I do hope that they'll listen attentively to the players and impove the game in many ways cuz it needs those improvements.. i've been playing (an hour or so a-day) since the collectors edition came out and have really had a love-hate relationship with this game. the LOVE comes from the simple fact that it's FF (and i've been a huge fan for ages), and that this game itself it quite unique. the HATE come's from the poorly programmed un-user-friendly UI, from the laaaaggggg that seems to be alllllways there, from the lack of perfect 'polishedness' a released game should have, and sooo many more LITTLE but annoying things! this shouldn't seem like some beta or alpha..
it's funny how you mentioned about not being able to "get a sandwich" or whatever if you need to craft/synthesize something. it's sad, though, that you'd have plenty of time to make a sandwich while waiting for all the NPC's and others characters to load. frustrating, yes, but the hope of improvement hasn't been entirely crushed.
i have a slight theory on Why crafting's annoying and isn't always consistent. it's not strictly tied solely to your CLASS RANK and TOOL OPTIMAL RANK but i believe it has quite a bit to do with both the Elements and the Chronology of EORZEA: i've noticed that everything about the chronology of the game is subdivided into SIX elements. actually six Astral (light) and six Umbral (dark) elements.
the succession is this: ice (light), ice (dark), water (light), water (dark), wind (l), wind (d), lightning (l), lightning (d), fire (l), fire (d), earth (l), earth (d). Six elements x 2 = 12 (i had read this in a book at Ul'Dah's Thaumaturgy Guild which explained that time and the elements are intimately connected.) each Eorzean month has an element. if i'm not mistaken Eorzea time goes like this: 1 Eorzean day = 48 Earth minutes, therefor, 1 Eorzean month = 1 Earth day and every Eorzea month corresponds to an element (total of 12).. if you are Crafting you need to not only take into account your character's affinities to the elements (when you lvl up via point allotment) but also the crystals you USE when crafting, also each of an element.
lets say the element of the Eorzean Calendar at the time of crafting is Earth, and you have a high affitity to earth (at least higher than the other elements), AND coincidentally the shard or crystal you need to use is an Earth one, the synthesis in this case would go smoothly.
i think this is what, most likely, could be held accountable for many folks' frustrations.. it's just a theory and i could be wronger than wrong :/
please forgive all that unnecessary rambling, and thank you truely on the Great Review!!
ZAM's In-Depth Look at Final Fantasy XIV
To coincide with the launch of the Final Fantasy XIV Standard Edition, Editor Chris "Pwyff" Tom decided to take an in-depth look at this ambitious and immersive MMORPG.
lBeing the MMORPG enthusiast that I am, I can very distinctly remember setting foot in my very first subscription-based MMORPG: Final Fantasy XI. I was still in high school at the time, so I had to borrow my sister's credit card to pay for the subscription, but I'll never forget just how excited - and confused - I was to be wandering around the world of Vana'diel. It's difficult to believe, then, that seven years has passed since my first real MMORPG experience, and here we are, all standing on the eve of the launch of Square Enix's successor to the Final Fantasy MMO franchise: Final Fantasy XIV.
While I would admit that I have too much nostalgia for Final Fantasy XI than is probably healthy for me, what truly made me interested in playing Final Fantasy XIV was to see the evolution of one of the most experienced MMO development teams in the industry. What many players forget is that Final Fantasy XI was released at least a year before World of Warcraft came along and, because of that, Final Fantasy XI remains a unique title in the market. Today, however, Square Enix is ready to throw the gauntlet down. Since FFXI was released with very little competition, SE was allowed the freedom to expand and develop their MMO as they saw fit. These days, the industry has become a very different beast and Final Fantasy XIV will be a real indication of whether Square Enix can truly compete head to head with other 'triple A' MMORPGs. So let's get on with the preview!
Starting Up
One tip that a lot of MMO veterans have for new players is this: "if you really want to love an MMORPG, don't play it in its first month." Everyone will put on their rose-colored glasses and spout nonsense about how specific MMORPGs like World of Warcraft, or even Final Fantasy XI, didn't have launch day bugs, but then you would be forgetting WoW's crippling server crashes, or perhaps the fact that Final Fantasy XI was out for at least half a year in Japan before hitting North American markets (remember that FFXI launched in North America with an expansion: Rise of the Zilart).
Final Fantasy XIV is no different than its other MMORPG counterparts, and there are a fair number of bugs and problems that have accompanied it out the door. Luckily, I didn't struggle too hard with Square's confusing "Crysta" subscription system, but I suspect if I had not spent three years mucking through Final Fantasy XI's horrendous PlayOnline application, I would not have been so adept at dealing with this new one. For those of you complaining that you need to pay an extra $3 to unlock a single character slot (on top of a "basic" $9.99 account fee), the only consolation I can give is that you can deactivate and activate your characters at will. I recall having three characters in Final Fantasy XI (two for gardening and storage, one for playing), and when I felt like taking a month off from gardening, I could simply disable two characters for a month to myself a whopping $2.
No More Hand Holding
As someone who has played every major MMO to come out in the past three or four years, I've begun to develop a very basic set of skills that has allowed me to flourish within any given MMORPG. The fact is, since World of Warcraft patented the "streamlined MMORPG experience," a lot of MMOs have followed the concept of creating guided systems for introducing players to their game. You get a quest, you kill the requisite amount of spiders to complete the quest, and then you get sent to a new area to get a new quest. Weapons and equipment will follow, as long as you just keep listening to the NPCs and you kill the bigger spiders at the end of the quest line. Sound familiar? There's a good reason why nobody really knows much about the storyline of an MMORPG - since quests are all presented in the same way, the only time you can tell if you're on an important part of your storyline is when the reward is a different color from its previous bretheren.
Final Fantasy XIV, for better or for worse, eschews this entire system of hand holding and, like its seven-year-old predecessor, throws your character into the fairly overwhelming world of Eorzea without so much as a "good luck." There is a basic tutorial that follows a storyline, but, truthfully speaking, you'll probably end up remembering more of the storyline than anything else (please stop making me spam emotes at these angry miners). Like Final Fantasy XI, there seems to be one storyline to follow per capital city but, outside of that, you're really on your own.
