Two MMO's in the main series....slight rant/concern

With the release of FFXIV we now have two Final Fantasy games in the main series which are MMO releases. The other being FFXI, of course.

Was anyone else not a fan of this idea? Something about this has always seemed like a waste of a roman numeral to me.

I always wished that Final Fantasy would just have one official MMO that would just constantly be updated and expanded. Maybe i'm just biased because I don't play too many computer games and I don't like subscription fees, but I think the games in the main series should be one-player because they have more longevity. I always picture the worst case scenario where years and years down the line the community playing this will grow smaller and smaller, and perhaps the servers will eventually go down, where as with my one-player titles all I'll ever need is a functioning console.

What do you think, EoFF faithful, am I just approaching this the wrong way?

I agree. I remember being a 14 year old kid who was a diehard Final Fantasy fan, wanting to be able to play more entries, but not being able to.

With FFXI, the fault was because my parents wouldn't let me. I didn't have income to pay a subscription fee, so even if I got the game for Christmas, I couldn't play forever. Not to mention MMOs play differently than a console game, and not everyone's good at them.

I guess now, I'm used to that fact FFXI (and now FFXIV) are MMOs, but I do think it's odd. I could see it more as a spin-off game, keeping the FF title, but maybe not a numbered entry.

MMOs are cash generators, which is why they did a second one.

I just wish they wouldn't name the MMOs as part of the original numbered FF series. I mean, there was Crystal Chronicles and Tactics and all that... They could've called it Final Fantasy Online something-or-other.

I would also prefer them to be named independently from the main series, although it's understandable why they didn't. Creating an MMO was a huge risk, and including it as a numbered entry reduced this risk somewhat.

I've no problem with the MMOs themselves, though. From everything I've heard, and my brief experience with them, the MMOs are brilliant.

I'd say that I don't mean this to be rude, but there's no way to say this other than being rude. It's been ten years. It's time to get over this.

I'm really not sure what the problem is. Is it the symbolic value of being a main-entry FF game? I just don't understand why that would be something people would care about. When it comes to devaluing the roman numeral, I have more of a problem with poor-quality main-entry FF games in general rather than arbitrarily focusing on MMOs.

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Originally Posted by Quinter Wonderland

I would also prefer them to be named independently from the main series, although it's understandable why they didn't. Creating an MMO was a huge risk, and including it as a numbered entry reduced this risk somewhat.

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This.

It's a pretty selfish stance to take, really. SQUARE MAKE A GAME FOR ME DO IT HOW I WANT WITH MY RULES NO DON'T DO YOUR OWN THING I DON'T CARE IF OTHER PEOPLE LIKE IT I DON'T SQUAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARE

Nerds just wanna nerd on their own terms, you see.

FF11 is better* than 50% of the other numbered games anyway. The fact that the monthly fee keeps young teenagers out is just an added bonus!

*In terms of lore, story, music, art direction, exploration and side-quests.

Not to mention how much more in-depth the combat system is. Ignoring the grinding.

Consider it ignored.

So when are you moving to Sylph, Cbc?

Whenever I feel like making a Galka

So tomorrow, then.

They way I see it :

Final Fantasy Xi : Oh we just lost tons and craploads of money from the Spirits Within movie ! Lets make a Online Game !

Final Fantasy Xiv : We just want more money. Meh. We want to jump into the money like good old Scoorge Mc Duck !

I love it how people attach some ideologies to companies whose ultimate goal will always be to make more money.

On topic: I don't mind. XI was cool when I played it for 2 weeks. One of the better MMOs that I have played, if not the best.

I love how pissy everybody's getting over the fact that certain people categorise things in different ways.

How do you mean, Quin?

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Originally Posted by Quinter Wonderland

I love how pissy everybody's getting over the fact that certain people categorise things in different ways.

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Don't get me wrong, I can sympathize with people who want to be able to say that they've played every numbered installment of the Final Fantasy series, and I appreciate that two of those titles being online games with monthly fees makes that a difficult thing to accomplish. The introduction of achievements tells us something about some common personality traits of "hardcore" gamers, notably the compulsion to complete things.

That said. Square Enix made an MMORPG a decade ago. The streak is long broken, and it's just obnoxious that after all this time people can't just move the hell on.

That wasn't my point. My point was that, other than the op, nobody gave any indication that they're in any way butthurt about the inclusion of MMOs. This is a discussion about whether you sort your DVDs alphabetically or by genre, and having any kind of strong opinion on it is hilariously ridiculous. xD

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Originally Posted by Quinter Wonderland

That wasn't my point. My point was that, other than the op, nobody gave any indication that they're in any way butthurt about the inclusion of MMOs. This is a discussion about whether you sort your DVDs alphabetically or by genre, and having any kind of strong opinion on it is hilariously ridiculous. xD

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Yeah I used to be one of those guys. The ones that complained that FFXI and FFXIV shouldn't be numbered entries in the series. I mean plenty of franchises have MMO spin-offs, but its always "World of Warcraft" or "________ ONLINE". Both XI and XIV have the words ONLINE on the cover too, but they went the extra step of including those games in the mainstay series. In the end, I just didn't care as much as I thought I did. Both games have the stellar production values we expect from Final Fantasy games and XI still has one of the best story in the series.

Firstly, it's not complaining. Secondly, it's not a matter of quality. I'll expand on the example and hope you understand.

When I sort my DVDs, I put them in Film and TV sections, then sort them alphabetically. The numbered FFs would be TV series, whereas the MMOs are films. That's the only issue I take with having the MMOs as part of the standard numbered series; it doesn't conform to my rules of categorisation. xD

But you're not the one who chose whether it was a numbered title or not. I'm just flabbergasted that after ten years, people still can't just get past that it was done differently than they would have liked.

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Originally Posted by Quinter Wonderland

When I sort my DVDs, I put them in Film and TV sections, then sort them alphabetically. The numbered FFs would be TV series, whereas the MMOs are films. That's the only issue I take with having the MMOs as part of the standard numbered series; it doesn't conform to my rules of categorisation. xD

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You mix your games in with your TV and movie DVDs? It sounds like you have deeper problems than how SE labels their games...

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Originally Posted by Ouch!

But you're not the one who chose whether it was a numbered title or not. I'm just flabbergasted that after ten years, people still can't just get past that it was done differently than they would have liked.

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You're putting way more emotion into it than there actually is, man. xD

Not so much emotion as it is general contempt for this reoccurring complaint.

I think even SE regrets putting this 2nd MMORPG in their main numbered lineup. Whose smart idea was it to put a totally unfinished train wreck of a product out as one of the main entries in the Final Fantasy series? So silly.

That being said, I wouldn't have a problem if SE decided to separate their MMORPGs from the numbered lineup, or if they continued to add more. I don't really care either way. Although I do hope that they would put more effort into putting out a quality product in general.

I wonder how long they will continue to keep up the Final Fantasy XI servers? I mean, ten years is a long time for any online game. What will they do when the subscription counts decline? Maybe they could make an offline version over a decade after fans first requested it.

I understand where people are coming from with the idea that Final Fantasy XI should not have been a main instalment, instead serving as a spinoff like so many other games. I get that. Zach is right, however, in that it was ten smurfing years ago and that nobody should really be upset about it. I don't know if anybody in this thread is legitimately annoyed at the inclusion, I read the thread this morning and forget most of the posts :shobon:

What I will say is this: Final Fantasy is a series all about innovation. You can point at any two Final Fantasy games and see similarities and differences. I think it is a testament to the series to see that it can be so diverse within its "main" games. Also, consider the fact that the beloved title Final Fantasy IX was originally slated to be a spinoff itself.

Final Fantasy XIV is another attempt at doing something new in the series and I support its inclusion (as well as its predecessor's) in the main series wholeheartedly, despite the chance I will never play it. At the end of the day though, the real question we should be asking is: Why the smurf do we suddenly have sequels out the wazoo?

$$$$$

Next question.

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Originally Posted by Roogle

I wonder how long they will continue to keep up the Final Fantasy XI servers? I mean, ten years is a long time for any online game. What will they do when the subscription counts decline? Maybe they could make an offline version over a decade after fans first requested it.

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It's been steadily declining for a while now, but not rapidly. They will probably just keep merging servers until there's just a couple of servers left, and keep it alive just because it's a main series game and they don't want to kill it off just because of that.

If they stopped releasing new content updates and had just one single server, I can't imagining it costing them a significant amount of money to keep alive. Even if you still had GMs at that point, you'd probably just need something like two, one for EU/US timezones and one for japan, because of the low population the game would have.

I don't think a total player base of 5000-10000 people would have a problem paying for all that, and that would be less than 5% of what the player base is today.

Unless they completely destroy everything with the new expansion pack, I don't think the game is going to be shut down in the next five years, and it wouldn't surprise me if the game was still breathing even ten years from now, if just barely.

I think an offline version is unlikely, though. I think they'd be more likely to release the server software to the public, for fans to run it themselves, after the game is no longer profitable for them.

I don't understand why this is a complaint at all. Who cares what a FF game is called? They could literally release a game called Final Fantasy: Shiny Sphincter and we'd all buy it.

Of course we would. That title is too intriguing to pass up.

I would support a Shiny Sphincter series. That's what FF needs right now.

Seriousness aside, I'm not sure how I could make it more simple for you people. Am I going to have to draw pictures before you actually understand? Don't care, not a complaint, I would list things differently. I don't understand why you lot interpret "I do things differently" as "WAHAHAHAA Y U NO DO MY WAY". smurfing hell, people.

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Originally Posted by Ouch!

It's been ten years. It's time to get over this.

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It's worth pointing out that I wasn't overly bothered by having an MMO in the main series, it just wasn't my personal preference.

The point I was trying to get at in my original post was my slight concern for the inclusion of a second MMO in the main series, hence the reason I posted this in the XIV Forum. This wasn't a post ten years in the making :p I should have been more descriptive.

I just felt like pointing this out to show I had nothing to "get over" :D