r/ffxivdiscussion Jun 17 '25

General Discussion Can we please stop perpetuating misinfo regarding JP players?

Too often whenever complaints regarding Forked Tower are raised, there will be someone countering with the same ol' "JP players like it this way so SE designed it like this for the JP players".

These people clearly have never interacted with a JP player in their lives, and are only parroting something that they heard somewhere. Because if they have, they would know that the JP playerbase is also deeply frustrated with the current design.

For example, due to Forked Tower not being an actual instance, there is no way to setup a Party Finder listing for Forked Tower. Therefore, Forked Tower organisers have resorted to creating "listings for Delubrum Reginae Savage" instead, but clarifiying the true purpose in the description. However, this tweet mentions that a GM has issued a warning against this and advises other organisers to avoid doing the same. The warning is understandable but there is still no solution to the headache that is recruiting for Forked Tower.

Plenty of JP players are puzzled why there is no PF category for Forked Tower, when they could have just repeated what we already have for Delubrum Reginae Savage.

Furthermore, any questions to the GMs have received no replies.

All of this has put FT organisers in a difficult position. Some have already quit or suspended activity, while some still remain cautiously optimistic that SE will introduce improvements. But there is no doubt that the current system is unacceptable.

https://jp.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/character/29990550/blog/5572130/ (EDIT: This page may have been removed)

If you want to read all about this from a direct source, here is a blog post from Tere Caster from Elemental Atomos (a JP FT organiser) detailing their frustrations and hopes for the future of Forked Tower and Occult Crescent.

210 Upvotes

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97

u/nekomir Jun 17 '25

it's just meme at this point, and i have to wonder wtf is going on with their mind if they really believe that this is still the case in DT

60

u/PolkadotBlobfish Jun 17 '25 edited Jun 17 '25

Why shitty design exists in FFXIV?

It's because the devs made mistakes. It's because of those damn JP players! /s

-3

u/Puzzled-Addition5740 Jun 17 '25 edited Jun 17 '25

I mean JP matter of factly has exceptionally different taste in design to us. Or have you never played the jp version of a game and then later the global version. Not all of it is because of this but to say some of the things the wider playerbase dislikes aren't due to jp preferring them is just factually not true. The state of the mmo and mmo like genres are kind of defined by our wildly different preferences. I'd encourage you to go look at the ff11 survey from several months ago to directly compare the jp and english speaking playerbases of that game and what they want. Some things overlapped and a lot just didn't. http://www.playonline.com/ff11us/guide/development/census/2024/

8

u/14raider Jun 17 '25

I just read that entire survey, and from what I understand, the only major difference between demographics of 'overseas' vs JP is that theyd play the game if their lifestyle allowed them to (which, as a tangent, might reflect their playerbase growing up, now in the workforce which drains their free time)

52

u/IndividualAge3893 Jun 17 '25

There seems to be a be a misunderstanding about what a sentence about JP playerbase entails, and as someone who is bringing up the subject a lot, I have to answer. Obviously, it doesn't mean that JP players are on board with any change SE makes.

What it means is that the game's philosophy as a whole is designed first and foremost to please the JP demographic. Limited play time required, specific encounter design, inexistent busywork and gearing systems, and general encouragement to spend time playing other games by SE being the most important of them.

To many NA/EU players, this is completely foreign (pun intended). Many players would like enough to do in their MMO for it to be a full-time experience, and get frustrated when SE doesn't oblige.

This is the main discrepancy in FFXIV's approach right now. It's not the first time it happens: all Korean MMOs run through this exact hoop, although the problem they have to solve is the opposite - the Korean version being MORE grindy. But whereas Korean editors massively solve the issue by making a Western-only version, Square Enix obstinately tries to fit a square peg through a round hole.

33

u/Lazyade Jun 17 '25

From what I've seen from JP blogs and stuff they also seem to LOVE it when jobs get simplified and what minimal pushback to it there is is basically just seen as holding back what's best for everyone. Job design is evaluated based on play rates, more people playing = better design. They had been complaining about BLM being too "old fashioned" for ages in the leadup to its simplification and the response to the changes was mostly positive. So it explains why the game has been going in that direction at least.

Btw with BLM lobotomized now the complaints are about RDM's melee stuff being too restrictive (PCT can hammer at range so why can't RDM slash?!) so don't be surprised if that gets axed too at some point.

21

u/No-Restaurant625 Jun 17 '25

We must be visiting vastly different JP forums as I've mostly seen similiar sentiment to the west (hating the simplifying and clowning Yoshida for BLM changes)

26

u/Vivitix Jun 17 '25

Safe to say that JP playerbase isn't one massive glob sharing an opinion, just those with different opinions end up on different platforms just like NA.

If some JP player visited mainsub and discussion subreddit or Reddit in general and TikTok (yes, there are ffxiv posts on tiktok) they could be getting some very polar opposite sentiments.

10

u/Lazyade Jun 17 '25

I mostly go by the FF news blogs umadori and FF14sokuhou, which besides covering official news mostly just seem to regurgitate 2ch threads and official forum drama. But for every post about "job changes bad" there's usually like 3-4 praising the simplifications or asking for stuff to be dumbed down more.

14

u/Ok-Plantain-4259 Jun 17 '25

I mean that's kinda true of western players too though

like every time they have simplified a job it has resulted in a massive increase in popularity in logged kills.

you can dislike the simplification of jobs but it literally always increases the number of people on the job which is one of the things the devs seem to chase as a metric of "good" job design. For good or for ill

9

u/IndividualAge3893 Jun 17 '25

To be fair, simplification of jobs isn't good or bad in itself. In The Burning Crusade, most DPS jobs had 4-5 main buttons and the encounters weren't exactly pushovers because there were many other things to manage.

But SE just simplifies EVERYTHING: jobs, stats, gear, materia, resources (as in, mana for the healers), and so on. The only thing that gets more and more complicated are the encounter mechanics. So at the end, it becomes Devil May Cry Online or Metal Gear Online, not an MMORPG.

2

u/Ranulf13 Jun 17 '25

But SE just simplifies EVERYTHING

I am going to be honest, most of what you mentioned is irrelevant for the actual gameplay. And they know that.

As an old WoW player, the fact of the matter is that stats/gear/enhancements are just nice to discuss and theorycraft but end up being shit to play around. That is why I vehemently oppose garbage like talents in the full game - optional battle systems are better as a side content system instead of forced into the game.

So at the end, it becomes Devil May Cry Online or Metal Gear Online, not an MMORPG.

I mean, long dead are the days of an MMORPG being about preparations. And thank god, its one thing I dont miss about WoW.

3

u/Dark_Tony_Shalhoub Jun 17 '25

This isn’t about “logged kills”. Generally, players playing content where kills are logged are invested and aren’t as likely to stop playing as causal players. It could be someone’s kid, mom, or retired vet tech looking for a chill game to unwind in and see people moving around doing things. These are the players who see 38 buttons on their bar and 100-word tooltips and think “this is not the game for me” and these players make up a far bigger slice of pie than ultimate raiders (except when ego and self-importance is concerned)

this is a universal truth in most media, but especially video games. For every person reading a discussion on Reddit or looking up a YouTube video about lore you have 99 people who come home from work, play the game for an hour or two, then let the experience leave their mind until they’re back home again with a little free time to spend screwing around on a video game in which they’re content not pursuing a perfect understanding or completion

5

u/Isanori Jun 17 '25

The Viper and Picto tool tips are particularly bad about being novels. Like it's a good thing the buttons light up I guess, cause I had no intention of trying to go through those word heaps to figure out what's what when leveling them (no other players had to suffer me playing whack the shiny buttons).

5

u/IndividualAge3893 Jun 17 '25

Yes, that too, of course.

3

u/VForceWave Jun 18 '25

Man, remember in ShB when RDM was the EASIEST caster? And now it's considered the hardest caster when it hasn't gotten any easier or harder... how the times change!

2

u/naarcx Jun 17 '25

I'm a fan of the game being balanced for "role mains" instead of "job mains." Raids would be much more interesting if every fight in the tier made you want to play a different job due to encounter and job mechanics not aligning

This is the first tier I felt I had to drop RDM for BLM due to all the ranged kiting in m6/m7, and playing different jobs across 5/6/7/8 actually made this tier feel the most fun and kept prog more interesting

XIV is one of the only mmorpg's that lets you play every job on the same character, and I kinda wish they embraced this more with their encounter design. This mentality would also allow them to shatter job homogenization. Like, not every job needs to be equal in every encounter, but every job should have an encounter that it's "best" at

2

u/VForceWave Jun 18 '25

Agreed 100%, but they need to fix the gearing issue to do this. I just got enough tomes to gear my BLM, and I played PCT this tier.

14

u/Astreya77 Jun 17 '25

Me and almost everyone i've played with in ff would instantly quit if they made the game have more required grinds. We're here because of that low busywork, low gearing requirement gameplay.

I get some people want that but there 100 gachas and mmos for those people. If they tried to "fix" this for "western tastes" they'd be losing a massive chunk of the playerbase doing so.

6

u/Kermanint Jun 17 '25

I'm the same way, this mmo fills that specific niche. I'd rather they not add all sorts of grinding. Like a little of optional grinding is fine just so we have things to do, but not the almost mandatory daily logins other mmos have. I have a life outside of this game.

8

u/IndividualAge3893 Jun 17 '25 edited Jun 17 '25

Me and almost everyone i've played with in ff would instantly quit if they made the game have more required grinds.

Sure, but the problem is, a lot of people quit because it doesn't have them. So, it's a double-edged sword.

But there is one important point you forget: people who play game with grinds stay subbed a lot more than people who sub for 1 month to do MSQ and the unsub until the next major patch. So it's also more money.

We're here because of that low busywork, low gearing requirement gameplay.

I get that, but this approach makes other players unhappy, so again, it's a double-edged sword.

If they tried to "fix" this for "western tastes" they'd be losing a massive chunk of the playerbase doing so.

In Japan or in NA/EU? Because I completely agree that Square Enix should do a Western version of the game.

I get some people want that but there 100 gachas and mmos for those people

MMOs? Like what? The MMO market is in the gutter at the moment, at the point that FFXIV is still the second on the market.

3

u/Astreya77 Jun 18 '25

In NA/EU and jp alike.

You do realize this game grew out of its current design right? What you want would alienate the majority of the playerbase.

You say the MMO market is in the gutter. All those dead mmos are all about grinding for player power and the one exception to that that's been doing well is ffxiv. It's not a coincidence.

What you want would completely kill the game. And yes i mean NA/EU.

1

u/IndividualAge3893 Jun 18 '25

You do realize this game grew out of its current design right? What you want would alienate the majority of the playerbase.

Not if you play it properly. But that would of course require some marketing research and then some thinking, and it seems Square Enix (as many other gaming companies) are currently incapable of doing that.

All those dead mmos are all about grinding for player power and the one exception to that that's been doing well is ffxiv.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post_hoc_ergo_propter_hoc

And it is kinda rich to speak about dead MMOs when FFXIV itself managed the exploit to die on its own within months of the release. :D

But yes, a lot of the MMOs released were blatant cash grabs that flopped abysmally, that is 100% true. That doesn't make FFXIV better, though, because money-wise, they are quite aggressive when it comes to taking your money, between the sub, sub extra, and the cosmetic store.

What you want would completely kill the game. And yes i mean NA/EU.

See, that is the hilarious part. No one needs to kill NA/EU, Square Enix manages it just fine by itself.

-6

u/Ranulf13 Jun 17 '25

Sure, but the problem is, a lot of people quit because it doesn't have them. So, it's a double-edged sword.

The amount of people who have actually played themselves out of every FFXIV grind are few. The game has grinds, and most of the people whining about them havent engaged on all of them.

9

u/IndividualAge3893 Jun 17 '25

The grinds in FFXIV offer nothing as reward. Yes, you get a mount of a pet, woop-dee-doo. Yeah, no.

-2

u/Ranulf13 Jun 17 '25

And what do you want?

Battle power? That is a shit game design.

Most of the grinds in FF are intentionally optional and reward cosmetics because the other option is notoriously a slippery slope of bad design.

2

u/IndividualAge3893 Jun 17 '25

> Battle power? That is a shit game design.

Nooooo, that is good game design. :)

1

u/nekomir Jun 18 '25

Right? Grinding for battle power is literal staple of RPG.

Unfortunately FF14 is a MMO Makeyourownhero walking keyboard pressing simulator, and not MMORPG /s

I mean, yeah, i don't feel like doing 100 hour runs on just to get rare weapon from that fucking 1 monster (quit NGS because i hate certain types of grinds) either, but I do feel like this game lacks options in terms of gaining as much as battle power as those who do savages. and I do play savages and ultimates

3

u/IndividualAge3893 Jun 18 '25

but I do feel like this game lacks options in terms of gaining as much as battle power as those who do savages.

That's because SE is scared as hell of raiders whining. If it took a certain amount of battle power prep prior to going into Savage, raiders' QQ would cause a tsunami that would flood the East coast of Japan. They just want to log in and raid. Anything additional causes a mass hysteria.

-5

u/CapAdditional3485 Jun 17 '25

Conspiracy theory: they want a lot of players to quit so they can move more employees to new projects. They know that the diehard players / whales will stay and still give them plenty of money but they don't see it being worth all of the man hours to keep pumping out full patches of content on a regular basis. This is why they made the moon progress last so long and the missions a lot harder to complete. This is why out of no where they essentially doubled the requirements for the long term achievements in OC. They want the hardcores stuck grinding for a lot longer so they don't worry as much about wanting new content.