[Albela]

Hello people.

now that I hav gotten some experience of open beta I thought I could do a short review:

Graphics: Nothing special. Characters, buildings and items look very good, but terrain looks terrible except for mountains. Most stuff look as if it would be FFXI, even with maximum settings.

Terrain: Worthless. I play in Uldah and everywhere I go I see copied terrain everywhere. The ledges are so much obvious copiy and paste it is not even funny. same goes for all the camps. FFXI outpost all over. Areas are also too big, so empty and everything looks the same.

Combat: Very good, fun. It is fast paced and looks nice with effects. just hope the delay is not part of combat in release.

UI: It works, they need to fix the stupid mouse and the general delay everytime you hit a button. And instead of the interaction button being inside of the menu, it should just be enough to click the items/doors/whatever to interact with it or just push the interaction icon once, not twice only to enter the stupid main menu. They also need to make the "return" button pop automatically when you die very much like the home ponit button in FFXI when you die. They just stepped back another 10 steps. this isnt monopoly.

Crafting: looks annoying. Have only seen my brother do it, and he failed the very first local leve as an armotsmith. Even if you would succeed every synthesis it still looks like a massive time sink.

character creation: It could have been better. Too few choices. Few hairstyles and few faces. No beard or moustaches. Not to mention races all have the same voices. Not even FFXI was silly like that.

party play: non-existant.
4/10
cant imagine tanaka or Kamamoto thinkinking this game will be good.

This post has been edited by Albela: 05 September 2010 - 03:55 PM

[Thxigl]

I posted this somewhere else, but I'll post my review here as well.

I was considering buying the game, but after trying out the beta I'm not too sure. I was selected for open beta (played for 3 days) and these are my first impressions of the game.

First the positives about the game.

1. Graphics are good.

2. Cutscenes are good with each town having their own story.

3. The game itself seems really big.

4. The NPCs have really good facial expressions.

5. The first mission was pretty fun (to me anyway).

6. Leviquests are nice and gives you a buff that boosts your skillpoints.

Now the negatives, which I'll probably get flamed for.

1. The crafting classes are very time consuming, with lots of clicking to actually start and it's very interactive. This very interactive aspect can be seem good for some, but it means if you're expecting to craft a lot, you're not going to unless you invest a lot of time into it. I understand it's a class of it's own, just like a melee or caster class, but if you're planning on doing crafting in the side for money or something it is very time consuming.

I only tried alchemy and mining and those 2 seemed really time consuming. For example, with alchemy when you start to craft you have 4 choices. You have this bar that goes up to 100% and when it's at 100% you made the product. Basically you keep choosing 1 of the 4 choices until you hit the 100% mark. When durability drops to 0 you fail the craft no matter what and if your quality is high you get better rewards or HQs. There's more to it than that and I'm sure crafting is probably faster when you're higher in your specific craft, but you're going to have to invest a lot of time to raise these.

Mining, I have no idea how it works. You just use Lay of the Hands and find a node then you go to your menu and click mine. After doing that, you have this interface where you click stuff to mine. I don't get it, but it seems very time consuming. For my specific node I had 5 tries to get something. Based on hard you strike and stuff you will get items. Just by trying it out I can tell that it's going to take a while to raise the craft, unless you have a lot of time to spend to raise it. Of course, I'm sure it will probably be faster if you're higher level mining lower level stuff. Also, running around, which is required for mining, also adds to it being time consuming since the areas are big.

2. Messaging in the game is annoying. There's only so much space to enter text then you have to hit enter and continue, which might seem like a minor thing to some people. When you're private messaging someone you have to hit the space bar first then control + r to reply back to someone private messaging you, which is also annoying.

3. The people in the game aren't very helpful. There's a few people that actually help you, but for the most part people are trying to find a way to get ahead when the game comes out, so they won't really help you. You can look things up online, but for the minor things that aren't on websites you'll be lucky if you get help from someone in the game. In fact, I had someone say they would only answer my question if I join their linkshell and server when the game goes live...

4. I don't know if this is just me, but I feel a small delay when interacting with NPCs to buy/sell items. It's like a .5 sec delay and it's only when I try to buy items or try to craft. Oh yeah, even switching your abilities and equipment has this delay, which is not fun at all.

5. Targeting mobs tend to be annoying as well. If you fight a mob that borrows into the ground, you lose the target and have to retarget the mob. I don't know if there's a easier way to retarget, but I end up hitting tab a lot until I target the mob again.

6. There's this thing called "anima" that teleports you to crystals you've been to before. It's fast for traveling, but from what I heard 1 anima takes like 4-6 hours or something to replenish. You have like 90-100 (I forgot). I have this on the negatives because I don't like how long it takes to replenish.

7. You travel a lot in this game. If you don't like running around you won't like this game.

That's my opinion on the pros/cons of the game, hopefully they fix these things before release. There are probably things I don't know about, which can change the negatives, but for a new player trying out FFXIV that's my impression on the positives and negatives. I thought the game was supposed to be casual, but based on all those time consuming things I mentioned it does not seem so casual.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but after playing this game and from stuff I've read about it with surplus (which I haven't had yet) -- it seems like SE's business plan for this MMO is for players to progress slowly so they stay subscribed and they make money off that. I'm saying this, because I've heard people say the game is casual, but from what I've experienced, this game doesn't seem casual to me. It's only casual if you decide to play it slow as in 1 class 8/hrs a week or something like that to not hit surplus, which = slow progression = more money for SE cause you stay subscribed longer.

That's all I can think of right now. This post is just my opinions on the game and it's not an attack on SE or FFXIV although to some fans it might seem so. Feel free to disagree with what I posted and tell me why or what I'm doing wrong for the negatives.

[Asraphel]

I have to be honest with myself, even if I don't like it... if I had not spent $1,500 on a new PC to play this game, I most likely would not get it on release... I absolutely LOVED FFXI... and I thought this would be kinda like a FFXI-2, I guess that was my own mistake, it feels more like a dumbed down WoW-2 with FFXI races look-alikes, which in my opinion, is the only thing the game has in common with FFXI. Don't get me wrong I REALLY wanted to like this game, but it is becoming harder and harder as I play it more. Please, no flaming from fanboys, this is just my honest opinion, I am sure there are people out there that are loving the game.

[Biscuitmagee]

Asrapheal, you just opened my eyes to what FF 14 really is...

FF10 had it's black sheep FF10-2

FF11 now has it's black sheep.... FF14(FF11-2)

[Ryo-go]

Thxigl, on 05 September 2010 - 05:11 PM, said:

I posted this somewhere else, but I'll post my review here as well.

I was considering buying the game, but after trying out the beta I'm not too sure. I was selected for open beta (played for 3 days) and these are my first impressions of the game.

First the positives about the game.

1. Graphics are good.

2. Cutscenes are good with each town having their own story.

3. The game itself seems really big.

4. The NPCs have really good facial expressions.

5. The first mission was pretty fun (to me anyway).

6. Leviquests are nice and gives you a buff that boosts your skillpoints.

Now the negatives, which I'll probably get flamed for.

1. The crafting classes are very time consuming, with lots of clicking to actually start and it's very interactive. This very interactive aspect can be seem good for some, but it means if you're expecting to craft a lot, you're not going to unless you invest a lot of time into it. I understand it's a class of it's own, just like a melee or caster class, but if you're planning on doing crafting in the side for money or something it is very time consuming.

I only tried alchemy and mining and those 2 seemed really time consuming. For example, with alchemy when you start to craft you have 4 choices. You have this bar that goes up to 100% and when it's at 100% you made the product. Basically you keep choosing 1 of the 4 choices until you hit the 100% mark. When durability drops to 0 you fail the craft no matter what and if your quality is high you get better rewards or HQs. There's more to it than that and I'm sure crafting is probably faster when you're higher in your specific craft, but you're going to have to invest a lot of time to raise these.

Mining, I have no idea how it works. You just use Lay of the Hands and find a node then you go to your menu and click mine. After doing that, you have this interface where you click stuff to mine. I don't get it, but it seems very time consuming. For my specific node I had 5 tries to get something. Based on hard you strike and stuff you will get items. Just by trying it out I can tell that it's going to take a while to raise the craft, unless you have a lot of time to spend to raise it. Of course, I'm sure it will probably be faster if you're higher level mining lower level stuff. Also, running around, which is required for mining, also adds to it being time consuming since the areas are big.

2. Messaging in the game is annoying. There's only so much space to enter text then you have to hit enter and continue, which might seem like a minor thing to some people. When you're private messaging someone you have to hit the space bar first then control + r to reply back to someone private messaging you, which is also annoying.

3. The people in the game aren't very helpful. There's a few people that actually help you, but for the most part people are trying to find a way to get ahead when the game comes out, so they won't really help you. You can look things up online, but for the minor things that aren't on websites you'll be lucky if you get help from someone in the game. In fact, I had someone say they would only answer my question if I join their linkshell and server when the game goes live...

4. I don't know if this is just me, but I feel a small delay when interacting with NPCs to buy/sell items. It's like a .5 sec delay and it's only when I try to buy items or try to craft. Oh yeah, even switching your abilities and equipment has this delay, which is not fun at all.

5. Targeting mobs tend to be annoying as well. If you fight a mob that borrows into the ground, you lose the target and have to retarget the mob. I don't know if there's a easier way to retarget, but I end up hitting tab a lot until I target the mob again.

6. There's this thing called "anima" that teleports you to crystals you've been to before. It's fast for traveling, but from what I heard 1 anima takes like 4-6 hours or something to replenish. You have like 90-100 (I forgot). I have this on the negatives because I don't like how long it takes to replenish.

7. You travel a lot in this game. If you don't like running around you won't like this game.

That's my opinion on the pros/cons of the game, hopefully they fix these things before release. There are probably things I don't know about, which can change the negatives, but for a new player trying out FFXIV that's my impression on the positives and negatives. I thought the game was supposed to be casual, but based on all those time consuming things I mentioned it does not seem so casual.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but after playing this game and from stuff I've read about it with surplus (which I haven't had yet) -- it seems like SE's business plan for this MMO is for players to progress slowly so they stay subscribed and they make money off that. I'm saying this, because I've heard people say the game is casual, but from what I've experienced, this game doesn't seem casual to me. It's only casual if you decide to play it slow as in 1 class 8/hrs a week or something like that to not hit surplus, which = slow progression = more money for SE cause you stay subscribed longer.

That's all I can think of right now. This post is just my opinions on the game and it's not an attack on SE or FFXIV although to some fans it might seem so. Feel free to disagree with what I posted and tell me why or what I'm doing wrong for the negatives.

Apperantly you've never played FFXI before as most of your statements are describing how FFXI works.

[Ryo-go]

Asraphel, on 05 September 2010 - 05:41 PM, said:

I have to be honest with myself, even if I don't like it... if I had not spent $1,500 on a new PC to play this game, I most likely would not get it on release... I absolutely LOVED FFXI... and I thought this would be kinda like a FFXI-2, I guess that was my own mistake, it feels more like a dumbed down WoW-2 with FFXI races look-alikes, which in my opinion, is the only thing the game has in common with FFXI. Don't get me wrong I REALLY wanted to like this game, but it is becoming harder and harder as I play it more. Please, no flaming from fanboys, this is just my honest opinion, I am sure there are people out there that are loving the game.

Double post:

Go back to WoW and your pathetic easy way of life.

[Thxigl]

Ryo-go, on 05 September 2010 - 07:30 PM, said:

Apperantly you've never played FFXI before as most of your statements are describing how FFXI works.

Don't assume things. For your information, I have a Maat's Cap in FFXI so I've played enough. As I stated in my post, that's my opinion on the positives and negatives of the game.

[Rhayve]

Thxigl, on 05 September 2010 - 08:33 PM, said:

Don't assume things. For your information, I have a Maat's Cap in FFXI so I've played enough. As I stated in my post, that's my opinion on the positives and negatives of the game.

Sorry, but Maat's cap doesn't mean much, except that you've leveled a lot. Nothing more. It's not really good enough to base any kind of argument on. Just saying.

This post has been edited by Rhayve: 05 September 2010 - 09:31 PM

[Thxigl]

Rhayve, on 05 September 2010 - 09:30 PM, said:

Sorry, but Maat's cap doesn't mean much, except that you've leveled a lot. Nothing more. It's not really good enough to base any kind of argument on. Just saying.

Of course it does. Ryo-go said "Apperantly you've never played FFXI" I just stated I played it enough to obtain a Maat's Cap, which was the argument. What other argument could there be? I'm not posting to list all my FFXI accomplishments. If you read my posts you would see I'm giving my opinion about FFXIV, while others who have no constructive criticism about FFXIV (such as agreeing or disagreeing) are just veering off the subject.

[Logan Draconia]

Open Beta =The Final Product. OF COURSE!

Still, a lot of this seems more nitpicking if anything. A lot of "negatives" are only such with a negative way of thinking. In short, if you go into FFXIV planning to dislike it, chances are you'll dislike it regardless. If you go into the game wanting to like it, chances are, you will.

I went into the beta HATING the new battle system. Hearing that chime every 2 seconds to make an attack drove me nuts and already I missed FFXI's auto-battle system. However, I started to think to myself (why am I comparing it to FFXI so much? Let me analyze this as it's own game). The next day, I went back on with a clear head and found myself enjoying it more, looking at everything more positively. Hell, I even made actual connections between XI and XIV, such as Guildleves = Fields of Valor, ect.

Also, I love the fact that I can be any kind of class I want. I already have a pseudo Dark Knight at a mere level 9, Rank 5 Marauder/Conjurer. Swinging my axe and nuking every now and then with a Lightning spell is great fun, plus the added Cure spell to keep me going until I get access to some sort of Drain spell.

The only true gripe I have is the fact that the fields are waaaaaaay too big. I also kind of miss the idea of "zones" as well. And last, but not least, places on the map are hard to understand unless it's in plain, english text. I know the map art text is also in english, but I can barely read anything. Still, it's pretty impressive to make me think the world is TOO large. The area outside Limsa Lominsa almost tricked me into thinking I was looking at a world map when I opened up the map, and all the camp sites and Aether gates were in different "zones" of sorts.

[rambus]

Ryo-go, on 05 September 2010 - 07:30 PM, said:

Apperantly you've never played FFXI before as most of your statements are describing how FFXI works.

not really, as far as i see FFXI's crafting is easier to deal with.

the other stuff is pretty dead on.
I disagree with this part of the message comment though ( number 2 on his list). In FFXI you have a limited number like FFXIV, i guess they could make the cap higher but its not THAT bad.

Graphics are nice and i do love the facial expressions.
I REALLY like the detail, you can see clothes move in the wind, your hair moves around and so forth. the big ponytail girl taru in FFXI looks like there is a ball on their head, in ffxiv it actually looks like hair.

the pigtail taru (like my avatar) has actual ribbons in her hair not strings like in ffxi. You pick colours for the ribbons, even though its only 4 its better then one.
I would like more choices for the ribbons.

ffxiv dunefolk

this was unexpected they added stuff like this, allows more customization. big plus, i wish there was more choices for the gem though, to reflect the zodiac signs like the description.

Character sounds, i am fairly sure FFXI has more then FFXIV does since its only 3 choices for taru when there is 8 in ffxi ( 1 track per type, A and B where the same)

sounds with the huge list of emotes! nice, nothing to complain here.

VS WoW now the chrs there have more voice and i do not get why FFXIV does not have more of it. I had someone told me they where exacting more voice over due to wow being able to do so.

I do not get the " go back to wow flame" I do like FF as a whole better then WoW and the interface FFXI had is part of the reason why

Friend list messaging ( maybe this cannot be done to lack of PoL)
seeing friends online that are on mules see ^
able to see friends online that are on different servers see^^
friend list adding without message is bad, people can add me I may not want to add me

the PoL management over the game was bad, not the system/idea it self.

limiting your friend list messaging to only when that specific character is online is what WoW does/ (did? was this changed?)
the spacebar BS WoW had.
the poor/hard to use searching wow had.

FFXIV has blinking, i thought they would get rid of it based on the heavy complaints to it and wow does deal with equip changes without blinking.

the level up mini quests and such is good, flashed out from WoW's idea of questing or FoV.
the D/Cing and loosing all data is bad, WoW deals with D/Cing very well im shocked that FF didn't take anything from that.

the interface of doing searches equipment and such is lagger then FFXI is.

Targeting is bad, knowing if your party member is fighting something is hard to tell or find the mob. mobs in FFXIV are red if someone else is fighting them or your party member. bring back yellow/purple/ red please.

where is call for help?

A programmer friend told me open beta is for the msot part suppose to have all the bugs worked out and should be a reflection of the final release. the open beta's main purpose is to test load on servers and publicity.

comparing FFXIV on its own or to other games its still bad (interface speaking ONLY) , its just comparing it explains its easier.

the keyboard commands like <r > and such, why change them/ take them out?

typing "/" "t" "<" "r" ">" could be less annoying then spacebar > ctrl r esp when it dont work at times ><

i likd to use /target <r> too or /target "name" FFXIV seems to lack all those commands

This post has been edited by rambus: 05 September 2010 - 11:48 PM

[ironwall]

I've never seen people get so butthurt over opinions... You either like the game or you don't. Don't hold it against someone.

[Asraphel]

Ryo-go, on 05 September 2010 - 07:31 PM, said:

Double post:

Go back to WoW and your pathetic easy way of life.

This is exactly what I was talking about lol
Seriously it's just my opinion, and thank you for your suggestion but I don't want to go back to WoW.

This post has been edited by Asraphel: 06 September 2010 - 04:28 AM

[MrReinhardt]

I love how when someone criticizes a product someone else likes a lot, they immediately go to insult the critic.

[Littlebender]

I'm enjoying the game even at 5fps but my biggest gripe with it so far is the durability and fatigue.
I have nothing to do till this fatigue wears off.

[Corrderio]

I'm not sure about flopped, but with all the criticism for some things I still do wonder if they can pull everything off before retail.

[Littlebender]

I really do hope they remove the fatigue system for retail. I can't see myself paying a monthly fee for a game I can only play for a few days out of each week.

[Corrderio]

Same here, considering I want to grind the hell out of Lancer/Gladiator to catch up to my friends since they'll have a 1-2 month head start.

However with lag/interface issues, SE has quite a lot they should be working on.

[Zzulu]

There are things already mentioned like the poor targeting system, return button doesn't pop up on screen when KO, a lot of things FFXI players assumed would be there that are not. I haven't played FFXI in a few years but still things the keys, place holders, and short cuts were extremely useful so much that I never used a mouse. It is hard to target mobs without a /target "name" or F8. It's really hard to heal someone considering I have to be in battle mode targeted on a mob and then tab around.

Even with all of those things left out (assuming they won't be in retail) FFXIV is still something new and personally I think is fun. Crafting might take a little longer, but you actually have some skill it in it now. You know you would get mad when you failed a synth and lost materials.. Well now you have some control over that.

As far as being time consuming, it's a MMO I wouldn't expect much less. The area's are big, but again so is FFXI's.

Overall, FFXI played a lot better but they also have 7 years of updates to improve that. FFXIV could have the same controls after you customize them, and SE maybe adds a few place holders or text commands.

If you don't like it FFXI is still running, WoW has the new expansion in Nov. Starcraft II is out... You have options lol.

[Rhayve]

Zzulu, on 06 September 2010 - 10:00 AM, said:

There are things already mentioned like the poor targeting system, return button doesn't pop up on screen when KO, a lot of things FFXI players assumed would be there that are not. I haven't played FFXI in a few years but still things the keys, place holders, and short cuts were extremely useful so much that I never used a mouse. It is hard to target mobs without a /target "name" or F8. It's really hard to heal someone considering I have to be in battle mode targeted on a mob and then tab around.

Even with all of those things left out (assuming they won't be in retail) FFXIV is still something new and personally I think is fun. Crafting might take a little longer, but you actually have some skill it in it now. You know you would get mad when you failed a synth and lost materials.. Well now you have some control over that.

As far as being time consuming, it's a MMO I wouldn't expect much less. The area's are big, but again so is FFXI's.

Overall, FFXI played a lot better but they also have 7 years of updates to improve that. FFXIV could have the same controls after you customize them, and SE maybe adds a few place holders or text commands.

If you don't like it FFXI is still running, WoW has the new expansion in Nov. Starcraft II is out... You have options lol.

Make a macro with /targetnpc - problem solved, until they asign a proper key to it.