let us be ABSOLUTELY CLEAR here that FF11 is probably going to be light years ahead of this and i think that's a big part of my bugbear. Whilst i maybe only got to the late 30s level wise i appreciated from the get go what it was trying to do - but this dates back to the PS2 Japanese launch.
Now? It's hard to see where this goes as i have yet to hit online but i have this horrible feeling this isn't much of a progression (if -at all-) over ff11. THe offline stuff feels very very poor to put it mildly and if this is any indication of the online then i'm not brimming with confidence
not done this in DQ10 yet but that at least introduced a risk reward system - you had your time based bonuses plus you could risk it. This really isn't any different to showing the level in a western MMO, though it does necessitate that extra step of an -examine-.
technically, that 1000 yen for 30 days (if you are playing in 30 day chunks) works out closer to $12 - again, it's a non-trivial cost if the game is an absolute shit fest.
Again - i reiterate that i'm vastly jumping the gun here - but i'm not sure what ideas are going to be there that elevate this from the existing MMO's. Okay - you can point to this being a popular series entry into the JPN crowd that didn't get WoW but yeah - i'm confused as to what about this game took 6 years. Perhaps there are a whole host of amazing ideas/story lines but i guess i'll find that out over then next few weeks.
isn't that a function of low uptake though? General Japanese reaction seems to be pretty negative and it doesn't seem like the games are flying off the shelves. :/