FFXIV Beta Quick Hits

I've spent some time looking around the interwebs for some quality beta reviews to compare with my own short experiences so far. After doing so, I felt it might be helpful to post my personal impressions of the game for others so others can get a feel for it.

I want to stress one very important thing here: these are quick observations from someone who absolutely LOVES FFXI - meaning that I will draw some comparisons between the two games. This isn't meant to be a review and there will likely be a ton of changes when the full game launches next week. Also, this is based on personal preference, so take it or leave it at that. With the foreword aside, here we go...

The quickest and easiest points to cover are graphics and sound: simply amazing. Not just from an MMO standpoint, but from ANY standpoint. I have to add that my standards are pretty pedestrian for these areas but yeah - they're good. Then again, my MMO experiences are pretty much limited to FFXI. What I do really want to point out is that the character models feel very natural to me - I don't have the feeling of playing a cartoon. The models themselves have a very nice sense of realism to them and I appreciate that. Essentially, you're getting a graphical update to FFXI in this area. The sound is what you expect from any MMO meaning the run-of-the-mill batte sounds and effects. Obviously, the music is top-shelf, as we always expect from SE.

The gameplay is a bit of a different story. It feels familiar, then foreign at the same time. What I do enjoy is a more active battle mode. Don't mistake this to mean that we now have an action-style/twitch-gameplay situation on our hands. The inclusion of using a button or key to attack does one thing: eliminates the "engage, WS macro, make a sandwich, repeat" effect that FFXI has on some people. True, that's a really simplistic description of FFXI's combat system and yes, nobody really plays like that, but FFXI can sometimes FEEL that way. As stupid as it sounds, the inclusion of a simple button press has a way of keeping you more involved in the battle process. In addition to this, you also have the additional factors of distance (similar to the ranger update in FFXI) mixed with the altitude from which you attack (when using ranged weapons) coupled with the distance from which you stike, the direction you are facing, and where are in relationship to the mob (i.e. - where you are striking) and you have some very interesting changes to a familiar combat system. Yes, that was a poorly written run-on sentence (/facepalm). Personally, I like it.

Another area that people are going to love or hate is the job/class system. To a lot of people, the descripion of this is a deal-breaker. It was to me, but it grows on you. Gone are the days of running back to your mog house, changing jobs, and gearing up - you can do this on the fly (and anywhere, from my experiences). There is a unique plus to this in that if you are suddenly facing a situation where you taking on pots in sky, you no longer have to hop off SAM, trek to the nearest moghouse, change to MNK, gear up, then walk back in order to have optimal damage - just change. Right there. Right then. From that standpoint, win. But that's just the job-change system. The actual system for leveling sounds convuluted on paper but in action, it's very familiar. The simple explanation is this: 1)you obtain exprience points which affect the level of your base stats (str, dex, HP/MP, etc.) 2)you obtain "rank points" that affect the actual job you are playing. That's it. Simple. Think about rank points in terms of FFXI's weapon level - it's the exact same concept. What makes the new system interesting is that you keep your base stats (physical level) at all times, regardless of class. Add to the fact that your physical level gives you points to alot as opposed to a set progression and you have some nice room for customizing how you play. And yes, you can re-alot these points at any time, anywhere. So, for example, I may want to re-alot and load my pugilist with tons of dex and str but those would be useless on mage jobs. There is a timer for re-alotting but I am not certain yet, as I haven't swapped enough times to notice. I digressed, so let me sum it this way: Physical Level = exp, Rank Level = weapon level (in FFXI terms). No, it really isn't that different.

The last quick hit is on the fatigue system. I haven't hit this point yet, and the developers have made a few comments on it. No, it doesn't seem that there will be point where you will be forced to stop playing. Yes, there will be a point in which you no longer receive exp but only on that specific job. The time here is still unknown but based on other comments around the internet, nobody has hit that limit yet. Also, the developers have commented that completing quests will likely reduce the cooldown period. What that means is that you will need to do some quests or play another job once you reach that threshold. I personally don't care for this but I think it has a unique prospect. While this may (and again, we don't know the details of the cooldown or what you can do to reduce it) stop me from focusing on just one job (like I did with SAM on FFXI for a while) it will force us to experiment with the other jobs. This is something that I really waited to do in FFXI and wish I would have sampled more when I started. At the same time, I hate being told how/when to play. Time will reveal the facts on this one, but I can see the good and bad of it.

On a closing note, and this is just a sense with little or no substance behind it, I don't think we will experiencing the same "*** YES!!!! PEACOCK AMULET <mine>!" moments in this game. My feeling is that SE has tried to make a more approachable game here than they did with FFXI. That's both a sad and good thing. I mean that they have finally struck the right balance that will allow the average player the opportunity to have the same experience as the elitist player. I don't feel that we're going to have the same sense that you HAVE to be in the BEST HNM shell to get that one item anymore. Or that you HAVE to have a certain job leveled to complete a fight (think ACP final fight). But, at the same time, I don't we'll have that same undeniable sense of euphoria that comes from FINALLY getting that Peacock Amulet in the world of FFXIV.

These are just some impressions but I figured I would touch on the things that the FFXI community would be interested in. Hope it helps shed some light for people, good or bad.

I really want to read this but I'm way too tired right now, I'll get back to you tomorrow with my reply on it lol.

Where is the tl;dr line at the end? <_<

Read it, skipped the fatigue part because I didn't hit that yet either. Been playing all the classes to learn wtf is going on.

1) I like how you an use your abilities no matter what Rank you are, as long as you have learned it.
2) I like how Crafting and "Fielding" (mining/logging/fishing) require more skill than a few button presses.
3) Macros need to have more lines so you can equip main/sub and your 10 abilities.

Enjoy~

Couple more things to add, for those who have system spec questions.

1. I ran this game originally with a Radeon 4650 card and pulled down a ~2000 benchmark with a AMD Phenom II x 4 and 4gb DDR3 ram. My new Radeon HD 5830 came in today and clocked out a 4133 benchmark. I also ran a nVidia GTX 220 and pulled down a 1508 benchmark on the same system. With that said, the 4650 and the 5830 don't play a whole lot differently. This means that you will most likely be able to get away with a 4600 series HD. The nVidia GTX 220 and the Radeon 4650 DO play quite a bit differently, however with the 4650 outperforming the nVidia.

2. When I first started running the beta, i tried to get away with a mouse/keyboard configuration. Having come from FFXI this just felt awful. After finally giving up and plugging in my 360 controller and setting the gamepad to FFXI Xbox360 defaults the whole experience changes instantly. Yes, this game is designed for gamepad usage. No, Mircosoft still hasn't created a driver for the chatpad, dammit - trust me, I check at least 3 times a day fo this stupid driver.

Try to add some feedback, if you can. The last thing I want is for people to buy this game without a whole lot of information, run it for a day, and then be out $60 lolz.

The gtx 220 is like the lowest end 200 series you can buy. You shouldn't be doing any real gaming with this card with the exception of like minesweeper and solitare.

Yes, I know that lol. But provinding people a point of reference for the lowest tier, a mid-range-to-low tier, and a recommended tier is useful and helpful.

Lol'd

As for the FFXIV and FFXI comparison.. I'm really enjoying FFXIV on pretty much every aspect over FFXI's systems..

In FFXI I was always a mage job, for the simple fact that melee jobs were always sort of stale in the action department, I never took a melee job super high because I tired of playing the job after 20-30 levels.. (the exception being DNC, and I didn't level it 1-68, someone else using my account while I was away for a year, did, I picked it up from 68-80 and enjoyed it)

However, in this game, I actually feel like I'm engaging the enemy, it's difficult to just spam attacks and repeat the same stale feeling that XI had with the way it's set up, it's actually detrimental to just spam keys, rather than actually thinking about the order you want to use given commands. So in a nutshell, they've left the basic commands melee had in XI (WS, abilities) but also taken out the stale auto-attack system and put in something more user-action orientated.

As for the mage-orientated side of things, I actually DON'T like the changes.. Again, they've kept the basics of it, but added more for the user to do, in a typical EXP PT in XI, a mage already has plenty to do, the same is true for XIV, but now we've got even more to do, it's become a bit overwhelming to be a mage unless you just stand there casting spells, but you're given incentive to engage in normal attacks (at least as a Thau) as one of the TP moves gives you MP back, and since you can't rest for MP, you need to do everything you can to keep up with MP, including using normal attacks and WSs.. The targeting system also makes it exceedingly difficult (at least for a keyboard user, I was always a keyboard-er in XI, I found the mouse slow, and I find it slow in this game as well) to effectively switch between different party members and the mob that is currently engaged. For a melee keyboard works fine, because you just target a mob, and stay locked on that mob, but that's not the case for a mage trying to heal everyone, again adding to the overwhelming feeling of being mage.

For the most part, everything about XIV is a step above XI, IMHO. There's really nothing to justify me personally saying that XI still has it's advantages or areas it's better in, other then what I mentioned about being a mage class. Then again, comparing XI and XIV is like comparing XI and WoW, they're just completely different, the only real similarities (other then core ideas, like synthesis, killing mobs to get exp, etc) is that it's an MMO and it's name is Final Fantasy, and the races include Mithra, Taru, Hume, Elvaan and Galka (even tho the Taru and Galka's have changed a bit)