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The Mog Log: Getting up to speed on Final Fantasy XIV as it is
If you're just joining us after a rousing session of Final Fantasy XIV, this column may not exactly be for you because this week isn't about speculation; it's about discussing the many things that people don't like about Final Fantasy XIV which either no longer exist or are known to be removed in version 2.0. This might seem like it's kind of silly, but honestly, I think there's a lot of stuff that people not actively following FFXIV don't know about. The game's biggest burst of visibility happened when it launched, just like every other game in the history of anything ever. While the game isn't for everyone now any more than it was a year ago, the development staff has taken pains to address gaps in the structure and improve the play experience for everyone. So here's an article about just that. And while you might already know the content of the article, the next time you know someone worried about something in the game that's long since been excised, you can point him back here.
Storyboard: The year of bionic chickens in review
Saying "year one" sounds so pretentious. Besides, it wasn't year one for roleplaying -- just year one for the column, with this installment serving as the capstone. And as I'm wont to do on anniversaries, I'd like to take the opportunity to look back at what worked, what didn't, and what I could be doing to make the column a bit better. Also: the header images. (I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the impromptu guessing game that's grown up around the headers' three images. I will also admit that's motivating today's image.) When I first started the column, I had a loose list of things I wanted to address over time, some of which wound up coming out early on and some of which fell off the radar altogether. Despite that, I knew that Storyboard was going to be a tricky column to write, because it covers an immensely wide field of topics. We certainly have other roleplayers on staff writing columns about roleplaying in a given game, but I wanted to make this something bigger, to talk about roleplaying in a broad sense as well as specific. That meant -- and still means -- dancing around a lot of issues, working with a lot of different play styles, and trying to keep things entertaining for the entire audience.
The Daily Grind: Before they were famous
The path to launch for a major MMO is a heady time, filled with ideas and promises that may or may not be included with the final release. It's understandable -- BioWare wants people excited about Star Wars: The Old Republic, for example, and so the team wants to drum up enthusiasm for the best and brightest portions. But when release day comes, the countless ideas about what might be in a game collapse into a single view of what's actually included. If you read news sites (such as Massively, for instance) on a regular basis, you usually get plenty of information on your game of choice. The question is, how does that match up with release? What did you think about your current game of choice prior to playing? Did you feel like you knew what was going on from all the pre-release information, or were you somewhat disappointed by the end results? Or did you think you'd never want to play the game based on previews, and then find yourself enjoying it once it was released?
The Daily Grind: What game would you change from the beginning?
Let's say for a moment that you have a time machine. Now, before you immediately start making plans to buy stocks and get President Kennedy to wear a helmet, it's a very specialized time machine. It will work exactly once, and bring you back to the development stage before a game has launched. You can't change the team or the studio, but you can have complete conceptual control over the game from the earliest testing until it finally goes live. With that in mind, what game would you pick? Would you go back to a game that's been canceled to see if better development early on could save it? Would you try and tweak something in your favorite game that always altered you? Would you try and make an older game more compatible with future design? Or would you go for a game that you never cared for and try to make it better?
The Daily Grind: 2009's defining moment
The look back has already started here and there, and we've got only two days left -- assuming you count today. And we've seen a lot of things happen over the last year, which everyone on-staff has their own opinion about. To some, it was the year of free-to-play. To others, it was the year of dying games. But there's no way to encapsulate everything about 2009 into just one statement, with the industry still changing and evolving. Sometimes even seemingly small changes are what we remember (fondly or otherwise) when viewed in hindsight. Out of all of the things that happened this year, what struck you as the most defining moment? Was it something major, such as the end of Tabula Rasa or The Matrix Online? Or was it something minor that other players might not even notice? Did it make the whole year better, worse, or was it simply a turning point? What seems like it's going to stick in your memory when you think back on the year as a whole? And as a connected topic, what seems like a big deal at the moment that you're pretty certain isn't as important as people say?
