How Could SE Realistically Improve Modern FFXI?

Yeah I hate daily BS, I only like to do organized events two or three nights a week.

They literally said it's open world content already.

And IF they make AF+4. It's still a hard maybe.

My bad. I thought this is what Eiryl was referring to. Since, from I understand, it isn't technically instanced, I wrongly assumed Eiryl was referring to it as open world.

Where did you hear this though?

November A.M.A.N. Live

"I'm thinking of a set +3 or more"
"I want to make equipment stronger"
"If you go there everyone can participate"

It's translation, so it's only a best guess. He could mean his own shitty gear. Or the translation is wrong.


You'll have to get a native speaker to listen at 1:42:00 or so for concise translation.

I hope they do Ambu +3 instead of AF +4... I dont mind if they do both, but given the choice between the 2 I think the Ambu sets offer more value. I dont realistically expect them to add any game changing effects/stats to the next tier of AF but I could be wrong

(^^^ fwiw, I don't believe these people exist.)

So this is an MMO and a realistic way SE could improve it would be to open crowdfunding for discrete upgrades to parts of the system. This is not a new idea and we're already generating plenty of reasonable ideas for them.

Where the crowdfunding model may break down in this case is that they may not know what they can or can't deliver on. I'd still like to see them try it.

That's fair, XI has always been grindy, that's for sure, but being grindy isn't the only problem. I think the difference is that the grinds were more rewarding, the time commitments were more segmented, you could bring more people in, and more importantly - there was variation in the content. I will concede that compared to 75-era LS structured content, it's pretty casual - but I also think the phase of the game and most players lives needs to be accounted for when considering that.

Sortie is just the same zone. Same objectives. Same running. Same bosses. Same hour timeframe, every time. Same 6 person limit. (I don't think Bitzer hunting is really interesting enough to be a consideration)

Nyzul has some variation at least and drops between, it's probably the closest to what Sortie is out of your list but it still feels more rewarding and it's a shorter time limit. Although I swore up and down about those damned lamps in era, admittedly. I didn't do much Einherjar in era but the zone format and different mobs at least shake it up somewhat, personally I find the chamber really interesting compared to the way XI does most content. Dyna-D has different zones and a multitude of rewards, it's fairly rewarding content and you have a lot of variation in jobs/comps. Omen is again, rewarding in other ways, with the potential for different drops but also the ability to choose different bosses, the objectives also rotate. Odyssey segfarms are only 30 minutes and reasonably fast paced, you run a bit but not before you start engaging with mobs.

Most of this content could also be spread out, we could have "Omen night" once or twice a week and stack entry items, between that and the variation in the content it kept it interesting - even if I could stack Sortie KIs beyond the one brewing, I'm not sure I'd want to do it twice, but the current system penalizes you for not doing it regularly.

I have my complaints about the content above but it always feels more tolerable to me. I see myself largely doing it (Nyzul being the possible exception) for both the content itself and the social aspects. With Sortie...I just don't get that. I think if they had fixed one of the 6 things I listed above, it'd be more tolerable for the content itself. You are right that a social aspect of this is always a big element, it is a MMO after all, but I think there's a limit to how much people cling onto it for that purpose alone - the content itself needs to be rewarding and interesting.

Well, this last version update makes a whole lot more sense now. And the "everyone can participate" remark Eiryl is referencing may mean they may try to balance some version of this content around Ambu weapons and +2 Ambu armor, though that's a bit of a stretch.

It's a bit annoying to deal with "Member password" "Square enix password" and "playonline password" but once you get past that, is POL really difficult to navigate?

You type in your password, then you come to a screen with a button that your mouse/keyboard automatically zoom to which goes to FFXI. Then it brings you to a page where your mouse/keyboard automatically zoom to a "play" button and then hit "play" again, and the game launches. Is this a labyrinth for you? Do you have difficulty navigating a wet paper bag as well?

I'd much rather them spend resources/time making game content than eliminating POL.

It would just be nice to launch the game, and just go to the game. Tetra master doesn't exist anymore and polmail has no use.

Zero investment to delete. Not altering. Not updating. Not reinventing. Just erasing.

It's only 3 or 4 clicks and 20 seconds. Sure. But they're unnecessary clicks and wasted seconds.

Oh you were listening to Eiryl... ok

Limbus was one of the first times they did multiple battle fields on the same map. Instead of the same battle field copied five or six times, they just had five to seven different battle fields all in one zone.

I'll defer to Thorny or someone with experience with the client, but the fact it's the primary login interface tells me that at least some of the session management is handled by POL and passed off to the client. It handles authentication and that UI would need to be replicated somewhere along with the content ID management portions. Friend lists are also managed through POL and presumably passed to the client to some degree. The version checking and update mechanism, also. You can't just unplug these things and it work without those being replaced. I'd be surprised if there wasn't more than just that even

It's not impossible but I doubt zero investment is accurate either, there are clearly elements of POL that the XI game client expects and those would have to be replicated somehow. I'd be surprised if they even have the in-house expertise to develop and test this as a change, which is probably why it hasn't been done

Keep the login screen, and from there it jumps straight to tos on XI

Delete the pol mainpage
(Skip the tos too, cause who cares...)

It's amazing that the servers for such an old game are still up. It would be great if FFXI were remade into a new game with updated graphics. I've been playing it myself for about 20 years, on and off—maybe time gilds the memories and the old nostalgia, but I'll probably keep playing as long as I can.

Third party devs have covered the mandatory elements of the handoff for private servers, so it's feasible a non-SE solution could be created. Atom0s has documented everything that would be needed for someone to do the retail auth handshake, I believe.

SE isn't going to do it. Partly for the reasons Iamaman outlined, partly because they just aren't.

Also, Ashita already has a plugin that skips most of the pol screens and goes straight to ffxi after you hit login in POL. It still allows content id assignment prompt and file update to occur if needed. I haven't found POL to be an annoyance since its release.

Lol... I actually enjoy logging into FF. I think the background and the music make it very enjoyable. I play at the end of the day so my brain associates it with fun time.

Which is a lie because I do sortie...