The Manderville Gold Saucer

Dionysos

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Slap me senseless if we have a thread about it already. I thought we did, but it turns out to be the news article about the patch?

Anyway, what do people think about FFXIV's version of the Gold Saucer?

Personally I think it is a welcome addition, but it seems a little bit incomplete. It looks good (loving the Cait Sith stained glass windows, etc) and it is filled with countless Easter eggs (Mt. Corel, etc).

I appreciate Triple Triad and am having a bit of fun with that (though I wish we could use more than one 'rare' card in each deck - the computer characters sure seem to be using as many as they want, so why can't we?!). It's not flawless, but it is a good addition.

I long for more attractions at this Gold Saucer though.

There was much more to do in FFVII's Gold Saucer. In FFVII we had a rollercoaster. We had a cable car thing. We had various arcade games (snowboarding, motorbike battles, boxing, submarining, moogle feeding / matchmaking, etc). We had arm wrestling. We had a fortune teller. We had a haunted house hotel. We even had a theatre and could watch a play (a one time event, but still...).

Just think about what the FFXIV Gold Saucer could be like if it had some of these things?

Imagine a theatre we could visit and actually watch plays? They could put FFIX's 'I Want to Be Your Canary' on, for example. People could purchase tickets for seats (the most expensive ones being the best seats - like an actual theatre), and perhaps people could purchase binoculars to watch the show more closely (full screen, etc), but otherwise people are sat next to each other and it could double as a social occasion.

Alas, that sounds like too much work for them. It would be cool though.

I really hope that FFXIV’s Gold Saucer opens new attractions at some point. It’s a very good start, but I do think that the theme park needs more. Other than the card game and chocobo racing there isn't much to do except try the lottery, or run around waiting for event announcements. Whack-a-Gilgamesh (or whatever it is actually called) is okay for a few seconds, but it isn't something anybody is going to spend time on.

It currently doesn’t match the FFVII Gold Saucer, but thank the heavens that we have something at least.
 
As you said, there are a number of attractions that aren't marked on the map and you have to discover them yourself. Some are actually really kind of fun, if simplistic, like the returning basketball one or the Gilgamesh punching game. I play them often, but only short term. It's not a big commitment, which I appreciate.

I agree, though, that I would like to see more there...but I can imagine putting something like the snowboarding in would be extremely difficult considering the nature of FF14. They would have to have select instances akin to the style of the chocobo racing, but most of the chocobo bits were already in the game (the renting chocobos) and they likely spent more of their time in QA than actual creation with the minigames, ensure they didn't break the MMO and lock players in the chocobo course. I imagine once they have the new systems like settled, and a proven development plan established for this type on content, we will see a plethora of minigames added. You have to remember that this is the first time SE has attempted to put minigames into an MMO like this.

As for the theatre, it wouldn't be that difficult, actually. With the GATE system, most of what we need is already in place.

Limit the # of accepted applicants > zone them in the centeras per usual > make them play Simon says with commands in order to win > ??? > profit.

Personally, I'm still waiting for a minigame that involves us running dungeons, or at least tackling returning bosses, as our companion chocobos instead of our characters. That has the potential for hilarity considering that no chocobo is locked into a role or path, in addition to the fact that SE already has a system in place for more than one chocobo now.

At the very least, they need to add more spectator options. As it stands, you can't even observe an ongoing TT match or chocobo race....hell, you can't even watch people playing the basketball minigame as you run by.
 
You're right.

I guess the theatre idea isn't so complicated. The more I think about it, the more I would want this. There's a lot of potential for it.

There are a handful of FF plays of diverse genres which have already been written (in part anyway):
I Want to Be Your Canary - FFIX - A tragedy
The Gold Saucer Play - FFVII (I don't know if it was given a name in the game...) - A comical farce
Maria and Draco - FFVI - An opera

These three are pretty much handed to them on a plate. Other plays could be created for the game if they wished to, but I can imagine that they might not want to write a play for the game! But these three more or less exist already, so would only need to be tweaked.

Perhaps I should write to Square-Enix, but I'm sure that they won't listen to me.

But now that we do have the Gold Saucer at least we have the potential for entertaining things like this in the future.
 
They won't listen for sure if you never write them. That is the only surefire way for it.

Although we may also have better luck if we knew how to read/write in Japanese.
 
I didn't really get to explore all that much, but from what I saw, it brought a lot of good memories. To see Gold Saucer in that fashion, same music and everything - I felt like a twelve-year-old again. I do agree that there's a lot of potential there, so I'm eager to see what they have in store in future updates. While there isn't much to do, just being there and running around feels like home. Hard to explain, but the atmosphere was just right.
 
The Gold Saucer was always inevitably going to be yet another tier of grinding on top of the game's many existing layers of grinding. If you're not grinding for Atmas, Alexandrites or lights for your Nexus weapon, you're in the Gold Saucer or in taverns across Eorzea grinding for the MGP currency. Unfortunately, given the amount of grinding necessary to attain anything worthwhile in terms of prizes, unless I miraculously win the Jumbo Cactpot lottery, it's sapped all the initial enthusiasm away and now I can barely be bothered to make the trip there anymore. I've noticed the population of the place has diminished over the last week as well, so clearly the novelty has worn out for many folks, unless they're that diehard at Triple Triad and Chocobo Racing.

I think it has the potential to be more. Perhaps down the line, once the expansion is out and the team has more manpower to devote themselves to making smaller, incremental content for each patch update from 3.0 onwards, they can start adding more to the place. I have a few crazy ideas in my head, but I suppose the logistics of getting them to work and to adequately balance them would be a challenge. Something like Blitzball in FFXIV would be a sizeable endeavour, and no doubt that will open up a lot of can of worms if not executed properly. Heck, even Triple Triad these days is opening up a few logistical nightmares with how the tournament so far has been handled.

Also, for a place called the Manderville Gold Saucer, there's a distinct lack of Mandervilles, aside from a glorious bust of Godbert with that one NPC staring at the junk area. Can I at least get a Wind-up Godbert minion, preferably without having to win the lottery?
 
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