Final Fantasy XIV Online: A Realm Reborn

 PC
User Score
7.8

Generally favorable reviews- based on 2236 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,673 out of 2236
  2. Mixed: 169 out of 2236
  3. Negative: 394 out of 2236
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  1. JimmyCricket
    Nov 30, 2015
    4
    I am completely bewildered as to why this game is getting such a positive wrap. Laggy servers, terrible, boring and monotonous quest line, extremely poor UI all add up to make this feel like a title from 2005 (if not for the impressive graphics engine). Even so I'd much rather be playing Vanilla WoW cause it was such a smoother game experience, even 10 years ago in comparison to this.I am completely bewildered as to why this game is getting such a positive wrap. Laggy servers, terrible, boring and monotonous quest line, extremely poor UI all add up to make this feel like a title from 2005 (if not for the impressive graphics engine). Even so I'd much rather be playing Vanilla WoW cause it was such a smoother game experience, even 10 years ago in comparison to this.

    Alas, this game does not come close to being a WoW killer, and shows no signs of ever being one.

    Do yourself a favour... Don't bother.    … Expand
  2. geoffconklin
    Nov 16, 2015
    10
    I just finished ARR and I have to say that it is the best MMO experience I've had in as long as I can remember. The storyline is amazing, it has as much polish as any Blizzard game (more if comparing it to their more recent games...), the servers are hopping, and there is just so much content. I am really looking forward to getting started on the expansion!
  3. Passivepete
    Oct 23, 2015
    0
    I've played a lot of games in my time and this one is bad. It's really simplistic, boring combat (press button, wait for cooldown, press the next button), boring missions (take this item to this guy) and clunky controls. It is designed around consoles so on a PC it is especially awkward to play. It looks like a little kids game, in fact I started to google it to see if it was designed forI've played a lot of games in my time and this one is bad. It's really simplistic, boring combat (press button, wait for cooldown, press the next button), boring missions (take this item to this guy) and clunky controls. It is designed around consoles so on a PC it is especially awkward to play. It looks like a little kids game, in fact I started to google it to see if it was designed for young kids. There is no real meat here, it's a dressed up grind fest. It makes me appreciate how good other mmos such as wow, eve, guildwars2 etc actually are and that I should appreciate them more!
    I really wanted this to be a good game I could sink some time into but I knew it wasn't it before hitting even level 10. The first introduction to the game, the hook that should make you think HELL YEAH, after creating your character is a whole bunch of dialog with no voice acting, it's your hint that this game is bad. Lucky they have a free tryout and I didn't waste money on it, they should have mini download of a few gig so you don't have to waste 20gig of data on it too.    … Expand
  4. eialici
    Sep 12, 2015
    7
    This would have been a great game if they had included voice acting for dialogues which, sadly, they did not.

    I see reviews and people claiming that the story is well written and sorts and that creating a voice dialogue for every scene is ridiculous. The story might be well written but I did not buy a game to read, I buy a game to play, Remember, Skyrim has voice acting for all    This would have been a great game if they had included voice acting for dialogues which, sadly, they did not.

    I see reviews and people claiming that the story is well written and sorts and that creating a voice dialogue for every scene is ridiculous. The story might be well written but I did not buy a game to read, I buy a game to play,

    Remember, Skyrim has voice acting for all scenes and that was in 2008. We are living in the 21st century, not in the 80's,    … Expand
  5. baslack
    Aug 20, 2015
    4
    Ok, at this point I'm an MMO veteran. I've played dozens of these things since SWG and while I wasn't around for EQ or DAoC, I've seen most of the big titles. FFXIV is an anime themed WoW 2.0 theme park MMO that's pretty conventional to 2004 game play. That it's subscription only in this day and age of F2P bailouts is remarkable. However, it's not because of any secret in game play orOk, at this point I'm an MMO veteran. I've played dozens of these things since SWG and while I wasn't around for EQ or DAoC, I've seen most of the big titles. FFXIV is an anime themed WoW 2.0 theme park MMO that's pretty conventional to 2004 game play. That it's subscription only in this day and age of F2P bailouts is remarkable. However, it's not because of any secret in game play or innovative storytelling. The game play is pretty much WoW with a prettier skin on it. The story is some of the most painful mary sue anime archetypal tripe you'll ever come across. I think it's ability to hold subs directly correlates to the fan base for the IP. Simply, it is P2P because SQ fans are willing to pay to get their fix.

    It does a few things very well. Most notably, right off the bat you're introduced to a very robust fast travel system, both intra-city and global map wide. The class mechanic is unique in that it allows any character to level any class; active class is dictated by the implements equipped. The world and characters are appealing, especially if you're a fan of the anime style. As a roleplayer, it has one of the most active RP communities in any game I've ever seen. Cities are full of folks roleplaying at all hours, every day (on Balmung). The game also seems to cater to these folks, with robust housing (instanced lots) and cosmetic gear.

    That said, it does some things horribly. This is old school tab targeting. This is old school toolbar drive rotation repeat combat. When people are scripting macros to do combat and crafting (which is also toolbar driven) because it's tedious, you know you have a problem. Quests are your standard fare: kill fetch and escort. Kill quests tend to be short, which is good, but fetch quests tend to be long and take you between multiple zones with excessive loading times due to the pretty art. Escort quests are highly tedious, requiring you to manually emote at your charge to get them to follow you. Leveling is fast, at least early, but very grindy and repetitive because of the over simplification of combat.

    Perhaps my biggest complain is that one of the most interesting features, housing, is locked behind a level 50 grind wall. As a roleplayer, housing is what will make be pay a sub. It's a space to play in. Having to slog through 50 levels of grindy game just to get to it is a show stopper. Not to mention when those quests end up bugged, failing to turn in and wasting your time. Finally, there should be a check box to skip ALL cut scenes in the game. In this day and age, forcing your player to sit through these is totally unacceptable. If folks want to get on with their play, let them do so, SQ. Finally, putting basic items like the Auction House as unlockables behind a dungeon based quest system? Yes, they did that. And that's just one example. FFXIV and SQ like to lock features of their game behind a large collection of hoops. It's how they spread out your time and grind your sub money out of you. Well... the players. My 30 days are up in about two weeks and I think I'll be moving on.

    The good:
    Well implement Fast Travel
    Interesting Multi-class mechanic
    Aesthetic appeal
    RP Community
    Has Housing

    The Bad:
    Total lack of innovation in gameplay
    Excessive grind
    Housing locked behind grind to 50
    Buggy quests still present after the reboot
    Unskippable cutscenes
    Basic functionality unlocks behind multiplayer dungeon quest completion

    P.S. Also note, which this maybe a Haven for roleplayers, getting into that haven, the Balmung server, will cost you. SQ for whatever reason ties their character creation to server queue. So if a server is full, you can't create characters on it. Balmung always has a queue and so it's virtually impossible to ever create characters on it. There's occasionally a window after maintenance (4AM PST) but otherwise, the only way to get onto the server is via the transfer service of Mog Station. That's $18 USD, for as many characters as you like from one server to another. Worth it if you're a roleplayer to some at least, but still, consider the extra cost if that's what you're coming to FFXIV for.    … Expand
  6. KrytyNiekrytyk
    Aug 11, 2015
    10
    Good battle system, great animations, unbelievable plot, epic music, pretty graphic. This is best mmorpg of all time, and one of the best games ever made. One minus - incredible expensive.
    Graphic - 10/10
    Audio - 10/10
    Plot - 10/10
    Gameplay - 9/10
    Overall rating - 10/10
    Best. Game. Ever.
  7. icometobot
    Aug 10, 2015
    10
    The best and far most fun mmo out there. You have to work your ass off to get good gears and the environment is VERY friendly. You can combine your skills and change to whatever classes you like. My classes consists of ninja, monk, and dragoon. I recommend this game to everyone and most of my friend quit the horrible game elsword and decided to play here and got hook. The dungeons, raids,The best and far most fun mmo out there. You have to work your ass off to get good gears and the environment is VERY friendly. You can combine your skills and change to whatever classes you like. My classes consists of ninja, monk, and dragoon. I recommend this game to everyone and most of my friend quit the horrible game elsword and decided to play here and got hook. The dungeons, raids, and pvp all consist on all servers not just one server alone. However, DPS classes will have to wait for a bit longer than tanker and healer classes UNLESS you have a full party with friends then it will be more fun. The graphics is beautiful and the content is extremely nice. My server is Coeurl. But it doesn't matter because you still que up with different people from all over different servers. Rarely salty people because people learned how to help each others. I believe REAL fun mmo is monthly subscription unlike those play for free **** and buy to win and look good mmo's.… Expand
  8. SynKazama
    Jul 13, 2015
    5
    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    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.    … Expand
  9. nutdemon
    Jul 2, 2015
    9
    This game is reaaaaally good! It has one of the most friendly communities I've ever seen on an MMO. Couple that with the excellent gameplay and storyline, this makes this game a real gem. Don't let the low user score confuse you, FFXIV: ARR is the new and improved version of it's older retard brother FFXIV. PLAY IT!
  10. GrimStabberson
    Jun 15, 2015
    1
    This game is the final nail in the coffin for my love of the Final Fantasy series. FFXIV is a HUGE pain in the butt to even get started and has a monthly subscription- on top of the game's initial price tag. It is largely a chore to play and is designed more to eat up time more-so than actually be fun.

    FFXIV is chocked full of mindless fetch quests that have you delivering trivial    This game is the final nail in the coffin for my love of the Final Fantasy series. FFXIV is a HUGE pain in the butt to even get started and has a monthly subscription- on top of the game's initial price tag. It is largely a chore to play and is designed more to eat up time more-so than actually be fun.

    FFXIV is chocked full of mindless fetch quests that have you delivering trivial items, like tea leaves, from NPC A to NPC B. In typical MMORPG format you will run the same dungeons and kill the same mobs for endless hours for drops and levels. Again, most of this game is designed simply to eat up time doing menial tasks repeatedly to keep you subscribing for months to make progress.

    My main purpose for writing this bad review, however, is to warn about the ungodly amount of spam it has. The spam here is worse than anything I've ever seen in a game- including free to play games. On many servers it is so unbearable that people either have to use 3rd party tools to block some of it (which is against the ToS) or simply turn off the personal chat function. The whole freaking POINT of an MMO is to interact with other players, but many people struggle doing that due to all of the spam messages we are constantly bombarded with.

    The "Report Spam" function in this game is basically nonexistent and most players don't even know how to do this. SE basically expects you to stop what you are doing, log into their website, fill out a form for each spam message, and send it to their "Special Task Force" (which is basically 3 employees for all of North America). What makes this even more ludicrous is that we sometimes get a dozen or more of these spam messages from various characters with names like "Dffrffddf Gffgfdfg" every few minutes. This has been a problem with them for the last 2 years and it really hasn't gotten any better. Basically, they just don't care. It is totally unacceptable.

    Anyone that says this isn't a problem is either in a locked server that's hard to get an account on (for bots and players alike) or are on a Japanese server (which SE seems to actually give a damn about). NA/EU servers, as a whole, are completely spammed into oblivion and the developers just don't care. As a US player, I personally take this as a slap in the face.

    As an added bonus, a large part of this game's community consists of elitist metrosexual douchebags. Sure, there are nice people that play, but expect the obnoxious ones to drown them out. If you're new to a dungeon in end-game there is a very large probability you will be insulted non-stop and possibly kicked out of the party. You can expect rudeness and petty arguments in nearly every raid. This community is so toxic that- if understanding people like me try to explain the mechanics of a dungeon to new people- even I get hate for taking the time to do so. The mentality basically boils down to "GO! GO! GO! YOU SUCK, NOOB!!!" Of course, when they inevitably wipe due to this attitude, they rage quit. This might not sound so bad on its own, but often there is an hour wait *just to get into a dungeon*!

    If you like being trolled by metrosexual half-naked cat-men and spammed nonstop by bots trying to sell you game money for real money, then this is the game for you. If you want to make friends to go on an exciting and engaging adventure with, however, look elsewhere.    … Expand
  11. Unholyskorn
    Jun 9, 2015
    10
    I liked it. Just about to come back and try it again. I stopped months in, didn't even get to the end game just got distracted by other games. I think people just come here to bash things.
  12. Panserbjorne39
    Jun 4, 2015
    6
    I have a level 50 Warrior (tank) and have played the game for about 3 months. Here's my review:
    Beautiful to look at but at it's core is a relentless never ending grind. Toxic community full of former WoW goons and griefers. There are some good players out there of course, but there is a ton of griefing and harassment that take place. RMT and bots are running rampant atm.
    Full of    I have a level 50 Warrior (tank) and have played the game for about 3 months. Here's my review:
    Beautiful to look at but at it's core is a relentless never ending grind. Toxic community full of former WoW goons and griefers. There are some good players out there of course, but there is a ton of griefing and harassment that take place. RMT and bots are running rampant atm.
    Full of pointless fetch quests and travel time sinks even after level cap. Tab target combat with 3 second globals is boring and all jobs feel the same. Dungeons using insta-wipe mechanics and rigid adherence to trinity remove all semblance of skill or fun.
    Some very cute moments but they don't outweigh the monotonous grind of a WoW clone like this.
    Dungeon queue for DPS jobs is insanely long. At level 50 I quit the main story arc and went to crafting because I just couldn't take the grind any more. Crafting is great, and probably the best I've seen so far in an MMO. But at the end of the day, action and combat are what keep me interested in a game so I will be cancelling my sub this month.    … Expand
  13. mk7peters
    Jun 4, 2015
    0
    Worst mmorpg I have ever played! First time log in you get bombarded with RMT friend requests by the end of your game play you have just received over 100 friend requests. SE support does nothing but tell you to blist and send a suggestion to them about it. You will spend more time blisting then enjoying the game. SE support is supposedly looking into the issue but I doubt they will doWorst mmorpg I have ever played! First time log in you get bombarded with RMT friend requests by the end of your game play you have just received over 100 friend requests. SE support does nothing but tell you to blist and send a suggestion to them about it. You will spend more time blisting then enjoying the game. SE support is supposedly looking into the issue but I doubt they will do anything since these accounts help make them money. In my opinion these so called support people are the ones engaged in these gil selling activities and will do nothing until they recuperate the money lost during the flopped release of this game. If you want to enjoy a mmorpg this is not the game to buy and dedicate your free time.… Expand
  14. braindamage
    May 18, 2015
    6
    a ok game ruined by bad game design, the design of this game turns the community into the game it to foul impatient piece of shi , I played ffxi online back a long time ago and never ran into the grief laden piece of chunks, I do in this game man,

    play it with a group of friends if possible also about time to ditch the ps3 don't you think,, it holds the game back the story is    a ok game ruined by bad game design, the design of this game turns the community into the game it to foul impatient piece of shi , I played ffxi online back a long time ago and never ran into the grief laden piece of chunks, I do in this game man,

    play it with a group of friends if possible

    also about time to ditch the ps3 don't you think,, it holds the game back

    the story is really hard to keep a track of in between all the dumb stuff you have to do in the meantime between missions, but the game is ok, not the story but the game play    … Expand
  15. PeterRJG
    May 6, 2015
    5
    This is pretty much the mini-review I wrote for mmorpg.com so it is a bit of a copypasta. Anyhow, here goes:

    I'm not sure what game these people here who say "excellent game" or "best thing ever" are playing. Maybe they're shills or trolls. Maybe they're easily amused. Maybe they get off on doing simplistic, repetitive, tasks. My bet is with the easily amused factor. Anyhow - my take    This is pretty much the mini-review I wrote for mmorpg.com so it is a bit of a copypasta. Anyhow, here goes:

    I'm not sure what game these people here who say "excellent game" or "best thing ever" are playing. Maybe they're shills or trolls. Maybe they're easily amused. Maybe they get off on doing simplistic, repetitive, tasks. My bet is with the easily amused factor.

    Anyhow - my take on this in pro and con form:

    Pros: * It's pretty * Vibrant music * Well designed and animated character models * Switching jobs and classes on the fly is a new twist - largely in theory though * You can track your character through SE's FFXIV website. It's a neat touch.

    Cons: * Mindlessly simplistic combat mechanics - you mash the same two/three buttons from levels 1 through to 50 irrespective of class or job. In other words, it shows its console heritage * Everything is on the same cooldown timer * Combined, the above two points quickly devolve into boring and repetitive combat * Can't skip the cutscenes/theater after character creation. This aspect gets old quickly * No zone or global chat channels. You're in a heavily-populated though silent world. * /tells are worthless as most people have them disabled due to rampant gold spammers * Most characters look the same - everyone gets the same quest reward gear * You can't mail alts money or gear or materials. You need to join a guild with a company chest open to do this, or trust a friend to do it for you * If you play a DPS class, expect long waits to do instances * Quests are the usual kill x amount of this, or gather x amount of this to hand in. No real innovation here * This is a subscription only game and it's debatable it offers anything over and above many free to play alternatives. Very debatable. All up, 5/10.    … Expand
  16. HungryHippo123
    Apr 14, 2015
    8
    I enjoy playing this game since i am a final fantasy fan but i felt like i was repeating a lot of the objectives all the time and wasn't giving me anything new to do, but its fun playing.
  17. Zenfang
    Feb 26, 2015
    0
    The Final Fantasy franchise has come a long way from the Final Fantasy 7-9 and even Final Fantasy XI and while I agree that ARR is a enormous improvement over what was first released it still leaves a lot to be desired. The battlecraft system is flat out confusing from Thaumaturge and Archer turning magically into Black Mage to splitting arcanist into two paths it makes no sense. Sure itThe Final Fantasy franchise has come a long way from the Final Fantasy 7-9 and even Final Fantasy XI and while I agree that ARR is a enormous improvement over what was first released it still leaves a lot to be desired. The battlecraft system is flat out confusing from Thaumaturge and Archer turning magically into Black Mage to splitting arcanist into two paths it makes no sense. Sure it has customization for characters,personal houses, and soon Free Company Airships (which in it self i a major break from the past FF games).

    I give it 5/10 it's pay to play, overpriced, graphically improved version of various other MMO's and uniting several past FF games completely throwing out the successful parts of FFXI. It's not fun unless you are crafting or chocobo racing and eventually that novelty wears off and you are left with a crappy battle system that is just boring. Don't buy it, don't waste your money - IF you want a good game go for Guild Wars 2    … Expand
  18. herbosoft
    Feb 17, 2015
    10
    This just might be the best Final Fantasy in my books. The soundtrack, the story, the dungeons, classes/jobs are all amazing. Well done Square Enix. I will be playing this one for a long time!
  19. benny0909
    Feb 16, 2015
    8
    Final Fantasy XIV A Realm Reborn has been one of the most incredible game purchases I have ever made. I've played more MMO's than I care to admit, but this title takes many of the elements of existing MMO's & improves upon them. With so many different jobs to choose from, you'll quickly find yourself juggling multiple playstyles, as many compliment each other & are all fun to play. IfFinal Fantasy XIV A Realm Reborn has been one of the most incredible game purchases I have ever made. I've played more MMO's than I care to admit, but this title takes many of the elements of existing MMO's & improves upon them. With so many different jobs to choose from, you'll quickly find yourself juggling multiple playstyles, as many compliment each other & are all fun to play. If your a FF fan, this is one title you won't want to miss.… Expand
  20. SpookySpartacus
    Jan 29, 2015
    5
    It's a good MMO overall, but it falls short of being great by any means.

    To put things into perspective: I didn't play FFXIV 1.0 and I haven't played an FF game in years before this. I have, however, played my share of MMOs, both sandbox and themepark: ArcheAge, WoW, Guild Wars 1 and 2, SWtoR. I'm not an FF fanboy by any means, but I would call myself somewhat jaded by the MMO industry    It's a good MMO overall, but it falls short of being great by any means.

    To put things into perspective: I didn't play FFXIV 1.0 and I haven't played an FF game in years before this. I have, however, played my share of MMOs, both sandbox and themepark: ArcheAge, WoW, Guild Wars 1 and 2, SWtoR. I'm not an FF fanboy by any means, but I would call myself somewhat jaded by the MMO industry of late.

    After putting in about 40 hours I have to say, plain and simple, I got bored. I didn't even reach the endgame, but already I was yearning for... more. More exploration maybe would have helped. More variety surely would have. FFXIV ARR has good content, enjoyable classes, fun crafting minigames, and I liked the FATE system even when it was repetitive. The idea of hunting down monsters for rewards is a nice twist, too.

    Really though, that's where the game ends and should have begun. There's no difference in this class system compared to any of the other games I mentioned above (with ArcheAge being the only possible exception). It could just be me, but I'm perfectly okay with making a new character to try out a different class, and that's essentially what you are doing whether you admit it or not - when you take a new job, your level goes back to 1 and you start over, accomplishing the same end through slightly different means. There's certainly nothing new about the questing, other than that the quests were honestly a whole lot easier than I expected, which partially led to the boredom I've experienced and ultimately in putting the game down for good.

    I like to think that this game is the same skeleton of the traditional themepark MMO (quest hub system, group and raid finder for parties, the good ol' leveling and crafting grind we know and hate) with the pretty colors of Square's AMAZING Final Fantasy universe painted all over it. So if you like that, this is a game worth looking at because at it's core, everything is present and shown off very well.

    The bottom line is that the MMO gamer picks up an MMO, as he or she has done time and time again, and plays it looking for something that improves on that design while still presenting the traditional elements in a way that is... well... palatable is a good word. If the amount of people still playing SWtoR is any indication, we will put up with any amount of bugs and terrible graphical quality as long as the GAME is fun. A lot of people will happily take that same formula in stride when it looks and feels this much better. However, the MMO gamer who's looking for the next new hit, the next fun, innovative game, will not settle for the skeleton model any more. We'll play it to see if we can tolerate it and when we can't find anything new and exciting in it, we'll move on and never look at it again.

    Sadly, that's what I'm going to have to do with this title - move on and never look at it again.    … Expand
  21. RedthornWitch
    Jan 19, 2015
    10
    I don't usually write reviews for games. However, I LOVE this game and I wanted to do so for this one. The first time I started playing I was a bit overwhelmed with it but once I started to get the feel of it I fell in love. FFXIV ARR has to be my all time favorite now. I definitely suggest this game to anyone who's interested in MMORPG. Its a beautiful game and deserves my 10 score. WithI don't usually write reviews for games. However, I LOVE this game and I wanted to do so for this one. The first time I started playing I was a bit overwhelmed with it but once I started to get the feel of it I fell in love. FFXIV ARR has to be my all time favorite now. I definitely suggest this game to anyone who's interested in MMORPG. Its a beautiful game and deserves my 10 score. With any game, there's going to be people who like it, and people who don't. So play it for yourself and make your own opinion of it!… Expand
  22. gamemax
    Dec 29, 2014
    1
    BAG OF STOLEN GOODS
    playing a thaumaturg: skill tree is copied from aion, "fate" events are copied from rift, skill sync is copied from guild wars 2, HUD customizing is copied from rift aso. aso.
    shame on the probably bought reviewers who made me buy this soulless, money grabbing asia grinder trying to cash in on the name of this great series and stolen ideas now please tell me    BAG OF STOLEN GOODS
    playing a thaumaturg: skill tree is copied from aion, "fate" events are copied from rift, skill sync is copied from guild wars 2, HUD customizing is copied from rift aso. aso.

    shame on the probably bought reviewers who made me buy this soulless, money grabbing asia grinder trying to cash in on the name of this great series and stolen ideas

    now please tell me again how profit incentive gives us the best product - capitalism debunked...    … Expand
  23. Dias
    Dec 8, 2014
    10
    Great game, I look forward too playing it when ever I get a chance. Sadly too say I have one big complaint. Having maintenance take down the servers during peek gaming hours and at the end of a game week is horrible for players like me and others. We understand they need to be done but can it be in the start of the "new week" so we can grind out our weekly points. It's frustrating andGreat game, I look forward too playing it when ever I get a chance. Sadly too say I have one big complaint. Having maintenance take down the servers during peek gaming hours and at the end of a game week is horrible for players like me and others. We understand they need to be done but can it be in the start of the "new week" so we can grind out our weekly points. It's frustrating and needs too be done when there are low number of people playing and not cutting the game week short by 3 hour. Only complaint for this game and will be posting more of them till it can be changed. I've suggested this game to 4 friends already and they too also love the game.… Expand
  24. Kyuurai
    Nov 21, 2014
    5
    This game was once a 10 in my opinion but now Square is just recycling old content.
    The endgame is just terrible.
    Do you like mindless grind of old content that you already did 1000 times just to get a new weapon that is going to be your BIS? Then this game is for you. They did the same to the crafting professions. They added something called "desynthesis" needed for the newest recipes    This game was once a 10 in my opinion but now Square is just recycling old content.
    The endgame is just terrible.
    Do you like mindless grind of old content that you already did 1000 times just to get a new weapon that is going to be your BIS? Then this game is for you.
    They did the same to the crafting professions. They added something called "desynthesis" needed for the newest recipes etc. You basically have to level your crafting once more in order to make those new recipes.

    This game is going downhill. All the critic reviews are from the "good times".
    Don´t look at the 2013 reviews. Go for the 2014 ones.    … Expand
  25. RobO2112
    Nov 16, 2014
    9
    It has been slightly longer than a year since launch.Those decreeing that this game would be F2P in months have been served their humble pie. And what we have now is something that's rather impressive for an MMO. A failed game, retooled, and turned into a thriving online community.

    So far this year we've seen added to the game: Dec 14, 2013 2.1 "A Realm Awoken" - Main Story    It has been slightly longer than a year since launch.Those decreeing that this game would be F2P in months have been served their humble pie. And what we have now is something that's rather impressive for an MMO. A failed game, retooled, and turned into a thriving online community.

    So far this year we've seen added to the game:

    Dec 14, 2013
    2.1 "A Realm Awoken" - Main Story Continuation; Crystal Tower - Labyrinth of the Ancients 24-man raid; 3 dungeons: Pharos Sirius, Copperbell Mines (Hard,) and Haukke Manor (Hard;) 5 trials: Ultima Weapon, Thornmarch, Garuda, Titan, and Ifrit (Extreme); the first installment of the Hildebrand side quests; 2 Beast Tribe dailies; and 4v4 Arena PvP "The Wolves' Den"; Treasure Hunts; Free Company Housing; and Duty Roulettes

    March 26, 2014
    2.2 "Through the Maelstrom" - Main Story Continuation; 8-man raid: Second Coil of Bahamut; 3 Dungeons: Lost City of Amdapor, Halatali (Hard,) and Brayflox's Longstop (Hard;) Trials: Leviathan(Hard/Extreme,) Thornmarch (Extreme,) Battle on the Big Bridge; second installment of Hildebrand sidequests; 2 new Beast Tribe dailies; FC Housing Gardens/Utility Furnishings; Glamours; Retainer Ventures; Zodiac Weapons; Challenge Log

    July 7, 2014
    2.3 "Defenders of Eorzea" - Main Story Continuation; Crystal Tower - Syrcus Tower 24-man raid; dungeons: Hullbreaker Isle, Tam-Tara Deepcroft (Hard,) Stone Vigil (Hard;) Trials: Ramuh (Hard/Extreme); 3rd Installment of Hildebrand sidequests; Hunts; Chocobo Raising; FC Housing Private Chambers; Ixal Beast Tribe dailies; Frontlines PvP (24v24v24)

    October 28, 2014
    2.4 "Dreams of Ice" - Main Story Continuation; 8-man raid: Final Coil of Bahamut; 3 dungeons: Snowcloak, Sastasha (Hard,) and Sunken Temple of Qarn (Hard;) Trials: Shiva (Hard/Extreme,) Dragon's Neck Colliseum; 4th installment of Hildebrand sidequests; New player class: Rogue; New player job: Ninja

    So if you're tracking with all that, that's about 8 additional hours of main story line quests, 4-5 hours of silly Hildebrand sidequests for comic relief, two new high difficulty 8-man raids, two new lower difficulty 24-man raids, 4 completely new dungeons, 8 hard mode dungeons (which aren't just carbon copies of their lower level selves adjusted to 50, but have unique layouts and boss encounters) and over a dozen trials. Not even to mention all the crafting recipes/changes, and all the other minor quality of life changes that just make it a better place to play, not to mention an entirely new class and job. This amount of content would normally be found in a full retail box expansion!

    I look forward with great anticipation to the story that we'll be told in the coming years, and all the indisputably Final Fantasy locales, characters, and music we'll be treated to along the way. The game may not for everyone, but it's definitely for me, and I would definitely encourage anyone who wants a treat for the eyes and ears while playing a solid MMORPG to check out FFXIV;ARR.    … Expand
  26. Winterlight212
    Nov 13, 2014
    7
    I initially gave this game a very good review, and I regret jumping the gun. New Review having played for a few months now: 1) Slowest combat of any MMO I have ever played (2.5 second global cooldown, compare that to WoW's 0.5 second global cooldown; now imagine drinking tea between spells). 2) As a result of extremely slow combat pace, there is no complexity or diverse rotation, there isI initially gave this game a very good review, and I regret jumping the gun. New Review having played for a few months now: 1) Slowest combat of any MMO I have ever played (2.5 second global cooldown, compare that to WoW's 0.5 second global cooldown; now imagine drinking tea between spells). 2) As a result of extremely slow combat pace, there is no complexity or diverse rotation, there is no complexity in dungeons or boss mechanics, because the pace of combat is so slow you would have enough time to anticipate nearly anything that comes your way.

    3) No public chat channels, and no standard intuitive chat interface, in fact you can't even set reply as the R key, it must be set with CTRL or ALT, really? As far as no public chat channels I mean no "General" or "Zone" or "Map" or "Trade" sort of chat channels as you may see in other games. You can create a private channel, though you have to go all the way to an NPC, read through some text, and can't even name it what you want because they are apparently anti-everything (i.e. very controlling), and won't let you use most words to name your private chat channel.

    4) The actual gameplay, aside from the extremely slow combat, just feels like an outdated Final Fantasy game that tries to be dramatic, and ends up being redundant. What I mean is they try to impress you with flashy spell/sound effects, and music, but then the actual gameplay is so redundant that you are just wandering aimlessly to try and repetitively grind the same quests over and over (literally, you repeat the same quests over and over, not even joking there, it is the exact same set of quests, with the exact same name, and the exact same objectives).

    5) Dungeons are very straightforward, in fact so straightforward that I would say there's absolutely no challenge whatsoever, which goes hand in hand with the slow combat limiting the complexity of ANYTHING in the game at all, but again no surprise here. As far as how the dungeons look, I was not impressed, they were all largely just going through "tunnels" of some sort or variation, and killing pretty much the same set of 5 different monsters up until the boss fights, which also were pretty redundant as well.

    6) Again with redundancy: Everyone looks the exact same. Why? Because there's pretty much only a few templates for gear of each type, which is why most people end up looking the exact same.

    7) Healing is a complete utter joke. I cannot emphasize this enough, as it is truly tragic, because I absolutely love healing. Zero complexity here, and again I think a big reason for that is the pace of combat, which means there is no need for a diverse range of options for healers, which is why it ends up being redundant as well.

    8) As many other players have noted: Zones feel extremely small, and I agree.

    9) Extending on the previous point: The FFXIV world is not an open world, it is divided up into many different instanced type zones. What does that mean? It means that if you go to a new zone, you will see a loading screen when entering that zone, because the world is not interconnected. Even more interesting is that even just within the same city there are multiple instanced zones, which is laughable to say the least, because it makes the city feel even smaller.

    In conclusion: Too small, too slow, too repetitive, and the game director is now talking about implementing "marriage," which is fine, but then he went on to say that it would exclude gays. Really? I mean come on, even Electronic Arts has plenty of gay relationships in their games, who cares if two male or two female characters want to get married? Are the Tea "Patriots" and Ugandans and all the radical ignorant populace of the world going to teleport in and suddenly crash the servers every time two male or two female characters get married in some undisclosed location? No. Does it destroy straight relationships who will have no idea that gay marrying is going on somewhere far, far away in some undisclosed location? No, because they won't even know, because it's not their business, and it's not announced, so they would not know, yet they feel the need to control what everyone does and thinks, which is ironic coming from these "Patriots" claiming to be "Pro-Freedom," really now... the ignorance is astounding. If Yoshida didn't want this to be an issue, he shouldn't have implemented marriage in the first place, at all, period. As for the rest of the game: Garbage. If you like garbage, you might like this game, I say might because garbage flavor can vary, you might not like this particular flavor of garbage.    … Expand
  27. SeanMcgahee
    Oct 17, 2014
    10
    Best MMO i have ever played... Im not sure why anyone could possibly rate this poorly. The music track is out of this world along with the graphics as expected from a final fantasy game. The story is incredible, the crafting and market system blows world of warcraft out of the water... And guess what; they have only been up and running for a year meaning they are an infant in the MMO andBest MMO i have ever played... Im not sure why anyone could possibly rate this poorly. The music track is out of this world along with the graphics as expected from a final fantasy game. The story is incredible, the crafting and market system blows world of warcraft out of the water... And guess what; they have only been up and running for a year meaning they are an infant in the MMO and already blowing others away. The dungeons are awesome, the crafting...yeah you actually have to make the items... Through a series of learned abilities ... Not just grab this mat and that mat and poof i made something.... Still not sold ok ok then how about this.... Try it for free on me...Pc, Playstaion3, or Playstaion 4... Pick your poison ;) I play on ps4.

    If you register a service account using my invitation code below you will receive a 14 day free trial, and once you subscribe using my code you'll receive exclusive in-game item rewards instantly, at 30 days and at 60 days. Just go to http://sqex.to/Msp and once again dont forget my code 8XNEJNJJ. My in game name is The Malevolent and i am on the Lamia server US if you need help or tips. Happy gaming!    … Expand
  28. EL1TE
    Oct 15, 2014
    8
    For the record my rating is: i like (10) and i don't like (0), not saying 10 is a perfect game, my ratings don't work like that, simply i either like, or i don't.

    What i like: The game has an interesting story with characters that make sense and that are not boring, the combat itself gets better as we level up despite having to grind a lot to get to level 50, the Primals are a good    For the record my rating is: i like (10) and i don't like (0), not saying 10 is a perfect game, my ratings don't work like that, simply i either like, or i don't.

    What i like: The game has an interesting story with characters that make sense and that are not boring, the combat itself gets better as we level up despite having to grind a lot to get to level 50, the Primals are a good challenge, the crafting and gather has some sense in this game and they are fun, the possibility to train and let him follow us and also color your own Chocobo is great, personal housing where we can put our trophies with items we get and by using them in craft, gather among other things, there's a good amount of Dungeons also, the classes itself i can say i have a lot of fun playing Monk, i also like Scholar and Black Mage.

    What i don't like: End game and Time between content patches. End Game is basically ONE dungeon with a few levels, at the current time we are on version 2.3 where the End Game is the Second Coil of Bahamut, a Dungeon that requires coordination by all party members, meaning if one fail is most likely going to be a wipe (Turn 6 might be an exception), however they introduce something called Weekly Limits, Weekly Limits are limitations that you can only get X item/Currency per week, limiting your progression, for example, each Turn of the Coil, drops Two gear items, however they are random despite each turn having it own loot table, and if you beat turn 6, you go to turn 7, you beat turn 7 and go 8 etc. You can't go back to beaten turns before weekly reset at Tuesdays, then there's the weekly limit for Tome currency which is used to trade for Coil equivalent stats-wise gear, however (excluding accessories) the amount of tomes you get per week isn't enough to buy a SINGLE armor pieces, not to mention the weapon that you need 3 Weeks to get it, which is insane, this is a CHEAP way not to allow people to progress by limiting them instead of adding new content.

    Time between content updates, currently it's been far more than promised, since the release of 2.0, we were promised content patches every 3 Months, except it goes for 4 Months, meaning that people have been doing their weekly stuff, which at this point pretty much all Hardcore players have, do coil, logout. This is a terrible thing to allow to happen, it's not healthy for the game.

    So why do i rate 10 (i like) with such limitations, well it's simple i used to play GW2 but it's been 2 Years doing the same, no expansions, they now sold some of their servers meaning the game sometimes lags hard making it unplayable, so yes, i don't have any other MMORPG to play at all, or i'd give this game a 0 as well, but since it's been 1 Year and fan fest is coming, and also 2.4 with a new class, i guess that's enough motivation.    … Expand
  29. Ezalael
    Oct 11, 2014
    4
    In 1 word: annoying. It's not beautiful, nor challenging. Walking a lot, with static fights. When not walking, teleporting, but not everywhere, where no crystal to TP we can take a chocobo, and see its ass during minutes until we reach destination. Very lovely.. mmh in fact no. Ah another thing really good: regularly talking to NPC will put you in video mode. Didn't understood why exceptIn 1 word: annoying. It's not beautiful, nor challenging. Walking a lot, with static fights. When not walking, teleporting, but not everywhere, where no crystal to TP we can take a chocobo, and see its ass during minutes until we reach destination. Very lovely.. mmh in fact no. Ah another thing really good: regularly talking to NPC will put you in video mode. Didn't understood why except seeing NPC full screen. Nothing else. Luckily you can skip. Good.… Expand
  30. curvy2
    Sep 26, 2014
    10
    God damn amazing, it's like one long beautiful dream you don't want to wake up from. Not since FFVII has there been one more deserving of the name Final Fantasy. And if your PC can crank it up to max settings it's hand's down the best looking MMORPG out there 10/10
  31. Pnx725
    Sep 13, 2014
    2
    This game faces many issues;

    *The combat system is one of the worst I have seen in any mmo ever, very simplistic and boring. *Huge storyline but only a few scenes have voice acting. *The maps in the World feel small and there is no sense of danger at all. *The Fate system (gw2 minievents copy) is boring and not challenging. *The dungeons are to easy *There is no enough real    This game faces many issues;

    *The combat system is one of the worst I have seen in any mmo ever, very simplistic and boring.
    *Huge storyline but only a few scenes have voice acting.
    *The maps in the World feel small and there is no sense of danger at all.
    *The Fate system (gw2 minievents copy) is boring and not challenging.
    *The dungeons are to easy
    *There is no enough real endgame content, it is only one 8 man raid with 4 boss fights. (can only do 1 time a week)
    *The game has a lot of restrictions to favor casual players and keeping the game becoming obsolete because of the lack of real endgame.
    *The crafting system is obsolete since they have let ppl know that dungeon gear will always be better than crafting gear.
    *The Customer Service is terrible and when they answer they send you a copy-pasted generic response with no help at all.

    Not all about this game is bad, it can keep you entertained till you realize it is not worth it, but I seriously recommend you to stay away from it.    … Expand
  32. Wolfmoon2682
    Aug 22, 2014
    10
    I've been playing MMO's since EverQuest, i've played literally DOZENS upon dozens of them and FF XIV ARR has to be one of the most polished and addicting mmorpg's ever to grace my collection! It doesn't innovate (aside from the amazing controls on the console version, the likes of which have NEVER been matched) but it takes everything the genre has done up to this point and perfects nearlyI've been playing MMO's since EverQuest, i've played literally DOZENS upon dozens of them and FF XIV ARR has to be one of the most polished and addicting mmorpg's ever to grace my collection! It doesn't innovate (aside from the amazing controls on the console version, the likes of which have NEVER been matched) but it takes everything the genre has done up to this point and perfects nearly every single aspect of it!

    And to top it all off the story rivals that of even the single player counterparts in the series.You simply do not want to skip the dialogue ever. The most basic of quests has at least a story worthy of some nostalgia or a chuckle. The graphics are fantastic even on the PS3 version and the FPS on PS3 is respectible for the quality and sheer size of the game.

    But the PC and PS4 versions are the best option naturally, i know i mentioned the controls for consoles but they really do feel natural and don't slow you down as much as you might think. There is always something to do in the game and the patches are so vast and full of content that other mmo's would consider them stand alone expansions! You simply get more than you pay for and the asking price of the monthly fee is cheaper than most (WoW included!)

    Simply put, this is one of the very best mmorpg's i have ever played. It had a terrible first release but a Realm Reborn made up for it in spades! What other mmo has failed and then not only redeemed it'self but wrote it's failure into the very fabric of the story via an in game cataclysm!?

    I look forward to many years of memories and expansion packs!    … Expand
  33. LiquidFrostbite
    Aug 22, 2014
    9
    Easily the best MMO out on the market right now for PVE. The game is not without it's flaws, namely PVP, but it's a fantastic game for any lover of MMO's. I am extremely impressed on how they turned around the game after the failure that was 1.0.

    In my opinion, it's the best looking MMO out right now. Everything from the graphics and animations, to the gameplay and dungeons is    Easily the best MMO out on the market right now for PVE. The game is not without it's flaws, namely PVP, but it's a fantastic game for any lover of MMO's. I am extremely impressed on how they turned around the game after the failure that was 1.0.

    In my opinion, it's the best looking MMO out right now. Everything from the graphics and animations, to the gameplay and dungeons is top-notch. The combat feels so incredibly fluid and polished.

    This is the one MMO that I constantly return to and I would highly recommend it to anyone that hasn't had the pleasure of trying it out.    … Expand
  34. Eclystius
    Aug 21, 2014
    9
    This game has provided me with over a year of great gameplay. Ignore the posts about bad storytelling and boring fighting... after finishing a large house, a novus weapon, and more... I still get daily entertainment out of this game because there is still so many things to do. Is it perfect? Hahah... of course not! However, it is well worth the money.
  35. stefmor90
    Aug 15, 2014
    4
    I never played the beta of this game, but in the first few hours I've played it, I found nothing remarkable. Now before anyone thinks 'But the game gets SO MUCH BETTER' that's a crock of **** if the game fails to captivate the player in the first few hours (which should be it's best moments of gameplay), then it has failed the rest.

    The first few quests I found myself doing were the    I never played the beta of this game, but in the first few hours I've played it, I found nothing remarkable. Now before anyone thinks 'But the game gets SO MUCH BETTER' that's a crock of **** if the game fails to captivate the player in the first few hours (which should be it's best moments of gameplay), then it has failed the rest.

    The first few quests I found myself doing were the worst: Fetch quests. I was told to go and pick up some items, or talk to some random NPC in the city, and these just dragged ON AND ON until I explored the whole city. I know the game is trying to convey a sense of exploration and meaning in exploring the city, but forcing the player and guiding them through linear tunnels of quests is certainly not a good way to make a first impression.

    Eventually, I finally got a quest where I could try out some combat. I thought that this must be the area where the game must shine, but instead it was mostly just cycling my 3 skills and dodging some telegraphed attacks, shown as little quarter circles and such on the ground you have to move out of or you take large amounts of damage .

    At about this time, I noticed that this game must have taken some huge inspiration from Guildwars 2 (One of my all time favorites), The telegraphed attacks, weapons changing gameplay, the FATE system, the personal story, and so on. However, minus the personal story, they seem patched on and no where near as competent or fun as the games role-model.

    I got to about level 10 when I stopped playing, and boy did it feel like forever. I was really bored and disinterested and level 10 is generally the area where MMOs should pick up but unfortunately Final Fantasy XIV didn't seem to be going anywhere special.

    Obviously this game is trying its hardest after its previous launch failure to be a great MMO, but it has completely and utterly disgusted me in the first few hours of gameplay, which is something no game, especially MMOs, should do. The only thing going through my head when I was playing this was 'I wish I was playing Guildwars 2, it does this so much better'.    … Expand
  36. datus
    Aug 10, 2014
    10
    Wow so sad to see this amazing MMO being down-rated because of problems that happened a year ago on launch day. All you incredibly learned individuals who gave this game low scores based on "launch day issues" and didn't come back to adjust your score should all just stop using the internet for humanity's sake.

    As an MMO veteran, I will give this game nothing short of a 10 for    Wow so sad to see this amazing MMO being down-rated because of problems that happened a year ago on launch day. All you incredibly learned individuals who gave this game low scores based on "launch day issues" and didn't come back to adjust your score should all just stop using the internet for humanity's sake.

    As an MMO veteran, I will give this game nothing short of a 10 for attempting to be awesome. Some say it's a WoW clone just because it has a skill bar. Other than that there is nothing WoW like about it. This is like a cross between UO and EQ with awesome FF story telling. I typically hate dialogue in MMOs but the story telling in this game is so compelling I actually enjoy the main quest line. Which is there for those who want it, and many MMO basics like mounts and airships are also level locked (a la FF games) which seems bad but they really make it work in providing a feeling of accomplishment.

    There is so much to do in this game between being able to play every class as one character, and trying out all the crafting and gathering professions, that it never feels like a linear progression regardless of whether you follow the story or not. It's just an awesome blend of open world exploration / harvesting and story line that I haven't seen in any MMO to date. I really think this is what ESO was trying to be. Also, best fishing system ever. My only regret is that I waited this long to try it.    … Expand
  37. aatassi
    Jul 31, 2014
    7
    + : nice graphics. story driven, different classes, housing, permanent updates,
    different platforms (PC, PS3, PS4)
    - : subscriptions

    Game-play : 6/10, graphics : 8/10, background : 7/10, lifetime : 7/10
  38. Narziss
    Jul 26, 2014
    8
    FFXIV is easily the best MMO I've ever played (right above GW1 and far above FFXI). In terms of contemporary MMO's, I hate the lack of the trinity in GW 2, which feels like a solo game. I hate the aesthetic and feel of WoW, although I appreciate the group play and dungeon queueing. FFXIV takes the best from everyone else and puts it in one package. My only complaint is the that theFFXIV is easily the best MMO I've ever played (right above GW1 and far above FFXI). In terms of contemporary MMO's, I hate the lack of the trinity in GW 2, which feels like a solo game. I hate the aesthetic and feel of WoW, although I appreciate the group play and dungeon queueing. FFXIV takes the best from everyone else and puts it in one package. My only complaint is the that the gear choices are too linear, and there aren't different options available to cater to different builds. There is only better and better stated gear, but no gear diversity with different utility (but that is a problem that most MMO's suffer from: linear gear progression instead of interesting gear selection. For example, in Diablo 2, you might use a level 29 ring just because it fit your build, even at level 99. In FFXIV there are no items with unique properties, gear is just a grind hill).… Expand
  39. Samuraikenshin
    Jul 23, 2014
    0
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Combat is slow and dull and only gets mildly better as you level up. Story is bland and unremarkable in any way as the time in between any parts that are ok is broken up by tons of typical bland fetch/ups quests. Quests often have you go from point A to point B back to point A then on to point C etc etc... The FATE events almost all fall into one of two categories, either kill a small zerg of normal mobs or kill one mini boss type monster. This is mostly the same as other games that feature this style of event, how ever it feels worse here.

    Endgame fights rely mostly on extreme gimmick mechanics combined with the long global cool down to force difficulty into the fights. In most cases just reacting to a fight mechanic will not be enough you have to memorize the pattern of the boss so that you can move pre emptively, part of this is due to the horrid net coding used and the awful latency/updating the server does. Itemization on gear is horrible. Secondary stats provide so little benefit that they shouldn't even be on gear, spell/skill speed being the biggest culprit. It provides so little benefit so as not to break the long GCD system they designed that it should have never been created.

    This comes from a pre 2.2 player that cleared turn 4 and just stopped caring about the game due to all the above issues.

    P.S. Crystal tower loot system is the worst thing ever.    … Expand
  40. x_ares_x
    Jul 22, 2014
    5
    FFXIV is an amazing feat - Square Enix did the unthinkable; they resurrected a previously doomed video game. With that being said, the resurrection leaves players like me wanting more. Before I get any "WoW fanboy!" responses, I *have* played World of Warcraft, but I've also played Final Fantasy 11, Guild Wars 1 & 2, Rift, Star Wars the Old Republic and many, many more MMORPGs. To say I'mFFXIV is an amazing feat - Square Enix did the unthinkable; they resurrected a previously doomed video game. With that being said, the resurrection leaves players like me wanting more. Before I get any "WoW fanboy!" responses, I *have* played World of Warcraft, but I've also played Final Fantasy 11, Guild Wars 1 & 2, Rift, Star Wars the Old Republic and many, many more MMORPGs. To say I'm a fan of one is to say that for one reason or another, I'm a fan of them all.

    What FFXIV isn't is a terrible game. It's not a bad game, it just has few qualities which make it stand out from the crowd and justify the monthly subscription.

    Pros would be obviously the graphics - the game's simply stunning to look at. The sound is great, music is great. A plentiful amount of pets and mounts. The game is pretty decent to play. FFXIV has a really good story and the community for the most part is somewhat friendly. It's nice to be able to move from one class to another just by swapping out your weapons.

    The darker side, or cons of this game however would be that with weapon and class swapping comes fewer spaces in inventory and fewer quests. Inventory stays the same no matter how high your level and there is, at this time no way to increase it unless you hire retainers - you get two of those at the most, after their inventory is full, you're out of luck. Main quests are limited in number which leaves the player seeking out something called Leves. Levels too are limited by how many you can do, depending on how many you have "saved up". You have credits which act as Leve currency, which will cot you 1 credit per Leve taken on, regardless of whether you're successful or not. Dungeons are mediocre at best, for the most part. As with most MMOs, if you're not a tank or a healer, get ready to wait in queue for a while, if you can figure out how to access the queue system - or as far as that goes, how to use the Glamour (read transmogrification) system, or even how to make or even use Materia. Unlike other MMORPGs, Square makes everything into a quest - do you want to make your armor stronger? You need to obtain Materia. How do you obtain Materia? Wait until 18 and quest the ability to change old gear into Materia - ah, but again, it's not that easy; no, again, you have to wait until your "spirit bond" with that piece of gear is at 100%, which might take a while, depending on how often you're in battle. However, let's say you finally completed the quest and have obtained some Materia, now to slot it - but how? That's right, another quest. However, even after you've successfully done these two quests and you have Materia and you're all set to slot it.... you get hit with the information that you can't slot it because the piece of gear you're wearing is for your current level which is 30, but your craft for that respective piece of gear is only at level 10. Let me clarifiy; if you plan on slotting Materia, you better keep your crafts (yes, CRAFTS) on par with your current class's level. You will also need more than one craft leveled as well, if you want to cover all of your gear. If you want to place Materia into your main gear if you're a plate-wearing tank, that will mean you will have to level Armorer for your armor, Blacksmith for your weapon/shield and Goldsmithing for your accessories at minimal. At the rate one craft depends on another for materials, you better be ready to level them all or shell out whatever the other crafters want for those much needed leather materials you will ultimately need. Raids are uninspiring and boring. The 2.5 second global cooldown encompasses almost every move, even stuns, which leaves one apprehensive at times on using abilities because the boss at any second could use a special move which needs to be stunned and ultimately isn't stunned because the tank's abilities are on cooldown - and so the group is wiped.
    The public quest system known as FATEs is another thing that is rather bothersome. When you join a FATE, you have to willingly, temporarily level down via Level Sync. However, your abilities do not scale with your level, they just become unavailable if they're higher than your current level. Have a new favorite ability you got at 35? If you're in a level 12 FATE and you're synced, better get ready for it to be temporarily disabled. These are not all of the flaws I see in this game, just the ones which bother me the most.

    Despite what I have posted here, I don't find the game terrible, I just feel that some of the systems and ideas in the game are not as user friendly as they could be. Aside from that, this game does nothing different than any other MMORPG hasn't done before it, it just doesn't seem to be able to do it as well. Can I recommend it? I'm sorry, I can't - not when there are far more user-friendly MMORPGs out there which have been around for so much longer and therefore have so much more content. Give this one a year and check back then - the game may have gotten better.    … Expand
  41. ReithD
    Jun 30, 2014
    10
    After a couple months of fixing the lag and server stability this is hands down the best MMO in the market right now. IF I had to rate it on release date I would have said a solid 8. That has changed with all the large updated occurring every 3-4 months.

    Some items do need work like the PVP content and more end-game for casuals are needing outside of crystals tower which a 24 man raid,    After a couple months of fixing the lag and server stability this is hands down the best MMO in the market right now. IF I had to rate it on release date I would have said a solid 8. That has changed with all the large updated occurring every 3-4 months.

    Some items do need work like the PVP content and more end-game for casuals are needing outside of crystals tower which a 24 man raid, hard-core you have the Coils an 8-man raid to mess with. The coils are by far some of the most difficult dungeons I've seen. In update 2.3 will will see the hunt system implemented which should expand group content on the last tier of difficulty.

    I love the aesthetics of the game. It doesn't look like WOW or a wow-clone like Wild Star, but it does bring many features people luv from wow. The characters have great emotes tied to them that are different from each race. These are the best realized races I've seen in RECENT mmos.

    Early on the combat system does not try to overwhelm you with too many abilities. That being said Paladin and Bard are not terrible technical at lvl 50, Warrior the other Tank then Paladin is a blast to tank with. Monk, Dragoon, and other classes become a Priority based combat and that is where you can find more complex combat. During the guildleves you will learn how your class/job works in a group setting through the lvl 50 process and does a good job of not holding you hand all the way through it.

    Alot of Lore has been built into the game you can find by doing beast quests, job quests, and sight seeing quests.

    Final Fantasy 14 A realm Reborn has a bright future.    … Expand
  42. BadMMO
    Jun 22, 2014
    0
    I hope Yoshida and his crew should take sometime to review various issue that they
    had been bringing forward towards each patch and new contents.
    Each patch gurantees a bug crash or massive error that would contributes to server downtime/delay. They should realise that ff14 is not a game for normal players who's not working or players who does not come from adequately financially    I hope Yoshida and his crew should take sometime to review various issue that they
    had been bringing forward towards each patch and new contents.

    Each patch gurantees a bug crash or massive error that would contributes to server downtime/delay.

    They should realise that ff14 is not a game for normal players
    who's not working or players who does not come from adequately financially stabled income household.

    Players are mostly working adults and rich kids or medium household income family.
    Working adults would not have generous time to contribute so much activities that SE
    been pushing this new contents. This new contents are not design to suit all works of life.
    It's more to catering towards hardcore players apetite.
    If we put into some wild measurements, a full set of high allaghan took hardcore players
    a min of 30-50hours gametime.
    However. if we look at working adults of contribution towards gametime.
    It's ten times that effort or probably more.

    Dungeon that aims to put players in precise positioning and highly scripted AI that aim
    to disrupt or wipe players with only one mistake. Oftenly , players who join got killed
    by lag and this contributed a wipe session. This would repeat as lag seems to spread
    across other players as well. As long as one player lag , it's gurantee a never win situation
    for a whole day.
    Working adults could only play during normal gametime hours. Especially Asians, we get to
    compete against high peak hours. This would resulting players cursing each other ,
    discriminating each other with the language barrier or "alien players" term.
    The game was not built on making global players to get along well but the mechanism promotes
    high discrimination competition as well.
    I would not say an easy way of attaining end game gears but more of a logical method to attain it.

    The game was made to look so time consuming and rigid that it no longer call entertainment.
    It's like a single crumb of bread divided into a thousand pieces to make it looks bigger and more time to consume.

    From last interview, it seems that Yoshida believes that the game was not challenging enough. They now aim to make it more
    challenging *In their point of view* . This would alternate the sequence of this spells/skill that raid boss cast.
    Now , players have been dying to lag had the only method to dodge this spell/skill.
    Instead of making the game more accomodating towards global players , they further tweak the mechanism to wipe players more easily.

    The game was created to be based upon something illogical that sucks player's life away.
    FF11 was once based upon that standard they made players left. It was never challenging. It's just extreme time consuming.
    With the server's cockup latency from time to time. Players had to rely on tunneling or vpn services. This is something abnormal.

    I've been looking for a game that's call entertainment. But for ff14, i feel that i'm still working inside. This is entertainment, not occupation recreation.
    I'm looking to release stress, not gain more stress from game.

    This has been square enix biggest failure in making mmo. They take pride into making something unachievable and unrealistic goals in their gaming mechanism.
    It destroys players life. Promoting players to hate each other which was regard as "competition"

    From the silly 12xzodiac stone that had random drop rates to 9x1500 tomes per book with each book with fate,leve,enemies and dungeon to accomplish.
    With t5 bcob, scob and ex primals that aim to make players scurrying accross pigeon hole safe zone.
    This would also cause players to redo the same silly raid for weeks or months.
    When players finally get through , they would only get a single drop that player been doing for weeks and months only to find it powerlot off by someone who did only 1-2 times. At least for ff11, for some highly time consuming raid, all participating players were rewarded well. This one give you nothing after so many attempts. And yes, japanese players usually powerlot very frequently in any raids. If you catch them lotting low , it's mostly unimportant lots or they are just lotting for fun. I've never won any lots before in bcob and primal ex. Everytime a japanese joins the lot, i'll always hit a gurantee low lot. Only unimportant drops that's dirt common, i'll get it without issue. Unless the japanese wanted that lot. If you are someone who is new and looking for entertaiment from game,i would suggest you not to touch this game. It's a game that'll literally suck you to hell.    … Expand
  43. kaltorak
    May 22, 2014
    6
    It's not bad, it's just... ok. I wanted to like it, but there is not much to be enjoyed. It has nothing bad. But there's also nothing to look forward.

    PRO: Graphics. Mostly outdoors, cities and characters are a bit meh. But in general they are good. CON: Skills and spells are dull. I could see all the skills I was going to get and there was none I could be really looking forward    It's not bad, it's just... ok. I wanted to like it, but there is not much to be enjoyed. It has nothing bad. But there's also nothing to look forward.

    PRO:
    Graphics. Mostly outdoors, cities and characters are a bit meh. But in general they are good.

    CON:
    Skills and spells are dull. I could see all the skills I was going to get and there was none I could be really looking forward to.

    The game is fine. The problem is Rift is better, GW2 is better, Wildstar beta looked like it will be better, even Neverwinter Online would be better if it weren't for the horrible subscription model.

    I would say, if oyu love FF universe, you can still enjoy it. Otherwise, even though not having anything really wrong, you won't    … Expand
  44. Bryguy1982
    May 20, 2014
    5
    **This is a long review, but I am just trying to help out my fellow hardcore MMO players out there. Even though I am a huge World of Warcraft fan and have played the game (WoW) for many years, I am not comparing FF14 to WoW. I am just trying to save you disappointment if you are trying to fill that WoW void with another MMO.**

    **Short list of Pros and Cons at the top, while details    **This is a long review, but I am just trying to help out my fellow hardcore MMO players out there. Even though I am a huge World of Warcraft fan and have played the game (WoW) for many years, I am not comparing FF14 to WoW. I am just trying to save you disappointment if you are trying to fill that WoW void with another MMO.**

    **Short list of Pros and Cons at the top, while details will be below that**

    Pros:
    + You can level all the classes and professions on one toon.
    + Plenty to do and experience leveling your first class.
    + Good graphics with a decent story.
    + Pretty easy to get geared and get right into the endgame action (This can be viewed as a con as well)
    + Challenging bosses for the parts of the game that haven't been nerfed yet.

    Cons:
    - Game world/community just feels empty and dull while questing.
    - NO world PvP. The game does have arena-like PvP, but it is the most boring thing ever.
    - There is no stand-out gear that separates the casuals from the best players. You can pretty much get the same ilvl gear without completing the hardest content in the game.
    - Professions are useless for improving your endgame, so there is no point in leveling them.
    - 30 minute to 1 hour dungeon queues for DPS classes using the duty-finder.
    - Too easy for bad players to get gear!!!

    FF14 Review:

    I have played this game for 40 days now while putting at least 5 hours a day into the game, so I feel I can give an honest review of the game. Like most MMOs, the gameplay grabbed my attention right away, but fell short for endgame material in my opinion.

    I am basing my review on Character Leveling, Endgame, Professions/Crafting, and just the overall server community (this will vary depending on which server you play on).

    Character Leveling: 7 out of 10
    What I like about this, is that you can basically level every class to 50 on one toon, which prevents the game from getting too boring right away, because you can mix-and-match different abilities. If you get bored of leveling a healer, just switch to a DPS class or tank.

    You can level by questing, queuing for dungeons (which start at lvl 15), doing Fates (random events that pop up around the world, which involve killing things), queuing for Guildhests (mini-dungeon). Basically, the game offers a variety of ways to level.

    The thing that sucks about using the same character to get your first few classes to 50, is that you will eventually run out of quests to do, because the quests don't reappear when you level a new class. As a result, you will be forced to grind fates over and over and over.

    Endgame: 5 out of 10
    (Before you FF14 fanboys bash me, I've completed Titan Ex and made it to T9 as a WHM. Basically, I feel I'm qualified to comment on endgame.)

    Dungeons consist of 4-man groups; Raids are usually 8-man groups, aside from Labyrinth which is 24.

    *Endgame provides a decent amount of dungeons for new players, such as Labyrinth of the Ancients, Primal HMs and Exs, and Bahamut Coil 1-9. My complaint with endgame isn't that the content is easy, but rather that you can grind the easier dungeons over and over and pretty much end up with the same gear as those who take pride in being a skilled player and spend hours wiping on near-impossible bosses.

    I feel the endgame is what killed this game for me. It basically becomes a grind-fest for Tomestones (these are used to get ilvl 90 raid gear). You don't even need to be good at the game and get equivalent gear to the best hardcore players. At lvl 50, most people are walking around with the same blues and looking the same. Due to this, you will get grouped with a lot of terrible players that were most likely carried by others.

    On a side note, it is really easy to gear up your other classes on the same toon. Just from healing raids over and over, I was pretty much able to get a full bard set and tank set.

    Professions/Crafting: 3 out of 10
    This game isn't any different from most other MMOs. It is a time-killer and doesn't give you any better gear that you can't easily farm for yourself. Most people do it just to sell stuff on the auction house (BTW... Money is pretty much pointless in this game. The only time you will spend it is on stuff for your guild house), or just to get achievement points. Basically... There is no benefit to leveling any profession to lvl 50.

    Server/Community: 4 out of 10
    Even though this is a MMO, most of the time you feel like you're playing the game by yourself. Once in a while you will group with people for dungeons/raids, but outside of that, the game just feels lonely. This is coming from someone that is on a popular server too. You will have the gold farmers spamming non-stop; the occasional troll yelling out random things; and the people in party finder needing people for extreme primals or fate grinding to upgrade their relic weapon. The world just feels empty to me. Maybe because their is no world PvP? I still can't put my finger on it.    … Expand
  45. ravenclaw77
    May 14, 2014
    5
    Game is fantastic on PS4, but the PC version is not something I can recommend. The controls and UI are really just designed for a powrrful console. While leaps and bounds improved since v 1.0, it still is very hard to suggest over games like RIFT, LotRO, SW:ToR, or even WoW. Make sure you meet the recomended specs if you decide to get this on PC, minimum spec has unplayably terrible frame rates.
  46. demonofelru
    May 5, 2014
    8
    This game looks beautiful and the sounds and music are fantastic. The overall story is exceptionally written. Another great feature is being able to be all classes with one character.

    This game is full of Final Fantasy nostalgia, and is a great fit for any fan of the series.

    The only downsides are that the end game sinks into the normal MMO trap of grinding for gear.
  47. Raygonsy
    May 2, 2014
    10
    I have been playing since the launch of ARR, almost 8 months a go and I must say it is one of the best balanced and polished MMO's I have ever played. The crafting is fun and rewarding however it doesn't make the best endgame gear so this may tern some people off. I see some people say dungeons and end game is just your skill rotations and and dodging red circles. While a lot of it isI have been playing since the launch of ARR, almost 8 months a go and I must say it is one of the best balanced and polished MMO's I have ever played. The crafting is fun and rewarding however it doesn't make the best endgame gear so this may tern some people off. I see some people say dungeons and end game is just your skill rotations and and dodging red circles. While a lot of it is there are plenty of other mechanics for bosses. Just for instance when you fight Diablo's there are 8 closed doors in the area where you fight him. Every door has a sign above it and has another door with the same sign above it so their in pairs.You have to time opening the matching doors when he does demi so your party gets sucked through one door and come out the other door and not get damaged. This is just one of many ways fights are more complicated. However it is latter based dungeon grind for the best loot so this may also tern some people off. FFXIV also has big updates every 3 months and a well written and fairly deep story worthy of other FF titles.… Expand
  48. matpsch
    Apr 17, 2014
    10
    I have played FFXIV since the original 1.0 release date. 1.0 had it's shortcomings but when A Realm Reborn came out, they totally made up for it. This game has such an immersible, beautiful world with so many fun quests, fights, and dungeons. It's highly addictive and every major update that adds even more content make it even more addictive to continue playing. Thank you Square Enix,I have played FFXIV since the original 1.0 release date. 1.0 had it's shortcomings but when A Realm Reborn came out, they totally made up for it. This game has such an immersible, beautiful world with so many fun quests, fights, and dungeons. It's highly addictive and every major update that adds even more content make it even more addictive to continue playing. Thank you Square Enix, this game is so good.… Expand
  49. AsuiaKyoto
    Apr 14, 2014
    4
    Horrible Customer service. Contradicting and abusive Terms & Policy.
    Community ruined by multiple mmorpg global world newcomers.
    This is no where near how Final Fantasy XI was. Sure FFXI Was a menu slow base game, though FFXIV new features and mid pace game play- it is all candy until Square Enix gets what they want from you. Money. They do not listen to their community when it comes    Horrible Customer service. Contradicting and abusive Terms & Policy.
    Community ruined by multiple mmorpg global world newcomers.

    This is no where near how Final Fantasy XI was. Sure FFXI Was a menu slow base game, though FFXIV new features and mid pace game play- it is all candy until Square Enix gets what they want from you. Money. They do not listen to their community when it comes to their account. Other than that great game, horrible service.    … Expand
  50. Krysen
    Apr 10, 2014
    9
    Before FF14 i played Tera, Swotor, WOW. Tera had a nice action combat system, Swotor a nice Story and WOW was just fun because of my friends. But i searched for a new game with nice story and a different feeling while playing. And FF14 has everything i searched for. It rewards you for doing simply everything.
    I love the FF universum and because of that i like the Models of the monsters    Before FF14 i played Tera, Swotor, WOW. Tera had a nice action combat system, Swotor a nice Story and WOW was just fun because of my friends. But i searched for a new game with nice story and a different feeling while playing. And FF14 has everything i searched for. It rewards you for doing simply everything.
    I love the FF universum and because of that i like the Models of the monsters very much. The fighting System is a mix of dodging Skills like Wildstar and auto attack like in WoW. The Graphic is amazing, the whole game looks like it was made with Love.

    For me, i am playing it Solo, it makes a lot of fun. I just wanted to play a Game until Wildstar comes out, because my friends didnt want to play another MMO and for that, it is the perfect game    … Expand
  51. augh18
    Apr 9, 2014
    7
    Probably the greatest comeback in videogame history (aside from perhaps the original Final Fantasy, though that was playing with far smaller stakes than FFXIV was in its original iteration).

    Best parts of the game are the animations and music. Has a distinct JRPG feel. Questing is tedious at times but I expect that with any MMO. Most revolutionary aspect of this game is probably the    Probably the greatest comeback in videogame history (aside from perhaps the original Final Fantasy, though that was playing with far smaller stakes than FFXIV was in its original iteration).

    Best parts of the game are the animations and music. Has a distinct JRPG feel. Questing is tedious at times but I expect that with any MMO. Most revolutionary aspect of this game is probably the Extreme Primals, which is a good and bad thing. Good, because they are the most intricate boss fights I have ever seen in any MMO, but bad, because the fact that it's an MMO means there are latency issues that can cause wipes in this fights due to a simple lag spike. It's like playing Super Meat Boy and needing to make a perfect jump to clear your perfect run, but getting a lag spike when you hit the jump key, so you just fall off the ledge into a pit of spikes and die.

    Thought the endgame was pretty decent (it's the standard MMO login for dailies affair) until the implementation of the "Atma" questline, at which point I decided to quit. Everything from 1 - 50 was overall extremely enjoyable, I do not see this as being a long-term game for most people, but seeing as you can get this for $30 right now (and often less due to sales) for the PC version, it's worth checking out for the free 30 days and enjoying the ride from 1 to 50.

    If this were a single-player game, the experience would be so much better, but unfortunately the "theme-park & dailies" MMO aspects start hurting the game the deeper into it you get, and this does detract from the Final Fantasy experience. While it's a far cry from what FFXIV was in its original form, it still shows why some franchises are better off sticking to what they do best, and this is a franchise that was never going to see gameplay benefit from going online. It's just more potential for monetizing, and that does nothing for the gamer but devalue the experience.    … Expand
  52. halcyon_zephyr
    Mar 26, 2014
    5
    First off, I would like to say that I played this game since launch, and quit about a month ago (February 2014).

    The Pros: > You can switch classes whenever you want (outside of combat) on the same character! This means that you can have basically every class unlocked on the same character so you can fill virtually any party role. If you picked a DPS at the start and find that it is    First off, I would like to say that I played this game since launch, and quit about a month ago (February 2014).

    The Pros:
    > You can switch classes whenever you want (outside of combat) on the same character! This means that you can have basically every class unlocked on the same character so you can fill virtually any party role. If you picked a DPS at the start and find that it is too hard to get into groups, then you can just start to level up a healer.
    > To help with re-rolling, you actually get an EXP boost to level up your other classes basically twice as fast.
    > The grouping system / duty finder is really nice in this game. You can just queue up solo and be paired with a random group (this usually goes a lot better than it sounds), or you can queue up with some friends. When you queue solo you now have the option of leaving a player commendation which can be spent on some aesthetic items, like a crown.
    > The graphics are stunning and the soundtrack is also quite nice!
    > The story is really interesting, as are most FF games. Depending on where you start off (one of three different towns, JOB dependent... not race) then you get to meet different a certain couple characters more in-depth than the others. This gives people a little bit of a unique feel for the game, and also makes it slightly more enjoyable to create a completely new character.
    > You get mounts that you can level up and use while exploring the game! Well, the only mount that you can have fight with you is the chocobo mount, but you can get other mounts that you can ride as well.

    The Cons:
    > The armor system makes no sense.... when you first get to level 50 you are probably using armor that was either crafted, or just found in a dungeon. This armor, if it is i50 or i55, can be infused with materia to give it bonus stats... like +HP or +Accuracy. However, you can easily get some new i70 armor from doing some dungeon grinding for a few hours, or by crafting it (this crafted armor can have materia added to it). This armor has a higher item level (the i#) and usually a little more defense with some stats added on to it. Later, you can get myth tomes in order to get the next highest item set which is i90. This armor is just a little better than the i70. However, if you put as much materia as possible on the i70 armor then you can basically have armor that is just as good, if not better than the i90 armor! The i90 armor is something you have to either wait MONTHS to get (since there is a mythos cap per week) or you have to beat the coils over and over and over which will also take months (since you can only do it once per week...). So basically the materia system is pointless because you can't use it with any of the high level armor, and it makes easy to get armor basically the best. This also renders the higher end dungeons, like the coils, basically useless (at least when it comes to loot acquisition).
    > They have completely broken the market so that there is no way to make money! You can have every crafting profession that you want, but there is no point to any of them since they take forever to level up and no one can buy / sell anything since patch 2.1 came out. This patch brought out guild housing at 1,000,000 gil!! This made everyone and their brother try to make money at the same time, so everyone was trying to sell things and no one was buying them... no guild on my sever could even afford a large house (the million dollar house) and only 3 guilds could even afford a medium house (15,000 gil).
    > Every major update that SE has planned so far (patch 2.1, and patch 2.2 *not out yet*) has just destroyed the game further when it comes to the actual game content. In 2.1 they came out with something called the Crystal Tower where there are three teams of 8 players fighting a series of bosses and enemies in order to get some random loot. This loot is seriously random, and basically all that was dropped were Lancer and Monk gear the whole time, when 8/10 times there wasn't even that class in your party. This frustrated SO many people... Also, once you obtained loot for that week you were not allowed to get any more for that week - but you could still do the dungeon. Thus, it was important to pass on loot that you didn't actually want!! However, some people at the end of the dungeons were getting FORCED to take loot, resulting in them being locked from getting loot the rest of the week! SE did nothing to fix this, and they were then behind in gear because of a programming error.
    > Trying to level up another class, even with the EXP boost is terribly slow and grueling; exponentially more so if you are trying to level a DPS class. When using the duty finder, you may have to wait for over an hour for just one dungeon! This one dungeon won't even get you half a level either... Tanks however, get into everything instantly, so if you plan to level a DPS, then you need to get a tank friend!    … Expand
  53. Polarthief
    Mar 16, 2014
    7
    Not great, but not bad. More or less the subscription pay model is what makes me a bit more critical of the game (should this ever go free2play, I'd instantly bump it up to a 9, if not 10).

    The game does some really, and I mean, REALLY stupid things, such as disabling any social menus and all whispers while inside a dungeon/raid, doesn't let you queue up for a role (and instead you only    Not great, but not bad. More or less the subscription pay model is what makes me a bit more critical of the game (should this ever go free2play, I'd instantly bump it up to a 9, if not 10).

    The game does some really, and I mean, REALLY stupid things, such as disabling any social menus and all whispers while inside a dungeon/raid, doesn't let you queue up for a role (and instead you only get to queue as a class), the game feels "slow", mostly due to the global cooldown of 2.5s and things that aren't on the GCD require spamming the keys very hard to get them to work, but overall, the game feels fluid and very fun. The graphics are great and the sound, like any FF game, is in a league of its own at the top of the video game music genre.

    If you ever get bored for a month or two and have a lot of free time, I recommend picking it up for the reasonable price (that comes with a free month). You will get a LOT done in that free month (I got two classes to max and even managed to do endgame). Until a few more patches roll out, the score will remain as is. It's not the best, but by no means is it bad, especially if you're bored of WoW.    … Expand
  54. bigmorningwood
    Mar 15, 2014
    10
    Boring story, slow painful start (Lv.1-15 are REALLY boring on every class), invisible walls, useless crafting classes, weekly cap in endgame content. Ignore this and, sadly, you have the best MMORPG in the market right now. Gorgeous graphics, superb combat (when you have all your abilities), you only need ONE character to enjoy everything there is in the game, endgame provides a goodBoring story, slow painful start (Lv.1-15 are REALLY boring on every class), invisible walls, useless crafting classes, weekly cap in endgame content. Ignore this and, sadly, you have the best MMORPG in the market right now. Gorgeous graphics, superb combat (when you have all your abilities), you only need ONE character to enjoy everything there is in the game, endgame provides a good enough challenge, most of the community is helpful, cheerful and well mannered, every class is balanced and has a unique playstyle, and every 2-3 months there's a big patch with lots of content (SquareEnix is doing a really good job this time). For today's standards, this is THE MMO everyone should be playing right now.… Expand
  55. silverwingz
    Mar 9, 2014
    10
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. The game has come far i must say from being trash to being something enjoyable,some of the quests get kind of repetitive but which games now 'days don't feel that way, if your just buying the game my tip to you is learn that map as best as possible your going to want to :) and learn how to craft early such as being an armorer saves you time in future :)… Expand
  56. Fuz
    Mar 6, 2014
    5
    The game itself is pretty good.
    The job system is fantastic, the graphics and animations are excellent (although it asks too much of a configuration... slow pc can't play this... even pcs that can play most of other games), gameplay is great.
    Crafting is interesting, but very grindy and with tiresome mechanics... you have to do a very long set of actions for every piece, and although    The game itself is pretty good.
    The job system is fantastic, the graphics and animations are excellent (although it asks too much of a configuration... slow pc can't play this... even pcs that can play most of other games), gameplay is great.
    Crafting is interesting, but very grindy and with tiresome mechanics... you have to do a very long set of actions for every piece, and although it's cool for items, it's really, REALLY not when you have to smelt 500 iron ore pieces (for example).

    The big problem with the game, is that endgame is utterly broken. First, the game relies on a very old and outdated RNG system that is causing huge issues to lots of players.
    Also, there is a bug in the game's code that leaves some players with visual lag: basically, the servers (for EU too) are in Canada, also the server updates the character position every 0.3 seconds ONLY, and on fights you see the AoE on your monitor, move out in time, and still get hit by oneshotting abilities. This causes some fights to be utterly broken and extremely annoying.

    So, until they fix the lag bug and the RNG system I would not recommend this game to anyone.
    It will be a worthwile purchase after they fix the problems.    … Expand
  57. SkillyD
    Mar 4, 2014
    3
    The game has some good features, but as you advance, it becomes increasingly repetitive and boring. Game play for your first class is great through level 15. The graphics are amazing, the music is enjoyable, and the story line intriguing. After level 15, however, the game becomes increasingly repetitive.

    If you use side quests to level your first class, it's much harder to level    The game has some good features, but as you advance, it becomes increasingly repetitive and boring. Game play for your first class is great through level 15. The graphics are amazing, the music is enjoyable, and the story line intriguing. After level 15, however, the game becomes increasingly repetitive.

    If you use side quests to level your first class, it's much harder to level additional classes, and there's an advantage to having multiple classes on one character since you can share skills between classes. If you don't use side quests, though, you have to do the same dungeons, FATEs (time-limited area quests for multiple players), and levequests (quests obtained by talking to a levemete) over, and over, and over. As you progress further, you must repeat dungeons to get gear and tomes (that you spend to get better gear). You may end up doing the same dungeon twenty or thirty times to get the gear you want for a single class. The more classes you add to your character, the more you have to rely on repeated dungeons, fates, and leves to level.

    With the exception of the insanely difficult Titan hard mode quest - which you must complete to get your relic (high-level) weapon - most quests are interesting and sufficiently challenging the first time, and even the second and the third. But by the 20th or 30th time, they do get dull. When I found myself listening to audiobooks so I'd have something interesting to do while I ran a dungeon, I knew it was time to quit.

    Oh - and customer service is terrible. When a bug totally blocked the main story quest progression on my server, it took three days for SE to repair it. It took four for them to respond to my report - and then it was only to say that I should have submitted the report in a different fashion (which was not obvious from the report form). In other MMOs, when a bug has blocked quest progression, GMs have responded to the report within minutes and made it possible for characters to progress.

    In sum - the game would be much better if the content were wider, so that characters and classes could be leveled without tedious repeats. And customer service needs to be vastly improved.    … Expand
  58. orsonriven
    Mar 3, 2014
    8
    this game could be better in some ways, but over all yoshi p and his team did a great job fixing this nightmare of a game and made fun game to play, even if you hate MMOs, if you like final fantasy games this is a game to play through the story once and enjoy it.
  59. tdebug
    Mar 1, 2014
    0
    If you passed through hell creating account, accepting dozens of agreement, confirmation emails, you may like this game ONLY if you actually like this specific type of MMO. It's basically same as Old Republic or Neverwinter, but in a different universe. Generally - dull and boring. This make you especially regret you lost an hours passing through hell as complicated and long accountIf you passed through hell creating account, accepting dozens of agreement, confirmation emails, you may like this game ONLY if you actually like this specific type of MMO. It's basically same as Old Republic or Neverwinter, but in a different universe. Generally - dull and boring. This make you especially regret you lost an hours passing through hell as complicated and long account creation process.… Expand
  60. ChaseFace
    Feb 26, 2014
    9
    It looks GORGEOUS, the music is amazing and has lots of throw-backs to older Final Fantasy games including Materia from FF7, for example. If you've always wanted the universe of Final Fantasy to be a multiplayer adventure, this is your answer. That being said, it's not a perfect MMO from a mechanics standpoint, but it feels like if World of Warcraft was friendlier and more majestic.It looks GORGEOUS, the music is amazing and has lots of throw-backs to older Final Fantasy games including Materia from FF7, for example. If you've always wanted the universe of Final Fantasy to be a multiplayer adventure, this is your answer. That being said, it's not a perfect MMO from a mechanics standpoint, but it feels like if World of Warcraft was friendlier and more majestic.

    Square Enix keeps adding new content every 2 months so there's never a lack of things to accomplish. There's 8 crafting classes, 3 gathering classes, and 9 combat classes, and they're adding more combat classes in the future.

    The combat, GUI, game mechanics, crafting, gathering, etc. are all explained simply to you through the main storyline, which doubles as a tutorial with a very manageable learning curve.

    The end-game can be either really close-knit and supportive or highly competitive with neckbeards trolling over the shout channel and prove how leet they are with their top-tier gear. I suspect they migrated from World of Warcraft.

    But don't worry, the game offers a LOT of challenge. The Primals (Garuda, Ifrit, Titan, Siren, Odin and now Leviathan) have 3 difficulties - Normal, which you complete to progress the storyline, Hard, which you complete to get your Relic Weapon as well as get Primal Weapon drops, and Extreme, which you complete for high-level quests (I would assume, I'm still trying to beat Titan HM). Hard Mode is already pretty hard.

    If you happen to be a big fan of RUSHING through the game to get to the end-game content, you're gonna be a little disappointed. There's a good amount to do end-game, but since the game's only 6 months old they're still releasing new content. Take your time and smell the roses.

    ALSO, THE ONLY REASON THIS GAME HAS SO MANY NEGATIVE REVIEWS IS BECAUSE THE LAUNCH WAS REALLY CHAOTIC AND PEOPLE COULDN'T LOGIN OR CREATE NEW CHARACTERS (y'know, like most MMOs experience when they receive a massive amount of traffic) SO EVERYONE **** AND MOANED EVERYWHERE ON THE INTERNET. The problems have been MORE than resolved. I haven't had to wait in a queue more than twice in about 6 months, and I'm in an extremely populated server.    … Expand
  61. JoshuaClee
    Feb 26, 2014
    2
    I realize that this game is currently free, but having to read tiny subtitles in 2014? Really? Really? 30 mins in and I have a headache. I just got new glasses so it's not me.
  62. xFODDERx
    Feb 26, 2014
    10
    Ok so 5 months in from first log on, the game is going from strength to strength, yes there are still very minor bugs, if you don't know what to look for then these may not be ever obvious. however hotfixes are very proactive and the Dev team always put a sub note on the forum showing know issues. RMT gold spammers are running away quickly and Square Enix have been very tough on cheating.Ok so 5 months in from first log on, the game is going from strength to strength, yes there are still very minor bugs, if you don't know what to look for then these may not be ever obvious. however hotfixes are very proactive and the Dev team always put a sub note on the forum showing know issues. RMT gold spammers are running away quickly and Square Enix have been very tough on cheating.
    Gameplay. a lot of MMOs branch for quest based levelling while others opt for good old grinding. FFXIVARR does both, a nice story mode to keep you interested with Fate grinding in between. the new areas in 2.1 are fantastic (even if the gear in Crystal Tower is below spec of Mythology and allagen gear) however they do add a nice way to gear up your sub classes.
    Future Safe. yes! currently PS4 version is in Beta and I believe PC dx11 is rolling out the door soon too. added to that Director Yoshi has stated a 10 year Dev support life.
    Finally. everything that has been stated for FFXIV has happened, so given that Gold Saucer has now started development, and we have seen the rear of an old very popular FF Series boss, then im very optimistic about loving the game for a long time to come.
    Slight footnote, im not to sure about PC gaming but I play on the PS3 and it works brilliantly, I would strongly suggest though that players choosing console platform to upgrade to an SSD as sometimes the ps3 minor lag can leave you thinking you have dodged an AOE yet be just caught, not very handy on a Titan landslide!    … Expand
  63. Watersson
    Feb 23, 2014
    9
    WoW Slayer - these two words can define this game. FF XIV is a beautiful game! Already I have not seen such a good graphic in the current-gen game. Soundtrack-eminent. Any hint of listening to me nicely. The same applies to the sounds of battle or music playing in the background. The most important thing is gameplay. THIS IS A G-R-E-A-T. During the game, we are exploring interesting andWoW Slayer - these two words can define this game. FF XIV is a beautiful game! Already I have not seen such a good graphic in the current-gen game. Soundtrack-eminent. Any hint of listening to me nicely. The same applies to the sounds of battle or music playing in the background. The most important thing is gameplay. THIS IS A G-R-E-A-T. During the game, we are exploring interesting and great locations. Quests are similar to those of other MMOs but here it is done very nicely. Creating a character and character classes and their skills are veeeeeeeeery interesting. The game is regrowth divine. Of course there are lag but it finally MMO. I would recommend it to every player. (Too bad the game is not F2P)… Expand
  64. sky_haze
    Feb 22, 2014
    10
    Good storyline. Beautiful texture details design. Good atmosphere.

    I recommend this game to try, people who like the things listed above.

    Most of the negative reviews are from the server issues the game had during the early access weekend prior to launch. This is not indicative of the final product.
  65. Trade60
    Feb 21, 2014
    10
    FF14:ARR has a lot to offer in an MMORPG. I played FF11 and the original version of FF14 witch sucked really bad. FF14:ARR has amazing graphics, huge game world, ground mount customization, great story, and so much more. I played just about every MMO out there and only a few held my attention, this is by far one of the better MMO's I had a chance to play. You can make one character andFF14:ARR has a lot to offer in an MMORPG. I played FF11 and the original version of FF14 witch sucked really bad. FF14:ARR has amazing graphics, huge game world, ground mount customization, great story, and so much more. I played just about every MMO out there and only a few held my attention, this is by far one of the better MMO's I had a chance to play. You can make one character and play and level every class in the game with the ONE character, much like FF11.
    The things I was not a huge fan of, that some MMO's like SWTOR have that FF14:ARR doesn't, you have to read the quests, or not read them, but they don't have voice actors, at least not on all of the quests, some of the main story quests have voice actors reading to you, and the cut scenes are amazing and also have voice acting. The choices you make don't feel like they really matter very much while questing, where games like SWTOR and ESO both have a really cool way about doing quests. In some ways it almost feels like an adult version of old school WoW.
    FF14:ARR runs so smooth, I am running the game max settings with 60 fps and the game handles great, even in high travel areas like city's, even on low settings the graphics are still great. The game does have zoning, but when the game loads the first time, any load screen after is very short. Most of the time it doesn't even feel like you zoned into a new area, the transition between zones is smooth, and you can still chat with your friends.
    Games like WoW on max settings have massive frame drop in load zones and/or city's, dungeons, raids going from 60 fps to 40 fps witch is very noticeable.    … Expand
  66. Nijinsky85
    Feb 18, 2014
    9
    I've played a lot of MMO's starting on SWG, to age of conan,lord of the rings, SWTOR, TSW and more. This has to be one of if not the best.
    Aside from the one character can be any class, it doesn't offer much new or groundbreaking, but everything it does offer is solid. You know you are playing a quality MMO. The world is amazing, offering so much character, and it still manages to keep    I've played a lot of MMO's starting on SWG, to age of conan,lord of the rings, SWTOR, TSW and more. This has to be one of if not the best.
    Aside from the one character can be any class, it doesn't offer much new or groundbreaking, but everything it does offer is solid. You know you are playing a quality MMO. The world is amazing, offering so much character, and it still manages to keep the traditional Final Fantasy Appeal.

    Well Done Yoshi P. I'd give it 10/10 but the PvP isnt great right now. But its a very good 9.    … Expand
  67. IrealiTY
    Feb 18, 2014
    9
    A very solid MMO and a fun experience. If you focus on getting everything out of this game (Cross Class Skills, Crafting, etc) you have a lot to do.
    To finish the current High Level Content you'd need a very solid group of people as the fights are very intense.
    The story is a bit generic but has a few interesting twists. PVP is currently the only miss placed pivot stone and needs    A very solid MMO and a fun experience. If you focus on getting everything out of this game (Cross Class Skills, Crafting, etc) you have a lot to do.
    To finish the current High Level Content you'd need a very solid group of people as the fights are very intense.

    The story is a bit generic but has a few interesting twists.

    PVP is currently the only miss placed pivot stone and needs better adjustment.    … Expand
  68. nawrot
    Feb 18, 2014
    3
    This game is WOW clone without real PVP and worse skills/itemization, graphics is much better, but i dislike cartoony style of WOW, so this is matter of personal preferences. For this alone i would give FFXIV score of 7/10 at least, but they totally messed up endgame. They copied every major idea from WOW, but stopped right where it matters for long and successful run, they did their ownThis game is WOW clone without real PVP and worse skills/itemization, graphics is much better, but i dislike cartoony style of WOW, so this is matter of personal preferences. For this alone i would give FFXIV score of 7/10 at least, but they totally messed up endgame. They copied every major idea from WOW, but stopped right where it matters for long and successful run, they did their own boring grindfest endgame instead. First you kill for ages in same 2 dungeons to get tomes, when your gear is fine (or you have somebody to drag your sorry ass) you get to farming primals. Doing that stuff for week or two could be amusing, but after you can run whole instance just by listening to it, because you did it so many times that you memorized every move and distance. Well at that point i can call it boring. Also difficulty in primal fights does not come from skills or lack of it, its rather directly translated to lag. All those fights are about is "run from red circles" and know where to stop, Heigan dance from Naxx times ten with out of the ass unicorn particle farts everywhere, so sometimes you barely can see what is going on.… Expand
  69. Ra1nMak3r
    Feb 6, 2014
    9
    Although Zoned, the game is amazing. The graphics are mindblowing. The cross-platform idea is genius and it is nice to discuss with console gamers or see how good they are playing an mmo with a controller. The bossfights are challenging (ESPESIALY FOR ME THAT **** GARUDA) cause they need excelent team co-ordination and strategy. And there are more than 2 strategies most of the times. TheAlthough Zoned, the game is amazing. The graphics are mindblowing. The cross-platform idea is genius and it is nice to discuss with console gamers or see how good they are playing an mmo with a controller. The bossfights are challenging (ESPESIALY FOR ME THAT **** GARUDA) cause they need excelent team co-ordination and strategy. And there are more than 2 strategies most of the times. The game feels magical and captivating low-level which is good since the game primarily wants your subscription. However the fact that there is little to no voice-acting isn't that great, however I know how great this cost may be. A realy good alternative to wow and I would love to see where they take this game in 2-3 years.… Expand
  70. Silvergryphon
    Feb 2, 2014
    3
    Full of flamers, trolls, goldminers, which greatly detract from enjoyment. There is no adequate reporting system or ability to 'monitor' these infantile actions by players, who deliberately do all they can to wipe teams/raids.

    Boss mechanics are absolutely horrid. Ground effects are useless - you MUST know the boss fight intimately, knowing each of his attack patterns, and be    Full of flamers, trolls, goldminers, which greatly detract from enjoyment. There is no adequate reporting system or ability to 'monitor' these infantile actions by players, who deliberately do all they can to wipe teams/raids.

    Boss mechanics are absolutely horrid. Ground effects are useless - you MUST know the boss fight intimately, knowing each of his attack patterns, and be positioned long before he casts it. If you go by the ground effect (red areas, etc), you will be hit most of the time, and in end-game content, that means the group/raid will fail.

    Vast improvement over first attempt, but still horribly executed in critical areas    … Expand
  71. CtrlAltDefeat
    Jan 29, 2014
    10
    Don't let all the negative and mixed reviews fool you. This game is amazing, unlike it's previous debut. It plunges you into the realm of Eorzea, where you are tasked with overcoming it's hardships and challenges that it's facing at the current time. The game keeps it's FINAL FANTASY feel with monsters from previous games, your own chocobo, and old classes like Black and White mage, andDon't let all the negative and mixed reviews fool you. This game is amazing, unlike it's previous debut. It plunges you into the realm of Eorzea, where you are tasked with overcoming it's hardships and challenges that it's facing at the current time. The game keeps it's FINAL FANTASY feel with monsters from previous games, your own chocobo, and old classes like Black and White mage, and truly makes them all "reborn."

    The gameplay is great and in depth, bringing classic spells and skills back, including the Limit Break. The class and job system is perfect, and makes it easier for you to decide what you want to become. End-game lasts a long time even at release, and they are constantly working on expanding it and making it even more epic! You can change your class anytime you want, so you can do literally EVERYTHING! Crafting is extremely in depth and fun to do, and gathering is just as exciting!

    The servers run smoothly, and I don't get lag on a server that is across the ocean. All the complaints about the servers are from the beta and the very launch of the game which is to be expected, so I do not know why people bash it in reviews. Square Enix makes constant upgrades to their servers to make sure players are having their best experience possible. They schedule maintenance late at night when not as many players are on as to ensure they are not intruding in players gameplay experience.

    The soundtrack... Oh my god the soundtrack! What else is there to say? All the music is beautiful and fits the setting perfectly. The graphics couldn't get any better either! The landscape and scenery will make you stop and take random selfies just because you want to waste time taking a gander at it. You will not find an MMO with better graphics for a long time. Boss battles are exciting and fun, even more so with a soundtrack that will have you rocking out before you know it, and a beautifully terrifying monster in front of you. The soundtrack will attach itself to your mind and devour your soul, and the graphics will make your eyes jump with joy!

    Square Enix did what no other company would do, and they did it well. The disaster that was 1.0 is no more, and now we can enjoy what we once thought was a train wreck at an insanely high speed. The man in charge of the game now, Yoshi-P, listens to the community and adds the content they want the most and fixes all their problems within moments. You simply cannot find a better MMORPG than this. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go run The Binding Coil of Bahamut with my Free Company. I really hope I see you soon!    … Expand
  72. wtfux2
    Jan 16, 2014
    0
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. PROS:
    -FFXIV graphics.

    CONS:
    -FFXIV adopted WoW questing system is plain and boring.
    -Lack of classes. The newer classes such as paladin, black mage, etc. are a joke. Both paladin and black mage get no abilities that are better than their base classes. Apparently, a black mage is a combination of thaumaturge and archer classes. How archer abilities increase magic potency? You tell me.
    -FATE experience points farming is plain and boring.
    -Dungeons are plain and boring. Dungeons where never SQUARE's thing. Maze mongers and meeble burrows from FFXI never had a high player participation rate. They only reason why FFXIV players do dungeons is to get gear and fast xp.
    -WoW adopted battle system makes fighting repetitive and boring.
    -Lack of skills. Compared to FFXI, FFXIV has a very limited arsenal of skills and abilities. Although the spells and abilities may level up, they replace the previous spell.
    -No elemental weakness. Even more dull gameplay with your one damage spell, blizzard.
    -Lack of summons.
    -Gamepad keybind system is horrible. FFXI gamepad marco system is more organized and faster to search.
    -Some classes such as archer can attack while moving, which gives them a tactical advantage against some battles. How archers hit their targets while they are facing in the opposite direction? You tell me.
    -No skill based system.
    -Materia system sucks. The only reason there is a materia system is to remove gear from the economy. Similar to the evolith augmenting system in FFXI. Was never really popular.
    -Harvesting/gathering is boring and ultra repetitive.
    -Dungeon search is cross server = lack of server community communication.
    -Legacy characters cannot transfer to non-legacy servers.    … Expand
  73. baevar
    Jan 12, 2014
    10
    Leaving this review because this game is just way way better than the 7.3 average score it has from the community. If you spend a little while reading the reviews here, pay attention to the date! You will find that there are a bunch of 8's 9's 10's from current reviews and then a bunch of 1's and 0's that are almost all back from August when it launched and impatient nerds freaked thatLeaving this review because this game is just way way better than the 7.3 average score it has from the community. If you spend a little while reading the reviews here, pay attention to the date! You will find that there are a bunch of 8's 9's 10's from current reviews and then a bunch of 1's and 0's that are almost all back from August when it launched and impatient nerds freaked that there were game server issues....for an mmo launch.... Since then they have added a bunch of servers, brought huge patches and generally explained that there was just way more initial demand for the game than they had ever expected. Well, I can undertstand the whiner reviews (sort of) but the end result is a metacritic number that is (even objectively speaking).. not an indication of the game's quality, but an average of the differences of opinion from those who came here to complain at the initial launch, to those who waited a bit to actually play/review.

    All of that aside, this game is absolutely wonderful. It's got that delightful FF universe, Square polish, the benefit of the advancements in the genre by games that came before it, and some incredibly smart design decisions. I have a hard time describing that part but there are just little details that you will see constantly as a reminder that this is a very new high quality MMO, it's learned from its predecessors and has thought of smarter ways to do the little things throughout the entire game. I have played WoW since vanilla, Rift, SW:Tor, Anarchy Online, DCUO, Guild Wars 2, Neverwinter, others i'm forgetting etc. and this is a very, VERY worthy modern day release of the MMO. They didn't reinvent much, but they did a lot of things smarter/better and the game world is absolutely gorgeous and the soundtrack is absolutely top notch. I enjoy the cross classing and freedom the game gives you. I have a blast with the gameplay as there are so many attempts to unlimit your freedom, change back and forth between classes without logging, do all your crafting on one char, have a backpack for every single gear slot that simply pops up when you click the gear slot you are looking for so as not to clutter the UI or your main bags. Crafting is actually somewhat fun because they built a minigame with leveling and abilities around it. Teleport to the town you want to go to instantly and from anywhere with no cooldown (but a gil cost), and use waypoints within the towns for free. Never need to mail yourself an item for your alt again.....(i'll let that one sit a minute)...because YOU are the alt, just equip a new gear set and your hotbars change along with it, and your level changes to whatever you've leveled that class to. Great for helping friends, although you can always sync your level down to that of your friends so you can always play a main with a friend and not ruin their exp or difficulty level.

    Lastly, it's subscription....and I am so thankful for that. I was getting so incredibly sick of all the F2P crapola that would try and squeeze as much real life money out of you as possible and at every other turn. I am more than happy to pay for quality and be free from the annoyances of getting nickle and dimed and bombarded with reasons to want to fill up the mmo cash tank. This game is saving me more per month by saving me from blowing through other games than I'm spending on it. Just take my money and deliver thanks, this game does.

    TL;DR I'm a hardcore MMO vet and have enjoyed FF since the first one; I am in love with this game right now as are some of my other WoW buddies and similar longtime MMO players. Well worth your gaming dollar.    … Expand
  74. RedRhoc
    Jan 11, 2014
    8
    FFXIV: ARR is currently the best MMO on the market today. It is an MMO however, so it will have time-sinks and a certain amount of grind. The classes are great fun, the performance is great, animations are smooth and the gameplay can be really challenging. The writing for questlines and npc interaction is superb - without a doubt the best in any MMO I've played. If you like the genre, giveFFXIV: ARR is currently the best MMO on the market today. It is an MMO however, so it will have time-sinks and a certain amount of grind. The classes are great fun, the performance is great, animations are smooth and the gameplay can be really challenging. The writing for questlines and npc interaction is superb - without a doubt the best in any MMO I've played. If you like the genre, give it a go - I'd recommend it.… Expand
  75. EclipseEx
    Jan 10, 2014
    10
    I will break my review into segments:

    GRAPHICS: The visually quality of this game is stunning. I often find myself just staring at the beautiful design of the world around me. The game does extremely well at immersing you in this fantastic world they have created. Some of the best moments are when the weather effects come into play and seeing the lighting change. SOUND: The sound    I will break my review into segments:

    GRAPHICS:
    The visually quality of this game is stunning. I often find myself just staring at the beautiful design of the world around me. The game does extremely well at immersing you in this fantastic world they have created. Some of the best moments are when the weather effects come into play and seeing the lighting change.

    SOUND:
    The sound is probably my favourite part of the game. The music is so well done it is unbelievable. They hit the nail on the head with each track. In one of the forest cities my favourite track is played and it matches the lore of the city so well. I don't see how sound in a game could get any better than this.

    GAMEPLAY:
    The gameplay is more of your standard PC MMO style. You have your hotbar with skills and items on it. The skills work on a global cooldown system, so using one skill puts the others on cooldown. There are certain skills that break this definition and are not on global cooldown so you can use them immediately. What tends to break the monotony of just spamming your skills over and over is the need to dodge aoe attacks from most enemies post level 15. These attacks are usually extremely powerful and can cause you to die if you are not careful. It is also worth mentioning that dungeons in this game are not easy. Without a properly balanced party you will fail to complete the dungeons. If you think you can use 4 dps to clear a dungeon you are sorely mistaken. Luckily, the Duty Finder feature in the game makes it as easy as possible for you to find a balanced party.

    CLASSES/JOBS:
    I think it is important to bring up the class and job system that is in place because a lot of people find it confusing at first. There are 8 classes to choose from when you create your character: gladiator (sword and shield), marauder (two-handed axe), pugilist (hand to hand), archer (bow and arrow), thaumaturge (offensive magic), conjurer (healing magic), and arcanist (offensive/support magic). You will choose one of these when you create your character. Once you get your initial class to level 15 all the other classes will become available to you. The level system doesn't work with your character as in a normal game but through your classes. So you could be a level 30 Gladiator and a level 5 Archer. You switch your class simply by changing your weapon. The advantage of levelling up multiple classes on a single character instead of making multiple characters is to obtain cross class skills. So you can use some gladiator skills while playing your archer. This system also eliminates the need to create many characters to experience the different classes. Jobs are the 'advanced classes' so to speak. To obtain a job you must have the main class of the job at level 30 and the sub class at level 15. Jobs offer powerful specialized skills at the cost of cross class skills. Job level is tied to the level of its main class. So you do not level up a job the same as a class. The best way to think of a job is as a special piece of equipment (which it literally is) that gives you enhanced stats and skills.

    STORY:
    There is a main story quest line to go through which unlocks the main dungeons and boss fights. The story is relatively interesting but not overly so. One thing to note is that there is voice acting in some segments and usually it is sub-par. There are a couple interesting twists to look out for.

    OTHER:
    The previous issues they were having with the servers have been fixed. You shouldn't have any trouble accessing the game at this point.
    If you are a running fan of Final Fantasy you will enjoy this game even more as there are bits of fanservice to be found all over the place. From sound effects from previous games to the classic inclusion of Cid, Biggs, and Wedge you will pick up on many things that you are familiar with.    … Expand
  76. ff14islame
    Dec 30, 2013
    0
    Bought the game, account got suspended due to "suspicious activity" can't recover it through their online chat or email. Been on the phone for an hour and a half and no help. By the way they charge your for the customer support by phone. my 50-60$ poof gone. absolute bull crap.
  77. shane_kirby
    Dec 27, 2013
    9
    Don't trust the negative reviews. I live in Canada and have had absolutely no problems at all with the game (bought it December 20th 2013). I've had no login issues etc. Also, I play on max graphic settings for PC. What I love most about the game is that I can play it on my big screen T.V with an xbox controller. I find the controls very easy to manage and I can relax on couch while IDon't trust the negative reviews. I live in Canada and have had absolutely no problems at all with the game (bought it December 20th 2013). I've had no login issues etc. Also, I play on max graphic settings for PC. What I love most about the game is that I can play it on my big screen T.V with an xbox controller. I find the controls very easy to manage and I can relax on couch while I play. Totally worth getting for cheap price of $30.… Expand
  78. Garethw87
    Dec 26, 2013
    8
    Excellent MMO. If you like the idea of an MMO, buy this! You will like it. very detailed, entertaining, designed, and the combat is great. It sounds minor but actually have to move and time the combat adds so much more to it then just standing, pressing the same button over and over. The Hunters Log book is great when bored to grab a few extra levels! The cities and character design isExcellent MMO. If you like the idea of an MMO, buy this! You will like it. very detailed, entertaining, designed, and the combat is great. It sounds minor but actually have to move and time the combat adds so much more to it then just standing, pressing the same button over and over. The Hunters Log book is great when bored to grab a few extra levels! The cities and character design is amazing. They look and feel very real and alive. And of course the story is interesting and not a bore. It feels like you are just playing another great FF game, not an online one!

    One word of warning. You need a good PC setup to be able to enjoy the game properly.    … Expand
  79. heatbr
    Dec 19, 2013
    10
    The game brings all loved features that a mmo need and go though. The game has a deep story, good customization and it made you addicted for it.
    One the most important for me is the multi-class and mastered classes. I don't need create a new char to start a new class and they combination the skills.
    Fight against the Primal, the quest/duty/fate system and the progression are very    The game brings all loved features that a mmo need and go though. The game has a deep story, good customization and it made you addicted for it.
    One the most important for me is the multi-class and mastered classes. I don't need create a new char to start a new class and they combination the skills.
    Fight against the Primal, the quest/duty/fate system and the progression are very balanced and the square heard theirs customers. Glade to see this piece of art game.    … Expand
  80. AtlasOrion
    Nov 30, 2013
    5
    I'm a big FF franchise fan and I was stoked to play this, lots of hype. There's good and bad, as with every game, but overall I found this game to be incredibly underwhelming. A great big "MEH". I really wasn't sucked in the way I have been with other games, even though it offers some really cool (albeit unoriginal things).

    Good: -Price, $30 is pretty reasonable, considering what you    I'm a big FF franchise fan and I was stoked to play this, lots of hype. There's good and bad, as with every game, but overall I found this game to be incredibly underwhelming. A great big "MEH". I really wasn't sucked in the way I have been with other games, even though it offers some really cool (albeit unoriginal things).

    Good: -Price, $30 is pretty reasonable, considering what you get
    - Graphics are amazing, though not recommended for anything less than an Nvidia 570 or above, or radeon 6870 and above if you want to get close to ultra settings, it's pretty demanding on systems.
    - Lots of detail, the mounts, pets, cities, characters and country side are very well drawn out with lots of little features
    - Great story lines adult scripts, not fluff for little kids, there's swearing and some "colorful" themes lol
    - Seems to be a decent crafting system in place, lots of mats to farm for ppl that like that thing

    Cons: Quests don't teach you much, you really have to make google your friend with this game. Can be very confusing and infuriating trying to figure out how to play and how to complete a quest. Like under quest objectives it will say "complete the quest objective". Ya, thanks for that...
    - Skills are very limited and very banal. Enjoy your half dozen ineffective skills with no customization.
    - Everyone looks the same. You're gonna wear THIS armor, and you're gonna not like it. No dressing room either.
    - Very tedious UI and game mechanics. To hand in an item you have to talk to the NPC, open your item log, click on the item to select "hand over" or place it in the "hand over box" then press "hand over". Iknowright?
    - Map tells you nothing, and there's icons all over the place that you will have no idea what they are, next to players, next to mobs, above NPCs. It's a crapshoot.
    - absolutely 0 visible range on mobs, PCs or NPCs. You can see them, but mousing over them does nothing past about 50 yards. That'll be fun for pvp...

    I'm sure they'll eventually fix it up and change a lot of things, they've already made some improvements while I was playing, but as of Dec 1/13 I would say wait another 3 months or so or you might become really disappointed and never come back to it.    … Expand
  81. suneater
    Nov 29, 2013
    6
    While it has improved a lot from the "1.0" launch version, not everything has changed for the better. FFXIV is completely average and doesn't try to excel at anything.

    The storyline has been changed from a quest every 5 levels (give or take) to a hand-holding, tunnel vision, JRPG-style story that leads you from one quest hub to the next and locking you out of everything that you haven't    While it has improved a lot from the "1.0" launch version, not everything has changed for the better. FFXIV is completely average and doesn't try to excel at anything.

    The storyline has been changed from a quest every 5 levels (give or take) to a hand-holding, tunnel vision, JRPG-style story that leads you from one quest hub to the next and locking you out of everything that you haven't done a tutorial for. I appreciate the attempt at a longer and revamped story but it has so many small problems that, while being the highlight of the game, is still sub-par for both JRPGs and story-centric MMOs. Many parts of the main story are NPCs literally just handing you extra "kill X" and "loot Y" quests that have become a cancer on MMOs. Everything outside of the story quest you are currently on is locked out until you are "allowed" to do it; for example, I had two mounts I earned during 1.0, but I wasn't able to use them until I completed a level 20 quest that I didn't have access to on my level 50 character because I wasn't that far in the story yet. If you're looking for a JRPG, try replaying one of Square's older games instead.

    The combat has been reworked into a hotkey spamfest. Like most modern MMOs, once you find your "rotation", you will be facerolling for most of the story and into endgame. "Red circle dodging" has become ridiculous in 2.0 with most endgame content requiring more running in circles than actual fighting. Playing a melee class is infuriating with many late/end game enemies spamming ground targeted AoEs that have a habit of one-shotting non-tanks. In short, the gameplay has become a slower version of GW2 with even more AoE spam from enemies.

    Endgame consists of grinding the same 2 dungeons for months to get tokens (why don't the dungeons drop token-strength gear?) to upgrade your gear so you can grind harder dungeons to get bigger numbers. All equip from 1.0 has been streamlined into just bigger numbers and stripped of unique stats & buffs; AF quests used to require a party to help and rewarded some of the best gear in the game with Job-enhancing stats. Now AF is trivialized, handed to you for finishing solo content and discarded once you get Darklight. Everyone looks the same, uses the same rotation, and is running the same dungeons to increase their numbers.

    After 2 years of reworking, FFXIV still has too many small problems to really be any better than "good". With all the huge changes in 2.0, many old problems were fixed but many new problems were introduced. Overall this is an average MMO, using average gameplay elements seen from many other popular MMOs while introducing no innovation or creativity. There is too much pandering, too much recycling of content, and too much rehashing of old FF elements (what does Lightning from FFXIII have to do with this game?). FFXIV is a western gameplay jigsaw puzzle pieced together by an eastern dev who bring nothing new of their own to fill in the gaps.    … Expand
  82. Roshi
    Nov 25, 2013
    9
    Game fixed. Final Fantasy XIV Online: A Realm Reborn is now a game on the right track to be worthy of final fantasy xi. the game has been rebooted from the ground up and is well worth another try if you liked final fantasy xi but hated the first version of this game.
  83. Acidosis
    Nov 24, 2013
    9
    The reason why I gave this game a 9/10 is because of the current uncertainty of the late game aspect of the game. Other than that, this game is solid. Graphically this game looks amazing, gameplay is good, lore (really FF) is fantastic, the sound track is mind blowing and this game is packed with people which people tend to forget! No one wants to play in a dead town. FFARR is one of theThe reason why I gave this game a 9/10 is because of the current uncertainty of the late game aspect of the game. Other than that, this game is solid. Graphically this game looks amazing, gameplay is good, lore (really FF) is fantastic, the sound track is mind blowing and this game is packed with people which people tend to forget! No one wants to play in a dead town. FFARR is one of the mmorpg out there and you should try it with your friends… Expand
  84. Zzzlol94
    Nov 16, 2013
    9
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Finally, after 2 years with LotRO being a pain in the ass and more boring and buggy than ever, a replacement has come. Perfect replacement. During the beta I got to play until lvl 15 or so, not getting into crafting or anything, which was also a great period but with poor optimization for graphics so it was quite laggy. Most importantly, I had no issues with the game at all. In the final release, the game was optimized and can be run with everything maxed out at 1920x1200 on a GTX 680 and an i7-920 at 60-90FPS.

    As a solo PvE player and leveling addict, this game is absolutely at the top of my to do list. There are lots of quests to do during leveling up the first class and enough to be at a proper level compared to the quests and the location you're at. If I would come to the situation where I'm in lack of quests, Square Enix has absolutely made it brilliant by implementing the FATE system. It's great for leveling up as they are common and give out a solid chunk of exp, at least during the lower levels. The quests are also varied enough and exciting enough to not be repetitive.

    One big thing too is traveling. It's ridiculously easy to get to anywhere in the game. At the start of playing it does cost a little much, but it seems like that will be no issue when you're starting to play the game a lot. 5 seconds from anywhere and you're suddenly at another place. Aethernet is also a brilliant way of getting around in a capital quickly and easily, well, it could be even easier if you could travel via the map and not a list over aethernet spots.

    Also a brilliant thing in the game is that you're not bound to anything. Pretty much, you're only bound to the look of the character you've created. You can change classes like *snap*. You can be any class on a single character. If you'd even like, getting every single class to level 50 on a single character, then having absolutely no need to relog for a different character. Only issue, gear sets may become chaotic... or would they? One brilliant feature is also the gear set list, where you can swap between classes or even different gear sets in a *snap*. You'd think that you won't have enough space for all this gear, but no, you have 25 slots for every type of gear, which results in 325 slots dedicated to weapons, amour and jewelry. No one likes to run out of inventory space

    Speaking barely of crafting. Whoa, crafting can actually be a bit more than just click on a button while having the proper resources and wait a few seconds. Having a set of skills you have to use to craft items is quite interesting and fun at first. Could become repetitive, but they still have the old fashioned way of crafting in case when you want to be AFK while its crafting loads of things.

    When you get to about lvl 20 and done the lvl 20 main scenario quest to enter a grand company and get a chocobo, the gameplay really softens up and becomes much better. There are just so many things done right with the game to be mentioned that it should just be experienced to get the full package.

    There are however a few issues I find annoying sometimes. Living in EU and playing on a european server, the server is located in NA, which adds on to the major issue with lag. Having a 200ms lag to the server, there's also another 300ms added onto that. Which results in everything you interact with takes a second to respond and every induction doesn't get interrupted after almost a second you've tried to interrupt it by moving. OHKO AoE attacks from bosses can be an issue for the slower players, as it can seem like you're out of the circle in time, but you're still getting KO'd. So it's not a perfect game, but looking away from the lag, it's damn near. Network lag causes this to be 9 instead of 10.    … Expand
  85. maddog2013
    Nov 16, 2013
    1
    Sorry, FFXIV is Not worth picking up.
    Is ARR better than FFXIV 1.0? 50/50 Some aspects are better, but overall improvement style, graphics, gameplay and content? No improvement. Three major problems. #1 Too easy. Too simplified. You can max level in 2 weeks, you can max all crafts in less than 6 weeks. After that all that remains is endgame.
    #2 Endgame content is pathetically weak.    Sorry, FFXIV is Not worth picking up.
    Is ARR better than FFXIV 1.0? 50/50 Some aspects are better, but overall improvement style, graphics, gameplay and content? No improvement. Three major problems. #1 Too easy. Too simplified. You can max level in 2 weeks, you can max all crafts in less than 6 weeks. After that all that remains is endgame.
    #2 Endgame content is pathetically weak. Grind grind grind the typical Square Enix play method to make you spend your money paying subscription.
    #3 Zero reason to party play, alliance play or anything. You can solo this game near 100% only needing others for dungeon dungeon boss. To call this a game worth of the Final Fantasy title is a sickening joke.
    #4 Subscription. Subs should be $5-$10 for FFXIV not the $15 average it is. You are limited to gametime via the server issue, login issues, and SE's policy of removing and gimping game content rather than improving issues.
    Only redeeming factor FFXIV ARR is the game that SHOULD HAVE ORIGINALLY LAUNCHED er.. nearly 3 years ago? This game does not hold water compared to 2013 gaming standards. FFXIV is a 2010 game and should have remained buried where it fell, not reanimated by Yosh-P, as the hollow corpse of a failed game from a company going downhill.    … Expand
  86. Sindena
    Nov 11, 2013
    2
    While it looks all shiny and pretty it is actually a grind fest with lots of problems. You only get quests once, but allowed to do all classes. So once you get to your second class it is grind till you go blind. Hours and hours of running in circles. Then if you are a lower level and trying to complete a quests, you are competing against a level 50 farming for items from same mob. He oneWhile it looks all shiny and pretty it is actually a grind fest with lots of problems. You only get quests once, but allowed to do all classes. So once you get to your second class it is grind till you go blind. Hours and hours of running in circles. Then if you are a lower level and trying to complete a quests, you are competing against a level 50 farming for items from same mob. He one shots everything so you either party up with him and stand there while he kills or you wait hours. Now the party up problem is, providing he will, is that you get lower exp if any cause you get ZERO hits in. Plus you do not learn how to play your class at all this way. The community is worst that World of Warcrafts andI thought that would be impossible. These people are down right hateful and snobby. Do not ask for help in the shout chat, they call you names and laugh at you. Oh and did I mention the relentless spamming in general chat and whispers by gold spammers. It is non stop and makes playing very difficult at times.

    Over all this is a bad game I would not recommend it to anyone. The only good thing Square Enix did was make it pretty. Another failure in my book with new clothes on.    … Expand
  87. iceblade1469
    Nov 10, 2013
    9
    Incredible game. This game is a good thing to come home from work or school and play until you go to sleep. Not many action-packed parts in the game, but the awe-inspiring graphics make up for that. All together, the game is great. Only thing i did not like is the constant maintenance's. There are so many of these un-needed maintenance's and at times that i actually play the game.
  88. RTS
    Nov 9, 2013
    10
    Take note, majority of the negative reviews were written by the cry baby nerds who couldn't get on during the launch day. I'm actually kind of glad it was difficult to get on, just goes to show how popular this game was and STILL is. Don't listen to these negative ones, for the most part it's just a bunch of lifeless nerds whose lives revolve around games getting pissed off because theyTake note, majority of the negative reviews were written by the cry baby nerds who couldn't get on during the launch day. I'm actually kind of glad it was difficult to get on, just goes to show how popular this game was and STILL is. Don't listen to these negative ones, for the most part it's just a bunch of lifeless nerds whose lives revolve around games getting pissed off because they couldn't long on when the game first started. It's a FINAL FANTASY game in MMO form, what did you think was going to happen? We knew it would be popular but had no idea it would do this well. My only issue with the game at first was the map and locating the missions once i picked them up. After i got passed the map issues this game just flows like a stream. Missions seem repetitive but that just comes with the MMO package. I've seen other MMORPG's played and just never found them interesting, figured since i was a fan of the FF series this would be the place to start. Over all for the most part I enjoy it and when you have friends on the same servers where you can share quests with it's even better. If i could change anything about this game it would be more voice acting and adding a voice chat for players in a party or dungeon quest to chat. Lets face it, the new FF games are no where close as good as the classics, but for one of the newer generation titles in MMO form this one is pretty good in my book.… Expand
  89. Nightchills
    Nov 6, 2013
    0
    The game is a total grid fest. Yes you can have one toon and do it all but OMG. There’s only enough quests out there for 2 “MAYBE” 3 classes worth of grinding and that’s still doing fates Rifts like in rift or should I say stolen from Rift or ark falls in defiance) The combat system is complete trash every ability is on a global cool down due to the cross platform factor. Set a macro andThe game is a total grid fest. Yes you can have one toon and do it all but OMG. There’s only enough quests out there for 2 “MAYBE” 3 classes worth of grinding and that’s still doing fates Rifts like in rift or should I say stolen from Rift or ark falls in defiance) The combat system is complete trash every ability is on a global cool down due to the cross platform factor. Set a macro and auto combat. While the game looks GREAT the mechanics and game play is so far below the line to even call it a Final Fantasy game. Gold spammers ever where, and due to SE’s lack of planning for the PC gamers there is no such thing and right click so if u want to ignore someone that takes an hour to open the menu then try to catch the spammer through the waves upon waves of spam. Within the first week of open game play you couldn’t walk into a town without getting spam in gen chat and IM’d constantly… Crafting is ok not the best crafting system out there, again a system stolen from another game. The crafting system is much like that of Vanguard, however the market is so trashed due to all the gold farmers you can’t make any money, and on top of that, that is how SE expects you to make money so good luck there. The community is the worst part though, one of the main grind instances for level 50+ gear just happens to be the 2nd to last instance of the main quest line. People speed run that instance and just leave the new comers behind they don’t even care if it’s your 1st or 50th time through. While this game could be great it falls short in a big way.
    Find a demo or get on a friends account. This game is good for about 1 month then the grind and the community will get you and you will wish you had every cent back.    … Expand
  90. dkaizer
    Nov 5, 2013
    8
    I bought this game in 2010, played for 2 days and tossed it in the garbage. In 2013, I bought this game again and feel THIS IS WHAT THE GAME SHOULD HAVE BEEN. Putting all server issues aside, the game boasts good visuals, multi-class and crafting system and epic storyline. Have not felt this good about an MMO since vanilla WoW days.

    On the other hand, the dungeon content could be    I bought this game in 2010, played for 2 days and tossed it in the garbage. In 2013, I bought this game again and feel THIS IS WHAT THE GAME SHOULD HAVE BEEN. Putting all server issues aside, the game boasts good visuals, multi-class and crafting system and epic storyline. Have not felt this good about an MMO since vanilla WoW days.

    On the other hand, the dungeon content could be expanded soon as the current ones are fast wearing out.    … Expand
  91. k0ng
    Nov 2, 2013
    10
    Simply the best MMO experience I have had to date. Great visuals, compelling story quest, excellent available levelling options and an engaging crafting system, with a beautifully tuned endgame (that, after a good few months remains unbeaten) I shall be continuing to pay my hard earned subscription for many months to come. Thumbs up SE!!
  92. xinny
    Nov 1, 2013
    6
    I'm coming at this review from the perspective of simply being a MMO Gamer.
    I have not played the previous iteration of this FF MMO, and my review is not based on the differences of the 2.
    The Good, and the Bad: The Good: Great Graphics and Visuals, actually one of the best Different Class Types to Fit all Persona's Lots of Instance based Content Great looking End Game gear    I'm coming at this review from the perspective of simply being a MMO Gamer.
    I have not played the previous iteration of this FF MMO, and my review is not based on the differences of the 2.

    The Good, and the Bad:

    The Good:
    Great Graphics and Visuals, actually one of the best
    Different Class Types to Fit all Persona's
    Lots of Instance based Content
    Great looking End Game gear

    The Bad:
    Global Cool Down is Too Long
    Lack of Direction in Questing. You will easily end up several levels ahead of your quest line.
    Instances have to be unlocked
    This one might just be me, i felt like i was traveling more than i was enjoying the game.
    Fate Grinding
    Instance Queue Times

    Summary:
    FFXIV:ARR has great graphics, and great looking end game gear with a variety of classes to choose from.
    However, what killed it for me was the lack of direction and general slow paced game play.
    The Global Cool Down is 2.5 seconds, unless you have a instant cast here and there, combat will become monotonous because you are waiting on the GCD more than you are casting abilities.

    It is far to easy to out level your questing line, what i mean is, you will end up being 5+ levels ahead of your questing line. This is actually a huge problem because this games instances are unlocked by doing Story Quests, and Story Quests tend to require a lot of traveling. So unless you strictly do each Story Quest back-to-back-to-back you will easily end up being 10 levels ahead of the instances you are unlocking. Which is fine if you just want to see the inside of them or the story behind them, but for purposes of gear it becomes pointless.

    Once you are ahead of your quest line you will most likely end wanting to fate grind, which is fun for the most part AS LONG AS YOU HAVE AOE. If your class lacks a variety of AoE most of the FATES will not give you XP because you are simply not dealing enough damage to the mobs while those with AoE are mowing them down.

    Overall i think this game has great graphics and variety, however due to the lack of direction and slow paced "ability usage" inevitably killed this game for me.    … Expand
  93. Belly
    Oct 30, 2013
    10
    This game has renewed my faith in the MMO genre, it's a very refreshing experience that brings a lot of good stuff to the table. It has a good fluent combat, a 'very' in depth class system where you can mix and match abilities across different classes and a huge world to explore and enjoy, it has everything for both the casual and the hardcore. Not to mention the graphics are gorgeous toThis game has renewed my faith in the MMO genre, it's a very refreshing experience that brings a lot of good stuff to the table. It has a good fluent combat, a 'very' in depth class system where you can mix and match abilities across different classes and a huge world to explore and enjoy, it has everything for both the casual and the hardcore. Not to mention the graphics are gorgeous to boot haha.… Expand
  94. wawekar
    Oct 30, 2013
    3
    The game has very nice graphics. How ever it just becomes boring and a chore to play after a bit. I did not last a month with it. if you like repetition over and over then this game is for you. I tried to play a conjurer (healing class), apparently I was not too good at it. Skills are boring. As a healer when I got heal 2 I could not use it as I ran out of mana healing. What didThe game has very nice graphics. How ever it just becomes boring and a chore to play after a bit. I did not last a month with it. if you like repetition over and over then this game is for you. I tried to play a conjurer (healing class), apparently I was not too good at it. Skills are boring. As a healer when I got heal 2 I could not use it as I ran out of mana healing. What did not make sense is your skills like heal 1 would heal for the same amount but each level you attained the cost to cast it went up. This game wasn't for me. I give it a 3 because the graphics were really good.… Expand
  95. Kafiro
    Oct 29, 2013
    10
    The best MMO I've ever played. The story is awesome, the gameplay is amazing, the details are gorgeous. The realm really reborn. The quest system is incredible, the Duty Find works well. And it's not just a game, or a MMO, now they gave us a Final Fantasy game.
  96. Izz
    Oct 28, 2013
    7
    This game is getting FAR too much credit. I was a huge fan of FFXI some 10 years ago, I always wanted an MMO with the amazing world and houses like it, but with a western feel and combat, and FFXIV ARR does just that.

    It is a good game, but it is not without it's problems. In fact, while a lot of big issues have been addressed, and there's a lot of awesome things in the game that many    This game is getting FAR too much credit. I was a huge fan of FFXI some 10 years ago, I always wanted an MMO with the amazing world and houses like it, but with a western feel and combat, and FFXIV ARR does just that.

    It is a good game, but it is not without it's problems. In fact, while a lot of big issues have been addressed, and there's a lot of awesome things in the game that many MMO's miss, a LOT of the LITTLE things are completely non-existent. This can range from simple right mousing a player to block or report as a gold seller (which there are many) to not being able to kick players in dungeons (Had a couple leechers put us on follow and AFK, and we could do nothing but accept it or leave ourselves, having to wait 40 minutes to requeue).

    The quest system is messy, there are very few quests around for those who like to level multiple classes (which I do, and have leveled EVERYTHING from professions to standard classes and jobs, to at LEAST 15, with all the jobs unlocked)

    This game has F.A.T.E's not much unlike public quests from warhammer (just, no where near as good) or similar somewhat to RIFT's in...rift (again, just not as good) These help to level alts, but unfortunately, it's a zerg fest of joining a party and just running around the zone racing other parties to a little blue circle and spamming as much AoE (sucks for non AoE classes) in hopes to tag the mobs for the extra XP, and then move on. This is alright for 30 minutes but it gets boring fast, and once you've done the quests on 2 possibly 3 (any more would be unbelievable unless you spent most of the time doing fates on the first 3) you're stuck with doing just these, or leve's (repeatable quests, in which you get 3 a day (12h), stacking up to 100. They also give low XP.

    It's nice that you can mix and match classes, but in reality, it's not like FFXI, and unless you've leveled a lot of classes, you get very little abilities to choose from, and if you have unlocked a lot? You still have few, even fewer that's not a carbon copy from another class, and/or just utterly useless (For example, a couple taunts, or heals that are identical, or "combo" abilities, that do 100 potency (damage) or 200 if chained from a specific ability, which you won't have unless you're that class, so you'll be using your basic 150 potency instead.

    It's "early" as it's only been out a couple months however, it's already been re-released once, so this should have been gotten right the second time around. Also, houses are not in it yet, and its something i really look forward too, and whilst their adding housing in the first content patch, its only for guilds.

    The zones are also very messy, where none of it falls together seamlessly. You have level 15's in one part that can just wander right into a level 40 part of the zone. The quests send you to often different area's altogether, and this might be alright if there was more than 8-9 per quest hub, and if they wasn't stupid quests like "/bow to this NPC" now "/dance"...I don't want to travel half the world, paying a fortune in teleports just to do that.

    The actual world is also very small, and we've just had the halloween event which consisted of ...3-4 quests.

    However, there are some good things about it. The professions and gathering are very nice and well thought out, if not a little easy but time consuming. The graphics is also amazing for an MMO.

    All in all, it's a fun game, and it has the POTENTIAL to be one of the best MMO's out there, the problem is, it's already losing it's player base and unless they get round to doing it SOON, it might end up going F2P and falling with the rest. Especially when you need people to do FATES, and since it's not very solo friendly for altoholics, this could be an issue.

    Graphics 8.5/10
    Sound 7/10
    Music 5/10
    longevity 8/10
    playability 7.5/10
    character development (tough one, there's a lot to get but ultimately, too much that's similar across classes and too few abilities) 7.5/10

    It however, does have a certain charm to it!

    Overall 7.8 10

    I hope that VERY soon they address some GLARINGLY small issues that should never have been overlooked, small issues yes, but lots of them. It has the potential to be the best MMO on the market, but the lack of housing and availability for leveling alts, and especially solo really let the game down.

    It's certainly worth the price tag (I paid less than £18 for PC) even if just for the free month to give it a go. If you like MMO's, this is certainly one to at least try, it has a lot of charm and the more support it gets the better it could potentially be    … Expand
  97. TheDeathWish
    Oct 26, 2013
    10
    Besides your usual gold sell sites this game is NOT PAY TO WIN. Awesome. Only can pay subscription.

    Set previous version aside: This game is wonderful, Beautiful world vibrant colors and like a Final Fantasy world. Easy to catch on and easy to play. Fate Events are nice and lots people doing them. Dungeons are very enjoyable, tough but not overwhelming. Lots of things to do to keep you    Besides your usual gold sell sites this game is NOT PAY TO WIN. Awesome. Only can pay subscription.

    Set previous version aside: This game is wonderful, Beautiful world vibrant colors and like a Final Fantasy world. Easy to catch on and easy to play. Fate Events are nice and lots people doing them. Dungeons are very enjoyable, tough but not overwhelming. Lots of things to do to keep you busy till they release more content. Be nice to see what pvp will have to over and to have spoken the words "to have the biggest guild and player housing in MMORPG history" is bold to make. Game runs well on max on gtx 570. Great music and great voice overs.

    Tho the game is lacking inventory sorting to be fixed in next large content release. Free Companies(Guild) has a great start and hope to see more on this topic.

    I Come from F2P games where you can spend $200 in such a short time and rather spend money on a game that has all included for monthly cost    … Expand
  98. Draken3289
    Oct 21, 2013
    8
    Don't let all the negative scores fool you, this game has come a long way, but it has a long way to go. Even the giant, World of Warcraft, was not made overnight.

    Square Enix listens to its fans and delivers in time. People complain of grinding, but I don't know of any MMORPG that doesn't have some aspect of grinding. People complain that some things are generic. FFXIV isn't looking    Don't let all the negative scores fool you, this game has come a long way, but it has a long way to go. Even the giant, World of Warcraft, was not made overnight.

    Square Enix listens to its fans and delivers in time.

    People complain of grinding, but I don't know of any MMORPG that doesn't have some aspect of grinding. People complain that some things are generic. FFXIV isn't looking to change the game, it's just looking to make its mark on the genre.

    Calling this game a WoW clone is like calling Halo a CoD clone. Just because Halo is a first person shooter doesn't make it a clone of Call of Duty, which is also a first person shooter. FFXIV has, arguably, the same layout as WoW, but that is because it is what we have come to expect in the MMORPG game.

    To completely recreate the wheel is a task that isn't worth undertaking. Instead, do what you can to make it better.    … Expand
  99. Just_thetip
    Oct 20, 2013
    4
    There were a couple bright spots in this game but overall I found it to be painfully boring. The ability to mix abilities from different classes is a great idea. Unfortunately most abilities feel much the same. Combat felt slow paced. The Questing is its worst flaw. Reading through incredibly dull and unimaginative dialogue from quest giving NPCs was nothing short of a chore. None ofThere were a couple bright spots in this game but overall I found it to be painfully boring. The ability to mix abilities from different classes is a great idea. Unfortunately most abilities feel much the same. Combat felt slow paced. The Questing is its worst flaw. Reading through incredibly dull and unimaginative dialogue from quest giving NPCs was nothing short of a chore. None of it is compelling and I ended up skipping through all of it after a while. The character models look good but the graphics for the environments are sub-par and that's with all settings maxed. The tool used to find a group for dungeons is probably the slowest I've encountered. Especially when considering it can group you with anyone in the NA servers. PVP is completely absent at launch and will be limited when it does come from what I've read. I tried to like this game and gave it some time hoping it would get better as my character progressed but that just didn't happen.… Expand
  100. Mudget
    Oct 19, 2013
    9
    Probably the most fun I've had in a MMORPG in a long time. Has definitely kept my attention longer than Guild Wars 2, Tera, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, or Rift. Best graphics bar-none in a MMORPG. I'm still constantly saying 'wow' at the lighting, texture, architecture, day/night & weather effects. It's fun to get new items not just because they improve my character, but because theyProbably the most fun I've had in a MMORPG in a long time. Has definitely kept my attention longer than Guild Wars 2, Tera, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, or Rift. Best graphics bar-none in a MMORPG. I'm still constantly saying 'wow' at the lighting, texture, architecture, day/night & weather effects. It's fun to get new items not just because they improve my character, but because they are unique looking. Underneath it all, it's pretty much your standard grind with a story woven through it. People complaining about the constant cut scenes just have a short attention span they're fine and are the only thing keeping this from being -just- a grind. A remarkable level of polish, come to be expected from Square Enix. I didn't play the prior version, glad I missed it, starting this fresh has been a blast. One character can hold all the classes in the game, just switch out your weapon and -voila- you go from being a warrior to a wizard or a ranger to a monk or any of the many tradeskill classes (which are their own games unto themselves). I've still created two characters, one to do all my melee stuff, the other for caster stuff, primarily to handle inventory better. All the separate items (especially tradeskill items) can build up fast. Battle are fairly standard fare, think WoW, but it feels much more organic and certainly more 'lifelike' for a fantasy world. Animations are great. In the higher levels, the dungeons absolutely require strategy and cohesive teamwork, and this can make for a wonderful experience or a horrible one. My first character was a healer, and there's a lot of healer-hate until you learn the ropes. Once past that hurdle, it's rewarding to become good at this game. On the other hand, you can certainly solo much of the game (but to advance the storyline you'll have to team up at certain points, and that's where, occasionally, people hit a wall). The team finding mechanism works great, always pairing a tank, a healer, and two dps classes, and it doesn't take long at all to get into most dungeons. There are occasional wait times, though. Fates are the random open-world dynamic events that happen, and people farm these for experience regularly. They are, in fact, more popular than the dungeons, and this is too bad. They should reverse the risk/reward and make dungeons more valuable to explore and complete, and lessen the payoff of Fates. But between the Fates, the dungeons, the storyline, the side quests, and the quite good tradeskilling system, you are almost never at a loss for something to do. End game is a bit lacking right now but there are promises for more content, including PvP, treasure hunts, epic difficulty dungeons/bosses, and so forth, along with housing and a few more classes on the horizon, so I do see this game lasting. If you hate the grind of WoW, you might not enjoy this. It's still the 'oldschool' way of MMORPGs in that respect. But it's delivered beautifully enough to keep most people sticking around. The story, while not terribly deep, is still fun to watch play out over the course of the adventure. And it's very intuitive from the get-go, with great UI customization and easy-to-pick-up mechanics and controls. Finally, I got the game a while after its shaky release, when people couldn't log on for long stretches, and I haven't had a single issue with logging on or finding parties, or anything, really. It's a very stable, very fun game. I highly suggest it.… Expand
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Awards & Rankings

33
#33 Best PC Game of 2013
19
#19 Most Discussed PC Game of 2013
31
#31 Most Shared PC Game of 2013

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
83

Generally favorable reviews - based on 32 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 29 out of 32
  2. Mixed: 3 out of 32
  3. Negative: 0 out of 32
  1. Hyper Magazine
    Dec 28, 2013
    80
    Full of enough adventure, daring-do and chocobos to make any MMO fan happy. [Jan 2014, p.72]
  2. Gaming Nexus
    Nov 13, 2013
    85
    A Realm Reborn is such a substantial change from the original game that it merits a second look if you hated the first release. So much has changed for the better, and it has resulted in one of the most polished MMORPGs out there today.
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  3. PCGamesN
    Nov 6, 2013
    80
    The completionist in me is nearly overwhelmed with the sheer amount of things to do in A Realm Reborn. Square Enix really do deserve praise for not only fixing the issues of the original game, but far exceeding their goal.
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