FFXIV: Day 1

So, last night was to be my first evening of playing FFXIV. It got off to something of a bad start though when, after another slow patch (which I grabbed from a mirror site as soon as I realzed the Square Enix system still wasn't working properly) logging in and trying to launch the game resulted it repeatedly erroring. Eventually I found (via third party webseites) that the servers were undergoing maintenance until midday PST (so 8pm European time). Nicely timed ^_^ - I hope it's not a daily occurence and please, Square Enix, do what other MMOs do and put that information on the launcher so people don't keep bouncing.

Getting into the game I messed around with settings to try and configure the screen and sound. The latter was a completye disaster - there pretty much are no sound options - and the former was tedious as hell (as the config is a distinct application, so you need to quit the game, make your changes (which may be educated guesses due to the lack of tooltips) then go back into the game to see what it looks like. Rise and repeat until happy/bored.

So, eventually I got to actually start playing and the exploring the world. I focussed on Limsa Lominsa with Elmindreda and wandered for a while through the islands and walkways of teh city. Quite pretty, but somewhat confusing to get from A to B. I had a quest to do I'd receieved from the proprieter of the inn/adventurer's guild in the city and spent a while working out where to go (as the map wasn't particularly good) but eventually sussed it and got to do my first "levequest", a vague tutorial on that bit of the system. This involved some fighting, which wasn't overly challenging (but was still mostly hitting random buttons, there being no combat tutorial).

Returning to the city I was directed where to get more levquests (though finding ones I can do rather than those for crafters/gatherers) was a bit of trial and error. I picked up four more quests (in the same locale as the first one) and set off to do them. the first one ... butchered me repeatedly. The quest mobs hit like a train and I was quickly KO'd. After rezzing (which involved selecting "return" from the menu then standing by a crystal for 30 seconds until I could move) I was able to head by to the quest area. However, I'd been "weakened" (I presume the FFXIV version of res sickness) which halved hitpoints (and preseumably hampered other things). It wasn't clear how long this effect lasted (no icons that I could see) but it seems to be about 5 minutes (which, given you only have 30 minutes to do each levquest) is a real pain. Back to the quest. Die. Res. Rest. Die. Res ...

Needless to say I failed teh first levquest. The second one went much better, but the third was borderline (so I suspect there's a balance issue). Of note was the fact that when you're injured you don't innately regen HP (at least not in fighting mode - I gather, reading websites, that you should when not in "active mode" but it didn't seem to be any better when I tried that). The fourth one was a bit of a pain too, but eventually I got it sorted and had gained several levels as a Thaumaturge and gained some other rewards, including a new robe.

I went to equip the new robe and found another funny; there's an inventory but also a gear button, so finding and equipping the new gear was "fun".

There still seems to be a lag issue with NPCs and player characters appearing, but I didn't seem to have a major issue moving around. The UI did feel a bit sluggish and the "built for consoles, not PCs" feeling is growing. In fact, looking at comments from other players the impression is that Square Enix are working for the Japanese market (and mainly PS3s at that) with the PC a secondary consideration (and US/Europeans tertiary). Hopefully that's not the case, but there's little in the UI/gameplay experience that suggests otherwise.

What would be useful is if the regions got their own servers which'd cut down on the lag - I suspect the current ones are on the US West Coast (judging by the maintenance times) or in Japan (juding by the number of Japanese players that were on (and typing away in Hiragana ...). That strikes me as odd given Square-Enix were insisting on region-specific accounts (e.g.. mine was with European Square Enix).

So, in summary, a potentially interesting game spoilt by a lacklustre new-player experience, horrible Ui and half-hearted PC implementation.