FFXIV online

[Norfy the Walrus]

I have the .exe downloaded but it won't install. Apparantly I don't have Service Pack 2 which I was sure I did have. I'm trying to see if I can get it working.

[dejibo]

Today is the day the CE comes out. I cancelled mine, due to the chaos and bad management at SE. I simply am not ready to roll up my sleeves, and jump in there, just to be the first one to play. I want them to work out some kinks, and when the PS3 is released, I will be ready, and hopefully so will they.

anyone going to play today?

[UltimateCloud]

Nope. I uninstalled the beta shortly after that last post because it kept refusing to work for me.

Seems like most of the bugs that I've mentioned have been fixed, but it's still a very unpolished game. People are finding it hard to install on Windows 7 64 bit too, which doesn't bode well for me...

In any case, I won't be getting it yet. Will wait and see.

[Caller]

I got it in the mail today and I'm installing it but I'm not going to play it yet. They removed PlayOnline but instead now you have to manage everything through a Square Enix Membership account.

And make no mistake it's essentially the same thing <_< And GOD what is with SE and these billions of codes. XD

I actually forgot I ordered it to be honest. >.>

EDIT
And you'll be happy to know it still takes an *eternity* to update its files. I'm currently downloading a total of two files. And it's going to take, no joke, three hours.

EDIT2
Got a free trial for preordering so what the hell I'll give it a go.

I'm on the Fabul server, my name is Ithildae Moonshadow and I'm from Gridania. And yes, it's a Yue clone. With indigo highlights!



And fyi this game crashes...a LOT.

[dejibo]

I agree, we need our own game. I am still standing firm and going to wait for the PS3 version. I just cant see me sitting at my computer for 4 hour chunks of time. Between my vision, and my MS it would just be too much. with ps3 I can lay down. While alpha/beta testing I found out that this game has much work to do, and hopefully it will be covered by the time the ps version is released.

[Yvondith]

YYYUUUEEEEEEE!!!

[Norfy the Walrus]

I'm wondering if all MMOs have these problems on launch. I understand making online games this big can be difficult weeding through bugs and stuff. I'm not giving SE any slack but I don't think I've played a single MMO right at its launch. FF11 doesn't count cause it was already 2 years out in Japan so they had plenty of time to fix shit up before we came.

And, WOAH! That is a lot of green behind you.

[Caller]

For us this game will be extremely easy to pick up and play because of our experience with FFXI. You remember how to initiate combat? Good, because it doesn't tell you. You remember you have to talk to certain NPCs to continue a quest? Good, because it doesn't tell you.

I like the leveling system so far. You have a job level and a physical level. And each time you fell an enemy you get job "skillups" and exp. You can spend the points on new abilities. Yes, it is almost exactly like FFT. They gave combat a bit of a WoW twist with the action bar at the bottom but you can still use macros and they can use the same "old" coding methods or their new coding which is supposed to be more efficient and concise but I haven't tried it.

This game gives off a great first impression though. You're not just thrown into a city and left to your own devices. You start in an instance not unlike LotRO. You're introduced to some characters and you're saved and then you're taken into the city you chose and you're given a few tutorials here and there. The animation and voice acting are actually really, really good, and I was surprised at that. Not every line is voiced, though, seems like only important cutscenes.

Oh and I hope you liked the Ivalice accent cuz uh...yeah, it's back.

I didn't get too far before I quit last night because the game is an absolute CHORE to set up before you can even play. It's not fun, it's frustrating, and it's glitchy. Very, very glitchy. It's hard to describe but it's similar to POL in that you have a "Square Enix Member" homepage where you login and you can manage your account. You do everything from payment options to adding new characters and bonuses here. Just like FFXI, you can NOT set your graphics options in game. So you will be spending hours logging in and out setting the graphics and resolution to actually work. There are a significant number of resolutions and textures that simply do not work. And there are others that crash the game outright. And more still will load the game, and you'll hear music and sound effects, but all you'll see is a blank screen.

It needs polish. It's not ready yet. It should not have been released yet. But it's shaping up nicely, I'll give it that. I'll see you guys in Eorzea when the PS3 version comes out!

[Office Ninja]

MMO's are typically a mess on launch because developers just want to rush the game out. Age of Conan was horrid at launch and now it's running great.

WoW actually had no problems in beta. It was the overloading of the servers that gave it a bad launch. Oh well, maybe the PS3 will be a better launch

[Yvondith]

From what I'm seeing from the Cata beta, it's running amazingly smooth compared to what I'm hearing about other games. Of course, there's probably gonna be issues with at least worgen when the game is released, but I'm expecting that. Still, I'm impressed. It plays just about as good as the public/live version.

Sort of want this, and sort of don't now. :/

[dejibo]

I see you borrowed the Maggie MoonShadow tradtion of MoonShadow names. Too cute!

[Caller]

Actually I'm being woefully redundant. Ithildae is Elvish for Moon Shadow.

[Caller]

Updated drivers and the game runs somewhat better but not perfect...but maybe it never will with all the complains people are levying against it. Strangely, updating the .NET framework gave it the most improvement. I have 7 CPUs on this monster and I can't figure out how to make it more efficient. WoW works easily enough, using only about 16% of my CPU, but LotRO takes 60% and FFXIV takes 94%. Yes, 94%. But it doesn't look like it's using all 7 CPUs for the game. I found some options that let you decide which CPUs to use per program but they were all enabled.

Well anyway I'm just glad I'm back up to 60FPS in WoW. I was PISSED that my two year old laptop was outperforming my monster. Not so anymore. Still, it's kinda amazing how much worse XIV looks than LotRO...and runs worse in turn. FFXIV doesn't have real time reflections, doesn't have interactive water, and it doesn't have environmental detail. But what it DOES have is a whole fucking MESS of ground clutter and you can't turn that off. Makes the game lag horribly. >.<

EDIT
OK so I had my first death tonight. You still lose 10% of your exp, but you do not lose any Class exp. Physical XP only. And you still have weakened. I got Archer to Lv2 and learned Puncture. It costs 1000 TP to use and does about 110 dmg, whereas my normal shot does about 45 so...works for me. 1000 TP may sound like a lot to us FF11 vets but you get about 200-300 TP per attack. I'll have screens in a bit, just wish Photobucket didn't reduce resolution.

EDIT2
Here you go.

smg.photobucket.com/albums/v337/seraphimhunter/FFXIV/

[Yvondith]

Sort of want. :/

And... ZOMG YUE IN SHADES IS SO FREAKING CUTE!!! *squees*

[UltimateCloud]

Haha, have you seen the reviews this game is getting?

I can't say that I'm surprised. I think one poster from GameFAQs summed it up best with something like:

It's like they took everything that worked from FFXI and got rid of it, and put everything else into FFXIV.

Surely something has got to change if these are the reviews they're getting? In any case, until something significant does change, there's absolutely no way I'm willing to pay for this piece of crap.