It's honestly that depressing for me right now. Square has released patch after patch continuously making crafting more difficult, and even as I try to grind up skills like Goldsmithing and Weaving I realize the miniscule profits I can make trying to sell items from them are not worth the time and energy when I can make at least as much simply by running guildleves. The reason I bought this game so early is because I wanted to access the features that the vast majority of players assumed had been hidden in the Open Beta. These include the ability to play as a Musketeer, the use of airships, and the use of Chocobos. However, these features are still inexplicably dangled in front of us even in the final release, with no explanation as to why we cannot access any of them. What is the point of this? What am I trying to earn other than equipment that behaves exactly the same way as the old equipment but with slightly higher numerical stats?
The storyline cutscenes are far and few between, they aren't engrossing and they aren't voice acted, and none of the other players seem to care at ALL about anything in this game other than grinding. Forget about lore, with all the time you're running around finishing guildleves you're unlikely to even care about talking to important NPCs.
What really gets me though is that EVERY MONSTER FIGHTS ALMOST EXACTLY THE SAME WAY. Think you can outsmart a melee enemy by keeping them stunned and running away? Yeah right. Every single monster, from squirrels to ladybugs to giant chickens have an overpowered ranged attack that can hit you from arrow range, and if you lead them too far from their spawn point they start regenerating back to full health. And when they get into melee range... you've pretty much seen it all from the first three monsters you fight in this game. 95% of monsters do nothing but alternate between half a dozen physical attacks and a "charge" attack that does about twice the damage. What happened to engaging boss fights, or creative enemies, or challenges that required more than just standing still and mashing attack buttons to win? I know there are a few occasional exceptions, but you will find nothing in this game on the scale of the epic cinematic encounters you can find in FF XIII or even World of Warcraft.
The saving graces of this game are the gorgeous sound and environments. This is perhaps the best looking MMO ever created, and it's quite an experience to traverse the cities on a powerful computer. Other than that though the gameplay feels depressingly bleak and repetitive. If you have a group of dedicated players that cooperate in an organized linkshell I can see this game being a lot of fun. If you're just trying to make your way through the game solo or with people who really don't know what they are doing, you're probably going to end up dreading even having to level-up after two weeks.
The storyline cutscenes are far and few between, they aren't engrossing and they aren't voice acted, and none of the other players seem to care at ALL about anything in this game other than grinding. Forget about lore, with all the time you're running around finishing guildleves you're unlikely to even care about talking to important NPCs.
What really gets me though is that EVERY MONSTER FIGHTS ALMOST EXACTLY THE SAME WAY. Think you can outsmart a melee enemy by keeping them stunned and running away? Yeah right. Every single monster, from squirrels to ladybugs to giant chickens have an overpowered ranged attack that can hit you from arrow range, and if you lead them too far from their spawn point they start regenerating back to full health. And when they get into melee range... you've pretty much seen it all from the first three monsters you fight in this game. 95% of monsters do nothing but alternate between half a dozen physical attacks and a "charge" attack that does about twice the damage. What happened to engaging boss fights, or creative enemies, or challenges that required more than just standing still and mashing attack buttons to win? I know there are a few occasional exceptions, but you will find nothing in this game on the scale of the epic cinematic encounters you can find in FF XIII or even World of Warcraft.
The saving graces of this game are the gorgeous sound and environments. This is perhaps the best looking MMO ever created, and it's quite an experience to traverse the cities on a powerful computer. Other than that though the gameplay feels depressingly bleak and repetitive. If you have a group of dedicated players that cooperate in an organized linkshell I can see this game being a lot of fun. If you're just trying to make your way through the game solo or with people who really don't know what they are doing, you're probably going to end up dreading even having to level-up after two weeks.