Wisdom of Nym: Looking back at Final Fantasy XIV’s 2015

I realize that this is arguably a little early. We’ve still got a couple of weeks left in 2015, after all, and patch 3.15 is going to be dropping later this week so that we all have new stuff to undertake for weapons. But you know, I feel confident evaluating Final Fantasy XIV now. I feel as if it’s in a state wherein there’s more to see, but not more that needs to be seen for a report card, so to speak.

Everyone who plays the game (and even several people who do not) knew at the start of the year that this would be a big year. It was the game’s first expansion, it involved the wrap-up of the previous storylines, and it was up against several other big high-profile launches. So how did the game do for its second full year of post-relaunch operation? Assuming you’ve forgotten all of the columns I wrote about how it was doing along the way, I mean.

The simplest thing to say is also highly accurate and also missing key context. At the end of 2015, Final Fantasy XIV is in largely the same place as it was at the end of 2014, and if you were happy with the game then you’re probably pretty happy with it now. Not that it’s in exactly the same place; several of the extant issues, like the availability of upgrade items, weapon acquisition, and leveling content have been addressed. But in broad strokes? It’s still the same fundamental game.

Why is this such a good thing? Well, it’s something that far too many games don’t manage in the wake of an expansion launch. There’s a temptation to rewrite the entire game from the ground up each time the level cap bumps and players are exploring new areas. I have a great deal of admiration fo the fact that the game I’m playing now is still recognizably the same as the game I was enchanted with at the relaunch. It’s the same heart, just with tweaking and solutions around the edges.

Those tweaks are, by and large, a good thing. Weapons can now simply be purchased outright with tomestones or primal tokens, eliminating the slay-and-pray nature of finding new weapons at the level cap. You can clear Alexander reliably via duty finder if all you want is storyline progress. Best tribe quests have more functionality when you’re leveling up a job. Updates and additions rather than a wholesale reworking, in other words; the lessons learned from operation have been internalized.

As a result, the complaints I do have about 2015 are of the potentially nitpicking sort. They’re not huge issues and I’ll be the first to acknowledge that. Heavensward is darn near a perfect expansion, and the game remains absolutely stellar, fun, and engaging. But it does seem a wee bit less engaging, and I think part of the problem is that this year has been a bit more sparse in terms of new content.

That is, to be honest, barely even a complaint. I’ve joked before about being bent out of shape that the magical content box only provided new entertainment on a slightly slower basis. But it still gets felt. It was felt when we were all waiting for the expansion for longer than expected, and it was felt when patch 3.1 took longer to come out than expected. Certainly it’s no year-long breaks with nothing to do, not even half a year with nothing new going on. But it still contributes to a certain degree of hurrying up and waiting while the next bit of content gets prepped up.

That’s exacerbated slightly by the fact that, as mentioned before, leveling through Heavensward is only smooth and satisfying on the first job. Subsequent treks through are much more ponderous, thanks to the simple fact that you’re out of quests, experience rewards are low, and the game doesn’t scale up well. 3.1 made matters slightly better, but it’s pretty clear that the leveling was balanced to keep you in the last batch longer than may be entirely healthy. It contributes to feeling as if you’re a bit stuck after your first leveling bout, and I know that I personally haven’t been as motivated to round out my stable of jobs as I have been previously.

There’s also the fact that the developers succeeded at making the crafting and gathering endgame more involved, but it was also made far more self-contained. It’s a bit harder to just craft as a side thing, and there’s much less applicable content for players who don’t want to dedicate themselves to it. Or perhaps that’s just me; I know I have felt a bit more stalled out in the non-combat arena with this expansion.

Last but not least, we still have no meaningful customization for any given job for our characters. If anything, it’s gotten worse with this expansion – we have three new jobs that offer nothing new in terms of abilities for other jobs, and the addition of Diadem gear means that you aren’t even picking between one or two pieces for the best possible stats in slots. The arguments against customization remain fairly weak, but that’s really an article for another week. In simple terms, two Scholars in identical gear are still identical, which is a little disappointing.

Even that’s a stretch for criticism because it was true last year as well. The game’s tiny PvP population existed last year, as well. The disconnect with the game’s extant role structure were there before. If you didn’t like running dungeons, crafting, and developing stories in 2.4 near the end of the year, you aren’t going to be happy with them now.

I am pleased with this year, though. Heck, even on the PvP front the game deserves some praise because while you can argue that it hasn’t been super successful at pushing that gameplay style, you can’t argue that it isn’t supported. Players have access to new gear and new maps on a regular basis, new gameplay styles are rolled out, and it even awards endgame currency for PvE without being an unbalanced source. The developers want to support players who play the endgame as they wish. That’s commendable, and that’s great, and that’s fun.

So here’s to 2015 in Eorzea. A few setbacks, a few odd decisions, some messy moments, and some delays, but it’s still a great place to adventure and the magnitude of those setbacks is monumentally lesser when compared with the game’s contemporaries. And I’d hasten to point out, yet again, that this is still a game in which a full RTS game was added just as a side feature in a major patch.

Feedback, asalways, can be left in the comments down below or sent along via mail to eliot@massivelyop.com. Next week, I want to talk a little bit about elitism, solid play, doing things correctly, and organization. The week after that? Yeah, it’s prediction time for 2016. Or we’ll find out that patch 3.2 will include a million relevant things and I’ll need to talk about that, who knows.