Final fantasy XIV any good?

[deama]

So was thinking about getting into this game, but not really sure about it. I hear mixed opinions and was wondering what you guys here think of it?

I played the free trial about 1-2 years ago and thought the game was meh at the time. I think I played the monk class. Has the game improved since then or?

 

[overture2112]

It's a game that has progressively become better over time. There's an overarching "main story quest" line that is simultaneously the most awful fucking thing ever and yet also an extremely solid story (at least by jrpg standards). I don't recommend it to friends because the main story quest of the base game (A Realm Reborn) is just so slow, full of busy work, and has nearly no pay off. It's like actually brutal to force yourself through it. The problem is that it does setup a lot of characters, events, and concepts that are important for appreciating the main story quests of the expansions, which are faster, have less busy work (less and less each expansion), and some solid payoffs. Due to this I can't quite say "just pay money to skip the story" or "just don't play it".

Story aside, the gameplay is great. Jobs are insanely well balanced (median dps of the worst and best jobs are within 10% of each other on end-game content), with usually only one job per expansion being "wrong" (eg. being notably better or worse than it's "supposed" to be given the non-dps related value it brings to a party) while being different enough to be worth trying multiple out. Older content is constantly played because the game incentivizes doing so with dailies and a fairly robust (though definitely not perfect) gear/level scaling system.


Not to suggest metacritic is a great way to evaluate games, but the trend in scores sort of speaks for itself in how the game has evolved.

 

[ADL]

It's a solid replacement for Everquest/World of Warcraft and the overwhelming majority of MMOs (generic questing+dungeons+raiding PvE games) but I hate those.
So if you're into that sort of thing, go play it.

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

It's probably good, but I can't look past the super anime bullshit and am racist against it.

 

[deama]

I've been trying to watch different gameplays and reviews of it, but it just isn't grabbing me that much.
I'm not sure about this one, I don't particularly like dailies, and now I'm hearing there's some sort of scaling going on? Beh.

I'm gonna have to think about this one real hard.

 

[ADL]

I've been trying to watch different gameplays and reviews of it, but it just isn't grabbing me that much.
I'm not sure about this one, I don't particularly like dailies, and now I'm hearing there's some sort of scaling going on? Beh.

I'm gonna have to think about this one real hard.

Apparently it gets "super amazing" after the base game but that's post-lvl60 with the Heavensward expansion.

 

[Blaine]

I played this game for a few months in 2018, as part of my "say goodbye to MMORPGs, because they won't even exist in an another decade" initiative. (This initiative resulted mostly in disappointment.)

The combat, including right up to the end of the endgame, involves DPS "rotations" (which means mashing buttons in the arbitrarily correct order). Even the healers mostly exist for DPS in this game; crowd control is nonexistent, and buffs and debuffs are almost unnoticeable afterthoughts. Most buffs and debuffs also simply increase DPS. You may be noticing a theme here. In FFXI (shortly after its release) there was an incredibly wide variety of buffs, debuffs, utility skills, crowd control, etc., all of which had their uses; those don't really exist in FFXIV.

Other than mashing buttons in the correct order to DPS, since everyone is DPS in this game, there are gimmicks to follow during "raids" and such, for example standing on the correct symbol when a boss shows a certain tell or reaches a certain phase. These gimmicks become more complicated and demanding in the absolute endgame, but they remain gimmicks.

PvE consists of doing solo fetch quests (there's absolutely no benefit to being in a group) for literally hundreds of hours, with an incredible amount of backtracking and interspersed with dozens upon dozens of stupid cut scenes. They are required in order to progress, unless you go to the cash shop and pay Square-Enix a bribe. After this, there are these scripted public raids that you can do for various daily rewards, most of which have become outdated (due to being the cutting-edge of older content) and trivial, but still you have to follow the gimmicks and waste your time doing them for the rewards.

By the way, I not only joined a big clan/linkshell/guild, I actually poached all of the good people from it and founded my own, and then we bought player housing and eventually played through a bunch of the endgame together. I left (after buying them an upgraded house in the most sought-after weeaboo-themed player housing town with all of my game bux) because the gameplay is one-dimensional and extremely dumbed-down.

I cut my teeth on MUDs, FFXI, SWG, pre-Trammel UO, and other old-school MMORPGs. This shit is as popamole as it gets.

 

[overture2112]

I cut my teeth on MUDs, FFXI, SWG, pre-Trammel UO, and other old-school MMORPGs. This shit is as popamole as it gets.

I wish there was anything modern approaching these. I tend to shy from private servers out of fear the creators will be jackasses or pull the plug (somewhat relevant given how much time you spend in these games) but it doesn't seem like anyone is even planning a new mmo like those.

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

If it matters to you I hear this game has pure steaming shit for PVP so you can take that off the table. From what I've heard FFXIV has a notoriously boring storyline you need to play through at least once and if you're not a big FF fan then a lot of the fanservicey stuff will go over your head.

I have heard it has really good crafting though but I hate crafting in 90% of everything I play so who knows if that's true.

 

[overture2112]

Crafting is like Everquest 2 after they simplified it. Which is to say, it's still far more interesting than all the wow-style crafting mmos (but that's a low bar...). They recently simplified FF14 crafting though, so there's far less intra-discipline synergies and other aspects that made it cool.

 

[ADL]

I cut my teeth on MUDs, FFXI, SWG, pre-Trammel UO, and other old-school MMORPGs. This shit is as popamole as it gets.

I wish there was anything modern approaching these. I tend to shy from private servers out of fear the creators will be jackasses or pull the plug (somewhat relevant given how much time you spend in these games) but it doesn't seem like anyone is even planning a new mmo like those.

Raph Koster lead designer of UO and Galaxies is doing his own thing but he just announced it back in October so we're five years away from that at minimum. Crowfall had him doing some consulting work and that's an interesting one.

Other than that, I can only recommend checking out New World and Mankind Reborn (Face of Mankind successor) when those comes out. Book of Travels is in pre-alpha right now and I'm having a blast with it because it's so unlike everything else.

Spoiler

Also Star Citizen

 

[deama]

The combat, including right up to the end of the endgame, involves DPS "rotations" (which means mashing buttons in the arbitrarily correct order). Even the healers mostly exist for DPS in this game; crowd control is nonexistent, and buffs and debuffs are almost unnoticeable afterthoughts. Most buffs and debuffs also simply increase DPS. You may be noticing a theme here. In FFXI (shortly after its release) there was an incredibly wide variety of buffs, debuffs, utility skills, crowd control, etc., all of which had their uses; those don't really exist in FFXIV.

Dang I hate this, I hate it when most classes are dps.

If it matters to you I hear this game has pure steaming shit for PVP so you can take that off the table. From what I've heard FFXIV has a notoriously boring storyline you need to play through at least once and if you're not a big FF fan then a lot of the fanservicey stuff will go over your head.

I have heard it has really good crafting though but I hate crafting in 90% of everything I play so who knows if that's true.

Best PVP experience I had was in mortal online, I don't think any big budget game is ever gonna come close to something like that, so I gave up on PVP experience a long time ago, in mainstream games at least.

 

[d1r]

It has an adequate campaign, ok-ish gameplay, and a wonderful presentation.

If you're just here for the Social / PVE aspect, then yes, give it a go, though the story is VERY lengthy, and mandatory for you to unlock other classes.

I however found the endgame serverely lacking, because there was no open world pvp, and I felt like that I was working towards nothing at the end. Just doing dailies did it not for me, and I am absolutely not a fan of how endgame PVE content looks like in this game.

 

[deama]

Actually, I was hoping to be more entranced by the story, but from what I can tell, I'm probably not going to like it much, or at best it'll just be "ok"; especially since I tend not to really like jrpg typical stories, I didn't like FF7, nor 6, nor 8, or really any of the ones I tried. Only jrpg story I kinda liked was xenogears, but even then it still wasn't that good.

 

[d1r]

Actually, I was hoping to be more entranced by the story, but from what I can tell, I'm probably not going to like it much, or at best it'll just be "ok"; especially since I tend not to really like jrpg typical stories, I didn't like FF7, nor 6, nor 8, or really any of the ones I tried. Only jrpg story I kinda liked was xenogears, but even then it still wasn't that good.

You're asking quite much for a MMORPG to actually have a good story. But it's definitely up there compared to other MMORPGs.

 

[deama]

Actually, I was hoping to be more entranced by the story, but from what I can tell, I'm probably not going to like it much, or at best it'll just be "ok"; especially since I tend not to really like jrpg typical stories, I didn't like FF7, nor 6, nor 8, or really any of the ones I tried. Only jrpg story I kinda liked was xenogears, but even then it still wasn't that good.

You're asking quite much for a MMORPG to actually have a good story. But it's definitely up there compared to other MMORPGs.

Well, I got the impression it was that super good, cause everyone else kept saying it.
Basically, how does the story compare to planescape torment, mask of the betrayer, legacy of kain series, KOTOR2, or even disco elysium?

 

[d1r]

Actually, I was hoping to be more entranced by the story, but from what I can tell, I'm probably not going to like it much, or at best it'll just be "ok"; especially since I tend not to really like jrpg typical stories, I didn't like FF7, nor 6, nor 8, or really any of the ones I tried. Only jrpg story I kinda liked was xenogears, but even then it still wasn't that good.

You're asking quite much for a MMORPG to actually have a good story. But it's definitely up there compared to other MMORPGs.

Well, I got the impression it was that super good, cause everyone else kept saying it.
Basically, how does the story compare to planescape torment, mask of the betrayer, legacy of kain series, KOTOR2, or even disco elysium?

Well, not good.

 

[overture2112]

Basically, how does the story compare to planescape torment, mask of the betrayer, legacy of kain series, KOTOR2, or even disco elysium?

I mean, almost every game is going to be complete shit compared to those.

I'd liken the story to a really good d&d campaign. It even follows that in terms of scale and power. You start off as a very minor adventurer in a big city, slowly become known throughout multiple cities, start dabbling in international politics, become involved with revolutionary wars, and eventually go to other planes. But like most d&d adventurers it's not exactly quality literature.

That said, if you don't enjoy stories like FF8 my (rough) guess is you probably wouldn't care for it.

 

[deama]

Basically, how does the story compare to planescape torment, mask of the betrayer, legacy of kain series, KOTOR2, or even disco elysium?

I'd liken the story to a really good d&d campaign. It even follows that in terms of scale and power. You start off as a very minor adventurer in a big city, slowly become known throughout multiple cities, start dabbling in international politics, become involved with revolutionary wars, and eventually go to other planes. But like most d&d adventurers it's not exactly quality literature.

Actually that sounds decent to me.

You said there's a good difference between all the classes, how much of a difference? Like, the most enjoyment I get is when classes are very different, some classes are complete crap at dps, whereas they are really good at buffing. Similiar to how dota 2 does it, wherein a hero can end up being vastly different to another. I hate difference for difference sake, I remember when I tried the secret world, all the classes at first seemed fairly different, with obvious different mechanics etc... but after playing them for a bit, I realized they're all just the same thing but with different coats of paint and with fairly minor actual differences.

 

[SerratedBiz]

There's a free trial you can do, why not just try the damn thing?

 

[deama]

There's a free trial you can do, why not just try the damn thing?

I did, and I didn't like it. But problem was that the free trial had a lot of restrictions, couldn't trade with players, couldn't use the auction house, locked classes, not having access to the "good" expansion packs, etc...

 

[SerratedBiz]

There's a free trial you can do, why not just try the damn thing?

I did, and I didn't like it. But problem was that the free trial had a lot of restrictions, couldn't trade with players, couldn't use the auction house, locked classes, not having access to the "good" expansion packs, etc...

Neither trading or auction housing are at all relevant to the gaming experience. If you didn't like the game up to level 20 or whatever, chances are you're not going to make it to the "good" expansions anyway since they come after like 40 hours of the initial campaign and post-ARR content.

 

[overture2112]

You said there's a good difference between all the classes, how much of a difference?

So everyone does dps. Any buffs or debuffs are sort of incidental parts of your dps rotation (though using them optimally and timing them with the rest of the raid is an important part of optimizing dps windows). The exception is healers, though they still spend a lot of their time doing damage (heals are big and impactful at higher levels, so you try to minimize time spent healing and maximize time spent dpsing).

Many classes have some sort of main single target combo sequence where you do A then B then C, some aoe skills, a stun and/or interrupt, etc and thus share a similar structure. However, there are many jobs and so quite a few that pull away from this norm.
As a rule, physical ranged characters can cast all their skills while moving and thus have incredible mobility during combat, making them responsible for many raid mechanics. Melee characters by virtue of being melee are less mobile but tend to have better damage if you can maintain uptime on a boss, and they have a number of mobility skills to help facilitate that. Casters are sort of a mix.

Unfortunately how classes play at lv10 or lv30 or even lv50 is quite different from how they play at lv80

 

[deama]

You said there's a good difference between all the classes, how much of a difference?

So everyone does dps. Any buffs or debuffs are sort of incidental parts of your dps rotation (though using them optimally and timing them with the rest of the raid is an important part of optimizing dps windows). The exception is healers, though they still spend a lot of their time doing damage (heals are big and impactful at higher levels, so you try to minimize time spent healing and maximize time spent dpsing).

Many classes have some sort of main single target combo sequence where you do A then B then C, some aoe skills, a stun and/or interrupt, etc and thus share a similar structure. However, there are many jobs and so quite a few that pull away from this norm.
As a rule, physical ranged characters can cast all their skills while moving and thus have incredible mobility during combat, making them responsible for many raid mechanics. Melee characters by virtue of being melee are less mobile but tend to have better damage if you can maintain uptime on a boss, and they have a number of mobility skills to help facilitate that. Casters are sort of a mix.

Unfortunately how classes play at lv10 or lv30 or even lv50 is quite different from how they play at lv80

Are there any interesting spells/abilities like opening a portal e.g. mage class in WoW, or can a healer do more than just healing? Like increasing party member's movement speed, decreasing cooldowns, etc...?

 

[overture2112]

Sadly there's basically no cool utility/fluff abilities. One of my fondest memories of Everquest 2 was when we were fighting on a floating island in the sky and the mob did a knockback move that shoved our tank off the ledge, at which point I dived off the edge myself and used an AOE "evac" (teleports you and nearby allies to a safe area) spell. Or the Coercer (think evil enchanter) being able to force other characters to bow to him (basically forcing them to do an emote). It seems like mmorpgs have moved away from those

What they have is minor; physical ranged characters can give a short move speed boost, some dps jobs can resurrect. I guess the Dancer job is a bit different as while it does it's own damage, a lot of it's "effective" dps is from buffing another character (their "dance partner"), they can do some minor healing, etc.