Final Fantasy 14 online seems small after playing Genshin Impact

Final Fantasy 14 and Genshin Impact are both giants. Although developer Hooverse released genshin Just two years ago, the game has grown across multiple massive regions and features a regular cycle of new content and events every six weeks. Similarly, Square Enix publishes final fantasy 14 in 2010 (and then again in 2013) and it quiet receives regular updates; It has since grown and has since received four major expansions A kingdom reborn republish. Two online multiplayer games that appeal to huge audiences, both games require commitment. The only difference is that Final Fantasy 14 respects my time in a way genshin Not.

For the unknown Genshin Impact sends players on a free-to-play open-world adventure set in an anime-like fantasy world. You can play the game in many different ways, focusing on building strong teams, exploring the many regions, or fighting your way through the story, but genshin can feel quite stressful to keep up with. Story quests involving major lore and entire regions can be locked behind limited-time events; Even building a team of four characters can take a long time, as you have to level up the characters, their weapons, their individual abilities, and items called artifacts that affect stats.

genshin unravels a seemingly endless to-do list that is very rewarding if you get it all done, but also engages the player in a cyclical game loop that focuses more on repetitive tasks than advancing a single story. Each completed task seems to uncover more necessary tasks. In addition, the game rewards you with an in-game currency called Primogems; You can spend this currency on gacha and play for new characters. The mechanic gives daily incentives to players who stick to the Battle Pass and tick off all the right tasks to win Primogems, which can make it feel like you have a financial incentive to play a certain way. For me, this has led to increasing burnout feelings and even a lack of motivation.

not how genshin, Final Fantasy 14 derives from a more linear formula that makes it feel like the time spent in the game isn’t thrown into an endless black hole. Yes, I have the ability to complete repetitive daily and weekly quests, but whether I do them or not feels like it’s really up to me as a player. I can level up a single job relatively quickly by doing the mainline quest and unlock later game content. It doesn’t feel like a constant drudgery juggling different tasks. After playing genshinlooking down the run of that 300 hours or more of gameplay strangely doesn’t feel too scary.

Image: Hoyoverse via Polygon

Before I started Final Fantasy 14 Seriously, I played about ten hours of the game this winter six months ago. with Final Fantasy 14, I was able to take a six-month hiatus and come back without batting an eyelid, knowing that all I had to do was click the buttons and simply follow the instructions on the main quest map icon. Additionally, Final Fantasy 14 includes other basic but important quality of life features, like the ability to skip certain cutscenes or dash through dialogue in more boring parts of the journey.

Another great way to carry a player through a long journey is to seek help from comrades. The best in gaming Final Fantasy 14 went on adventures with friends and learned under their guidance. (genshin has multiplayer features but limits how and what you do.) I had a friend and longtime player of the game who offered to chauffeur me around in her giant Moogle mount, meaning I was essentially someone from quest point to quest point drive around. As we plodded through the rather boring early game quests of A kingdom reborn, she taught me the world of gaming. I learned about its history and what has changed in the world since it played. She spoke to me about a wedding she attended and what the ceremonies entail in Eorzea. She would gossip about characters with me and tell me about dramas in her guild. The conversations while playing not only allowed me to connect with my friend – it made Eorzea feel more like a living, breathing world.

This is not to minimize the very real time sink involved in playing an MMO. I do not think so Final Fantasy 14 is for everyone. But I don’t think long-term commitment in and of itself should deter a player. That’s because Final Fantasy 14 shows the merits of a game where the developers don’t have to let you play every day and fully recognizes that gamers like to take time off. During a Q&A session at Gamescom Final Fantasy 14 Producer Naoki Yoshida (known to fans as Yoshi-P) offered advice to a player who asked about dealing with low motivation to play the game. Yoshi-P surprised fans with his response, telling the player that they really shouldn’t be playing the game that often. according to a Reddit post translating the answerhe said:

It’s okay not to play it every day. Since it’s just a game, you can stop forcing yourself if you’re having a hard time sticking with it. In fact, when you limit yourself, you accumulate unnecessary stress [to] just playing this one game as there are so many other games. So come back and play it to your heart’s content when the big patch hits, then stop to play other games in front of you [get] get burned out and then come back for another big patch. This will actually make me happier and in the end I think this is the best solution I can answer to keep your motivation in the game.

To me, that sums up why Final Fantasy 14 feels arguably easier to tackle than, say, going back to the regular grind genshin. Sometimes, for a game to be fun, all it takes is regular and frequent breaks. In genshinI have to enforce boundaries in ways I don’t Final Fantasy 14, where a break feels natural. This is an element of playing a big game that feels difficult even in single player games. I’ve played RPGs that feel a bit too difficult to get back into after a week’s hiatus because as soon as you exit the game you realize you’ve forgotten some of the combat systems or feel too lost in a dungeon.

Sure, jump in Final Fantasy 14 can be a sucker. From the moment you arrive you will be overwhelmed by the daunting prospect of exploring a vast city. You see a map riddled with unfamiliar symbols and watch dozens of other players going about their business around you. You have to learn about jobs, mounts, outfits and much more. It can certainly be overwhelming, but I’ve found a game that allows me to unravel the mysteries of his world step-by-step at my own pace.