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When does this game become an MMO
Shmackpappy
Member Posts: 75
I bought this game on Amazon when it went on sale for 14.99. I figured it was a good risk. I convinced my wife to try it too. She picked a different class from me and started in a different town. So far the game is decent but seems like a single player game. The occasional FATE doesn't change this. I am up to level 11 so far. The one thing that bothers me most is that I would like to group up with my wife to quest. When do these story lines converge? And does more group content become available at some point?
Comments
grouping = fates and dungeons
to play together one of youll will have to travel which might be rought at your current level but at lvl15(iirc) you get access to the airships and then meeting up will be easy.
Well at end game there are 8 man raids and there is a 24 man raid .
Mostly 4 player groups .
Instances .
This isn't really a true MMO but since EQ1 have we actually had a true MMO that doesn't rely on instances ?
I remember WOW had 40 player raids . I get more players in Battlefield 64 players so does this mean Battle field is an MMO ?
BF4 is an MMOFPS
Don't confuse this with MMOFPSRPG
So wait, EQ1, with its tiny little zones about an eighth of the size of those in FFXIV and infinitely smaller than those available in say, WoW or LOTRO (including chopped-up cities) you consider more of a 'true' MMO than modern games?
Am I just misinterpreting this, or is that what you're saying? Because either way one of us has sure as hell gone off the deep end here.
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The genre is about to jump off a cliff once it's decided new players should be given the finger by assuming they don't need to learn the basics of the game before grouping up.
Even FFXI, the groupest of the group MMOgroups, had you solo to level 12~ range. Why? Because it's dumb x infinity to require grouping up when you don't know what the hell you're doing.
BF4 is not an MMOFPS.
Planetside was an MMOFPS, and a damned fun one at that.
Planetside 2 is why we probably won't see anymore MMOFPS for awhile. Single-handedly gutted the genre and made it as unfun as possible.
Waiting for something fresh to arrive on the MMO scene...
End game FFXIV is just instances , the only MMO is standing in town while waiting for party.
Are you saying that 4-8 man instances is a true MMO ? If so then wow really ?
"Starting city" (main story) storylines start to converge at lv30ish (Coerthas Highlands) IIRC, first dungeon is something like level 8-12. Class storylines never converge and are solo mainly (par the parts where you have to hunt something in the open world).
You could always change your city of choice to team up with your wife, once you get your airship pass.
FFXI had much more for players to learn by the time they got to grouping range. You had to learn the basics of the game, the world, how things worked, how/where to find missions, etc. You had to learn where/how to obtain gear, including the Auction House, which pretty much the entire economy revolved around. You had to learn your chosen job and the ins-and-outs of it. You had to learn the different mob types, what mobs were aggro. You had to learn how each mob type aggroed so you could learn how to avoid them. You had to find out which mobs were social and would link even if they were not inherently aggressive, so you'd know when it was safe to attack something or not. Elements played an important role. Weather played an important role.
Even by the time you reached the level where grouping became a necessary thing, it was likely you still didn't have even all the basics down. Because FFXI didn't hold you by the hand, spell everything out, show you exactly where to go, what to do, who to talk to, what to attack. It didn't give you a level indication, you only had a "Con" system letting you know its strength relative to your own - which you then also had to learn to work within to decide what you could take and what was too difficult. It didn't give you an icon indicating if a mob was aggressive or not, you had to figure that out through trial and error.
FFXI's world required you to be involved, to explore, experiment and learn on your own, or through help from other players. It didn't spell everything out for you. The world was dangerous and mysterious, and it was up to you to find your place in it.
In FFXIV, however, you just follow the floating quest markers, map markers and other helpers. There's next to nothing to learn, because everything is spelled out for you.
When you finally got to the point where you could go to the Dunes (or to Shakrami/Buburimu when people still went there), a whole new level of learning came into play. You'd learned how to use your job's abilities to sustain yourself. Now you had to learn to use those skills in a group context. You had to learn and understand aggro-control, healing priority, DPS monitoring so as to not pull hate off the tank. It became an entirely new experience all over again, and knowing your role in a group was critical as a serious mistake in FFXI could mean a wipe for the party if people couldn't pull it together and get things back on track. And this was the case from the early levels, not just once you got into the higher ones.
Even after you'd started grouping and knew the basics, you were still learning and adapting, as the game continued to throw you new abilities that could be worked into a group's tactics, often requiring interaction between players (Thief's SATA, etc).
FFXI, by and large, kept you learning throughout most of the game.
In ARR, you know the basics - everything you'll ever need to know - well before you reach level 10. And it does this by design. A mob's level is clearly indicated. Aggro status is well indicated. Whether it links or not is well indicated. Where to go on the map is clearly marked - even if it's in an area you haven't been to yet. There's very little for a player to learn or figure out on their own, because Yoshi-P has made sure to spell and point everything out... out of his seemingly neurotic fear of "stressing people".
So, if you want to cite FFXI as an example of where early level training actually matters, because there's actually things to learn... then sure, no argument there.
But to reference it as an example of why XIV needs "early level training" before grouping takes place is.... well... silly. There's next to nothing to learn. The game spells it all out for you. FFXI had a pretty steep learning curve. FFXIV has barely any learning curve at all.
The game branches out a bit more as you progress, as with any MMO really. The first 10-20 levels of an MMO are often a very solo orientated experience to just get you familiar with the game and your class.
It's also worth noting MMOs are what you make of them when it comes to the social/online stuff. I've managed to play MMOs before where I basically don't talk, group or play with anyone. That was kinda my own choice (just wanting to enjoy the story and level up, not really fussed about group stuff) and on the whole it was all a pretty solo outing.
Some aspects of MMOs I personally enjoy these days:
Yes Battlefield is an MMO. Do you know what MMO means? Now its not an MMORPG though.
Planetside is an MMO also.
MMO. A computer game in which a large number of players can simultaneously interact in a persistent world.
Battlefield is not a persistent world, it's a set of maps where the "world" effectively ends every time the map changes.
I think people are missing out on the Duty Dungeons because they are not "reading" what the npc's say. Duty opens up at level 10 and if you aren't paying attention you'll skip right past it. Has to be unlocked on your toon in conjunction with Leves. The Leve npc gives you a quest to visit the Duty npc after you finished unlocking Leve.
The other hitch is with the Leve's themselves. You have to "release" them at a specific spot on your map. You might get used to finding map spots by clicking "map" next to quest in your journal. But you can't do that with Leve because even tho it has an icon for "map" that actually is an overview page. You have to look further down in your Journal to see the actual quest. You can find it easy it will be the only quest with a button to instigate quest.
Battlefield is an MO (multiplayer online game). It is missing the massive part which requires have a virtual world where a massive number of people can interact.
You don't actually have a massive number of people interacting in most MMORPGs though. Yeah there are more people in the world but as far as interacting goes Battlefield has the edge over most games. If massive numbers of people interacting is what makes an MMO then either Battlefield is an MMO or lots of games considered MMOs aren't.
You're grasping straws here try and get your view across that's wrong. First lets look at the definition used in MMO.
Large or imposing, as in quantity, scope, degree, intensity, or scale
I don't see 32-64 players on one tiny map to be a massive or imposing task for game developers today. Especially when there are extremely limited number of models and actions/effects.
On the other hand even a 100 players running around a town in a real MMO is a big achievement imo. Hundreds of model possibilities, just as many for gear, not mention, actions, mounts, pets, chat, and all the other stuff going on in the background. Keeping all this updated for everyone pretty seemlessly is a massive task imo. But, now put it all into the server of a huge map and thousands of players at any time. Now that's massive.
These lobby shooters are not MMOs in my opinion for the record(like crossfire for example is not an MMO).
lolwut..
/planetsidemmofpsbf4notsomuch
Ryoshi1 as Rikimaru
My understanding of a MMO from this site, is a game that groups multiple people together for an activity. Diablo 3 is listed here and the maps and amount of players in BF4 are bigger/higher. Planetside 2 is listed here its kind of like BF4, Starbound is listed here and at best that has co-op gameplay.
/shrug I guess the term MMO has been made to mean more than 1 person playing.
As far as FFXIV becoming a mmo, it is one as soon as you start in a city full of other players.
Did everyone fail to read this part of the conversation. That right there says it all. BF4 is an MO not and MMO as the maps "cycle". If BF4 is an MMO then so is Quake 3 Arena.
Also back on topic.....I agree FFXIV isn't exactly open world adventure as I expected or wanted it to be like FFXI, the world is very instanced and is mostly sitting in ques. It isn't like you can go out, fight in a dungeon and get some better gear and meet people and possibly pk or the like and make friends/enemies and what you can is very pre-defined, static and not very difficult or the main focus. I feel you OP and I feel the same way. Although FFXIV is a dang fine game it isn't the one I have been waiting for, but it is a nice diversion.
I don't have a "view" on this. It means fuck all to me if Battlefield is an MMO or not. My only opinion here is that you need a massive number of players interacting for a game to be a massively multiplayer online game. If it's enough to have them all playing the game then Super Mario 64 was on an MMO, and if it's enough to have them share a world or server then Dark Souls was.
It follows quite logically that if my requirement is sound, then either Battlefield is an MMO or Final Fantasy isn't one. Unless of course you want to say that there's significantly more player interaction in Final Fantasy than in Battlefield (which I don't believe to be the case).
BF4 is an MOFPS
Don't confuse this with MMOFPS (like planetside).
EQ1 was a much better MMO than FFXIV