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Linnaete

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Heavensward (3.0) is nearly one year old now and looking back on it, there's a lot to be said about how in many ways, it hasn't actually been an expansion so much as a lengthy extension. Arguments can be made that the formula has actually stayed more or less unchanged. There weren't the bold and unique risks that people were originally holding out hope for, especially given the excited sentiment running high among Reddit and the official forums that 3.0 would be where Square Enix would truly experiment and move out of its comfort zone. A Realm Reborn was a necessary safe route given the cost of the whole reboot of the MMO after all and yet Heavensward continues to remain strangely adherent to what its predecessor established. Of course, there are arguments against this and people are free to present their own opinions on whether 3.0 meets expectations as an expansion and what the definition of "expansion" even is.

But hey, let's think ahead and cast our minds to 4.0. What do you guys want to see from the second expansion, which by any reasonable estimation, could well be a mid-to-late 2017 release? I'll start with a few things:

- Drop PS3 support; yes, I am advocating for my own exclusion from 4.0, providing I still haven't upgraded (or will be in any position to play at all) by then. I'm not daft enough to think that this presents a quick fix, because most of their excuses for limitations can come down to their server architecture and the very probable odds that the team is too small and inadequately equipped in terms of a budget to handle significant and timely quality of life improvements. But the cut off point has to happen somewhere and it's better to do it sooner than later, if only so they're not as heavily burdened to ensure that all of their platforms have the muscle to handle certain future features. If it helps to gradually alter the development side of things where a future expansion can have actual town skirmishes and other interesting ideas such as aerial combat on flying mounts without PS3 limitations to bear in mind, so be it.

- I'm not actually that interested in Ala Mhigo to be honest. And all signs point to Ala Mhigo being our next stop after Ishgard and it's just as predictable as it gets. I would love it if Square Enix simply surprises us, subverts our expectations and just sends us to another part of either Eorzea or continent completely. How about Meracydia to the south? How about Thavnairia, the Middle East analogue of the world where the exotic dancers herald? How about the New World to the far west that Merlwyb Bloefhiswyn supposedly discovered? A colonial drive to populate and explore the New World could be interesting, even if it rips off FFXI's last expansion (Seekers of Adoulin). Fans speculate that because the team picked flying over sailing for 3.0's crowning feature, it suggests that sailing is next on the agenda. And a colonial push westwards would be more logical context for sailing than Ala Mhigo.

- A slowdown or downright halt to the usual vertical treadmill system of gear acquirement. Surely there has to be something to break up the samey formula of constantly grinding for weekly caps to the Allagan tomestone flavour of the month from the same roulettes in order to acquire marginally better gear as item level numbers continue to steadily increase. I mentioned the Guild Wars system of expansions before and I thought it would be an interesting approach to take. Levels can remain the same so as not to make instantly obsolete in terms of relevancy old content. Expansions can be relatively self-contained stories set in wildly different areas of the world that help to expand Eorzea outwards and any means to mitigate creeping power levels and overgearing can help ensure that newer players aren't quickly deprived of a chance to see an older fight in the way it was meant to be designed (where overgearing means mechanics and phases can be skipped). A slow injection of a more horizontal system of gear acquisition can't be amiss, surely?

- Take Diadem back to the drawing board and try again. I've never done Diadem and I am disappointed in the way it has turned out, but it has so much potential if executed properly. It's also why I fear the Palace of the Dead deep dungeons may well collapse under the weight of its own ill-executed design. Let's hope I'm wrong about the latter.
 
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