I wanted this game to be good, I really did but I just cancelled my pre-order. I completely agree with this review.
The graphics are beautiful, the story is good and the fighting is better than FFXI IMO, but between a number of things like the crappy questing, the fatigue system and the lack in detail in almost all areas (Character Creator, User Interface, NPCs, Terrible Framerate on good PC, etc.) I wont be getting it anymore. If they workout some bugs and drop the whole fatigue idea I might pick it up for ps3 in march.
Either you will like something or you don't, there is no need to act all jaded or entitled. Do you try a burger joint for the first time and critique every little detail about the place when you don't enjoy the food you got? No... you just don't go there any more.
Look SE has already stated multiple times there will be more content at release than in Beta, that is a fact, it has been linked throughout these arguments, the problem with linking any single example is it doesn't encompass all that they will be releasing.
For instance in one interview they stated there will be a way to change your hair in game and that there would be more hair styles available at launch, this was said a few DAYS ago, and the interview has been posted on MMORPG.com so read it if you so choose. The point is they had a lot of different interviews where they mentioned certian things that would be in at launch that were not in the beta, to link them all would take any individual days to complete.
Ultimately if you are so driven to hate something you have to make up lies and spread false rumors and be a generally snide person, does this really make you happy in life? Thats all I'm askin people out there... Are you happy? I am, and I'm playing Final Fantasy 14.
Either you will like something or you don't, there is no need to act all jaded or entitled. Do you try a burger joint for the first time and critique every little detail about the place when you don't enjoy the food you got? No... you just don't go there any more.
Look SE has already stated multiple times there will be more content at release than in Beta, that is a fact, it has been linked throughout these arguments, the problem with linking any single example is it doesn't encompass all that they will be releasing.
For instance in one interview they stated there will be a way to change your hair in game and that there would be more hair styles available at launch, this was said a few DAYS ago, and the interview has been posted on MMORPG.com so read it if you so choose. The point is they had a lot of different interviews where they mentioned certian things that would be in at launch that were not in the beta, to link them all would take any individual days to complete.
Ultimately if you are so driven to hate something you have to make up lies and spread false rumors and be a generally snide person, does this really make you happy in life? Thats all I'm askin people out there... Are you happy? I am, and I'm playing Final Fantasy 14.
QFMFT and thx
RIP Ribbitribbitt you are missed, kid.
Currently Playing EVE, ESO
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed.
I've played em all, and tested all the rest. I'm not gonna sit here and brag about my system or what games I've played. But I will say honestly there are a hundred things I could say that are great about this game. And a few bad things. But here is a breakdown of my top 10 mmo's, as well as my overall average score from 1-10.
1. EQII - It is still the best overall MMORPG.
2. Star Wars Galaxies - the launch was horrible, making it to Jedi from beta in 8 months was awesome. then some puke noob got to do the same thing just by buying the game 2 years later. The game was awesome. The community f-d it up.
3. FFXIV - This game has the potential to be the best of all time. It's not PC friendly until you hook up a gamepad and set up your macros, but after that, in my opinion everything is there. A learning curve, player economy, robust crafting, a class/action system that makes every person a true individual. I have currently tried out every class.....on one character....what other game allows you to do that?? They are pushing the threashold of RPG. Could we finally have an MMORPG that is ACTUALLY an RPG? Or do we have another, "hey look there goes another one of those zombie lookin things, oh and another that was identical, and another......
4. EQ - it was the orginal that every other was based on. I know about all the others that were released before this one, but they all sucked.
5. Vanguard - Awesome game. Not enough people with badass enough computers to play it. So no one did. It was good.
6. Aion - A newer release that I think belongs here because of the depth of the combat system.
7. WAR- wow clone...only WAY BETTER!!!!!!!!!!!!! Stop playing that other piece of crap.
8. City of Heroes - Awesome concept, not the greatest execution on world believeablility but the character creation is probably the best of most mmos.
9. Guild Wars - If I want a quick game with a little fun in there. But I really don't like guild wars that much. I think the concept is innovative and belongs on my list. But I mostly put it here so that wow wouldn't fit on my list.
10. ALL OTHER MMO's EXCEPT WOW. ( Okay fan boys and flamers go ahead....because that game attempted to copy what had already been done before...then they kindergardenized it so that Zombies and Heros could play it, in otherwords children and braincell deprived individuals so that they could have a large fanbase. Come on lets be honest, it isn't the Tier whatever armor that makes you happy it's that every time you play that game you know that you are probably smarter than 99% of the server, and it makes you feel smart. Go buy a real mmoRPG. Which is any of them whose character creation has more than 6 options.
So....in my book....FFXIV is right up there with the greats. As long as the community doesn't screw it up.
Yay!
A good list, I think you had it all pretty much right. I think Aion and Age of Conan both have a great first 10-20 levels than it falls out but still fun. If I could switch out a spot I would probably take out Guild Wars or WAR and replace it with Dark Age of Camelot, just because it helped revolutionize the genre along with EQ but DAoC gave us a huge RvR concept that is still adapted in alot of MMOs today. For PvP DAoC revolutionized the genre as much as EQ and I think it always gets left out.
Either you will like something or you don't, there is no need to act all jaded or entitled. Do you try a burger joint for the first time and critique every little detail about the place when you don't enjoy the food you got? No... you just don't go there any more.
Unless...you know...you plan to write a review article for a food magazine or website.
Foreward: . Aside from that and any easily implemented fixes,such as enabling hardware mouse support, you are essentially looking at the 99% completed product and if nothing else, the meat and potatoes of the game. Something the developers feel
8.5 GB (beta size) out of 22+ GB (retail size) is approximatley 38% of the completed content as represented in Open Beta.
So yeah... that is where I stopped reading. Good luck though on your path to becoming a professional game reviewer! Practice makes... and so on.
Some of your numbers don't make sense. To put a 0/10 on controls/interface is to say that there weren't any there. Also, your overal enjoyability should be the mean average of all your other ratings.
I also think you had this all planned out to give FFXIV a bad rating from the start. If you're going to give a review, you need to be completely on the fence about it and not lean to either side.
Some of your numbers don't make sense. To put a 0/10 on controls/interface is to say that there weren't any there. Also, your overal enjoyability should be the mean average of all your other ratings.
I also think you had this all planned out to give FFXIV a bad rating from the start. If you're going to give a review, you need to be completely on the fence about it and not lean to either side.
That's exactly what I was thinking too, for the same reasons. And no, it isn't any 'fanboi thinking' as some are prone to respond, I'm fairly neutral towards FFXIV, but reading the OP's comments those were the things that were obvious and stood out.
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums: Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
Foreward: . Aside from that and any easily implemented fixes,such as enabling hardware mouse support, you are essentially looking at the 99% completed product and if nothing else, the meat and potatoes of the game. Something the developers feel
8.5 GB (beta size) out of 22+ GB (retail size) is approximatley 38% of the completed content as represented in Open Beta.
So yeah... that is where I stopped reading. Good luck though on your path to becoming a professional game reviewer! Practice makes... and so on.
Got to love people making figures up. They say it needs 15Gb for install. Go to their web site and read.
Games do not take up what they recommend, not even close. Its additional space needed for install (only). The release code is likely to be greater than what's currently there, but you're dreaming if you think its going to be anywhere near 62% more.
Foreward: . Aside from that and any easily implemented fixes,such as enabling hardware mouse support, you are essentially looking at the 99% completed product and if nothing else, the meat and potatoes of the game. Something the developers feel
8.5 GB (beta size) out of 22+ GB (retail size) is approximatley 38% of the completed content as represented in Open Beta.
So yeah... that is where I stopped reading. Good luck though on your path to becoming a professional game reviewer! Practice makes... and so on.
Got to love people making figures up. They say it need 15Gb for install. Go to their web site and read.
Games do not take up what they recommend, not even close. Its additional space needed for install (only). The release code is likely to be greater than what's currently there, but you're dreaming if you think its going to be 62% more.
Ah, finally, a supporting link. Well, it was't 22gb, but its roughly double the size of the beta client, so definate evidence that they withdrew a considerable amount of content from the beta.
In fact, once you factor in that the overwhelming majority of the beta content will be the basic needs to get the game up and running, we've got the client, all the world mapsm and all the basic equipment already, so what we have left must be pure win. There will be an intro cinematic in there, but considering the in-game cinematics are not pre-rendered, I can't say all that space will be spent on intro movies.
Heck, that's even more than I was expecting - if it were just 25% more, that would be a ton. I betcha World of Warcraft didn't have this much of a difference between beta and retail, considering how I could go straight from beta to retail without reinstalling the client.
Actually that is normal. Pick up a game box and compair what it says to what's actually on your hard drive. Of course in the case of a MMO it will need to be one not patched much since launch, for obvious reasons. Usually there's about a 40% overhead. The client isn't likely going to see much of a boost, maybe 1 or 2 Gb due to the story arc, and that is assuming its simply not software disabled at the moment.
They have stated what will be in at launch, and it is not heaps of content. Its as everyone following the game closely already knew, i.e. the full story arc and leves in the areas it takes one.
Even if the 22gb number was correct(it's not even close) it would still be a moot point. It only takes a few mbs of patches or content to completely change the game, the size doesn't tell us anything other than the fact that they cut the usual suspects of cgi and sound(probably voice acting from some cutscenes). It wouldn't be a Final Fantasy game without at least a few gigs worth of cgi. Why would you make your open beta players download an extra 8 gigs of sounds and video they'll never hear or see due to the beta restrictions?
Some of your numbers don't make sense. To put a 0/10 on controls/interface is to say that there weren't any there. Also, your overal enjoyability should be the mean average of all your other ratings.
I also think you had this all planned out to give FFXIV a bad rating from the start. If you're going to give a review, you need to be completely on the fence about it and not lean to either side.
Were there no interface at all, I'd not been able to play the game at all. That said, FF XIV's interface is about as close to a perfectly bad interface as one can get and the score reflects that. My overall enjoyment is NOT an average of the other review categories nor should it be. I could be playing the smoothest, best looking, best sounding, best programmed game of all time and completely HATE it. If I wanted to average them, I'd create a seperate categorie called "overall score" as that's all it would reflect. Overall enjoyment is just that, if I had to describe how much fun I had in the game on a scale of 1 to 10, it gets a 2. There were a few moments of joy here and there but they were almost all entirely hampered by the poor implementation of game mechanics.
As a reviewer, you would try out a product from the stance of someone objective and by the time you've formed an opinion on the game, you are subjective. That's basically the definition of reviewing something; on objective review is an oxymoron. It's just a description, not a review, if it's objective.
Some of your numbers don't make sense. To put a 0/10 on controls/interface is to say that there weren't any there. Also, your overal enjoyability should be the mean average of all your other ratings.
I also think you had this all planned out to give FFXIV a bad rating from the start. If you're going to give a review, you need to be completely on the fence about it and not lean to either side.
As a reviewer, you would try out a product from the stance of someone objective and by the time you've formed an opinion on the game, you are subjective. That's basically the definition of reviewing something; on objective review is an oxymoron.
Actually, as a reviewer, you'd want to play the finished game for a considerable amount of time before you even think of scoring it.
Considering that:
You haven't played the finished game, we just detremined this beta client is only 63% the size of the retail client, at minimum.
You probalby didn't play the game very long because you turned your nose up at the interface and bolted before you could adapt to it.
Even if the 22gb number was correct(it's not even close) it would still be a moot point. It only takes a few mbs of patches or content to completely change the game, the size doesn't tell us anything other than the fact that they cut the usual suspects of cgi and sound(probably voice acting from some cutscenes). It wouldn't be a Final Fantasy game without at least a few gigs worth of cgi. Why would you make your open beta players download an extra 8 gigs of sounds and video they'll never hear or see due to the beta restrictions?
Wow you just keep digging your hole of ignorance further and further.
Actually, as a reviewer, you'd want to play the finished game for a considerable amount of time before you even think of scoring it.
Considering that:
You haven't played the finished game, we just detremined this beta client is only 63% the size of the retail client, at minimum.
You probably ran screaming after a few minutes of play because you couldn't handle the big, bad interface.
You are no authority on what a good review is.
1. This is a review of the beta, as noted in the title. As such, it reflects my experiences in the beta and not the finished product. If you have a problem with that, I'm afraid you should just avoid this thread alltogether as someone's impressions of a beta seem can bother you so much. No need for the extra anxiety someone else's opinion may causeyou.
2. I was in the closed beta for 1 month and the open beta until just a few days ago. I leveled 5 toons to 14+. Not sure how many hours but I'd imagine it was over 100 hours. It's not the most complex game on the market, intellectually, it's just the most poorly designed.
Actually, as a reviewer, you'd want to play the finished game for a considerable amount of time before you even think of scoring it.
Considering that:
You haven't played the finished game, we just detremined this beta client is only 63% the size of the retail client, at minimum.
You probably ran screaming after a few minutes of play because you couldn't handle the big, bad interface.
You are no authority on what a good review is.
1. This is a review of the beta, as noted in the title. As such, it reflects my experiences in the beta and not the finished product. If you have a problem with that, I'm afraid you should just avoid this thread alltogether as someone's impressions of a beta seem to bother you so much. No need for the extra anxiety someone else's opinion may causeyou.
2. I was in the closed beta for 1 month and the open beta until just a few days ago. I leveled 5 toons to 14+. Not sure how many hours but I'd imagine it was over 100 hours. It's not the most complex game on the market, intellectually, it's just the most poorly designed.
Your review makes perfect sense. You don't need to justify the validity of it to anyone. Some people are beyond the ability to communicate properly with. Part of life.
"I'm not cheap I'm incredibly subconsciously financially optimized" "The worst part of censorship is ------------------"
In addition to not understanding the difference between a review and a entirely subjective rant, do you also not know how to add?
Also the beta version I played had both cutscenes and sound included, are you sure you played the right game?
Cutscenes included does not mean cgi and the betas were level restricted thus the endgame voice acting would not be needed. If there's no cgi added when the game launches I'll eat a shoe, well I'll try anyway, just for you.
In addition to not understanding the difference between a review and a entirely subjective rant, do you also not know how to add?
Also the beta version I played had both cutscenes and sound included, are you sure you played the right game?
Cutscenes included does not mean cgi and the betas were level restricted thus the endgame voice acting would not be needed. If there's no cgi added when the game launches I'll eat a shoe, well I'll try anyway, just for you.
No retort for how you clearly don't seem to understand how to add two rather small numbers?
and I quote "even if it were 22 gb (it's not even close!!!) heehaaw"
Silly me for actually using an observable metric to deduce that the entire game's content is not available in beta rather than your obviously superior method of gauging your omniscience against your infallable intuition towards MMO's.
But hey, that is why I'm just a lowly responder and you are paid the big bucks for your hard cutting investigative review journalism!
Your review makes perfect sense. You don't need to justify the validity of it to anyone. Some people are beyond the ability to communicate properly with. Part of life.
Glad to hear that when the majority of the forum was telling you a few days ago that, as pertains to your belief that FFXIV is in the wrong for using standard development practices in creating their maps, despite how heavily you were denying being told otherwise at the time, apparently the reflection that people can be thick and we have to live with this stuck. I just wish you used it for better ends than reinforcing how much we all need to hate this game, because you said so.
[Edit: Oops, I just noticed I got a "trolling" warning for telling you this the last time. I thought this was a fair reflection to point out how biased a fellow was from their post history, but I guess not as far as the moderators are concerned, so that's the last time I'll do it.]
Some of your numbers don't make sense. To put a 0/10 on controls/interface is to say that there weren't any there. Also, your overal enjoyability should be the mean average of all your other ratings.
I also think you had this all planned out to give FFXIV a bad rating from the start. If you're going to give a review, you need to be completely on the fence about it and not lean to either side.
PSM3 magazine gave Uncharted 2: Among Thieves it's first ever 21/20 rating for a game. Does that imply that Uncharted 2 is more than 1 game? No, it's simply for emphasis. The OP discussed the UI/controls extensively in his review, and to his credit he did at least give plenty of specific reasons why the UI was bad. The 0/10 rating was for emphasis, on what he apparently truly believes is the worst UI/control scheme ever released in an MMO.
As far as a category such as "overall enjoyability" goes, that's the most subjective one. That's the one that outlines that particular reviewer's personal opinion of the game. And think about it, you could have, say, an action game that scores a 10/10 in every category except it's combat, which is so horrendous it gets a 1/10. Average all the numbers and it'll probably come out to 8+/10. But with combat being such a key factor in an action game, a horrendous combat system could make the game completely worthless to play for many people. Much less than an 8/10, probably closer to a 4/10.
I still don't see how anyone can guess that the OP hated FF14 before he even started to play FF14 for the first time. It's impossible to determine that just because he eventually wrote a highly negative review after the fact. Whether he entered his FFXIV experience with a positive, negative, or a completely neutral outlook, his experiences in the game would/could/should have influenced him the same way according to his tastes in MMOs and produced his ultimately negative opinion of the game. After which he'd be writing the same review.
Some of your numbers don't make sense. To put a 0/10 on controls/interface is to say that there weren't any there. Also, your overal enjoyability should be the mean average of all your other ratings.
I also think you had this all planned out to give FFXIV a bad rating from the start. If you're going to give a review, you need to be completely on the fence about it and not lean to either side.
As a reviewer, you would try out a product from the stance of someone objective and by the time you've formed an opinion on the game, you are subjective. That's basically the definition of reviewing something; on objective review is an oxymoron.
Actually, as a reviewer, you'd want to play the finished game for a considerable amount of time before you even think of scoring it.
Considering that:
You haven't played the finished game, we just detremined this beta client is only 63% the size of the retail client, at minimum.
You probalby didn't play the game very long because you turned your nose up at the interface and bolted before you could adapt to it.
You are no authority on what a good review is.
Wrong.
Video gaming, whether you like it or not, are like a business. I don't know if you've ever worked retail before but when you try to get a customer you have literally, at least at the places I've worked at, around 1 minute and 30 seconds to captivate them. If you miss the window of oppurtunity or fail to reapproach after rejection, you've lost your sale.
A video game is pretty damn similar, for those of us who don't read reviews (such as myself) we do it the old school style: play it at a friend's house.
If my friend has the game, chances are he's gonna be biased as living hell and start screaming "BUY IT BUY IT BUY IT" (I know I've done that for multiple games before and convinced people to do it). However, there have been times where I have failed to convince, and failed to enjoy a game within the first 15 minutes. For each individual, the window of oppurtunity is different but it is DEFINITELY not greater than one hour.
I don't like how most nerds and gamers believe video games need to "warm you up" for you to enjoy them. FFXIV, on first impression, is garbage. The downloader is broken, the mouse is unresponsive, there is no direction or tutorial at all, the controls are completely different from the standard MMO scheme. I adapted quite easily because I grew up with FFXI, but what about the average player? I bet you every cent in your savings that if I were to get a WoW player (the BIGGEST customer MMO base to make $ off from, or even a console player, despite the controls) to play the open beta via whatever control scheme they lke that they would not buy the game.
You have a niche group of players (ie. fan base) that will buy the game, then there is even a SMALLER group of players that somehow enjoyed the unaccessibility (or difficulty as people like to call it) of the game so um....lol
The point is, a good game will captivate you within the first 30 minutes and make you want more (WoW, Modern Warfare 2, StarCraft 2, Killzone 2, League of Legends, and many others), and bad games...such as FFXI, FFXIV and Aion (even though I enjoy Aion) will immediately turn off the majority of the playerbase. Yes, I understand FFXI has a 500k sub base, but that does not mean it is good in anyway shape or form. Try to toss a new player into XI and don't hold his hand, see how long they last before they quit.
As far as the numbers game goes, let's face it, we don't KNOW exactly what content is in the remaining GBs to be downloaded upon release. Some of you are saying (and a bit over simplifiying), "there's 60% more of the game to come!" Others are saying, "yeah, and that's all the content (voice acting, cut scenes, quest NPCs/locations/scripts, primary story line etc.) that comes after the Beta level cap, which has no bearing on the quality of gameplay that we experienced during the beta levels." Bottom line, we don't know which it is, or what combination of both it is.
And like Emp said, arguing over the size the new files will occupy on the hard drive is silly because it only takes a relatively small patch to completely overhaul a game. In fact, concerning the changes the OP would surely like to see (Ie. UI improvements), the live version of the game would require exactly zero (0) more GBs to vastly improve. For the OP and many others who are currently in the negative about this game, t's not necessarily about adding more as much as "fixing" what's already there.
Comments
I wanted this game to be good, I really did but I just cancelled my pre-order. I completely agree with this review.
The graphics are beautiful, the story is good and the fighting is better than FFXI IMO, but between a number of things like the crappy questing, the fatigue system and the lack in detail in almost all areas (Character Creator, User Interface, NPCs, Terrible Framerate on good PC, etc.) I wont be getting it anymore. If they workout some bugs and drop the whole fatigue idea I might pick it up for ps3 in march.
Mystery Bounty
I just think this is all silly.
Either you will like something or you don't, there is no need to act all jaded or entitled. Do you try a burger joint for the first time and critique every little detail about the place when you don't enjoy the food you got? No... you just don't go there any more.
Look SE has already stated multiple times there will be more content at release than in Beta, that is a fact, it has been linked throughout these arguments, the problem with linking any single example is it doesn't encompass all that they will be releasing.
For instance in one interview they stated there will be a way to change your hair in game and that there would be more hair styles available at launch, this was said a few DAYS ago, and the interview has been posted on MMORPG.com so read it if you so choose. The point is they had a lot of different interviews where they mentioned certian things that would be in at launch that were not in the beta, to link them all would take any individual days to complete.
Ultimately if you are so driven to hate something you have to make up lies and spread false rumors and be a generally snide person, does this really make you happy in life? Thats all I'm askin people out there... Are you happy? I am, and I'm playing Final Fantasy 14.
QFMFT and thx
RIP Ribbitribbitt you are missed, kid.
Currently Playing EVE, ESO
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed.
Dwight D Eisenhower
My optimism wears heavy boots and is loud.
Henry Rollins
A good list, I think you had it all pretty much right. I think Aion and Age of Conan both have a great first 10-20 levels than it falls out but still fun. If I could switch out a spot I would probably take out Guild Wars or WAR and replace it with Dark Age of Camelot, just because it helped revolutionize the genre along with EQ but DAoC gave us a huge RvR concept that is still adapted in alot of MMOs today. For PvP DAoC revolutionized the genre as much as EQ and I think it always gets left out.
Mystery Bounty
Unless...you know...you plan to write a review article for a food magazine or website.
8.5 GB (beta size) out of 22+ GB (retail size) is approximatley 38% of the completed content as represented in Open Beta.
So yeah... that is where I stopped reading. Good luck though on your path to becoming a professional game reviewer! Practice makes... and so on.
http://xivpads.com/?1595680
http://guildwork.com/users/murugan
Some of your numbers don't make sense. To put a 0/10 on controls/interface is to say that there weren't any there. Also, your overal enjoyability should be the mean average of all your other ratings.
I also think you had this all planned out to give FFXIV a bad rating from the start. If you're going to give a review, you need to be completely on the fence about it and not lean to either side.
That's exactly what I was thinking too, for the same reasons. And no, it isn't any 'fanboi thinking' as some are prone to respond, I'm fairly neutral towards FFXIV, but reading the OP's comments those were the things that were obvious and stood out.
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
To the OP: kudos!
Got to love people making figures up. They say it needs 15Gb for install. Go to their web site and read.
http://eu.finalfantasyxiv.com/#/about/game_info
Games do not take up what they recommend, not even close. Its additional space needed for install (only). The release code is likely to be greater than what's currently there, but you're dreaming if you think its going to be anywhere near 62% more.
Good review. Well thought out, well written, and agrees with the vast majority of people on the internet.
"I'm not cheap I'm incredibly subconsciously financially optimized"
"The worst part of censorship is ------------------"
Ah, finally, a supporting link. Well, it was't 22gb, but its roughly double the size of the beta client, so definate evidence that they withdrew a considerable amount of content from the beta.
In fact, once you factor in that the overwhelming majority of the beta content will be the basic needs to get the game up and running, we've got the client, all the world mapsm and all the basic equipment already, so what we have left must be pure win. There will be an intro cinematic in there, but considering the in-game cinematics are not pre-rendered, I can't say all that space will be spent on intro movies.
Heck, that's even more than I was expecting - if it were just 25% more, that would be a ton. I betcha World of Warcraft didn't have this much of a difference between beta and retail, considering how I could go straight from beta to retail without reinstalling the client.
Actually that is normal. Pick up a game box and compair what it says to what's actually on your hard drive. Of course in the case of a MMO it will need to be one not patched much since launch, for obvious reasons. Usually there's about a 40% overhead. The client isn't likely going to see much of a boost, maybe 1 or 2 Gb due to the story arc, and that is assuming its simply not software disabled at the moment.
They have stated what will be in at launch, and it is not heaps of content. Its as everyone following the game closely already knew, i.e. the full story arc and leves in the areas it takes one.
Even if the 22gb number was correct(it's not even close) it would still be a moot point. It only takes a few mbs of patches or content to completely change the game, the size doesn't tell us anything other than the fact that they cut the usual suspects of cgi and sound(probably voice acting from some cutscenes). It wouldn't be a Final Fantasy game without at least a few gigs worth of cgi. Why would you make your open beta players download an extra 8 gigs of sounds and video they'll never hear or see due to the beta restrictions?
Were there no interface at all, I'd not been able to play the game at all. That said, FF XIV's interface is about as close to a perfectly bad interface as one can get and the score reflects that. My overall enjoyment is NOT an average of the other review categories nor should it be. I could be playing the smoothest, best looking, best sounding, best programmed game of all time and completely HATE it. If I wanted to average them, I'd create a seperate categorie called "overall score" as that's all it would reflect. Overall enjoyment is just that, if I had to describe how much fun I had in the game on a scale of 1 to 10, it gets a 2. There were a few moments of joy here and there but they were almost all entirely hampered by the poor implementation of game mechanics.
As a reviewer, you would try out a product from the stance of someone objective and by the time you've formed an opinion on the game, you are subjective. That's basically the definition of reviewing something; on objective review is an oxymoron. It's just a description, not a review, if it's objective.
Actually, as a reviewer, you'd want to play the finished game for a considerable amount of time before you even think of scoring it.
Considering that:
You haven't played the finished game, we just detremined this beta client is only 63% the size of the retail client, at minimum.
You probalby didn't play the game very long because you turned your nose up at the interface and bolted before you could adapt to it.
You are no authority on what a good review is.
Wow you just keep digging your hole of ignorance further and further.
http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/#/about/game_info
In addition to not understanding the difference between a review and a entirely subjective rant, do you also not know how to add?
Also the beta version I played had both cutscenes and sound included, are you sure you played the right game?
http://xivpads.com/?1595680
http://guildwork.com/users/murugan
1. This is a review of the beta, as noted in the title. As such, it reflects my experiences in the beta and not the finished product. If you have a problem with that, I'm afraid you should just avoid this thread alltogether as someone's impressions of a beta seem can bother you so much. No need for the extra anxiety someone else's opinion may causeyou.
2. I was in the closed beta for 1 month and the open beta until just a few days ago. I leveled 5 toons to 14+. Not sure how many hours but I'd imagine it was over 100 hours. It's not the most complex game on the market, intellectually, it's just the most poorly designed.
Your review makes perfect sense. You don't need to justify the validity of it to anyone. Some people are beyond the ability to communicate properly with. Part of life.
"I'm not cheap I'm incredibly subconsciously financially optimized"
"The worst part of censorship is ------------------"
Cutscenes included does not mean cgi and the betas were level restricted thus the endgame voice acting would not be needed. If there's no cgi added when the game launches I'll eat a shoe, well I'll try anyway, just for you.
No retort for how you clearly don't seem to understand how to add two rather small numbers?
and I quote "even if it were 22 gb (it's not even close!!!) heehaaw"
Silly me for actually using an observable metric to deduce that the entire game's content is not available in beta rather than your obviously superior method of gauging your omniscience against your infallable intuition towards MMO's.
But hey, that is why I'm just a lowly responder and you are paid the big bucks for your hard cutting investigative review journalism!
http://xivpads.com/?1595680
http://guildwork.com/users/murugan
Glad to hear that when the majority of the forum was telling you a few days ago that, as pertains to your belief that FFXIV is in the wrong for using standard development practices in creating their maps, despite how heavily you were denying being told otherwise at the time, apparently the reflection that people can be thick and we have to live with this stuck. I just wish you used it for better ends than reinforcing how much we all need to hate this game, because you said so.
[Edit: Oops, I just noticed I got a "trolling" warning for telling you this the last time. I thought this was a fair reflection to point out how biased a fellow was from their post history, but I guess not as far as the moderators are concerned, so that's the last time I'll do it.]
PSM3 magazine gave Uncharted 2: Among Thieves it's first ever 21/20 rating for a game. Does that imply that Uncharted 2 is more than 1 game? No, it's simply for emphasis. The OP discussed the UI/controls extensively in his review, and to his credit he did at least give plenty of specific reasons why the UI was bad. The 0/10 rating was for emphasis, on what he apparently truly believes is the worst UI/control scheme ever released in an MMO.
As far as a category such as "overall enjoyability" goes, that's the most subjective one. That's the one that outlines that particular reviewer's personal opinion of the game. And think about it, you could have, say, an action game that scores a 10/10 in every category except it's combat, which is so horrendous it gets a 1/10. Average all the numbers and it'll probably come out to 8+/10. But with combat being such a key factor in an action game, a horrendous combat system could make the game completely worthless to play for many people. Much less than an 8/10, probably closer to a 4/10.
I still don't see how anyone can guess that the OP hated FF14 before he even started to play FF14 for the first time. It's impossible to determine that just because he eventually wrote a highly negative review after the fact. Whether he entered his FFXIV experience with a positive, negative, or a completely neutral outlook, his experiences in the game would/could/should have influenced him the same way according to his tastes in MMOs and produced his ultimately negative opinion of the game. After which he'd be writing the same review.
Wrong.
Video gaming, whether you like it or not, are like a business. I don't know if you've ever worked retail before but when you try to get a customer you have literally, at least at the places I've worked at, around 1 minute and 30 seconds to captivate them. If you miss the window of oppurtunity or fail to reapproach after rejection, you've lost your sale.
A video game is pretty damn similar, for those of us who don't read reviews (such as myself) we do it the old school style: play it at a friend's house.
If my friend has the game, chances are he's gonna be biased as living hell and start screaming "BUY IT BUY IT BUY IT" (I know I've done that for multiple games before and convinced people to do it). However, there have been times where I have failed to convince, and failed to enjoy a game within the first 15 minutes. For each individual, the window of oppurtunity is different but it is DEFINITELY not greater than one hour.
I don't like how most nerds and gamers believe video games need to "warm you up" for you to enjoy them. FFXIV, on first impression, is garbage. The downloader is broken, the mouse is unresponsive, there is no direction or tutorial at all, the controls are completely different from the standard MMO scheme. I adapted quite easily because I grew up with FFXI, but what about the average player? I bet you every cent in your savings that if I were to get a WoW player (the BIGGEST customer MMO base to make $ off from, or even a console player, despite the controls) to play the open beta via whatever control scheme they lke that they would not buy the game.
You have a niche group of players (ie. fan base) that will buy the game, then there is even a SMALLER group of players that somehow enjoyed the unaccessibility (or difficulty as people like to call it) of the game so um....lol
The point is, a good game will captivate you within the first 30 minutes and make you want more (WoW, Modern Warfare 2, StarCraft 2, Killzone 2, League of Legends, and many others), and bad games...such as FFXI, FFXIV and Aion (even though I enjoy Aion) will immediately turn off the majority of the playerbase. Yes, I understand FFXI has a 500k sub base, but that does not mean it is good in anyway shape or form. Try to toss a new player into XI and don't hold his hand, see how long they last before they quit.
GG
As far as the numbers game goes, let's face it, we don't KNOW exactly what content is in the remaining GBs to be downloaded upon release. Some of you are saying (and a bit over simplifiying), "there's 60% more of the game to come!" Others are saying, "yeah, and that's all the content (voice acting, cut scenes, quest NPCs/locations/scripts, primary story line etc.) that comes after the Beta level cap, which has no bearing on the quality of gameplay that we experienced during the beta levels." Bottom line, we don't know which it is, or what combination of both it is.
And like Emp said, arguing over the size the new files will occupy on the hard drive is silly because it only takes a relatively small patch to completely overhaul a game. In fact, concerning the changes the OP would surely like to see (Ie. UI improvements), the live version of the game would require exactly zero (0) more GBs to vastly improve. For the OP and many others who are currently in the negative about this game, t's not necessarily about adding more as much as "fixing" what's already there.