Disclaimer: Please read this with an open mind, as the following sentences are not meant to trash talk about WoW or persuade others to quit playing the game, but they are rather a honest subjective observation on the state of the game in comparison with FF14.
I’ve been playing WoW on and off for about 10 years, and I must admit that I’ve never been much into the endgame content (at times it was fresh and new). I’ve been a casual player who for years felt that the game developers are forgetting about the casuals and rather focus on the gameplay experience of the ridiculously small percentage of hardcore elite raiders / PVP players.
It’s only logical to ask why I haven’t quit playing WoW earlier, if I wasn’t satisfied with the state of the game. Well, to be honest, I went with the crowd, because in order to have fun in a MMORPG title, you have to have somebody to play with; and WoW has always been the behemoth of MMOs. It was the definition of a successful MMO, while other titles tried and failed to be the WoW killer over and over again.
Another reason is that WoW has the most amazing and (in a good way) stereotypical depictions of elves and dwarves, which are my favorite fantasy races (I’m a huge Tolkien and Paolini fan), so if I wanted to “have my own Gimli or Arya”, the WoW was the obvious environment to choose.
The way I played the game was through leveling, exploring, and creating a special RP kind of bond with each of my characters. It was so much fun to do the same quests over and over again, but with a slightly different background story for each of my characters.
You can imagine that with this type of approach to the game, I could not take it easily when I’ve seen the leveling experience being put on the side track and destroyed more and more with each expansion. The developers clearly see leveling as a fast-paced secondary content that’s meant to rush your alt to the max level. Druid specific quest line in Moonglade for the bear form? Gone. Trainers? Practically gone and useless. Low level dungeons? Another boost to gain 3 levels in under 30 minutes at almost any level (overstatement, I know).
It’s all only about the endgame content and competition. And this type of approach from developers, who are undeniably solely responsible for the state of the game, creates toxicity. Please, I really encourage you to leave a comment below if you have never witnessed skilled players leveling their alts through dungeons yell at new players about the tactics or threatening them to be kicked from the dungeon if they once again ask for doing the whole dungeon, because they have quests there. I personally don’t believe that I’ll see one comment stating that this never happened during your game time. We all know how much the game pushes you towards the endgame content and how toxic our community can be.
These two things (crappy leveling experience and toxicity) alongside with too many unnecessary game mechanics and systems were the reasons I’ve finally decided to quit WoW after the lawsuit news. Because I finally got an answer why the game sucks so much and gets worse with every expansion. It’s because middle aged men can’t keep their perverted hands to themselves in the workplace.
I’m a realist and for all those years I thought that the game sucks only because of the corporate culture and the fact that game developers are not former or current players of the game. All the way up to WOTLK, the player was the god for Blizzard, not the shareholders. I don’t know when exactly this changed, but the lawsuit kinda gave me a clue about other reasons for WHY it changed.
So I made a decision and moved over to FF14. A game which looks has always deterred me from even getting close to it. It just became the new behemoth and I went with the crowd. I would quit WoW anyway, but the crowd pointed me in the new popular direction.
And so it happened that FF14 made me even more mad at the state of WoW and disgusted with Blizzard. The game I’ve always looked upon with disgust has proven me wrong, because regardless of how many players FF14 may have, it’s the systems, storytelling, leveling experience, gameplay mechanics and AWESOME community what makes it THE MMO. The perfection of gameplay and storytelling in FF14 made me so angry at myself. Angry that I did not quit WoW earlier and save myself countless hours of feelings of detachment from the game I loved.
Example 1.
In FF14, you are not encouraged to kick a player from dungeon party. Exactly the opposite - there’s a system to mark exceptional players and help them earn rewards for excellent team play and “sportsmanship”.
Example 2.
The community does not tolerate toxicity. And you know what’s the funniest thing? That FF14, which is the game with far more sexualized female character and gear models, is the game that doesn’t have sexual abuse scandals at the company and developer levels. Neither in the community, which despite being RP and ERP oriented on many servers in FF14, is not sticking it down your throat and harass you if you don’t want to participate in it. FF14 is a MMO for raiders, RP players and casuals too. And it works.
Example 3.
Game mechanics and systems in FF14 come with actually meaningful and helpful tutorials. The first dungeon party I have ever enjoyed after 10 years of playing WoW, was in FF14. Because prior to getting access to them, the game made sure that I go through tutorials on HOW dungeon fights are different from killing mobs while doing standard quests. Everyone comes prepared, because the game demands it, which results in far less anxiety, nervous reactions and toxicity inside the instance group.
Example 4.
One character in FF14 can be all classes and switch between them. Same applies to professions. Why is this good? Because it gives the community a choice. Those who prefer endgame content usually have one main character capable of everything. On the other hand, RP players still have the choice to create alts for their RP and can go through the story again. And you go through the story expansion by expansion = with new expansions in FF14, the old content doesn’t change at all (at least that’s my current understanding and experience). Imagine it like being able to do original Vanilla content without the effects of the Cataclysm (without workaround systems like Chromie).
Example 5.
Storytelling. Yes, I must admit the voice acting sucks in the original game (Realm Reborn), but oh boy, the developers care about the story and its coherence. It’s just nice to play a game that knows where the story is heading and doesn’t have to invent a major turn of events (that would shift the whole paradigm illogically) with every expansion.
I wish you all who chose to remain with WoW countless enjoyable hours spent in game, and I’m happy for you if you are OK with the state of the game. It’s just not my case anymore and I wanted to both say goodbye and share my thoughts about my own reasons that lead me to my decision.
In the end, as a player who has spent 10 years in a game that wasn’t the right one for him, I give you one advice - don’t stick to one game and try as many as you can. Keep an open mind and I guarantee you that you will come out of experiencing more MMOs as a better and happier player (even if you end up staying with WoW after exploring other opportunities.
why everybody always saying that blizzard is not doing game for casulas?