Final Fantasy 14 Team Didn't Expect So Many Players - PAX 2013

[Greg Tito]

Final Fantasy 14 Team Didn't Expect So Many Players - PAX 2013

Producer & Director Naoki Yoshida said FF14's launch problems are all due to underestimating the excitement.

Way more people wanted to give Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn a shot than Square Enix anticipated. After the disastrous launch way back in 2010, FF14:ARR's new director/producer Naoki Yoshida - known to fans as Yoshi-P - said he assumed many Western gamers would let others test the waters first instead of flooding into servers on day one. He was humbled at the response, as he said when I got to speak with him through a translator at PAX Prime 2013. It must be frustrating to have to go through a shaky launch yet again, especially since the buzz from the beta was so strong, but Yoshida still finds himself doing damage control.

"I want to start off by thanking Western fans for keeping an open mind this whole time," Yoshida said. "We had a rocky launch [in 2010] and we lost a lot of trust. Thank you for giving us a second chance, for that we really thank you."

As for the current server problems and long queues afflicting the current launch of A Realm Reborn since August 27th, Yoshida was very apologetic. "We didn't expect this kind of response at launch. We thought players would let others take the plunge," he said, based on how bad it was in 2010. The number of players trying to log into FF14:ARR has "exceeded expectations."

That said, things are in motion to alleviate the problems, and a fix will be coming sooner rather than later. "Our server team is working around the clock to fix the issues," said Yoshida. "We are working on an update to distribute the server load that will go live on Wednesday [Sept. 4th] that will clear everything up. Then we'll be ready to take the next step with our fans."

Yoshida also wanted to clear up a big miscommunication regarding player videos of FF14 footage on YouTube such as Let's Plays or walkthroughs. He said there are no restrictions going forward, you can post whatever videos you like without fearing the wrath of Square Enix taking them down.

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As for players frustrated that they can't play with their friends on the right servers, Square Enix is working on a server transfer program. It's unclear if there will be free transfers offered, or if a small fee will be involved. Yoshida wants to avoid the situation where all the players transfer to the same server for free, but we should see a transfer system for FF14 in place in the next month or so, and we'll get more details on pricing then.

Okay, whew, damage control over. Let's talk about the game. Most people who have gotten to play ARR have thoroughly enjoyed the innovations it brings to the MMO space, but there are still a few nagging design issues. I asked Yoshida about the lack of dedicated healing classes in the first few levels.

"The Arcanist actually has enough healing spells to make due in most situations until you get to level 30," Yoshida said. "We will probably make a change in the duty finder to designate the Arcanist as a healing class so that it's easier to group up with them."

Surpisingly enough, Yoshida said their internal metrics say the problem isn't a lack of healers at those levels, but a dearth of tanks. "We are considering offering bonuses to the tanks so that more players choose to play them," he said.

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One thing I was confused about when FF14:ARR was first announced was how Square Enix decided to stick with the subscription model, despite the obvious benefits of free to play in the current market. I asked Yoshida why he choose to stick with forcing the player to pay 15 bucks a month.

"Final Fantasy 14 was developed using all Square Enix's money, there were no outside investors or publishers," he explained. "So if FF14 is in the red, losing money, we can wait it out until the subscriptions stabilize.

"We stuck with subscriptions because we wanted a stable amount of money to pay developers to develop patches on time. We didn't want to get into a situation where we couldn't afford to make a patch," he continued. "As a producer, I of course will be watching how the money flows and will evaluate the situation. If we had to change to a free to play model, we would probably offer a hybrid model with free to play servers and subscriptions servers, but it's not something we have planned right now."

I'm skeptical as to whether the free to play model features has such a high fluctuation of income, but it seems Yoshida's information points to that. I also fail to see why he's ok with going in the red with a subscription model but not in the free to play to pay his own developers.

Part of me is afraid Square and Yoshida are falling into the same trap they did when FF14 first launched. Yoshida admitted bravado was to blame.

"One of the biggest reason FF14 failed, was that we didn't understand the Western MMO market and how it had changed," he said. "We had the mentality that 'We are the best. We are Square Enix. We know what players want.' We had so much success with Final Fantasy 11, but we didn't study what had changed in the market since then.

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"One of things I did when I took over development of FF14:ARR was to make everyone play current MMOs to see what Western players expect and to get back to that global standard," Yoshida said.

He also mentioned how he was fan of the older Final Fantasy RPGs, the deep rich and dark stories. "The current Final Fantasy games feel like they are for kids," he said, oddly criticizing his own company's offerings. "I want to make a Final Fantasy game that's more for our generation, our older fans, and the response from fans so far is that Final Fantasy is back."

Final Fantasy may be back, and by the WarCry team [http://www.warcry.com/news/view/125084-Final-Fantasy-14-Preview-Part-One-Reigniting-a-Fanboy], A Realm Reborn is an excellently designed MMO. Hopefully the server issues are indeed cleared up next Wednesday, and enough players can get to play it so that the business decisions Square and Yoshida have made prove true.

Otherwise, Yoshi-P may have to continue doing damage control.

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Check out more on Final Fantasy 14: A Realm Reborn on WarCry by clicking below!

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[Poetic Nova]

Might pick up a copy when the servers can handle the traffic. Glad to see they managed to make a proper FFXIV.

 

[KeyMaster45]

The game really is quite fantastic. I haven't had so much fun with an mmo since I picked WoW all those years ago.

 

[bliebblob]

That's all pretty good news to me. Not only should digital sales hopefully be back by wednesday, but with the youtube ban lifted my favourite youtube reviewers may review it after all. Which would be most welcome because I haven't been this indecisive about a game purchase since I had to choose pokemon blue or red!

 

[nodlimax]

Yeah yeah yeah, let's wait a few months and then let's take a look at the game. From what I've seen during the beta, it's the same boring s*** as WoW just in a different look.

 

[CrazyCapnMorgan]

The game really is quite fantastic. I haven't had so much fun with an mmo since I picked WoW all those years ago.

Same here, with the exception that I can't log on to play the damned thing. I posted a blog on my character's lodestone page that sums up my thoughts and feelings regarding the entire launch debacle. I will link it here.

Note to mods: If this does violate some rule, please notify me so that I can edit my post. Thanks.

http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/character/2821717/blog/60605/

That's all pretty good news to me. Not only should digital sales hopefully be back by wednesday, but with the youtube ban lifted my favourite youtube reviewers may review it after all. Which would be most welcome because I haven't been this indecisive about a game purchase since I had to choose pokemon blue or red!

If you like classic and iconic Final Fantasy things, this game is definitely worth the purchase...once the issues with the servers are adequately addressed.

 

[Zeckt]

Honestly, the only people who would want this game to fail are people who hate Square Enix. I'm going to plunge into the game myself in maybe a month or two, I always avoid mmo launches.

 

[ckam]

I'm not generally interested in MMOs, but since it is Final Fantasy I'll give it a quick shot. If anyone can answer these questions for me, I'd be very thankful for the information.

1) Is the combat system Point-and-Click, like I click on an enemy and my character starts punching the enemy until it dies?
2) Is the ability system like a xylophone?
3) Do I have to collect 20 asses at any point?
4) Is everyone The Chosen One?
5) How nice is the general community?

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

Way more people wanted to give Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn a shot than Square Enix anticipated.

Square Enix's reaction, to me, sounds like a lack of faith in their own product. That is not a happy sign.

 

[Alfador_VII]

Way more people wanted to give Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn a shot than Square Enix anticipated.

Square Enix's reaction, to me, sounds like a lack of faith in their own product. That is not a happy sign.

No, this is what all online game launches do. They sell X million copies of an MMO and every time they seem surprised that the servers can't support X million players...

Not seen one get it right yet. SWTOR did nearly, very good servers stability, just some long login queues at peak time. (Yes I know they screwed the pooch later, but that's another thing)

 

[Omnicrom]

Huh, I always thought the problem with FF14 v1 was that they outsourced it to a crummy Chinese MMO Programming mill and didn't realize that crap work would make people dislike. I guess they just assumed that a big name MMO didn't need to actually be made in house to any standard of quality. Of course that's about par for the course for SE these days so why the heck am I surpsied.

 

[deadish]

Would be nice if we got a Mac version ... but that isn't going to happen is it. ><

Doubt my laptop could handle it even if they did release a Mac version.

Way more people wanted to give Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn a shot than Square Enix anticipated.

Square Enix's reaction, to me, sounds like a lack of faith in their own product. That is not a happy sign.

The market is saturated. It doesn't help that FFXIV is a sub game.

 

[DanielBrown]

I only noticed the game a few days before early access and decided to buy it.
Unfortunetly I'm pretty sure a huge amount of the Western audience will leave when their free month is up, myself included. I expected some grind, being an Asian MMO and all, but not this much. Lost all intrest in the game a few days ago due to the quest shortage that starts around level 36... and that's only with one class. I can't imagine the pain of leveling up another one without any quests at all - or a third one(I'm a huge altoholic and have to try everything) etc etc.

It's very good for a new release, if you can call it that, but it really needs more quests for those that doesn't enjoy FATE/levequest grinding. Another possiblity is making the exp in instances worth it. Way too low at the moment.
Having light parties of four was also a really bad move I don't understand. The queues for dps is insane since there can be only two per party.

I'm not generally interested in MMOs, but since it is Final Fantasy I'll give it a quick shot. If anyone can answer these questions for me, I'd be very thankful for the information.

1) Is the combat system Point-and-Click, like I click on an enemy and my character starts punching the enemy until it dies?
2) Is the ability system like a xylophone?
3) Do I have to collect 20 asses at any point?
4) Is everyone The Chosen One?
5) How nice is the general community?

Edit: Elaborating a bit since others understood your questions better than I did(really late here!).

1. Yes, the same way as in WoW, but most mobs uses AoE attacks which you can avoid by stepping out of the red area. Personally I'm not much for the system. It makes more sense than just standing there taking and giving blows, but for melee dps it's quite an annoyance.
The global cooldown for most skills is 2,5 seconds, and a few skills you can use in between, which makes combat fairly sluggish. I've played LOTRO for the past three years though so I'm used to that, but at times it can feel very slow.

2. Yes, some classes(all melee ones I tried so far) also uses combos and many attacks do more damage if you either flank them or attack from behind. Again, makes more sense, but it's quite annoying in instances when the tank doesn't stand still. Spent so much time on my lancer trying to find the flank of the enemies.
You got fewer skills than I'm used to though. At www.xivdb.com you can check all skills.

3. Yes, as in basically all MMOs. Don't expect anything different. You don't have to gather/kill as much as usual though, as already said.

4. Of course.

5. Since it's both on PC and PS3 you can expect a lot of silent players. The PC players are a gamble. Some nice people and the majority are douches, like in most MMOs.
In instances I've had runs with both silent, serious parties, talkative, nice parties and the douchebag parties where they whine and rage after every single mistake. Most of them have been nice. In the open world however everyone is a fucking douche. Had so many people wait for me to attack mobs only to tag them quickly before I strike.

Watch some gameplay videos and decide for yourself if it seems intresting or not. Just be prepared for the grind. Since you're not used to MMOs it might get extremely frustrating for you.

 

[InfinityX]

I'm not generally interested in MMOs, but since it is Final Fantasy I'll give it a quick shot. If anyone can answer these questions for me, I'd be very thankful for the information.

1) Is the combat system Point-and-Click, like I click on an enemy and my character starts punching the enemy until it dies?
2) Is the ability system like a xylophone?
3) Do I have to collect 20 asses at any point?
4) Is everyone The Chosen One?
5) How nice is the general community?

1) Its point and click, BUT mobs have stronger abilities that show as a red cone or box or circle that you have to move out of or take large damage / status effects. (Similar to GW2) Its a mix of both worlds really.

2)If you mean like Press buttons to do attacks in a rotating fashion, yea it is. You can equip some cross-class abilities though (like a Marauder's Bleed on your Archer class) (P.S If you don't already know, One character can be every class)

3)Yes, but I haven't seen any of those quest go past a number of 5 or 6. There are other quests like hunt the target, Find the disguised target, and a "how many mobs can you kill in a time limit". To be fair, what other type of quests are you looking for?

4)It wouldn't be a MMO if you weren't. Personal story makes you feel like the chosen one, but when doing dungeons, you feel like a adventure (IMO).

5)Its mixed right now. with the servers being a mess, I think lots of people are on edge right now. I've personally have not come across any rude players, but I heard tanks get the short end of the stick though at later dungeons.

 

[rbstewart7263]

Jeez escapist you can be such negative nancys sometimes. Noones making the subscription complaint with the elder scrolls online. I think someone just wanted to pop in and play for free./:1

 

[ckam]

1) Its point and click, BUT mobs have stronger abilities that show as a red cone or box or circle that you have to move out of or take large damage / status effects. (Similar to GW2) Its a mix of both worlds really.

2)If you mean like Press buttons to do attacks in a rotating fashion, yea it is. You can equip some cross-class abilities though (like a Marauder's Bleed on your Archer class) (P.S If you don't already know, One character can be every class)

3)Yes, but I haven't seen any of those quest go past a number of 5 or 6. There are other quests like hunt the target, Find the disguised target, and a "how many mobs can you kill in a time limit". To be fair, what other type of quests are you looking for?

4)It wouldn't be a MMO if you weren't. Personal story makes you feel like the chosen one, but when doing dungeons, you feel like a adventure (IMO).

5)Its mixed right now. with the servers being a mess, I think lots of people are on edge right now. I've personally have not come across any rude players, but I heard tanks get the short end of the stick though at later dungeons.

Oh sorry, I didn't elaborate on 2, I meant are there 50 different spells that your character can cast / have on HUD. I tend to dislike casting 20 different spells in a combo because "that's how you get the biggest dps/damage" in the game or whatever. Thanks though.

 

[KeyMaster45]

I'm not generally interested in MMOs, but since it is Final Fantasy I'll give it a quick shot. If anyone can answer these questions for me, I'd be very thankful for the information.

1) Is the combat system Point-and-Click, like I click on an enemy and my character starts punching the enemy until it dies?

Yes and no. Depending on the class you're playing depends on how you tackle enemies. Though I have yet to try them I understand that many of the melee classes revolve around abilities requiring positioning yourself in relation to your target, flanking and what not. The ranged classes play like pretty standard fair casters, but again each has it's own little catch to combat. Another thing to note is that while an ability may be "instant" cast the game will not apply the damage until the animation for it is complete; in most cases this gives an instant spell maybe a 1/2 second soft cast time. Archers stand out amongst the ranged classes because though they have abilities with cast times they are allowed to move freely about the battle field while casting, so long as their enemy does not leave their line of sight.

Though I'm guessing the root of your question is does combat rely mostly on auto-attacking, and the answer is no. Auto-attacking is in the game, but if you rely on only that during combat you will be dead very quickly. Also if you intend to stand still and just mash buttons mindlessly while in combat you will die very quickly, because many enemies have telegraphed attacks that you must avoid (displayed by a red area on the ground to show where the ability will hit)

2) Is the ability system like a xylophone?

You mean does the UI make use of a hotbar to manage your spells and abilities? Yes, yes it does. If you don't care for that though you can always plug in a gamepad and play it that way. I've yet to try a gamepad, but I hear it works very well to the point where it really is just preference of play style (or you're playing it on the PS3).

3) Do I have to collect 20 asses at any point?

No, no mmo has ever requested you collect 20 asses of some creature, or 20 donkeys.

Currently at level 40 the most I have ever been asked to collect of anything is 8. There is no random drop on quest items like that either, if you're being sent out to collect 4 cyclops eyes you will be 4 for 4 on eyes and cyclops (cyclopi?), provided you were the one to tag the creature first. If it's a simple kill quest then you need to contribute enough damage to killing the creature to recieve credit, or tag it first. It's a level grind, and SE has put in multiple options for how you might want to tackle that. At the end of the day questing is grinding on monsters with context towards a larger story and world building.

4) Is everyone The Chosen One?

Again, yes and no. In relation to the world at large your character is considered but one face among a seething multitude of adventurers out looking for fame and fortune. On the smaller scale of you personally your character becomes embroiled in multiple story lines of varying degrees of grave importance. I can only speak in terms of the main story and Black Mage quest lines, but in both you're not "the chosen one" just an important piece to the puzzle of solving a problem.

The best way to put it is that one the level of a single player Square has crafted a story for people to experience that feels more akin to a traditional FF game. The disconnect of there being other players following the same story path as you is even lampshaded at one point where you character walks in to the inn where the game begins (which city this inn is in varies depending on what your starting class was) and see the proprietor giving the exact same speech you got to "another new adventurer".

Honestly I don't know what else to say about this. If it's something you can't mentally get over to enjoy the rest of the game, then I suppose that's a personal problem.

5) How nice is the general community?

They're a little bit on edge right now because of all the server problems, but nice enough I suppose. The community certainly isn't dandelions, roses, and hugs. If you can put up with basic forum bile then you should be able to stand the FF14:ARR community.

Now let me ask a question of you.

Did you really want someone to provided answers to these questions or were you just rattling off Yahtzee's list of MMO tropes, and really have no interest in playing MMOs at all?

 

[InfinityX]

]Oh sorry, I didn't elaborate on 2, I meant are there 50 different spells that your character can cast / have on HUD. I tend to dislike casting 20 different spells in a combo because "that's how you get the biggest dps/damage" in the game or whatever. Thanks though.

Nah, Im just about to hit lvl 30, but I only have about 20 ability slots used up, 5-6 of those being Items.
I mostly tank, and my DPS rotation is mostly 1-2-3, or 1-2-4 if I need mana, But again, a DPS class has more combos to work with, and most of mine is Aggro gain, or defensive ones.

Usually your Highest damage comes from gear and position rather then press 20 buttons.