Looking back and hoping for the best
We were expecting to hear from Squenix about about Project Rapture at E3. What we weren't expecting was this.
I can't say I am surprised. FFXI is one of the top MMOs, both critically and financially. It's kept me coming back time and again. After over 6 years I am still playing it and enjoying every moment. So why wouldn't they create a follow-up?
I am mixed about this successor. I have no doubt that it will be an enjoyable game. What is in doubt is what it will be.
So much of this genre has been dictated by the King Behemoth(see what I did there?) of MMOs, World of Warcraft. WoW is not a bad game. I devoted about 6 months to it full heartedly and enjoyed it. The mechanics were great and the world was interesting for the time i spent in it. But it was always missing something. I never realized what that was until I started to talk to people who still played XI: I felt I was important. While WoW, and indeed all other MMOs, have roles for individual jobs, there was a certain way XI handled it that made you understand, appreciate, and come to love your role.
It's a rare feeling in multiplayer games when you actually feel like what you did really mattered to people. Whether it was a white mage throwing her life away to save a party on the brink of death, or the paladin who saved that same white mage form her fate only to suffer it himself, or the samurai who decided enough was enough and meikyo shisui'd at the right time to turn a total lose into a decisive victory, or the red mage who was smarter than all of us and chainspelled an escape. It was a sense of accomplishment that was ever present in the game, but on a small and intimate scale that many players really enjoyed.
I remember feeling so empowered the first time I kept hate all through an astral flow. Or when I decided I was going to die to make the Orcish Overlord Conqueror Bakgodek face off against the San d'Orian Royal Guards, who shortly dispatched this mighty foe. Just last week I took it to face the Shadow Lord in single combat, and I emerged the better man. Or even simple things, like the first time I used sneak attack and trick attack with viper bite as a thief and saw half of the beetles life bar empty as the giant 500 flashed overhead. Were any of these particularly grand things? No, they didn't result in anything other than my party going o.O, but that meant more than any new armor or shiny sword could.
It's this sense of accomplishment that I never felt in WoW, or any of the other MMOs I have tried, that has kept me coming back to xi even after all the stops. It's hard to say what ff14 will bring. The Squenix press conference today at 11am pst will hopefully showcase more information. If the game can offer me what I craved from xi, while providing me a new experience with new mysteries and challenges, I can say for certain that I will be buying a ps3 or a pc for the sole purpose of living those moments once again.
I can't say I am surprised. FFXI is one of the top MMOs, both critically and financially. It's kept me coming back time and again. After over 6 years I am still playing it and enjoying every moment. So why wouldn't they create a follow-up?
I am mixed about this successor. I have no doubt that it will be an enjoyable game. What is in doubt is what it will be.
So much of this genre has been dictated by the King Behemoth(see what I did there?) of MMOs, World of Warcraft. WoW is not a bad game. I devoted about 6 months to it full heartedly and enjoyed it. The mechanics were great and the world was interesting for the time i spent in it. But it was always missing something. I never realized what that was until I started to talk to people who still played XI: I felt I was important. While WoW, and indeed all other MMOs, have roles for individual jobs, there was a certain way XI handled it that made you understand, appreciate, and come to love your role.
It's a rare feeling in multiplayer games when you actually feel like what you did really mattered to people. Whether it was a white mage throwing her life away to save a party on the brink of death, or the paladin who saved that same white mage form her fate only to suffer it himself, or the samurai who decided enough was enough and meikyo shisui'd at the right time to turn a total lose into a decisive victory, or the red mage who was smarter than all of us and chainspelled an escape. It was a sense of accomplishment that was ever present in the game, but on a small and intimate scale that many players really enjoyed.
I remember feeling so empowered the first time I kept hate all through an astral flow. Or when I decided I was going to die to make the Orcish Overlord Conqueror Bakgodek face off against the San d'Orian Royal Guards, who shortly dispatched this mighty foe. Just last week I took it to face the Shadow Lord in single combat, and I emerged the better man. Or even simple things, like the first time I used sneak attack and trick attack with viper bite as a thief and saw half of the beetles life bar empty as the giant 500 flashed overhead. Were any of these particularly grand things? No, they didn't result in anything other than my party going o.O, but that meant more than any new armor or shiny sword could.
It's this sense of accomplishment that I never felt in WoW, or any of the other MMOs I have tried, that has kept me coming back to xi even after all the stops. It's hard to say what ff14 will bring. The Squenix press conference today at 11am pst will hopefully showcase more information. If the game can offer me what I craved from xi, while providing me a new experience with new mysteries and challenges, I can say for certain that I will be buying a ps3 or a pc for the sole purpose of living those moments once again.