Hang out with me on Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/genjigearlive
In this video I give my thoughts and reactions to my first week playing Final Fantasy 14. I started my play through a week ago to see if the story deserves the title “best in the series”, since then I have been playing through the game on twitch and documenting my experience.
My other two channels for vods and clips, will be adding to them sometime this week:
https://www.youtube.com/@genjigeargaming
https://www.youtube.com/@genjigearclips
A lot of people complain about the slow tutorial start. I always felt that that is one of the reasons that the game has always done well getting new people eased into things. That said, I also agree that for gamers/mmo vets it is really easy, and you will often be way over leveled if you're not playing 2-3 classes at once. The game even gives you bonus exp to catch up those other jobs. Combined with the fact that you can play those other roles on the same character, it is really one of the most friendly/respectful of people's time systems I've seen in mmos. In later expansions, there is content for each class role that really incentivizes people branching out and trying other roles.
Queue times are generally pretty good because of the roulette system. Healers and tanks will pop fast unless you're on at a really off time. Even dps timers are never miserable imo.
FFXIV teaches reading! The script also gets smoother as time goes on. It will have less of those really weirdly constructed sentences. Share with us the first time you say or think: "must needs". 😛
FFXIV fans are emotional vampires like another commentor said, and we're so rabid because you would sound crazy already, telling people that an MMO has a good story, nevertheless a phenomenal one. It's such a hard sell, basically having to tell people "JUST TRUST US, IT'S SLOW FOR THE FIRST 50 HOURS BUT IT GETS INCREDIBLE AFTER THAT." One of my favorite things to do and what a lot of other's is watching new player live reactions to key scenes, to relive it vicariously through others.
It's just the effort of trying to get people through that first part, and you'd be hard pressed to find anyone that's stuck it out past that, to later hate it and drop it. That being said, don't feel the need to bumrush it. You're right that there's a ton of stuff to discover. Best way to enjoy it is at your own pace, and if you feel like you're starting to get bored, push through more of the MSQ.
Will continue to look forward to your review videos! This is great!!
My FFXVI twitch schedule PST:
Mon-Friday 7pm-9:15pm
Saturday 9am-12pm
Please share any FFXIV videos that would be fun to react to!
Will have content up on the vod/highlight channels sometime this week.
One thing I love is that there is no pay to win here, nor is there really an incentive. (Yeah, you can buy skips, that's not really what I mean though). The fact that A Realm Reborn and Heavensward are 100% free with nearly no restrictions (if you want to play that way) says a lot. Pay funds are literally just exotic outfits from the store and cosmetic changes. (But there is plenty of fantastic looking glamour in the game. For sure not required to enjoy the story and complete the game). Also, sharing the Jobs. Chefs kiss revisiting areas with a new job is so nice, and avoids unnecessary alternate job progress. It respects my time and keeps the bad kind of grind other games use away. Main Story is easy… I literally have played dungeons with handicapped people of limited hand dexterity. But everyone got to enjoy the story, and that's the point for the Main Story. When you're caught up on the world, you get to participate in the sweaty gamer content… right now you learn how to use the tools you have, but you get SOOO many more. Learn as you go and it'll be that much more cool later ^_^
Love seeing the start of your journey!!
Side note – there is a whole side story around the healer (her name is Edda) that failed her party. You actually walked by her and her party when unlocking Sastasha and her story continues later in the game.
The ai party is a new thing they've been adding and it's wonderful imo- there's some tradeoffs that become more apparent later on. Nothing crazy just- the ai won't tend to be able to 'mass pull' mobs, will generally go from one pack, fight/kill, then move on. And they typically only do single-target attacks. And unfortunately while doing things like mechanics they stop attacking. So you get a slower experience than you would with a player party, however you can take things at your own pace which is great if you're learning a class, and also they do the mechanics properly so you can learn those too. As a dps main, the time spent in queue for duty finder/doing the dungeon is about the same as doing the ai party dungeon, but healers/tanks tend to have quicker queues so benefit from doing the normal duty finder stuff typically.
I’ve been playing for a year and a half and the game just gets better the further you go. It also gets much harder to the point where you need to know your proper class rotation to do content efficiently. It can be a bit overwhelming at first. ARR does have a lot of reading but voice acting gets better in the expansions as you mentioned. Glad you’re enjoying the game!
You will slowly get more and more added in that hotbar, lots of OGCD's to weve between skills at higher levels. That said, glad to see you still giving it a go 🙂
If you juggle between multiple jobs you can mitigate some of the overleveling issues. I find having a tank job, a healer job and a dps job can be maintained without having to grind and still meet most level requirements as you unlock content.
The Duty Support system is great to get a feel for a dungeon before you go do it with real people. So glad you’re having fun!
they aren't even speaking in cursive yet. good luck.
Without spoilers, I’ll just say a favorite part of ARR is the mission immediately AFTER the second Primal fight. The fight itself is fun, but the mission after is the real stuff.
Take your time and have fun :D, the only pieces of advice i would give is to not forgett your job quests and to do optional raids/trial series before going to next expansions 😀 not gonna tell more :3
The one massive downside of the duty support system is that a lot of the unique and challenging 4-man content in ARR and Heavensward that is tied to the MSQ was simplified and homogenized across the board. Thankfully the optional dungeons still retain their quirks, so you can still experience some challenges early on.
I love A Realm Reborn. I love every expansion, too. Its all got wonderful stuff.
Wow, you really got the FFXIV community’s attention huh? Let me add a thought: it might feel at times like the game has too much dialogue. But you will see as you move through the expansions that every single NPC contributes to world building in some way. Almost every character, no matter how briefly they appear, has a connection to someone or somewhere in the game. The sheer dedication to world building is staggering, almost no one is a throwaway character. People and places are not replaced in further expansions, they are added to and built upon! It has the most lived in world I’ve ever experienced.
Your brain will stretch with all this reading aloud. And if you ever need to read aloud to a small child you will be pro.
Chickity China the Chinese Chicken is my favorite Raid Boss
Why? because we are forever jealous of sprouts getting to experience the game for the first time. Once you finish the Endwalker, the vicious cycle begins where you seek sprouts to vicariously experience it once again.
What I've said to many people is what you're alluding to: ARR is VERY much a training experience now. The game relaunched pretty barebones, but also had a lot of fluff for them to pad out of the game at the time and figure out it's best features. Now you've got a whole lot less buttons to press, they give you a "Brand New Ring" to speed level to 30 to get a job, and your MSQ will guarantee you being over leveled pretty much always. With so much content to get through, the alternative would never keep people getting passed the beginning.
Tips:
– Take a moment to chat with some characters when outside of a cutscene, particular main characters.
– Tank Stance!
– If you wanna get somewhere fast and don't have a chocobo yet, use the chocobo porters.
– I truly feel a lot of new players pick GLD/PLD to start, but the true value of this game imo is to try out other jobs. You should always try at least one job per role, because it makes you a better team player, and who knows, you may actually like one more. Don't wait too long to do this!
– Nothing outside of MSQ is voiced, it never changes, even in current stuff, but there's definitely more of it later. But the reading is very worth it. Just be patient and really absorb the world and it will absolutely pay it back
– Pay attention to the politics. Many people split the story into "politics/magic fantasy stuff" but they are intertwined, especially later.
– Do the Blue + quests. They always give a new feature, sometimes miniscule, sometimes jobs and dungeons and trials.
– https://xivtodo.com/
It’s weird. There are times when I just speedran parts of the MSQ, and other times where I lingered over certain moments. Both are completely fine to do and TBH you’ll probably end up doing both. FFXIV is huge content wise and you can do anything you want – though on the flip side, if you don’t want to get overwhelmed just focus solely on MSQ. Like others have said HW is where the game really opens up IMO.
Combat gets much more complex and harder every expansion, and trust me, it gets FRICKING HARD. Like… you will die. So think of this phase as a time to develop and practice your skills.
Side note at 6:00 – there is a whole questline dedicated to this mage. It’s one of the first examples of optional side content that is EXTREMELY rewarding. Something to think about.
XIV players have been tempered by YoshiP. That is why we want more people to play.
Personally, I want more people to play the game because there's currently so much negativity going on around the world and so much toxicity online that it's hard to find a place where one can just enjoy things and have fun. FFXIV gives people that safe environment and allows you to connect with people that either have/are gone/going through the same things as you or people that are willing to help you forget about the real world or even just listen as you vent to them. FFXIV is more then just a game, it's a community that supports each other and welcomes everyone with open arms. Everyone needs a space like the one we provide and I hope one day the real world could be more open and supporting like FFXIV's community is.
ARR does a good job to hold your hand and then slowly let you go off on your own.
But the game does not only pick up in story.
But gameplay as well…even in Endwalker they have some fights that are a total bitch slap at first lol
And you begin to even hear long time experienced players say "I still need to learn it" lol
the only hard content you are going to find is on Extreme trials and savages, criterios dungeon, and ultimates, out of that the game is easy if not one os the most easy games , is not a bad thing but you need to know where is te dificult thing, and the story is not that , the story is just that, the story and all msq quest are easy , the really hard part is clear extreme in "Min ilvl no echo" or the savage , and ultimate is the final test of the game where you can take months and months tryng to clear just one ultimate
Welcome to Eorzea!
If you are looking for a little bit more of a challenge/actually see mechanics in some of the earlier dungeons, if you queue with a premade party into a dungeon, you can set yourselves to minimum item level. This works for all content!
When you are in the "Duty Finder" menu, there is a small gear icon on the top left of the box. Click that and you'll get a whole array of options on how you want to set up your queue. On of them is "Minimum IL". This will set you to the bare minimum item level for the dungeon you are going into.
Normal syncing brings you down to the maximum allowed level for that dungeon/trial, but the min ilvl setting will allow you to take your gear out of the equation.
That being said, most of the dungeons at the start will continue to be a breeze, and it is really the later trials that you can use this setting on to make things a bit more spicy if you'd like.|
I hope you enjoy your journey through this game <3
haha the mage getting their tank killed haha oh boy….. that little dialogue is in no way a lead up to some crazy side story or anything. 💦
Azoria lol
Is he actually new though?
"Ezoria"
.. aight checks out👌