Final Fantasy 14 (FFXIV)

There is a letter from the producer live starting about 12pm tomorrow. It is expected Phase 4 will start right after or within a day or two.

You can watch the letter here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-oLdgjimrUQ

You would be better waiting until Phase 4 but have you signed up and got a SE account to take part? I dont think you are automatically allowed into Phase 4 despite it being an 'Open Beta' you still need to sign up and what not. Phase 4 is supposed to carry over until retail release once there is no major glitches or bugs found so if your looking to get involved you should try get into it at least.

Just double check you didnt buy the Digital Editiona CE Upgrade incase because you will need a 1.0 Standard copy or registration if so!

Ill be playing on the Excalibur server but that is mostly for Legacy 1.0 players. If you have any questions just ask. http://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/ can be a great link for new info and places to ask questions etc!

Looking forward to the final beta this weekend. I was signed up for the last one as well, but didn't get much of a chance to play.
For anyone thats been playing for a while, which server should I join and what's a fun race/class to play ?

Just downloading patches. Any suggestions on a server?

Play 1.0 originally in 2010. Game was garbage so stopped and came back in Jan 2012 after the new development team had implemented numerous patches. They did wonders on the 1.0 game but it was flawed from the start. Dropped servers in Nov 2012 and been involved in the alpha / beta and now patiently waiting for release

Ill be playing it long term either way. Realy enjoying the game but as im a Legacy player my opinion is probably on the positive side from the start! Be interested to think what new players think of it. Its already been mentioned but I think most new MMO players are wanting more action orientated gameplay of being able to dodge / first person etc. Me personally i think this offers a nice balance of your typical tab / target MMO and having to move from certain moves and certain boss mechanics.

If anyone is playing ill be on Excalibur but this is a legacy server so a load of already capped players etc! Might want to start on a new server

Dcully wrote: »

Surprised to see such little attention on this game, normally a shiney new mmo would be a hot topic here :P
Havent looked into it much myself, anyone played yet?

FFXI was my longest running MMO (4 - 5 years), so was very excited when XIV was released a few years ago. Like other posters have said, it was a pile of poo that should have been smothered at birth.....

This is as far removed from that as you could possible imagine. Combat is fast paced, graphics are fast and look pretty gorgeous (although there's room for improvement still I think). The game feels very busy, lots of people running around. Some things I really like:

- as a caster dps, you can get pretty much unlimited mana points using a handy 'convert' type spell. No more waiting around for minutes for your mp pool to regen, or spending every gil you earn on ethers

- there are still the dreaded 'kill & collect' quests, but get this, when you are killing a mob for an item, YOU ALWAYS GET IT. No more killing 100 wolves to collect 10 pelts. No more I KILLED THE WOLF WHY CANT YOU TAKE ITS PELT!!!. Sorry, needed to get that off my chest.....

- Farming mobs seems pretty well set up - you don't lock a mob once you engage it so for quests you can get a drop of kill recorded by helping others, which is nice. Spawned mobs for quests seem to be attuned to you so no stealing.....

- Exp seems to roll in quickly - lots of simple way to get more, including a nice touch where by you kill 3 of a new mob you encounter for a boost

- Levequests seems to be working well, and the explanations are good

A few things I'm not as keen on

- Menus do seem a bit fussy (but a million times better than 1.0), and I guess it has to set itself apart in some ways

- Cutscenes are a bit drawn out, and voice acting is sparse (although I gather thats intentional in beta)

Haven't tried yet:

- Changing role - focussing on my THM (BLM) at present - I understand you can do a form of the FFXI job mixing for traits etc

- Auction house or crafing

Overall I think its a good effort, and the FF heritage will stand to it I. Big question is will it be yet another MMO FOTM when it launches, and even more so, will people pay to play...... I think I'll give it a shot, and I'd sworn off MMOs for the next year or so.

Update..... ok I'm totally sucked in..... damn you SE

Played the weekend too not realising that phase 4 was having characters carried over to release. Thank god I named my character something proper instead of the usual bull$hit you see running around during beta.

Anyway I got hooked over the weekend. Loved every bit of it. Got my Glad to 20 (max for phase 4) and then got him to Conj 15.
Wasn't mad about the conjurer play style but I loved my Glad. Tanked the 15-17 instances and they were great fun!

The game is beautiful. That much is for sure. One of the nicest looking mmos out there at the moment!

I had the same confusion as ArthurG for item collection. But then realised it automatically ends up in your bags. I don't think its 100% every time but close enough

Took me a while to figure out the auction house (message board). You don't get access until a bit later in the game and it becomes available via retainers. You get your first around level 17-20 by following the story quests. (at least this is what I figured out). You might be able to buy stuff from the board but I think you need a retainer to sell. Anyway it all becomes clear when you go through the story.

I did a spot of gathering / crafting. Think Miner to level 15 and armorsmith to 10ish. It's different. Not the usual craft 99 items and walk off. I enjoyed it.

Anyway I preordered and am looking forward to early access. Still not sure when that starts.

Soon I hope!

Gunmonkey wrote: »

Should do, you are given a code when you pre-order so head to http://preorder.na.finalfantasyxiv.com/gb and enter your e-mail, they should send an e-mail whenever you can enter the code to claim the early access. Still not heard anything meself but still 5 days to go.

Same here.... given its out on the 27th, I'd have assumed early access would be this weekend, but maybe not.

I'm away for a few weeks in September and might actually wait till I'm back before starting out, let things settle down, ans see where the population is headed. Or maybe not

Still waiting on codes myself.

For anyone interested, Dev confirmed there will be no character wipe for release. Didn't bother me if there was as I'm going to delete mine and start again anyway after things I've read up on during the week such as stat points being class specific instead of character etc..
Only took a few days to level what I had before so no loss really.

I ordered direct from SE for digital download.

The error 3 is mostly congestion I think. Last update from them says they are still working on it.

I've no idea if you'll be able to download the client after choosing a physical disk but it'll be easy enough to get the client from an alternate source if not. Let me know if you can't and I'll set something up for you if needed (once I get mine ofc)

Sephiroth_dude wrote: »

Well I pre-ordered ,how do I buy a sub?also I didn't receive any code.

You might have to send Amazon and e-mail for your code. I got mine pretty much when I made the purchase, but I have read of others having to e-mail for theirs. I wouldn't worry about buy your subscription just yet as the game come with 30 days free.

*Edit: I just realised that you never mentioned the retailer, I had to e-mail GameStop in order to get my code. Go go PS3 and PC collectors edition (I need help!)

Random screenshot, this game is beautiful!

I finally got the registration to work, and used the code etc.

However when I went to download the client, I'm getting a 'maintenance' error from the launcher. What I didn't realise is that the Beta 4 client is the same as launch, so if you have it, don't uninstall it like I did

I didn't pay much attention to this during beta, but where are people going - is there an (un)official UK/Ireland server?.

I didn't pre-order. I didn't really
think much about it till I did the beta. Now I'm hooked. Waiting on details about full release. Oh I'm on Odin server too.