FFXIV VS. WoW: Clash of the Titans

There are tons of new FFXIV videos showcasing graphics, combat, and quests. I guess no one is taking the NDA too seriously.

I was planning on trying Cataclysm while I waited for FFXIV(seeing as I'm just a lowly PS3 player), but the more I learn about FFXIV, the more apathetic I get about Cataclysm. Maybe it's because I've always felt more connected to Final Fantasy lore than Warcraft lore. Maybe it's because Blizzard withholds so much information about their products that it's hard to get excited about something I know so little about. Then again, maybe it's because DC Universe Online is being released on November 2, and I'm thinking of making that my new "waiting for FFXIV MMORPG." Seriously, I think there's even less known about DC Universe Online than Cataclysm, but SOE still managed to give a release date. Throw me a bone, Blizzard.

More likely, it's because I'm just so sick of the WoW phenomenon. I'm sick of it being everywhere; I'm sick of how everyone flocks to it like sheep; I'm sick of Mr. T. WoW has made me hate Mr. T. That's an unholy sin.

I have nothing against the game itself. The community is a cesspool of human excrement, but the game itself is uncomplicated, addictive fun accompanied by a decent narrative. Yes, it's very streamlined. What isn't these days? Even FFXIV is getting this treatment. The difference is that FFXIV looks like it will keep that feeling of grand adventure thanks to it pushing the graphics envelop and naturally coaxing the community to pull together to overcome obstacles with its more cooperative gameplay rather than pitting everyone against each other over Chuck Norris jokes(Again, not WoW's fault, the community's).

And now, the real reason I put "Clash of the Titans" in the title of this post: to tear down the bull shit movie of the same name that claims to be a remake of the 1981 classic.

Besides this movie not being able to hold a candle to the old "Clash of the Titans," it barely has any legs to stand on as its own movie, let alone defend itself for all its discrepancies.

The acting is flat and the characters themselves are completely uninteresting. They are introduced in a way that makes them seem like they'll be significant and are either killed off ten minutes later or left hanging with no development. This eventually leads to one of the most trite Hollywood love plots ever seen in a movie.

The editing is an absolute nightmare, making violent cuts that constantly throw the characters in a new location. It doesn't even feel like the characters are traveling.

Evidently, parts of this movie were filmed in Wales and Spain. For what purpose? There's hardly any scenery in this movie; the characters just “teleport” to a new location. Cut, scene change, boom, we're there. The few nice images are computer generated. This movie could have been shot in a closet that had a green screen.

Honestly, I could have forgiven the bland characters and story and all the changes they made to them. I went into this movie just expecting to have some fun with crazy fight scenes and adventure that take advantage of good CGI, and it doesn't even do that.

All I wanted was a basic summer-action flick, but the fight scenes are few and aren't even impressive compared to what I was expecting. This movie is nothing but a clip show of scenes from the original "Clash of the Titans" replaced with bad actors, CGI, and a forced, anti-climatic ending. Aside from the Kraken, the only impressive thing in the movie, everything is a soulless copy of its former self.

You Can't Do That On TV

While brushing up on the latest news at ZAM I found this.

It's part of the ESRB's rating description for FFXIV. The rest can be found here.

Evidently, FFXIV will have bleeding monsters(in cut-scenes), strong language(H-E-double toothpicks), suggestive themes(that's what she said), and, ESRB's words not mine, "Some female characters are depicted from low camera angles, with lingering camera views of their buttocks (i.e., up-skirt shots)."

Buttocks!? You can't use that word on the internet! You should know better, ESRB.

Anyway, I'm more interested in the "suggestive references" the ESRB quoted from the game: The netmaster's probably up in his office polishing the mast just thinking about her, stick yer manhood in the forge, and you cheating little whore! Some people are calling this "edgy." I don't know about that. It just reminds me of the playfulness Final Fantasy used to have before every game was about some brooding, zazzed-up she-male who just needs to be loved, or get his memory back, or learn why he exists, blah, blah, blah.

I miss the days of the porno mag and developer's room of FFIV and Galuf's comically failing memory and the characters finding out Farris was a girl in FFV. I hope FFXIV gives us more of those kinds of moments.

Owner of a Lonely Heart

Some new videos have popped up on the FFXIV channel. The one linked is a video about the motion capture and creation of the five races. I was hoping for a more in-depth look at character creation, but it was not meant to be. From what was said in the video, it seems like character customization will be ridiculous. They mention being able to change nose size, add moles, tweeze eyebrows, shave chest hair... What? It's in the video. See for yourself.

Now I'm all for customization, (especially since FFXI has, you know, none), but now we've gone to the completely opposite extreme. I mean, it's not like it's hurting anybody. It isn't as though they're forcing people to create incredibly detailed characters. I just wonder who is actually going to spend several hours adjusting the density of his character's nose hairs(probably more than I think).

They also mention that, at present, there are sixty different emotes in FFXIV... Wow. For someone like me, whose emotional spectrum merely covers "angry" and "not angry," that's a superfluous amount of emotion. One of the Lalafell looked like he was doing the chicken dance. I didn't even know that was an emotion.

But enough of FFXIV, I'd like to get real for a second. For the first time since I resubscribed to EGM after their long hiatus, I checked out their online magazine counterpart. Since the current generation of humans doesn't read and prefers to laugh and clap their hands at cutesy videos, EGM needed to give their subscribers something that could let them pretend they were watching Youtube videos instead of reading.

I am more than happy to simply have the print edition of EGM back, and have always shunned online newspapers and magazines. But today I said, "what the hell," and checked out the online magazine.

Honestly, it's pretty cool as far as online publications go. Unfortunately, it stills suffers from the same flaws as many other publications: overstimulation and nightmarish menu navigation.

Though to be fair, EGM online has one of the better organization of menus I've seen, and I could have lived with that if it were the only nuisance.

As I "opened" the "magazine" to "read" it, I was greeted with a video that automatically started playing. I skipped it, but I found it wasn't the only one. The magazine was full of videos, animations, and scrolling text. "I suppose this is a natural evolution," I said to myself. "In print, everything is still. Onine, everything is in motion." I chuckled snobbishly at their frivolous attempt to ammuse me with moving pictures and kept reading (if what I was doing could be called "reading").

It was then I noticed something. I was having trouble reading, and it wasn't just because I was squinting at small computer text on a reflective white background. There was music playing.

"Hm, what a strange place for music," I thought. "It's not like they have music in libraries and--oh, wait, yes they do. Libraries and book stores do stock CDs... And movies... And video games... What the fuck is wrong with this world?"

Just about every page of this magazine has music and sound effects. I love music, but... Come on, guys. I'm trying to read. I don't watch a movie, listen to a record, and read a book all at the same time. When I'm reading, I want to read. Anything else is just distracting.

Most of these intrusive little features can be turned off, skipped, or circumvented in some way. After that, what am I left with? It's now the same magazine I have in print form. Okay, that's not entirely true. If you have premium membership (which I do) the online publication has more info than the print, and I guess that's the real point of the online mag.

So why am I complaining about the online magazine? I have the print form, and I can turn off the distracting features of the online mag if I really want to read it. Well, I'm not complaining about the magazine itself. As I said, it's one of the more organized online publications I've read and the videos and music, while intrusive, are pretty cool. I just can't believe this is where we're heading, not only as gamers, but also as people. Are we really at the point when our culture-induced ADD is so strong we need all of this overstimulation while reading?

Maybe I'm wrong, though. Maybe it's not that we're so technology dependent that we've all but forgotten what a book is. Maybe it's just that gamers prefer to get their information from inaccurate, unimaginative wikis rather than from credible publications.

It's not a "Job" System; it's a "Class" System.

Wow, after a long dry spell, a bunch of new FFXIV videos and pics came up all at once, and speaking of "WoW," I've got to get a few things off my meaty chest:

1. To everyone already screaming "WoW-clone" at FFXIV with excessive use of exclamation points, shut up. WoW did not invent quest experience. So stop toting yourself as some hardcore gamer who won't play FFXIV because it's too casual. It only proves how few games you've actually played. You may as well say FFXIV copied DnD.

2. To everyone already saying FFXIV's casual gameplay is a step backwards compared to FFXI, shut up. FFXI did not advance the MMORPG genre in any way. The only thing unique about it is that it was the first online Final Fantasy game, and maybe the job/subjob system was pretty different from other MMO games. It wasn't genre-defining.

3. To everyone making bold assumptions, rash conclusions, and stating facts otherwise based on logical fallacy about FFXIV, definitely shut up. You have seen a few minutes of Alpha gameplay. ALPHA. You cannot make any accurate predictions, positive or negative, about this game yet. Speculate all you want, but stop being a dick about it.

Okay, that aside, this is the first PS3 game I've seen that has blown my mind, visually. Clearly, out of the PS3, 360, and Wii, the PS3 has always been the graphical powerhouse, but this is the first game where I actually think it's a selling point. The fluidness(definitely not a word) of the gameplay is pretty amazing, and this is only alpha.

Still can't comment much on the actual combat. Obviously, there are some similarities to FFXI and some differences. The HP, MP, and TP bars are still around, though TP seems to function differently. Seems the lock-on and auto-attack are still part of combat, but it looks like there's home kind of hotkey spread at the bottom of the screen in the video. I'm thinking this, along with the very high amount of TP shown in the video, may imply that weapon skill type abilities will play a much larger role in combat than they did in FFXI.

The best news for me has been this:






























I mentioned some concerns in my last post that this whole lack of a defining job system might mean everyone was basically going to be a Warrior with a different weapon, as far as melee go. Mostly, I was actually worried that there would be no Monks. Monk is one of my favorite jobs in FFXI(though my main is actually Dragoon), and I was hoping they'd make a return. It seems they will in some form, at least. SE is still hush-hush on the details of how this "class system" will work. In a way, it kind of is like everyone is a Warrior with a different weapon. They keep saying there are no "jobs," par se; it's all in how one trains his skills and equips himself.

The most sense I can make out of all it is that if you use hand-to-hand weapons, learn hand-to-hand skills, wear armour that augments and aids said style of combat, you are, essentially, a Monk, but you won't be called that. We're all just "people," apparently. It's like SE is trying really hard to not be racist so they're just generalizing all the jobs. I'm all for seeing how this turns out, though, no matter how convoluted it seems right now.

P.S. - If you've not checked the FFXIV official site recently, do so. It's been updated.

It all began with a stone...

... and several nations previously at war but who are now in an unspoken truce due to the invention of "airbourne battleships." Okay, I threw the "stone" part in myself, but according to the latest news at 1UP, the basic plot of FFXIV is sounding a lot like FFXI.

This news hit the internet highway a couple days ago, but I've not been able to formulate an opinion. I try to not have an opinion and base reactions only on facts, but it's difficult to do that when one is so underwhelmed.

Paraphrasing from the 1UP article, there are four "job skills" in FFXI: Fighter, Sorcerer, Gatherer, and Crafter, all of which will grow depending on one's equipment. I guess if you have weapons equipped, you'll be training your Fighter skills, if you have some kind of tool equipped, you'll be training your crafting skill, etc., etc.. I'm hoping it only sounds dull now because of how little information is available. I also hope that equipping different weapons will, essentially, change your class. If you equip knuckles, you're a Monk, a Polearm, a Dragoon, and so on. I'll be seriously pissed if the intent is for everyone to be a Warrior with the only difference being the weapon one has currently in use. Hopefully, I'm way off the mark. Still, I'm apprehensive to learn how this will work out, but this isn't much to go on at the moment. So let's focus on something more concrete.

Eorzea will be the starter continent with several islands surrounding it. Cool, sounds like a big world. The five races have pretty much been confirmed: Hyuran(Hyrulian), Miqo'te(Misquito), Lalafell(Lala, fell), Elezen(Eleven), Roegadyn(Rose Garden). All, respectively, correspond to Hume, Mithra, Tarutaru, Elvan, and Galka from FFXI. You can see scans of them in this thread on ZAM.

Better still, all the races will be fully customizable. Hyuran will also be split into "midlanders" and "highlanders," while Miqo'te will be split into "diurnal sunseekers" and "nocturnal moonkeepers," whatever that means. In any case, I'm glad there won't be as many dopplegangers around.

What has me most intrigued, though, is how the quest system will work. It reminds me much of the Tactics Advance games and how mark hunting worked in FFXII. Adventurers will receive work passes from Eorzea's guildmaster to go on quests either solo or with others. Paraphrasing Komoto, he says a certain amount of players will not be needed for specific quests. It'll be up to the players how many people they want to bring. I'm not sure what that means, exactly. Maybe he means that the quest difficulty will scale up or down depending on how many people are present.

All in all, these are interesting ideas with a lot of perplexing vagueness. SE has my attention, but we'll see how long they keep it:



... Okay, I'm all ears.