth be told, I really can’t say enough about how unpolished and unrefined the gameplay in Final Fantasy XIV is. The interface is horribly clunky, and needlessly complex; why do I have to click to open a menu list just to access my inventory, or equip a new weapon? You can create macros, but the key layout is terrible. Having to click an enemy—then click a spell or effect—and then click the enemy again to attack is ridiculous. I have no idea what the game designers were thinking. Rumor has it that auto attack, and a serious overhaul of the combat system, is coming in the upcoming patch. I truly hope this proves accurate, because no matter how pretty the Final Fantasy XIV world is, the controls and cumbersome combat makes it a nightmare to play.
The final nail in the coffin might be the horrid quest system. You gather up some quests at the local inn, then head out into the wilderness to find one of the hovering “aetheryte” crystals, which you must interact with to officially begin one of your quests. The only perk is that once you’ve killed your five nutbiter marmots, a little cloud of smoke will let you redeem your completed quest for your rewards on the spot, and then teleport you back to the aetheryte crystal if you desire. That’s as far as the perks go, and after that it’s a waiting game until you can access more quests or redo the ones you’ve already completed; there is literally a real-life countdown timer for the bulk of these. If this sounds frustrating and tedious to you, you’re spot-on; it’s absolutely unbearable at times, and totally unnecessary.
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Innovation: 5/10
Considering how many problems Final Fantasy XIV has, I can’t really say this is an innovative title, at least not in the good sort of way. The graphics and soundtrack are the best element of this video game, but neither of the two is so revolutionary that it merits a high score in this section. I have high hopes that the team behind Final Fantasy XIV will come up with some great features to make this game stand-out in a sea of (better) MMO options, since this game is still fairly new, but in the meantime FFXIV simply isn’t strong enough to lure players away from more successful titles.
One aspect of FFXIV that is a refreshing change from the norm is the class system. Instead of being limited to just one class, you can freely switch between class options with a (ridiculously complicated) swap of your weapons. You even retain some of the abilities from some of the other classes you have leveled, above and beyond a true “dual class” system. Now, if only leveling-up was more than frustrating quests or mindless grinding.
In truth, a lot of the cutting-edge cinema effects are misleading, giving players false hopes about the quality of gameplay that lies ahead. I’m going with a straight 5 here, because although this title certainly isn’t among the best as far as being innovative, it also isn’t among the worst.
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Polish: 4/10
As I mentioned above, Final Fantasy XIV feels like an incomplete game, or one still in beta testing. There are too many glitches, too many problems with the interface and mechanics that should have never left the beta phase without being addressed. FFXIV will celebrate its one year anniversary at the end of September, which means these glaring problems have been endured by the player-base for far too long.
Currently, there is no monthly subscription fee for Final Fantasy XIV. When (and if) that policy changes, players will likely be forced to purchase the base game and pay a monthly fee per character instead of a flat rate. The ironic thing is that there is currently no reason to have multiple characters, considering every toon can access every class option. Unless you just want to test out the alternative races, you can simply do everything on one main character. If you want to roll an alternate toon to level with friends, you normally would have to pay an additional $3 USD per month for that character slot. Perhaps if the game was of higher quality, this system wouldn’t sound as ridiculous to me as it does. However, I was annoyed with Square Enix after going through their ridiculously tedious account creation process, so the cryptic membership policy—do I get a free character slot, more than one, or none at all?—had me further irritated.
The visual engine is really the only thing with polish here, and that certainly doesn’t extend to the user interface, as outlined above.
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Longevity: 5/10
If you are a die-hard fan of the Final Fantasy series, you might stick with this one, at least for a little while. That being said, I cannot truly recommend this title to anyone who wants a quality MMO with plenty of long-term appeal. The developers need to do some serious work to get this one up to par with the other major contenders currently available, and even then I’m afraid it won’t stand-out enough from the pack to be a top MMO.
The only perk is that you currently aren’t required to pay a subscription fee, as I mentioned above, though you still have to buy the PC version of the game for $15-30 USD depending on your chosen vendor. This arrangement is subject to change at any time, of course, so make sure you cancel your account just in case the fees kick-in after you’ve abandoned this one.
I really, truly wanted to enjoy Final Fantasy XIV above and beyond what I had expected. When the clerk at the video game store tries to convince you not to purchase a title, because the company “practically apologized for ever releasing it,” it doesn’t bode well. Unless some serious improvements, updates and finishing touches which were neglected prior to the original release are implemented, Final Fantasy XIV is likely to fade into oblivion—and quickly.
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Social: 5/10
As you may have come to expect by now, the social element of Final Fantasy XIV—wait for it—feels incomplete. The chat system is weak, and the guild system is just as disappointing, which means communication in the game is poor at best. Characters display a guild emblem in front of their names, but that is about as far as it goes for the in-game guilds creating a sense of unity and companionship. Even adding someone to your friends list is a chore, just like so much else of this video game.
Value: 5/10
On the bright side, you currently only have to pay for the base game to delve into the visually appealing, beautifully scored world of Final Fantasy XIV. However, that’s about as good as it gets, and I can’t imagine many players trying this one and feeling much of anything beyond frustrated and unsatisfied. The opening scenes are misleading, and very quickly all of the excitement of character creation and the opening movies leave players wandering around searching for vendors, navigating with little help from the horrible map, and trying to complete quests that have little guidance available.
In the end, I want my $14.99 back.
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In Conclusion
Two words: Look elsewhere. While this might sound harsh, and I’ll go ahead and apologize to those of you who actually enjoy this MMO title and are reading simply to agree or disagree with my sentiments, I simply will not recommend this title to anyone. If you love the series, I expect you to be disappointed; if you love fun, even addictive MMO video games, I can’t imagine you being anything but disappointed. The elements of Final Fantasy XIV which are high quality and worth the purchase cost are buried underneath all of these totally unnecessary problems, and the poor design decisions.
If you’ve ever seen the classic film "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" then you’re familiar with the blank slate of the humanoids which emerge from the pods, only to gradually shape and mold into a duplicate of a human being. That’s what Final Fantasy XIV feels like—an undeveloped pod person, and the probability is that it will eventually become little more than a shallow duplicate of a real game.
Firstnerd here. o/
So you're saying, if I get a chance to miss it, miss it? I've been watching this one closely to see if the new team has made any outstanding improvements, looks like its going to take more work. Thanks for the review.
Beta'ed and before i got in, i thought "man this is going be better than FFXI", when infact, it's way worse. Played FFXI for roughly half a year and man o man was it tedious... but FFXIV sets a new bar for the word TEDIOUS!
Its true sadly , and the game was quite overpriced when it did go live. The interface is just horrid
Played the game at launch, despite the fact that the environments looked pretty darn good, it didn't change the fact that it also seemed to repeat over and over again in the awful maze like newbie zone for the forest starting area. Or that I was fighting mushrooms of various levels that looked exactly the same. Or that they somehow made kill 10 X quests more boring than WoW versions. At least WoW had the common decency to give you some story pretending you did something. This game was like, welp here yer 1k money, come back tommorow to do it all over again. To be honest I think a 5/10 is generous, for the reasons I gave added onto what you already said.
While the review completely reflects my own experience with the title, it couldn't have come at a worse time. Next week will see the release of the 1.18 patch, with massive changes to several core systems of the game. I don't really expect the game to be "good" after that, but at least "significantly better than now".
It's a bit of a waste of the reviewers time to write a review that's only valid for a week.
Wow. I'm just surprised this game is almost a year old and yet this review would have remained mostly the same, if it was written within a month of the game's release. I mean, people may hate on a company like Trion but you have to give them credit for fixing a ton of issues and adding tangible content in the 4 months their game has been out.
I don't think the reviewer went into this game with an open mind. I've played since release, and the game has changed, dramatically changed, since it's release. The UI is WAY smoother, combat and growth is much better, new content/fixes are being implemented continously, and hell, there is another patch in 5-6 days. I am a final fantasy fan, I've played through all of them, this one is defintiely the worst, but I don't think the reviewer was fair.
^^^^^^^^^^^^
iv played every final fantasy to date and completed the majority and the one thing i can say is that since final fantasy x-2 the games have just turned into test subjects and have gotten worse and worse, especially the mmorpgs (XI, XIV) which have the loss of feeling of a final fantasy franchise, where the story line was entrapping and left you wanting the next game, as soon as XI and XII turned up i sighed, as that was the start of the downfall of final fantasy, and as an original final fantasy player i prayed for a final fantasy mmorpg, but the result was terrible and expensive.
I found out that personally, play this game with a mouse and keyboard is impossible for me. Instead, I decided to try playing with a PS3-style controller. Using that and the in-game macro system, I'm actually rather enjoying this game. I know it's bad, but it seems much more bearable if you use a controller in my opinion.
I was amazed that they could make a game worse then FF13.
the main issue i had with ff14 was the lag.like the servers were in asia when they know full well the ocean pipe is limited to 5 mb/s
the control were smooth when there was no lag
if you loved the conplexity of everquest you ll feel right at home here,but like i say lag was the killer for me it wasnt smooth when the server was empty(people working)and was way worst when people where playing.
this is a game made for asia it isnt made for english market at all.
Agreed, I saw this review and had to keep checking the date, because it didn't make any since to do a review when they are completely changing the game in a week.
Anyways, I am still holding out hope that this game survives and does well. They did so many things I like and would love to see developers start paying attention to that I want it to work out for them.
We'll see next week if they are headed in the right direction.
Made for asia? Could you explain further?
I didn't know someones ethnicity affects how they play a game.
No mention of the horrible game engine and server coding that makes updates and fixes they do just as tedious as everything you mentioned? The game is poorly built from the ground up but we all saw that in beta. The irony is, the new team is probably just as annoyed trying to fix this mess as we are trying to play it.
I find this review rather pointless. Yes the game sucks right now, The game has sucked for almost a year but they're working on it and they have a huge amount of game changing patches planned this summer so I really don't get why you'd need to release this review now and give it another kick in the crotch. If you waited this long with writing a review you could have waited a few weeks more.
Did they ever add more quests or leves to do? or just more mobs in general to grind on? looking everywhere for a marmot got old quickly.
i might be wrong here but asian like it when say the get an achievement it actually feel like an acheivement,that it is so long and so hard that if you see 10 player get it it will be a miracle.in wow an achievement on average everybody gets them lol!
see the diff.
I'd like to correct this because it isn't true. The game was built for the Japanese. Much of the asian market prefers Aion/Lineage 2 style pvp fests. Of course most Japanese bashed the game just as much as the rest of the world.
The review is pretty much spot on. The upcoming patch isn't a Jesus patch. They're adding auto-attack, renaming the disciplines, and adding two instances. You can't patch in fun, and that is something the game is lacking. While it's a step in the right direction, this review will still be true.
It is somewhat odd to see a review this late. Why bother?
Even if they do somehow manage to get SOMETHINGS right. I still cannot see people coming back to this instead of going over to the new titles comming.
I tried FF14 .
The reviewer was over kind with the score. No auction house should bring it down another point 4.1 .. now add in a horrible crafting system and down another point. 3.1 . The original reviewer only touched on the Limited Quest amounts per REAL day you can complete..
That is RIGHT .. You only get to do a LIMITED amount of quests and your CUT OFF from doing any more for REAL LIFE TIME .. and it is not a few hours but Days. Down another Point. 2.1 ..
There that is a more realisitic score.
I did read notes on the new upcoming Patch and as always more is done then the notes say. saddly MAJOR problems that keep players away are NOT being Fixed with this patch .. only a few of the annoyances of the past YEAR are supposedly addressed ... YES I say supposedly because HOW THEY FIX these is yet to be seen .. hell with this company IT COULD BE WORSE and in their own minds they have fixed it.
Where was the Internal Testing all those years this game was in the making ? HOW on earth did the testers NOT have problems with testing this game, as did the MILLIONS of players at release >?
I rate this game a 2.1 based on my own findings in the game and concure with all the OP has to say about this title ...
To the 100 FF fanboys and gals More power to you .. You got more patience then I ever will if your happy in this game.
The best time for me in this game was when I was Logging out .. I would always Feel a Great flood of peace once again as the game was closing down .. and I noticed how stressed I was while trying to navigate inside that game, looking for the Niche I could find enjoyable ... Maybe it was Fishing, but then, MAYBE NOT ..
I have a hard time giving credibility to a review of a game where the developers believe they've screwed up so much that they've made it entirely FREE while the build up the game to a point where they believe to be "acceptable", after which they'd bring back the P2P model. It's like a BETA, so reviewing a BETA is a bit....eh.
Although in all honesty, if I were to review the current state of FFXIV, I'd score the game around 5 or 6 on 10 too. But I'd definitively have put more emphasis on the current state of FFXIV, being like a free Beta while developers figure out what works and doesn't work (Massive patch coming next week for exemple).
SE launched the game, sold the CE and standard edition, and had there not been a complete shitstorm, would have had no problems charging a monthly fee for it. SE did what they had to do to save a game that would have otherwise completely failed if they started charging a sub fee.
They officially had closed alpha testing, multiple closed beta phases, and an open beta. The game is not in beta anymore.
People keep trying to defend this game with upcoming patches, but I've also been keeping track of this game and none of those patches, not even auto-attack, will make this game more interesting. Auto-attack will be helpful, sure, but the game still revolves around taking like 5 minutes to kill a single monster before moving on to the next one. All of those upcoming patches some of you seem to think will save this game are bandaids for a corpse.
The reviewer was overly generous with the score. It's like he was afraid to give this game less than a 5 in any category, and they shouldn't have been. Square needs to trash updates on this title and focus all their efforts on the new one. Trying to save this is a waste of time, and unlikely unless it's built from the ground up, but the kind of effort and resources that will take is better spent on a title that doesn't carry the stigma this one does. Utter waste of time, in everyone's hands.
Imo:
Anyone still playing this is simply an FF fan. You're not in it for the gameplay, because that's where the game simply fails.
Nope, it's all about riding the chocobo's.
I have to agree, and will go even further to state that the alpha version wasn't that different either.
If I had to review the game during the last alpha stage, then the pros and cons would have been the same except for maybe the plot (probably because it was still mostly a mystery).
I made the mistake of buying the CE when the game launched, the interface annoyed me so much on launch day I quit it was that bad :(
The graphics were nice but that was about it.
Would I re-sub or buy another FF MMO, not a chance.
I totally agree with you on the first part, FF XIV is shit and the patches and updates aren't really bringing very much to the game to really improve it. The game is and probably always will be plagued with things like repetitive bland content that is on timers (really! how stupid is that?), slow and clunky combat that feels like it is turned based, a big open world on rails with invisible walls, menu mania and frankly, the continued development seems to be very slow. I had to laugh at Massively.com everytime they post about FF XIV updates as "news"...as if every batch of little changes to the game is news worthy. Recently they posted "news" about a whole dungeon being added to the game, big whoopdee...one whole dungeon that is rather uninteresting as far as dungeons (or content) go and it itself is on a timer.
I disagree with you on the second part though, I think the Poor review is fair.
I think that Bill didn't actually play very far into the game as if he had waited just a few days more till 1.18 patch he would have seen that the game is on an upwards curve with SE making fixes, improvements, and adding new content. The review is sort of superficial and comes from the WoW fan type of mmo player, who likely would hate FF XI too. So where does that leave XIV, well the team are fixing, adding more, and imrpving...but the game will also launch on PS3. As a result the negative reviews and somewhat rocky launch on PC may yet even out into SE's eventual aim for the game which is a worthy sucessor to FF XI. Worth also mentioning that FF XIV sold over 500K copies at launch inspite of all the issues. Like a phoenix from the flames I think PS3 launch could see the FF MMORPG in a finally finished form.
I've ordered CE just recently, it was priced at 9€. Shipping/handling costs were higher than the game itself, pretty sad (for the game), but thumbs up from me. Price (for CE content) wasn't the only factor that encouraged me to buy FFXIV, they are finally fixing one major turn off (for me) that game mechanics had: in patch 1.18 they are finally revamping item repair system! Now you don't need a million of different materials to fix your stuff, but only one, easily obtained item. Hopefully someday they will replace the hideous console -oriented UI too. This new patch will bring a lot of "improvements", fatigue system will be abandoned as well. Too bad that game's review couldn't wait til July 22.
Cheers.
I gotta back up the site here.
They waited months, how many? To even put out a review.
Waiting for a patch that will "Fix everything!" months and months after release is being disingenious. They should have reviewed this mess before anyone got tricked into buying it.
Waiting this long, hundreds of people may have wasted money on an incomplete game.
And this things problems go well beyond a bad ui and bad social features, the combnat is totaly broken, the quest and leveling systems are ill explained, and upon explination, that you have to go outside the game to find, are still terrible.
Everything about this game but the visuals would need to be changed to make it playable, let alone good, and the updates as i have read them do not change every aspect of the game.
i dont want to hate on this game but if square doesnt want to go bankrupt their going to have to accept their failure and drop this game. their are too many power house MMOs comming out soon that even if they get the game upto snuff no ones going to pick it over mmorgps like guild wars 2 and swtor, and if they take longer then that to get the game in shape i doubt their is any hope.
Um, before I left, you couldn't ride chocobos... and I'm sure that was never put in yet. so no it's not all about riding the chocobos.
A shame the review came before the miracle patch, coming in a few days. Like the others miracle patches they release since...release. Soon it'll be a even better game, almost ready for release!
Adding genre staples like auto-attack and dungeons hardly indicates the game is on an upward curve. Further, renaming the classes to be more consistent with the established brand hardly indicates the developers have had a revelation. The essential problem, which the review hints at several times, is that the game lacks many of the defining features consistent with this genre of game. The inclusion of dungeons as a means of offering additional content is quite common place; however, this is the first set of dungeons being included into the game. Meaning, it's the implementation of an entirely new content deliery system within Final Fantasy 14.
Try to understand, that when the inclusion of basic features and the inclusion of established genre staples is slated for the next few patches, that the game isn't heading towards being exceptional any time soon. It's heading towards mediocrity, which would be a dramatic improvement over what it is now.
i wanted to love it..i loved the visuals, didnt mind the quest/day limit or anything else.. even planned to get a new graphics card just for this one to run on higher settings.... but the rest..the lags, the way-too-slow system of changing even the smallest stuff in your inventory or social tab...
i was in beta and decided not to buy the pc version but wait for the ps3 version which was scheduled for march...and been delayed since (or cancelled?). i will not buy this game but when they give a trial i will look into it and see if it has changed enough to be...bearable so i can enjoy the good aspects. but the fact that after nearly a year they still dont offer a trial nowadays speaks for itself i think...
Review is fair but poorly timed.
Either come up with a review a month (no later) then release. If you've waited 10 months to review a game, you should at least try to keep up with the updates. Patch 1.18 is due to release on July 21, 2011 in the U.S. (July 22, 2011 in Japan).
The developer, Yoshi-P has said that they can't make fundamental "content" changes in the game until they produce a good foundation. The foundation is the new combat system. The combat system is due to be released in 4 days. Additionally, content by way of Grand Companies (ala City State campaigns in FFXI) are also being released.
Again, I agree with the review RIGHT NOW, but I would have waited 4 days to say something. This team is working its ass of to make changes. Yes, it's slower then other games, but other games don't have to change and develop core mechanics.
MMORPG, really poor form on this review. It's a slap in the face to the hard work the developers are going through right now. For those of us who read their updates and great communication on the official forums, really feel that SE has turned the Corner. Yoshi-P is the antithesis of Tanaka. I hated the way Tanaka did things. Unlike Tanaka, Yoshi-P has played Dark AGe of Camelot for years and also Everquest. He's also played World of Warcraft and plan on Playing Rift.
As for why I recently came back to FFXIV, after being gone for 6 months.... COMMUNITY and HOPE. The community is excellent. Very similar to FFXI. And because I've seen the progression of how the game has changed and how it will change, i'm going to stay for another 3-4 months before I decide if it's time to jump ship.
However, this review is really really poorly timed and in bad form. Would it have killed you to wait 4 days? And for those that say, "by your logic, MMORPG should be waiting for the miracle patch, and that patch is never coming." SE has said that 1.18 is the start of the new system. If MMORPG could wait 9 months before a review, they could have waited 4 days to see what the BIGGEST PATCH in FFXIV'S history has to offer.
You are a real trooper to subject yourself to doing the review for this. I salute you.
I really agree with the review.
Biggest letdown in my MMO history.
I will never play another FF game again
The look of the game is charming. The user interface is an abomination, for which the developers responsible should be banned from game development for life under penalty of death....or playing their own game...whichever is worse.
Quote for truth. It seems like it would be a cool job doesn't it? Playing games for a living and reviewing them.
But there must be times when you want to pretend you are opening your office window to get fresh air, but what you really want to do is jump out the window and end the suffering.
Nothing is going to change next week!
Even if the combat finally gets less cumbersome and maybe even a tad more enjoyable. The game still has no content! You still end up doing the same boring repetitive crap you've been doing the past year!
They only going to add a single new dungeon! Wow! How long you think people will be burned out on that?
It's really sad, but with all the competition out there and with titles as The Secret World, SW:TOR, Guild Wars 2, etc on the near horizon... I just don't see how they can recover from this.
As the true FF fans just stick with FFXI and avoid FFXIV like the plague.
I am sure the new dev team works really hard... it just goes way too slow! Way way too slow!
The game is seriously lacking content and the amount of content that need to be added still... at the current speed they are releasing stuff... it's going to take at least another full year till the game comes to a point of being actually release worthy!
Sorry... but by then everyone will have forgotten this title and moved on. Ones patience has a limit and only runs so far till you come to a point and just give up.
Pretty lacking review. Lori really put in a good couple hours of gameplay to write this.
She makes no mention of the:
This game was such a dissapointment for me. I was so excited...then I played the beta...and yeah...
Still keeping an eye on it though since I really WANT it to be good. Once it gets good enough (dunno when that will be or how I would even judge it) I'll give it a serious shot. If nothing else, the game is insanely pretty and it's the only MMO that I actually left the in-game music on while playing.
I agree, its shocking but in some ways unexpected. I had so much hope for FF14 and it's sad that the game didn't go anywhere. I find most F2P games more fun and more deep than FF14. Square-Enix really lost a lot of respect from me thanks to this title.
Ya it is a tad fishy that they decide to review it now before a patch and the fact that the game itself is still free. Had they started charging for a monthly subscription this month I would understand the need to review it but this seems more like a way to discourage others from playing more then anything.
If this reviewer wishes to give a fair review they should get their but in gear and play the game again after the patch. Note the differences from what they've said and keep their trap shut til they actually start charging. You can't compare XIV to Rift or WoW yet until they decide to charge or even mention a form of revenue for the game itself.
Honestly a review like this is something that should've been done the first month as the official review, not 10 months later a week before the patch. That just echoes out sabotage. Granted to be frank i've never trusted a single word from this site I only go to see if there any any interesting MMOs being mentioned and for the most part I find that they've leave a lot of games out of the loop. Just because your site is names after the genre you are focusing on doesn't mean you're any good at it.
I just hope people are actually smart enough to try the game for themselves heck, at Gamestop you can get the game for 14.99 and free monthly play as of now. So if you are curious to try it out after this patch would it really hurt to invest 15 dollars into trying our of curiosities sake.
It takes a lot to admit that you made a mistake but it shows no class if you willingly attempt to sabotage a game by reviewing it without giving it a fair rap. Even if you do say oh you gave it 10 months a true "official" review would be when they start charging.
While this is my first post this is also my last one. The only reason I even signed up for an account was for a chance to try free betas, other then that this site have nothing to offer other then the occasional interesting forum topic of new MMOs in the works, and that's about it.
So in all I say that if you are a true MMO player you shoudln't be getting your opinions from others. An MMO is a different experience to each person to even compare your experience to another just isn't logical. You are better off attempting to take the plunge yourself and seeing if you like it. As it stands now XIV has the perfect oportunity if you are willing to risk 15 dollars to see what it has to offer. That's just me though as a person who did get the game when it came out I am eager to see how this patch pans out. I'm also eager to see the progress made once the game goes monthly-pay. The true longevity of this game will only be determined when they start charging so ya, just don't let reviews on MMOs determine what you should and shouldn't play. An MMO's worth can only be determined based on personal experience not someone elses's opinion since an MMO is about how you wish to progress through it.
Hm, I wasn't going to make another post but your gameplay opinion is slightly flawed. While sure the majority WAS Leves at first they have added a lot more for players to do then just leves for the most part. You failed to mention that they have added quest outside of leves that you can perform freely and without limit. They have also added special "objective" quest for gatherers/crafters in which they are given an objective at their guild and are rewarded with gil or shards of crystals.
If you simply looked on the main site you would have also seen mentioned of the so called rumor of auto-attack.
http://lodestone.finalfantasyxiv.com/pl/topics/detail?id=f190cdb1385c767ed137148ace50c372373a87e4
This was posted on June 30th, 18 days before you posted this review. If your review is to be taken seriously how can you claim auto-batlle to be a rumor when the mention of it was more then half a month ago? You really lose your credibility when you can't even be bothered to view the main website to see how they are changing things then actually make note of the progress they are making. Just saying, research goes a long way, if you want to be taken seriously you shouldn't be giving an "opinionated" review on a game. A review is suppose to be analytical, analyzing the aspects and how certain gamers think of it. Not oh this game is doing this wrong and I don't approve.
I'm just throwing this out there, you might wanna reconsider keeping this article published and actually pull it off the main page and actually write in a more analytical manner rather then pure opinion.
As Mythbusters proved, you can polish a poo to a glass like shine... it is still a poo.
Oh please! Next week's patch is not the miracle patch people have been waiting for!
Finally fixing the combat mechanics after almost a year of horror isn't going to change a single thing!
As the game is still lacking content! So after next week you still end up doing the exact same "utterly boring and repetitive" stuff as you've been doing the past year.
I honestly welcome all the negative criticism.
If I paid attention to other people's opinions about a game, i'd be hopping from mmo to mmo, like a mouse in a hamster wheel. People who play FFXIV right now don't care about these reviews. However, people on the fence will be persuaded to not invest in the game that could turnout to be something they enjoy.
You can probably buy this game for ~$15 and it has no monthly subscription fee. For those of you on the fence, just try it out after 1.18 (July 21, 2011).
One of the reasons I continue to play is because I enjoy the journey not the destination. I love seeing how FFXIV is developing and would love nothing else than to see a success story in the end. PS3 is make it or break for FFXIV, Yoshi-P said so himself.
For those of us that stayed, it will be a sense of satisfaction that our loyalty paid off. And if it "sucks," then we didn't have to pay for anything. For those that talk about, "loss of time" as the worst loss of all, that argument can be said for any mmo, good or bad. There's a millions of things you can do with your time that is infinetely better than playing an MMO especially one that requires multiple hours a day.
I have a family and a career, I play an hour or two (at most) a night. It's good winding down time for me and I'm not in any hurry to get anywhere. As soon as FFXIV becomes more a headache than a form of entertainment, I'll just leave, regardless of where the current development cycle for the game happens to be.
Second guessing why anyone would play this "horrible, abomination of a game" is like attacking someone who enjoys underwater basket weaving. Entertainment is subjective. People need to get off their high horse. :)
this review is unjust on the game, I agree with the review but this is a review for a game that square knew was bad, and are currently working with a brand new team to bring the game up to par. So as of now you are reviewing a game that isnt finished and it takes a hit for that. So I cant see were this review is needed or acurate at all because the game is still what i say....In Alpha.
While some of the complaints (and I reiterate, some. Some others look more like mad rants with little or no reflection in the actual game) are valid, reviewing the game just a week before the first of a series of radical overhauls is downright unprofessional and simply plainly silly.
Not innovative? LOL. Seriously? The class system is the very basic of a MMORPG, and by itself the class syestem in FFXIV is one of the nicest innovations in the MMORPG market in years.
It almost seems like the reviewer hates the game so much that he's trying to intentionally negatively impact the hype of the upcoming changes with an unfairly negative review.
Sorry, but this poor excuse for an article is one of the reason why internet blogging has often nothing to do with actual journalism. If the game deserves a "5.1", this reviewer deserves a 2, for the effort.
you, sir, are misinformed, and being misinformative. Just like the reviewer-
Next week's patch does not just entail the addition of autoattack. It introduces two new dungeons, the grand companies (which include a whole new mission system), an overhaul to guildleves, new quests, the removal of the fatigue system and quite a lot more. It may not completely reform the game by itself, but between what's coming with it and the following couple patches to be released before the end of summer, there's enough to bring the game easily on par with some of the best out there, content oncluded.
If you want to spread some gratuitous hate, at least do some fact checking first.
Hmm, I've seen people complain that MMORPG has waited too long to review this game, now you say they are reviewing it too early. Although they don't charge a sub fee, do they still charge people to buy the game? If so, it's released and you can't call it an alpha.
Should they have waited a few weeks for the next "miracle" patch? Maybe, but go ask the STO people how well that is working out for them when they complained about their recent re-review before a new patch that in the end didn't live up to most people's expectations.
Likely the same will prove true in this case as well. Sure, the game will get some degree better, but the site can't wait forever to review a released game.
You and some other posters may fool people who don't play it, but you can not fool the actual players. I've been playing since headstart and will continue to do so. This tidbit of "continuously adding content" (from another poster, not you) and bothering to mention those "sidequest" (you) is garbage.
There is no real content in the game besides leves, period. Those sidequests offer no xp or sp from doing them; they offer no gil rewards; their items rewards are absolutely pitiful; they're useless outside of just reading some lore. You also don't mention that most of them are either fedex quests or play out exactly like leves.
I do not know of those quests for gatherers/crafters, but I have heard nothing of them from any crafter I know.
The only other content in the game is NMs, the same NMs who were killed and put on farm status mere hours after they came out. The NMs were bogus additions, as the vast majority would simple qualify as "elite" mobs in other themepark MMOs. I mean hell, most respawn in 5 minutes.
What other content is there to do? Oh right, nothing outside of leves and 1 story quest every 5 to 10 main job levels. Oh and 1 simple job quest at 20 and 30. Yay.
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To the rest talking of the "overhaul" in 1.18... While they are good changes for the game and anyone playing it should be excited for them (because they really are good changes), they are NOT a miracle patch. Auto attack isn't going to change the combat very much outside of no longer having to spam 1 for your TP builders and not having to worry about the incredibly-poorly thought out Stamina bar.
The instances are the most welcome change from my perspective, as it finally promises some real content outside of grinding leves. However, that has the potential of being a flop much like the massive disappointment from many when the sidequests were released.
However, I really don't think the changes in 1.18 would have any real change on this article, as they really don't change the game that much. Most of the heavier changes are planned for 1.19 and beyond, and for those it's better for a "wait and see" rather than overhyping the daylights of them as some form of "miracle patches" (talk to Mortal Online fans about those 'miracle patches').
The author of this review is a complete moron, he couldnt wait until fri to wait for 1.18? Also he failed to mention sidequests, SP fixes, and other misc. changes. This review holds NO weight mainly because we have seen an official vid of auto attack but its still a rumour, anyone with half a brain knows that because of that it is not a rumour. Also what about mentioning the changes that have been officially announced in 1.18 before bashing it.
The reviewer obviously played for 30 mins and called it rather than playing for a decent amount of time. This review is worth nothing because of the idiotic time to review it and them throwing aroun the word rumour.
To quote DarkRain and build upon Kyleran's statements. The releasing of the game to the public was unjust. So many things that are in this game are unjust. A whole brand new team building this game back up to par is going to take atleast another year to bring it back to where it should be, even longer. What do we have releasing in the next year? Just about every single MMO everyone's been waiting for whether that be SW:TOR, TERA, GW2, or Archeage.
Actually logged in for the first time in ages (first time this year?) Just to comment on this. I am a FFXIV player, have been since beta and the game has suffered greatly all year long from SE wtf decision making. (Yes let's redesign the entire class and combat system, because that's ONLY going to take the whole year to do!! WTF?)
HOWEVER considering this game has been effectively taken back to beta in all but name since before the very first month came out and all the initial horrible reviews had just come out, you would think the author of this article would have taken this into consideration. And perhaps maybe held off for a few more months or perhaps until the PS3 release for a 'final' review. How do you finally review a game that is still in limbo? In MMO purgatory?
Since when is development NOTES a frigging RUMOR??? You think the Lodestone is where devs post their RUMORS do you? Does this writer take 10 minutes to research anything about what they wrote?
Anyway, to end yes these scores are completely fair, it's too bad people at MMORPG do not take development cycles into account and view the game's progress as a rumor. My opinion of this site has been rather POOR for a while, but now it's non existant.
Sorry you don't get to play the alpha/beta card because they are not charging a sub fee atm, and the reason for that is they released this game and sold it to millions of dissapointed players. People paid real world cash for this. It is a disgrace that companies are willing to release such poor products.
I also think that this review should have happened a very long time ago. I feel the site has lost credibility by waiting this long to post a review.
I actually agree with this because THEN this review would actually be relevant. Now it's just a bad joke.
They lost credability for being too impatiant to wait 4 days for the first huge patch
You forgot to say "until 1.18", because yes, the rewards of sidequests are being overhauled, and SP rewards will be introduced. Some fact checking would be in order.
Besides, saying that they play "exactly like leves" shows a degree ignorance that's quite baffling from someone that claims to be playing the game (thing that I honesly doubt).
Betweem the two dungeons, new quests, the overhaul of levequests, and the mission system bound to the grand companies, anyone that actually plays the game and follows it knows that 1.18 will add quite a lot.
Probably not, but not because of the reason you think, but mostly because it's quite evident that the reviewer went into writing with a quite sizable bias against the game.
It's simply absolutely silly to review a game just before a sizable patch. The fact that other patches (even in othr games) disappointed is no reason to downplay the very solid possibility that this one will improve FInal Fantasy XIV by a lot. Anyone that knows what the patch actually entails (and not just a few snippets, like you and the other misinformed guy above you), knows that it's a very sizable patch. I don't normally talk about "miracle patch" (because it's a stupid definition), but reviewing the game just before it's release is simply unprofessional.
A lot of changes are scheduled between here and September, and since MMORPG.com waited this much to post a review, posting it *right now* is quite fishy.
The next patch puts in a lot of content. The game is being played as well. The fact that SE haven't closed this one down should tell you that they are on the upward path now....sadly though Bill decided to review the game before a major patch.
SE has repeatedly oppologized for the state of the game. It was bad form for them to release the game in the state they did. The company has paid for their mistake and paid dearly.
Since that mistake, they have completely changed development teams and instilled a new director. The game has remained free to play for the past 10 months. The created an official forums and actively listen to the forum participants. They've opened up the line of communication and provide updates/developer letters every 2-4 weeks.
Yes, I spent $80 for this game. Everything that SE has done since it's release has been a step up. I'm not going to perpetually doom a company for infinity based on a decision that the current developer and team had NOTHING to do with.
I will support them (moral support, since the game is currently free) because I believe their current level of communication is genuine. I will leave when I realize that SE no longer backs this game and has given up on it. I don't believe that to be the case because their pouring money into it without getting anything back.
A game focused on salvaging its credibilty with an honest effort is something I enjoy supporting.
Its fine to review it pre patch. It was long overdue although everyone knew it would get destroyed in this review as it has every other. There is no salvaging the game at this point and they would have been better served to shut it down and dealt with the bad press. There is no miracle patch. THe game has such a horrid reputation that it will never recover. To give credit where it is due though, at least they havent charged for it to this point.
Nothing to see here. MMORPG.com were waiting to get payed for a high rating review and finally realized that SE isn't going to pay them, unlike many other mmos did.
I do like mmorpg.com and I agree that FFXIV is flawed in many many ways but I can't stay serious about it getting only 5.1 while other, MUCH WORSE games got stupidly high scores, compared to FFXIVs one (I'm looking at you, Xsyon, Vanguard, Ryzom and many more).
Btw, I'm now in the process of installing FFXIV again to be ready for the 1.18 changes, since most of them are exactly what I was waiting for.
This is a silly statement if i ever saw one. The market is full of games that launched disastrously and have then become very enjoyable due to continuated work by the developer. Age of Conan, Champions Online, EVE Online and many others.
Mind you, all of those games would have benefitted enormously from the treatment SE is giving to FFXIV (free to play until fixed).
There's no need of a "Miracle patch" but of continuated improvement, which anyone that actually plays it already saw so far, and that the annoouncements about the coming updates show quite easily.
The "reputation" of the game can be easily reverted with a good PS3 launch, possibly accompained by a cheap Steam relaunch of the PC version.
The PS3 launch will trigger new reviews, and if it's good (and if journalists have the little bit of integrity necessary to admit the improvements), it can easily trigger a renaissance for the game.
It's that simple.
I'd also like to say that this review does not cover the main story line at all other then the very beginning, my guess being that Lori never actually got far enough or never noticed her NPC linkshell blinking.. The story plays a lot like in FFXI except you get notification in the UI when you are high enough of a level for the next installment. You are set on a quest which has cinematic scenes (though not cutscenes but like mission scenes as in FFXI with no voice over) that explain what is going on in the world and what your role is as an adventurer.
I find the story to be really immersive and personal, something most MMOs fail to achieve. I felt cheated at the release of this game that there were literally no side quests, some have been added in though not nearly enough yet. But I look forwards to more that will also give out SP (xp), what I will say about the new quests is that they are not half baked story wise and they directly tie in to what is currently happening to the world, that the monsters grew bigger is actually commented on by NPCs and quest givers, that change is in the air ect...
I feel like my Miqo'te lives in a world on the brink of possibility and while this may not be enough for many players, for the type of gamer that I am; explorer and role player, this means everything to me.
Sincerely, Siali Liatho.
It will never amount to what could have been....ever. Almost a year later and they still cannot charge for the game. Almost a year later and still no real reason to believe it will be ready for another year . Also at this point you would be hard pressed to find it in stores. I seen a CE at best buy for I think 39 dollars the other day. I hope it improves for the fans but there is no reason for anyone but the most hardcore supporter to believe it will get better.
You gotta pay to get the game right? ofcourse it'll get reviewed, I prefere beeing warned before i spend money on crap.
And how can anyone review a game depending on dev notes? I've seen tons of dev notes not make it into games, for several reasons, heck a game like SWG had issues at launch, and the dev team tried to "fix" it, and completely killed the game, a patch arent always godsend and an addition that will make any game way better.
Heck reviewing a game would be impossible, there are always a patch on the new, that will make whatever game it is, so much more fun and great, we've all heard and seen it before, but most patches add little, or doesnt change the core game.
The game is just flawed at it's core, they need to pull the plug and start all over.
Well that is just such a great set of points...Bill missed the story arc on this one somehow, I guess through lack of playing.
You fail to realise because of Tanaka's mistakes Yoshida has to completly rebuild a game that took 5 years to make, so if we are paying in less than 5 years they havent been slow they are progressing stedily right now which it whats needed not a patch thrown together in a month full of bugs and incomplete
For what I payed for this game (80$) I got my money's worth so far. Your point would have value IF they had been charging a monthly fee for it like any other broken released MMO to date, but they have not.
Now people can get this game for far less, it's the equivalent of a movie (which offer no guarantee to be good or enjoyed by every customer either), or eating out, or whatever else you'd blow 15-30 bucks on... That's really nothing for mere ACCESS to the game that has no monthly fee until further notice and the game is deemed actually ready for one.
Yes, in 1.18 they'll actually attempt to make them useful. Until that happens, don't list them as content because AS content, those side quests are a joke. And no fact checking was in order, because you listed as them as content to do all ready in the game and not of what will become of them in the future. On that side note, I'd wait to see how they're redone come 1.18 before committing to that as some great change.
Also, many of the combat related ones actually, you know, DO. You go to the area highlighted in your map, your mobs spawn and you kill them. If you want to argue the smaller technicallities like some locking you into a private instance once inside the zone, go ahead.
And ah yes, the leve overhaul. Where as right now the main form of leves are done as leve-link parties, they're overhauling them to make them more solo-focused. I welcome some changes, such as rewards being given based on time completion so no more purposefully stalling leves, but I'm not thrilled on them being redone to focus on solo.
That leaves group content to the 2 instances and... I guess you can still leve-link and zerg through the leves as fast as possible?
Finally, the Grand Companies - as they are described - read a LOT like faction grinds in every other MMO. I suppose that is something new to do, though? I hope I'm pleasantly surprised, however.
As for you doubting I'm still playing, I frankly don't care.
EDIT: some spelling mistakes
Might not even have to pay that. It's still very easy to find friend codes from the collector's edition.
I think the main difference between STO and FFXIV, is that SE not only acknowledged the bad quality of FFXIV, but removed the monthly sub and allowed players to play for free while they listen a bit to player feedback and build the game to a point where SE is satisfied with. Of course the boxes are out there, but this is mainly a move towards those who had already bought the game, as a way to make up for failing to meet the player's expectations along with theirs. They've decided to go back to somewhat of a "testing" phase until they are happy with FFXIV to charge monthly again.
That is why this review seems "unjust", in the way that it's basically like beating a dead horse. And to top it off, they release this "review" few days before an important patch that will overhaul a few areas. Perhaps it will fail to deliver, but it still would've been wiser to wait, especially when it's only in a couple of days (less than a week?)
STO on the other hand, still charges monthly fees and has a Cash Shop on top of it, so they're definitively asking to be judged like other MMORPGs. Although MMORPG.com *should* have reviewed after the patch, even though it failed to deliver.
Mine are still unused if anyone wants them.
EDIT: Codes are all gone.
They're not inaccuracies in my eyes as mechanically, they function exactly the same as how leves function mechanically once you go out and do them.
I suppose the rest is "agree to disagree?" Which is fine. We'll all know just how much everything is changed come this weekend anyways.
EDIT: Nevermind, I misread "doesn't" as "don't," hah hah.
The problem is that mechanically they don't play like levequests. They play like quests. IE: The quests that we've seen in every MMORPG since the inception of the genre to today.
Levequests don't play, mechanically, like the usual quests (mind you, i don't even enjoy them as much), they play somewhat similar to daily quests (even if there are differences).
I would say that when we're talking about mechanics, it's not a matter of opinion.
if X is different from Y, Z can't be equal to X AND Y.
Well, I would say the review is ill-timed, yes. This review should have been done like a month after launch, and it should have been privy to a re-review after the upcoming patch.
Yes, I understand the game was launched too early. For that, SE takes a major integrity hit. But, they are on the right track.
I'm in the vast minority here, but I love the game. It's probably because of my attitude going in. I knew that with any SE (specially FF ip) game, you have to do research and study things. That's not everyone's cup of tea.
Some BS rumors:
There is no content outside of leves - There absolutely is. It's basically the same as FFXI, you can form grind parties in the exact same way. You have to understand how the SP (fancy term for exp) system works, which apparently no one does. Some mobs are better than others. Find the good ones, and they net faster SP than leves. Not sure why this was "awesome" in FFXI but sucks here... oh well. Not to mention an actual storyline, and class (guild quests). Rank 50 is where the content dries up, and yes, they have no endgame.
The patch is only adding auto-attack - False, they are adding many, many features from new dungeons, to a new mission system, reform of guildleves, SP adjustments, and so on.
There is no AH - The Market Wards are now searchable by catagory, and are roughly identical to the FFXI system. The only difference is you have to run to an NPC to get your stuff. Not sure why people have a huge problem with that, I remember in SWG having to travel across an entire planet to get gear.
I also don't get the UI problems. It's pretty simple and straightforward if you ask me - I'm simply not experiencing all of the problems people describe. I'm just not. Maybe it's because I have a good PC and a fast connection? Dunno, but it's actually easier to use than FFXI to me - and you don't have to tie everything to a macro the way you did in XI.
As for travel, you can freakin teleport. Sorry there's no airships, but I'd rather take an instant teleport anyway. You only have to run to an area once. Yes, you have to manage Anima, but I've been playing since launch basically and have never run out. I guess I just actually think about things before I click "Yes." You can also get a ride from other party members for 0 anima, set favored locations, and use return for 1 anima - guess people just don't like planning.
7/10 on graphics, right before saying the game is "stunning" makes no sense. He says he lowers it for the UI?? Isn't that gameplay?
Anyway, the game gets a bad rap. Seems all the people talking trash either never played it, blayed it during beta, or played it shortly after launch. Don't get me wrong, releasing an unfinished product is not forgivable, but it's in the past and they are doing what they can to fix it.
Gotta disagree with the innovation score as well. I guess he feels that they failed at their innovations... but there is a lot going on in this game that is new and different.
Anyway, play it or dont. Besaid (server) has a high population, there's always something to do, and people are having fun. Not sure about the others. As I said, there is no endgame - but I'm sure there will be. I'd give it a 7/10 honestly, considering the 8s and 9s this site throws around like candy. It's not perfect, but it's not crap, and on this site apparently a 6/10 is crap and 8/10 is amazing.
So when should they have reviewed it:
When it launched? "Oh wait, it needs work...give it more time."
Now? "Oh wait, the miracle patch is coming...give it more time."
Next week? "Bugs from the miracle patch.....give it more time."
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You get the idea. People have been asking for a FFXIV review for months now and now that its here and its not what the fanboia wanted, its simply "the wrong time". Sorry it does not work like that. The game did not live up to expectations and has some serious issues. More time will not change this and by now, unless someone is a major FF fan, it does not matter anyway as they have moved on.
And a miracle patch ranks up there with the Loch ness monster, Big Foot and the Chupacabra....its been talked about a lot, people think it exists but sadly it doesn't.
To do a levequest, you go to the levequest counter NPC and select one. You then go to the designated camp, activate it, and then go to the yellow zones on your map. You kill the mobs or gather the drops, and you're done.
For many of the combat side quest, you go to an NPC that's not at the levequest counter. You then go to the yellow marked areas, your mobs spawn, and you kill them. You then return and "quest complete."
The only parts that are skipped are "go to the camp and activate the levequest." The actual combat and mobs we face is functionally no different than what we've doing in leves all this time.
This is what I've experienced, and why to me, they are really no different than levequests. The only positive is that the NPC say a little more something of the world.
I HOPE the overhaul to them in 1.18 is great, but I'm not hyping myself up to it. I hope I'm more clear now?
Exactly Abriael, as I said earlier SIDE quests are there for story mostly right as of this moment, later on there will be reward. But their primary function is to provide something for the player to experience and enjoy aside from the main missions. I think that function should still be the prime objective for these, though as a casual player I seriously welcome greater rewards for them as well.
Leves are a great way to level, but they don't really offer much in the way of story but that's okay because that's not their function. I can't say what I feel about their refocus on solo play, they really should have given info on what would replace group leveling too...
edit: @ Kaijin. That's like the foundation of games in general, get objective >>> kill stuff >>> get conclusion/reward.
You might as well say there's no difference between ANY type of game as well while you're at it.
Except the way they've been implemented, you don't really get any meaninful reward. As I've repeated, I hope the 1.18 changes make these more awesome, but I'm not hyping myself to that.
Miracle patches don't exist. What does exist is constant work in the right direction, which SE already shown so far, and more of which will come with the next patch and the couple after that.
Several MMORPGs have seen the fruit of that kind of improvements, and there's absolutely no reason to believe that FFXIV won't. Sentences like "more time will not change this" are simply silly, and untrue. Time changes MMORPGs, even quite radically, and that has been proven again and again in the history of the genre.
When they should have reviewed it? Either immediately (pending enough time to experience the game at a half decent level), or AFTER some of the patches that introduce radical changes that warrant a review. Or both.
That's what journalists that want their reviews to be relevant (and have a little bit of integrity) normally do.
Otherwise you have something like this review, that's already quite inaccurate, and will be completely inaccurante and irrelevant in four days. {mod edit}
Doing a review 1 week before a major game changing patch is bad timing, sorry it just is. That applies to any game. The site should be more aware of what is going on in the games they review.
It should have been reviewed right after launch like any other game, regardless of the "give it more time" arguement. This site should have the integrity to do a review when the game comes out. It should have had patch reviews just like any other game. It should have been subject to re-review after the big patch. Not saying it would have scored any higher, but seriously this is just ill-informed nonsense. It's mind boggling how disconnected this site is sometimes - people look to them for up-to-date info about their games. This type of thing makes it seem like they aren't even paying attention.
If anything, this should have been an article about the upcoming changes to the game, and what we can anticipate. This site hasn't even adressed that. WoW gets a total review of what's coming up in 4.2, this game gets a review 10 months after release that is full of innacuracy? Give me a break. Instead they add a disclaimer about "games always getting patched." Seriously... I mean... seriously? For the love of god pay attention to what you are doing.
Tanaka designed leve quests as the main part of the "content" for the game. Sorta like "rifts" are the primary means by which Rift delivers content.
Unlike Tanaka, who played FFXI as his only MMO, Yoshi-P has plaed DAOC (5 years), Everquest, World of Warcraft, and plans on playing Rift.
Yoshi-P has said on the record that it was "wrong" to make leves the main-stay of FFXIV. Leves will now be primarily for people who want to solo and rank up. The game is shifting to a new type of content (dungeon's, grind parties, group quests, raid-boss's [Ifrit Battle], etc.). Chocobos and Airships are coming in 1.19. And a continuation of the combat overhaul by end of September.
FFXIV that Tanaka developed and the one that Yoshi-P is developing will be similar in name only.
It is such a horrible slap in the face to the new dev team to REVIEW Tanaka's FFXIV, 10 months after release, without waiting 4 days, to see Yoshi-P's game. The substantive changes that Yoshi-P's team has been working on for 6 months are completely missing from this review.
The "worth" of this review expires in 4 days. Even if 1.18 is horrendeous, this current review is still innacurate because it does not incorporate the changes.
Here are two reasons why the review came out now:
1. They want to have a review out for Tanaka's FFXIV so that they can do a Re-Review for Yoshi-P's changes.
2. The reviewer is sooo out of the loop with FFXIV that he/she released the review not even knowing the biggest patch in FFXIV'S history is scheduled to be released in 4 days.
Regardless, there's no excuse for this review. It's poor sportsmenship at best. Either review a game a month after its release, or let people know you're holding out for X reason. There's no justification offered for why the review would be released at this point.
I disagree with people questioning the integrity of the site or the person writing the review. I only disagree with the timing, I think it's unfair to question someone's personal credibility just because you disagree with the review. That's a little step too far for my taste.
The timing is a direct line to their credibility/integrity. The reviewer did absolutely no research, and fails to mention the state of the game being drastically changed. They provided half of the information. It has nothing to do with me "disagreeing with the review." It has everything to do with them simply blowing it - writing a review that will be invalid in 4 days. In other words, people in 5 days will read this review thinking that this is what the game is. It will not be. That's lack of integrity. It would be another thing entirely if they just stepped up to the plate and reviewed this major release (and it is a major release) after it was launched in a timely manner. Now, someone next week will say, "gee, what's this game all about? Wellthis was writeen last week, must be accurate," and it won't be.
Think what you want, that's your opinion... but the timing, which you said you disagree with, is what causes everyone to say these things. Its a blatant tell on not putting in any effort to deliver accurate data. If anything, this should have been an article on the upcoming changes, something an informed site/reviewer would have done.
They gave their reasons back in December. See Stradden's post:
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/3939510#3939510
The reviewer or the site should have known there will be a patch in 4 days and thought they should hold off to see what is in the patch, if the reviewer submitted this review the people who run the site should have refused put it up, anyone who thinks 4 days before the first big patch is shortsighted and shows they dont read official sources, they even said auto attack was a rumour when theres a damn developer video, and if the reviewer and people that run the site doesnt even read the direct information from the producer then thier integrity is a problem, we have this information for a reason.
I stand by my point that it was because SE havent given this website money they reviewed it now. Give me one good reason that it was reviewed 4 damn days before the first big patch and not "its 10 months" wait 4 damn days.
It's not up to this site to decide when a game is ready. When it's released, it's their duty to write a review and inform player what is happening in a major title. That's what they do. When a game changes in a major way that will effect the entire gameplay strata, again, it is their duty to write a review, or provide an update. It's called journalistic integrity, but who am I kidding.
They gave the game almost 1 year to mature into something better and that is more then fair, i might be wrong but highly doubt the next patch will turn this game from bad to good.
I have not playd it as i waited some befor buying this game, but after all that have been said about this game i would never thouch it even if it was free.
That is just stupid, why couldnt they have done the review in the last 3 months we have been waiting for this patch rather than wait till 4 days before the patch, it makes no damn sense
gaming journalism isn't a responsibility-free job (if you're interested about my full opinion on this matter, i actually wrote an article about it a while ago: here )
When you go public, especially if you go public about the someone else's work, you have quite a big responsibility weighing on your shoulders. This responsibility includes being as clear cut as possible to avoid suspicion about possible ulterior motives.
To be honest it's very, very easy to see an ulterior motive behind this review. The timing is simply too screwed up, and it adds up to the hyperbolically negative tones of the article itself (it sounds more like a random blogger's rant than an factually relevant review). Hyperbole + bad timing are a very bad indicator on a MMORPG review, and seem to hint on an interest on the writer/publisher's side tho place a hit against the hype formed by the upcoming patches.
So yeah. The writer/publisher of this poor excuse for a review decided to go public with this timing and this hyperbolic tones. I'd say there's little to complain is suspicion arises.
"It's not ready for a review," was their answer.
So when the new developer, who took over in January, says that it takes a 6 month development cycle to see substantive changes in the game, and when the same developer says the big changes will occur 1.18-1.20 (July 21 - End of September), MMORPG decides to do a review 4 days before those changes are realized?
If you read the lodestone (FFXIV official website), it would be obvious that the biggest changes to FFXIV are occuring in the next 3 months. To review it at this point reall shows that the reviewer had no idea what was going on.
For example, saying auto-attack is a rumor is blatantly false. WE new about auto-attack as being definete more than a month ago.
Sooooo wait, they decide that NOW is a good time though? How in the hell does that even compute? Mere days before 1.18, a month or two before 1.19? BEFORE a monthly fee has been added and the game declared ready for 'relaunch'??
That makes no damned sense unless they had another reason OR they really are that incompetent OR uncaring about this game.
First people complain that they want a review for this game.
THEN people complain when they get a review for their game that isn't good.
THEN the same people say "Why did you review this, it's about to have the miracle patch".
After the miracle patch they will say "Wait for the next patch, that review doesn't take into account all the changes they are saying will take place".
In the end, MMORPG can't win. This game has been out for a year now. The miracle patches have yet to hit in that time. In FACT, there are a score of MAJOR MMO's coming out on the market soon enough. The fact that SE STILL isn't charging for this tells you how they REALLY feel.
You may enjoy the game, good for you. But questioning the integrity of a reviewer on a site who was NICE enough to hold review for this long and GENERALLY conforms to every other review out there. I'm sorry, but that screams of fanboism.
Have a good day.
EDIT: ZOMG, look one post above mine. The miracle 1.8 is coming out, then a miracle 1.9 2 months after that! I can predict te future.. it's like I have ESP-N or something :-P
AS stated previously, there are no such things as miracle patches, however there are important patches that make fundamental changes.
1.18 is one of those patches. The review would be relevant and accurate had it waited 4 days more. I think the review was written months ago. It was rubber stamped last week, and released today.
I'll state on the record that I agree with the score if this was released a month after release. However, the manner in which the article is worded (using "rumor" on game changes that are facts known more than a month ago) and the timing, makes the review less than credible or informative.
I have no idea why anyone in their right mind would even waste their time reviewing this title before the PS3 launch. Anyone who even paid remote attention to the game at PC launch knows it was a hunk of junk, but most of those people also know that the game's only chance is it's second wind on the PS3. Just go onto the Lodestone, FFXIV's official news site, and you'd see the massive list of plans due by the end of summer.
I'm not normally agitated by this kind of thing, but doing a review of the game now is simply inappropriate. Hope you do a re-review come PS3 launch.
PS3 launch was indefinitely put on hold due to how bad the PC launch was. Fairly sure they've stopped entirely on it.
Yoshi-P has said that he believes the PS3 release is the make it or break it point. As soon as it's released for PS3 is an indication that SE is satisfied with it.
Yeah yeah... That's not the point, their reason for holding out on a review and their reason for doing it now before MAJOR changes are due to BEGIN. Is the point, it makes no logical sense.
Did I say ZOMG diz patch is gonna BLOW your damned troll's minds OFF!!! LOLZZ ??
No I'm actually well aware of the game's strengths AND shortcomings and why certain people wouldn't enjoy this and why some would. In fact I wrote a preview of this before the game came out and was defamed pubically for daring to list the things the game would do to scare people away, though I was 100% right.
These patches are NOT going to change the game so drastically you will all magically fall under it's spell and won't be able to resist playing and eat your words that you dared to not like it.... BUT it will the beginning of a new era for the game and it's community and it's a disservce to those people that such a review as this comes out now instead of waiting out the week to try it out and report IF it really does herald better times for the game or not.
This review as it stands reads like the game that came out at launch and does a very poor job of outlining what has actually been done so far and is coming. It's a crying shame of a review.
So next time just release the review when you actually wrote it or when you last played the game.
Of course they can win. They can do what any gaming journalist with integrity would do. Review a game when it's released (after the necessary time to experience it sufficently, which can vary between a week or two and a month), and then, if warranted, re-review it AFTER some major patching changes things enough to make a further review relevant.
It's actually very, very simple.
The fact that SE isn't charging, and is paying to mantain the servers going and further development without even implementing a cash shop to generate revenue tells us only one thing:
That they're confident that they can turn this game around in a good one.
Otherwise they would have already closed it or turned it into a full fledged F2P game that generates revenue with alternate methods. It's quite simple. Business 101.
A month after release? Really. The article is worded "cryptically" with "rumour", whatever, but you go on to say that they should've known them a month ago. So the article is only a month old. Not much can change in a month. The game is recieving 1.8, which adds auto-attack and a combat revamp. That was, what, one section of the review article?
It all comes back to the fact that the game SHOULD'VE gotten a lower score had it been reviewed when it was released, like most other games. But MMORPG.com waited and you should be happy that it got higher because it had almost a year to fix stuff.
And you would be wrong: Here's some relevant news for you:
Final Fantasy XIV's PS3 version Coming "At All Costs"
More fact checking needed here, or simply to actually read the thread. 1:18 adds quite a lot more than that. It adds two dungeons, an overhaul of quests and levequests, more quests, grand companies and relative missions, removal of the fatigue system and changes to the death penalty, and even more stuff.
All confirmed. No rumor there.
Which makes a large portion of the article completely irrelevant in 4 days. Job well done.
I would like to at the very least see an apology and this review taken down and get it re reviewed after 1.18.
[Mod Edit]
That's a conduct that I would expect from a media outlet with integrity after this debacle. Needless to say, I don't think It'll ever happen.
So:
Aesthetics is untouched by any of those.
Innovation is untouched by any of those.
Gameplay is still vastly untouched (in the categories of account creation, tutorial, and storyline).
Polish moves up a little, I guess?
Longevity is more of an opinion based thing, imo.
Social is still a hassle.
Value relatively similar.
Honestly, one patch isn't going to change what this game is. It's going to take a lot of time and effort to turn this thing into a game. If there was a category for "Determination to turn it around" they'd have 10/10 but they've fallen so far and many bigger sharks are coming into the pool soon that by the time they can say "We're ready." there's going to be few who will listen.
Prolly not because they want to do as much damage to FFXIV as they can, but we can always hope, also the entire official forums saw through this review.
They didn't review it in a timely manner because "it wasn't ready." Seriously? Since when do they decide when it is ready for a review? It hits stores... it's their responsibility to review a major title. Imagine if real journalists practiced this type of BS? (Although I'm sure some do).
But now that a major game overhaul is coming in four days... it IS ready? They have divided their own logic. They should have written an article about the upcoming changes, maybe interviewed someone from SE... you know... what a real journalist would do.
What's a fair buffer to review a game? A year? 2-3 years? I'm a big FF fan and FFXIV deserves the harsh reviews because the game was released is a sorry state. It's like they took all those years of what they learned from FFXI and then started from square 1 all over again. Seriously, did any of the people who made that game ever even play an MMO?
Anyone who reviews 4 days before a patch is trying to damage a game as much as possible this site should show some balls and stand up to this joke of a reviewer who wants FFXIV to fail why else would the review be done now?
OMFG someone give me a penny for every time I've heard this: new bigger badder MMOs are coming and they're going to take over!!! No they don't, what happened with Rift lately?
Let's see: game launched with great success and is very smooth, a ton of people play it for some months, after level cap many decide it's not much different then how WoW runs, a bunch get bored and now wait for the next big hit to fullfill another 8 months of leveling to reach end cap and do it all over again.
Don't even try to pretend that MMOs have this amazing longetivity anymore and that any single one is going to pull a WoW and attract everyone for years. Nope, they are all 'niche' and it's far more relevant to push out quality content at a good rate then try to beat out any competition. Maybe that's actually one of FFXIV's down fall, releasing wayyyyy too early to beat out other MMOs, yeah that was a great idea! :S
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/16719-mmorpg-s-review
(I don't know if non members can read that :P)
It is true for page 1 and 2, but past that you'll realize that a good chunk is saying the review is perfectly fair, while the other half is saying what you, Abriael and Cynthe are saying (btw, you'll notice some common names there, too).
So.. regardless of what's coming in the near future, SE has still had almost a year in THEIR benefit to make the game better than what it should've been reviewed as. Guess you wanted that 4.1 on here for another 2 years instead of a 5.1
Do you seriously think FFXIV could be further damaged than what its earned on its own?
Obviously, pretty much every one of those would be effected by the patch. Whether it is better or worse is not for me to decide. Hell the score might even go down. But it will be effected. This is an obvious post from someone who has no idea the breadth of changes being made and is still deciding to comment about it. Like I said, it might go up, it might go down, but this review will be completely irrelevent in 4 days. This review kicks a company while it's down.
People wouldnt have minded if they released a review after 1.18, 4 days before the biggest patch (note I have never said miricle patch) is completly illogical unless they want the game to fail, and the only reason this site would is because SE gave them no money. I have not seen any logical arguments to wait till 4 days before a patch, this website is getting bad press on the official foums and fansites because of this out of date review, completly biased review
Do all games get re-reated after every patch or expansion nowadays?
*re-rated
Social includes the tools in the system, not the population exclusively. Guilds and chatting are almost nonexistant and not because the population is just low.
The "new" combat system and quest system is innovative in FFXIV itself, but not other games, sorry.
Gameplay is untouched in account creation, tutorial, and storyline. Sure, combat is being overhauled. That's one part, you nailed it.
Value: in the grand scheme of things, the value of this patch won't increase the value of the game by more than an tiny margin.
I arent saying to re-rate every game, but MMOs are differant to offline games because the contantly change, take any MMO now that has been out 3+ years, they are not the same game as they were at release, MMOs should be reviewed after game changing patches,*sarcasm mode on* or if your a retarded mmorpg.com reviewer then 4 days before, *sarcasm mode off*
I don't think you read my post.
MMORPG has a responsibility to review a game in a timely manner. If the game is crap, say it's crap and call it a day. Almost a year in THEIR benefit? That's not for a journalist to decide. They should not cater to any company, nor make decisions as to what is "ready" for a review. When it's on shelves, it's ready to be reviewed.
A) It is not for them to decide when a game is "ready." They should be too busy informing consumers.
B) They defy their own logic by claiming it's "ready" before a major overhaul.
How the heck do you know?
Like FFXIV has much of a playerbase to grab from already. I can only speak for myself, but I'm sure many other FFXIV players are interested in atleast one of the following upcoming MMO's: TERA, SWTOR, GW2, Archeage. I'm not spelling DOOM and GLOOM from the Heavens above, only that these games will take what little playerbase FFXIV has and make it that much smaller.
People such as Cynthe have been reasonable about it, just as many people on that thread. You and Abriael however have repeatedly condescended the reviewer over and over on this thread. Perhaps the most logical thing to do was - after expressing your concerns on this thread which you're obviously allowed to do - inquired with the writer through PMs for their reasoning?
EDIT: grammar, spelling mistakes, yadda yadda
Because Value is more like a "conclusion" score. And 1.18, while changing many things, leaves many of those tedious shortfalls still glaring at you in the screen.
If you notice he made the account to do said flaming, 10 post all in this thread trashing the reviewer. Odd considering that most that play the game agree w/ the review and concede that this isn't going to be some miracle patch. Just put the guy on ignore I imagine he'll get himself banned before long.
Contrary to what some believe most of us would love the game to get better and be that enjoyable expeience that ffxi was for some. When that day comes(if ever) I'm sure a rereview will be done and will show the improvement.
Anyway, obvious devil's advocate at this point.
This situation isn't unique to FFXIV. It has happened a few times before for other games. The articles are written over a course of a few weeks so the timing isn't intentional. The bottom line is FFXIV should have a lower score when it was released in September, yet it got a 5.1 because the reviewers waited for some unknown reason. Niether of us know. They had a year to do fixes, and as of a few weeks ago and today, the game is still in a 5.1 state. 1.18 won't make it a 7.5, or a 8.0. If the reviewers constantly wait for patches then their article becomes out of date anyway.
You're arguing your opinion as though it's fact. I know plenty of people who are coming back to FFXIV to try it out after 1.18. Therefor, the value they place on this patch is considerable.
It just seems that you think the value of the game is never going to change regardless of what SE does. Clearly that's wrong. Maybe for you there's nothing SE can do to redeam themselves, but for many others, that is not the case.
The review should take into account a person like you and a person who is on the fence. To say that 1.18 adds absolutely nothing to the argument is clearly shortsighted. There ARE things being changed in the game....some are ground breaking some are not. The review would be better served if it incorporates the new and the old. Especially when the new is only 4 days away.
I'm actually of the mind that what we have left in the playebase really can't get any smaller and that the people who would go to another game have pretty much already left. I have people ask me all the time if the game is ready to come back to and have to regretfully tell them no, to wait until fall or winter or even later for a really solid experience.
Players come and go all the time, and there's no guarantee that the games you listed will attract a whole bunch of players for a long time. Tera is already dwindling in Korea and it literally just came out. TOR is STILL an enigma on many front other then they have voice overs and a crazy amount of story content. Archeage if it's FFA PVP will be a pretty Darkfall with some neat features, not a title that will attract a horde of players.
I just get sort of tired when people play the new MMO on the horizon card to say that a certain game has very little future or hope of attracting old and new players. I know in my own circle of friends we play new games, and we check out old ones all the time to see if we like them better now. This is a constant.
I do play. I just logged in a few days ago. Maybe it's not so obvious.
I'm really sorry to inform you, but their are hundred's of MMO's. Unique systems are almost nonexistant, just less used ones.
One part lowers the score by 1 or two points, changing the overall score by, what, .2 or .3?
I know because 1.18 isn't a miracle patch, there is no such thing. 1.18 won't raise the score to acceptable MMORPG levels. It won't make it a 7.0, it won't make it a 8.0.
Reviewers should not "constantly wait for patches." They should be informed enough about the games they are reviewing to understand when certain patches are going to change the entire dynamic and gameplay of a certain game. Those patches should be treated differently. If they delayed a review because "They decided it wasn't ready," then they should have a clear understanding of their timing and the very events that they claim "aren't ready."
This should have been an "Upcoming changes to FFXIV" article, not an "Official Review." They missed their window, and should have taken the hit and not published this. "It has happened a few other times before with other games" just makes it worse. They should be informend enough about the MMO industry to understand when to release certain information, and when not to.
Anyway, at this point we'll agree to disagree, this thread has sapped my energy.
No I'm not at all. Value is ONE category in this review. Changing the value to a 7.0 or even a 10 only affects the final score by a tiny amount. The value of the game goes up every single patch, no arguing that.
I never even mentioned 1.18 not adding anything to the argument. All I said was that while it changed many things, a lot of the annoying problems are still there. Yes, the combat is definitely changing for the better, you heard it from me first if it helps ya. There are just lots of things left to tackle and so the overall score won't change by much.
I agree. We've pretty much gone full circle and come back to "What's an acceptable time table to release a review from release". Agree to disagree, chap!
I can say this much: If they add chocobos you can breed like they did in FFXI, an auction, a mail system, and airships they'll increase their rating dramtically.
I dont want the reviewer to tell me privately why they posted the review, I want them to say why in public, it would be the right thing to do, they failed by releasing this review now, it should all be on their head as I say the only reason they would is for a final kick in the balls for SE before 1.18
XD Yes indeed. Chocobos and airships are tentatively slated for 1.19. I'm one of those pushing for a proper AH and I think everyone is dying for mailing...
We have known about this patch for a week, infact it was delayed so we have known it could come anytime for over 1 month this review should not be up
Anyway, can't do this anymore. You will obviously think what you will.
EDIT: Sorry bout that, I said I was done... lol. For real this time.
And your speculation is just that - speculation.
Also, really?
Originally posted by Delsus
"lol wheres my temp ban then, gotta keep trying lol "
You're not going to get a response by repeatedly condescending the writer and website, which is most of what you've done on this account.
Just keep in mind that they haven't (afaik) stated how they'll be in or in what form. I've all ready seen some players assuming a lot of things regarding the chocobo issue.
If they have nothing to hide they will come out publicly if they have things to hide they wont, and your quote from what I said on the official foum was after Abriael got a temp ban for speaking hid mind about the corruption of this site just like me, so wheres my ban for speaking my mind.
This site is corrupt and will only give developers that give them money decent ratings
Well I'll counter and then we'll call it a draw!
I play the game. :)
Innovation is taking systems and making them easier to use, more effective, or more productive. FFXIV has taken LOTS of their game designs and made it overy complicated to use. Menu-driven on a PC release? Click and activate skill and click? These are BACKWARDS of the industry.
Relevance. We're talking about different things here.
I'm not sure if I can agree on opinion here. 1.18, nor any singular patch (within this context), can raise ANY game from a 5.1 to a 8.0. There is no such thing as a miracle patch.
We could argue that SE paid off MMORPG.com to hold off the review for a X number of months.
Yes they have, it's just basic chocobo rentals so far, they are looking into chocobo mounts you can raise and other animals. We don't know if the rentals are on rails or on a timer like XI though. Because that's SE for you, cryptic until the end. lol
Edit: Found the actual post, they are not on rails: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/16145-CHOCOBOS%21%21%21%21%21%21%21-1.19%21%21%21%21?p=231739#post231739
EDIT: Almost at the exact same time :P Thanks
Muah ha I just edited my post !! :) You're welcome.
well if according to the review there has been no changes, because this is discribing the game at launch theres no mention of any new patches then I might agree you but not if tehy release it 4 days before a patch
How is it describing the game at launch? Everything that is written is still things you play with today. Also,
Original Post
"Before we take a look at Final Fantasy XIV, I want to preface this article with a disclosure. Here at MMORPG.com, we are aware that games are always patching and game updates are pending pretty much forever. However, until those changes are live on the servers, we cannot anticipate how they will affect the gameplay or community, and therefore those rumors and announcements do not affect the score card detailed below. We feel we’ve waited more than long enough to give FFXIV a fair shake. Check back with us later this year for an update after those changes are live."
They've promised and said "Hey, we'll come back in a little while and see what's changed but we, and players, have waited long enough for this."
Just because they didn't exclusively say "Oh yeah there was patch 1.14 and patch 1.15 and then this and this" doesn't mean anything.
In all honesty, I am getting tired of reviews and people saying this is the worst MMO ever.
Listen up, FFXI had a horrible launch and horrible first year when it launched in Japan. The NA got it a year after JP and had the more polished version. Give FFXIV time to fix up, such as 1.18 on Friday. FFXIV is repeating that, except Japan and the NA shared the launch this time.
I dont see the words "Sidequests" "Notorious Monsters" "SP ajustments" "Behest ajustments" these are things that should have been looked into for a new edited reveiw, because they are in the game right now
"It's simply absolutely silly to review a game just before a sizable patch. The fact that other patches (even in othr games) disappointed is no reason to downplay the very solid possibility that this one will improve FInal Fantasy XIV by a lot"
That quote made me chuckle. Especially since every patch to date has been, at best, abyssmal. Expecting a company constantly tilting at windmills to suddenly change course requires an immense amount of bravado.
This game does not need patches, it needs a complete rewrite. Someone in a prior post said it best, this game takes the word tedious and puts an exclamation mark on it, and the upcoming patch changes that not at all.
The reason people dislike Trion's baby is the complete lack of originality, but the game is really polished. This you cannot say about FF IV, sadly.. I have also played in beta, and my god, the interface was just mind-numbingly painfull. It seems that almost after 1 year, all my complaints are still unresolved.
Why should we give it more time to fix itself? It hasn't done thus far and it's been a year. What about all those patches previously? These .18's are so highly touted.. maybe had they released 6 months ago..
They are overhauling the game right now, the first changes will be seen on friday when it should have1.18 and the first of the battle changes, alot of changes will be done and in september it will be a completly differant game
Probably because he's not born yesterday.
... Every single one of the things you named would be lumped into Gameplay. All those things you mentioned are a bit too specific for a review, especially adjustments? Really? You want them to mention how they've adjusted systems yet the review is based on what the game is right now. This isn't FFXIV: A Complete Guide to Patches + A BONUS review! :)
Yeah..... Which what they are doing? Which is why the patches have been so small so far? Which is why there's grounds to be excited for 1.18 because we're finally going to see some of the fruits of this rewrite actually happen, finally??
Really guys if you do not know why the game is where it's at and can't spend the time reading the information helpfully posted in this thread, why are you still posting? :P
This has been said about many, many other MMOs.
The changes listed are good for players and it's expected to be excited for them. But don't hype them up so much yet. It's better to be pleasantly surprised when it finally arrives, than feel underwhelmed.
So is Mortal Online, and Darkfall, and SWG, and EQ2 and Shadowbane. One of those games doesn't even exist and I'm pretty sure Henrik says the word "overhaul" to himself in the mirror every morning before heading to work. The statement just doesn't hold weight.
I'm sure this is how the SOE billed NGE too.
The fact that its being rewritten changes everything, if a game is crap a review can say it, but if a patch that is the start of a complete rewrite is just plain stupid, anyone with half a brain knows this
Have we somehow forum traveled to the Mortal Online forums?
Your statements and hype are noteworthy and it's good to know such faith exists, but generally these type of statements are one's that make people shy away from a certain game after seeing them.
Quote: "We feel we’ve waited more than long enough to give FFXIV a fair shake."
Why may I ask that you give them a fair shake, is it because they asked for it?
I don't mean to be rude but what about the fair shake to the community, especially the one's that spent money for the box and came to regret it.
SE gave you a fair shake of your pockets. :D
I love how there is a few people up above in this thread trying to kill off the FFXIV community.
If you guys don't like the game, stop commenting on it and stop trying to get everyone to believe the overhaul is going to do nothing. They are adding a lot more content in the next three patches. Instances, implementing mounts and pets (Because old team was too lazy to do that I guess.), a new battle system, no EXP limitations anymore (More stupidity from old team.) and more to do in general.
Also the reviewer only had PUG rank 1 and physical lvl r2, which proves to me he barely played it, so couldnt get a full feeling for most changes, like NMs, sidequests and behest changes, it looks like they played for less than 30 mins and wanted to write a review that should show changes for high ranks which they couldnt, this is a launch review because of what it covers and should be removed because its missleading saying nothing has changed. SS of r50 or the review is worth nothing.
And there are a few people with 25 posts or less on this particular thread defending it. I'm not attacking the community. I'm saying that MMORPG is being yelled at for waiting and then they review it and people complain. Then they complain they should have waited for yet another patch. Mind you this is patch 1.18 so following most intelligent version info.. they had 18! updates before this one.
And when you say new dev team, all they did was replace one director and bump everyone else on the SAME team up a notch.
I'm not trying to kill off any community. FFXIV actually has one of the more enjoyable communities (if you can get them talking). Not commenting or commenting on something is my prerogative as these are discussion forums. The patches are just that, patches. They change things, they fix things, and sometimes they break things, but any singular patch is definitely no miracle patch.
To be fair we don't really know that, that's just when they took those screenshots. Though by reading the article I don't think they got much beyond level 12 ish.
@Ikeda *points at my post count* I've been away a while but I used to a 5 star elite member. XD
They moves alot of the lead devs round and alot of the lower down devs will have been moved around just never got mentioned, it is a completly new team
For one, I said the next THREE patches. Not just 1.18.
@Ikeda: They had a bunch before, yes. But like I said, they had the old director and he wasn't doing well. Once they got the new director, more patches came out and more content has been worked on.
Hope you plan on doing a re-review soon. All of this will go out the window.
After logging into the game for 30 seconds (and even before when signing up for an account) you already encounter the elephant that is the menu-driven UI. The response time has definitely improved over time (Omfg it was bad. :D) but it's still something that you deal with every single time you want to do ANYTHING in the game. It rears it's sluggish and big head everytime.
After a minute you encounter combat and the Target-Click-Target style combat.
ROFL @ asking for a R50 review.
This is the Darkfall eurogamer review all over again.
Since you're now simply parotting Abiael from the official forums now, here's a direct quote from an R50 from there:
"If she leveled to 50 the game would get a score of 2 instead of 5 because only than she would grasp the full failure."
Anyways, no matter the score there would have been a mini little uprising from some portion of the community. The review and article is quite accurate for the game as it is now. 1.18, 1.19 and 1.20 is promising a lot of changes, but how they will fully turn out is currently unknown.
This weekend will hallmark the first, real step in the new development team's "rewriting," so we'll get a better idea of how it all goes from there on.
I think enough has been said at this point for any new players to all ready fully get and grasp that, so we'll see how it all goes from here.
Also, @ the comment about "trying to kill the FF14 community," ground yourself, will you? None of this will do anything to the community right now. Those of us who have chosen to stay in face of all the game's problems won't leave just because of some random forumites opinion or 3rd party site review.
Never got mentioned you say... then how do you know?
A quote from Square Enix on the changes: "[Organizational Changes to the Development Team]
To improve the service of FINAL FANTASY XIV, Square Enix has made the following changes to the development team:
Managerial Changes
Producer/Director
Naoki Yoshida
Section Leader Changes
Assistant Director
Shintaro Tamai (FINAL FANTASY X, Front Mission 5: Scars of the War)
Lead Game Designer
Nobuaki Komoto (FINAL FANTASY IX, FINAL FANTASY XI)
Lead Combat System Designer
Akihiko Matsui (FINAL FANTASY XI)
Technical Advisor
Yoshihisa Hashimoto (Next Generation Game Engine Development)
Lead Programmer
Hideyuki Kasuga (FINAL FANTASY XI, DIRGE OF CERBERUS -FINAL FANTASY VII-)
Senior Concept Artist
Akihiko Yoshida (FINAL FANTASY XII, Vagrant Story)
Lead Artist
Hiroshi Takai (FINAL FANTASY XI, THE LAST REMNANT)
Lead UI Designer/Lead Web Designer
Hiroshi Minagawa (FINAL FANTASY XII, Vagrant Story)
These members will make up the development team’s new core—a core dedicated to ensuring we achieve a level of enjoyability that will more than satisfy our customers. Under a schedule of more frequent version updates, the new leaders and their respective sections will strive for continued improvements to FINAL FANTASY XIV service operation and development.
Even if it would have given a lower rating no one can review a game in a couple of hours as I said if a game is crap then say its crap, but put your back into reviewing it and review it at a logical time (like after 1.18) and if its still crap then damn say its still crap.
Exactly. Just picking apart little pieces and changing subject every post in order to claim some "victories". A 50 by the name of Cichy posted that and it was immediately downplayed by Abiael. Pretty sure his POV of 50 is just as valid as his/hers. It just sounds like someone REALLY likes FFXIV and can't have anything bad said about it.
So what was the old list?
"This is Red 5; I'm going in"
Seeing as I can get a collector's edition for 20 bucks...
P.S. I'll try it out... but I seriously think I'm wasting my cash.
What do you mean "old list"? Those were just the new members they had placed in the FFXIV team...
As an mmo reviewer there should at least be a separate article for when the dungeons are released.
{mod edit}
They already promised a re-review.
If I knew the answers I probably would be giving you them instead of debating them. (or I'd be hiding them and conspirating!)
So they changed the Director yet only ADDED people.. no switching, add/removing, etc? All I ever heard of was the Director switching.
Not entirely sure. I think it was said somewhere that they completely changed those though. That's why it says "Changes" and not additions.
Please refrain from baiting or attacking other users.
I see. So they replaced the old ones with these new members/leaders. Besides the Director and the Lead Game Designer, I had forgotten about the other replacements.
So Rift got its review about a month after release. DCUO's was about three weeks later. Earthrise? Also about three weeks. Yet this one was spared the merciful killing blow for what's now approaching a year? Why the double standard? Is the fact that the title was so bad that you felt it was unfair to give it an honest review back when it actually meant something?
Apologies to those who enjoy it because my intent is not to offend you, but this game has become mostly irrelevant. It actually would have been a better thing to not even bother with the review at this point. It only confirms what most of us were safely assuming and ticks off those who number themselves fans.
Just do the reviews when the game comes out so the paying public can form some sort of opinion on whether or not it's worth an investment, even a meager one. You can always re-review later if the game undergoes fundamental changes to warrant it. A couple of weeks from now might have been a good time for just such a re-review.
When a game gets released, the product is on the market and it should be your job to give your readers a fair assessment of what's been put out there, clamoring for their gaming dollars. The kind of special treatment extended to this game only makes me wonder why an honest review was verboten all this time. Is someone in MMORPG's executive a big FF franchise fan?
And BOOM headshot. This is exactly why this review is coming out at a bad time. People who know nothing will take it as truth and post this ^^^.
No they are not fans, FF fans wouldn't post something so innacurate. :/
Log in for me and tell me what's so inaccurate about what was said here. :) New content aside (again, they're going to post a followup), it's all accurate.
I play all the time and I've already posted what I wanted/needed to say I'm not going to play your prove me wrong game sorry lol..
edit: Maybe innacurate was a bad choice of words, I'll give you that, how about incomplete? Misinformed?
Is there a better rationale for not exercising their due diligence and reviewing this title on the same type of schedule as every other? Someone stopped a review from coming out all this time. Someone made that call. I just want to know why.
The article already disclaimers the whole thing in the second paragraph. If you want to argue they should've added that a new patch was coming in a few days, I'd throw back that the review was written over a period of time. :)
From reading about MO/Darkfall and other games that launched like a IED, I wouldn't hold a reveiw on a supposed "mircle" patch either.
This game was extensivly betaed, then sold and launched as complete. The fact that they came back and said they wouldn't charge until it was fixed was good of them, but end state is it does not make up for the false start, nor the outlay of money from the people who bought it at its initial box price, vice the $0.11 its going for now.
Yes well honestly at this point so do I. The reasons they gave does not satisfy me one bit. Guesses are; they are posting it so they can post an updated review later outlining what's different, or they just don't care.
Personally I think it's the latter. But I guess we'll see.
edit: Yes an extensive beta where ALL the features complained about here were given MUCH feedback on and was never addressed and pushed aside by fans and the old dev team alike. Game launches, is a bad mess, SE goes WTH Tanaka where's your promised content and additiions? Tanaka's like I got nothing. Enters Yoshi: "Hmmm this whole thing's design is crazy, let's redo it!!"
10 months later, here we are. On the brink of things changing and no one who isn't actively following the game would never know because bloggers who haven't played the game since launch go ahead and post this!
Oh well... Here's to hoping there's a better assesment come winter/spring. And if not well there's better sites out there anyway. I'm not even sure why I posted all day today I swear this place is like crack.... Once you post you can't stoooop.
The problem with this review isn't that it is inaccurate. It's the suspect timing for it's release. If they wanted to blast this game for all it's flaws they should have done it months ago. There is no excuse you can give to any member of this games community for blast it like this a week before it is supposed to be completly overhauled.
Didn't SE asked to not review the game for some months? Maybe this one site decided to actually be nice and listen to them ;]
You can't escape, you know. You have to keep posting... for science.
I honestly don't understand the reviewer's scoring method. Are we using some type of grade school scoring where an 8 is average and a 5 is a fail? Shouldn't 5 be average? Why do game reviews have scoring grades where high numbers are average compared to say movie reviews which sit somewhere in the middle?
Honestly, this review score should have been much lower even with this odd scoring grade system. The only thing the reviewer liked about the game was the graphics, sound, and class switching system. The reviewer talks about the lack of polish, horrible UI, lack of content, and mechanics intentionally limiting the amount of content you can do per day. I don't see anywhere in this review aside from the graphics where points are being generated in FFXIV's favor, so I don't understand where the 5 points magically appeared.
If I were to rate the game based on this review it would probably be somewhere between a 1 and 2. I think the reviewer was being overly generous with rewarding points. When you can't talk about a single thing in the categories as a positive, where are the 4 or 5 points coming from?
Also, people who are expecting the patch to somehow remedy all the problems with the game (or at least boost it's score) are naive. Adding in a raid zone and autoattack won't fix issues with the game.
First off, at the time I feel it's impossible to make an encounter interesting with FFXIV's limited combat, because the entire system needs an overhaul. Animation locking is a thing of the past and makes combat unbelievably slow with little options for mobility. Class abilities need severe tweaking, as of right now you have to level almost all jobs to a certain point to acquire a powerful skill for raiding, but there are still many skills that serve no purpose for class mixing and even are terrible while you have that job set as primary.
The UI still requires 3X as much actions to get simple things done as in other MMOs and there is still lag present. Selling items which takes less than a minute in other MMOs could very well take over 10 in FFXIV. Finding an item you want by shifting retainers could take over an hour where it is a less than 3 minute process of an auction house search in another.
Then you have technical issues. What kind of modern PC game can you not alt tab out of fullscreen and back without crashing the client? The game runs poorly on some high end systems, and the patcher is such a nightmare to use that most people playing the game wind up manually installing patches.
Possibly true and not at all reassuring. That would only be evidence that their focus lays in catering to the interests of the publishers rather than serving the interests of their readers. I understand that advertising dollars make the world go 'round, but if you want to be a credible reviewer, you need to maintain some kind of impartiality. The game was on the market. People were buying boxes. They had an obligation to inform their readers about the game, despite the protestations of the company behind the debacle. And debacle it was. It's shameful that it's taken this long to acknowledge it. Also shameful is how unhelpful the review is at this point. It serves absolutely no useful purpose right now.
Even so, I hope this miracle patch actually performs a miracle for those of you hanging on to the game. I'm not out denigrade it unfairly. My problem is with the manner with which it has been handled by this site.
Hit it right on the head. This patch isn't going to be able to fix all of those problems with the game. Oh and if it magically was able to fix the UI issues, make combat more interesting, make it easier to buy and sell things, the game would still be devoid of content that can keep a person interested for more then an hour tops.
Aside from all the technical issues the little content that is there comes with loads of arbitrary rules that make it a pain for no reason at all. You know the whole not being able to do levequests as much as you might like is just kind of silly to me.
Very fair review.
I'm playing the game currently and am actually quite excited about changes they've been discussing very recently... though I'm less than thrilled about others.
In fairness to SE, they're currently in "hunkered down and get this sinking ship patched up and back on course" mode. They are very serious and very passionate about fixing the game, no question.
However, you can't score a game on "potential" or "intent". My personal feelings about the game and hopes for its future do not override the reality of what it state it's in right now. In that regard, I think Lori did a very fair job of reviewing that current reality. I think the score is pretty fair as well... I might have scored it a bit higher on a few details, but overall I agree with it.
The game is still very rough around the edges, it does still lack content and a variety of things to do overall, and it does still revolve far too heavily around leves, which become tiresome and repetitive before long.
As far back as late Beta (since I gave them the benefit of the doubt prior to that), it occured to me that SE didn't seem to have a real focus for FFXIV. FFXI, by comparison, always had a very strong "core", a very clear identity of what kind of game it was supposed to be, what kind of experience(s) it was supposed to provide. FFXIV lacks that and feels rather schizophrenic in a number of ways. I really hope part of SE's revamp is finding a core direction to take for it.
Anyway... there's always the re-review. Personally, I think the most appropriate time to re-review it will be some time after SE re-implements monthly subs. That will be the time at which, by their own measure, the game will be "complete" and ready enough for prime-time.
All in all, a very harsh, but very fair review.
naw, gotta dissagree. it's better than FF13, but that isn't saying anything.
It's an important patch that will (ostensibly) fix and improve things that need fixing and improving. It's an important step in the right direction.
It's not a miracle patch.
I just find it a little disturbing that it took this long to get a review....
Kinda do find it funny it comes right before a major patch. The timing of this review is suspect to say the least, as a con that is listed is the "Awkward Combat"... and from what I understand from patch notes and dev logs (I haven't played this game in a long while) that the combat system is getting a major overhaul.
I just don't get why the review waited until now.
I was part of the closed beta team that worked on befor it was the open beta...character creation, combat and camera controls were always a major gripe with me and the other testers. The had a nice basic contol system with old mmo the only real thing they cranked up to 11 positivly was the movies and graphics. Combat, Crafting and may other things were just made overly difficult and complex. I have to say making dedicated crafting classes was something new but found that they had no real way to level them effectively with out getting you pounded into snot...
So wait... you think this is the worst FF, meaning it's even worse than FF13, but the review wasn't fair? >.> I'm so confused.
Yeah, that is a good question when you think about it.
They waited all this time, almost a year, to do a review. With a significant patch that addresses at least one of the complaints in the review coming in a matter of days, and another major patch coming (as I understand it) next month... Why not wait a couple more months so you can say "hey, you know what... this game was really in horrible shape since its launch, but they've put out a couple major patches that really seem to be taking it in the right direction." Of course, that is assuming the reviewer found the changes to be improvements in the first place.
Perhaps it was deliberate in order to get a "base score" of the game before SE's new team starts to really start implementing all the changes, so that a re-review down the road will have a bit more context.
I mean, all these past months have really entailed the new team getting into place, getting changes on the drawing board, getting things designed, developed and so forth.... It's been "behind the scenes work". The fruit of all that time and effort, however, is going to now be implemented starting with 1.18. It's "go time", in other words. So, if you're going to get a base score for "how the game is now", right now would be the last opportunity to do so.
I still think it's a fair review for how the game is right now, but I can also agree that the timing is rather odd.
Just had to say, this review seems very anti Square. Complaining about paying for more char slots when all you need is 1 char who can do everything btw. Docking points for visuals!??!? Its the most technically beautiful MMO today. Its fine if its not your preferred art style but you can't argue its not great looking. So what they re used some monsters/ scenery. Don't act like every other game doesn't use a palette swap for new monsters too.
Clunky UI , slow combat, unituitive way of selling crap I can agree with, but to dock its graphics is just silly.
To people complaining about crafting, its not that complicated once you know what to do.
How many of these "important patches" will we need before we get a fun, playable game with a decent amount of content to compete with other MMOs on the market? By the time enough of these patches hit, FFXIV will be completely irrelevant, and newer MMOs will be blowing it out of the water.
Is the reviewer suppose to hold off reviewing the game for another 2 years, because every month an important patch "gaurenteed" to fix various problems with the game is coming? How many of these important patches are we suppose to wait for?
Limitations are a problem in MMOs. Putting in artifical limitations like leve limits and surplus is just silly where MMOs are suppose to inheritly have more freedom. The game designers just don't seem to value our time at all. Even travel, after running out of anima, which recharges way too slowly in a game like this, is a tedious process. Doing simple actions is a tedious process. Nearly everything in the game just wastes the player's time needlessly AND you have limitations on top of that which prevent me from doing what little content the game has to offer.
If leves being the only path people take for the fast possible progression is a problem, limiting them is not the solution. Instead, they could have come up with more appropiate solutions, like decreasing EXP and rewards gained from leves to be more in line with other content (or better yet, increasing rewards gained from grinding and removing surplus altogether, allowing players to level at whatever pace they want with whatever content they want). Instead, now you have a situation where most of the players that they have left do the limited number of leves per day (roughly ~1 hour of work every 36 hours) and log off the rest of day. Worse yet, if you grow tired of leves you really don't have much else to do. Grinding is extremely slow progression.
Considering the game is ment to be Pay to Play, i don't think there should be a review until they start charging you money as was first intended, they have already admitted it isn't what they wanted and "Poor" reviews are useless until they say "It's good enough" Then people's opinion would actually mean something.
My opinion, i have played it since launch, and i like it just as much as FFXI, the learning curve is steep, you're not going to learn a Final Fantasy game within a few hours, that's just how it is, and it's not for lazy people who arn't willing to learn more than button 1,2, 3.
/waits for review when you're charged money
How are you going to re-review the game before it gets any of its big patches that fix the game? You are trying to make this game fail and you rating for this game at the time being is unjust and unfair.
I'm just going ahead and requoting that because this really should be read a few more times...XD
Lol, at least you got out of it with 14.99, I played beta..decided it was alright because I didn't get to far..bought the collectors edition because I liked it so much, and the visuals and ideas, then played for like 4 days and was like, wtf? 80 dollars gone.
I just ran out and got my CE for 14 bucks. :-) Was very excited to see one in the area. For 14 bucks, just having a digipass makes it worth that much for me.
I would be the first to agree with that but I have to argue that - why are we cutting SE a break on this when evry other game out would be ripped to pieces if its fans "just wait until the patch improves things"?
Shouldn't the game have launched with this patch? Shouldn't the game have been in this supposed better state when it launched?
When has it become okay for a game company to launch a sub-standard product only to say "we will fix it later" and all the sudden its ok?
Or is the state of the genre such that this is okay and we are lemmings running off the cliff, chasing the next big thing, willing to pay for anything in any state, with only a promise that it will get better.
I, for one, demand better and thinks a game should be in a finished and acceptable state when its launched. I do not wait for games to be fixed (games with the issues like FFXIV - somethings are acceptable and understandable). That is not being on a high-horse, that is simply demanding a quality service for the transaction involved.
I do not care when the review should have ben posted, why its posted now, what patch is coming and how its supposedly going to make the game better. FFXIV launched poorly and the critical reception (across the board) has been luke-warm at best.
MMORPG.com's review is just another review of a game that had potential and failed to live up to it....and that part remains true no matter when the review was written.
If you had followed the thread you'd know that we're not arguing wether the game deserves the score, I tink we all agree on that, we're arguing why it's coming NOW???
Only my first paragraph was directed at you. I'm sorry if I used quotes and confused you. The rest of the post was directed at various other posts above. I have no good method to directly quote multiple posts here.
They've come out and said it, yet there really hasn't been much in the way of improvements coming. Changes to the EXP system which make grinding much slower and boring (going from things that were tough to fight to two shotting doblyns for SP), addition of NMs which are uninteresting encounters, changes to crafting which made some professions more difficult to level.
You use typical agruements like, "if it's too long to wait, then move on". I'm sorry, but if everyone moves on except SE's most zealous fanboys, and especially with new MMOs from major developers in the future on the horizon, FFXIV is doomed to fail before the game becomes a complete game, not the husk of a game it is now. I'm asking how long you fanboys are willing to wait before you accept the reality that the game will never improve to a state where it becomes the triple A quality game it was meant to be. Maybe it will survive on it's death throes by it's overly ardent fanbase, but it's a shame SE released the game in the state it is and I personally think they should scrap this money sink before it kills their company.
I still think it's completely naive to think otherwise. They gave monthly updates and interviews with Tanaka in charge too. Do you really think Yoshi is going to somehow pull this game from the ashes like a Phoenix? I've already moved on from the game months ago, my posts are directed at the fanboys claiming this review isn't fair because a patch is coming (which many believe is a miracle patch, no I'm not talking directly at you here), just like the many other patches that came before it. If that were the case then you couldn't review any MMO until long after it was dead.
I hope she doesn't read these replies, because it won't change how bad of a game this was.
The patch won't do anything for it. Plain and simple. Waiting for it would have accomplished nothing except people saying "But the plans for the next patch are GREAT!"
And if it's "So improved" already....lol
"You can't please everyone" - Edmund Burke (1729-1797)
"You don't know what you got, 'til it's gone" - Ben Franklin (1706-1790)
"Enjoy what you have, not what you expect them to be" - Richard Trench (1807-1886)
Any game that relies on miracles patches isnt good to start off...
So no, even if they release 400 miracle patches the game will still suck at its core, because the problem is there, and the core of a game can't be changed without changing the game itself..
The game has been out a year now and SE charges for it. How long is the review to be postponed before it's okay to evaluate it?
People can take this review and compare it to post patch and see how it's been improved, but unless the upcoming patch is a miracle patch then it won't make that huge of a difference in the evaluation. For the rest of us (those who aren't hardcore FF fans) the review is valuable.
I would point out that STO was recently reviewed in a failry harsh light, right before an upcoming patch, and people criticised the review in a similar manner. The patch hit, the game improved I guess, but not significantly for anyone to come point out that improvement. If anything there were a few that pointed out it was better that the game was reviewed before because the patch was buggy. Again, how long, how many patches, and how many updates must be issued before a game can be reviewed?
The bottom line here is that the game is released and SE is collecting revenue. Anytime is a good time for a review at that point. There is no reason any released title shouldn't have a review published.
yep i beta tested this game briefly and was shocked that yes they still managed to have a terrible UI, which considering how bad FFXI 's was that terribad. This game though is probably worse than FFXI which is almost amazing in and of itself botton line review is spot on , just walk away ......
I haven't logged in in quite some time, but this was exactly what I had to say. I beta'd, bought the CE and while I was disappointed, I still haven't given up hope on this game. Yeah, they rushed it out and it wasn't ready, but with the work they've put into it, it's come a long way. With 1.18, while I don't expect it to magically fix the game, it should certainly improve it A LOT. With all of the changes inc, I was a bit surprised to check the site today and finally see a review... Seriously? As a writer, why would you waste your time and write a review that's meaningless in such a short amount of time especially when the game has been out for so long now? Sure, they put a disclaimer at the beginning of the piece, but still, seriously?
"Rumor has it that auto attack, and a serious overhaul of the combat system, is coming in the upcoming patch."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGmUoY7Gqzc&feature=player_embedded
Cya credibility.
Stating things are rumours, that have been posted on the official site, is another great example they don't.
I have to wonder how bad a game has to be to get below a 5.0. There have been many conversations about how scores are skewed so heavily to the top of the rating system, and yet a game that isn't even worth 14.99 to the reviewer is getting 5.1 which, if the rating system had any sense of all, would mean there is just a tad bit more right than the wrong with the game. I know that is not the case sense most games barely get below a 7 and are considered terrible but geeze... 5.1 for pretty graphics and music? This is not my opinion, this is just me reading the review and wondering how the score and the review don't reflect each other.
They reviewed STO right before a patch. Go over and see the comments after the patch. Do you really think this patch is going to be such an improvement the game will suddenly be fun? It doesn't matter if they review it before or after the patch, the game play isn't going to change that signficantly. If the flaws in the game are really that deep it's going to take more than a miracle patch to change that.
These reviews aren't really for the people playing, they are for the rest of us who might consider playing. The reviewer might catch some flack from fans who don't like what they hear or when it was reviewed, but they would be crucified by the masses if they let a review slide until after patch and then gave them a pass because it was "improved" compared to before.
If a game isn't up to speed I would really rather know that before I waste my time and money. I want to know what isn't working just as much as I would like to know what's good out there. Would it really make you feel better for them to wait a few weeks until a patch is out and still say the game sucks? I have serious doubts that reviewing after a patch is going to make that big of a difference.
I'll also point out that anyone here can write a review after the patch goes live and let us all know how the game has improved. That's part of the new review system. So there really isn't a reason to wait to pump out the reviews in my opinion.
I'm glad you don't like the current system because they're changing it very soon. :) It's been the topic for much controversy over the years.
You are exactly correct. Had they given the game a good score on a review post-patch, it would be ripped to shreds, given the poor reception of the game to date.
A couple other points:
This review was probably weeks or months in development, then the writing, then the editing and the the posting. It did not happen over night. Most likely MMORPG.com had the review and wanted to be sure to get it up before the patch hit so the reviews is for the game that was actually reviewd. HAd they waited, the review would be innacurate and not about the game that was reviewed. Hence, the caveat at the start about upcoming patches. They are aware of the situation and are taking it into account but there is no need for someone's work to go to waste just because a patch is coming soon.
Also the phrase "rumor has it" is a common expression. Sure they could have said "According to the website" or "in the patch notes", etc.....but the reviewer chose the expression they did. it amazes me how someone takes one little comment, one little expression and then uses that choice to try and discredit and insult an entire review.
"Rumor has it that auto attack, and a serious overhaul of the combat system, is coming in the upcoming patch. I truly hope this proves accurate"
I think adding "I truly hope this proves accurate" sort of takes away from it being just a saying, and emphasizes the rumour part. It truly is accurate, if you look at the official site.
True although the rumor of a change has been right along with it. I guess I will believe it when I see it.
Either way, I'd love to know how this computed to a 5.1 in the old system, specifically how the polish section even got a 4.0... i thought music and graphics was covered in another section.
But how many times have we seen something promised that is not delivered or even stuff in patch notes that a layer post says didn't make it.
It seems the reviewer hopes this stuff is in the patch but it cannot be confirmed or official until the patch drops and its there or not. Again, it wouldnt be my first choice or words but I get what the reviewer was wanting to say and its context is fine.
I do think the review was made some time ago, but it is a fair assessment of the game as it stands, sure there is the first of the game changing patch this week, it adds a bit of content and auto-attack. I do just wish for a ps3 re-review when that launch and then we will see.
I am keeping tabs of the game and some of the changes looks promising, the fact that the armory system is stll there (one weapon = one class) and supposed to stay there is iffy a bit. I will note that I wam waiting for the PS3 release and hoping there will be a new server to start fresh, that is one decision that SE took to overhaul almost the whole game and keeping the server open that I don't like. I don't want to play in a bloated economy where everything is overpriced by the lvl 50 crafters.
They need to reduce the time it takes to kill a MOB, and scrap the SHITTY market ward system for a REAL auction house. This would do wonders for making the game more fun.
Thankfully the community manager recognized that my ban wasn't justified, so let's kick some misconceptions out of the way. Shall we?
-If a reviewer knows that there's a major patch incoming just a few days from the publishing of his review. Then he simply holds the review back. They waited 10 months to review this game, 4 days aren't going to kill anyone.
This is not because the game may be better or worse than what is described in the review, but simply because the game will become DIFFERENT from what is described. A major change in the combat system, the addition of a sizable amount of content and more makes for quite a big difference. No journalist with a shred of integrity would knowingly post a review that will become obsolete and potentially misleading four days after. It's that simple.
In the case the patch doesn't deliver? Great. They can just post the review as is four days later (biiig deal), and everyone wins.
-There are clear reasons to believe that this reviewer didn't even play the game enough to get a valid impresson of it. ALL the pictures included in the article clearly come from the very early game (maximum a couple hours in). Now, either she's extremely lazy in taking picture of a game (that I could justify on a console, but on PC? where taking pictures is EXTREMELY easy?), or she didn't play the game more than a few hours and went to cherry pick around forums to copy/paste some rants that she could reuse.
Now, she might have nailed some vaild complaints, but a review isn't just a list of complaints. A gaming journo's duty is to extensively play a game for himself and THEN list the pros and cons, not cherry pick on forums to save time.
-The reviewer doesn't even know how to *technically* write a review. Seriously, lumping up the *functionality* of the UI with the graphics and going as far as using it as an excuse to lower the aesthetics score? That's fairly chuckle-worthy.
-If the review was written weeks or even months ago, then even more reason to scrap it without publishing. You simply do NOT publish an old MMORPG reviews, chances are that it'll be outdated, and this one is.
-This review is full to the brim with hyperbole. Every single negative point is extremized and dramatized with tabloid-like emphasis. That's not how you write a review. That's how you write a rant on a random blog. It flies in the face of any concept of a fair assessment of a game's pro and cons, and it gives the reader a faked impression of the game. If someone is so poor at getting concepts across that he needs such a widespread use of hyperbole, then he shouldn't work as a gaming journalist, that's really all there's to it.
Ultimately, this is one of the poorest reviews i've read in a while, and it's sad to see some people bending over twice to defend it. Unfortunately if the internet has thaught me together, are new and extensive meanings for the definition of "devil's advocate":
Too bad that the market wards system as it is now works pretty much exactly like an auction house, with more flexibility added as customers can also simply windows-shop (auction houses discourage impulse purchases, which are a very important part of any healthy economy) and see the 3D looks of the items they buy directly on a character.
I would agree that the wards as initially conceived were pretty poor, but at the moment they lack nothing than an auction house has. Demanding an "auction house" just beause it's named "auction house" is simply silly, and it would do nothing to "make the game more fun".
After reading a bunch of people rabbidly defending against this "unfair" review (that personally I find quite generous on the score side), I suddenly remembered another game that is defended before every single patch...
Anyone care to guess what MMO I'm thinking about? YES, IT'S Mortal Online!
I'm in utter disbelief that someone would say a review should wait MORE, for a patch.
if the review already waited for ten months (which demonstrates that they are in no hurry at all to review the review itself) and the patch is very sizable, it only takes a slight amount of logic to understand that it should be delayed.
I'm in utter disbelief that someone would think that releasing a review that has a very high chance to become irrelevant and misinformative after four days is in any way justifiable.
I read review, I waited some time for this how game improved since release. After reading the review I assumed the game is still bad as it was at release, too bad SE. Review after so all this time and review is exact the same as it was at release. I hoped this one will be good, I am giving hands off ffxiv game then. Need to look at something else. Ty for review, waited so long.
As reviewer said :
Two words: Look elsewhere. I simply will not recommend this title to anyone.
Review reminded how bad game is. I wonder why I had false hopes for this game. Time to move on.
Just another piece of evidence of the detrimental effects of poor gaming journalism, of which this review is a clear example.
http://www.play-mag.co.uk/opinion/games-journalism-is-broken-mainly-because-its-not-all-written-by-automatons/
Here's a nice piece for you to read, Abriael.
Enjoy.
Why should it wait? You obviously haven't read any of the thread and have only charged in to correct opinions and views different from what you want to see. As has been asked before why should the review wait after the game has been out a year and the company is collecting revenue from it? There is no reason. If the game had just been released, then maybe waiting for a patch would make sense, but as it stands, I can see no reason to wait.
Just to point out again, STO had a patch coming out right after its review and the same complaint was raised. That patch didn't deliver the miracle and the review still stands as valid.
Another reason that the review shouldn't be witheld is because under the current review system anyone can post a review. So if you want a review "post patch" to compare game improvements over this review then you're free to do so. I noticed you were very critical of the reviewers journalistic capacity, well now you're free to try your hand at that yourself and provide your own review. If you dont' like this review, create your own.
No. Gaming journalism is broken because people use strawman arguments like the one you cited in order to slap out poorly conceived editorials and fill their shift.
There's a big difference between being an automaton and writing a completely cold description of a game, and writing a solid review strongly based on fact, fairly assessing a game's pros and cons, while still adding one's personal opinion.
A review is not an opinion piece, it's a mix between fact and opinion.
This review is tainted not by opinion, but by the widespread use of hyperbole. Hyperbole has nothing to do with opinion.
Opinion comments on reality and complements it by explaining a subjective point of view. Hyperbole warps reality. There's a whole world of difference there.
Quoting you from the official FFXIV forums about this review's post.
"A review is not an opinion piece. A rant is an opinion piece (and a poor one). A review needs to be solidly based on facts. Not on hyperbole. On facts."
You are basically contradicting yourself here. In this discussion on this site you are saying opinions in reviews are allowed... yet on the FFXIV forums you say that they can only be comprised of facts? How embarrassing.
It's not written by professionals either. I take no issue with the score, it isn't the score I would give it but it's in line with other reviews of the game in its current state. There is certainly plenty to be critical of, the company itself has admitted such and that is why much of it is changing.
The issue I take was how horribly it was written. There was literally no useful analysis of the game's systems contributed by this article, and the reviewer's knowledge of the game was that of someone who had played maybe to level 5-10 if even that. More than likely she played the game 2 days, the whole lead into the article "she has been spending a lot of time" is a total lie. If she truly had been playing this whole time surely she would have had something more substantial to say about the game.
{mod edit}
On the most points, i agree with this Review. I started with the Pre-Launch Pack and i was full of so much hope in this Title. I played like 3 or 4 Days and i feeled allready pissed off, by creating my Account on the Website. It tooks like over an Hour, to fucking figure out, WTF 2 DO there... After sucsessfull registration, i still wasnt sure, i did all correct, specially about the final coasts.
Anyway, after logging in, everything doesnt fit and feels well. Questing becomes booring in less then 2 Hours or something, controlling sucks like Hell and Graphicperformance, even on Medium or Low, sucked.
Maybe Today there some Fixes made, im not sure. I feld in too deep depression about FFXIV, that i never followed anything, anymore.
/cheers
You're the one that didn't read the thread. They shouldn't have waited at ALL. They should have posted their review at release (after a reasonably short time to actually experience the game), and then, if warranted, post a re-review when and if the game gets updated so much to deserve a second look.
The fact that the silly choice of positing a review right before a major patch has been made for another game, and that that reviewer has been lucky that his piece didn't become obsolete and misleading because that particular patch didn't deliver doesn't change the concept that posting a review right before there are big chances for it to become misleading and obsolete is unprofessional.
LOL. There's a big difference between an official review officially published and endorsed by a site and a simple user review.
But no worries, I'm going to write a full re-review of the game (not here of course, but on the site I work for, I have no reason to contribute to one with such poor standards) when such a thing will be relevant.
There are two times in which a review of a MMORPG is relevant. One is a reasonably short amount of time after it's release, the other is after sizable updates created the conditions to give the game a second look with different results.
That's why I'm currently to re-reviewing Eve Online and Age of Conan, both had very relevant and game-changing additions recently, and they're worth an updated look. None of them has very relevant updates coming shortly, so a reviewing them now won't result in something that will be outdated and mislading in just a few days.
When the same conditions will apply to Final Fantasy XIV, then it'll be justifiable to post a review so long after release.
Ah, the usual, trite method of misconstruing someone's points when one isn't able to counter them in their original form... how embarassing..
let me explain some *basic* english to you. Something BASED on facts isn't necessarily made ONLY of facts.
FACTS need to be the solid foundation upon which a review is based. Then opinion can be added over that foundation.
In no way or form this means that opinion in a review isn't allowed. That's a clear misrepresentation of my point on your part.
Hyperbole, on the other hand, is not an opinion. Opinions are a complement to facts. Hyperbole is a misrepresentation of facts.
if you want to try and counter my arguments,by all mean do so, but counter *my arguments*, not your personal misrepresentation of them.
{mod edit}
To get back on topic, i.e. the review: regardless of the content, which really doesn't seem to be the biggest problem with most people defending the game right now, timing of the review seems to have ruffled everyone's jimmies to the point where they feel the reviewer and mmorpg.com are conspiring against Square Enix and their game. It's absolutely ridiculous that they're treating this as a conspiracy.
Tried this during the beta phase. One of the absolute worst games I have ever tried. That it sold a single copy is absolutely baffling. Beyond amateurish from start to finish. Absolute crap.
The problem isn't that you're stalking. I sure have nothing to hide.
The problem is that you openly and blatantly misrepresented my argument since you couldn't counter it in it's original state. Which is rather sad indeed.
Because of course your experience in *beta* is sooo relevant to the state of the game a year after, right? :D
The only reason it sold at all was because people like myself were suckered in to thinking they'd take any feedback seriously from the alpha/beta stages and fix the game up for launch.
But nope.
The game ended up selling for dirt cheat on amazon not too long ago (not sure if it is now, haven't bothered to check) for like £3 or so. I wish I'd bought it then instead of the £40+ Collector's Edition.
This game is the very definition of buyer's remorse.
I agree with the first scenario. They probably didn't care.
It's probably taken this long for the review to come because they just simply have had no one willing to play the game in order to submit some form of review for it. The fact that someone indeed did play the game then submit a review for the game, in itself, is praise worthy, regardless of whether it was well written or not.
Too bad that the pictures included in the article put the "indeed did play the game" part under serious doubt.
A gaming journalist that reviews a PC game normally puts a little effort in taking snapshots from a few different parts of the game, at different stages of gameplay, instead of hurriedly grabbing a handful of pics from the first hour of gameplay, when their character is level 1. It makes the article looks better and more professional.
This article looks more like an ill-conceived copy-paste of hyperbolic complaints taken from the forums than an actual review coming from someone that actually played the game.
You are placing an actual definition of "playing the game" I see?
The reviewer indeed made a character and took screenshots, as you said. Does this not consititute playing the game? They also discussed leve quests... so they must have done some of those too, right? The game also launches you in to your first story quest, so the reviewer played through that too, right?
No matter what rules of "playing the game" you place on other people, this reviewer indeed played the game.
I was part of the FFXIV forum community for nearly a year before the games release, honesly the best forum community ive seen yet, and played the game for bout 2 weeks, i saw the fail coming but didnt wanna admit it.
This review really sums up everything of FFXIV to date, so thank you, they should just abandon FFXIV and go back to focus on FFXI.
Such a shame :(
Ah, more strawman arguments, I see.
The elements you listed can easily be read on a forum or anywhere else on the internet.
Reviewing a game, and especially one as complex as a MMORPG requires quite a lot more "playing the game" than just installing it, creating a character, and strolling around for a hour or two.
There was no straw man argument being made. Please look up what this means (as well as hyperbole) before placing the word in almost every single post you make.
As I have previously said, the reviewer has played the story quest, gone through their leve quests and has taken the time to do all of these in each city.
That constitutes having played the game, not just "strolling around".
If you are so sure people were willing to make a review for the game nearer to the launch date for this site then why wasn't there one made?
I see zero evidence of any of that in the article. She made no reference to the main storyline only implied taht guildleves were quests (they are not) and that they had weak uninteresting plots that were weakly woven together. This is not accurate at all of the main storyline. The problem with the main storyline is that it does not make up a very large portion of the content at this point, however in this week's patch and the implementation of the grand companies we will get more lore/story fitting in with the overall grand arching conflict between the city states of Eorzea+beastman and primals versus the Garlean Empire.
She mentioned none of this because she didn't really play it or even spend 5 minutes doing research on the game (hell 5 seconds visiting the lodestone would have done wonders to clear up some of the false information she included in her review)
Get sick of people thinking that their experience in beta / the first few weeks = up to date.
Evidence that the reviewer started a character in all three cities:
"The opening cinemas for the three starting lands are impressive, I won’t deny that."
Evidence that the reviewer played the tutorial story quests:
"In fact, the quest which begins during this tutorial phase is a great example of what awaits players: Monotonous running around, lukewarm cut scenes"
Maybe you should look them up, as the use of those two definition is perfectly fitting to this case.
You're misrepresenting and misconstruing my arguments, arguing against such misrepresentation instead of them (because you can't counter them in their original form and content), which is a by-the-book strawman argument.
The review overdramatizes and overemphasizes almost all the negative points listed, which is again a by-the-book example of widespread use of hyperbole, that is a misrepresentation of reality.
Played the story quest? Then why didn't she post pictures of the story quest past the very few cutscenes that you get before entering the game proper? Gone through leve quests? Where's the evidence of that?
Nothing proves that she did actually play the game further than strolling around a couple hours, while the choice of pictures quite evidently shows that either she's been extremely lazy, or she simply didn't go beyond that. In both cases they definitely undermine the credibility of this review.
Aside from the fact that that is no "evidence", as she could write that the sky is orange, even if we decided to just go ahead and do a leap of faith trusting what she writes, that costitutes less than a couple hours of gameplay, which is nowhere near what's needed to review a game, let alone a MMORPG.
Mate, you're digging your own grave.
When I said each city, I meant making a new character in each one to see how they differed in terms of story and cut scenes.
Also I gather you're getting the character's level from the screenshots? That might have been their level at that time but after some guildleves that would have gone up considerably.
None of the screenshots show the reviewer's character's name so we couldn't do a lodestone lookup to check this so we cannot be certain either way but I will not outright believe they are lying without proof stating otherwise.
I think I lasted a month. That was at least 6 months ago. I see nothing has changed.
Oh, a lot has changed. This review is simply a misrepresentation of the current state of the game, while your post is just another example of the detrimental effects of that kind of misrepresenting reviews.
Nevermind.
Eh, unfortunately this forum is poorly coded and the so called "enhanced editor" makes it very hard to do so effectively. I use the BBML editor to do so, but can't demand everyone to do it.
The lack of fluid fast paced lip numbing combat turns me off. But when everything comes into play, I'd have to say this is my least favorite mmorpg of all time.
Lame saying is lame.
Friday is the start of the big revamp for this game. Including a combat overhaul...
Dare I say Friday will be the final straw...
I already talk players online, they say they will leave if the overhaul is failure..
The combat overhaul every fan boi is harping about... it's auto attacking...
Yea, sad.
Face it, the game is the same piece of trash that it was on release.
And about the patch, I have NEVER EVER saw a wonder patch, in any game.
Sure, I can write a bunch of titles that claim that are preparing a wonder patch. But no such thing exists! It NEVER existed!
So, I should believe that SE, that launched a game that was so bad that I quit while testing it (so I couldn't bare playing/testing it for free), will get themselves together and release the grand-daddy of all patches. Seriously? You people are naive, if you believe that.
What about the actual maps in the game? Are you gonna claim that they are not copy/pasted from small premade pieces, and put together in a big "deja-vu"-puzzle? Is there a patch for that too?
Only thing good about this game was the pretty graphics. Other than that it was one of the worst games I ever played. I agree with some ppl 5/10 is generous.
Feel bad for those people in japan, but this game came out before that disaster and I'm not gonna cut them a break and imma speak my opinion. The game sucks. You need to change the whole thing around or just get rid of it.
Think I may try and go check it out to see if I notice much of a difference. Last time I played it was the same thing over and over. Pick up a few cards go do a few kill quests and that was all there was to do. Very boring.. maybe it has changed, I hope that's the case because like other people said it was boring and tedious.
No one is calling it a "wonder patch" it's laying the foundation.
And yes....... there is full map and zone overhauls coming in future, so there is a patch for that. They have already realized the issues with the maps / zones, and are doing full overhauls.
Just another example of people who played during Beta / the initial release, and have no idea the new direction and shape the game is talking.
"What about the actual maps in the game? Are you gonna claim that they are not copy/pasted from small premade pieces, and put together in a big "deja-vu"-puzzle? Is there a patch for that too?"
In one of the interviews, the producer even admitted that they copied and pasted some parts of the world.
I really have to disagree with you there. A week ago I loged in, it took me good few minutes to figure out how to kill a mob. So the UI is still just as horrandous.
Yeah, admitted they are aware of the shitness of some of the maps, and informed us that they are doing full zone redesigns on these.
Yes there is actually.
Here is some information on it from the producer himself:
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/12971-One-to-Fifty-One-Zone-Long-OP?p=186771&viewfull=1#post186771
It's called research.
Dude, after almost a year or so, if we're still complaining about UI, than I would call this bad progress. And if as little thing as UI has not been fixed in a year, than when are we going to see the world re-disign?
What are you disagreeing with? I wouldn't call it "horrandous" and it's definitely less shit if you use a controller.
The game sucks harder than a collapsed star!
And the review pretty much sums up my feelings about most Square Enix games at the moment. I just really REALLY hope Deus Ex is the one exception to that rule...
I was just thinking that I was thinking that that ------
WHY DID THE PRODUCERS THINK THEY COULD GET AWAY WITH IT AND EVERYONE WOULD LOVE A UNFINISHED GAME?
Who said they got away with it? The original producer did get the shitcan... so...? The game is free still, while they attempt to save it.
If it was actually his fault, or the big boss rushing him, who knows. I don't like the game in it's current state, I definitely don't love it, but I've been playing since release, and I like the new direction.
To sum all this up:
- The map is TO BE FIXED..
- The quest system is TO BE FIXED..
- The UI is TO BE FIXED..
- The combat is TO BE FIXED..
... are we still talking about a game? What game? Where is the game? I only see a list of things.. TO BE FIXED..
Not sure on your point? I was simply pointing out your statement about the maps had already been addressed, making you look a bit silly for making statements before doing the slightest amount of research.
Along with the review calling confirmed facts, rumors.
I find it funny you hate this game with a passion, and still post here. Get over it, the old producer got fired, as well as other lead managers. The new ones can't come in and be like "OH WELL, WE OVERHAULED ALL THINGS ALREADY HERE YOU GO!!"
It takes time, give them time. They are already beginning the revamp process this friday. If you hate this game so much, leave it be and MOVE ON.
Like how FFXIV is just another piece of evidence of the detrimental effects of poor game development?
What excuse would the FFXIV apologists have come up with if the review came out a month or two after the upcomming patch and it still got a low score?
Personally I would give it a thumbsup, and not be playing the game any longer, if their second attempt fails.
This game is piece of trash and review 10 months after release proves it.
I've gotta agree with the point you made. This game should have been reviewed about a month after release, back when it was relevant and if enough had been change/improved since then; MMORPG.com could have easily done a re-review, like they do with other games. This review really serves no purpose but to insight the fans of the game. It's not as if anyone is clamouring to read a review that says pretty much the same thing we have known for months, unless it's the kind of person who wants to validate the thoughts, they share with the reviewer.
{mod edit}
Originally posted by fiontar
Not really, they have actually retained a full development staff (after restructuring), and have multiple teams working on both the revisions and content. However because they are doing major revisions to just about the entire game the foundations of that have to be built from the ground up. Now that we are getting 1.18, 1.19, and 1.2 they will have much of that foundation and have stated that future updates bringing more content will be more frequent.
The game is not on lifesupport no matter how many of you want to try and pretend it is. The difference between this game and many other MMO's with a bad launch is that this Square Enix is still commited to putting in the resources and talent to salvage and re-release the game.
Just one thing !
To do a review Before a great major uptade content this is really stupid.
( its mean total bashing of a bad starting game, / wich they try to get more interesting and you guys gave hope down to every1 , btw i never played that game and i will wait before playing it until they think the game is worth and made the player pay for it )
kind of a pointless review, anyone with half a brain knew of this games failure (and it sucks right now) so much so that the lead devs got replaced and the games free and basicly back in beta. A review this late in, right before some of the major changes is pretty pointless.
If you have any intrest in the game you already have the pc version (its stupid cheap already) or your wating on the actual release, which is the PS3 version.
Just review it again a little after that.
LOL It took MMORPG.com almost a year after the game's launch to review it, and fanboys whine that they should have waited for another patch? Cry more.
Lurker here (that almost never posts anything), but this one is gonna get me out from behind the bushes.
This review is far FAR too lenient on Final Fantasy XIV. FFXIV is absolutely, beyond a shadow of a doubt, the worst, most inept, hellish trainwreck of an MMO to EVER be released for public consumption. Especially considering the expectations and pedigree. When I bought it, the conclusion I inevitably came to is that the developers of this game had clearly (a) never played an MMO in their lives, and (b) were shockingly incompetent. If everyone associated with developing this game in any way, shape, or form as not been fired by now (and blacklisted in the industry); it's a crime.
Avoid this game like the plague. Worst--MMO--ever. Period.
Between "needing fine tuning" and "not playable" is NOT a fine line, not at all.
Yeah.. I'm a hater, right? :))
Every time someone doesn't share the bliss of some failure, he's a hater. I guess the whole freaking world of mmo gaming is made of haters, because only a hand-full of you actually believe the crap you preach.
lol, I don't hate on any game, I keep to the facts.. and Prior to the wave of F2P most MMO releases came hand in hand with server crashes every 5 mins and a massively broken UI. Just cause I called you out in a FFXIV thread doesn't mean I'm blindly supporting the game it's a broken POS. Personnally i do hope it gets good if not only so I dont have to look at those crap graphics and hideous cartoon style characters in every other MMO.
Actually, some of the best launches occurred in the early 2000s. DAOC, COH launches were almost perfect. EQ2 launched well but had some serious graphic requirements. SWG had a decent launch. Bad launches (outside of AO) are a very recent phenomenon with MMO's....mainly because games either are revamped at the last minute to compete with WOW or rushed out the door to compete with WOW.
I think the review score is fair at this point, but my issue with this review is that it reads like it was written at least two months ago. It's important that information is up to date, because what you might not view as favorable, might interest another person.
On the same token, even if the score would not have changed, writing a review 4 days before a major patch just seems illogical at best. As others have stated, your information will then be very outdated. It honestly does not sound like the reviewer really knew anything about the patch, other than updates were coming.
Even better, in the next couple of months, the game is scheduled to receive most to all of those changes the developers have been working on for the last 10 months, at which point, this review will be completely obsolete.
I do hope you plan to release a more accurate and updated review then.
Well I haven't played since the week of release. Even before 1.18 it is definily better than it was but it hasn't changed alot. More mobs and at various levels is about the biggest thing so far that I noticed up to rank 10. Ranking up also seems to go faster in general. There are a few more side quests and the quest givers now have thought bubbles over their heads. UI lag is definitly way down. As for anything beyond rank 10 I couldn't say.
I understand wanting to change core mechanics before content so I will forgive the continued lack of content. It is definitly an issue but they seem to be headed in the right direction. I would like to see them dump the timers in general and specifically the timer limiting the number of levequests you can do. Leves are, as far as I can tell, the major way of bringing gil into the economy. Much like missions are for Eve. Putting these basic cash generating mission on a strict limit continues to be FFXIV most fundamental design flaw. Are they scared people will stop doing crafting or gathering? Well then that should indicate a problem with those activities. There is no reason to limit a fun activity just so that people will be forced to do some of the not fun activities. Besides, the crafting isn't that bad, nor is the general mob grinding. The point is, people should have the choice. If too much gil is the problem then have the leves give rewards with diminishing returns. Half the gil after 8 leves seems reasonable. Leves don't give you much anyway.
Over all, it is getting better but still has a ways to go. What it needs is more things to do. FFXIV is a sandbox game. Sandbox games need to provide lots of different activies to do at any one given time. FFXIV is has a few thing you can do but not enough variety. And what you can do is often strictly limited in real time.
This is exactly what I was going to say. The reviewer acknowledged having waited for some time before writing the review; why on earth not wait until after this big patch with its proposed fundamental changes to core aspects of the game?
Exactly!
I'm currently playing FFXIV on the recommendation of a friend since I was feeling bored with Rift. I did find the UI extremely frustrating for the first couple of days, but then I adapted as I realised that it was similar to a console UI, but easily playable with a pc keyboard.
Lori states:
"Truth be told, I really can’t say enough about how unpolished and unrefined the gameplay in Final Fantasy XIV is. The interface is horribly clunky, and needlessly complex; why do I have to click to open a menu list just to access my inventory, or equip a new weapon? You can create macros, but the key layout is terrible. Having to click an enemy—then click a spell or effect—and then click the enemy again to attack is ridiculous. I have no idea what the game designers were thinking. Rumor has it that auto attack, and a serious overhaul of the combat system, is coming in the upcoming patch. I truly hope this proves accurate, because no matter how pretty the Final Fantasy XIV world is, the controls and cumbersome combat makes it a nightmare to play."
Actually, you can press home (instead of the customary esc) to open the menu, then use arrow keys to scroll up and down the options there and finally hitting enter will select the option. No mouse click involved (I, too, hate unnecessary mouse clicking).
For attacking monsters, tab will select the nearest enemy in front of you and shift-tab the nearest enemy behind you. Pressing 1 will attack the monster with your basic attack by default (you can change which ability is on which hotkey in spells and abilities) and also simultaneously locks you onto the target and brings up your action bar. Just like any other mmo, you can then hit 1-0 for your abilities. No mouse clicks here! At the end of the battle, F will sheath your weapon and leave you in rest state where you replenish health and mana more quickly.
I was a bit thrown by the "area of effect" button which appears when you do aoe spells, but, again, it turns out to be simple. Hit the key for the spell, then when the AoE message appears, hit enter and away you go, the spell attack is initiated. Actually if you think of AoE's in most MMO's they require a mouse click to position the AoE.
Currently I'm enjoying FFXIV, mainly because it feels different to most mmo's in the sense that it holds my attention more than most. I don't know how long that will last and I'm hoping for good things from the upcoming patch and future changes. I also hope that SE decide to go with a fremium model for payment rather than a montly sub, and I definitely would not be keen on paying extra per character. The game itself cost me only £5 from Amazon.co.uk and, since there is currently no subscription fee, that seems like a good deal to me.
Oh, and the graphics are sumptuous ^^
I'm confused by your comment. Did you mean that I was trying to defend the writer of the review? If so, I'm not sure how you got that impression.
Does your comment that the graphics are just a 7 have any bearing on my stated opinion that the graphics are sumptuous? The new paragraph and the use of the word "Oh" were meant to denote that this was an entirely different topic to my previous topic which was, indeed UI functionality. I'm not sure if you are suggesting that I am confused about which category graphics should come under? Or the writer of the review is confused about said categorisation? Or .... well, who knows?
Ah ok. I'm always a bit of a failure when it comes to sarcasm, I tend to read things "straight" (probably due to my Asperger's Syncrome). No wonder I spend a lot of time feeling confused ^^
So two consensus have been reached from two like minded groups
Group One : The game has hardly changed over the past year, this is what they shipped so this is what got reviewed. Also I am only posting because I am mad that I bought the game on raw impulse at release day and want to throw mud at it.
Group Two : The game is literally one week from being this to being that. This review is wasted server space and proof of ineptitude. Also I am absolutely sure that the patch is the cure all panacea for FFXIV!
The various arguments strewn here and about regarding the lack of "new content" are also, considering the massive game rewrite only just about to begin rolling into action, somewhat flawed. If the game was well recieved by the general public on release, we would have seen the various endgame and plotline advancements that users are accustomed to in their P2P MMORPG's. Another thing users would have expected in their P2P experience is paying, which not a soul has had to do since they brought the box home.
The heads of the development team were replaced.
there are well advertised plans to overhaul the very structure of the overworld.
The manner in which people combat the beast hordes is ever so near its highly touted overhaul
And the tedium of equipment upkeep and construction is being ever simplified as to maintain the complex and, I'm told, rewarding crafting environment while inducing a fairer balance for those of whom prefer to strike enemies than steel. (such as myself)
I am optimistic for the future of XIV because the intentions of its developers to right the wrongs has been made evident.
How about you?
Well deserved score that is all i am gonna say.
Hey guys,
Let's keep it civil and constructive. Attacks and baiting each other will not be tolerated.
We understand many of you are passioante one way or another about this game, but if you can't refrain from using disrespectul or abusive language towards each other action will be taken against your account.
If you have criticisms about the review itself, that is fine, as long as it is constructive. Insullting the staff or our writers is unacceptable.
Fixed that for ya heh. :P
By the time the game reaches it's intended released state, other AAA mmo's will have released, and that's when it will become (and probably remain) a shadow of what it could have been.
That, and you're still better off playing FFXI.
The only one pretending here, is you.
Other AAA MMORPG are always present on the market. The fact that some will launch in the future has absolutely no bearing on the quality of FFXIV, present or future. Besides, no MMO to be launched in the foreseeable future has a graphical quality comparable to FFXIV, so the fact that they are "newer" helps them very little when their engines are made to run on a laptop from world war 2.
Oh but wait, FFXIV's graphics are just a 7! because the UI has too many clicks! :D
So according to you no other MMO will have a bearing on FFXIV because of its graphics? its about the art style and not just graphics and game like Tera, GW2 and TSW are a great competitor in terms of looks. But then again graphics mean nothing if game play is horrible and that is the main problem of FFXIV.
Gameplay > Graphics and when UI is as tedious as FFXIV there is hardly any interest left in how well the game looks.
Graphics are what keeps a game futureproof. FFXIV has been launched with graphics to keep it current for a long while. On the other hand, if you think Tera or GW2 look so great, you may want to look at them from an actual in-game point of view, instead of just some cinematic trailer with a camera flying around. Because the character view exposes their weak engines quite clearly as what they are. Old.
Gameplay is exactly what is improving on FFXIV. By when Tera or GW2 will launch, there's a fairly solid possibility that gameplay will have massively improved, and graphics will still be superior.
So that is your opinion not a fact and i disagree with it completely. GW2, TSW and Tera all have future proof graphics and yes it played Korean version of game and it looks gorgeous even better than FFXIV copy paste world which is completely devoid of character and life.
As far as game play will improve we will see about that in future. But i have little hope. Since we are already getting much superior gameplay + amazing graphics with games like GW2 and Tera so hardly any reasons left to wait for this supposedly solid improvements to FFXIV.
Sorry too little and too late.
Now look who is creating "straw men". Blitz was not talking about graphic quality at all.
Also the graphics being too good to run on "World War 2" laptops is a good thing, because this means more sales for the game because more people can play it. Excluding the large majority of PC MMORPG players from playing the game because their hardware is not up to snuff is not a good marketing strategy at all.
But like it has been said in the post above me, graphics mean nothing (unless you only play Call of Duty) and should not be used as a plus point when the core gameplay mechanics are not favourable to most of the people who have tried the game.
What does the "copy paste world which is completely devoid of character and life" have to do with it's graphics?
They have already addressed the issues with the maps and some zones, complete zone redesigns in the works, this was mentioned a few pages back.
Because amazing graphics is not just about polygon count but it is also about how interesting and appealing you make it. You can create most beautiful locations but if they are empty and devoid of life people will still get bored. And running through FFXIV zones is like running on a treadmill in front of a screen.
And no it is still a issue because we are talking about present and not future/
hah!! a reviewer is never good enough, doesn't have enough technical know how or qualified to write a review if he/she gives low scores to your favorite game. nothing new. But i would trust his technical know how more then say you who thinks that FFXIV is the only MMO in near future to have amazing graphics and that somehow it means something for overall gameplay.
{mod edit}
You played the "korean version" of GW2 and TSW? Wow! Where do I apply? LOL
Of TSW we saw very, very little, and the game is still a loooong way away. Both Guild Wars 2 and Tera have extremely outdated engines that are average Korean/Korean-like MMORPG flavor. The character eye view reveals clearly low quality textures, low polygon models (that are ridiculous in GW2, while Tera is mostly lacking in the environments and textures) and sub-par effects.
None of them get even near to compare to the graphical lush of FFXIV.
Adding lush environments and places can always be done. Radically changing the engine to bring it up to par is something that's very rare in the industry and requires a lot more effort and resources.
Too little too late? Says who?
By when those games will launch (and we don't even know when yet), FFXIV will have evolved, and will still have a superior engine, that opens more visual possibility. Those games will be severely limited at the top end by their engines.
They'll very possibly be very enjoyable, but they have little bearing to the quality of FFXIV, present or future.
Why don't you stop with the "ALREADY ADRESSED" stuff, jeeez?
Is it in game RIGHT NOW? Well, it's not freaking already adressed!
They PROMISSED stuff? True! Is it here? No! So... is it "already adressed"? NO!!!
Did you see what I just did there, with the present/future tenses? Have you spotted the difference?.. not complicated, really.
It is obvious i was talking about TERA but you got to act smart about it isn't it? anyways back to topic.
I don't think i can take you seriously after you wrote
*Both Guild Wars 2 and Tera have extremely outdated engines that are average Korean/Korean-like MMORPG flavor*
like i said it is your opinion but sorry that was completely false and most idiotic thing i have read in a while.
Yeah it's already been addressed, they are aware of the issue, not sure what to say... enjoy pointing out the faults they are currently working on, while you can?
Honestly I'm still waiting for you to answer my question as to where I was praising the game in it's current state. I am well aware of it's current flaws, but I can also see beyond that, you speak as if they are happy with the game as it stands, and this is it.
Also I like how I am not able to talk about the future and confirmed improvements coming to FF14, but you are able to compare games that haven't even got a release date to it?.........??
I also don't see Guild Wars 2, Tera or the other UNRELEASED games that don't even have a firm release date yet. Though it seems that for some the promises from Bluehole, ArenaNet or others are valid arguments, while those from Square Enix are not.
I see what you did there.
"YOUR OPINION IS FALSE!"
I'm sure I'm not the only one able to see the contradiction there.
Sorry mate. It's no opinion. Polycount, texture resolution and mapping effects are no opinion, they are mathematical aspects that have nothing to do with subjectivity. Both Guild Wars 2 and Tera are radically inferior under that point of view, while of TSW we didn't even see enough to judge-
At least I know that graphics and UI functionality are very different topics and shouldn't be mixed, as I know that a game needs to be played extensively before reviewing it. Things that the reviewer seems to have overlooked.
{mod edit}
Sorry to burst a bubble ere, but bashing a game you hate doesn't make one a pro.
What contradiction that i find your opinions false and idiotic? if you feel the same about my opinions feel free to do so but i am sure more would agree with me when i say you are wrong regarding what you just said about GW2 and TERA graphics being cheap Korean knock offs.
As far as subjectivity is concerned everything we are discussing here is subjective but that doesn't mean you can make ridiculous statements and get away with it only because you are being subjective just like when people use 'IMO tags.
{mod edit} Opinions are subjective. As anything that's subjective they cannot be FALSE, which is an objective term.
On the other hand Graphical quality ganted by an engine is NOT subjective. It's a matter of numbers. the texture resolution supported, the effects implemented, the count of polygins, that's not a matter of opinion.
Art Direction is subjective, but as great you think the art direction of the upcoming games you listed is, it will always be limited by the limitations of the engine. On the other hand an engine with an higher output can have areas, equipment and assets with a better art direction added at any time.
You sure described them as such, and continue to do so, going as far as going against facts, denying that their engine is the usual korean/korean-like MMO fare. unfortunately for your argument, things as polycount and texture resolution are not a matter of opinion. They're both measurable numbers, and just to bring an example both Tera and GW2 have character textures of a resolution that's equates to a quarter of that displayed by the FFXIV engine.
{mod edit}
Hi everyone,
Looks like the message didn't get through to you guys. We're going to be locking this one up temporarily so we can clean things up. I apologize for the inconvenience but we do appreciate your patience!
Alright! We're back in business!
Let's keep it constructive and civil from this point on folks. Consider this your warning.
Just dont resort to banning people for having a differant oppinion to the reviewer, like I have seen you do. Nice way to make the public listen to you, ban everyone who has a differant oppinion to a reviewer
I don't have any stake in what your opinion is. It's not what it is -- it's how you deliver it and whether it's relevant and/or appropriate to the discussion. Attacknig the author in any way is never appropriate. Criticiising what the author wrote without insulting them is actually quite possible.
Same goes for you guys. Disagree, agree with each other all you like, but don't attack or belittle eachother while doing so. It's not complicated.
I would really like to know from where are you getting your so called facts? you seem quite sure that Tera and GW2 will be limited by its engine limitations? and no they both look like usual Korean MMO fare is not a valid reason, hell this reasoning doesn't even make sense.
GW engine was developed by Anet from scratch and they have nothing to do with Korea or Korean MMOS what so ever. Also if graphics are pleasing to eyes and runs well on your machine an average player could care less for all the techincal blabbering. And both Tera and GW2 look good and run well and releasing with amazing gameplay right out of the box.
Everything that you said regarding polygon and texture reslution is still an opinion unless you have some insider information regarding TERA and GW2 engines and their future limitations but you do not.
If the author (or the website) chose to put a review up after the next patch, the huge amout of bias and conspirisy thories that came are the author and the websites fault.
[mod edit - non constructive]Your writer and editor is at fault 1.18 is in 3 days from now, you waited 10 months I want to know why it was chosen to review it less than 1 week from the FIRST MAJOR PATCH and havent heard that yet, even through a PM to the author.
The author has alot to anwer for
Square Enix has so many talanted game developers and years of experience, including MMO. How they could fail that hard?
We don't. As for your comments regarding the timing of the review, it's been noted and I will forward it along to editorial, but please keep in mind that reviews are planned out and scheduled well in advance of their publish date to allow the reviewer time to properly assess the game. MMOs are always evolving, and this game in particular has been out more than long enough to warrant a review.
We revist games all the time, and I'm sure Final Fantasy XIV will be no different. If the game improves with this upcoming patch and continues to improve by the time we get around to looking at it again it may receive a better score.
Also they mentioned confirmed changes as rumours which shows your reviewers dont know whats going on behind the scenes at all
The question still remains though, Why wait this long just to review the game? Why not when the game released nearly a year ago. It could have gone like review the game when it comes out, then rereview once they start charging for subs or a year later.
It's not an opinion it is very much fact. What is opinion is whether such things are relevant to player enjoyment. It's relevant to certain players but not all, probably not most.
GW1 was always limited by it's engine, while it looked gorgeous for the first 2 years it quickly aged, Abriael seems to think GW2 will be similar, this isn't speculation, this is fact. Aion is in the same boat, it will age a lot faster then FFXIV because it's engine only puts out so much. I don't know about TERA because I don't care about that game. Rule of thumb is that if a game is hard to run when it first launches it's going to age very well in terms of graphics while others that can be played by everyone won't.
These are either things you approve of or do not, there are reasons on both sides why one approach is better then the other. I personally prefer longevity.
Anyway 1.18 also brings settlements!! These are the new quest hubs we believe, I didn't even expect them until later so this is very nice. XD Yay!
As to the subject of this thread being trolled, I guess it's a good indication that people are genuinely upset about this article and perhaps MMORPG.com could take this into consideration next time they launch reviews. Timing is everything.
There were almost no changes since launch. And no adding target mode a and target mode b isn't worth to mention in a review when you still need to use a controller to play the game. the only thing which somehow improved the game was making the ui less laggy and maybe some nms. Still the ui is less laggy but still a mess and nms didn;t help with the core of the game. FF XIV didn't have any substantial changes since release. Patch 1.18 will be the first.
If you'd like me to address your feedback, cut it with the non-constructive comments (e.g. insinuating the review is a "troll attempt" by the author).
Again, we appreciate your frustration, but we'll most certainly be looking at the game again at some point this year. At the very least, we'll be taking a look at how 1.18 has affected the game.
In any case, this is our review of the game based on what the game was like when it was under review. That's the beginning and end of it. I'm sorry if you're unhappy with that, but all I can do is assure you we'll be looking at it again. The review is not going to be pulled, we stand by it completely. That is our position.
So theres no NMs, no sidequests, no SP changes, no new crafting recipies, no behest changes? while they are small (cept NMs cos there fun) they are worthy of review, even if it doesnt change the score, somthing like "while Guildleves are boring and repetive there have been a few SP ajustments since launch, which makes the lower levels a bit less of a grind" or "In Square Enix's desperate attempt to give users new content they have releasesed a hand full of NMs that can give decent gear, and the respawn rates are reletively short so no more standing around for hours waiting forr a spawn, just to loose it, however the drop rates are really low which makes the lower respawn a little redundant because you can kill over and over again with no drops".
That would be how you review SP changes and NMs, no bias, shows both side of the argument and shows that you have actually played the game, the 3 most important things in a review
Except that 1.18 is only the begninning of the revamp and will not be enough to illustrate where this game is going. I'd wait until next year. Or at least this winter. What I do know is that if everything goes the way it's planned out this time next year this will be a whole new game and unfortunally not many people will be aware. Or perhaps FFXIV fans should create their own buzz..
But seems this is your very least I don't expect a whole lot. Part of this problem isn't your site's fault but SE who should have known better to launch this when it did but it does make me sad this site only caters to some games. Also apparently your commenters aren't allowed to disagree with each other. Now I am reminded of the real reason why I left this place.
Goodbye again MMORPG.com
It surprises me that the FFXIV-heads are getting their knickers in a twist over this review. It isn't like the game hasn't already been butt-reamed by just about every other gaming media outlet already. At least MMORPG.com gave the game a good 10 months for Square Enix to try and get their shit together. Everyone else torched the crap out of the game after 3-4 weeks at best.
MMORPG.com isn't at fault for their review of FFXIV. Square Enix is. They have noone else to blame but themselves for the state of the game (past and present) and the negative opinions that FFXIV has drawn from the MMO community. FFXIV is like the new Vanguard: Saga of Heroes. ;)
Wow, this much drama over a game most would agree fell way short of expectations. And here I thought MO fans were the epitome of the "rabid-defenders-of-my-favorite-game" archtype of the MMO genre. I guess I stand corrected.
Seems odd to wait this long to post a review right before the new development team makes changes.
All this could have been said opening week or opening month. Why play FFXIV for so long to get an in-depth review of the state of things, when you stop just short of when they actually make changes. lol
I'm waiting to see what the new development team does with FFXIV, so if you waited a week and said 1.18 did not make FFXIV un-shitty, your article would still be pertinent. Now, after the Friday patch, we don't really know if this review remains true. It loses significance.
Are we going to have to wait another year for an article of how FFXIV after they actually made changes? lol
Quit being a slacker.
So keep waiting, and waiting, and waiting? You got their answer. This review was scheduled long before it was actually written. The reviewer probably started writing when those "changes" were still rumours. I'm sorry to say, but nobody can ever tell if something is going to have a positive reception until it's been released. You should create lots of buzz. FFXIV is heading in the right direction and it has a big heart and only time can tell whether or not that is good enough.
Commenters are encouraged to share their opinion and disagree to the highest degree. What's not acceptable (and what MikeB has interated 3? times already in this thread, excluding damage control) is that baiting, trolling, harrassing, talking down, etc., is not acceptable. I don't know what the official forums for SE allow but it's a tad different here if those concepts are new to those who have jumped from there to here.
This was the argument that myself and others were trying to make last night when fans of the game were ripping us apart. I do not understand it. MikeB confirmed that the review had been in the pipeline for a while. Sure, its just now coming about but that's just how it happens. He even confirms they will re-visit the game.
Last night, the argument was "This review is not fair/accurate because 1.18 comes soon". Now its 1.18 is only one step in the process. Now we must wait until the Fall, or 6 months or one year from now? I do not get it.
Don't get me wrong, I wish SE all the best and hope they can turn the game around. I have seen enough MMo failures to last a lifetime. But asking the community to wait 6 months or a year is not going to happen. FFXIV will be a blip on the radar by the time numerous quality AAA titles launch in the next year (and I am not just referring to MMO's).
The review is for the game as it is NOW, regardless of the state it is in. And right now the review is accurate for the state of the game.
This is the vicious cycle of delusion which many die-hard FF fans got themselves trapped in to since before the game came out, during testing. Many people could see that the game was not going to do well, but the die-hard fans would use the excuse, "But it's only in beta! It'll be better by launch!"
"The game launched but didn't do so well... Give it a few more months!"
...and so on.
The same thing is happening now and will most likely happen again after 1.18, 1.19 and 1.20. This is why they're now saying to not review the game after 1.18, because they want to keep this cycle going. The people who are caught up in this rift of delusions just cannot be reasoned with unfortunately.
I'm gonna agree with the guys here that say it seems REALLY odd timing to hold off a review all this time and then do one a few days before their big fixit patch (at least the first big one)... Would have been a more cedible piece if it had ackowledged the facts of the planned improvement.
[Mod Edit]
She calls auto attacks a rumor. How can she as someone who Bill Murphy (and I'm going to accuse him of lieing here, or at least of being misled by the author) said had been playing the spending "a long time in the game" not be aware that this is in a patch coming out the WEEK OF HER REVIEW. Even if she did not ever visit the lodestone, which as someone writing a paid (you do pay your contributors don't you?) article she should have done in her research; she still should have been aware of it from interacting with other players in game.
The review was poorly written because she gave no evidence of this "lenthy period" she supposedly spent playing the game. She refers to guildleves as quests, I can understand the argument that they are similar to "poor repeatable quests" in other MMO's however as someone playing and review this game, she should understand the difference between these and actual quests and have made that distinction in her review. Not only with guildleves but with all game systems she makes no attempt of putting them into context or going into detail, instead offering only her final opinion. Well as a freelance writer who spends most of her time writing about her love of Desperate Housewives and Grey's anatomy her opinion lacks the gravity to be taken without supporting arguments and context.
She goes on to accuse Square Enix of providing an uninteresting and disjointed storyline, which again she bases off her experiences of tutorial quests (2 minutes worth of playing) and guildleves which again are not main sources of lore. The actual story of FFXIV I find far from uninteresting or improperly woven together, the dynamic between the Garlean invaders and the free cities of Eorzea along with a possible tentative alliance with the beastman alliance and their primal gods (summons from Final Fantasy lore) is anything but uninteresting or uninspired. Yet even if she disagreed with that assessment she should have at least judged it its proper context by giving examples from the actual storyline and defending her opinion/score in this regard.
I take no issue with a poor review of the game in its current state, what I have a problem with is you posting a review like this which is so utterly lacking in unique analysis now. If you were going to make such a half hearted attempt at a review you could have at least done us all a favor and posted it closer to the release date, rather than shortly before the beginning of the long awaited revamps. Surely she did not almost a year to write such an article, I could have done it in ten minutes with the game. {mod edit}
This is a horrid horrid game. There were actually people fired and things got reorganized because of this total fiasco but game will never recover. I expect FFXIV servers to eventually close...
I've lost my faith in Square Enix after they released this peace of garbage. I've played FFXIII and still loved the company but when I tried FFXIV, oh my gosh... I could have never imagined that they will DESTROY the game like this... I wouldn't even give this game 5. I'd give it a TWO. TWO out of TEN.
I cry a little inside when I think about FFXIV how grand was the rise of the MMO through the great marketing campaign with CGIs and website info and how AWFUL was the fall, what the game could have been and how these morons destroyed the game from the bottom up. In my opinion this is the biggest disaster in the history of MMO. And my favorite JRPG game developer did this... :(
+10
Furthermore they should focus letting this game as free to play mmo if they want ps3 users to buy it.
I doubt they would demean their flaghship series by making one of the #'d games a free to play mmo.
They seem pretty intent instead on working to fix what's wrong with it prior to the PS3 release and relaunching it with those fixes as well as new content (likely an expansion for existing PC players).
The Score is fair.
Timing is horrible.
The manner the "Review" is written either shows it was written 7 months ago and published only now.
Or, MMORPG knows FFXIV doesn't get any foot traffic on this website (or the rest of the web for that matter) and they rubber stamped a "review" no reflecting the changes in the game.
MMORPG probably thought nobody would care or make a big deal about it, after all, no one really visits this website for FFXIV news.
However, as someone who frequents this site to get news on MMOS, i'm really disapointed at the lack of effort and diligence put into this review. It completely discredits your website as it relates to other reviews.
I woulnd't be surprised if the reviewer even new this game had an official website or that the producer writes monthly update letters. Poor effort.
Should have waited one week, included the 1.18 changes in the review and call it a day.
I think it was released 4 days before the big patch because the website and the reviewer are completely oblivious to the changes in FFXIV. Why should they be, this game doesn't register on their raider. But after this 38 page thread, maybe they'll take more pride and respect in their work product before releasing something.
My 2 cents.
You know how to fix a problem with timing, stop releasing poorly implemented games. Hell, this game should have been officially months ago, after a month of a release maybe. Gaming changing patches should not be common place in this industry. And if they decide to release one, this is a risk they take. It is not the job of reviewers to wait around until companies tell them its gtg to review their game.
It is very tiring to have these reviews literally a week before a major game changing patch. First with STO now FF - not to mention the rating remains completely subjective, and a 5.1 in one review has no bearing on a 5.1 in another - because it only graded from the author's perspective.
Please tighten up this review process MMORPG.com
This same sort of thing did happen not so long ago as you mention...
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/319509
Edit:
Originally posted by MikeB
Also, let me add that the review was in progress long before Season 4 was set to hit live servers. We'll most certainly re-visit the game post-Season 4.
Seems to be a problem?
Ironically they are both games that are underperforming terribly and have both drove away potential customers in droves. Why does it seem to surprise so many that games standing on such shaky ground would rate bad reviews?
I'm fairly certain they both have recieved bad reviews from other sites as well. I think alot of people (especially those of us with post counts in the thousands spend atleast a little time on here almost every day so what's wrong with reviewing a game as it exists right now and revisiting when those changes actually take place?
You guys should be honest with yourselves and maybe ask yourself if you think a game you don't like deserves to have a review held until two or three patches are released or six to eight months after it releases?
I loved the FF series pre mmo's so I do wish them success but if they have a game out now that they are charging any money for I think sites like this should do there customers a service and review them when they begin charging money.
And to mmorpg I do hope that the next few games with horrible reputations are not allowed to exist and charge your customers good money for six months to a year especially when you are only going to get roasted and belittled by the few fans left of those games down the line.
i dont know where or why the comments are coming out that this game had never been reviewed before..
it had several times, even during closed beta there were reviews coming out.
i was a closed beta tester, had played FF11 from na release up until my invite to closed beta in 14.. now, well i play neither. 14 really soured me, tried to go back to 11 with all the abyssea stuff and just couldnt make myself enjoy it.
and i remember my email box popping up with reviews of 14 when beta was still going.. then when they released it, more bad press, more bad reviews, then they dropped the price, more bad press..
so how any of you all missed multiple reviews of 14 boggles my mind..
i do really appreciate the op posting this "newer" review showing and telling me that pretty much nothing has changed since beta and glad someone took the time because it saves me from getting bored one evening and trying it again..
hopefully in a week or two after this patch people are talking about gets implemented hopefully we will get another review or two on the changes..
as i always told people when i was beta testing the only real thing good i could say about it was "it looked pretty" but, has to be alot more to a game than "pretty" to keep me interested in it..
i tried being the good little beta tester, filled out my thoughts, sent in my bug and error reports i ran into.. and i can tell you from personal experience the complaints that have been in gaming forums since the game went live were the same complaints on the beta testing boards so yes it was all known over a year ago, well known..
i remember one post in particular from one of the designers saying "yes we know and are working on a better more user friendly interface" and it appears it never made it out.
never know maybe one of these days it will turn into a fun game to play.
hopefully.
Nobody is saying that the game wasn't reviewed - everyone's fully aware of the numerous reviews that ripped the game. However, there was never a MMORPG.com review until now, for some weird reason.
It's okay to criticize the review. It's constructive, provides feedback for them (and MMORPG.com) and you've had the freedom to express your opinion. However, when it comes to criticizing the reviewer, it's completely unnecassary and uncalled for.
Yes, a review of STO was just published right before a patch and many people were upset, but then the patch launched and the game hasn't gotten significantly better. In fact the patch was buggy and not well received. Waiting until a patch release would have made no difference. In fact the review might have been even more critical.
Now some devoted FF players are upset because the review is right before the patch. One person above suggests that they should even wait for a few more patches, maybe even a year, before they do a review of the game. I must strongly disagree with that for the following reasons:
1. The game is "released". If the game was still in a beta state then a review would make little sense except as a marketing update.
2. These developers/publishers, specifically SE in this case, is charging money for the game. The gamer public has a right to know how the game is doing right now, not how a patch might make it better, next week, month, or year. If SE can take someone's money, they can take the heat of a review. It's only fair.
3. Unless the game is closed and seeing a relaunch, it makes little difference if there is a review before some game systems patch. I would rather see a review now and then a review in a month to see how the patch has changed the game experience than not at all.
4. Players can review the game themselves. If players don't like a review we have the option of presenting our own. We can try our own hand at journalism and see how damn hard of a job it really is. We can take our chances and face the flaming public as they rip our opinions to shreds. But we can give our opinion about the game regardless, and that is a pretty powerful opportunity.
Maybe the review process could be "tightened up", but I would still rather see reviews written regardless of developer timelines and patch schedules. We as fans deserve more honest and critical opinions like this. The MMO and gaming industry in general has seen too many lenient reviews and gimmes for the sake of PR and we the gamers have suffered the worse for it.
Except they are not charging currently for FFXIV since the new development team took over.
Also you don't enjoy any honest opinion, you enjoy an honest opinion that validates your view. My honest opinion is different from the reviewer's but I doubt you would care enough to read it or the actual information on the game and upcoming patches I have posted in the FFXIV forums here which is backed up by facts not opinion and conjecture like the review/many comments here. Honest opinions are worth little in reality, that is why professional reviewers tend to back up their opinions with analysis and examples so that people can not only hear the reviewer's opinion but *gasp* form one of their own.
This review was poorly written, and the only reason anyone at all is defending it is because the game itself was poorly recieved on launch and so the review isn't out of place in that regard. If people would take the time to look for actual information on the game, even only so far as the stuff MMORPG has posted they would see how blatantly shallow and uninformed the review is, and hence why people are complaining.
Or you could just tell us which parts of the review you found uninformed and shallow instead?
I haven't played the game in months, but I did have a several jobs at high level and I do follow the game (seeing as there is a chapter within the community I belong to). Nothing about the review screamed inaccurate to me.
I did that about a dozen times in this already as have others...
If you want to see if your complaints are going to be resolved you could read up on the information they regularly post on lodestone about the development their official forums or the FFXIV general forums here.
If your complaints included the copy+ paste world you can read about them revamping all the zones here, if your complaints included guildleves you can read about their announcement to do away with them as a central focus here, and some things they hope to repalce with soon here (soon as in next three patches, the first of which is this thursday), if your complaint was about the armory system the current classes (they are adding more defined job system mainly geared for specific roles in partying on top of it after 1.2) and combat you can read about some of those changes including auto attack and enmnity revisions. There is much more they are changing, and if you are more specific about your "unresolved complaints" maybe I can enlighten you about whether or not they plan to change it.
If you just want to be vague though... not much I can help with you. That is assuming you actually want information and aren't just trolling me.
I scored a free copy of this game and played it with a friend. I was uncomfortable with nearly everything in this game and hated it. However, I could see what Square-Enix was doing with this title. Despite this game being quite terrible the controls were very suited for a Playstation or Xbox and this game would probably have received an insanely high score if it was released for a console and not a computer. Computer games seemingly have a higher standard than console ones. I suspect much like FF11 this game will go to console and when it does, it'll do quite well.
Plays perfect on the PC with a controller, super comfy. PS3 release is also coming.
I played XI for years with nothing but keyboard, and continue to play XIV with nothing but keyboard (usually no mouse either). Though I did convince one of my friends (EQ veteran) to play XI and XIV and he could never figure out the controls. Some people are too set in their ways, I don't see why people can't adapt to new controls...
However that being said they are still in progress of improving UI and controls for PC players, so maybe you will eventually get one you are happy with.
I also played FFXI with the keyboard only, controlling the camera with the arrow keys. I might consider that again, when I can use the arrow keys in that way, until they... controller feels superior to me.
I've created my SE account and when I try to add a FFXIV account it asks for a registration code which I can only find in their store for $30. How is that not charging for the game? I went through all the trouble of creating an account because I believed you when you said they aren't charging for the game only to find out I have to shell out $30. That brings me back to point 2 where I state they are charging to play their game, that makes it more than fair game for a review. I read reviews on any product I purchase, games are no different.
Don't put words in my mouth just because it ruffles you that I appreciate the review. I do enjoy an honest opinion. I also question the opinions I read to see if they are the odd one out or if others share that opinion and for what reasons. I also see that others do share the opinion of the reviewer and for similar reasons. After going through the horrendous account creation process and trying to navigate their convoluted website I now share the opinion of others that the account/web interface is an unpleasant experience.
I understand that you don't like the review because it criticises something you value. The game was poorly received at launch and later because it has some deep flaws and people, outside of some diehard fans, aren't finding it fun. If SE doesn't make it easy to find that information and fun in the game, then people aren't going to give it a chance. That's how it works. No one owes SE the effort to figure out their game or having to spend money on it. SE needs to court gamers a little harder or their game will fail.
Huh? I didn't once state any of my complaints about the game (which have not been resolved or are not being resolved), but this isn't about me. I just asked you to point out which parts of the article you found shallow or uninformed.
Plans to do things in an MMO are a dime a dozen. Until it's in the official release of the game, I see very little that was inaccurate in the review.
You can look through the thread to find my posts, I outlined them in detail with links to back them up.
Also to the person saying they hoodwinked you into buying the game for $30 you don't have to buy it from the Square Enix store. If you can't figure out how to buy things on the internet I don't think you should be giving your credit card information to anyone. Also there is plenty of information on the game. They regularly update information on the lodestone with their development plans and changes.
None of those links explained anything about why you didn't like the review. None of the information in your posts backed up anything. The reviewer did not once complain about copy pasted worlds, just that there are a lot of reused monster models outside of the world. I know for a fact this was in fact addressed in a few patches, the big one with the NM update that added a bunch more monster models like goblins and such, but it still holds true for the game in it's current state (the variety of monsters is much smaller here than most MMOs, and there is less diversity due to them keeping the ecology to certain regions).
Guildleves getting changed from the centre focus is fine and all, but again it had nothing to do with what the reviewer said. Even if guildleves were removed from the central focus of the game then the game will still basically be devoid of a lot of "content". The problem wasn't that guildleves were boring in and of themselves it's that there isn't much to do outside of these leves, and changing the focus isn't going to remove that fact.
Enmity changes and the addition of autoattack likely won't fix the underlying problems the reviewer had with the combat system in the game either.
I have to ask, and I'm not trolling here, did you even read the article or just look at the score and assume the reviewer went out of their way to bash the game?
Also when is it okay to review a game? Could you review Rift right now because they have a patch coming soon? Also they announced alternate advancement points, which won't be coming next patch, but sometime in the future. I guess it's not fair to review the game till you wait for that. Then, when they announce something before that that is coming out after it, then you have to wait for THAT too. The end result is the game never gets reviewed. So when is it acceptable to review a game? Really, this game should have been reviewed the month it was released. The fact the reviewer waited this long to even review it should be applauded by fans, not vilified.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctf260qnDeU
First of all my response to you and the links I provided were under the impression that you were looking for whether your complaints had been answered. I misquoted and maybe I was responding to that part of someone's else post that was posted nearer to yours, if I remember it said exactly "I have a job and can't look for information all day, can you list what changes are coming I can't spend all day browsing forums".
Second of all I read the review, and I have responded to the review with what I thought I was wrong with once in a response to the moderator's defense, and once earlier both times I provided links as to why the review was innacurate, specifically her comments about guildleves being storyline/lore conduits and auto attack being a "rumor". My problem with the review was certainly not the score. Though I would personally have given it a 6.5 (not that anyone cares) in its current state, my problem was the lack of actual analysis or examples from the game.
Her entire review could have been written off of reading one troll post or 10 minutes in the game, but a good review should provide supporting examples from the game (substantial examples not the shallow ones she offered), and useful analysis so that people can form their own opinions. She wrote a bad review.
I would have prefered if this review was posted 6 months ago, or a year ago at release. She did not mention ONE SINGLE THING which has been changed since then so what's the point of waiting? {mod edit}
Yeah, whoever you quoted above wasn't me. I just asked the question of what you didn't like about the review is all. That's fine and you answered it in this post. Personally I think the review is fair, but I respect your opinion. I can see how you didn't like the review, but personally I felt she gave plenty of concrete examples about things she didn't like and explained why she didn't like them. To each their own I guess.
The game has great potential but it feels unfinished.
I actually enjoyed the combat system and didn't mind the interface at all as well.
Crafting is awesome not just the mindless click 1 button and done sort of crafting.
Content is what is missing in the game u just dont have enough to do.
That is of course only my opinion.
ps.I cant take the review serious a game reviewer who says "Rumor has it that auto attack, and a serious overhaul of the combat system, is coming in the upcoming patch" just seems like a person not fit for the job SE already announced the changes and also showed the new combat system in Videos therefore its not understandable for me how it could be a rumor.
pps. I actually hate the implementation of Autoattack
Actually I didnt buy they game as i played in their "Alpha" and "Beta" and found them to be so incomplete that i choose to wait and see the game when they went back and re did it. And as for complaining that mmorpg hasnt reviewed it, i never once did I was happy they hadnt as that ment they could be waiting to get it more. As for that they dont even have to review it ign did right at the beginning and gave it a bad rateing but that was at the beginning so to me review it when it comes out or not at all honostly.
I didn't say they hoodwinked me into buying the game for $30. They claimed SE didn't charge to play the game when they obviously do. If I have to buy it at all then SE *IS* charging for the game. So my point above that a company that takes in money for their games should be fair game for a review as well.
I did do a little bit of research. The best price, from a reputable vendor, was GameStop at $15, the next was Amazon at $27 and the rest were all $30. GameStop didn't actually have it avaialbe when I visited the site.
Anyway the point still stands. SE charges for the game and consumers have a right to know if it's not worth the money. That is why I appreciate the review, so I don't waste my money.
Spare me your indignation, no one contested your right to read a review of a game before you bought just that this particular review was a poor attempt. There were many better reviews (also negative) posted closer to launch), but hey if you want to be half informed be my guest.
I could care less the game is undergoing a complete revamp, once this is over (most of the core changes which will occur in the next 3 patches, likely the next 2 months) I'm sure there will be better reviews available to reflect the actual game before they start Charging.
fanatics
I didn't start really freaking out until someone posted a quote from the admin saying that they would WAIT to review the game until changes to the game were made, I gathered he took the new dev team leadership into consideration when deciding this. But THEN he allows a review to be published JUST before the START of those changes are made??? My initial reaction was disappointment, then I wanted to add a few things that were not in the article and then I was just confused.
This is my problem. I hope I made it clearer.
{mod edit}
EDIT: For those saying that the site should not WAIT to do a review, let's be clear we all AGREE on this. They should have done a review RIGHT AWAY. But they chose not to, this is what is suspect or odd to many.
Well the history of FFXIV has been riddle with problems (and I do not mean this to be critical). If I remember correctly, the game launched in late September 2010. Maybe MMORPG.com was giving the game the benefi of the doubt when it launched and held off on the review to try and give SE a chance to right the ship. Of course, a few months later (December I think) the dev team went through major changes. Again, not the best time to review the game....give them time to fix things. About the time all of that panned out, the earthquake/tsunami devastated Japan. SE even had the servers offline (rightfully so) and there is no telling how much this set back the "fixing" of the game. So much of this time is about reccovery and rebuilding that honestly the game was right to take a backseat to more important things. Once everything was back up and running, it was moving into April and honestly, it can take months to work out the details of contracting a reviewer, playing the game, getting the review written, edited, etc....
It came out when it did because either they would have had the reviewer do everything for no reason (time, money, energy wasted) or had a review about a game that no longer existed once the patch came. They did exactly what I would have done - release the review with a disclaimer saying "hey we know changes are coming but this is how the game is now". The review is about the game now, not what they game might be.
They're not charging a Sub rate/cost for playing the game, you still have to purchase the game. Please do some research before blindly hating somthing. SE having admitted fault said they would not charge a subscription cost until they deem the game fit for it, thats why people are saying wait until they start charging for it.
How about you dont buy this game or play it for a simple fact of the GM's do whatever they want and SE customer support doesnt deal with the GM's directly but you have to call them. So for example i tried to login after work and the launcher said my account was locked. So i tried again samething my account was locked. I check my email nothing in my email about anything. I call SE on monday because this happend on a friday night. They said that only GM's know why i was locked out of my account to wait a few days till its brought back up and open an ingame partition. So i waited till tuesday and nothing so i called them back they said i should of recieved a email about Gil Spamming and my account had been banned for 3 days for it. I said how come you couldnt tell me this on monday when i called they said they had just recieved the update as i called them. So i said whatever just let me play the game i paid 80$ for and btw i dont even know what Gil spamming is he said you were trying to sell gil for real money. Im level 7 i dont know how much gil i would need for real money but whatever. Anyways they said my account is backonline to go login and ask a GM and file a complaint. So i get off the phone try to login and what do you know account locked i went into my email i had 4 emails of 1 min seperation that said your account was banned due to gil spamming and then 1 min later a email for reactivation and then another banning my account for breaking user agreement and one for reactivation but still cant get online so i called them again and he said my account was permanetly banned if i would like to file a customer complaint so i did when was this game released november? yea still no contact. So dont buy this game their support sucks and i will never pay SE's online division anymore of my money i think 80$ for a paper weight is enough for those you know whats.
I haven't been playing since release... I am a new player over the past month. Is it the best MMORPG I have ever played in my life? no. But it is good. I like the game now, for what it is. At release, it played like a different game all together and I couldn't stand it. This review does nothing to get across that point, nothing at all. Maybe this reviewer doesn't like the game, and thats fine too. However the fact that the game is so radically different than it was upon release isn't even touched on in the review. It was a chore playing the game at release, fighting the menus and camera system. All of that has changed. I feel like it should have been mentioned, and the game is definatly worth a look by anyone who was interested in it, or FFXI before it.
I don't think the contents of the review are in question.
The timing is just silly. Even if you don't expect things to change much with the new development team, if this review had come out next week after a small, but significant gameplay change, people would take the review as a relevant summary as to the state of FFXIV.
As it stands, the review now just tells everyone what they already knew, hearing from others, or figured out for themselves. For someone who has been reviewing FFXIV for almost a year, waiting for the first round of the new development team's changes would be insignificant in comparison.
I just don't understand what the fuss is about. The game is a mess right now. One patch will not change that. Maybe by the end of the year it might be better. Not as if this is the first major patch, there have been several of them, all which have failed to make much headway.
Getting upset over the timing of a review in this situation is ridiculous, especially when past patches have had questionable success.
Personally, I think anyone currently playing the game is sending the wrong message to the industry that releasing a partially finished product is ok, whether it is subscription free or not. This patch will not change that either, it might get the game to what most of us call early beta status.
Agreed, it'll take more than one patch, but the other patches have more or less tweaked things. This patch, while a small change, is changing gameplay significantly.
It's not going to get better overnight, and it might not even get better. But... if this review came out next week with the small, but significant change taken into account, I would consider it a solid review.
So while a lot of people may agree with what the review is saying, they still have to go and see what the auto-attack change does to the gameplay. This article could have saved them the trouble, but it didn't.
It's a bit wasteful.
Good post kinda mirrors my thoughts.
Let's say that these same people you see in here bashing the reviewer are the very same people that are on the forums causing drama. Anytime anyone beings up a valid complaint in the forums this same group of people bash them as well. The bad part is the forums allows them to cuss the poeple with a complaint, which is a direct tos violation, and nothing gets done to them even after repeatedly doing this. The problem comes when someone responds to them and tells them to back off. they get the tos violation warning email sent to the account.
Statements like this can be a tos violation in response to another telling someone to go shoot themselves, but the actual shoot themselves statement was not:
"was this even necessary? a guy asked an innocent question and you have to be a jerk."
This is why the game cannot move forward. One group can tell someone to shoot themself with no actions, but another can say to stop being a jerk and get a tos violation.
I have been in game since day 1 and do continue to do so, but that being said the review is quite accurate. If anything in the opinion of alot of people that actually play the game it is moving backwards not forwards. If the game now is considered a 5.1 i would give the original release on it a 5.5 and after the 1.18 patch a 4.8. The majority of people taking up for se are fanbois that actually state they do not play the game, but instead want to argue anything that someone that is playing the game suggests. They have complete faith in yoshi and his changes because it is continually making the game to cater to the lowest common denominator. There is nothing that is remotely difficult in game now and the only things that were anything close to difficult in game(the nm's tanaka put in place) has been promptly turned ito childs play under yoshi's watch.
Stay tuned and see if this game can turn around, but the direction it has been headed in since the change leaves much to be desired. I would not advise anyone to either buy the game at this point, much less, tell anyone that has quit to come back. After 1.18 a few things will change, but these will no way be finished items and they will not drastically change the game to more enjoyable.
I wholey agree with this.
The company most done a disservice is likely Square Enix. I'm sure they would like to take their development team from this irredeemable uninspired clunker and move on to making more DS and cellphone games. Unfortuantly, however, the fantatic loyalty of Square's fans prevents them from letting this game die the quick ignoble end it so deserves. Which is ironic, because the people playing it now, presumeably because of the two words on the game box that come before the roman numerals, would probably be better served by a new product.
@DSP
Everyone that plays the game doesn't like where this game is going? Really? No, to be more accurate there's a portion of players who were Tanaka supporters who loathe what is being done to the game, a portion who wanted to see changes since launch loving what Yoshi is doing, and a portion in the middle who like some things from Tanaka's time and some things coming or done by Yoshi.
{mod edit}
"If anything in the opinion of alot of people that actually play the game it is moving backwards not forwards"
The Tanaka supporters feel he was more qualified than someone that has never been in charge of a game before. The Yoshi lovers believe that just because he has played games he is ready for a leadership position. If that's the case everyone on this site is just as qualified as he is for that job. Sorry when a game is in bad shape and struggling to tread water the experience should be the desired route everytime. Yes, the majority did vote for changes, myself included, but that does not mean the changes being put in place are the changes the people wanted.
Everyone needs to check this fact. If a game is released in half finished state and there is no content with very few people playing a game how would you answer a question asking "Do you want drastic changes alrering the game"?
If the game is in bad shape, yes, you want changes. To one person changes towards auto-attack is what they wanted, but alot stated that content is what was needed. In fact, the overall majority asked for content in the players poll.
Dude... 1 week and the game changes, completely. Did you even do research for a decent timeframe releasing this, or are you specifically trying to bring bad light to the game in the ONE time it could possibly make a 180.
This is pretty low, either way. Thanks for not letting people know of the upcoming additions to the game with 1.18 and beyond.
Not the reviewer's job.
As I mentioned in my previous post, there are actually inaccuries in this review, to wit:
Lori states:
"Truth be told, I really can’t say enough about how unpolished and unrefined the gameplay in Final Fantasy XIV is. The interface is horribly clunky, and needlessly complex; why do I have to click to open a menu list just to access my inventory, or equip a new weapon? You can create macros, but the key layout is terrible. Having to click an enemy—then click a spell or effect—and then click the enemy again to attack is ridiculous. I have no idea what the game designers were thinking. Rumor has it that auto attack, and a serious overhaul of the combat system, is coming in the upcoming patch. I truly hope this proves accurate, because no matter how pretty the Final Fantasy XIV world is, the controls and cumbersome combat makes it a nightmare to play."
Actually, you can press home (instead of the customary esc) to open the menu, then use arrow keys to scroll up and down the options there and finally hitting enter will select the option. No mouse click involved (I, too, hate unnecessary mouse clicking), ie the statement in the review that "... I have to click to open a menu list ..." is inaccurate.
Also, regarding attacks: The statement "Having to click an enemy—then click a spell or effect—and then click the enemy again to attack is ridiculous." is also inaccurate. For attacking monsters, tab will select the nearest enemy in front of you and shift-tab the nearest enemy behind you. Pressing 1 will attack the monster with your basic attack by default (you can change which ability is on which hotkey in spells and abilities) and also simultaneously locks you onto the target and brings up your action bar. Just like any other mmo, you can then hit 1-0 for your abilities. No mouse clicks here! At the end of the battle, F will sheath your weapon and leave you in rest state where you replenish health and mana more quickly.
I was a bit thrown by the "area of effect" button which appears when you do aoe spells, but, again, it turns out to be simple. Hit the key for the spell, then when the AoE message appears, hit enter and away you go, the spell attack is initiated. Actually if you think of AoE's in most MMO's they require a mouse click to position the AoE.
Being a polite person, I didn't want to baldly state that there were inaccuracies in the review, but I thought that my post had made it clear without being bolshy about it.
When we like or don't like a game, that is an opinion, and our enjoyment of a game is based on subjective criteria in the main, hence I don't bother to defend games I enjoy, nor attack those I don't, although I'm happy to discuss why I like or don't like them. It is irritating, however, to read a review of a game which contains blatant inaccuracies, and then have posters claim that it doesn't. I'm currently playing FFXIV (and my opinion of the game is irrelevant to the point I'm making here) and because of that I'm willing to take a few minutes to point out (again) mistakes I noticed the reviewer had made.
Lori states:
"Truth be told, I really can’t say enough about how unpolished and unrefined the gameplay in Final Fantasy XIV is. The interface is horribly clunky, and needlessly complex; why do I have to click to open a menu list just to access my inventory, or equip a new weapon?
Then Lori states wrong. I checked game on this I have to tell that you can config any key in option to open individual things. When I press I - Inventory opens, when I press T - equip opens.
Without accesing main menu. This is pretty incorrect information.
To be honest I would of totally agreed with this review 10 months ago, but now I can't help but point out it's utterly poor timing. Thy release this review near the DAY of a major game changing patch that re-does almost half the problems this review complained about and try to tell us they're serious. This review is harsh to say the least. I will agree the game is in a poor, poor state and is almost unplayable, but the next 3 patches promise to do a 360 and bring the game to where it should have been in the first place. If MMORPG.com was going to wait to review a game they should have at least given it the time of day when the company was doing major patches, even if the patches end up being complete and utter fail at least they can say they were waiting for major game changing patches to review the game instead of just procrastinating. I don't know, I just really wish they had waited cause it reflects poorly on the staff of MMORPG.com almost as badly as that glowing ill-informed review they did of Fallen Earth a few years back that got pulled almost the day it was put up. I'm maybe being a little harsh but at least I didn't wait 10 months to post up a poorly backed comment on this review.
I have to agree with some of the others on here. If you waited this long to finally review the game, how come you couldn't wait a couple more days to take in all the new stuff thats being added to the game with the 1.18 patch? Its literally going to be a different game after today. It just come off as sloppy, IMO. Ill will be the 1st to admit the game is flawed, but the new development team genuinely seems like they are willing to take the players ideas and suggestions into consideration, and that they truly want to make the game better then when it shipped. Yes, its slow going, but they did say after 1.18 that things should start coming out at a faster pace. Anyway, I hope the game gets another review here soon to take in account everything thats getting changed.
Why don't some of these people just come out and say MMORPG should have waited to review the game so they can read the review they want to read? I paid for the collector's edition like a dummy almost a year ago and they're JUST now ironing out major flaws? A virtually unknown company like Trion made a game with more polish, content and innovation than a giant company like SE could after 6 years+ of development in FFXIV.
Hold your breath all you want for this 1.18 patch that some have you have hyped up to be this miracle "god patch" but this game is still several patches away from truly getting on its feet.
Sorry dude, but 1.18 is not game changing by any means. Granted, it is a step in the right direction, but this patch just is a good start. I doubt the review would change much at all even if done after this upcoming patch. Besides, who knows, it might be fraught with unforseen problems.
Rift has very small servers hard for more than a few hundreds to play at the same time.
I wonder if anyone actually thought people were enjoying the game? Oh, thats right, its impossible that im enjoying it.
I'm also enjoying it.
I dont think all of us think 1.18 is going to be a "God Patch" but its a step in the right direction.
No need to guess if the patch is going to be this or that, you can read the patch notes yourselves.
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/17007?p=241517&#post241517
yep you are right you can see what's being added. a bunch of people that had hopes this game could turn around have now realized there is no hope with this inexperienced wanna be leader in charge. this game just went from a 5.1 to a 3.1 after the patch. it was a good thing the game was reviewed before this patch hit.
I actually found it better after the patch. At least the combat.
EDIT: And LOL now you can just "walk" your way through terrain which even with jumping would be too high. And stand still on almost vertical slopes.
yeah, the game is so much better when you have a 15 second cooldown to use a regular attack.
update on the release on the "golden patch". took around 2 1/2 hours to download got in for 5 minutes. game crashed and has been giving error code 30002 since then. post on their main site shows they are looking into the issue, but was posted well over an hour ago. great start to bringing players back so far though.
Sounds like a great time to review the game to me ;)
Give the game another 3 years it might be good then without sub.
If you mean phantom dart, that's not the regular attack anymore. Disciples of Magic now "punch" enemies with their weapon hand when auto attacking. It does terribad damage though.
actually that is only true if you are up close to the mob in its face in which is not where a mage should ever be. a mage it ranged and meant to dot, nuke, debuff, buff, and heal. they should not be in front of a mob hitting it in the face so spirit dart is still technically the regular attack since it is the attack you do at range.
this review's 5.1 was very very lenient on xiv as of now. theres actually many people even stating they would rather craft now in the game than do battle classes until they finish installing this system as it is now back to pre-beta condition in battle.
That sounds great but you can't kite in this game. Unless you are always with some other player and getting no aggro, you will be within punching distance of the mob.
please don't tell me you believe this. a mage should never be face to face with a mob. if they are it's due to one of 3 things. 1 the tank is horrible and cannot maintain hate, 2 the mage is spamming actions that draws hate, or 3 the mage is playing solo only. any other time besides that the mage will not be near the mob. since the mp cost for even cures are all at least 100mp and they have @1400 mp at r50 they aren't spamming much of anything spell wise.
tell me again why would the mage be close enough to the mob to punch it if the people in the party are doing things right. the game is based on party play so, yes, you are normally going to be playing healer only as a mage if you are a con since they destroyed thm in this patch. you are just as good taking a blacksmith or fisherman into battle instead of a thm now.
Partying? The thought hadn't even crossed my mind. I'm quite sure I've never partied in this game.
The mage should be close enough to the mob to punch it and get TP if you want to recover MP with Damnation/Brilliance.
Of course, you can also enter passive mode between heals! That sounds like fun.
So anyone tried the new patch and did it change the game completely like most of the fans have been saying since this review came out? i am downloading the patch but it won't finish for another 6 hours or so. Patcher is too slow.
It did not change the game completely, read the patch notes and you can save yourself the bother.
yes, it changed the game dramatically. i been in game since day 1 and stayed even with as bad as it was hoping it would get better. i was wrong. the original battle system that was released with the game is more fluid and enjoyable than it is now. i have finally decided i am done with battle classes until this jumbled mess of a patch gets sorted. i will either craft only or give up the game completely in the meantime.
the dungeons are nice and the fact fatigue is gone are good things. nothing else can i say i even remotely enjoyed at all.
I did read the ptach notes but some things are lot more clearer when you actually play the game and sadly i am not getting in any time sooner so i was looking for opinions of those who already tried it and if they can still justify their reasoning that review should have been kept on hold till this patch.
have no fear the people that are not happy with this patch are already getting "this is only the first part of the changes wait until 1.19 and 1.20" replies or the "well if you don't like the changes quit the game". if the reviever made the review right now they would have gotten slammed even harder than they did by releasing it last week. if you have an account step on their official forums and see the outright war going on in there as we speak. if you think those supporters were rude here you should see how they are treating the players on their forums.
It's the same after patch. Combat is slightly more enjoyable for me but it's not for all. I like the auto attack. Besides that nothing really changed. you have 2 new dungeons so there is a little more to do I guess but on the day to day basis it's still the same boring game. The game will b e good at the end of they year woth more patches but it will only be good not spectacular. There is not and propably won't be anything special about it.
It seems it will be just a wow for FF fans. Standard mmo with japanese flavour.
Edit: And I agree that ff fanboys are one of the worst I've ever seen. Surprisingly people actually in game are usually better untill you mention other game, then they get angry just like those on forums.
Be glad that it was reviewed before patch.
I was reading the official forums to get the pulse on how the patch was and those that are unhappy with the changes are quickly told to gtfo and leave their precious by the rabid fanbois of FF. So much for this wonderful fabled community of Final Fatnasy fans (it was a myth during XI, the game was full of elitist ***hats that would backstab you for loot.).
The patch seems to have brought not much changes, but hey theres always 1.19, 1.20, 1.21, 1.22, 1.23, 1.24...
The peole on the official forums that are complaining about the patch are primarily concerned with two things: The mage changes or the archer changes.
Both classes needed to be changed. Healing was a joke. All you did was spam aoe heals and never ran out of mana. The changes makes the group dynmaic more challenging. DPS can't go all out because they will draw agro and die, because the healer needs mana for the main tank. The main tank needs to mitigate as much damage as possible because resources are finite. Conj becomes main healer while Thm becomes debuffer/buffer/nuker. The changes, to any reasonable person were necessary.
Edit: Thaumaturges could solo same leve Notorious Monsters. Not very notorious if game mechanics allowed you to do that. The changes are "harsh" but absolutely necessary for balance.
The third complaint is lack of experience points that leves offer now. YoshiP has said that leves are no longer the focal point of the game. They are for solo players. BTW, quests now offer experience points to offset some of the SP lost. Also, main quest-storline arcs offer sp. My R38 story quest offers 32k SP. That's a lot.
The Grand company quests are well done. The dialogue is rich, there are cut scenes, and the quests are directly related to the story in the game. They ARE NOT filler quests of kill this over there and bring back X amount of Y item. The Company quests are also tied into the dungeons. The dungeons are tied into the story.
This patch offers a lot of syneregy between different elements. The UI looks slick, the icons look badass. The timer's on the skills are also a welcome change. There are new combat animations for certain abilities. 50 Marauder has Storm's Path which looks a little like Steel Cyclone from FFXI. Doomspike for lancer looks great, not to mention Chaos Thrust. The UI lag is vertually gone. Zoning from area to area to teleporting is much faster. You get rewarded for going from nation to nation and some game elements even require certain things be done in a certain nation. 12 different outposts have been added throughout the world. Coming to a patch in the near future, they will be quest hubs for people to level up and get better acquianted with the story.
If this is the work product of YoshiP and his new team, I'm very very happy with this patch. A lot of people in my shell felt that the game took a great step forward.
For those of us who wanted to see if FFXIV is worth sticking around for, this patch really made it more clear. BTW, I left the game for 6 months (December - June) for all of the reasons mentioned in this thread. I've seen the changes and the forward memomentum. So when people complain about minor things and miss the big picture, then "fanbois" may take offense. If you have a right to criticize the game (which you absolutely do), then I have the right to criticize your criticism.
Something like this. I am actually glad that I am not member of that ffxiv forum community, I have FFXIV title and I tried patch. From what I read on ffxiv forums, people are bitching there at each other for different opinions. Oh, senate. Here we are !
and for all of your so called improvements the game is lucky it got the 5.1 rating before the update because if it got one now i doubt it would make it to a 4.5. the game took massive steps backwards and made yoshi a true hypocrite. he stated the changes would be to make balance and to allow people to be able to play how they want.
standing with my wand put away for half a battle because of using one or 2 cures is not fun.
he's right dps cannot go all out because they broke the hate management of the tank even farther and added a hate meter. you can actually see if you are pulling hate off the tank.... that made for really skillful play. "i have to stop hitting the mob because i am about to make it mad so keep hitting it and i will join back in later". you fight mobs that will aoe and do 1k damage to the entire party repeatedly, but the cost of one aoe cure is roughly 20% of your mp.
as far as thm becoming the nuker/buffer/debuffer is concerned thm does not even have buff spells in the first place. those belong to con, but they can be cross classed. if the con has the buffs they should actually be the buffer not thm. con can use every skill the thm has besides 1 so you cannot actually believe people will take a thm into a party because of the shadowsear spell. that one spell is the only thing that a thm can do that a con cannot do just as well and it is on a 3 minute timer. any party with half a mind will take an additional con and leave the thm out of the party because of the added benefit that if the mage runs low on mp they can stop debuffing and nuking and go onto part time healing duty while they recover and the thm cannot do so.
the changes to thm to not allow them to solo the notorious monsters were needed, but to nerf it to the point it is not even a viable party member anymore is beyond nerfing and went into ignorance. a thm went from the most fun class in the game to the point it is less fun to play than crafting is. i'm sorry i enjoyed the freedom to do multiple things for a party and so did con. geez, the con's are mad that they are now completely relegated to healing duty instead of being able to use their nukes and dot's. they have more of each than the thm did already anyways so the idea that thm is going to be dot/nuker is completely false as well.
the changes to the ui lag, spell animations, and other things have been asked for since day 1. they had nothing to do with the actual changes in the battle system so to claim it was needed to make them is comletely false.
if you left the game for 6 months then you failed to see that the system had already taken major steps forward in terms of ui lag so you are comparing now to 6 months ago. if you had been playing for the last 6 months like i have been you would have seen that it has been getting better a little at the time.
the fanbois may feel free to voice their happiness in the direction in all things yoshi did, but they do not have the right to personally attack anyone they do not agree with. of course they can get away with it since the moderators allow the fanbois to personally attack people even more than they did when they came over to this site. they are not and will not get anything said to them by the moderators so they may attack anyone they deem as non fanboi.
I think you're just a "glass half empty" type of person, so nothing i can say will change your mind.
"Those convinced against their will are of the same Opinion still."
I'm having a great time in FFXIV, i'm sorry that you're not. You can move onto other games or wait for SWTOR/GW2.
yes, considering i stayed in the game while you took a 6 month break meant that i had hopes the game would get better. i stayed when it was bad originally. i stayed while they were doing little updates that fixed one thing here and there. i even stayed after the nm's were made so easy that even without the overpowered thm you could duo the high level nm's.
i stayed because i was still having fun in game. that was the "glass half full" to me. the game needed alot of work, but it was fun to me so i stayed for 10 months non stop. a game is meant to be fun and standing in passive mode half of a battle is not fun no matter how you try to justify it.
you are right nothing you can say will convince me pigeonholing, forcing cookie cutter classes, and standing in passive mode for half a battle is fun. i could have fun in a battle before by, ya know, actually fighting. it reminds me of a pick up game in basketball and you are the last one picked sitting on the sidelines watching. the people playing are having fun, but all you are doing is wishing you were able to join in.
Wow, thats low.
I have they changed anything about this game?
I have opinion A of how the game should be.
You have opinion B ofhow the game should be.
SE looks at suggestions and combines it with their own vision of the game and comes up with something called patch 1.18. How do you suppose SE is going to make the game great for both us when we have a difference of opinion of what the game should.
So once again I say.... I'm sorry you don't like the direction of FFXIV after 1.18. I do. I love it. If FFXIV is turning out to be something you don't like... move on.
I think the problems with FFXIV isn't just about taste though, there are technical and foundational flaws there. It's such a beautiful game with a nice soundtrack; it's too bad it is still hampered by some very poor design decisions. Don't get me wrong; it's perfectly fine to enjoy a game despite the flaws, but denying those flaws exist is another matter entirely.
Flaws are different in every other eyes.
Are you seriously claiming that there is nothing, nothing at all that you would want changed about FFXIV?
It was a steaming pile of trash a year ago and still is.
The game still has horrible controls which hamper combat. The addition of "auto-attack" one of the most fundamental basic features found in any MMO just illustrates the major flaws in this game and the band-aid approach being used by SE to address these issues. Avoid at all costs IMHO. This game still blows chunks.
Aside from Square Enix pleading to media not to a review it for a full month, the game was universally panned as the utter abomination it is. Lori May, the reviewer, probably conducted this review hoping, rather naively, that Square Enix had made significant changes to the game.
T
Meh this review is meaningless now, well seeing as the reveiwer only chose to play for about 2hrs most and prolly saw up to rank 15 highest what they saw maybe hasnt.
This is a fail biased review and should not be taken seriously, imo it was just an attack at SE.
Let me start by saying I actually played FFXIV on release, and from everything I'm reading, nothing has changed really.
http://lodestone.finalfantasyxiv.com/rc/character/status?cicuid=1371481
This is my character, Cheshire Cat, on Gysahl. I quit after a little less than a month of playing, and the last two weeks was spent mainly working on crafting. I am a HUGE fan of the FF series, and the games visual effects are amazing if you have a computer that can handle the output. I ran everything on high, and I have a superclocked GTX 460, and it sometimes made my computer get so hot it would heat my room up to crazy levels. That turned a lot of people off to the game, not being able to experience everything it had to offer with low spec computers. Another thing is it is NOT a solo friendly game. You almost have to go into the game with a group of friends to get much out of it, because the chat system doesn't promote idle chatter, or really much in the way of any kind of chatter at all. The leveling can be downright tedious unless you do it the right way, but they don't tell you the right way, and its very difficult to stumble on unless you are playing with a group of people regularly.
My guild was able to figure out how to get the most out of the leveling system fairly quickly, and we wound up getting over 20 in a few days, but they thought people were leveling too fast, and shut down the XP gain to miniscule amounts to try and hold people back. We found a way around that and got over 30 the next week, but by then most of the rest of the population of the game was getting tired of getting stuck at ~16-18. There was a mass exodus from the game and one by one the guild started dying, so we all just called it quits. Honestly, if you want to see a graphically amazing game that will leave you gaping in awe at the cinematics, the level of detail in the field and in town, AND you have a comp that can handle it, try this game at least. I can promise you that it will be shortlived, that you will probably come to hate the game within days, but there really is a lot of amazing things to see in the game. I was able to see all of it as far as you could go back then, and I'm glad I at least saw it and experienced it once. Its an amazing ride the first time through if you can handle the grind, but one ride is enough, theres no need to ride more than once, or stay on the ride.
I think I will still give it a try. It's free right for the time being, the retail box is around 10.00, players are say the patches are making the game better, and all the bad press is keeping the jerks away.
Be glad she did the review before the 1.18 patch! Otherwise the score would have been even lower!
Since the 1.18 patch, the game has become even more tedious than it already was! What a utter FAIL patch it is.
This review was not an attack to SE... it's just the truth about the state of the game!
Sure after a year it finally runs a bit smoother and UI has become a bit less clunky and more friendly / more responsive.
But aside from that not much has changed! Not even with the 1.18 patch!
1.18 is good, what are you playing?
-Playing Con / Thm is strategic and a nice challenge now
-Dungeons are good
-XP is where it should be, no more BW3 bullshit
-Grand Companies seem good, enjoying the initial quests and story, look forward to raising my recruit rank
-Combat is heaps better
"Check back with us later this year for an update after those changes are live" Allmost a year after the beta came out they still haven't fixed it?
And sorry to all the fans of this game but i was in the closed beta and SE didn't take any beta tester seriouse. To begin with their installer was broken so you could only download with 3kb p/s. Reported that and SE posted a new downloader on the beta website, problem was that those compleet idiots had made a error with the beta site programming so no beta tester could login there and there for not download it. Many reports send about it and SE just not fixing it. Took me days to download the closed beta and was happy when i reached 30kb/s. So a few weeks later the open beta starts and only then i got a email from SE "sorry the question you asked refers to the closed beta, we as of now are in the open beta there for we cannot be of assistance anymore".
Many reports had been send that the game was not ready for release, many many bugs and the controlles where terrible, mouse support wasn't reconised. You had to play with a controller otherwise badluck for you. The only thing they fixed was the mouse. SE never took any beta testers report seriouse. So its ironic to say SE listens to the players cause they should have listened to the beta testers. Its why you are beta testing, not to have a sneakpeak but to test the game on faults and bugs.
Also the game would be released on the PS3 this march and as far as im aware it hasn't been released for the simple reason, FF14 has been the biggest pile of sh#t that has come out. What idiot thinks its logical to remove hotkeys and instead make you find your way trough a giant menu list. Or the first time you died you having no clue how to get back alive. No button to go to a graveyard, no tutorial telling you how to get revived or corpse run or what ever you had to do to get alive again. Just laying there. Only to find out that you have to be at some stupid stone if you want information about how to play the game. Why wasn't this in the tutorials, why wasn't this in one of the 100 menu's?
And the defense "atleast the game has no monthly fee right now as other current failed MMORPG's" doesn't count. You don't have to pay a monthly fee because you bought the early beta version of the game. The game is far far from done. Thought AoC was bad during release? FF14 is a 1000 times worse. If they had charge you a monthly fee no one would be playing FF14 atm and they wouldn't be able to finish the game for the PS3 release. No, SE butt raped the fans of FF and put up a middle finger to MMORPG players. Warhammer online was released early...FF14 was even released much much earlyer. They needed atleast 1 to 1,5 year before releasing. Now you just play so they can make a good PS3 game out of it while the pc gamers already gave up on this game. It will never have the size of community as they could have had if they didn't deliver you a turd with a fancy ribbon around it.
The score FF14 gets is way to high even, but i guess the fixed some minor issues cause other sites gave it a 3 and lower.
I played this game at beta, and I've gotta say, It's getting a lot better. It's not quite up to subscription status (still F2P), but the new team is putting in quite an effort. I definitely do not envy the amount of work they have on their plates.
That said, the game still has quite a few issues they still need to deal with, but it's starting to feel a lot more like a FFXI-2, which is what I think a lot of players wanted.
I really hope the new team doesn't have to do it all for nothing. I mean they can work hard on it but it probally is to late for the pc version of FF14. Once a bad name it will haunt a MMORPG forever even if they improve it. And we are almost a year further and the game has to be redone by the new team almost completely. So probally another year before its PS3 launch ready and in the state it should have been a year ago for the pc release. And thats not even the perfect state, thats the launch ready state, the state you build on from that moment on to improve the game even more.
FF14 has some nice things though, i liked their class system and the graphics where beautiful. But SE really failed when they decided that the testers didn't know what they where talking about even though now they desperately try to fix these issues.
Also defenders of this game and call it a bad review. You might wanna keep in mind that many people paid 40 - 50 euro/dollar into this game and never play it again. Also as i read here there are more patches comming out so even if he waited a few days you proball would say "its stupid he released the review already, he should have waited another month when the next patch comes out". The fact remains that the game even in its current state is not launch ready. And he said they will do another review after a few more patches. its great you love the game and by all means please keep loving it, we all have a different taste and thats not a bad thing. But the reviewer was right about that the game can't be recomanded too atm. Maybe in half a year it will be, but as said there is allot of competition comming and those who might wait now might by then moved on to another mmorpg.
How is the combat heaps better since the 1.18 patch?
What fun is there to watch your character fight in utterly slow auto attack, staring at long cool downs on attacks and abilities?
The pre 1.18 combat, even with fatigue, was much more fast paced.
Sorry but they still have a very long way of tweaking and balancing to go with this new combat system. As it's far from fun in my book.
Grand Companies is just an empty shell now... with only like 0,1% implemented. Restricted to rank22 and up. And people having yet to wait another 1-2 months for the next patch to hopefully add more.
After patch 1.18 leveling up is still based on mindlesly grinding mobs and doing leve quests. So NOTHING in that regard is changed!
i was in the alpha and closed beta for this game and i can tell you from first hand knowledge the controls turned me off immediately. the largest thread in the beta forums had over 5 thousand posts in it complaining about the the controls layout and 0 got changed. i stopped playing the game soon after realising nothing that was tested was getting any attention, and i never looked back. and from your review it appears as nothing has changed still. what a waste of an iconic IP .. as an oldschool gamer i had high hopes for it. FF7 in my book was one the greatest games of all time. it's such a pitty that it's legacy has lead to this.
Log in and try the game out... it plays differently now because it is far more responsive.
If you used a mouse and keyboard, try using a controller.... people who use a controller usually love the game. How many MMO's can you play using a controller. Sit back, put your feet up and enjoy the ride. After trying out the game with the changes and you still think it's "horrible" then move on. At least your decision would be based on first hand knowledge instead of an outdated, poorly thoughtout and poorly written "review."
Btw, 1.18 came out last week. Unlike other games, this site hasn't even posted anything in their news reel to indicate it's come out. I don't think it's on purpose. I think this site feels that FFXIV will never come back and they dont' want to spend anytime on it. That's sad and unprofessional because I know of lot of FFXI veterans who are waiting in the wings to see how this game turns out this summer.
once something improves to make it worthwhile then it will be talked about. it's funny i had more fun under the initial game when it was first released than i do now. 1.18 caused me to drop the game when i stayed through even the little content it had before. the game has forgotten the fun factor. the armory, freedom, and versatility was the only redeeming things this game had. this is no longer the case.
the majority of people asked for content. they got cookie cutter classes, boring kill x mobs, and auto-attack instead. how much more can they ignore people's complaints before even the ones that like the game realize they could care less about what anyone wants?
I had to check on my own once again. Man it so sucked in the date of release so I built a nice portion of hate since then towards the game. I blasted it so much on youtube with bad comments since the day. Man, I cant blast it anymore. I tried and played for two days, guys. You can tell what you want, but I actually started to like it more.
It was trash, so big trash guys. I find it much better now, hell yeah. I tried some party plays and so on, great improvements. Yet it requires more work, this alone isnt enough. But ! damnit, leves were trahsed aside as daily quests - they re no main content of the game now. Ffs I loved this. And was about time.
Grind now benefits party play greatly with so much new added mobs all around the world. Goats and rats were everywhere before, you can find so many different mobs now.
There is content, some organizations you can recruit and so on. Great exp rewards for quets and much more. It has got its flaws and it needs work but I can tell I dont need to hate it anymore. I had grudge, guys. Grudge... I think I can threw that aside now.
I should just keep an eye on the project further, its becoming something good actually. UI still needs major overhaul and game needs more stuff. I see its on good way. It looks like SE can fix their sh´´t at the end.
After patch 1.18 I upgrade my score from a 6.0 to a 7.5. After 1.19 and 1.20 with all the content coming with those it will likely peak out between 9 and 10. Already just with what 1.18 has given and that is only the beginning the game is already more fun and challenging. I recommend to any who thought about trying the game out now wouldn't be a bad time to start. While the game is still free to play and there is some new content there will be more content added during your level up process. Already 1.18 has already gave FFXIV a breath of fresh air for the older players and has brought many back to the game also I have seen several new players who are coming out of the woodworks.
This game will never have the requirements to rate a 9-10. Clearly you are smitten with the game. That's great but your opion of the game is clearly not objective.
Lastly, you can't count serveral new players as "players comming out of the woodworks."
Wow people are actually happy that FF XiV is becoming the same old boring mmo as every other since WoW's release. Boring quests and dungeons. Oh and some grinding. The game needs so much more to be anything worth playing. If somebody is fine with the game right now they should be happy with every single f2p mmo released in the past 4 years. There is nothing in this game which makes it original. maybe there will be, I hope so since I like japanese games they have some nice feeling to them but right now it's just a shell.
I went back after 1.18 to see the changes after not playing the game for over 6 months.
Long story short, I'm not leaving again for sure... The ammount of changes is immense for somebody who hasn't been around for that long. Majority of my issues with the game is fixed / improved.
1. The UI is really fast and is, imo, just great (at least for playing with a xbox controller).
2. The combat is fast enough while still staying a FF combat (I absolutely loved FFXI), auto attack improved the feeling a lot but it's still much more strategic than most other button smashing mmorpgs out there.
3. There are interesting world quest with long and deep stories that are connected to the main storyline / lore and are very fun to do / complete. They also bring very nice rewards / exp.
4. Experience for all the non-combat leves has been greately increased upon succeeding.
5. Market wards are MUCH easier to navigate and find whatever you need to find. They aren't a chore anymore. There's absolutely no need to go around and search for stuff vendor by vendor. AH will still help but for now it's quite good.
6. They made some graphic improvements. I increased my settings and am now playing at close to max settings with 8xAA and it's VERY smooth, even though my machine isn't anywhere near top (core2duo, ati 5850, 4g ddr).
7. Gathering is much faster now. Fishing isn't boring as it used to be due to faster animations, lesser wait times without action. Crafting is faster too. The horrible lag we used to have while crafting is completely gone!
Would still love to see stuff like better party searching tool (current one works but people hardly use it, sadly), AH, chocobos, airships.
Edit: wrote Dodos instead of chocobos yesterday night...
lol you can delete the previous post.
But nice out of date review wonder why its out of date, maybe because it was released 4 days before a major patch tut, tut, tut broke one of the first rules of jornalism. I hope there is a new compotant reviewer in the game now trying out the NEW things, you know things that were added after release, which this review failed to mention. Oh yeah I forgot your reviewers dont see rank 25 nevermind rank 45.
I agree 5/10 this game. I have played it on release day.... the game graphic is excellent(best thing about the game). However the thing is really affecting the game:
--UI(User interface)--
Ex: when ur talking to NPC and it takes while to go next section whta u want(buy or sell). Or crafting, takes awhile to get recipe ready to make.
--Very Solo Game--
Ex: You can solo for 90% of the time. You have to spend much time to craft, leves, till they are all maxed due to repair. Then finally you can level your job class to max. This is dumb setup, needs to refix this whole system so we can social better!!
--Content--
The content isnt big enough. Its hard to explain...
--Levequest--
Believe it or not.. its VERY repeatitive and dull. It needs to be eliminated or revamp. Its like ur on leash to do it to max your growth.
Its just couple things to mention.. there is much more to say but those above i post is most important thing to fix about the game.
this makes one of us that will rank it up after this patch. i think the review was right inline at 5.1 before the patch. the game is alot closer to a 4.5 after the patch than it is a 6.0 and the extreme 7.5. the only people that would rank it this high are the believers in yoshism(yes, the official forums have started a faith in yoshi cult that nothing he does can be wrong.)
you are being very generous to think this game is even on pace to ever break the 6.0 mark much less 9.0. if you like to stand around in a battle and chat like you are in a dating site then auto-attack and standing around in passive mode would make it more fun. if you like to actually be involved in the battle you do not.
People who are unsure who to listen to (mmorpg.com forums are full of haters for the sake of hating and nonbelievers), please take a minute and check this post on the official forums:
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/18311-From-complete-boredom-to-OMG-I-hate-being-at-work-I-wanna-play-FFXIV%21
FYI, I'm not a fanboy and I didn' play the game for a very long time before 1.18 because it simply wasn't fun in my eyes. Right now I'm feeling exactly like that posts OP. Enjoying the game immensly and can't wait to log back in :)
There are a lot more players around as well. The majority of players on official forums and a couple of other popular ones (ffxivcore and zam) are agreeing that the game has improved a lot since 1.18 and is finally moving in the right direction.
Might as well read this ffxivcore review of 1.18:
http://www.ffxivcore.com/topic/31354-download-complete-118-in-review/
yeah, also make sure you notice the same people supporting these changes are the same people that came attacking the author or the review as well as this site itself. here's the little cult following they have started and anyone that says anything about the game they will attack you because it goes against their faith.
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/16868-Yoshi-P-ism-New-Religion
I have to agree that YoshiPism is one of the strangest thing I have ever seen. It simply bogles my mind that there are people with such ideas, I understand having some faith he will do something good to the game but this.. Just woow and it speaks a lot about the kind of people visiting FF XIV forums.
When I go to the official forums I see actually the complete OPPOSITE! When you take off those rose tinted glasses.
A lot of negativity by vast majority of players, but being BASHED, INSULTED, FLAMED left and right by a handful of extremists religeous fanbois, also busy spamming lots of "positive" topics to try burry all the critical ones.
I thought that FFA PVP game communities were extremely hostile. But so far the FFXIV forums are the worst I've seen to date at the moment. What a sheer hostility that is going on in there right now. It's not even funny anymore!
Sorry, but no. I really like Brian, always enjoyed listening to him in the podcast, but he is so enthusiastic about XIV he couldn't write an unbiased review if his life depended on it. If you read his stuff as a fans perspective on the game, that is fine, and it's worth reading, but it's not a balanced review.
Given the amount of work the developers are putting into this presently, I'd say a review is a trifle unfair. Of course, they did launch the game in a worse state than it's in now which does make it fair game for reviewers.
No one is question their hard work.
Problem is it's just taking too long and people's patience is starting to run out.
And since the 1.18 patch and the new combat system, the game feels like a beta again. They now have a long road of tweaking, adjusting and balancing ahead.
It just shows the kind of horrible state the game was in at launch and a huge slap in the face it was towards their fans.
That it takes the new team this long to rework the core of the game and now finally can start slowly working on content.
Now it will take at least 6 months to another year for them to add enough content for the game to become actual launch worthy.
By then, only the most diehard fans will be left. Especially with titles like SW:TOR, GW2, TSW, EQ:Next, etc coming up.
I am sure they will keep a decent amount of loyal fans in Japan, but it will be a tough cake here in the west for SE to retain enough people.
So again... it just takes them too long! Free 2 Play or not... doesn't matter. I rather pay 15/month and play a finished game with content, then hanging around in an empty hollow game void of content.
You have to realize that Yoshi P is apparently one of the best directors/producers currently in the business you can have working on your MMORPG. What he is doing to revamp this game is unprecedented in a AAA mmo, it blows what Sony did with EQ2 out of the water. I've played a lot of Sony games and Square Enix is just proving they are exponentially the better developer that is actually commited to their MMO's/players. If Yoshi P/Square Enix had been at the helm of Vanguard I guarantee that game would have gone much differently.
That game, and many other quality MMO's have simply been railroaded by their publishers and the incompetent people in charge of their development, so you'll have to forgive people for apprieciating the guy for actually being commited to fixing their game, it is a rare thing in MMO's these days.
Really?? I hope you are not part of that YoshiPism fanatical group. 0.0
I understand your pasion for the game. But you start to become a little scary now!
I have yet to see Yoshi P. pull off something like the Echoes of Faydwer expansion for EQ2, but then for FFXIV !
EoF was the best and largest expansion to date of any MMO I have seen. It was THE expansion that really turned around EverQuest 2 and brought back a hell lot of people to the game! Rise of Kunark after that was also a pretty huge expansion. (unfortunately after Kunark SOE pulled away lot of devs and the game went downhill from there on... but that is a different matter.... but it's still a way better game than FFXIV in it's current state almost a year after release!)
So lets keep both feet on the ground shall we? and not float of to Fantasy land.
As tell me what has REALLY changed to FFXIV the past whole year? What has Yoshi P. and his team delivered so far?
So far it's mostly UI rework, battle system rework and adding a handful of side quests.
From content perspective and game world atmosphere perspective (two really large issues with FFXIV) not much has changed still.
The game still feels soulless, empty and void of any meaningful content, besides repeatable guild leaves, a handful of side quests and heavily fragmented story quest chain! ...and some dungeons for the higher ranks.
They only now start to talk about revamping the zones, to give it some soul / atmosphere / more vibrant lifeness. Which who knowns how long it's gonna take before we actually see it on the live servers!
After a whole year we might finally start seeing chocobos and airships with the next patch (lets cross your fingers).
So please. Lets keep EverQuest 2 out of this discussion, as eventho it's issues and flaws it still had superior amount of content and features compaired to FFXIV!
Everquest 2 has been around for over 7 years now... a lifespan we will yet have to see FFXIV ever to reach.
Those were paid expansions though. Overall I think there was less work to be done in EQ2 and they still botched it and threw in the towel. Vanguard is more comparable, Vanguard got no expansions in fact they told us not to even get our hopes up for one because they wouldn't fix the code to allow expansions to be added. They chipped away at a skeleton crew in charge of developing/fixing the game, and a much better game than EQ2 (even after Faydwer) basically was left to basically stagnate with no hope of ever being what it could have been. That was sad for the people who actually enjoyed the game.
The YoshiPism religion thread is a joke, they are just supporting what he has done as developer so far. They don't actually worship him, or do anything else that was posted above (like systematically attacking negative posters lol). But no, I'm a tarvuist. I'll be a tarvuist to the day I die. My hatred of the evil Barvu and all who follow him (Phil Collins) is simply beyond words.
http://tarvu.com/
I just got done reading the link. Sorry but SE could probably delete his character, and the only thing he would say is "It was for the best". I know personally I wouldn't read anything of his, if I was looking for an objective opinion or review. This guy wouldn't even be on the list.
Well thats why you shouldnt base a decision on MMOs from release let me break this down for you.
UI slowness mostly fixed in Dec i think it was, although going through a full inventory still can take a bit of time, only multiselect will fix this
Solo game, being fixed as we speak, 1.18 made party grinding the most effective way to party, however people still dont use the party search feature and grind with their linkshells, and the instanced raids require parties of 4 or 8 depending on which one you are doing.
Content is like all MMOs being adressed through the life of the game, but since release we got sidequests, grand company quests, instanced raids which isnt much but its being added in every patch.
Levequests have been revamped for solo players rather than the main way to get SP, and will undergo more changes in future patches, infact right now they are barely worth doing because grinding is supposedly better SP.
Also we have seen the start of the combat revamp and it just needs some changes to be as close to perfect as we can get. All your complaints have been addressed to some extent this is not like the release version now, which is why this review was out of date 4 days after this review was published
Some minor corrections
you are right it is a joke. it's funny that people actually have such true faith in any one person. it's been stated in this very thread that yoshi is one of the best directors/producers in the world. this is the first game he has ever been in charge of. for those of you that do not believe that the fanbois are systematically attacking people with any criticism take a few looks at these and tell me if that is false or not.
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/18445-Can-we-stop-with-the-QQ-threads-now
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/17850-Will-SE-ever-be-able-to-shut-the-people-on-this-forum-up
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/18229-What-can-the-dev-team-do-to-satisfy-the-critics-of-1.18
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/17139-Good-Job-SE!-You-ruined-the-Archer-class.
read any of those and tell me there's not personal attacks going on in those forums. it's to the point most players in the game that has any complaint about any part of the game refuses to go on the forums at all. they already know from seeing what goes on there that they will be constantly bashed for saying anything negative about anything the game offers at all. you are more than welcome to go on there if you bash tanaka, but it's showing truth again that the majority of the blame should go on wada for pushing a rushed release of an unfinished game in the first place.
That is such a ridiculous statement, that any player who has a complaint refuses to go on the forums at all. Way to cherry pick your threads there btw, and if you read the comments you would realize that they are bumped primarily by people criticizing those few people for their optimism.
if anything a handful of trolls on the official forums General Discussion Board are responsible for the greatest number of useless topics of which they create about 5-10 a day. There are far more people in support of the patch, but even still the majority of posters are simply players who sometimes post criticisms but mostly post useful feedback/information about the game. All forums are pretty worthless a few days after patch because of the number of clueless people who come on their whining about something (like the archer thread) before they even understand it.
Same thing with a number of threads whining about Darkhold excluding melee, which it absolutely does not, not at all, not one single bit. Those people were wrong, they have been shown to be wrong, it is not even a matter of opinion just a fact. Sometimes people who rant really don't know what it is they are talking about as it turns out.
As I said before this review was out of date when it was written and it is even more out of date after 1.18 it is just meaningless drivel and should be removed because it is just missleading now.
Anyone that reads it that play FFXIV now and has half a brain will agree that it just looks like a load of biased drivel because it is so missleading.
way to try and twist words to try and make it seem like i said something i never said in the first place.
"it's to the point most players in the game that has any complaint" is in no way, shape, form, or fassion equal "That is such a ridiculous statement, that any player who has a complaint refuses to go on the forums at all". those are 2 completely different statements.
i do not post in the forums any longer for that very reason. i know the majority of people that have complaints do not go there for the same reason of having words twisted(like you just did mine) or being personally attacked. if you read the first 3 threads they are started by the fanbois actually attacking the people that complained about anything in game. yes, they were bumped by people coming to their own defense, but was started as an attack on them so you cannot blame them.
it's funny they are considered trolls now that they disagree with the changes, but the people that didn't like the original direction were not considered the same thing. trolling in those forums speak means if you do not agree with your opinion they are a troll. it doesn't matter if something is a legit complaint or not you will automatically call them a troll. if there were far more people supporting the patch my server would not have been dead again 2 days after the patch. people liked the fact things were different so came to visit, but quickly got bored and left again.
as far as my cherry picking goes. you stated that there were not people personally attacking people that do not like the direction of the game. i showed proof. that's not cherry picking it is proving that something is, in fact, happening.
It's really sad to see how critical mmorpg.com posters are about FFXIV :(
Yes, the game isn't in a very good shape even now with 1.18
Yes, some people are overentusiastic about its progress and are giving it a higher grade than it deserves at the moment
No, it's nowhere near 5/10 (and, imo, never was)
The thing is, lots of people are back, I see old people on my server (Besaid) who came back after long brakes just like I did and all of them are enjoying the game a lot with all the new changes. It's all that matters to them and me. I don't give a crap about who exactly is the games developer and how much the community loves / hates him. All I know is the game is enjoyable now when it wasn't as much before.
Naysayers, if you ever played FFXIV before and are bashing it without knowing in which state it is now, please, at least give it a fair chance and log in for one evening. You'll understand why other players, who aren't Yoshi-worshipers or fanboys or whatnot, are truly enjoying it.
they're critical because it is bad and not getting better.
after the patch it dropped from around the 5.1 in this review to closer to 4.5 if i am feeling generous.
alot of people came back to test out the new system. i seen tons of people i haven't seen in months the night that the patch hit and the day after. guess what happened though? they all left again.
i do play the game and have since it came out. i am now, finally, giving up on it after this patch. i wll craft only when i actually sign in, due to how boring battle is now, until 1.20. the only reason i haven't left already is i had promised my ls leader i'd give it til then before this massacre they called a patch went live. after that unless yoshi makes a complete 180 i will be gone for good.
edit: i don't want to come off doom and gloom. i am glad you and your friends are enjoying it. i was glad to see people i haven't seen in months, but was not happy to see them leave again in a few days. i hope you do continue enjoying the new stuff, but this game just feels as though it is no longer for me with the direction yoshi is taking it. i enjoyed the versatility the game offered, but it is quickly becoming the normal cookie cutter classes and that is what i don't like.
Well at least Yoshi came out and quickly posted another letter on the forums, admitting they pushed out the patch too early before it was ready and that they might have gone a little overboard with the changes.
Not that it matters tho. Damage has been done. A lot of people got upset and have given up now. An no "praising" fan is going to change that.
And seeing how hostile the official forums had become since patch 1.18... well that ain't really helping the game either.
This patch has blasted a huge rift in the community and split them apart between the contineous religeous defenders and the people that are getting fed up and about to give up!
The game is absolutely improving, majority opinion on 1.18 has been mostly positive.
I'm going to take a wild shot in the dark and guess that you play either a Conj or Thm. Sorry little buddy, but SE never intended you to be able to sit back and spam spells without managing your MP. Time to learn to play.
If you are any other class, then you have nothing to cry about, the patch was a buff straight up for everyone except the two mages and anyone who cannot see that is of feeble mind and lacking common sense.
Most people who post on here wouldnt know about the letter. They think mmorpg.com always has up to date information which we all know is wrong and it just has out of date garbage that is out to damage FFXIV as much as possible.
well let's let you a little inside then i have 6 classes at 50 and 4 are battle classes so your shot in the dark only hit yourself. you are the exact type of response that is given in the forums to anyone that has any complaint yoshi has done. thank you for bringing it here also so even more people can see it for what i really is. btw, managing mp isn't casting one heal then going into passive mode to recover. that is being lazy.
the entire battle system is slower than it was before. i'm glad some people like slow battle where the majority of time you are sitting and waiting on something else to do. sorry little buddy, but i much prefer being able to enjoy a battle than having to sit around watching other people fight. slowing down a already slow battle is not a buff.
once again thank you for coming in and showing people the personal attacks that are very much the norm on the forums and why people that actually play the game stay off it for the most part. i know of a total of 7 people that are on my server that visit there and i have usually 50 or more active just in my ls at any given time. i guess the vast majority avoids it.
edit: yes, i know the letter and it stated what the few trolls(as you call them) said in the forums. there were some classes that needed nerfs, but that they went too far with them.
Or don't read the full review and trust that the look on this avatars face is a plea to be released from the boredome that is FFXIV.
Seriously though, I think this title forgot the first rule for games (any game really)
1. Must be fun to play.
It has awesome graphics, but it is not fun to play. For me the best part of this game will always be pregame test App they released. After the game was actually released, it became all to clear that this game wasn't ready to be released. Swing and a miss.
Such a shame. I was almost tempted to feed into the stunning visuals and the name alone. It just felt like a console RPG except it was online. With all that money SquareEnix has and the simple fact that they had a somewhat successful MMO plus YEARS to watch what actually made WoW and other MMOs survive they still decided to go against the waves and like the their console games, constant changes to make their gameplay new and innovated just dug themselves deeper in a hole. Don't get me wrong. I like different and new but there are just standards to MMOs and no no's that should not be over looked. Oh well. This fall is going to be a massive release of new MMOs which will just make this game fade in time unless they decide to do a massive patch to basically revamp things that suck about this game. Like 75% of it. =/
If you actually read the news then you would know this is what they are in the process of doing right now. 1.18 was the start of the process of a complete overhaul of the game.
{mod edit}
So for how long you want them to wait before they review? every MMO improves with time and keeps changing but it is not practical to wait for that 'one' day which will never come because MMO never finishes. I hardly doubt the score would be any different even if they waited for new patch since 1.18 patch hardly changed the game as it was being claimed.
While you guys have no problem roasting MMORPG for posting a review of the game in it's current state because they were four days from a patch how is it that you so easily overlook that they waited 8 months to review the game in the first place?
The blatant fanboism is at epic proportions on this topic I've seen some of you guys say why not wait until this patch 1.18 and even some that suggest they needed to wait until the entire round of game changing patches are complete.
News flash guys a review is not meant to simply glorify any game you feel you enjoy it is to inform the community about how the game plays out at that particular point in time.
If the game exists and costs money a review should always be posted and no just because they aren't charging a sub fee doesn't count unless you the fans or SE are going to give us the box for free as well, GW2 is going to be B2P since there will never be a sub fee can they request that a review never be done?
As you stated the review of an mmo can be obsolete at any point and as they stated in the very first sentence of the review when those patches are implimented the game will be revisited.
I've seen alot of silly arguments in my time here. This is by far one of the funniest though. When they release a review doesn't matter. How close the review is to the current state of the game is. By your logic no game should ever get a review till either the first expansion or first big patch (or miracle patch). Because it might become "obsolete". The last line is priceless though. You think it needs to be taken down? Who are you exactly?
Why is that person so mean at the game? Because she didn't get character creating? She did one quest? what else?
This is a very fair review. I only wish MMORPG was as brutally honest about STO..
I love the fact this review was released 2 days before a major update to the game lol
It improved alot to the game but still a ways to go.
if i were SE i'd be glad the review was 2 days before the patch not 2 days after. to me the fun left the game when patch 1.18 came in. to me the game has gotten worse not better.
The condition FFXIV is in right now there is never a good time to review it. there is always a new patch coming which is suppose to fix the game or make it better and yet nothing changes much. And no they didn't want to wait for another year. Also MMORPG.COM always revisits and re review the games. So don't worry they will review it again.
The timing of a review absolutely DOES matter. Given that in this case, the review basically became invalid in a matter of days (which it is already outdated now) since many of the systems reviewed are no longer there. So, anyone who reads the review now (or even as little as one week after it was written) will not get an accurate representation of the game. Patches are one thing. This was a major systems/mechanic overhaul and deserved to be treated as such. And then to cite confirmed developments as "rumour" illustrates a lack or research and integrity.
"How close the review is to the current state of the game is."
Exactly. The review did not address the current state of the game. Game changing items that are 4 days away are "current."
Reviews have a responsibility to be current and relevant. They should not take a "holier than thou" approach and review games when they "feel" they are ready. It's like saying, "we're not gonna review this until we feel like it, go waste your money." If this had been dropped a few weeks after release, it would have been a relevent article for almost a year, and then they would have an opportunity to re-review, or release an article about the upcoming changes. In this case, the review became invalid after 4 days. To attempt to defend this logic is simply ridiculous. I'm not upset about the rating itself - but about the fact that the content became irrelevent so quickly, and the obviously did not research the game.
MMORPG has been notorious on ignoring this game. They published nothing about the overhaul of the development team, the gigantic, mechanic changing patches, or the new directions of the game. Then, they drop a completely irrelevant review days before a major patch. It's not good journalism, it's not a good practice at all.
Whether you like the game or not, whether it "deserved the rating" at the time of the review, doesn't change that fact that the review was no longer relevant four days afterwards, and is not relevant now. Much of the content/mechanics sited in the review simply no longer exist. It's full of mis-information, and will mis-guide potential new players which the game desperately needs. Rift, WoW, AoC, all of them get articles on patches, updates on development. This game has been largely ignored, misrepresented, and shoved to the bottom of the barrel overall. It's not a balanced approach to game reviews and it's not fair to potential customers and current fans of the game.
Sorry but the game hasn't changed that much. The basic and core features are still the same. Addition of some new contents hardly means that overall game has changed. So the review is still very relevant.
Yes, ask yourself those questions, and then read a current, relevant review. Maybe find a site that has posted one iota of information on the current state of the game, the development team changes, and the mechanic overhauls. Not this outdated, uninformed revieew by someone who lists comfirmed updates as "rumours,"
Obviously you aren't a player. Everything they describe regarding combat, guid leves, and conent is outdated. There have even been vast mechanic updates.
Please don't spread misinformation simply because you have an axe to grind or want to play devil's advocate. The game has been completely ignored by this site. Potential users: please go somewhere else to get game information.
Like what? addition of auto attack? addition of a raid instance and few quests? a lot of other changes which are sitll on paper and have not been implemented yet? care to give us the list of these big changes which makes FFXIV at core a very different game?
i'll list the changes.
they added auto attack that made a flawed system an even more flawed system because they only implemented partial changes to take over for a full system. it is more slow and cumbersome than it was before.
they removed leves as being one of the main things that people used to rank up. this leaves grind parties against weak enemies as the most valid way to rank up. yes, leves got boring, but so does anything else when it is the only thing to do.
they added 1 r45 dungeon and 1 r25 dungeon. most people completed these 2 new pieces of content within a week or so and have most of the gear for their classes already so dungeon parties have started to slow already.
they added a besieged type event. this was actually a nice addition to the behests that the camps offered, but then extended the timer between the times you could join a behest.
they added grand companies. as of right now consists of 3 mini quests for each city which only grants access to the same 2 dungeons.
in summary. they did add some stuff that drastically changed the game, but not all changes are good. it is not enough to say the core of the game has changed at all. people that did battle still only do battle(for the most part because alot have stopped and only craft now) and the ones that only craft continue to do so(although the game has increased in the number of full time crafters)
Hm..... I wonder why people keep saying that this is the worst online game.
1st You guys said that the quest and level system is boing. Excuse me, care to tell me what were you doing in LineAge 2 or the stupid SilkRoad or any other online games ? All you guys did was grinding monster to get higher so suck up and stop complain about the quest system here.
2nd You guys complained about the control system ? I will only say; get use to it. I can control the game pretty easy; if your brain cant comprehence to use anything other than mouse and 1 to 0 then dont even try to play.
3rd I have noticed the way you guys play; you guys never ever read the instruction in the hand book or in the game. You guys never read the quest they gave out. So you guys dont have any right to complain how you guys stump in the way. I will give you people an advice, learn to read.
And last but not least you people are far to comfortable with all the interact; teleportation, auction house, monster droping gold etc.... I will say these are what kill the online game. There will be a bunch of gold farmer selling gold everywhere. With the limitation of number of quest and teleportation will allow others to enjoy the game. It's call MMORPG; but every freaking online game i had play were only MMO; a bunch of grinding idiot did not care to enjoy the game.
Conclusion; i prefer Square Enix keeps the game this way, if not their Final Fantasy name will be just one of the stupid online game in the rank with silk road or line age where people only do 2 things there; grinding level and fighting.
You are totally correct :)
That is my only concern with version 2.0, hope they dont turn it in to the same as every other game just to bow down to the folks that wont evebn hang around as soon as a new title hits ( just to go and complain about that).