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[HappyBivouac]

In the OP you tell people not to take the CheatCode Central review seriously because they rate based largely on it's potential, however...

Reviewing a game for its potential doesn't make any less sense than reviewing a constantly changing game as if it weren't one.

The validity of any review of this game so far is questionable at best. The OP should indicate that if anything.

In the IGN review they admit that they're simply rating based on what the game currently is, and that it could end up being a great game in the long-run, but even then if you're admitting that obvious fact, why give it a score at all?

 

[Dreamwriter]

The game doesn't tell you shit when you start. They tell you one or two things but for the most part you have to figure out everything by yourself.

Name a basic gameplay element that it doesn't tell you? I mean, it starts with a combat tutorial, offers to warp you to the Adventurer's Guild (if you turn that down, it's your own damn fault ), teaches you how to look at your map, tells you to go checkout the Aetheryte Crystal outside of town (doesn't point your way there with arrows, but it doesn't have to, it already told you about the map and told you which gate in town to go to). At the crystal it teaches you how to do Leves, during your tutorial Leve it teaches more combat mechanics, then sends you back to the Adventurer's Guild...it teaches all the basics, and in the process gives you a decent idea of the layout of the town and the area right outside town. It doesn't go into anything as advanced as crafting, but the instruction manual and The Lodestone do a good job of explaining that for people who are that advanced into the gameplay (and The Lodestone is linked from both the game and the address given in the instruction book).

 

[CTLance]

Seems like the west is in agreement. Now I wonder what the japanese gaming press will say.

Pros:
Not quite Star Trek Online bad.

Cons:
Worst user interface in a PC game since 1998; every aspect of game unnecessarily convoluted; feels like a free-to-play MMO in the very worst way.

Yeowch. That's harsh.

Spoiler

(and obviously bias ... ed)

 

[DaBuddaDa]

Reviewing a game for its potential doesn't make any less sense than reviewing a constantly changing game as if it weren't one.

Most reviews aren't meant to be in-depth philosophical explorations of the quality of a game, they are primarily consumer reports, as in "should you spend your money on this game now that it's out?" People are wondering if they should spend $50 + $13/mo. on this game, and the reviewers are saying no. Could it be a good game a year from now? Yes, but that doesn't help the person who is wondering if they should buy the game now. Inflating the score based on speculation that the game will improve later is deceptive to the consumer.

What else do you expect them to do? Re-review the game every month for the next two years?

 

[Kandinsky]

I feel sorry for the people that actually believe SE will fix this game soon (and by soon i mean 2012:lol )

D:

 

[Technosteve]

Do you buy a house half built? Do you go to the building inspector and say oh the electrical wiring yeah that'll get done in patch 1.05, the plumbing well the people can shit outside until the toilets get installed in patch 1.1. Your going to say well at least the house has four walls and a roof, but in the future it will have running water electricity and garbage collection.

 

[HappyBivouac]

What else do you expect them to do? Re-review the game every month for the next two years?

Once a year would suffice. Maybe at the 6 month mark for the first year. And yes, I do expect that if they wish to be credible. That score will stay the way it is forever if they don't re-review or update the review, yet it will reflect what is essentially a completely different game. Is that not just as deceptive to the consumer?

Basically the traditional scoring system doesn't mesh well with the MMO genre.

 

[dimb]

Do you buy a house half built? Do you go to the building inspector and say oh the electrical wiring yeah that'll get done in patch 1.05, the plumbing well the people can shit outside until the toilets get installed in patch 1.1. Your going to say well at least the house has four walls and a roof, but in the future it will have running water electricity and garbage collection.

This is not a good analogy. Lots of people buy houses before they are built.

 

[DaBuddaDa]

I feel sorry for the people that actually believe SE will fix this game soon (and by soon i mean 2012:lol )

D:

Seriously. Anyone with any experience with FFXI knows that SE was slower than molasses fixing anything that people bitched about, and usually their "fixes" were half-assed, convoluted, didn't address the real problem, or came years too late.

 

[HappyBivouac]

Do you buy a house half built? Do you go to the building inspector and say oh the electrical wiring yeah that'll get done in patch 1.05, the plumbing well the people can shit outside until the toilets get installed in patch 1.1. Your going to say well at least the house has four walls and a roof, but in the future it will have running water electricity and garbage collection.

Do you look at an unfinished house that's under construction and say "Jesus this house sucks balls" and never look back?

Seriously. Anyone with any experience with FFXI knows that SE was slower than molasses fixing anything that people bitched about, and usually their "fixes" were half-assed, convoluted, didn't address the real problem, or came years too late.

And yet somehow, it started out being as terrible as FFXIV is now, and ended up being a great game. Huh.

 

[JWong]

Reviewing a game for its potential doesn't make any less sense than reviewing a constantly changing game as if it weren't one.

Reviews are always based on the product at launch.

 

[Vespene]

I'd actually rather play APB to be honest.

 

[Wallach]

This is not a good analogy. Lots of people buy houses before they are built.

It's a great analogy. People do buy houses before they are built - they just don't live in them.

Do you look at an unfinished house that's under construction and say "Jesus this house sucks balls" and never look back?

Have you been to the future where this happened to FFXIV?

 

[markot]

In the OP you tell people not to take the CheatCode Central review seriously because they rate based largely on it's potential, however...

Reviewing a game for its potential doesn't make any less sense than reviewing a constantly changing game as if it weren't one.

The validity of any review of this game so far is questionable at best. The OP should indicate that if anything.

In the IGN review they admit that they're simply rating based on what the game currently is, and that it could end up being a great game in the long-run, but even then if you're admitting that obvious fact, why give it a score at all?

They have to review the game on the state that it is in now, not what it could be a year from now...

People have money and want to make purchases, they need to know if its worth it at this point in time. It could get a patch that fixes everything, but more then likely it will suffer with these problems for a long time.

This idea that mmos need to be reviewed 'specially' is absurd. They are still games, they are still to be judged on the same factors of fun and the current state that they are in.

Lol? When you buy a house you have plans, you know what the finished product will look like, and you dont move in until it is ready. An MMO is not a house, it is not to be judged on what it 'may' be, on its 'potential', it needs to be judged on the here and now. And now and here this game clearly sucks.

 

[HappyBivouac]

It's a great analogy. People do buy houses before they are built - they just don't live in them.

And you don't have to play FFXIV until it's a good game. But are these people going to re-review it at that time? Hell no!

 

[DaBuddaDa]

And yet somehow, it started out being as terrible as FFXIV is now, and ended up being a great game. Huh.

FFXI is by no means by todays standards a great game. It is improved over what it was in 2003, but most people who dive into FFXI now won't think it's a great game. :lol

And you're talking about a game out for eight years.

 

[Wallach]

And you don't have to play FFXIV until it's a good game. But are these people going to re-review it at that time? Hell no!

The game doesn't deserve to be "re-reviewed" every time it gets incrementally better.

The game will get another review when the first expansion pack arrives.

 

[PandaPandaPanda]

Once a year would suffice. Maybe at the 6 month mark for the first year. And yes, I do expect that if they wish to be credible. That score will stay the way it is forever if they don't re-review or update the review, yet it will reflect what is essentially a completely different game. Is that not just as deceptive to the consumer?

Basically the traditional scoring system doesn't mesh well with the MMO genre.

or they could have you know

*drumroll*

waited until the game was in a more acceptable state before releasing it

they released it in a less than acceptable state and they're getting slammed for it as they should be.

 

[FLEABttn]

Do you look at an unfinished house that's under construction and say "Jesus this house sucks balls" and never look back?

Did the builder tell you it was built enough to live in?

 

[Ploid 3.0]

I feel sorry for the people that actually believe SE will fix this game soon (and by soon i mean 2012:lol )

D:

In 2015 ffxiv will be amazin though, well if the stars line up right. Maybe 2016.

 

[markot]

And you don't have to play FFXIV until it's a good game. But are these people going to re-review it at that time? Hell no!

Presupposing that it will become a good game.... they may well do a 're-review' later on, many sites do of long running mmos, but why they hell cant they say this game sucks if it sucks? Why pretend that there is a golden future that awaits if you just wait? It sucks, they have played it for weeks, been in the beta, had advanced access.

 

[MrDaravon]

I'd actually rather play APB to be honest.

Yeah, about that...

 

[Kintaro]

Don't be pedantic. In case I need to explain it to you, "finished" in this case means "ready for launch". The points I outlined above cover the basics pretty well. AH, UI, alt+tab, inventory, quests, content, tutorials, etc.

There has never been a MMO "ready for launch" either. There's just varying levels of the phrase. FFXIV is on the low end, obviously.

 

[HappyBivouac]

or they could have you know

*drumroll*

waited until the game was in a more acceptable state before releasing it

they released it in a less than acceptable state and they're getting slammed for it as they should be.

Yes. They should get slammed for the fact that they released an unfinished game, but in a way that acknowledges that the game will be finished at some point in the near future. Applying the standard game review format to an MMO at launch just doesn't make sense, and I can't believe people are eating it up. Being told to hold onto your money for now is fine, but most of the press is more along the lines of "game sucks lololol"

Did the builder tell you it was built enough to live in?

That's a failure on SE's part I'll happily admit to, but don't go around saying or implying that the game sucks and will always suck. It's irrational and misinformed.

 

[Vespene]

There are things in this game that must have been intentionally designed to be as awful as possible. Like "designer-san, we just finished programming the questing system. No wait, this is not tediously shitty enough, work harder!"

 

[May16]

That cheat code central review is nonsensical >.< whys it even counted?

84 (Great Score!)
We can't recommend that you spend $50, and then $12.99 a month after the first 30 days, on a title that has as many flaws as FFXIV does. But we can recommend that you keep an eye on the news to see how this game evolves. (But dont buy it loooooool!)

>.>

They don't wanna hurt their Square Enix PR, basically.

This (among other things) is why the game industry is a joke.

 

[DaBuddaDa]

Yes. They should get slammed for the fact that they released an unfinished game, but in a way that acknowledges that the game will be finished at some point in the near future. Applying the standard game review format to an MMO at launch just doesn't make sense, and I can't believe people are eating it up. Being told to hold onto your money for now is fine, but most of the press is more along the lines of "game sucks lololol"

They're really not saying that. Re-read the reviews, they all acknowledge that (hopefully) patches and improvements will come in time.

These reviews are for the most part very professional and honest. They're saying "The game could be great in the future, but as of this review, it's awful and we do not recommend it. As of today, the game is a x/10, save your money." There is nothing better they could say.

As others have said, FFXIV will get another chance by reviewers when the inevitable expansion comes out.

 

[dimb]

There has never been a MMO "ready for launch" either. There's just varying levels of the phrase. FFXIV is on the low end, obviously.

WoW/EQ2/Guild Wars were fine.

Sure they got better but they were very much whole games at launch.

They're really not saying that. Re-read the reviews, they all acknowledge that (hopefully) patches and improvements will come in time.

Read Rory Manion's review on Gamespy. The hurdles to make the game better seem insurmountable to any sane person.

 

[PandaPandaPanda]

Seriously. Anyone with any experience with FFXI knows that SE was slower than molasses fixing anything that people bitched about, and usually their "fixes" were half-assed, convoluted, didn't address the real problem, or came years too late.

Yup

eg

Look at when there was no timer to disengage/engage an enemy. Players who used 2handed weapons took advantage and got insane DPS from it. SE put in a half assed fix by adding a timer that just annoyed the hell out of most people-I know personally it pissed me off more than anything.

 

[markot]

Wow was unfinished, but it had the basics of a fun game there, a combat system that was fun and worked, crafting systems that were largely there and functional... etc...

Is there going to be a patch for ff that reworks the combat? The crafting? The ui?... etc...

This game has serious problems, it isnt 'unfinished' its in a bad state with things being implemented poorly and in the worst ways possible. Unfinished is a few zones missing, little end game content, not systems that are dysfunctional, leveling systems that make no sense, an economic system that is idiotic, a ui that is designed for controllers and is completely alien to the system it is being launched on.

Stop saying 'its unfinished' or that 'it has potential' the scores are reflecting the design decisions that the team made, they are not half implemented, some of the classes are not missing. Square has made a bad game and made the wrong decision and gone down the wrong path for almost every aspect of this game. If the game was finished, those facts wouldnt be undone.

 

[Effect]

The CheatCode Central review score is a problem but what they say about the game lines up with the other reviews. At this point makes no sense to remove it now. One shouldn't score a game based on what it could be. Having an example of a review like that might be good.

We as consumers can take into account how a game will improve in the future. Most do. I think that's a fair position to take as long as you don't ignore the obvious even if you cna deal with the issues. However it's equally valid to review a game based on what is sold at the start. Paying consumers have a right to be upset about what was sold to them. Now people might not be as upset as they are if they were dealing with a company that was know to actually address issues and not simply ignore them. SE has a problem with this though which I think others will agree makes this whole situation worse.

 

[Ninja Scooter]

WOW was also a while ago. At what point do MMO devs stop getting this benefit of the doubt BS and get called out for shipping incomplete games? If a game sucks NOW, in the state it is in NOW and the state in which Square Enix is asking you to pay $50 + monthly fees for it, than it's a reviewers job to tell you that. Fuck potential. Fuck "re-reviewing" it a year from now. How about putting the onus on S-E to not ship a piece of shit incomplete game?

 

[Lonely1]

GameSpy 2/5: http://pc.gamespy.com/pc/square-enix-next-gen-mmorpg/1127142p1.html

Seems pretty across the board 4/10.

IGN is the notable exception, but it's not like a 5.5 is much better. :lol

Gamespy absolutely panned the game. The text reads like a 0/5.

 

[-Pyromaniac-]

Obligatory...

LOL that really never gets old.

 

[Kandinsky]

And yet somehow, it started out being as terrible as FFXIV is now, and ended up being a great game. Huh.

Again, holy shit, this is 2010.

 

[dimb]

Wow was unfinished, but it had the basics of a fun game there, a combat system that was fun and worked, crafting systems that were largely there and functional... etc...

Would you care to prove this? I hear this a lot now with FFXIV but it seems like revisionist history to me beyond the lack of the honor system.

 

[FLEABttn]

That's a failure on SE's part I'll happily admit to, but don't go around saying or implying that the game sucks

But it does.

and will always suck. It's irrational and misinformed.

This is fair however MMO's almost never get a second shot. The only exception I can think of is EvE and even then I think it's more because of a complete void in Sci-Fi UO type games.

A game improving to the point where it makes it worth playing is almost unprecedented. SE can certainly try but they blew their launch and this is the price you pay for it. People are sick and tired of half finished MMO launches and if your basic systems aren't feature complete day 1, never mind, I dunno, having real quests, you will get called on it. This isn't EQ in 1999, this isn't FF11 in 2002, this is FF14 in 2010. People have expectation, SE didn't meet them, and few come back from outcast status. Just as few actually patch a good game in later.

 

[HK-47]

Again, holy shit, this is 2010.

Also holy shit, they spent more than a decade crawling out of FFXI's launch hole only to fall back with XIV. Did they just throw everything out and start from scratch?

 

[DaBuddaDa]

I am really interested in seeing the subscriber stats for FFXIV from October through December.

 

[PandaPandaPanda]

Yes. They should get slammed for the fact that they released an unfinished game, but in a way that acknowledges that the game will be finished at some point in the near future. Applying the standard game review format to an MMO at launch just doesn't make sense, and I can't believe people are eating it up. Being told to hold onto your money for now is fine, but most of the press is more along the lines of "game sucks lololol"

And while I wouldn't say the game "sucks lololol" it's in an unacceptable state. The MMO market is being more crowded as more companies want to get in due to the consistent amount of income from monthly subscriptions. I don't know how FFXI was at JP launch. I didn't play then but saying FFXI started the same way is unacceptable. The market and genre has come a long way since 2002 or 2003 when FFXI originally launched and while i'm not saying they should copy from every successful (as in still running and making profit) MMO out there, they still need to keep making changes to the changing market/player base.

 

[hamchan]

You can't give a game a good score now just because it might be good one day. I can give you a bundle of paper and tell you it'd be the best book ever one day, it still deserves a 0/10 right now, at that moment.

They're reviewing the game as it is now. Maybe you have a point that they should be doing re-reviews, I think Eurogamer does that. They'll probably review the expansion when it comes out though, there's your re-review right there.

 

[HappyBivouac]

So what's wrong with the UI? Can someone break it down? It works fine for me.

Gonna go ahead and pull a Londa (sorry for singling you out here; I know you hate it) here and say it's probably "Well uhh I'm familiar with WoW's UI and most of the recent MMOs did a UI similar to that so uhh why isn't this like WoW? I'm a dumbass and can't be arsed to take a couple hours to get used to a different way of playing a game."

My current issues with the UI, all of which will definitely be patched in soon:

1) No inventory sorting.
2) Targeting in large groups. All they need to do is add the F1-F6 and F8 targeting functions that FFXI had.
3) UI lags a bit much.

 

[markot]

Would you care to prove this? I hear this a lot now with FFXIV but it seems like revisionist history to me beyond the lack of the honor system.

Ive been playing wow since open beta. The combat is largely the same, the crafting... They had a lack of end game content in wow, but that was about it. There were server issues with so many players trying to log in, and they were a victim of their own success.

BUT. People still wanted to play, people spread good word of mouth, it got good reviews. Why? It was fun, it wasnt 'the potential for fun down the road maybe'. It was a good game and it has gotten better no doubt, as blizz learnt more and got feedback from the players. But it was still essentially the same game.

Content is one thing, the core systems in an mmo are another. Those are things that should be worked out in alphas, not after launch.

And I prefered pvp in wow before the honour system it was alot more fun and unorganised and hectic... and fun cause the combat system was fun and pulled you in...

 

[JWong]

Wow was unfinished, but it had the basics of a fun game there, a combat system that was fun and worked, crafting systems that were largely there and functional... etc...

Actually, I would say launch WoW was a finished product. All of the features were working and fun, and it had enough content to keep a hardcore busy for half a year.

It was also leaps and bounds better than every MMO before it from the get go. No need to pander it with promise, it was awesome from the beginning.

 

[HappyBivouac]

I'll resign to the fact that I probably just look at games in a really unusual way. I'm no SE or FF loyalist; I didn't touch FFXIII and there are plenty of earlier entries I have zero interest in. I just honestly see, past all the horrible problems the game currently has, the makings of a really freaking good game here.

 

[PandaPandaPanda]

I am really interested in seeing the subscriber stats for FFXIV from October through December.

Are those numbers even available? I know ones for WOW are available but those are sent out by Blizzard PR so i'm assuming those numbers are reliable. I've seen charts that compare numbers for different MMOs on various websites but I never took them to heart as I didn't see where they got their numbers from(or I missed it.)

 

[JudgeN]

FFXI is by no means by todays standards a great game. It is improved over what it was in 2003, but most people who dive into FFXI now won't think it's a great game. :lol

And you're talking about a game out for eight years.

What is considered a great MMO by todays standards? I feel as though FFXI holds up really well, they fixed so many that were wrong with the game.

 

[Khrno]

Look at when there was no timer to disengage/engage an enemy. Players who used 2handed weapons took advantage and got insane DPS from it. SE put in a half assed fix by adding a timer that just annoyed the hell out of most people-I know personally it pissed me off more than anything.

Aww.. so SE fixed an exploit and you got annoyed? Did you get annoyed too when they fixed the fishing exploits, how about the duping, did you get banned then? Or what about the draw-in from some HNMs? Ah I know, maybe the mpk patch annoyed you?

Just as a reference, I did get advantage too of the engage/disengage exploit with my DRK75, just like I did when the 2-handed buff, and with some other ones, but was never resentful for them to fix those exploits.

Anyway, Kadinsky comment is stupid, they won't wait 2 years to fix all the server issues, and other critical bugs. Missing features and content will be added in a timed manner and class balancing, well they'll never get done with that.

FFXI is by no means by todays standards a great game. It is improved over what it was in 2003, but most people who dive into FFXI now won't think it's a great game.

FFXI was one of the best games ever by early 2008, now besides going the shit casual way and losing many, many of its great points, it destroyed 7 years of content with the current way it's going.

Maybe when they reach the 99 cap, and enough content is added to make up for all the content sent to die, then it might great again. Although after what they did to CoP, there's like a 0.1% chance for that to happen.

 

[Mileena]

I can't wait to play this game when it gets fixed. Is there any BRD-esque class? I love BRD so if not I'll be upset.

 

[Alex]

The notion that Final Fantasy XI got these large and speedy updates blows me away. They had very slow updates, and they were rarely anything amazing outside of a few specific new concepts they added in every couple years to keep up how they could with the genre.

They completely half-assed it a lot of the time, especially considering how miserable their end game is and the complete ignorance they liked to feign in conjunction to problems with it.

Final Fantasy XI took forever to get where it is now, and it's still riddled with all kinds of issues and still revolves around the early 2000-era timesink designs. This is why FFXIV was such an important release for a lot of people who liked a lot of what XI tried to do, but just couldn't get over that dark ages style of design cradling it.

The difference is, and also concerning how it was for the launch quality is that Final Fantasy XI had more typical MMO-esque problems at launch, it was missing things, but it wasn't nearly as sterile compared to the rest of the genre as XIV is now, it also had a lot of ACTUAL potential attached to it's mechanics and not just crazy fan prayers.

With how Square works with content, I can't help but feel that the expansion of this game is going to be somewhat awkward unless they break open the wallet some, which is a hilarious concept considering who it is.