Little post E3... posts

E3 has some interesting games on display, including Vampire the Masquerade Bloodlines 2 (yeah long name) in which I hope ranged weapons will do some damage compared to it's predecessor (It's called Vampire The Masquerade Bloodlines, just FYI)

The moustache itself is a reason for playing

But no, I'm not preordering anything, not even Keanu Reeves can sway me (no, he's not in a vampire game, but a game about robot hands... or legs... or half a head), even if I preordered I still have to wait a year to play it, I only prordered something if (1) my friends are preordering, and (2) .... uh no, I have no reason for number 2.

On second thought... I DO have reason number 2

Also there's a Final Fantasy VII remake, which is a grim reminder for humanity that they're twenty two years older and will finally see Aerith died again in a glorious expensive 3d animation, and when the scene ends there will be another reminder that they don't have to insert disc 2 but they have to WAIT for the disc to be released, and they're (probably) have to buy it.

I'm not going into any character controversy, please add a story DLC about this meteor, it IS IN THE LOGO!!

Being Saleh: From Astral To Umbral a.k.a it's getting easier

Since my initial plan to upgrade to Warlords of Draenor is blown to bits by several... circumstances (like my social life and Guild Wars 2) I finally have time to get back to Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn, It's not without several planning though, for one: FFXIV has been the most improved MMORPG I've ever played, and since I'm a filthy casual what I meant by "most improved" is "it's getting easier"

Except those pants, which made me hate ninjas

Since it's initial release on September 30th 2010, Final Fantasy has transformed from a total wreck into one of the most polished MMORPG ever created, at least that was all the review you can get from numerous website, I don't really care about it all, I played since A realm reborn beta (pre patch 2.0) and I can tell you from my own experience FFXIV has been most approachable, even than WOW, since I don't really raid and have a real piece of work internet connection from patch 2.0 to patch 2.5 FFXIV has been a great journey in term of casual gameplaying and story

The Story so far.... 

Final Fantasy XIV has numerous story quests, which it's names (like the F.A.T.Es) are homage to almost everything in pop culture, names like "Sudul Eht Nioj" or "Life is a Syrcus" almost get me chuckled every time, the writing (and translation, hello, it's a japanese game) work to this day was incredibly tidy and astonishing, if you're not into reading quests text like me you might skip them into oblivion, but really, slow down and read them all even when there are no voice acting (with sometimes regretfully awful, minor, nvm) I came across a line of dialogue which can or can't be tailored to my selection of race, it could be my imagination and since I'm too stupid to take a screenshot I just continue in hope to find another one, alas I never did.... maybe I'll ask around sometimes.

Please enjoy this Minfillia screenshot to ease your pain

So, in every patch (from 2.0 to the latest 2.5) there are at least five story arc in FFXIV, one is the main story arc where you as the good hero of Eorzea faced and confront threats from every not-so-good fellas, (minor spoiler) the latest patch offered a major plot twist which served as an opening into what we might expect in patch 3.0: Heavensward (yes it's an expansion). 

With Batman

Number two is the Hildibrand arc which we embarked in a gag journey (hey, what a hero without it's sense of humours) with Hildibrand Manderville: self-titled agent of inquiry and Inspector Extraordinaire Gentleman, which actually just a private detective with a penchant for disastrous and hyperbolic solution which (surprise) not always right, combined with numerous luck and colorful allies Hildibrand arc probably the most extraordinary (har har) arc Final Fantasy XIV has ever created simply because it get me laughing every single time =))

I'm so sorry for posting this

 Number three is the moogle courier stories, it puts up us as a mail courier for the good (and again, not-so-good) people of Eorzea, to deliver them letters which lead us to know more about their problems and woes, and --of course as a hero -- helps them, it's a short episodic goodness which the NPCs are described as more than just a quest giver, but also have life of their own.

A very GOOD life

Four is the Crystal Tower arc, where you embarked with a group of researchers known as NOAH to unlock the secret(and raiding) of crystal tower, as I said before the bosses are homage to Final Fantasy III
 

Five is another raid story: the Coil of Bahamut story act where we accompanied by Alisaie Leveilleur, the twin sister of Alphinaud Leveilleur which is a major story character, Allisaie takes us into a research facility which studies the impact of Bahamut's prison from the last era, it served as a hardcore raid instance but since the story is so good (I don't know, I don't raid) there are talks about to make it a soloable arc for casual players, I'm looking forward to this.

Even with such numerous story arc apparently Square knows where to stop and overshadowing people with what might be expected on Heavensward, the stories are not yet over, my eternal question is whether they will be continued or not, WOW has so much unfinished story arc and only a few of them has ever continued, things like Koltira's last stand to Sylvanas and Abyssal Maw has been scrapped and considered finished, no it's not finished, I refused to acknowledge that. Hopefully with much overshadowing here and there Square will actually resumed it

The (lazy) gearing and gameplay

Take a look at my post here, here, here, and here oh also here

As you can see from my numerous posts about 'dem gameplay on FFXIV you might see that I'm not too hot about it, I stopped playing in the beginning of patch 2.3 and as I came back gradually I just realized how I might be wrong, on the verge of patch 2.3 my chosen first class is a monk, a punch drunk dps guy, I have a sphairai which is a relic weapon a.k.a the strongest weapon on patch 2.0, with the help of the -then added chimera and hydra encounter on duty finder on patch 2.1(yes in case you forget it's a LFG tool)I zoomed through the steps of it and with my saved mythology tomes which I farmed from my days as paladin I obtained it in days, not weeks, not months, days, boom.

As square has numerous free weekend I mostly farmed the next upgrade of my weapon, atma (obtained by the old fashioned FATE grinding) on those days, sometimes it's going good, sometimes it's friggin frustrating (RNG sucks) I hit the jackpot on September free weekend.

So there's me and my atma weapon, as I renewed my sub I set myself another goal, another upgrade, the animus, which is another grindfest, yes bloodying my atma weapon with blood from numerous creatures is kind of sadistic way to upgrade a weapon but hey I need 9 books to be completed, each has at least 20 challenges ranged from killing X things and running dungeons (don't die on the last boss or it won't be count, blah), I decided that I will solo this thing, using DF and old-fashioned waiting game for fates, I got into 1/3 on the last books so it'll be awhile but the thing is, it's only takes three weeks to get into this phase and I don't even focus on it with numerous story arc to finish,

Animus is a level 100 weapon, you know another way to obtain 100 weapons on FFXIV on patch 2.5? Here's what I do on my Paladin: Run Crystal Tower --> upgrade gear with tomes --> run Syrcus Tower --> buy level 100 weapon with tomes --> run some more syrcus tower --> upgrade them to lvl 110 with tomes and stuffs found inside.

Yes it's easier, yes it's faster, but it just happened that I skipped patch 2.3 and 2.4 entirely!!! which means every good stuff of them is now available on vendors, so if I leveled another class now, on this patch, take it four weeks if you're a slow leveler (which can't be, because duty roulette bonus which will zoom you) add days for relic, run CT, buy weapons and armors, run ST, upgrades, voila, boom you're now decked in ilvl 110 in matter of weeks (probably one) if you skipped the entire leveling process entirely, on this ilvl you can access almost every single content on FFXIV, the first and second coil bahamut, the extreme primals, the odin, the hard and expert dungeons, The Hunt, world of darkness, latest PVP, anything, you see where this going? Yes FFXIV has become more approachable tiered-progress-based MMORPGs and that's VERY VERY GOOD

But what can I do on those content? I'm not fast enough to dodge things, or breaking things with heavy rotation, well just the point I want to make, Square tone down almost EVERYTHING in the latest patch, well not everything, hard still means hard and old dungeon can be irritating (yes I'm looking at you Aurum Vale) but the effort you pulled plus the gear you're wearing helped, the hardmode of Amdapor, Halatali and expert Wanderer's palace has a difficulty setting somewhere between sleeping in dungeon and breaking a keyboard, patch 2.0 Ultima battle was over the top and exceed all my expectation about how fun and engaging a dungeon battle is just because a) it's not too hard and b) it has a good song, the two latest trial and dungeon: The Chrysalis and Lake Keeper tops it, the balance was perfect, the boss battles are fun, last boss battle are somewhere between intimidating and brutally satisfying, there's no perfect way to win this, the one hit kill skillz was so few but if you don't entertain your footwork, you can still wipe, for a melee dps it's fun, for tanks and probably healer it's fun, yeah, that's only it, it's fun :D

Here's another SS to reward you, and no I don't even know what that is

Onward to 3.0

Well, I've written so much, so here's something, by scrapping everything that was on patch 1.0 FFXIV finally got a second chance and they used it well to gain acknowledgement from a solo (casually zerging in raid) player like me, by simplifying means and upping the rewards for activities FFXIV can continue to grow, but here's the thing, as you can see it's only the main game I'm talking about, come the expansion how approachable the state will be? Will the leveling process simplified? Up until now the main story arc requires you to get into dungeons and beat it but to be honest it's extremely worth it since the story is well written and enjoyable, For the story I think new player wants the whole experience too (Blizz cut the Undercity Siege story arc on Cataclysm, /rude), but LFG tool will probably without old players running around it (even if it's synced), so the fact that new players must open it all just to unlock high level dungeon can be.... discouraging, especially for new hardcores which tend to grind everything just to get into max level, and since max level dungeon in FFXIV tied to quests and main story quests and not the level, this can be a problem, at least for the powerleveler

Well there are solution, Blizz now sold instant level 90 on their website, it's also bundled with Warlords of Draenor expansion, but it's because they have 5 expansion pack and cataclysm rendered the old lore continuity useless for the sake of new graphics and eye candy, FFXIV still has a way to go, it's only the second expansion and since the main game bundled with patch 2.0 so it can be counted for a first expansion, it will be interesting if Square will go the same road as Blizzard (a.k.a make everything on the previous expansion obsolete, excluding Pandaria, they still have more content than all WOW combined)

But for now, I'll enjoy a little crystal action

Being Saleh: The Winner

Two months ago Square Enix made a Free Company/Guild video recruitment contest, so we submitted our entry, it's just us having fun in a dungeon and Linsa Lominsa together.... and we WIN!!!!

Thanks to everyone participated, it won't happen without you all!! , we delivered some cheesy lines though :D

Aesthetic and Necessities

Final Fantasy XIV has a number of aesthetic animation on characters, including some gesture and emotes, for example when your character laughing he's actually makes the laughing expression on his face and the appropriate body language, it's a trick taken from Aion and RIFT but FFXIV made it better. Your character head follows an ally or even a mob when targeting it, the legs tilted when on uneven ground, even the death animation is satisfying (other word from frustrating) and I like the fact that when I logoff a character on an inn, he'll make the wake up animation when I login

Of course sleeping in front of the inn can be considered a public offense :P

Another one is the sound: music of Final Fantasy is one single point from being perfect, it's gorgeous and atmospheric, it's rare for some repeated theme can be so familiar and still enjoyable even after a few weeks, Ul'dah Theme for example is different on day and night, creating a feeling that at night your character should be in bed rather than huddling in the nearest market =)), I also have suspicion that the upbeat tempo of Garuda's theme is my downfall since I tend to sync anything, (including my tapping) to a song, I might accidentally push that limit break button too soon =))

On combat however the graphical aesthetics becomes complicated, my longest animated skill "rage of halone" can be a perfect example, it features the character slashing the enemy four times, ended with a flashy groundsmashing animation, it takes like three second from casting to dealing damage, and this is when it becomes a problem, rage of halone is not a channeled skill which means it shouldn't/can't be cancelled, unfortunately your character can move while using this skill which result into an awkwardly sliding animation. Not to mention a controversial issue: unchanneled long timed skills locked the character position which means no matter how far you are from those red circle area, as long as you're still doing animation for that skill (and cast it while inside red area) , you're still gonna get hit

I also returned to WoW several weeks ago for the last raid content: Siege of Orgrimmar, it's also a perfect opportunity to examine my character animations, my warrior is of course instant casting all the way, and the animations are mostly one second and deal instant damage, it doesn't have much animation (almost none actually) but it does the work. It looks like Square is still using the old MMORPG system for positioning (where miss is not based on positioning but your stat) and failed to update/mix it with the new positioning system. On newer MMO like TERA and Guild Wars 2, positioning is everything since battle occurs actively.

the ability lag is also still a hot topic out there, it ranged from the cancelled skills when chaining attacks until the skill becomes completely unaccessible or didn't deal any damage, mostly blaming the animation and lag on server side, I think SE really needs this addressed since they've been completely silent about this issue,

Aesthetic should be necessary but should be carefully cultivated in order not to breaking the immersion of gameplay, other than that SE has put a real effort to creating Eorzea to be full of beautiful things... and characters :D

Being Saleh: Reborn in Eorzea

Again, works get ahead of me (but this time I actually enjoyed it, maybe I'm getting older, well... whatever)

So yes, I finally got myself a copy of Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn, the chocobos finally did it, or to be specific: my guildmates needs a tank :D.

Here's the thing, Square finally sorted all of their crazy-numbered error message and opened servers as well as resuming their digital sales, so I boot it up and created a gladiator with paladin in mind. Of course first I have a list of what I should do to be on level with my 15-days-earlier friends, so my twelve hours a day powerleveling begins.

this is my place to unwind after being used by my friends

The Quests
As I said before Final Fantasy has a solid story quest and numerous sidequests to choose about at the start, every five level you're also treated to your class ability/skill quest which also can be considered a side story, although ability quest takes place in a solo instance where's your allies are NPC (which sometimes rushes themselves to death) they can be quite hard to ge into if you're on a minimum level required, Square refunded your lost time with a buff that stacked every time you failed these mission which gives you expanded stats until you're finally on a level where mow down your enemies like hot knife through a butter, quite convenient

Apparently the sidequests stopped flowing on the last 10 levels, and the story quest required you on a specific level, this is where the grind begins, you can do FATEs, levequests, dungeons, or hunting logs. Stocked some rested xp under your belt also helps, food buffs aren't significant so you can do without it, there several FATE spots where people are LFG-ing, notably in Mor Dhona and Coerthas

The Grouping Content
Yes, apparently it's true: Sometimes your progress on the main quest storyline are halted on a content where you must find groups to tackle a dungeon, this is where the duty finder (LFG tool) comes in handy, although it's still a curiousity that I have to queue 20 mins on the late mandatory dungeons, side dungeons has more horrible queue time, more like hours, and I'm a tank, my DPS and healer buddies said "you don't want to know my average queue times"

This probably can be traced to the fact that dungeon on Final Fantasy XIV are... difficult, I'm not talking about mindbreaking diffcult, it's just that there are numerous way to screw up on some bosses and even some trash, the difficulties can be compared to early Cataclysm expansion dungeons on WoW (before they nerfed it to the ground) where I sat down to watch more drama than defeating Jin'do =))

Dungeons in FFXIV contains numerous mechanic, and nothing can be facerolled, as a tank you're completely dependent on your healer, the healer also dependent on your DPS ability to take down trash mobs before his/her mana ran out to heal you, AOE skills are almost non-existant on the first few level and since your level scaled down to a dungeon your late level active and passive skills are also locked out. Also: Dungeons have timers, sometimes it's like 60 mins or something and when it ran out you're kicked out of it, so when you wipe you risk your whole dungeon experience although you d get to keep your loot from defeated foes or bosses

Ability lag or sometimes called : "I'M OUT OF THE RED CIRCLE GODDAMIT, WHY AM I STILL GETTING HIT???!!!" is my bane of existence in FFXIV. Yes, the dreaded beta bugged red circles still has it's place on the live version. It's where the animation and the hit or miss situation isn't synhronized perfecctly, the result is you're still getting hit even when you're 100 yards out of the red circle, or cone, or line, whatever. Let's take a peek of Garuda, the primal of air, she has cone-wide slipstream that must be avoided or your healer will have double trouble healing you, when I strafed so I face her side, or her behind I'm still getting hit, it can be frustrated sometimes since the red circle isn't helping at all and all the late dungeon bosses will one shot you.

Taste my rage of Halone!! where you can one shot me while I strafe-gliding with this skill

Trials are where your party faces one of the primals of elements, there are three so far: Ifrit (fire), Titan (earth), and Garuda (air), they made a really awesome group and story content since it requires you to stay at your toes no matter what odds they throw at you (also the soundtracks are great), on the story content they're manageable with PUGs. On the hardmode endgame content however, they will wipe the floor with your face seconds after you engaged them if your full party (2 tanks, 4 DPS, and 2 healer) doesn't know what to do with them, it takes skilled and seasoned well-coordinated players to go toe and toe with them, and also: good gears. I used to against locked content but this thing? This is a wild ride that will keep you glued on your keyboard or flip it with frustration =))

I'm actually Diablo, this is my final form after Blizz took the auction houses down

  

Almost 50
I've only 6 level more from cap but I also found some flaw of Final Fantasy XIV, since there's only one story content and you exhaust it on leveling your first class leveling another class can be a completely tedious job, since there's no more story to follow, the side quest on another town however abundant they're only consist of your average kill ten rats quest, so you're limited to FATE and leve grinding (also hunting log if you prefer it). Leveling a diciple of land/hand is probably more manageable since they have their own leves and ability quests, also high-end crafting will requires you to take up some interesting sidequests

Overall it was a trip, I'm glad I finally bought it, the great soundtracks and story is probably the highlight of this game, I'm still curious of what SE will brought up with this game, the Crystal Tower raid and housing features seems promising for early updates, they still have a long way to go if they want to be on par with WoW and Guild Wars 2 as an AAA High Fantasy MMO

I will write a next post observing the aesthetics of FFXIV, another highlight (If i have time) :D

For now I'm just gonna stare at the fire and hope it yielded exp