Morning in Vana'diel: Real FFXIV Questions.

Morning in Vana'diel is your daily dose of FFXI and all things Vana'diel. Give us your thoughts on the interesting topics of the day! Today, Ringthree is still sick, but he is struggling through adversity to post today so that he doesn't have to hear it from Omoikitte again.

Ok, so we have seen the original set of generic questions for FFXIV, and SE's typical non-responsive answers. But outside of the those questions are the real questions, the meat and potatoes questions. I want to know if they will be using a controller for FFXIV. I mean it is going to be on PS3, but the PS3 is a lot more "computer-like" than the PS2, and in general MMO's have been moving to the ASWD-mouse for movement. Will ASWD-mouse movement even an option in FFXIV? If you want to pull people back from WoW that would be a good option. I love using the controller for FFXI and I hope they bring it back for FFXIV, but I hope they adjust the keyboard and mouse set-up to be a little better for those that use that.

Is there going to be a macro system in FFXIV? Are we even going to need a macro system? And most importantly are they going to finally allow 3rd party development for the UI and add-ons. The Windower community is a vibrant and useful group that is self-regulating to prevent real hacks and doesn't even allow the program to go open source to prevent abuse. If you compare this with most other MMOs you will fine that if allowed most people will work within the system. Of course there will always be abuse but if you look at how well the Windower community works and how well regulated they are, then you have to be able to see that it is a good idea to let the positive forces work for you instead of turning almost all of your PC players into "cheaters".

The economy is another important aspect of the game that is always thought of as "neat" but only as an after thought. The economy in FFXI is super screwed up. While I don't think that farming should be eliminated, I don't think that farming for money on-line should be so time consuming that it eliminates the ability to go to other events or turns making money into a luck game. There are many ways to make money in FFXI, but many of them are based on luck. Which brings me to my next point, can they do something to even out the drop rates on items, or at least have everything in the game have an alternative point/token system for the same gear or at least part of the same gear and if there are going to be alternative collected items to make things (a la Salvage) then have those tokens from that event used to purchase those items. And you could sell the items for money if you don't need them and want the money for other things.

Finally, can we get some community contact? Seriously, they got off to a good start with the podcast series, but if it never goes farther than that then SE really hasn't learned anything at all. You need to have official forums and you need to have daily contact with players, and those contacts need to have some idea of what is happening on the development teams. Even if it's just in Japanese, that is better than nothing. No more of this fly-by-night contact.

So what do you think that SE needs to fix with FFXIV that is currently a problem with FFXI? They said they are learning from FFXI, but the proof is in the pudding. Leave us a comment and tell us what you really want to know about FFXIV!