SynKazama

For starters: Most of the technical problems people have at this point boil down to "skill Issue" or lack of reading comprehension. A lot of the negative reviews are straight up lies like "there's no jump button". Crimson desert is not for everyone. It's not overly challenging, it's not overly smart and it's not overly unique, it's pure ambition done in a way that benefits those who can look past it's individual components and have the bandwidth to take it all in. Those with a desire to wonder if there's something behind that waterfall or at the top of that mountain. Minor Spoiler: There probably is. After the first 20 hours or so, there's dopamine stashed in every nook and cranny so long as you avoid the Youtubers spewing "DO THIS NOW". It's a love letter to the NES generation, the gamers who started out playing video games just for the gameplay. It was made for the people who spent months playing Zelda 2, searching for secret tiles and wishing they could take their raft anywhere in the ocean. It's janky, it doesn't make any sense, it's a big messy plate of gameplay spaghetti and it is glorious just as it is.

FFXIV as a whole offers a great story, beautiful world, great music and production values. By gaming standards it's very good. By MMO standards, it's actually quite bland and really offers nothing new to the genre or fails to even rehash anything that made MMOs great. From a veteran's perspective (10+ years playing various MMOs): Jobs are overly balanced to the point where they don't differentiate well within their trinity (Tank,Healer,DPS). Everything in the game has been designed around equality, which is odd seeing as how, like FFXI, all jobs are accessible on a single character and players are encouraged to level multiples. Character progression slows to a near standstill at cap with virtually no options for how you build and play your character. Unlike most other MMOs there are no talents/skill trees/ branching or specialization in either skills or equipment. All skills and abilities are automatically learned along the way, and for equipment It's simply a straight vertical climb up the iLVL chart which also offers next to nothing in terms of choice. Raid content is repetitive and heavily reliant upon dodge and enrage mechanics. While raids can be difficult, it is generally because people fail to execute a very mechanical formula such as failing to meet DPS checks or remembering phase changes and specific positioning. Dungeons are simply a means to level and gain tokens to exchange for the basic pre-raid iLVL requirement gear. There are no valuables or collectibles (besides glamour items, furniture and minions) to be obtained. No usable rare and unusual items exist at all in the world. Crafting provides almost no advantage to character development as equipment is, in 95% of all cases, sub-par to raid and token gear. It can be used to earn an equally useless income by crafting consumables and glamour items but ultimately provides little to be desired. Both of the above are done in an overly cautious means to prevent RMT (Real Money Trade). Despite the recent news and reviews, open world is no more dangerous than in 2.0. Players can still take down 3 enemies at a time with literally no open world danger aside from going AFK. The most glaring issue is in all of the limitations imposed by SE that prevent people from continuing to grow at their own pace. Nearly everything is gated by timed lockouts and access. Even gathering jobs can only obtain the most important resources at specific intervals. These serve the purpose of delaying content consumption between the patch cycles and to balance the progression levels of the player base. Although the attempt to level the progression of the player base is likely done to prevent elitism, it's backfired in a sense. Instead of being judged on their progress in the game, players are more often ostracized for lack of coordination, response time and general skill. It's first expansion Heavansward offers almost nothing new to the genre either. The largest changes made to the game are a graphics refresh (DX11), open world flight, new dungeons, new jobs and a level cap increase. In other words, very standard fare for an MMO expansion. Once the world is seen, story played through and dungeons crawled it leaves very little for veteran MMO players to enjoy. If you're new to the MMO genre, looking for a casual place to hang out online with friends, really into role playing or just have a very limited amount of time to play, FFXIV may be hands down the best choice. But if you're a hardcore MMO player, raid junkie, or want to become a PvP god we're a little out in the cold right now. Hopefully 2015/16 will bring back some of the great sandbox MMO features many of us miss.

FFXIV as a whole offers a great story, beautiful world, great music and production values. By gaming standards it's very good. By MMO standards, it's actually quite bland and really offers nothing new, and fails to even rehash anything that made the genre great. From a veteran's perspective (10+ years playing various MMOs): Jobs are overly balanced to the point where they don't differentiate well within their trinity (Tank,Healer,DPS). Everything in the game has been designed around equality, which is odd seeing as how, like FFXI, all jobs are accessible on a single character and players are encouraged to level multiples. Character progression slows to a near standstill at cap with virtually no options for how you build and play your character. Unlike most other MMOs there are no talents/skill trees/ branching or specialization in either skills or equipment. All skills and abilities are automatically learned along the way, and for equipment It's simply a straight vertical climb up the iLVL chart which also offers next to nothing in terms of choice. Raid content is repetitive and heavily reliant upon dodge and enrage mechanics. While raids can be difficult, it is generally because people fail to execute a very mechanical formula such as failing to meet DPS checks or remembering phase changes and specific positioning. Dungeons are simply a means to level and gain tokens to exchange for the basic pre-raid iLVL requirement gear. There are no valuables or collectibles (besides glamour items, furniture and minions) to be obtained. No usable rare and unusual items exist at all in the world. Crafting provides almost no advantage to character development as equipment is, in 95% of all cases, sub-par to raid and token gear. It can be used to earn an equally useless income by crafting consumables and glamour items but ultimately provides little to be desired. Both of the above are done in an overly cautious means to prevent RMT (Real Money Trade). Despite the recent news and reviews, open world is no more dangerous than in 2.0. Players can still take down 3 enemies at a time with literally no open world danger aside from going AFK. The most glaring issue is in all of the limitations imposed by SE that prevent people from continuing to grow at their own pace. Nearly everything is gated by timed lockouts and access. Even gathering jobs can only obtain the most important resources at specific intervals. These serve the purpose of delaying content consumption between the patch cycles and to balance the progression levels of the player base. Although the attempt to level the progression of the player base is likely done to prevent elitism, it's backfired in a sense. Instead of being judged on their progress in the game, players are more often ostracized for lack of coordination, response time and general skill. Overall, Heavansward offers almost nothing new to the genre. The largest changes made to the game are a graphics refresh (DX11), open world flight, new dungeons, new jobs and a level cap increase. In other words, very standard fare for an MMO expansion. Once the world is seen, story played through and dungeons crawled it leaves very little for veteran MMO players to enjoy. If you're new to the MMO genre, looking for a casual place to hang out online with friends, really into role playing or just have a very limited amount of time to play, FFXIV may be hands down the best choice. But if you're a hardcore MMO player, raid junkie, or want to become a PvP god we're a little out in the cold right now. Hopefully 2015/16 will bring back some of the great sandbox MMO features many of us miss.